Chapter 39
It was hell. No amount of training or preparation could help him here. Naruto tried, he really did. But this was the end of the line for him. There was no answer; no matter how he thought about it, he would fail today.
What is the most common element that Sunagakure shinobi use in their ninjutsu?
How should he know that? And to begin with, why were they subjected to this unexpected test? He hadn't even woken up properly. Yesterday, he finally climbed the tree all the way up using only his feet. And so, he returned home late after celebrating with Rock Lee.
That is, they sparred with each other until they were too exhausted to move. He had to drag his body back to bed, and the night wasn't enough time to recover. Well, his body was fine, but he still wanted more sleep. And now he was attacked by the most unexpected assault ever.
It was brutal and lethal. He wished he could cheat off someone else and be done with it, but he felt the eyes on him. Even though Iruka-sensei wasn't looking at him, he was looking at him. It was so scary that he couldn't even concentrate on the test.
"Remember, those are the most basic things that every shinobi knows, even children like you. If you can't answer them, that means your education was lacking, and I will have to fix it myself."
Gulp. It wasn't only Naruto who swallowed his saliva. And he wasn't the only one who was sweating like crazy. The pen in his hand was uncomfortably slippery. Droplets of sweat dripped down his forehead on the paper.
He only needed to write one word. But he was already forgetting how many elements there were in total, so it was even harder for him to make a guess. No, to begin with, it was impossible, wasn't it?
"Phew."
Naruto had to control his emotions in situations like this. Calming himself down, he let go of the first question. Since he didn't know it, he had to try to answer another question. There was no point in agonizing over it and trying to force his brain work for once.
What is the most common weapon used by Kirigakure shinobi?
Yep, Naruto was dead meat. He didn't even need to try to imagine how Iruka-sensei would reeducate him, but he knew he wouldn't come out of it in one piece. After all, he couldn't even answer the first two questions, and there were ninety-eight more of them.
…
Iruka still couldn't believe what was taught to these kids. It wasn't a normal school; it was a shinobi academy meant to prepare them for the job. In Iruka's time, it wasn't like this. It showed the unrealistic views of the previous headmaster.
And it also showed how lax and wishful the Third Hokage was not to fix it sooner. Did he really believe that it was fine to leave it like this? Sure, they were just kids, and learning mathematics, literacy, and history was important, but it wasn't enough.
Even if they could learn logical thinking from mathematics, or learn from mistakes made by people who came before them, as well as understand where they all came from and how the current system was formed, it wasn't enough.
They were never going to live a normal life. And the information they could learn wasn't infinite at their age; some of them could barely remember a thing or two. So, Iruka believed they needed to know about the real world to be able to react to it better when they were faced with it.
"Atrocious," that was the only way he could describe what he was seeing before his eyes. "I understand that some kids wouldn't know anything about the shinobi world, but for even a clan's heirs in the class to be so ignorant is frankly surprising."
Well, he did expect these results. But he hoped that they would surpass his expectations at least once. Still, he had now shown them that they knew nothing. So, they wouldn't be able to complain when Iruka filled their heads with what they needed to know, even if he had to do it forcefully.
After all, the best way to learn is through pain. This time, though, it wouldn't be physical pain that they would experience. It was better for them to learn the long and boring method that talentless people like Iruka had to use. Memorizing everything, even the things he didn't understand.
Stacks and stacks of books were put on Iruka's table. Copies of real missions, encounters with various villages' shinobi, reports of situations outside the village, and depictions of battles. Iruka couldn't believe that all this was just stored away without anyone seeing it even once.
He remembered his days going through countless books of this kind, learning everything before his first mission outside the village. He was so damn scared at the time that he could only think about how he was going to die out there.
Well, not really, it was his second time outside the village that he was scared off. But just thinking of how arrogant his mediocre skills were when he first took a mission outside the village made him cringe at his patheticness.
Learning helped a bit, though it didn't help at all in a real situation. The first few times he encountered danger, he forgot it all. But that was him, a talentless and delusional idiot. They had a better chance than he did. Maybe they will learn a thing or two after the first encounter with danger.
"You all will have a week to write a report on what you have learned from these books," Iruka said. "And then I shall test you on that. So, you'd better try to learn at least something; otherwise, you're in a world of pain."
They weren't looking at Iruka when he addressed them; they were staring at the thick books that held only part of the records he wanted to teach them. Even he would have trouble reading through all of this in a couple of days, so he gave them a week, more than enough time if they tried.
…
Dealing with the kids he was responsible for wasn't enough for Iruka. There were still kids whom he had to bring back to reality, especially the one who was getting on his nerves, showing off like he was some kind of genius.
Rock Lee had improved quite a lot. His attacks now had more confidence behind them. But his improvement couldn't be compared to Neji's. The speed and precision of his attacks were far superior to those of others. He didn't need much guidance to reach his full potential.
But Iruka wasn't satisfied with it, so he threw itching powder into his eyes in the middle of the match against Rock Lee. Neji seemed to have taken Iruka's words seriously and managed to react to a foreign object flying at him this time, but the moment he caught the bag, it exploded in his face.
"Don't worry, you will be able to wash it off, but for now, I would concentrate on your opponent if I were you."
Neji didn't have time to even react to what was happening before Rock Lee attacked him. Iruka liked how Rock Lee didn't hold back to let his classmate get his bearings and used the situation to his advantage.
Iruka liked Rock Lee not because he was familiar to him, even though he wasn't in the grand scheme of things, but because he was the only one of the kids who felt pressure. What they had was time, more than anyone else. It would take another three years for them to graduate.
So, why would they rush things? They didn't feel the end of their days breathing down their necks. And that made them too lax. Even with Iruka pushing them, if they themselves didn't see a need to push to their limit, there wasn't much he could do.
But Rock Lee was desperate. He knew he didn't have much, so he had to push himself to make what he had so much better. He felt the end of his road breathing down the back of his neck. If he couldn't succeed in taijutsu, he wouldn't succeed at all.
"That's enough." Iruka stopped Rock Lee's kick before it connected with Neji's head. "Rock Lee has won. Though I hope you realize why you won."
"Yes, sensei!" Rock Lee replied in a way that it seemed that while Iruka was gone, the boy got a lot more confident in himself.
"Still, you did well. Continue with your training. Though I would suggest that you focus on your defense and stamina more," Iruka instructed Rock Lee, as there was much he could teach him. "That is for today. Everyone can leave. Neji, you stay behind."
After the others left, whispering to each other about why Neji was left behind, Iruka waited patiently for the boy in question to wipe his face and eyes clean. Iruka had seen enough of him; it was time to take him seriously.
Iruka cared little about titles like genius or anything similar. Sure, he could acknowledge talent when he saw it, since he didn't have any himself. But that was it; there was no such thing as a prodigy. It was just a compilation of effort, talent, and luck.
"I saw your fight with Hinata," Iruka said. "Do you want to hear my opinion of it?"
"Haven't you already shown it?"
"It was just the one part of what I saw," Iruka replied. "In three years, you will graduate, probably at the top of the class. Even if Rock Lee surpasses you in taijutsu, that's all he has. I don't see any reason why you wouldn't go as far as becoming a Jonin. But that is the end for you."
"That sounds fine to me."
There was something that had changed about Neji from the original. There was no hate in him. Nor anything else, either. He was a machine. Expressionless and emotionless. That was the kind of impression Iruka got from him.
Others might think that something was wrong with him or that he was lacking. But to Iruka, Neji was full of potential. No matter what you threw at him, he would take it. But he would never be able to be truly strong. No, he wouldn't be allowed to.
Konoha was a shinobi village. It had many secrets to make other villages envious and enough traitors to make it a center of ridicule. The Hyuga clan would never be able to support him fully because he was not bound to them in any other way but his name and the enslaving seal.
Without any bond to the village or even to his family, others would soon start to be wary of him. They wouldn't dare to teach him, as they knew very well that this sharpened sword could be pointed at them one day.
Iruka didn't have such thoughts. He didn't care if that sword was put to his neck or discarded in the end. Since he had started to sharpen it, he would make it as sharp as it could be without breaking it. And unlike anyone else, Iruka truly believed that Neji could be the sharpest weapon he could create.
"It is no surprise that you are blind to your surroundings when you are surrounded by your clan. So, I will expand your vision myself. In these three years before your graduation, I will teach you everything I know. Oh, before you say anything, I don't care what you think. All you need is a desire to become stronger, and I will provide the methods for you to do so."
Iruka knew he was creating another lunatic and taking him under his wing when he already had two others. But he couldn't let go of someone like Neji. He wouldn't just be a so-called prodigy.
He would be one of the best shinobi in the world, and hopefully, that would be enough to change things in this world. At least be a part of the change Iruka wanted to make. Though in the end, it was Neji's decision how he would change the world around him. Iruka won't try to influence him on what he should do, as it is for him alone to decide.
"Now, your first training task is this."
Iruka unsealed the stack of books and let them fall before Neji's feet. He didn't even wait for him to reply. There was no need, because there was no other option for Neji but to read these books about poison and medicine. They were all Iruka's old research materials.
And there was more where that came from. There was no point in teaching him taijutsu, since he had his own style, nor did Iruka see any reason to train him physically, since he was already pushing himself quite far on his own.
All Iruka wanted for Neji was to expand his vision, to see that there were far more things he could do with the Byakugan and his abilities than he was taught. When he was done with Neji, the boy would be an expert in all fields of shinobi work.
And everything that Iruka couldn't teach him, he would learn on his own, or others would teach him. Might Guy would take care of him and continue his training. Iruka could attest, especially in the past three months, that Might Guy knew more about how to train a human body than anyone else in the world.
A.N. As always, thanks for reading and supporting me, so I can continue writing without any concerns, and if you want more, up to seven more chapters, you can support me on pa treon. com \ ironwolf852.