Watching Minato's expression, Aaron immediately understood what he was thinking and shook his head.
"It'd be tough to get her into your ANBU. She left Root because she was sick of all the darkness she saw there. That's why she quit and started an orphanage to take care of kids left behind by the war."
Hearing that, Minato couldn't help but look disappointed.
Right now, he was desperate for capable people.
There was no helping it, his new ANBU unit still had a huge manpower gap. Many of the village's covert missions were still being handled by the Third Hokage's ANBU.
Some might wonder: Isn't Konoha the strongest ninja village? With so many shinobi, can't they just reassign a few to ANBU?
It sounded ridiculous but in the current situation, it was actually true.
First, Konoha had just come out of the Third Great Ninja War and suffered heavy losses across all ranks.
Second, it wasn't that Konoha lacked shinobi capable of ANBU work. it was that Minato, the Fourth Hokage, lacked his own ANBU. The Third Hokage's forces were still fully intact.
Under these circumstances, if Minato tried to pull a large number of elite ninja into his ANBU, other departments would immediately suffer. The Third Hokage wouldn't allow it and neither would the rest of the leadership.
The reason was simple: there was no urgency. ANBU operations were already covered, so why disrupt the entire system just to reshuffle personnel?
Minato understood this as well. With no other choice, he had to focus on training a new generation from scratch.
That's why, when he heard about a retired shinobi that even Danzo couldn't stop thinking about, he immediately considered recruiting her.
Seeing Minato's disappointed expression, Aaron chuckled.
"Hey, don't rush it, Rome wasn't built in a day. Give me two or three years, and I'll make sure your new ANBU is completely transformed."
With his training methods (borrowed from a… rather unconventional "pirate-style" system) and some special tricks up his sleeve, developing talent quickly wasn't a problem at all.
Minato nodded, then casually asked, "How did Kakashi perform on this mission?"
"He did well at first," Aaron replied, "but toward the end, he exposed himself. It was an accident, and he managed to recover, but still, something like that shouldn't happen. Overall though, pretty solid."
"Thanks for looking after him," Minato said, a hint of guilt in his voice. "I'm supposed to be his teacher."
Aaron waved it off. "Don't worry about it. He's helping me out anyway. And honestly, the kid's got serious potential. With the right training, he could become one of ANBU's top operatives."
After that, the conversation drifted into more casual territory, Minato bragging about how Kushina's cooking had been getting better lately, for example.
Aaron just smiled faintly. You laugh at me for being single, I laugh at you for being whipped fair's fair.
After leaving the Hokage's office, Aaron didn't return to ANBU or look for Kakashi. Instead, he headed straight to a local dango shop.
Walking in like a regular, he greeted the owner. "Same as usual, Watanabe. You know the drill."
The owner grinned. "Got it, Aaron, give me a minute."
Before long, three servings of his "extra-loaded" dango were placed in front of him.
It was mid-afternoon now, past the lunch rush, so the shop was quiet. The owner pulled up a seat beside him and asked casually,
"Out on a mission? Haven't seen you in two weeks. I was starting to think a new dango place opened up and stole you away."
He got up briefly, poured a glass of water, and set it on the table.
After finishing one plate, Aaron took a sip and laughed. "Yeah, mission. And hey, have some confidence, your dango are the best in Konoha. No competition."
The owner stroked his mustache thoughtfully. "Really? Some customers say they're too sweet."
Aaron scoffed. "That just means they've got no taste. If dango aren't sweet, what's the point? People like that just don't understand their true charm."
The owner chuckled. "Your palate is… a bit extreme, Aaron."
Putting on an exaggerated, aloof expression, Aaron said, "The truth is often in the hands of a select few."
The owner paused, then sighed in admiration. "You always manage to say something philosophical at the strangest times."
After finishing, Aaron packed up some regular dango to go and headed toward the orphanage.
Mission complete, it was time to relax a little. Maybe show off a bit in front of a beautiful woman… and check on the "future talent" he'd been investing in.
When he arrived, he saw Nono teaching the children how to read inside a classroom.
He didn't interrupt, just stood quietly outside with the dango, waiting for class to end. If he went in now, the kids would get too excited to focus.
Fortunately, it didn't take long. About ten minutes later, Nono wrapped things up early and said with a warm smile,
"Your big brother Aaron is here to see you, why don't you invite him in?"
A wave of children instantly rushed toward him more specifically, toward the dango in his hands.
After handing out the snacks and escaping the clingiest kids, Aaron made his way over to Nono.
"So, how's it going? The village subsidy should arrive tomorrow," he said with a teasing grin.
He still remembered how indifferent she'd been at first.
Nono clearly remembered too, her face flushed bright red. But she still bowed her head sincerely.
"Thank you, Aaron. With the village's support, things should get much easier."
Being proven wrong didn't feel great especially not this embarrassingly but if the outcome was always like this… she wouldn't mind it happening more often.
"Don't mention it. It's nothing," Aaron said with a smile. "They may be war orphans, but they're still part of Konoha and the Land of Fire."
He noticed her studying him closely and raised an eyebrow.
"What? It's only been two weeks; did you forget what I look like already?"
Nono answered honestly, "I was wondering if you were secretly the Fourth Hokage in disguise."
"Oh?" Aaron smirked, intrigued.
"I heard the Fourth Hokage pushed through a lot of opposition to make this orphanage officially recognized, with monthly funding… but you're just"
"a regular chunin, right?" Aaron finished for her with a grin.
"But hey, no rule says a regular chunin can't be friends with the Hokage. Minato and I go way back, we were classmates at the academy."
Nono looked at him differently now.
Wow… so this guy's actually got connections.
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