Chapter 254: New Member Joins the Group!
"Uchiha Kanmoku wins the final. The champion appears to have taken some fairly significant damage — I'd suggest heading to medical treatment promptly, or you may be looking at long-term complications."
Ryū addressed the one competitor still on his feet with the same unhurried tone he'd used all day.
The third round had its winner. His internal response was minimal. The Chūnin Exam as a spectacle was on the small side — or more precisely, the genin involved were on the weak side — and without Orochimaru showing up to cause canonical chaos, the day had been thoroughly uneventful.
Entertaining for the audience, presumably. For Ryū, deeply boring.
The only reason he'd accepted Minato's invitation in the first place was sixteen days of complimentary meals. Without that incentive, the answer would have been no from the start.
The crowd erupted in cheering as he finished speaking. None of it was for him — nobody cheered for the referee under normal circumstances — and he had no attachment to any of it.
Minato rose from his seat at the official platform, raised both hands, and pressed downward. The noise subsided. Six months as Fourth Hokage had, apparently, produced a certain presence.
"Congratulations to Uchiha Kanmoku on winning the third round of the Chūnin Examination. Prizes will be distributed in three days' time — no need to concern yourself with that for now."
"I've observed every performance here today. Whether from Konoha or from a visiting village, each of you represents the next generation of the shinobi world. The talent and potential on display has been extraordinary. The era ahead will be yours. Those of us standing here now are simply providing whatever shelter we can while you grow into it."
"The first post-war Chūnin Examination has concluded without incident — which, as anyone who has followed these examinations across the years will appreciate, is genuinely unusual. Something unexpected happens every time. That it didn't today is a reflection of everyone's effort and cooperation."
"…"
Minato launched back into what was clearly a polished and practiced set of remarks, and Ryū felt his interest evaporate completely. The man genuinely could have pivoted into professional public speaking. Whatever talent for rhetoric that career required, Minato had an excess of it.
Ryū had heard enough speeches in his previous life to have developed immunity to the format. He was already moving.
He left without a sound. Nobody noticed — every eye in the arena was fixed on the platform where Minato was in full flow. By the time anyone registered the judge's absence, it would be ten minutes later, or half an hour, or perhaps an hour, depending entirely on how long Minato's closing remarks extended. Current read: not stopping before thirty minutes at minimum.
By six in the evening, Konoha's streets had gone quiet. The exam was over, the visiting crowds had dispersed, and the city was settling back into its ordinary rhythms.
Ryū dropped onto his bed with the boneless ease of a man whose body wasn't tired but whose tolerance for tedium had been thoroughly depleted.
Next time Minato invites me to something like this, no amount of free food is sufficient compensation. One day of this and I've regretted it the entire day.
He was still muttering when a soft chime sounded in the back of his mind.
He paused. Looked inward.
A new-member notification had appeared in the Chat Group.
After two weeks of relative quiet on that front, another one. Were they really adding two per month on a fixed schedule?
The newcomer's handle was a puzzle: Senbei Is So Tasty.
Senbei. Ryū's first association was the rice-cracker brand from his previous life. His second was a university roommate who had gone by that username — a fully-grown man who had chosen the most aggressively adorable possible handle, and set his account gender to female. The discovery had required Ryū to spend a full week maintaining careful physical distance, not entirely certain what to make of the situation.
[Ding! "Senbei Is So Tasty" has joined the Dimensional Chat Group!]
Ryū cleared the nostalgia from his head. Whoever the new arrival was, welcoming them was the standard first move.
RawrSoFierce: @Senbei Is So Tasty — welcome to the group, new member. Please share a photo, a voice sample, and your gender, thank you for your cooperation!
Kaguya-sama: @Senbei Is So Tasty — welcome to the group, new member. Please share a photo, a voice sample, and your gender, thank you for your cooperation!
Wandering Little Planet: Cutting in before the chain starts! Welcome, new member — I'm the Chat Group's most adorable Little Planet, please take note of my existence!
Crazy Diamond: Group status -1
Roar of the Evil Dragon: Group status -1
My True Form Is Cola: Group status -9527
Terrible Tornado: Wait, something's off. Including the new person, we only have around a dozen members — where does 9527 come from? That's more than we have in the group.
My True Form Is Cola: Tornado-senpai, have you not seen a Stephen Chow film? He's a massively famous comedy actor from the country next to Japan — extremely well-known even within Japan!
Terrible Tornado: I genuinely don't get the reference and now I feel bad about it.
My True Form Is Cola: No worries — I can send you the film!
Senbei Is So Tasty: …What kind of Devil Fruit ability is this? Are you pirates? Marines? Or perhaps… the Revolutionary Army?
Senbei Is So Tasty: Something managed to create a bizarre construct inside my mind and slipped past my Observation Haki. That's mildly interesting.
"…"
Ryū stared at those two messages for a moment.
Devil Fruit ability. Observation Haki. Revolutionary Army. Pirates. Marines.
Five terms, every one of them immediately recognizable. The new member had to be from the One Piece world. Ninety-nine percent probability — what other franchise used both Devil Fruits and Observation Haki as signature concepts? Setting aside certain fan-fiction crossovers, the answer was nothing.
Which would make three One Piece world members in the Chat Group. Whitebeard, Kizaru, and now this unknown arrival.
Senbei Is So Tasty.
Senbei. Someone who eats senbei.
Ryū felt a name surface.
Garp.
Sengoku.
Those were the two characters in the original One Piece story with an established senbei habit. One of them.
RawrSoFierce: @Senbei Is So Tasty — are you Garp, or Sengoku?
Senbei Is So Tasty: You used a Devil Fruit ability on me and you still don't know who I am? Must be some kind of extreme long-range variant.
Senbei Is So Tasty: This old man doesn't have anything to hide. I am Fleet Admiral Sengoku of the Marine Headquarters.
RawrSoFierce: …Called it.
Admiral Kizaru: …Pfft!!
Edward Newgate: …Pfft!!
Kaguya-sama: Incredible — Whitebeard-ojii-sama literally mentioned Fleet Admiral Sengoku this morning. That prophetic mouth of his is fully maxed out at this point.
Senbei Is So Tasty: Hm? Whitebeard? Borsalino?
Senbei Is So Tasty: What is the meaning of this?!
Senbei Is So Tasty: Will someone please explain what is going on?!
"…"
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