Anko: This Is Fine, Shikamaru, Future Seventh Hokage

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Nine-Tails sensed that Naruto acting strangely, and there was an inexplicable ill intent in his eyes as he looked at it.

"It's nothing, get some rest," Naruto said with a smile.

Upon hearing this, the Nine-Tails was immediately terrified; this was fucking strange. It would rather Naruto be sarcastic and cynical; this sudden gentleness made its heart pound.

"Just tell me what's wrong, don't do this, it scares me."

"It's alright, there might be times when I need your help." He stood up and glanced at Nine-Tails, his face still bearing that enigmatic smile.

"Uh," Nine-Tails was a little confused.

It was just a Tailed Beast, spending most of its time in prison. So it didn't understand that there's no such thing as a free lunch, and that every gift from fate comes with a hidden price.

As night fell, Naruto, having slept for two days, didn't feel particularly tired. He decided to go out on a whim, figuring it wouldn't be convenient to visit Ino or Hinata so late at night.

"What did you say about the Rinnegan?" Anko lay sprawled on the sofa, wearing a thin black nightgown, looking at him lazily. "Can you just casually reveal such confidential information?"

"Are you going to betray the village?" Naruto said nonchalantly, sipping his juice and biting the straw.

He glanced at her sideways, as if to say, "Don't you want others to know about your thoughts of betraying the village?" Anko immediately shook her head, instantly denying it.

"I hadn't thought about it."

"That settles it then. As long as you don't betray the village, it doesn't count as leaking information," he said somewhat shamelessly. "Besides, you're just a teacher at the Ninja Academy; you don't get involved in those things."

"Did you say that to me on purpose? To show off?" Anko was taken aback, her eyes filled with disdain as she looked at Naruto. "I thought you were so magnanimous."

Naruto remained noncommittal. Saying something like that to Anko carried absolutely no risk. Whether it was showing off or just being cool, the point was to have fun.

"What's wrong?" He glanced at Anko indifferently and said smugly, "I've done so many tasks for the village, can't I enjoy myself a bit?"

"You have a really bad personality, you never do anything productive all day."

"Huh? Aren't you one too?" he retorted. "I really feel sorry for the students at the Ninja Academy. It's too embarrassing to have a chuunibyou teacher like you."

"You're the one who's immature!" Anko blushed.

"Isn't that right? Chunin Ninja Exams that year?" Naruto turned his head, opened his mouth, and looked like he was about to reveal all of Anko's chuunibyou (middle school syndrome) exploits. Anko panicked.

"Shut up!" She lunged forward and covered Naruto's mouth with her hand.

Her face was obscured by messy black hair, but the soft curves of her chest were clearly visible through her pajamas, and her slender waist was faintly visible through the black silk.

"Huh? Unable to face reality?"

"Stop talking! Damn it, I should have punched you to death back then."

"You couldn't beat me even six years ago, you Jonin." Naruto grinned, but soon faced even fiercer retaliation, with punches and kicks raining down on him.

"Young man, your attitude towards the teacher is terrible." Anko pinned Naruto down and untied a black rubber band from his wrist.

Slightly out of breath, she finished speaking, then put the rubber band in her mouth and bit it with her teeth. She deftly tied up the loose hair at the back of her head, speaking indistinctly.

"Stay after class and receive rigorous individual tutoring!"

Late at night, Anko, exhausted after finishing her tutoring session, walked barefoot on the floor. She took two cans of chilled drinks from the refrigerator and hastily put together a quick and easy platter of fast food.

"Here you go." Anko sat cross-legged on the bed, wiped the sweat from her face, and handed a can of soda to Naruto.

The latter took it and calmly pulled it open in sync with her. With a soft slurp, the two of them almost simultaneously lifted it up, took a sip, and then put it down.

"Ah! That's refreshing!" Anko exclaimed. "Drinking an ice-cold beverage at a time like this is really great."

"Yeah." Naruto narrowed his eyes, looking relaxed.

"Oh, and this beef is pretty good too. Even though it's fast food, it tastes just as good as the real thing," Anko said excitedly, seemingly recovering her energy.

"It does taste pretty good, but fresh food isn't expensive, and it's not good to store so much fast food," Naruto said, even though he was the one who stored the most fast food.

The Sealing Space is filled with boxes of instant food, which they don't usually eat. They only open some occasionally, just in case, because who knows what the future holds?

If it's about to expire, then just donate it to the Konoha Welfare Institute.

"Okay, okay." Anko leaned against the headboard, looking exhausted. She took another sip of soda and sighed, "The Ninja Academy's salary isn't high either, so of course we have to be careful with our money."

"Are you short of money?" he asked.

"You're giving it to me?" Anko retorted.

"Uh," Naruto somewhat guiltily, "Why didn't you say so earlier? I've almost spent it all. Now I have at most tens of thousands of taels left."

"You're so poor!" She was stunned.

Tens of thousands of taels of silver can actually buy many things. It can buy hundreds of ramen sets, enough to last for half a year if eaten twice a day. But for a ninja, a single ninja tool might cost tens of thousands of taels.

"It's alright, I don't lack anything." He described getting something for free in such a refined and elegant way.

"Compared to you, I'm practically a little rich woman!" She drew a circle with her hand, laughed first, then turned to look at him and asked.

"Would you like me to give you some?"

"No need." Naruto shook his head. "I have other ways. I'm not short of money anyway. If you don't have any money, you can tell me, and I can scrape together some."

"Uh..." Anko was speechless. This person was too shameless. "Forget it, forget it. I don't care about money. One person has enough."

After chatting for a while, Naruto suddenly remembered something and looked up at Anko.

"Should we... go on a date or something?"

"Why?" she asked, somewhat surprised, not understanding why Naruto was acting so strangely.

"Given our current situation, we should at least go on a date, otherwise it doesn't seem fair to you," Naruto said after a moment's hesitation, frowning.

"No, this is fine!" Anko was a little confused. "Why would you think that? I don't like trouble, and going on a date might cause trouble for both of us."

"Although I do think about it occasionally, I'm not the kind of person who's very willful. It's really okay if I don't go on dates."

"It shouldn't be any trouble, I just forgot to tell you recently," Naruto said. "Anyway, it's a bit complicated to explain, so let's get straight to the point."

Naruto opened the Gate of Hades in the room, setting the coordinates to the Land of the Falls.

In the latter half of the night, which should have been his favorite time to laze around, either sleeping soundly in bed or turning over and continuing to sleep, he took Anko and traveled thousands of miles to the Land of the Falls out of a strange sense of guilt.

Here, waterfalls abound, all naturally formed. Fire Fly blaze, their fluorescent glow sweeping across the mountains like a grand tribute from all nations, creating a truly magnificent sight.

"Wow! What kind of Ninjutsu is that? Space travel?" Anko didn't hold back her admiration. "This should be the Land of the Falls, right? I've heard about it before."

"Wow, there really are huge waterfalls! Wow!" She pointed to the forest of waterfalls in front of her, her words as pale as a modern person who only knows how to say "Holy crap."

"Hmm, of course it's amazing," Naruto said proudly.

"Amazing, amazing!" Anko flattered. "If you had reminded me before we teleported, or brought a few changes of clothes, we wouldn't look like two freaks now!"

"Ah, this." Naruto looked up at the sky, the night wind was chilly, and he suddenly felt a bit like he was being bullied.

"Forget it, tutoring doesn't discriminate by location." Anko was quite nonchalant, licking her lips.

The next day.

Naruto woke up in his bed, glanced out the window, and pulled the curtains shut with his foot. All he wanted to do was lie there, wait for the wind to blow in, and not do anything.

As the saying goes, it's better to stay still than to act.

The situation in Kumogakure is stable, and Black Zetsu is up to something. Obito probably searching for the Rinnegan, and Konan has also left with Rinnegan.

The Land of Snow continues to develop as usual, Iwagakure has subdued Kurotsuchi, the Leg Shadow, making it basically stable. The only unstable factor is Kirigakure, but it won't affect the overall situation.

As for Naruto himself, the number of Evil God follower has increased to six, and he only needs four more to complete the mission and get the reward of reverting his body back to level eighteen.

With four vacant positions, he still needed to think carefully about which unlucky person to drag into it. He had only been an adult for less than a year, and there was still some time before the end of the year.

His focus isn't entirely on external matters. To prevent a repeat of the previous lightning incident, Naruto plans to spend more time with Ino and Hinata.

Even if he had to sneak around, he would still make time to go shopping with Hinata in his spare moments. Or he would have meals with Ino or chat in the office.

Sending flowers, using the Gate of Hades for travel—they used every means at their disposal, the only thing missing was setting off fireworks with the Tailed Beast Ball.

However, due to the criticisms of the Yamanaka couple and Hyuga Hiashi towards Naruto dared not be too blatant and always kept a low profile.

This also meant that he was mostly free in the village. Occasionally, when he had nothing to do, he would go to Sakura's place for a meal or to watch her handle official business.

"How boring!" Choji yawned, sat down in front of the stall, picked up a piece of meat and put it in his mouth. "Take it away, take it away, I have no appetite."

"Can you spit out the meat before saying that?" Shikamaru said, somewhat speechless.

"Yeah, Choji, you're such a drama queen," Naruto retorted, his eating speed no less than Choji's. "A new shop opened, how come I didn't know?"

"You guys..." Shikamaru said helplessly.

"By the way, Shikamaru," Choji, picking up a few bites with his chopsticks between bites of meat. "Where have I seen you lately? Are you that busy with work?"

"I remember that people in the Hokage Building have been relatively free lately, but you seem to be the opposite. Before, even when you were busy, you could still see people, but now you can't even see a shadow of them."

"Don't even mention it, Kakashi-sensei transferred me to the Hokage's Office." Shikamaru sighed. "I'm busy to death all the time, and I don't know where all these documents come from."

"The Hokage's Office? Not bad! Shikamaru, you've soared to great heights!" Naruto said with a grin, a hint of schadenfreude in his voice.

The three shared similar temperaments and lacked ambition. Even when Choji wanted to become stronger, it was merely a matter of following the crowd.

He only trained hard because he didn't want to fall behind his comrades, but after growing up, Choji gradually lost his fighting spirit. He went from training frequently to training occasionally, and finally gave up.

Shikamaru, on the other hand, is naturally beautiful and cannot help it; even if his soul wanted to give up, his body simply couldn't. Shikaku Nara, as a strategist, does not participate in the power struggles among the higher-ups.

The Nara Clan needed someone to lead them to prosperity, and Shikamaru became the object of the hopes of the Nara Clan. They wanted him to enter politics, or even become Hokage.

Nowadays, Kakashi is overwhelmed by the work pressure and has proactively sought help from his secretary to share the workload. After much thought, among his disciples, only Sakura seems to be functioning normally.

One Uchiha betrayed the village, and another Naruto Uzumaki, was also teetering on the edge of becoming half of Konoha Ninja. The village could no longer restrain him, let alone make him Hokage.

After much hesitation, Kakashi decided to transfer Shikamaru. He simply copied and pasted what the Fifth Hokage, Tsunade, had done: first find a Hokage secretary, then quit the job.

After escaping his predicament, he'll hand over the Hokage position to Shikamaru. Whether the higher-ups agree or not is none of his concern; he can only hold out for a maximum of three years anyway.

"Isn't that Hokage trainee?" Choji's mouth dropped open, and he even forgot that he was still holding a piece of meat in his hand.

In a flash, Naruto snatched the meat Choji had his eye on with his chopsticks. Ignoring the heat, he blew on it twice and stuffed it into his mouth.

"What Hokage candidate? It's the Seventh Hokage!" Naruto said with certainty, though his words were vague.

"What nonsense are you talking about?" Shikamaru propped his head up with his hand, watching Naruto and Choji clown around with a bored expression. "How could someone like me become Hokage?"

"The position of Hokage should be filled by someone who is strong, prestigious, and experienced."

He glanced lazily at the two of them and said casually.

"Strong, prestigious, and experienced, it's impossible for me to be the Hokage. Besides, being Hokage is too much trouble."

"Let the more capable people go. I'll just stay in the back and give the Hokage some advice."

Choji and Shikamaru were talking, while Naruto was busy showing off at the dining table. He wasn't surprised at all that Kakashi had chosen Shikamaru to be the Hokage's secretary.

Among this generation of ninjas, Shikamaru is considered one of the best in terms of both strength and performance. They can't rely on themselves, so they can only rely on Shikamaru.

Perhaps Shikamaru could become the youngest Hokage.

"Let's drink! Let's drink!"

"Drink!"

Half a month later, Naruto and Ino parted ways happily near the Yamanaka Flower Shop. Their eyes were practically drooping with longing, but they still had to part reluctantly.

Just as Naruto arrived home, Uzuki Yugao suddenly brought some bombshell news.

The Rinnegan was stolen, Konan was seriously injured and on the verge of death.

"He's about to die?" Naruto was somewhat surprised, but he had expected it. Obito still made his move, and Konan was no match for him, so she naturally lost.

"No way, where is he?" he asked.

"Kumogakure." Uzuki Yugao uttered a place name.

Naruto took a deep breath and said.

"I see."

Perfect, materials for the Evil God follower, add one more.