In Terms of Looks, Even the Yellow Flash Falls Half a Step Short of Me

After that, the group, young and old alike, faithfully reported to the site personally designated by Uchiha Gin every day after work and school for grueling training.

They lined up to spar with Training Dummies that neither fought back nor talked back.

Though it was called sparring, it was really just them attacking unilaterally. Yet for some reason, ever since they had gotten these Training Dummies with their taunt level maxed out, their mastery of new skills had shot up dramatically.

The younger batch of Konoha sprouts aside, Jiraiya and the other old geezers who had just come of age felt the improvement in their strength most directly.

At the training ground,

Jiraiya stared solemnly at the utterly motionless Training Dummy before him. After training with this strange dummy so many times, he felt certain that he would succeed today.

Taking the dummy as an imaginary enemy, he suddenly struck an exaggerated kabuki pose and let out an incomprehensible chant.

"Yo yo ee!"

"I am the Mount Myōboku Toad Spirit Immortal Su Daoren—the Toad Sage himself~"

The over-the-top performance made the onlookers and the two toads nearby rub their foreheads and sigh.

"Is he like this around you too?"

Face full of disgust, Fukasaku turned to ask Orochimaru, whom he knew reasonably well.

"His condition has always been stable."

Orochimaru nodded expressionlessly, though the faint twitch at the corner of his mouth showed that he was nowhere near as calm as he looked.

"That's right! That's right!"

Everyone else immediately chimed in.

"Huh? What is Jiraiya doing?"

However, it was only when Tsunade's surprised voice rang out that everyone turned their attention back to Jiraiya himself.

They watched him suddenly bite his finger and smear blood onto his fingertips, all of them puzzled by what he was doing.

"Why is