Image-Building

Around noon, the Fourth Hokage returned home after being busy for most of the day.

Ever since becoming Hokage, Minato Namikaze had spent far less time with his family, so even a brief meal like this was worth cherishing all the more.

Besides, Minato Namikaze had only just become Hokage. He was unfamiliar with government affairs and all sorts of official work, far less adept than the Third Hokage, and had to spend a great deal of time learning. Thus, even when he came home for lunch, he still brought several documents with him.

At the dining table.

Minato Namikaze ate while flipping through a report.

"Ever since we tacitly entered a state of ceasefire with Sunagakure and Kirigakure, the pressure on the front line has eased considerably. On top of that, Iwagakure no longer has the strength to repeatedly cut through the Land of the Falls and the Land of Grass to launch a large-scale invasion of the Land of Fire. The Cloud's offensive in the Land of Rice is no longer as fierce as it used to be...

"It can be said that although the war isn't over yet, from the Hokage's standpoint, we must start considering postwar matters now."

All the countries were currently exhausted, so the trend toward ending the war was easy to see. Precisely because of this overall political climate, and to ensure that the process of ending the war encountered no further complications, certain "minor matters" were deliberately ignored...such as the recent incident in which a Kirigakure squad infiltrated the Land of Fire.

"Bringing up the postwar period all of a sudden makes it feel like there are a thousand tangled threads and nowhere to begin."

The young red-haired woman carried the last bowl of soup to the table before asking this.

She was considerate enough not to stop Minato Namikaze from working at home.

Just as she was about to sit down, Minato Namikaze immediately stood up, pulled away a chair beside the table, and pushed a tall stool over to it instead.

"First is the matter of the shinobi. Large numbers of shinobi died in the war. On one hand, that weakened the village; on the other, it threw the gender ratio out of balance... In any case, far more male shinobi died than female shinobi."

"Population growth?"

The population issue was indeed a matter of national policy. In practical terms, the number of shinobi concerned the very survival of a shinobi village.

Encouraging marriage and increasing the population after a war was also standard practice.

"Someone needs to set an example... What about Kakashi? And in the interest of encouraging remarriage, it would be best to find him a suitable marriage partner."

Kakashi Hatake really was Minato Namikaze's own disciple. Minato seemed to be considering finding Kakashi a pretty widow.

"...Minato, sometimes your thoughts really go off the rails."

"No, no. I'm just worried about Kakashi's mental state lately... Oh, right. Let him help with the next matter."

Kakashi really was worth worrying about, because he had the face of a man destined to remain single for life.

Meanwhile, Yuhara had nearly finished his brief exchange with the retired old man, who soon left.

Yuhara's ideals sounded lofty. What sort of reaction had the retired old man had? The answer was: no reaction at all. Yuhara's words sounded somewhat shocking at first, but what meaning did it have for a Genin to say such things? There was no crime in imagination precisely because imagination was meaningless. When Yuhara became a high-ranking official at the ministerial level, then he could talk about such ideals.

Besides, for Yuhara at present, rather than saying that he wanted to fight for the rights of civilian shinobi, it was more accurate to say that he simply disliked clan shinobi. Although there was not much difference between the two ideas, if one had to point out their slight distinction...well, it mainly reflected the difference in a person's breadth of character.

Yet this was where the tragedy of humanity lay: hatred and anger were far stronger driving forces in life than kindness and devotion.

After sitting on the bench for a while longer, Yuhara stood up and prepared to tidy himself up as the old man had requested.

However, he first went to the Ninja Tool Shop he had visited before to replenish the mercury he had used up. Based on his previous combat experience, he had realized that there was no need to carry so many weapons, so he altered the specifications of the "Sword Crate" and reduced the quantity he carried... He now carried only one 8×25×140 "Sword Crate," half of it made of iron and the other half filled with mercury.

At least, what he carried now looked like a ninja tool, rather than a cracked coffin board strapped to his back as it had before.

After replenishing the mercury, Yuhara was about to leave. However, perhaps because the shopkeeper was not satisfied with selling only raw materials to this old customer, he called out to him.

"Sir, do you need any high-end ninja tools?"

"High-end ninja tools?"

Yuhara was somewhat puzzled. Weren't Explosive Tags high-end enough?

"Yes. Something like a Chakra Blade, for example."

"A Chakra Blade?" Yuhara became interested. "Can I take a look?"

"Of course."

The shopkeeper reverently handed Yuhara a weapon that looked no different from an ordinary kunai. Yuhara then tried releasing his Chakra, and it immediately flowed through the kunai.

A Chakra Blade was essentially still an iron blade. The difference between it and ordinary ninja tools probably lay in the way its atoms were arranged. The tiny gaps between the atoms seemed to be just large enough to allow Chakra to pass through...

After testing it briefly, Yuhara handed the thing straight back to the shopkeeper. "How much is this kunai?"

"Very cheap. Two hundred thousand ryo."

"..."

Could he look up the dictionary and properly check the definition of the word "cheap"?

"I'm not interested."

Yuhara waved his hand and walked away.

Not long after leaving the Ninja Tool Shop, he reached into the "Sword Crate" behind him and pulled out a kunai. He then cheerfully tossed it up and caught it again... Yuhara seemed to have found a way to make money. How had he never thought of such a simple method before?

This wasn't merely making money skillfully. It was making money brilliantly.

In an especially cheerful mood, Yuhara entered a barbershop to deal with his long, weed-like hair.

He then made an especially outrageous request to Konoha's barbers.

"Do you know Konoha's genius shinobi, Kakashi Hatake?"

"Mm. He's the Fourth Hokage's disciple, right? I've seen him before and remember him vaguely."

"Good. Give me the hairstyle of Konoha's genius shinobi Kakashi Hatake's even more genius father, Konoha White Fang, Hatake Sakumo."

"...Sir, slow down. I didn't catch that."

By then, the barber had already undone Yuhara's hair and was preparing to toss the item in his hand aside. Yuhara stopped him.

"Oh, return this hair tie to me."

"Sorry, is this something particularly important?"

"No. It's an ordinary object I got from a passing stranger, but I have no intention of throwing it away."

P.S.:

Please add this to your collections, and please vote with your monthly tickets.