Karma Reversal

Konoha, Ninja Academy.

"Everyone turn your books to the chapter on the First. The Will of Fire created by the First is the ideological belief of every Konoha villager!"

On the podium, a middle-aged man with a thick mustache was lecturing the forty students below, his voice fluctuating with passion and high spirits.

"Wherever the leaves dance, the fire burns on. The so-called Will of Fire..."

The students of Class 4-A were listening very attentively, many even stirred to excitement with glowing faces, wishing they could immediately sacrifice themselves for the village.

Only Watanabe in the corner was absent-minded, staring blankly at the scenery outside the window.

It has already been a month.

Watanabe muttered to himself, feeling quite depressed inside.

A full month had already passed since he inexplicably transmigrated into the Naruto World, and no matter how reluctant he was to believe it, he now had to accept the reality of transmigration.

As one of the Big Three web-anime, Naruto was wildly popular all over Earth; however, Watanabe had never watched it. He only liked reading web novels and didn't like watching cartoons, occasionally hearing his classmates mention it a couple of times, and he knew nothing about the original plot.

He couldn't say he knew absolutely nothing; at least he knew there was a bunch of simps on TikTok who loved Rin more than Obito.

Not knowing the original plot isn't a big deal, but the crux is that I'm still this weak. This is going to be tough...

Watanabe sighed deeply.

The body he had transmigrated into was also named Watanabe, twelve years old this year, and a very ordinary commoner in Konoha.

Both of his parents had sacrificed themselves during the First Shinobi World War, leaving him only a house and nothing else, completely alone with no one to rely on—a standard orphan template.

"Kakkō will continue to illuminate the village and make the newborn leaves sprout..."

On the podium, the bearded man was still chattering away, lecturing the crowd.

Utter nonsense, sheer balderdash.

Watanabe inwardly slandered and mocked.

Unlike his brainwashed classmates, when he opened the book Will of Fire, he only saw the two words "cannibalism" written all over the lines.

This was by no means alarmist. In Watanabe's view, the so-called Will of Fire was simply a method used by the Konoha High Command to rule the villagers, much like a pyramid scheme organization setting its own corporate philosophy.

The Will of Fire emphasized sacrifice and dedication from the older generation for the younger generation, yet back then, when Watanabe's parents died for the village in the First Shinobi World War, Konoha only gave Watanabe a symbolic relief fund and paid no further heed to whether he lived or died, letting him fend for himself and even refusing to waive his annual tuition.

Didn't you say you wanted to let the newborn leaves sprout?

At least let mine sprout, then!

Therefore, every time he heard someone preach the Will of Fire, Watanabe felt it was hypocritical and ridiculous in his heart. Over the years, he had lived frugally, surviving on his parents' relief fund and doing child labor for others, and seeing that this school year was about to end, he didn't know where to scrape together the tuition for the next semester.

Poor as he was, he still had to go to school. Knowledge changes destiny; this was an eternal truth no matter what world he was in.

Watanabe went to school for no other purpose than to become a ninja. In this world where strength spoke, only the strong had the right to speak, and ordinary commoners were tantamount to ants.

However, Watanabe was very unfortunate; his ninjutsu aptitude was not outstanding, and coupled with having no ninja elders to teach him, after muddling through four years, he had remained the tail-ender of the class from start to finish.

Konoha's tail-ender—he couldn't possibly be any more useless.

If only I had the talent of Orochimaru or Jiraiya.

Thinking to himself, Watanabe looked at the two boys with white and black hair not far in the front row.

Orochimaru and Jiraiya were his classmates, and just like him, they were commoner orphans, but their ninjutsu aptitude was extremely outstanding, leaving Watanabe streets behind, tying with Tsunade, who was known as the Little Princess of the Senju Clan, as the top students of Class 4-A.

In terms of talent I'm inferior to Orochimaru and Jiraiya, and in terms of family background I'm inferior to Tsunade. Why is a transmigrator like me so miserable?

Watanabe looked again at a beautiful blonde girl in the front row, feeling more depressed the more he thought about it. Since he was here, he should make the best of it; he wanted to live out a decent life in the Naruto World, yet he couldn't see where his way out was.

If push comes to shove, I can only leave Konoha and go to a town untouched by the flames of war to steadily live as a commoner, so I don't get sent to the battlefield as cannon fodder one day. This shouldn't count as being a rogue ninja, right...

[Karma Reversal System binding.]

A line of text suddenly appeared before his eyes, and Watanabe was stunned.

A system? The golden finger has finally arrived!

Watanabe instantly grew excited, looking much like the other classmates brainwashed by the Will of Fire who were eager to sacrifice themselves immediately.

[24%]

[58%]

[99%]

[Karma Reversal System successfully bound, click here to view the attribute panel.]

Watanabe looked around, and seeing that no one was paying attention to him, he maintained a calm exterior and tried to manipulate his consciousness to click on the light screen in front of him.

A row of attribute panels popped out:

[Host: Watanabe

Chakra: 20

Spirit: 10

Vitality: 80

Defense: 15]

The panel was extremely concise and clean, clear at a glance.

That's it, it's gone?

Watanabe was a bit dazed.

Where was the task tab?

Where was the store tab?

Not selling goods and not issuing tasks—what kind of system are you??

Watanabe flipped back and forth studying the light screen in front of him, but apart from the attribute panel, he couldn't bring up anything else. He didn't even know how to use this system.

Until class ended, he still hadn't figured it out.

A system finally arrived, please don't just let it sit there as a decoration.

Watanabe couldn't help but grow anxious, spending the entire recess hunched over his desk fiddling with the light screen.

"Tsunade, you have such an amazing grandfather, you're so cool!"

"Lord First is the idol worshipped by all of us!"

"If it weren't for your grandfather, our Konoha could never have been established..."

As usual, the crowd surrounded Tsunade's desk like stars revolving around the moon, chattering with all sorts of praise.

Tsunade grew impatient with the listening, perfunctorily dealing with them with a couple of responses, when suddenly, her peripheral vision caught sight of Watanabe, who was alone and wretched like a beaten dog in the corner.

That guy...

After four years together in the same class, Tsunade understood Watanabe's background to some extent. She held an indescribable sense of sympathy toward him, feeling that they were the same age, yet their fates were vastly different.

Because Watanabe never deliberately tried to cozy up to and please her like others did, being cold and aloof, it resulted in Tsunade almost never interacting with him.

Before long, the class bell rang.

The crowd returned to their respective seats one after another, and the noisy classroom returned to peace.

The head teacher, Osaka Rukawa, walked in carrying a wooden box and said casually, "Practical sparring this class. We'll use a draw to choose sparring partners. The ones whose names are called come up."

"Dan Katō."

"Jiraiya..."

Hearing that there was practical sparring, Watanabe's expression immediately drooped somewhat.

He was the tail-ender of the class; didn't practical sparring plainly mean offering himself up to be beaten by others?

He temporarily abandoned studying the system he had just obtained, and when Osaka Rukawa called his name, he walked up to the podium to draw lots.

New author, new book, begging for recommendations and favorites!