Yamanaka Tohru's Spring

The next day, Yamanaka Tohru brought the mission scroll delivered by the Anbu last night and went to work at Konoha Hospital.

He hadn't been to Konoha Hospital in nearly two years, yet there were surprisingly few changes inside.

In Konoha Year 42, relations between the various villages were becoming increasingly tense. Even Konoha was on edge, with everyone on high alert.

Most of the village's funds were being used to stockpile war supplies, leaving no extra money to renovate Konoha Hospital.

Yamanaka Tohru arrived at the director's office with the mission scroll. Despite not having seen him for two years, the director recognized Yamanaka Tohru at a glance. The hospital director had a vivid memory of this young, talented Medical Ninja.

Yamanaka Tohru was assigned by the director to the emergency department, where they treated defending ninja returning from the border.

Konoha Hospital frequently received injured individuals; they knew their own situation best. Yamanaka Tohru was well aware of his own Medical Ninjutsu proficiency.

Ever since Yamanaka Tohru saved White Fang, rumors had circulated in the village that he was a Medical Ninja comparable to Tsunade.

If it was solely about treating external wounds and performing surgery, Yamanaka Tohru was confident he was no worse than Tsunade.

Surgery was the result of his five years of accumulated knowledge from his previous life, while his proficiency in treating external wounds came from adding Nature Transformation to the Healing Technique, allowing him to skillfully use advanced Medical Ninjutsu like the [Mystical Palm Technique].

However, in other aspects, Yamanaka Tohru was far behind Tsunade. His biggest weakness was detoxification.

The world of the Hokage was different from his previous life; it had Sunagakure, whose Puppeteers were skilled in using poisons.

One reason Yamanaka Tohru agreed to work at Konoha Hospital for the Third Hokage was partly to gain exposure to Sunagakure's poisons.

During her time as a Medical Ninja, Yamanaka Tohru's mother, Yamanaka Seiko, had detoxified poisoned ninja on the front lines of the Sunagakure battlefield. Yamanaka Tohru planned to learn detoxification from his mother after he understood Sunagakure's poisons.

The Third Great Ninja War was about to break out. Yamanaka Tohru had to perfect his Medical Ninjutsu as much as possible before the war began. If possible, Yamanaka Tohru also wanted to realize an idea he had before the war started.

For several days, Yamanaka Tohru saw no ninja returning from the Sunagakure border. After asking a senior, he learned that Sunagakure's poisons were too terrifying; ninja poisoned and not treated in time mostly died at the border.

On the sixth day at Konoha Hospital, Yamanaka Tohru finally saw the first ninja returning from the Sunagakure border.

This ninja had been poisoned not long before and had received basic treatment from the accompanying Medical Ninja, which prevented the poison from spreading further and barely saved his life, allowing him to hold on until he returned to the village.

In his previous life, Yamanaka Tohru didn't know much about poisons when he was in college. He only knew that poisons could be classified by their properties into acute and chronic poisons, by their visibility into apparent and latent poisons, and by their targets into neurotoxins and hemotoxins.

The poisons used by Sunagakure's Puppeteers were mostly acute apparent poisons; once poisoned, death would follow quickly if not treated within a certain time.

Yamanaka Tohru and the seniors worked for several hours to save the injured ninja's life. This ninja had been poisoned with a hemotoxin; as it circulated with the blood, the toxin quickly spread throughout the body.

Later, Yamanaka Tohru learned from conversations with the seniors that most of Sunagakure's poisons had this effect. Yamanaka Tohru confirmed that Sunagakure's poisons were basically all hemotoxins.

Learning that most of Sunagakure's poisons were hemotoxins, Yamanaka Tohru breathed a sigh of relief. If it was a hemotoxin, Yamanaka Tohru could use Ice Release to temporarily freeze the body, stopping blood flow, and then find a way to clear the toxin.

In the following days, Yamanaka Tohru continued to work at Konoha Hospital while learning Nature Transformation for the [Healing Technique] from Yamanaka Seiko.

Adding Nature Transformation to the [Healing Technique] could achieve various effects, including detoxification.

After a period of busyness, Konoha Hospital suddenly became quiet, and the atmosphere in the village grew increasingly somber. Ninja entered and exited the village with hurried expressions every day.

After studying Medical Ninjutsu with Yamanaka Seiko for over half a month, Yamanaka Tohru's [Healing Technique] could handle most poisons.

With Konoha Hospital being quiet, Yamanaka Tohru didn't receive any other missions and was instead transferred to the outpatient department to treat civilians and village ninja.

There were few people in the outpatient department all day. Yamanaka Tohru spent his abundant free time poring over Tsunade's notes, hoping to find something related to Medical Ninjutsu.

One day, while engrossed in reading the notes, Yamanaka Tohru received a patient – a little girl with purple hair.

Yamanaka Tohru could swear to all the gods and Buddhas that he wasn't a lolicon; he just happened to like lolis.

Yamanaka Tohru felt completely healed. In his previous life, he had lived for 32 years without ever falling for a girl. In the world of the Hokage, he had spent 9 years without showing any favor to the beauties from the original story.

As of today, Yugao was the first girl Yamanaka Tohru found "kawaii" at first glance.

"Um, my wrist is sprained from practicing Taijutsu. Can you heal me, Ninja-sama?" the little girl said, extending her right hand. The little girl's voice was soft, and Yamanaka Tohru felt his heart melt.

Yamanaka Tohru tried his best to put on a friendly, big-brother demeanor, gently comforting the little girl while treating her injury.

Under the treatment of the [Mystical Palm Technique], the little girl's sprain quickly healed.

"Thank you, Ninja-sama!" the little girl said politely.

"You don't need to be so formal. What's your name, little sister?"

"My name is Uzuki Yugao."

So it was her! Yamanaka Tohru certainly remembered Uzuki Yugao. She didn't appear often in the original story, but she was quite popular. One reason was her appearance, which ranked among the top female ninja in the Hokage series, and another was her name.

Yugao itself is the name of a flower, the moonflower – its flower language is eternal love.

In the original story, most of Konoha's female ninja found their partners: Naruto and Hinata, Sasuke and Sakura, Sai and Ino, Asuma and Kurenai. Only Tsunade and Uzuki Yugao remained single.

Tsunade never got together with anyone else after Jiraiya's sacrifice in Amegakure.

Uzuki Yugao's boyfriend, Gekko Hayate, died early at the hands of Sunagakure's Baki and Yakushi Kabuto.

Yamanaka Tohru liked Yugao very much. This liking wasn't romantic, but more like the affection an older brother has for his younger sister.

"Yugao, that's a beautiful name. My name is Yamanaka Tohru. Yugao, don't call me Ninja-sama; you can call me En or En-niichan." Yamanaka Tohru decided to establish a friendship with Uzuki Yugao as soon as possible.

"Then I'll call you En-senpai! My father taught me to be polite and not to call strangers by their first names."

To Uzuki Yugao, Yamanaka Tohru was a stranger on their first meeting, even though Yamanaka Tohru had left a good impression on her.

While chatting with Uzuki Yugao, Yamanaka Tohru learned that she was four years old and that today was her first time practicing Taijutsu, which resulted in her injury.

Yamanaka Tohru recalled that Uzuki Yugao used swordsmanship in the original work. "Yugao, are you going to practice swordsmanship?"

"Yes, Senior En, how did you know?"

"That's not important. What's important is that I can find someone to teach you, Yugao."

"Really? Who is it?"

"Of course, it's true. Come to Konoha Hospital tomorrow, and you'll find out then." Yamanaka Tohru kept it a secret; he already had someone in mind to teach Uzuki Yugao.

"Okay! See you tomorrow, Senior En."

"See you tomorrow!"