Medical Ninjutsu Scroll

What did that mean? She didn't believe him? As long as she acknowledged Kabuto, the truth would come out. How was he supposed to prove he was telling the truth?

Xing Ran still did not know that Nonō had already met Kabuto, but Nonō's next words quickly resolved that question.

"Kabuto did not receive any order from Danzo to assassinate someone among the Iwa ninja either." Nonō's words made Xing Ran breathe a slight sigh of relief.

That meant they had already met, and judging by her tone, they had even finished recognizing each other as family.

"That order will come. As for when exactly Danzo will issue it, honestly, I don't know either. Believe it or not, I've told you about the danger, so I feel better now. As for what you choose to do in the end, I don't care." Unable to provide any proof, Xing Ran could only speak with a hint of shamelessness.

He only wanted a clear conscience and to satisfy his desire to learn. He had said all he could; they could look after themselves.

After hearing Xing Ran's words, Nonō fell silent again. As the seconds ticked by, Xing Ran grew anxious on her behalf. Why was she still standing here? She should hurry home and find her own mother before anyone spotted her.

"What do you want in return for helping us like this?" After a long while, Nonō suddenly asked, leaving Xing Ran somewhat speechless.

She'd been holding that in for so long? Was she just waiting for me to state what I wanted out of this first? Indeed, there were no purely good people in this ninja world. Who would believe that someone who had gone to such lengths for others expected nothing in return?

Yet Xing Ran truly only wanted to prevent the tragedy from happening again and ease his own conscience. It would not be wrong to say that, having gained wealth, he wished to benefit the world. He had obtained Superman's power, so what was wrong with acting as he pleased?

"No requests. You can leave now. I still need to sleep." He knew that this was a ninja's normal reaction, an attitude of absolute vigilance toward strangers and unfamiliar things. But knowing that was one thing; being interrogated after doing a good deed was still irritating. With a polite, practiced smile, he directly showed her out.

Seeing Xing Ran's impatience, Yakushi Nonō was genuinely confused this time. Did people who did good deeds without asking for anything in return really exist in this world? Heh, she had met one such person before. Well, that person was herself.

At that thought, the corners of Nonō's lips unconsciously curled up, and the atmosphere instantly became lighter. Suddenly, she found that this handsome young Konoha ninja before her was rather pleasing to the eye.

Her long life as a spy had kept Nonō from smiling for a very long time. Seeing her smile, Xing Ran somehow found himself affected by it, and his practiced smile became more sincere.

"You're a good person. This is my thank-you gift. Perhaps we'll meet again someday." Nonō put her mask back on, tossed Xing Ran a scroll as thick as an arm, and headed for the window she had entered through.

Xing Ran caught the scroll on instinct. Just as he was about to ask what it was, Nonō, already climbing through the window, turned back and added, "Oh, right. Although you're a good person and helped us, that child Kabuto doesn't trust you. Sigh, his growth was affected by all that spy work..."

Yakushi Nonō had been speaking to Xing Ran in the first half of her sentence, but before she could finish the latter half, she had vanished into the darkness again. It was as though she were explaining herself to Xing Ran, and also blaming herself for being inadequate.

Xing Ran looked at the empty windowsill. The night breeze lifted the curtains before they quickly settled again, and the room fell silent once more.

The handsome youth tugged at the corner of his mouth, trying hard to force out a smile. Being called a good person—did that count as repaying kindness with enmity? Whether in his previous life or this one, few good people ever met a good end.

The most representative example was right before him. Nonō, a truly good person who had kindly raised the orphans left behind by war, was destined to die a miserable death.

He weighed the scroll in his hand. It was not light, so it likely contained a great deal of information. He wondered what it was.

When he opened it, dense writing and anatomical illustrations filled the entire scroll.

It was a Medical Ninjutsu Scroll.

Moreover, from the notes inserted throughout the text, it was clear that this was not merely a Medical Ninjutsu Scroll. It also contained a large amount of Yakushi Nonō's training insights.

Xing Ran had Super Brainpower—well, an underdeveloped version of it—but he still learned ninjutsu very quickly. For ordinary ninjutsu, as long as he had study materials, he could master it in about half a day.

The only thing preventing him from becoming someone like Kakashi, who had learned thousands of ninjutsu, was this world's backward obsession with secrecy.

The ninja world had both prestigious ninja clans and civilian ninja.

The difference was not merely how many people shared the same surname. It was also the inheritance of knowledge. As prestigious clans, they had access to far more ninjutsu than civilians, making it easier for them to find techniques suited to themselves and giving them a greater chance of becoming strong. In this virtuous cycle, clans would produce more and more powerful members and collect more and more ninjutsu.

Civilians were different. If they wanted to learn a new ninjutsu, aside from the Three Body Techniques taught at the Ninja Academy, they could only rely on their own efforts.

Whether they apprenticed themselves to a master or exchanged mission contributions with the village for the chance to learn ninjutsu, they first had to put in effort before receiving a reward. They were far behind the prestigious clans.

Do not think apprenticing oneself to a master was easy. It was not like his previous life, where one had to spend three years as a servant, three years as a child laborer, and three years as an assistant before learning the real skills, but running around and serving one's master in the early stages was unavoidable.

Even Naruto had not had it easy. Jiraiya was Naruto's grandmaster, yet Jiraiya still conned him out of all his savings before teaching him some real skills.

Therefore, an act like this—handing one's own insights and a Ninjutsu Scroll to another person—was absolutely a valuable gift.

Unfortunately, this valuable gift left Xing Ran deeply depressed. The reason was that his Chakra affinities consisted only of the Yin Release Chakra inherited from his family and his own Earth Release Chakra. Such a wonderful thing was of little use to him.

"What a pity. Time to sleep." Xing Ran rolled the scroll back up, lay down on the bed again, and soon fell asleep.

In the middle of the night, Iwagakure entered a world of water amid flashes of lightning and claps of thunder.

Iwagakure had not seen such heavy rain in a long time. When Xing Ran got up the next day and opened the window again, fresh air rich in negative ions instantly flooded the room—and filled Xing Ran's lungs along with it.

"What wonderful air..." Xing Ran lazily leaned over the windowsill in his room. A light drizzle still fell from the sky. Today was hardly a good day to go out, making him feel even more sluggish.

The dusty air of the Land of Earth made Xing Ran feel as though he were living amid the smog of his previous life. But today's rain had washed heaven and earth anew, and the air of this world, almost untouched by industrial pollution, pulled Xing Ran back to reality once more.