Who Cares

"Heh~ heh heh heh..."

Jiraiya stuck his rear end out, prying at the gaps in the wooden fence as he tried to catch a glimpse of the scenery behind it, letting out a lecherous chuckle every now and then.

"Pathetic..."

Seeing Jiraiya's perverted appearance, Nawaki curled his lip.

"Hm?"

Hearing the sound from behind him, Jiraiya turned his head around with a suggestive expression.

The moment he saw Tsunade's face, he was startled into a shiver.

"Ah... huh? Tsunade? Why are you guys here?"

"Obviously to catch a peeping tom!"

Tsunade sneered, her fist cracking as she clenched it, her smile carrying a distinctly cruel undertone.

Without waiting for Jiraiya to speak, she threw a punch straight at his face.

"Hold on! Wait, wait a second!"

Jiraiya dodged the punch in a panic, and feeling the fierce wind of the fist brush past his ear, cold sweat instantly soaked his back.

If that punch had landed, even if he were lucky enough to survive, he would likely have ended up with a face like a squashed melon...

"I wasn't peeping! It was just... research! That's right, I was just doing research!"

Hearing this, before Tsunade could speak, Minato tilted his head, his eyes full of innocence: "If research requires watching women bathe, then why doesn't Jiraiya-senpai ask the women in his own family for help?"

"Ah, this..."

Jiraiya's expression stiffened, and he was left speechless.

"Pfft..."

Seeing Jiraiya get shut down, Tsunade let out a cold scoff. She retracted her fist for the moment and watched him with a relaxed air, looking as if she were waiting to see how he would explain himself.

"If someone were peeping at Jiraiya-senpai's family, how would you feel?"

Seeing that Jiraiya remained silent, Minato pressed the attack; he truly detested the act of peeping.

Among the Sannin, although Tsunade loved to gamble, she never involved others in it.

At most, she made things difficult for the casino owners, but even against those loan-sharking gangs, she never used the banner of justice to welch on her debts.

Orochimaru was a villain, but he was a villain in the open, never bothering to justify his actions.

But Jiraiya's behavior—peeping at women bathing while calling himself a romantic—was truly excessive!

Was that romantic?

That was just sleazy!

Minato didn't actually have any intention of being a moral paragon, but he was a normal man who would eventually want to find a girlfriend.

If this kind of behavior wasn't stopped, who knew when his own woman might be the one to suffer? Who could tolerate that?

Hearing Minato's words, Jiraiya's face twitched again.

He no longer knew how to answer the boy.

Being asked such a question by a five-year-old child, even with his thick skin, he felt too embarrassed to argue.

Minato continued, "Jiraiya-senpai, as a disciple of the Hokage, won't doing this bring shame to the name of the Hokage?"

At the mention of the Hokage, Nawaki immediately perked up. He pointed a small finger at Jiraiya, filled with righteous indignation: "Exactly! Don't you have even a shred of awareness as a disciple of the Hokage?"

Jiraiya really wanted to say that the Hokage liked to peep too...

But of course, he couldn't say that.

So, facing Nawaki's questioning, he could only pull a bitter face and raise his hands: "Alright, alright, I know I was wrong! I promise I'll never peep again! Can you guys just let me off this once, please?"

"Hmph, that doesn't sound very convincing coming from you."

Tsunade sneered: "You've said similar things before, and every time, you revert to your old ways before long. I think it's better to just cripple you so you can't go out and harm people anymore!"

"Eh... isn't that a bit too cruel?"

Nawaki was stunned; he hadn't expected his older sister to want to solve the problem at the root.

Tsunade shook her head and said nothing.

Many men felt that peeping was no big deal, primarily because they thought it was just a look and didn't cause any real harm.

They would never understand the psychological trauma and panic such behavior inflicted upon women!

Just because someone who abuses animals doesn't kill people, does that mean they don't want to?

Thinking of this, the chill on Tsunade's face deepened. She turned to look at Minato: "What do you say, Minato?"

"Hmm—"

Minato thought for a moment and sighed with some regret.

"I support strict punishment! However... having said that, Jiraiya-senpai is Teacher Tsunade's teammate, and he has previously given me pointers. To kill him just for one instance of peeping would be a bit too heartless."

Hearing this, Jiraiya was instantly shocked. "Hey, hey! Minato, don't go spouting nonsense! Tsunade never said she was going to beat me to death!"

Watching Minato's contemplative expression, cold sweat trickled down Jiraiya's temple.

Only now did he realize that this boy, who looked so gentle, sunny, and even a little airheaded... was actually a black-bellied schemer!

Tsunade let out a soft huff, ignoring Jiraiya, eager to hear what kind of answer Minato would provide.

"Ah, I've got it!"

Minato slapped his palm, his face looking purely innocent as he said, "How about this: we make Jiraiya-senpai write a letter of guarantee..."

"Phew..."

Hearing Minato's suggestion, Jiraiya felt an immediate sense of relief.

Scared the life out of me. This kid is still quite naive after all...

Tsunade shook her head slightly, feeling a faint, inexplicable sense of disappointment.

Just as the two were lost in their own thoughts, Minato clapped his hands lightly and continued in a gentle tone:

"We can submit the guarantee to the Konoha Police Force. If any peeping incidents occur in the village from now on, they will all be blamed on Jiraiya-senpai! And we'll post it on the village bulletin board!"

"Eh—?!! No way!!! Don't do that!!!"

"Hahahaha!! A public execution? That's interesting!"

Jiraiya's face turned deathly pale. After a brief second of stunned silence, Tsunade couldn't help but burst into loud laughter.

Jiraiya tried to struggle, but Minato landed another blow: "Also, we must explicitly state that the peeper is Jiraiya, disciple of the Hokage!"

"Damn it! You brat! This is slander! You're framing an innocent man!"

Jiraiya completely lost his composure, shouting in a frenzy.

If things really went the way Minato described, he wouldn't be able to show his face in Konoha ever again.

Just as he was about to argue his case, he saw the corners of Minato's lips curl into a gentle, sunny smile. But the words that followed made Jiraiya feel as if he had fallen into an ice cellar!

"Who cares?"

"When Jiraiya-senpai is peeping, does he ever care about the victims' feelings?"

"!!!"

Jiraiya's pupils trembled!

Minato's words were like a thunderous blow, ringing in his ears and making his head spin as if he'd been struck by a club. His face turned deathly pale in an instant.

That's right, who cares?

The people who frame you know better than anyone that you're being framed.

When he was peeping, had he ever cared about the thoughts of those girls?

In this moment, all the excuses he had made for his voyeurism, all those high-sounding justifications, seemed so ironic and ridiculous now that he was the one being targeted.

He finally realized that what he had always called "free-spirited romanticism" was, in reality, nothing more than base perversion.

This "perversion" was not referring to flirtation between men and women, but rather the twisted and terrifying reality of the word itself...

As the fig leaf of self-deception was torn away, and as he viewed himself from the perspective of the victim, he suddenly found his own behavior unbearable.

At this moment, facing the girl he had loved for years, Jiraiya felt an indescribable sense of shame.

This shame gnawed at his heart, corroding his self-esteem until it was riddled with holes, forcing him to flee in a panic from her gaze.

Watching Jiraiya's stumbling figure retreat, Minato turned to look at Tsunade.

"Was I too harsh?"

"No, it was absolutely perfect!"

Tsunade patted Minato's head with one hand and gave him a thumbs-up with the other, laughing heartily.

Nawaki nodded repeatedly as well, though he silently made a resolution in his heart.

From now on, absolutely, definitely...

Never get into an argument with Minato!