Exploitation and Counter-Exploitation

What Mizuki did not know, however, was this.

The moment Naruto turned to leave, the corners of his mouth curled upward, revealing a faint, mocking smile. In Naruto's heart, Mizuki was nothing more than a hopeless idiot.

Stealing the Scroll of Sealing?

What kind of fool could come up with such a plan?

He hadn't even considered the feasibility or the success rate.

A guy who was merely immersed in his own wild ambitions—if he wasn't a moron, what was he?

"Well, let me make good use of you, Mr. Mizuki! I hope you won't disappoint me."

Naruto left the examination hall.

He didn't care at all about the strange looks from his classmates.

Naruto was well aware of why they were looking at him with such odd expressions. It was simply because they didn't see the Hidden Leaf Village ninja headband that symbolized graduation on him. Furthermore, the soundproofing in the exam room wasn't perfect, so they had more or less heard the voice of their teacher, Iruka, coming from inside. Unlike the Naruto of the original story, who was a dead-last student, the Naruto of this life was a top student in his class. His overall grades were consistently at the top, especially in theoretical knowledge, where he was a stable top-three and occasionally first. As for practical combat, he was even more outstanding; in the entire class, only the top-ranked Sasuke Uchiha could suppress him.

Of course, they certainly didn't know that this was because Naruto was restraining himself.

Otherwise, given that Sasuke couldn't yet utilize the Sharingan he had already awakened (having been triggered by his brother on the Night of the Massacre, he had already awakened a single-tomoe Sharingan, though he hadn't realized it himself), Naruto could beat him to a pulp in minutes.

Even so, from the perspective of these classmates.

It should have been very easy for Naruto to pass the graduation exam, right?

Even if they had seen Naruto struggle with the Clone Technique during his studies, so much time had passed; with Naruto's intelligence, it shouldn't have been a problem, right?

This was the opinion of almost everyone present.

However, the final result truly exceeded everyone's expectations.

After six years.

Naruto Uzumaki, who had consistently ranked in the top five of his class, had actually failed to graduate. It was no wonder that the moment Naruto walked out, almost everyone present looked at him with astonished eyes. Among those present, only one person looked at him with a worried expression.

That was the young lady of the Hyuga Clan—Hinata Hyuga.

Unlike the gazes of the others.

At this moment.

Watching Naruto's departing back.

A trace of extreme worry appeared in Hinata Hyuga's pale pupils, and her hands twisted together unconsciously.

"Naruto-kun..."

Naruto, who was already walking away quickly, naturally wouldn't care about the opinions of the classmates behind him.

Naruto certainly didn't leave the school directly. Instead, he went straight to the rooftop of the Ninja Academy, found a relatively quiet spot, and lay down very leisurely.

"Next is to wait for that idiot Mizuki to find me. If I remember correctly, it should be around dusk when the exams end, right? Hmm, looks like I can take a little nap..."

Naruto rested his hands behind his head, looked up at the blue sky and white clouds, and narrowed his eyes comfortably, thinking silently to himself.

This was his golden opportunity.

If he missed this village, he wouldn't find this shop.

This time.

He couldn't be like the idiot in the original story.

With such a massive Scroll of Sealing, he only looked at the Multi Shadow Clone technique. This was one of the most precious existences, recording almost all of the Hidden Leaf Village's A-rank and above ninjutsu. To say nothing else, the Dead Demon Consuming Seal and the Flying Thunder God Technique—Naruto had to obtain these two. The latter went without saying; as a space-time ninjutsu developed by the Second Hokage, Tobirama Senju, and further improved and popularized by Naruto's father, the Fourth Hokage Namikaze Minato, it held extremely important significance for Naruto. As for the former, Naruto was simply curious about the world. After all, he was curious whether the Death God and Jashin described in the original story truly existed in this world, and the Dead Demon Consuming Seal was one of the best mediums to explore that.

Aside from these two.

As for the remaining high-level ninjutsu and forbidden techniques.

As long as it was possible.

Naruto intended to learn them all. He didn't necessarily have to master them immediately; as long as he could understand the core of the technique and the hand seals, he could slowly ponder them in the future.

"This is the most important step..."

Naruto thought silently to himself.

And it was just as Naruto was pondering this first step of the plot.

Suddenly.

Naruto opened his eyes and sat up.

"Wait! What if that guy Mizuki doesn't act according to the original plot?"

To put it bluntly, after arriving in this world.

The original plot could really only be used as a reference.

If he still treated the so-called plot as an answer key to copy, Naruto could be one hundred percent certain that he wouldn't even know how he died.

Would Mizuki come to find him according to the original plot?

In all likelihood, he would.

However, the Uchiha massacre five years ago had already deviated slightly from the original plot, which made Naruto have to wonder if the plot of the Scroll of Sealing would also undergo different changes this time.

It seemed that Naruto had not yet done anything to alter the original plot.

However, to be fair, the moment Naruto arrived in this world—whether it was a soul transmigration or a straightforward reincarnation—the trajectory of his fate had already diverged from the original story. Furthermore, while there were no major incidents, Naruto had experienced a different childhood than the original; he did not cause trouble like the original, nor was he a dead-last student like the original.

If one were to really speak on it.

There were still some changes.

Therefore, Naruto had sufficient reason to suspect: if the plot deviated from his expectations once again, what was he supposed to do?

The answer was, there was no way!

"If that guy Mizuki really does something different from the original plot, then that would truly be a huge problem..."

After pondering for a moment, a bitter smile appeared on Naruto's face.

Because Naruto realized.

There was truly nothing he could do.

At the very least, regarding this specific matter, Naruto was in a very passive position.

Without Mizuki's instigation.

He lacked a legitimate excuse to "play dumb" and steal the Scroll of Sealing to learn from it.

He lacked an even greater opportunity to graduate directly.

The former was manageable; it was just the loss of one chance to become stronger, right? That was something that could eventually be made up for in other ways.

The most important thing was the latter.

Once he truly could not graduate this year.

Then the resulting problems would be far too numerous.