Konoha Chivalry Rules Mystery

The Konoha Ninja Academy had a six-year curriculum.

Unless you were so gifted that the teachers thought, "Keeping this kid here would just waste his time," or you applied for early graduation yourself, ready to begin a life as cannon fodder or part of the loyal rank and file.

Those with red-eye disease were exceptions, of course.

Otherwise, you had to dutifully warm a bench for all six years.

What did they study in those six years?

"Sing a folk song for the Hokage."

"Grandpa Sarutobi knocked Ōnoki down with a rock."

"Why the Third was the strongest Hokage."

"The First Hokage's senility in his later years."

The philosophy behind the curriculum was clear.

You could lack ninjutsu, but your Will of Fire had to be up to standard.

You could fail to throw a kunai straight, but you had to know who had given Konoha's villagers their backbone.

The Sarutobi Clan, of course.

The Third's kindness could never be repaid.

As for actual ninjutsu instruction, there was practically nothing beyond the Clone Technique over those six years.

Many villagers with extremely poor aptitude could not even master the Clone Technique, but nobody cared.

Teaching anything else to the loyal rank and file was pointless to begin with.

The Ninja Academy's benefits existed solely to produce shinobi who served Konoha's interests.

It was precisely this absurd environment that had given rise to an unwritten code of conduct.

Amamiya Maki summed it up as the Konoha Chivalry Code.

First, as a Konoha villager, you could pressure anyone you pleased.

Second, if you did not pressure geniuses, you could get out of Konoha.

Third, if you were a civilian-born genius, then sorry, your civilian status had already been revoked, and you were now a target for pressure.

After a month of observation, Amamiya Maki confirmed that this code was about as widespread in Konoha as the Will of Fire.

Everyone paid lip service to loving Konoha, while tormenting others was a daily routine.

Still such refined, easygoing villagers.

Today was the monthly exam.

The exam had not even begun, and a Konoha troublemaker had already come over to put the code into practice.

"Minato Namikaze!"

An arrogant voice exploded across the room.

A dark-brown-haired boy stood with his hands on his hips, his nostrils pointed at Minato. His posture was textbook-clearly an old hand of the Konoha Imperial Banner, steeped in its ways since childhood.

Jiro Matsumoto, the grocery store owner's son. His father had dragged him to the Orphanage to stir up trouble a while ago, only to fail. Now he was probably taking that frustration out on Minato.

A Civilian Ninja whose talent, if not exactly outstanding, could at least be described as utterly unremarkable.

"Don't think you can throw your weight around just because you're talented! What are you smiling about every single day?!"

Minato sat at his desk, his smile unchanged.

That smile was not deliberate politeness-he genuinely did not feel offended.

After being tormented for so long, he was already used to it.

"I'm telling you, I'm going to knock you down a peg in today's monthly exam! I'm not scared of you one-on-one, and I'm even better than you at team combat!"

Amamiya Maki leaned back in his chair, watching with interest.

Bullying was one of Konoha's scenic attractions, an essential experience to savor.

Redheads had to be bullied, white-eyed kids had to be bullied, and anyone in a jumpsuit had to be tormented.

Even strangers had tongues like poisoned knives, their words leaving listeners feeling warm inside.

Seeing that Minato still had no reaction, Jiro Matsumoto pressed closer.

"Blondie! Where are your parents? Didn't anyone teach you basic manners?"

The classroom fell silent for a moment.

Minato's fingers tightened slightly around his pen, but his expression remained unchanged.

Nonō clenched her fists and was about to stand when Amamiya Maki held her back.

"Don't."

Nonō looked at him in confusion.

"What would standing up accomplish? Are you going to argue with him or fight him?"

Amamiya Maki lowered his voice. "Minato himself doesn't even care about what he's saying.

"Standing up for him would only make things more awkward for him. Besides, the more attention you give people like this, the more worked up they get.

"I've tormented Minato for so long that these few remarks are nothing to him."

Nonō slowly unclenched her fists.

Not because she thought Minato did not care about those words, but because Amamiya Maki was clearly far more vicious than the other boy.

After hurling insults for ages, Jiro Matsumoto found that it was like punching cotton. He could not even get an echo.

Breathing hard, he looked around, and the watching students all averted their eyes.

"Just you wait, all of you!"

Having delivered his threat, he strode back to his seat and slammed his desk with a bang.

The little interlude ended.

Amamiya Maki looked away, mentally scoring the performance.

Adequate vocabulary, solid emotional delivery. Unfortunately, his mentality had let him down.

A true master would not lose his composure just because the other party refused to respond.

[Detected that the host has inflicted psychological pressure on "Jiro Matsumoto."

Pressure points +5]

Amamiya Maki froze.

He had not even said anything. That still counted as applying pressure?

On reflection, though, it made sense. Jiro Matsumoto had unleashed his entire combo on Minato, and Minato had not answered with a single word.

Meanwhile, he had sat in the back row watching the boy like a performing monkey from start to finish.

That situation of "you think you're bullying someone, but you're actually being treated as a joke" really was pretty stressful.

Even a mosquito's leg had some meat on it. He silently thanked Jiro Matsumoto for his contribution.

At nine in the morning, the proctor entered with a stack of exam papers.

Once the papers were handed out, Amamiya Maki turned to the first page.

Question one: write out the core tenets of the Will of Fire from memory.

Where leaves dance, fire burns on.

The standard answer.

Question two: in which battle did the Third Hokage use the Shuriken Shadow Clone Technique to turn the tide?

His pen paused.

He didn't seriously shoot the flying Ōnoki down with shuriken, did he?

After some thought, he wrote, "During the Second Shinobi World War, Lord Third encountered Iwagakure's main force at the Land of Rivers Border. He shot Ōnoki down with a single Shuriken Shadow Clone Technique, turning the tide of battle."

That was what the textbook said.

As for whether Ōnoki could fly, or whether shuriken could bring down an airborne enemy, those were problems for whoever wrote the question, not him.

Question three: briefly describe the mistakes the First Hokage made in his later years.

Distributing the tailed beasts to other shinobi villages.

Bowing his head to the other Kage for the sake of peace.

Failing to trust Tobirama's judgment.

He had seen the answers to all three questions in the textbook.

Each question was like a carefully honed knife, silently cutting apart historical truth and piecing it back together into the desired shape.

The First had distributed the tailed beasts to balance the villages' strength, an attempt to trade trust for peace. The textbook reduced that to "senility in his later years."

The Second's development of forbidden techniques, establishment of the Anbu, and improvements to the shinobi system received only a passing mention.

Yet the pages about the Third taking command in a crisis and saving the day were printed in darker ink than the other chapters.

History had always been written by whoever occupied the chair.

The remaining questions were much the same.

Praise the Third, disparage the First, and reduce the Will of Fire to absolute loyalty.

He thought as he answered.

Shinobi raised under this educational system had fixed values drilled into them repeatedly from the age of six.

Once they grew up, they would automatically act according to those values.

The Konoha Chivalry Code was merely one of its fruits.

Jiro Matsumoto had not been born a foul-mouthed troll.

This system had spewed him into existence.

The bell rang for the papers to be collected.

The proctor announced that the practical combat test would take place that afternoon.

Jiro Matsumoto was the first to rush out of the classroom, making sure to shoot Minato a "just you wait" look before leaving.

Minato kept smiling, as though nothing had happened.

Outside the classroom, Jiro Matsumoto was discussing tactics with a few lackeys.

One of them pointed toward Amamiya Maki. Jiro Matsumoto turned, swept his gaze between Amamiya Maki and Minato, and curled his lips into a provocative smile.

Amamiya Maki leaned back in his chair and watched that face.

Last time at the Orphanage, he had sent Fire Release skimming past this guy's father's nose, singeing a few hairs. Root had also broken up that "troublemaker marriage" with seven punches in a second.

And here he was again today.

Apparently, the Matsumoto family had poor memories.

The "Konoha Imperial Banner" mentality his father had instilled in him since childhood probably had not been shattered by reality yet.

That was fine. He did not mind throwing another stone.

"What, want to run your filthy mouth at me?"

Jiro Matsumoto's expression stiffened.

He apparently had never expected Amamiya Maki to speak first.

Every contingency he had prepared was aimed at Minato-Minato would not fight back, Minato would only stay silent, and Minato was an easy target.

But Amamiya Maki was not.

He understood these rules better than Jiro Matsumoto did-the first rule of the Konoha Chivalry Code: as a Konoha villager, you could pressure anyone you pleased.

And the third rule: if you were a civilian-born genius, you were a target for pressure.

He was neither a genius nor an easy target. He was an enforcer of the rules.

"Hmph! Don't think having a little talent means you can look down on everyone..."

"Wait, you actually count as a person? Is your mouth a septic tank? It stinks, and you keep spraying it everywhere. I still remember how your dad looked when Root beat him and chased him off outside the Orphanage. How do you still have the nerve to strut around school?"

Jiro Matsumoto's face instantly flushed red.

The students watching nearby froze for a moment, then began whispering among themselves-the news that a Root shinobi had sent Taro Matsumoto packing with one punch outside the Orphanage clearly had not reached the school yet.

"Y-you... what did you say?!"

"I'm talking about your dad. Couldn't keep the grocery store going, so he switched careers and became a punching bag. Root hit him seven times in one second, and he went scrambling out of the Orphanage. All your neighbors should know about it by now, right? What, he didn't tell you? Or did he tell you, and you refused to believe it?"

Amamiya Maki's tone was as flat as though he were reciting a textbook. "You just called Minato blondie and mocked him for having no parents-what about you? Your dad's such a useless piece of trash, and you still have the nerve to talk about other people?"

Jiro Matsumoto's mouth opened and closed. A few indistinct sounds escaped his throat, but he could not get a word out.

The lackeys beside him had already quietly taken half a step back.

The memory of being verbally torn to shreds at the Orphanage clearly had not faded. They did not want another round.

"If I were your dad, I'd have tossed you into a field the day you were born. Better to have given birth to a slab of roast pork than you."

[Detected that the host has inflicted psychological pressure on "Jiro Matsumoto."

Pressure points +8.

Obtained: Chakra Capacity Fragment ×1]

Jiro Matsumoto stood rooted to the spot, fists clenched so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

But he did not attack.

The lesson his father had received from that Root punch outside the Orphanage was clearly still working-if he attacked someone at school and they fought back, it would be self-defense. Even if they did not fight back, the teacher would hold him accountable.

Either way, he would lose out.

Amamiya Maki looked away.

He was now certain that, through the kindly admonishment and patient guidance of a Konoha troublemaker like himself, Jiro Matsumoto had been left speechless.

He patted Minato on the shoulder.

"Good luck this afternoon."

Minato looked up, his blond hair gleaming faintly in the late-morning sunlight.

"You too."

Looking at that brightly smiling face, Amamiya Maki silently considered the matchups for the afternoon's practical combat test.

With any luck, he might be paired with Jiro Matsumoto.

If that happened, he would not mind giving the boy another hands-on lesson in the Konoha Chivalry Code.

After all, under this code, he was merely a refined, easygoing Konoha villager.

What was wrong with putting a little pressure on a classmate? Perfectly reasonable.