If You Suck, Train Harder

Three days later, someone took the mission.

The person who accepted it was a middle-aged woman from the Senju Clan who introduced herself as Senju En.

A Konoha genin, she had spent twenty years as head nurse at Konoha Hospital.

Her gray-white hair was pinned up impeccably, and the fine lines on her face were more orderly than Konoha Hospital's medical records.

As she stood at the entrance to the Mission Hall verifying her clients' identities, she looked down at the mission slip in her hand.

Then she looked at the two children in front of her, whose combined ages probably fell short of her shoe size, and fell silent for a moment.

"You two posted this mission?"

"Yes, En."

Nonō folded her hands neatly in front of her and bowed at an impeccable angle.

Amamiya Maki stood beside her and nodded along.

He noticed that Senju En had tied her forehead protector tightly enough to leave a faint red mark on her forehead.

It wasn't for appearances. She was afraid it might slip down and block her vision during a mission.

Even after twenty years as head nurse at Konoha Hospital, she still maintained the habits of someone ready to rush out and save a life at any moment.

Senju En folded the mission slip and put it in her pocket, checking that no one else was nearby before speaking.

"Under Konoha's regulations, I cannot teach you any medical ninjutsu.

I can only teach you the most basic medical knowledge. That was clearly stated on the mission slip."

"We understand."

Amamiya Maki answered.

Senju En glanced at him.

The boy had answered too quickly, as though he had already memorized every word on the mission slip.

"Also, if I'm caught teaching ninjutsu, my head nurse's license will be revoked, and you'll both lose your eligibility to attend the Ninja Academy."

"Understood."

Amamiya Maki's expression didn't change.

Nonō nodded vigorously beside him.

Senju En stared at them for another two seconds, then sighed, as though mourning in advance the free time she was about to waste.

Still, there was nothing for it. Medical ninja were scarce, and children willing to pay to study on their own were rarer still.

"All right. Every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon, come find me in Exam Room Two by Konoha Hospital's back entrance. Don't be late. I won't wait."

Amamiya Maki and Nonō exchanged a glance and bowed together.

Senju En turned and took a few steps toward the hospital, then stopped again.

"Oh, right. Which of you wants to become a medical ninja?"

"She does."

Amamiya Maki pointed at Nonō.

"What about you?"

"I'm keeping her company. It's not like I have anything else to do."

The corner of Senju En's mouth twitched.

She didn't believe the boy was telling the truth.

But after twenty years as head nurse, she had seen enough children to know when to ask questions and when to keep her mouth shut.

You expect me to believe you just want to study? I can't even be bothered to call you out!

"See you Wednesday."

With that, she left at a brisk pace, her gray-white bun bobbing twice in the afternoon sunlight.

Their first lesson took place in a small examination room by Konoha Hospital's back entrance.

The room wasn't large. An examination bed stood against the wall, two half-dead pothos plants sat on the windowsill, and the air smelled of disinfectant mixed with old medical records.

Senju En brought over several introductory medical manuals, their covers worn and fraying.

"We'll start with the human meridian system. It's the foundation of all medical ninjutsu. You can't learn ninjutsu yet, but basic theory doesn't violate the rules.

Once you become full-fledged ninja, this foundation will be very useful."

Nonō opened her notebook and wrote the date on the first line.

Amamiya Maki opened his notebook too, drawing something on the first line that looked very much like a jellyfish but was actually a neuron.

Senju En glanced at the jellyfish and said nothing.

"Chakra starts in the dantian and travels throughout the body along the meridian system.

The twelve standard meridians and the eight extraordinary meridians-every one of them is a basic pathway a medical ninja needs to know."

She placed a finger on Nonō's open notebook and traced the line the girl had just drawn.

"The essence of the Hemostasis Technique is precisely infusing chakra into the meridian nodes around a damaged blood vessel, using its activity to stimulate the vessel's smooth muscle into contracting."

"You don't just splash chakra onto a wound. Remember, the more you pour on, the faster the tissue dies."

Nonō's eyes shone with astonishing brightness, and her pen never stopped.

"If several meridians intersect around the wound, which one should we stimulate first?"

Senju En's hand froze in midair.

She turned her head and, for the first time, took a serious look at the little blond girl.

"Which book did you learn about intersecting meridians from?"

Nonō named the book: chapter seven, section three of An Overview of the Human Meridian and Chakra Circulation Systems, which she had borrowed from the Konoha Library last time.

Senju En fell silent for a second.

That was a section only medical ninja of chunin rank or higher would read, and the girl before her was only six.

"Prioritize the main meridian governing that region."

She spoke a fraction slower than usual.

"But if a branch meridian is damaged, you need to provide supplementary stimulation at the same time.

Otherwise, contraction in the main meridian will transfer the chakra pressure to the branch and cause secondary bleeding instead."

Nonō wrote down every word.

Amamiya Maki took notes too.

He wrote: main meridian first, branches second, don't splash chakra onto wounds.

Over the next few lessons, Senju En's enthusiasm for teaching noticeably jumped several notches.

How to prepare poisons, identify a toxin within thirty seconds of poisoning and mix a makeshift antidote, and use the most basic herbs to suppress wound infections in the wilderness.

As long as it didn't violate Konoha's regulations, she held almost nothing back.

Nonō absorbed nearly everything she taught.

Whenever Nonō grasped a point immediately and applied it to other situations, Senju En wore an extremely restrained expression, the corners of her mouth lifting by mere fractions of a millimeter.

Amamiya Maki recognized that expression.

It was a blend of "teaching you feels amazing" and "I was praised like this once too, so I know how happy you are right now, but I can't let you see it."

As for Amamiya Maki, Senju En's assessment was: "Passable practical skills, barely keeps up with theory, and talent entirely in line with what you'd expect from an orphan."

In short: if you suck, train harder.

She had been organizing her teaching notes when she said it, her tone as flat as if she were reading a diagnosis from a medical chart.

Amamiya Maki had no objections.

He hadn't come to become a medical prodigy in the first place. He was here to farm fragments.

The more outstanding Nonō's talent proved, the more willing Senju En would be to teach, and the more benefits he would later gain from Yakushi Nonō.

If Yakushi Nonō became Tsunade's apprentice, he might even get to cling to Tsunade's pale... thighs.

And honestly, his talent really did meet the standard for an orphan.

His chakra control was barely at the beginner level, and he relied entirely on rote memorization for medical theory.

His only noteworthy skill was boiling water with the Fireball Technique, which was about twenty seconds faster than the normal method.

But he had his own path.

Every day after school, Amamiya Maki put in extra taijutsu practice at the Training Ground.

Minato was there too.

Ever since he had witnessed Amamiya Maki and Nonō going in and out of the hospital every day carrying medical books thicker than bricks.

Minato Namikaze had doubled his training load.

Up at five in the morning, ten laps around the Training Ground, kunai throwing, the Clone Technique, chakra control-every exercise was scheduled down to the minute.

During a break that day, Minato turned around from the front row, his gaze settling on the two seats beside the window at the back.

Amamiya Maki and Nonō each had a medical manual open in front of them, its pages covered in meridian diagrams and poison formulas.

Nonō read while writing and sketching in her notebook. Amamiya Maki leaned back in his chair, occasionally turning a page or offering a comment or two on her notes.

They were learning real medical knowledge.

Not the common-sense advice taught at the Ninja Academy, like "remember to find a medical ninja if you're injured," but poison preparation, emergency wound treatment, and maps of the meridian system.

Minato's fingers tightened slightly around his pen.

He hadn't even fully mastered chakra nature transformation, yet those two children his own age were already learning to identify toxins within thirty seconds.

He turned back to his textbook, but spent the entire ten-minute break staring at the same page without moving past a single word.

No. I can't fall behind.

So he doubled his training load again.

Senju En taught them for nearly two months.

At their final lesson, she put away the two manuals, then called Nonō outside the examination room alone.

Amamiya Maki remained inside to organize the teaching notes. Through the half-open door, he heard Senju En say a few things to Nonō in a very low voice.

When Nonō returned, her eyes were a little red, but the corners of her mouth were lifted.

"What did she say?"

"She said I was the second-best student she'd ever seen."

"Who was the best?"

"Lady Tsunade."

Amamiya Maki folded the notes, slipped them into his pocket, and fell silent for a moment.

"That's pretty good, then. Nothing to be ashamed of."

The two walked side by side out of Konoha Hospital's back entrance.

The sunset outside stretched their shadows long and thin, like two saplings that had yet to grow.

Holding the medical manual she had spent two months leafing through, Nonō turned her head to glance at Amamiya Maki.

"Maki, why did you study medical ninjutsu with me?"

"Because the Shinobi World is dangerous."

Amamiya Maki slipped both hands into his pockets and looked toward Minato, who was still putting in extra practice at the distant Training Ground. That golden figure ran lap after lap beneath the setting sun, as though he would never stop.

"Learning medical ninjutsu won't make me stronger, but it can help me live a little longer.

And you have what it takes. I just happen to be standing beside you."

Nonō lowered her head, the ends of her blond hair falling onto the pages.

She wanted to say something, but in the end, she only hugged the book a little tighter.

Meanwhile, at the Training Ground, Minato Namikaze was doing his hundredth push-up.

His arms ached so badly he could barely lift them, and sweat dripped from his forehead into the dirt, leaving tiny circles on the dry ground.

But this was the only way Minato could find peace of mind.

Otherwise, all that awaited him was being left far behind!

When he had passed the classroom earlier, he had seen those two medical manuals again. They were several pages thicker than last week.

He quickly did the math in his head.