When Naruto entered the classroom, everyone turned to look at him.
After all, Naruto was fairly well known throughout Konoha.
Naruto ignored their stares and scanned the seats below, soon spotting a pair of empty seats.
Without waiting for Iruka's permission, Naruto led Hinata over and sat down.
Hinata blushed as Naruto pulled her along, but she did not resist and simply sat beside him.
Seeing this, Iruka could only sigh helplessly, thinking, Lord Third really has saddled me with a troublesome job...
Just as Iruka thought of the Third Hokage, he appeared at the classroom door.
In fact, the Third Hokage gave a speech every year when new students entered the Ninja Academy.
But today... he had been late because he was working through a game guide under a time limit, so he could only wait until all the students had entered their classrooms, then make the rounds one classroom at a time.
Many of the students were excited to see the Third Hokage.
As Konoha's Hokage, the Third naturally could not stroll through the streets all that often.
And what was the Hokage? The strongest person in Konoha, its guardian deity.
On top of that, the Third Hokage had always worked to polish his image in the villagers' minds. Almost all the children from civilian families in Konoha admired him, whereas they had little impression of the First or the Second.
They only knew that the First had founded Konoha. What had the Second done? The Fourth had sealed the Nine-Tails and protected all of Konoha. As for the Third? He was the strongest Hokage in history... that title alone was enough to make everyone remember him.
Seeing the children's admiring gazes, the Third nodded inwardly.
Then he looked toward Naruto in the back row and saw him pulling a laptop from his backpack while chatting with Hinata, leaving the Third speechless.
Ignoring Naruto, the Third Hokage began his speech.
The content was the same as every year, nothing more than the Will of Fire and the like.
Still, the Third's speeches about the Will of Fire always managed to stir the children's passion.
After finishing his speech, the Third left for the next classroom to give another.
After the Third left, Iruka began his lesson.
Naturally, before starting class properly, he introduced himself.
"Hello, everyone. My name is Umino Iruka. You can call me Iruka-sensei."
"For the next five years, I'll be your homeroom teacher."
"To help me get to know you all better, please introduce yourselves!"
"As your teacher, I'll go first."
"My name is Umino Iruka. I like Ichiraku Ramen, dislike mixed rice, and my birthday is May twenty-sixth. My hobbies are..."
Iruka rambled on at length.
But when it was the students' turn to introduce themselves, they were much shyer.
When Naruto's turn came, he stood up and said, "My name is Naruto Uzumaki. There are lots of things I like and quite a few things I dislike. My dream is world peace."
Naruto's introduction left everyone somewhat speechless. He might as well have said nothing at all.
Once the introductions were finished, the actual lesson began.
Meanwhile, Naruto opened his computer and began his adventure in slacking off and gaming during class.
Back when he had attended school in his previous life, Naruto had never experienced playing games at his desk while the teacher lectured at the front.
Today, however, he finally experienced it for himself. It really did feel much better than sleeping through class.
In fact, Naruto was not the only one slacking off. Shikamaru, Ino, Kiba, and the others sitting in the back were doing the same.
The reason was simple: Iruka's lessons were far too basic. For children from ninja clans like them, these fundamentals were things they had learned long ago.
Although Naruto did not come from a ninja clan, the Third had given him plenty of private instruction.
By now, Naruto had learned the Three Basic Techniques, the Shadow Clone Technique, Wind Release: Great Breakthrough, and Wind Release: Vacuum Sphere.
Recently, Naruto had also been teaching himself how to form that spinning ball.
With his Six Powers Taijutsu added to the mix, Naruto could easily graduate early and even become a Chunin.
So... sitting here learning ninja fundamentals with a bunch of little kids really was pointless. Playing games was a much better use of his time.
Naruto turned on his computer and immediately started a match of League of Legends.
"Naruto... what's that?"
Hinata asked softly as she looked at the laptop.
"This...? It's called a computer, and what I'm playing is a game! Want to try?"
Hinata grew a little shy at Naruto's question.
She actually wanted to say yes. She wanted to try whatever Naruto was playing, too, but... she could not quite bring herself to say it.
Seeing this, Naruto smiled. "Tomorrow, I'll bring two computers. Then we can play together!"
"Okay!" Hinata nodded, then continued watching Naruto play.
To avoid disturbing the other students during class, Naruto wore headphones while gaming. Even with the headphones on, however, his focused expression piqued quite a few people's curiosity.
The first to act was Kiba Inuzuka, the most curious and restless of them all.
Like Naruto, Kiba Inuzuka sat in the back row.
Holding Akamaru in his arms, he inched toward Naruto's seat.
Before long, he could see the images on the screen in front of Naruto.
Games were incredibly appealing to young people. After watching for only a short while, Kiba was already hooked.
Seeing what Kiba was doing, Shikamaru and Choji quietly moved behind Naruto as well and began watching him play.
A few minutes later, the aloof Sasuke moved a little closer to Naruto from behind, as though it were purely incidental, and quietly watched with interest too.
As Iruka taught, he noticed several students quickly gathering around Naruto, and dark lines creased his forehead.
Iruka knew that these children from ninja clans did not really need his instruction, but... even if they were not going to study, they could not disrupt everyone else...
With several students gathered in the back, many of the civilian students sitting at the front kept turning to look, seriously disrupting the pace of Iruka's lesson.
"Shikamaru, Choji, Sasuke, Kiba, Naruto, get outside!"
As Iruka exploded, his head instantly swelled, and he roared at Naruto and the others.
As for Hinata and Ino, who were also watching Naruto play? They were girls, so surely the boys had led them astray. Standing outside as punishment naturally had nothing to do with them.
Hearing Iruka's words, Naruto nodded, picked up his computer, and headed outside.
Iruka was a good guy, and Naruto was willing to show him some respect.
Besides, playing games in the back row really was too conspicuous and had drawn too many people over.
So... Naruto decided to bring a few more computers. Then Shikamaru, Sasuke, Choji, Kiba, and Naruto himself could each have one, making a full five-player premade team.
Before you continue