"Goten! Goten!"
A flurry of hurried footsteps approached.
Naruto Uzumaki slipped out of the alley, hunched over like a thief.
He glanced around a couple of times, confirmed no one was paying attention to them, then leaned close to Son Goten's ear.
"I found a great place."
Naruto waggled his eyebrows, the six whisker marks on his face trembling.
Son Goten lazily lifted his eyelids and glanced at him.
"Better than Ichiraku Ramen? Is there free meat, or those really expensive desserts?"
"Come on, it's not food!"
Naruto scratched at his head in agitation, leaned a little closer, and said mysteriously, "It's somewhere you can relax and see... ahem, see the 'World Truth.'"
Son Goten's ears twitched.
World Truth?
That sounded familiar.
When he had said he wanted to pull Haku's pants off to verify the truth last time, he seemed to have felt much the same.
"You're going too?" Son Goten looked Naruto up and down. "Don't you like that pink-haired Sakura? What, have you fallen for someone else?"
"Shh! Keep it down!"
Naruto clapped a hand over Son Goten's mouth, his face turning bright red. "This is training! Kakashi-sensei said ninjas have to be good at observing their surroundings and gathering intelligence! I'm going to gather intelligence!"
"Tch."
Son Goten pushed Naruto's hand away, his face full of disdain.
"Just say you want to look at pretty girls. Gathering intelligence, my foot. Naruto, you're such a hypocrite."
Son Goten straightened up, dusted off his backside, and pointed at Naruto with righteous indignation.
"That behavior is sleazy! It's vulgar! As Team 7's ace, I, Son Goten, have always been upright and honorable."
"If you want to look, walk straight through the front door and look openly! Hiding in a corner and sneaking around is what weaklings do!"
Naruto stood bewildered by the lecture and scratched his head. "But... wouldn't we get beaten to death if we went through the front door?"
"Then run faster."
Son Goten said it as though it were only natural.
"I'm not going. Go by yourself if you want."
Five minutes later.
On the roof of Konoha's public bathhouse, at the boundary between the men's and women's baths.
Two small figures lay against the tiles.
"So this is what you meant by 'not going'?" Naruto lay beside Son Goten, looking at him with a twitching mouth.
"Shut up."
Son Goten clung to the tiles like a gecko, keeping his voice extremely low.
"I'm here to supervise you and keep you from heading down the path of crime. Besides..."
He closed his eyes, his nonexistent tail seeming to sway gently in the air.
"This is a kind of training too."
His ki perception spread out instantly.
In this world, most ninjas relied on chakra perception, or their sight and hearing.
But Son Goten's ki was a radar for life energy.
Even through thick walls and rising steam, he could clearly "see" everyone's positions inside, and even outline their curves based on the strength and shape of their ki.
He didn't need his eyes.
Sometimes, the mind's eye was more direct than physical sight.
"Whoa... so many people..." Naruto pressed his face against a gap between the tiles, trying to find an opening with his naked eyes, nearly drooling.
Just then.
Creak.
The faint scrape of a roof tile came from behind them.
Someone was there!
Son Goten instantly suppressed his entire presence.
This was the lifesaving skill he had learned on Blue Planet-suppressing his power level to nearly zero. Even a top sensory ninja would take him for a rock right now.
A tall, burly figure was climbing onto the roof on all fours.
It was a white-haired middle-aged man carrying an enormous scroll on his back, wearing an extremely lecherous grin as he prepared to approach the vent above the women's bath.
Jiraiya was in a very good mood.
He had just returned to Konoha, and gathering material was a must.
Sales of Icha Icha Paradise had dipped a little lately, and he urgently needed fresh inspiration to catch his readers' attention.
"Hehehe... Konoha's hot springs really do bring back memories..."
Jiraiya rubbed his hands together, about to lie down.
Suddenly, he met a pair of dead-fish eyes.
Son Goten lay on the tiles with his head turned, looking expressionlessly at the big fellow who had suddenly appeared.
Naruto was startled too and nearly cried out, but Son Goten clamped a hand down on his head.
The standoff lasted three seconds.
Jiraiya stared wide-eyed at the black-haired kid before him.
How was this possible?
He was one of the legendary Sannin!
The Toad Sage of Mount Myōboku!
Even a Kage Level fighter couldn't get within two meters of him without his noticing!
If this kid hadn't turned his head just now, he wouldn't even have noticed two people lying here!
"Completely concealing his presence?"
Jiraiya was astonished.
There wasn't the slightest chakra fluctuation coming from this kid. His breathing was almost synchronized with the wind, and his heartbeat was too faint to hear.
What level of Stealth Technique was this?
Jiraiya looked into Son Goten's clear eyes, which held a hint of curiosity, and instantly overturned his conclusion.
He was a born peeping prodigy!
"Hey, mister."
Son Goten broke the silence.
He frowned, looking at Jiraiya with undisguised distaste.
"You're breathing too loudly."
"Huh?" Jiraiya froze.
"You sound like busted bellows, huffing and puffing." Son Goten pointed at Jiraiya's nose. "And when you climbed up just now, you put the wrong amount of pressure on the tiles with your toes. Three grams too much, which made the tiles scrape at four hundred hertz."
"Plus, you smell way too strong. That oily stink could carry a mile upwind."
Son Goten sat up cross-legged, looking like a school disciplinarian disappointed in a hopeless pupil.
"Completely unprofessional."
"Doing that will disturb the girls bathing inside."
"If you startle them, put them in a bad mood, and make their skin tighten, we won't get to see them at their best."
Son Goten shook his head and sighed.
"Adults these days don't even have the basics down, yet they come out to peep... gather material?"
Jiraiya's mouth fell open, his jaw nearly punching through the roof.
He was being lectured?
He, the great Pervy Sage, the founding father of peeping, was being lectured on professional technique by a ten-year-old brat?
"Kid! What do you know!"
Jiraiya lowered his voice and argued, his face and neck flushed red. "I'm doing this for art! For literature! Besides, my Stealth Technique is among the best in the Shinobi World!"
"The best, my ass."
Son Goten rolled his eyes.
"Didn't your left foot step on a loose tile just now? To keep it from making a sound, you forcibly held it in place with chakra, but that let a little chakra fluctuation leak out."
"To the Jonin inside, that fluctuation is as obvious as a searchlight in the dark."
Son Goten laid it all out convincingly.
Sweat broke out on Jiraiya's forehead.
Every word was right!
Who exactly was this kid?
Even he had only realized that tiny mistake afterward, yet this kid had seen it all clearly from right beside him?
"Then... what do you think I should do?" Jiraiya asked before he knew it, his tone actually carrying a touch of humble eagerness to learn.
Beside them, Naruto's eyes nearly popped out of his head.
This impressive-looking guy was actually asking Goten for advice?
"Watch closely."
Son Goten raised one finger.
"First, blend into your surroundings."
The instant he finished speaking, Son Goten suddenly "disappeared."
It wasn't an invisibility technique.
He was there, yet he seemed to have become a roof tile, a wisp of wind, a patch of air.
Jiraiya rubbed his eyes. If he couldn't still see him with his naked eyes, this person wouldn't have existed in his perception at all.
"Is this... Unity of Heaven and Man?" Jiraiya swallowed.
"Second, don't look with your eyes."
With his eyes closed, Son Goten lightly tapped the air with his finger.
"Listen with your 'heart.'"
"Third compartment on the left, water temperature forty-two degrees. A girl with a great figure is splashing water over herself. Listen to the water striking her skin... so springy."
"By the window on the right, two people are chatting."
Son Goten smiled smugly.
"It's Anko and Kurenai."
"Anko's complaining that she's had too many missions lately and no time to eat dumplings. Kurenai's laughing at her, saying if she keeps eating, she'll get too fat to fit into her fishnet outfit."
Jiraiya listened in a daze.
Was that really true?
He could even hear that?
The water was so loud over there. Did this kid have supernatural hearing?
"I don't believe it!"
Jiraiya gritted his teeth. He couldn't accept losing to a brat in his own specialty.
He immediately crawled two steps forward and leaned toward the largest vent, wanting to verify it himself.
"Idiot, don't move!" Son Goten's expression sharpened, and he reached out to grab him.
Too late.
Jiraiya's enormous body had only just leaned over, and he hadn't yet managed to make out the scenery inside.
A surge of killing intent shot skyward.
"Who's there?!"
It was Mitaraishi Anko's voice.
Immediately afterward, a yellow object shot out of the vent like a shuriken, whistling through the air.
It was as fast as lightning.
And it was wrapped in violent chakra.
Smack!
A crisp impact rang out.
The bar of soap struck Jiraiya squarely on the forehead and shattered into powder.
"Ow!"
Jiraiya cried out in pain and toppled backward, clutching his forehead.
"You filthy old pervert, again! I knew you were nearby!"
Anko's furious roar made the roof tiles rattle. "Fire Style: Great Fireball Technique!"
Boom!
A scorching blast of air surged out through the vent.
"Run!"
Son Goten reacted extremely quickly. Grabbing the still-dazed Naruto with one hand, he pushed off with his feet and instantly vanished in a blur.
"Hey! Kid! Don't leave me behind!"
Jiraiya scrambled to his feet, flames already licking at his backside.
As he swatted at the fire on his rear, he looked in the direction Son Goten had disappeared, his eyes lighting up.
"What incredible Body Flicker Technique speed... and that terrifying perception."
"This kid... is a diamond in the rough!"
Ignoring the large bump on his forehead, Jiraiya broke into a broad grin.
"That settles it. I'm taking him as my student!"
Before you continue