For the first time in his life, Naruto stood in the Hokage's office as the one being reported. And it was not going well.
"WHAT PART OF 'STAY IN THE VILLAGE' WAS UNCLEAR?!"
Tsunade's voice shook the room, the windows rattling as she leaned over her desk, knuckles white. Papers trembled. The scent of sake still lingered in the air.
Naruto stood straight, hands behind his head, smiling awkwardly as if this were just another lecture.
Even Jiraiya, standing to the side, didn't meet Naruto's eyes.
"I'm disappointed in you, " Jiraiya said seriously. "You ran straight into an Akatsuki confrontation."
Naruto scratched his cheek. "Yeah… but it worked out, right?"
That earned him another glare.
"YOU ARE BANNED FROM MISSIONS FOR A WHOLE MONTH, YOUNG MAN!" Tsunade roared. "Do I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?!"
Naruto opened his mouth—
Before he could answer, Asuma stepped forward.
"With respect, Lady Hokage," he said calmly, "he did break protocol. But if he hadn't come, we wouldn't be standing here."
Kotetsu nodded. "He saved us."
Izumo added, "More than once."
More shinobi spoke up. Even Shikamaru, arms crossed, sighed.
"…Troublesome as it is, he made the right calls."
Tsunade and Jiraiya both blinked. They hadn't expected this many people to back him.
Tsunade pinched the bridge of her nose and turned to Jiraiya, exhaling slowly.
"…Fine."
Naruto perked up.
"No missions for one week," she continued, "and I'm cutting your allowance by 50% for two months. No more ramen binges."
Naruto's face went pale.
"NO—YOU CAN'T DO THIS TO ME!" he shouted. "Please! At least make it 30%!"
The room went quiet. Tsunade stared at him. Then sighed.
"…Thirty percent."
Naruto's eyes lit up. "YES!"
'I don't know why,' Tsunade thought irritably, 'but I just can't say no to this kid.'
The shinobi behind Naruto cheered quietly, clapping him on the back. Jiraiya watched from the side with a proud, amused smile.
Then—
Everyone froze.
Tsunade's killing intent flooded the room.
"Permission to be dismissed, Madam Hokage!" they all shouted at once.
"Dismissed."
They vanished in a flurry of shunshin—everyone except Naruto. The door closed. Silence.
Tsunade leaned back in her chair, folding her arms.
"So, Naruto," she said calmly, "what really made you leave with them?"
Jiraiya stepped forward, serious again.
"I know you're reckless, kid—but you're not stupid enough to walk into Akatsuki without a reason."
Naruto opened his mouth to answer— And vanished.
BOOM!
Tsunade slammed her fist into the desk. The wood split cleanly down the middle.
Jiraiya burst out laughing.
"…He used Flying Raijin, didn't he?" he said, realization dawning.
Tsunade glared at him.
"What."
"Nothing," Jiraiya said quickly—then vanished in a puff of smoke.
Tsunade leaned back, rubbing her temples as the ruined desk collapsed completely. She exhaled heavily.
'I need to gamble this stress away,' she thought. The Hokage's office fell silent once more.
Back in his apartment, the door shut with a soft click behind Naruto.
The place was quiet in a way he wasn't used to—not the peaceful kind, but the hollow kind. The faint drip of a leaky tap echoed from the kitchen. Rain tapped lazily against the window, tracing thin lines down the glass. The smell of damp fabric and old wood hung in the air.
Naruto dropped onto the chair at his small table and set the pouch down carefully, as if it might explode if handled wrong.
He untied it.
Coins spilled out first, then folded notes—far more than he'd ever held at once. Naruto stared for a moment before instinct kicked in, hands moving as he began to count. He stacked bills into neat piles, lining them up with surprising precision.
One thousand.
Two.
Five.
When he finished, he leaned back slightly.
"…Ten thousand."
A clean ten thousand ryō.
For someone who'd grown up rationing ramen cups, it felt unreal. His chest tightened—not excitement exactly, but something heavier. This money had weight. It smelled faintly of blood and smoke.
He exhaled slowly. Then he noticed something else. Nestled at the bottom of the pouch, half-hidden beneath the lining, was a seal tag.
Naruto picked it up, brows knitting together.
It wasn't flashy. No ominous glow. Just a carefully drawn seal array inked onto reinforced paper, dense with interlocking symbols that curved in on themselves. The chakra embedded in it was faint but unmistakably stable—old, practiced work.
"…Of course," Naruto muttered.
He turned it over, inspecting the edges, running a finger close without touching the center.
'He probably sealed the rest of his money in here.'
Which meant there was more. Not just a little more—likely a lot more. Naruto leaned forward, elbows on the table, eyes fixed on the seal.
'So how the hell am I supposed to open this?'
He knew better than to poke it blindly. Seals weren't like jutsu—you didn't brute-force them. They were rules written into reality. Break the rules wrong, and the punishment wasn't chakra exhaustion.
It was dismemberment. Or explosions. Or worse.
And that was the problem. Naruto didn't know seals. Not really, except for his Flying Raijin
The Anime barely touched fuinjutsu beyond emergency tags and storage basics. The seals they actually showed were either forbidden or locked behind clan secrets.
He frowned.
'Funny,' he thought bitterly. 'For a world that uses seals in almost everything. Kishimoto never really thought to explain them, even a bit'
He wasn't ungrateful. Ten thousand was already life-changing. Rent, food, supplies—he could breathe for a while.
But the seal sat there like a challenge. Like unfinished business.
Naruto sighed and tossed the pouch back onto the table. It landed with a soft, heavy thud.
"Later," he muttered.
He pushed back from the table and stood, stretching his arms overhead as his bones popped. The fatigue finally caught up to him—not physical exhaustion, but the deep mental kind that followed killing someone, arguing with the Hokage, and bending space itself to escape a lecture.
'Guess I'm heading to the library.'
The idea didn't excite him. Dusty shelves. Old men giving him looks. Scrolls written like puzzles inside riddles.
But if there was even a chance of learning how to open that seal safely—
Naruto glanced back at the pouch.
—it was worth it.
He grabbed his jacket, flipped off the light, and stepped back out into the village night, the unanswered secrets of Kakuzu's seal waiting patiently behind him.
TO BE CONTINUED