Chương 80: Setting the Tone and the Written Trial

The moment Koharu Utatane's voice trailed off, her three lifelong companions turned their gazes toward her in a synchronized stare of disbelief. They looked at her as if she had suddenly sprouted a second head. The purpose of this private audience with Dongye Zhen was simple: to witness firsthand the unique ninjutsu of a homegrown prodigy and to eliminate a few improbable theories. It was an evaluation, not an interrogation.

Had there been any genuine suspicion of treason, the Anbu's Interrogation and Torture Force would have already been peeling back the layers of the boy's mind long before the high command ever graced him with their presence. Realizing the absurdity of her own suggestion, the elder Councilor quickly retreated.

"That was a lapse in judgment. Seeing the mechanical similarities between the two techniques made me overthink for a moment." Hiruzen Sarutobi exhaled a thin, disinterested stream of smoke.

"The world is teeming with ninjutsu; similarities are an inevitability. My clan excels in Fire Release, many of which mirror the Uchiha's own techniques. Does that imply a clandestine bloodline connection? If I were to conceptualize a defensive chakra art, I might well arrive at the same logic this child did. Would that make me an agent of the Sand?" He leaned back, his eyes narrowing slightly.

"Furthermore, Chiyo's Chakra Shield is fundamentally a sealing art. Zhen's techniques are the opposite—sealing is merely the skeletal framework for advanced nature transformation." Danzo Shimura, the "Shinobi of Darkness," found the taste of the situation increasingly sour. As the decades piled up, his disdain for his peers grew in tandem with his ambition. Not only did they reject his pragmatism, but their very instincts seemed to be rotting.

"You're becoming senile, Koharu," Danzo scoffed.

"Would you hand a sleeper agent the keys to a village's proprietary high-level ninjutsu? The fact that the Higashino brat developed these arts himself proves his genius, but more importantly, it proves he's had no contact with the Sand. If I found such a specimen in a rival village, I would either abduct him immediately or kill him to prevent a future catastrophe. I certainly wouldn't invest in his development." Hiruzen, Homura, and Koharu all pivoted their gazes to Danzo. Was anyone surprised?

Not in the slightest. This was the quintessence of Danzo's worldview. In fact, most intelligence heads in the Five Great Nations likely operated on the same grim frequency. Mito Homura, who had remained silent until now, finally spoke.

"The boy has demonstrated an unparalleled talent for creation. Whether it is these defensive arts, his Shadowless Sword, the Wind Finger Gun, or his sensory capabilities, the boy is a marvel. But more importantly, his devotion to the village is absolute. He offers up these secrets without hesitation, all for the sake of the Leaf's strength." Danzo looked at him with naked contempt.

"Homura, you haven't seen a real battlefield in years. Your eyes have grown dull. Did you miss the most vital detail? Beyond the efficiency of the design, these arts demand a level of shape and nature transformation so precise it borders on the sadistic. I ask you: even if these scrolls were public, how many could actually master them? Could you?" Homura went silent, opting to share a quiet, shamed corner of the room with Koharu. Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

Hiruzen took a deep drag of his pipe, feeling a familiar pang of weariness. His old teammates were losing the keen edge of their shinobi intuition, buried under mountains of paperwork and civil administration. Finally, he set the tone for the matter.

"Enough. This conversation is over. Zhen is an indispensable asset to the Leaf—the crowning achievement of our educational system after Minato and Kakashi. I do not wish to hear another whisper of suspicion regarding his loyalty. Is that understood?" The three elders offered a silent, begrudging nod. Behind his closed eye, Danzo felt a flicker of annoyance. A genius of this caliber was wasted on Hiruzen. Unfortunately, Dongye Zhen was not "Root" material.

The boy's heart was devoid of the necessary darkness; he was intoxicated by Hiruzen's "Will of Fire," making him impossible to tether. If Zhen was off the table, perhaps Kakashi Hatake would be more pliable. The boy's recent tragedies were dragging him toward the abyss. It was time, Danzo decided, to see if he could harvest a few secrets from the White Fang's son. The following morning, Dongye Zhen arrived at the examination hall with a sense of genuine curiosity.

There was a certain nostalgic tang in the air, a high-stakes tension that reminded him of the college entrance exams in his previous life. It was a refreshing change of pace. The hall was nearly at capacity. It was a purely internal affair, populated by Konoha's Genin. There were twenty-five teams and two solo entrants—Zhen and Shisui—totaling seventy-seven candidates. The sheer volume of examinees was a direct byproduct of the war-time recruitment drive.

Zhen recognized only a handful of faces—mostly peers who had graduated in his year but hadn't accrued enough battlefield merit for a field promotion. Those he was actually familiar with—Hayate, Yugao, Muta Aburame, and Meiko Inuzuka—had already been fast-tracked to Chunin. Only he and Shisui had been "specially invited" to jump through these bureaucratic hoops. The green Genin in the room were visible perturbed by Zhen's presence. To them, he wasn't a peer; he was a catastrophe designed to ruin their curve.

Shisui Uchiha looked the most surprised of all, though he quickly recalled the aftermath of the Eastern Front and connected the dots. Zhen offered him a casual wave before turning his attention to the demographic makeup of the room. It was a study in polarization. You were either a ten-year-old prodigy or a grizzled veteran whose hair was already beginning to silver. There were men in the room who had spent decades as Genin, their faces etched with the desperation of a final gamble.

For them, "Chunin" wasn't just a rank; it was a lifelong obsession. These were the "laborers" of the shinobi world. With limited talent and meager prospects, they existed in the safe, low-level bracket of D-rank and C-rank missions. They were less "legendary mercenaries" and more "chakra-enhanced handymen." The village's primary request of them was simple: marry early, have children, and hope that your genes might produce a seed of true genius in the next generation.

A few minutes after Zhen took his seat, the first phase—the written exam—commenced. Proctors distributed the papers with clinical efficiency. Unlike the legendary exams of the future, there were fewer proctors here, but their gaze was no less piercing. The passing requirement was scrawled across the chalkboard in stark, white strokes: All three members of a team must correctly answer at least eight questions. If a single member fails to meet the threshold, the entire team is disqualified.

Zhen scanned the ten questions. Half were standard curriculum—accessible to anyone who hadn't slept through the Academy. The other five, however, were wildly advanced. They dealt with concepts far beyond the expected knowledge of a Genin. A realization dawned on him. If you wanted to pass, you couldn't rely on your own brain. You had to find another way. This wasn't an academic test. It was an exercise in intelligence gathering.

In the world of the shinobi, "cheating" was just a clumsy word for "surreptitious data acquisition." As long as your methods weren't crude enough to be caught, the truth was whatever you could steal.