The days of being a puppeteer in Konoha

Chapter 50 Kushina's Decision
After finishing her meal, Kushina quickly picked up the pocket puppetmon again.

Minato, who was cleaning up the dishes, saw this and pretended to be calm, but in fact his movements gradually accelerated.

Kushina seemed to have noticed this as well, and gave Minato a sweet smile—

Then she dismantled the pocket puppet beast...

Minato's expression froze when he saw this, and then he felt a little amused.

It seemed that Kushina would not fight him again before she had enjoyed the afterglow of victory.

Minato, who had given up on this idea, came forward after washing the dishes and started studying with Kushina.

They thought that it would be quite difficult to disassemble a puppet beast with such an ingenious design.

Unexpectedly, the reality was just the opposite. With the help of the instruction manual, the two quickly disassembled it into its components.

It seems as if Hideki deliberately designed it into a structure that is easy to disassemble.

But the two of them still couldn't figure it out.

Because this puppet beast is not easy to damage, it seems unnecessary to disassemble it repeatedly...

However, the two did not think much about it, because Kushina had already disassembled the key components of the Puppetmon and found the core with the key rune ritual circuit drawn.

The core is a black wooden cube slightly larger than a dice and looks seemingly ordinary.

But when Kushina picked up the cube and examined it carefully, her brows gradually furrowed.

Minato knew that this was Kushina's subconscious action when she encountered difficulties.

——For example, when thinking about what to eat for dinner...

"What's wrong, Kushina?"

Seeing that Kushina didn't respond for a long time, Minato had to take the initiative to ask about the situation.

Kushina then woke up from her dream, and then her expression became a little strange.

"Minato, you'll know once you see it."

With that, she handed the cube to Minato.

Minato didn't dare to be careless since Kushina behaved like this. He took the cube and observed it carefully.

But he didn't expect that the first sight he got close to was such a critical hit to him!
Because Minato suddenly discovered that the wood was not originally black, but was painted with countless tiny and dense runes, so from a distance it looked like a black square...

"This...this rune is so small, and there are too many of them, right?"

Minato couldn't help but exclaim.

You must know that in order for the rune formula of sealing to run smoothly, it must be drawn in one go, and there must not be any mistakes.

Therefore, the artist will generally try to reduce the number of runes through various algorithms and techniques to reduce the difficulty of drawing and the chance of error.

However, the densely packed rune circuits before his eyes were completely contrary to the theories of his predecessors!

Minato couldn't help but recall that Hideki once said that he was a layman in sealing techniques.

He thought Hideki was being modest, but he didn't expect this to be the truth.

is not that right?

Forget about going outside the door, you have already embarked on a completely different path from your predecessors in the sealing technique!
After complaining about Hideki in his mind, Minato made a guess:
“Is this the puppeteer’s unique way of drawing runes?”

Unfortunately, Kushina quickly rejected it:

"Mito-san showed me several kinds of puppets before, but none of them were like this..."

"And to achieve this level, one must have extremely precise chakra control, which is not something an ordinary puppeteer can do..."

"Hideki is not an ordinary puppeteer. He has mastered the art of puppetry through self-study and is the only puppeteer in Konoha."

Minato smiled, then became a little confused.

"But with such impressive accomplishments, why does Hideki say that his sealing skills are poor?"

Kushina seemed to be unable to hold back after hearing this, and she covered her mouth and asked Minato to take a look at the specific contents of the cube before speaking.

Minato was a little confused, but he did as he was told.

He began to open his eyes wide to identify the tiny runes that were smaller than ants one by one, and then his expression gradually became as strange as Kushina's...

"Ah this..."

Minato didn't know how to describe his feelings for a moment.

It's like seeing a piece of calligraphy that looks like it was written by a famous calligrapher, but when you want to take a closer look, you realize it's actually a composition written by an elementary school student...

Because the blocks were filled with the most basic and simple rune spells, and there were many rigid, redundant and repetitive places, Minato could think of a better way to express it with just a glance.

Such an inefficient rune spell circuit forms a huge contrast with the magical drawing technology.

That's why Minato and Kushina, who are both professionally trained, have such a strong sense of disharmony and their expressions are so strange.

After a discussion, the two had guessed the origin of the puppet core to a near-ideal level, and both felt somewhat emotional about it.

"It seems that Hideki really lacks knowledge of sealing techniques." Minato couldn't help but sigh:
"Otherwise, they wouldn't have designed such a...long and complicated circuit."

"But he has superb chakra control, so he was able to draw such a long ritual circuit on the puppet core by brute force..."

"But I didn't expect that such a magical pocket puppet beast would actually rely on such a simple and crude circuit to operate..."

Kushina was very interested:

"I finally understand why Boss Hideki hired me as a Sealing Technique Consultant."

"Because his level of sealing skills was completely brought up by his unrivaled drawing skills."

"The circuits he designed would be difficult for us to draw in one go, not to mention for children."

"So my task is to simplify his extremely long technique circuit to a level that is easy for children to master!"

“Perhaps I can improve it…”

"It's a good opportunity to see through the performance of the puppet beast whether Hideki's drawing skills are better or my rune writing skills are better..."

Kushina was very excited about this task as she had never tried it before. She ran to get a pen and a scroll and started writing and drawing on the scroll according to the black squares.

Minato originally wanted to ask Kushina about her final decision.

But seeing this scene, he felt that there was probably no need to ask any more questions...

Kushina, whose competitive spirit has been aroused, will never give up this job.

But Minato suddenly thought of a question.

He just forgot to tell Kushina that Hideki had already obtained the basic information of the sealing technique.

With Hideki's intelligence and talent, the shortcomings in the writing of the techniques will probably be gradually made up.

Minato couldn't even imagine, with Hideki's drawing skills, to what extent his sealing skills would be improved after systematic study.

Does Kushina really have a chance of winning?
However, seeing how excited and energetic Kushina was, Minato decided to keep it to himself.

Anyway, no matter how smart Hideki is, it will take at least one or two years for him to thoroughly understand the information under the condition of being overwhelmed by various tasks...

……

In the barbecue restaurant, Hideki, who had already eaten, was thinking about his plan to learn the sealing technique:

"It seems that I have to master all the information given by Minato before the end of the semester..."

Because even if Kushina joined, she could at most help him complete the rune design for the workshop.

The combat puppets, the rune design of the ninja tools, and the exploration of the principles of chakra are ultimately something that Hideki has to solve by himself, so he can't let down his guard.

At this time, the students around me also finished their meals.

Hideki looked at the empty plates on the table and felt a little heart bleeding.

He finally understood what it meant to have a young boy eat his father out of poverty...

"Teacher, you've finished your meal, can you start training me?"

Obito asked expectantly.

But before Hideki could say anything, Ebisu's sunglasses began to glow, and he took out a pen and notebook and asked:

"Special training? What special training? Why would the teacher give you special training, Obito?"

"Yup!"

Sitting next to Hideki, Yuhi Kurenai shook his arm and said:
"Teacher, you are biased. Why do you only help Obito with special training?"

Hideki explained casually:

"Don't worry, everyone. The special training given to Obito is the reward for setting up a stall to collect information, so everyone of you will get a share."

"Of course you can also choose other rewards."

Hideki explained some of the contents of the points plan to everyone, and then said:
"Although it has not been officially implemented yet, I have still converted your contributions into points and recorded them."

"So you can also save your points and redeem them for what you want later."

"By the way, the one with the highest points right now is Lin."

Hideki gave Lin an approving smile and explained,

"Because although her turnover is average, she collects the most and most detailed intelligence, and is of the greatest help to the work-study program. We should all learn from her."

"Yes--"

Everyone agreed with a long tone, and Lin's face was red, as if she was happy that her efforts were noticed by the teacher.

Seeing that everyone was starting to think about where to spend their points, Hideki smiled and went to the counter to settle the bill.

After a moment of silence for the wallet that had died heroically, Hideki returned to the private room and asked with a smile:

"Have you decided where to spend your points?"

(End of this chapter)