The days of being a puppeteer in Konoha

Chapter 8: The Sandaime Hokage

Not long ago, in the Hokage's office.

"After the school training class is over, ask Kimura Hideki to come to my place."

"Yes, Hokage-sama."

After watching the Anbu leave, the Third Hokage Sarutobi Hiruzen puffed on his pipe and turned his gaze back to a crystal ball on the desk.

What was displayed at this moment was the scene where the little ninjas were enthusiastically trying out the Pocket Puppetmon...

Sarutobi Hiruzen had never expected that he would make such an interesting discovery just because he used the telescope technique to check the class situation on a whim.

Especially when he saw the rare innocent smiles on the children's faces, the corners of his mouth couldn't help but rise slightly.

But when his peripheral vision accidentally caught a glimpse of a frontline report on the table, his smile quickly disappeared, turning into a long puff of white smoke...

Ugh……

As the successor of the first and second generation Hokage, he also wanted to realize their vision and let the children have a happy childhood.

As a qualified leader, he knew very well that sending the children to the battlefield so early was just a temporary solution and would lead to the slow death of Konoha.

It’s a pity that he has neither the incredible strength of the First Hokage nor the intelligence of the Second Hokage.

Faced with the severe situation of the ninja world being surrounded by wolves in all the ninja villages, he is really powerless, so how can he care about the physical and mental health of the children...

Therefore, if the efficiency of cultivation can be guaranteed, he would be happy to see children cultivate in this almost playful way.

At least in this way, we are a little closer to the future that the first Hokage hoped for.

Thinking of this, Sarutobi Hiruzen couldn't help but cast his gaze on the handsome young man in the crystal ball who was instructing students on how to control the puppet beast.

Kimura Hideki...

The Sandaime couldn't help but feel a little emotional.

As the principal of the Ninja School, he knew that there was a student like Hideki who had excellent academic performance and was much smarter than his peers.

Unfortunately, the ninja world is ultimately a world where talent is king, and Hideki, who had average ninja talent, did not receive much attention from him.

It was not until he learned that Hideki had mastered the secret puppetry of the Sunagakure through self-study that he realized that he had underestimated the boy's intelligence.

Perhaps only a genius like this could come up with such an interesting chakra line training method.

In particular, the idea of ​​dividing the training of chakra lines into three stages through teaching aids to reduce the difficulty of learning made Sarutobi Hiruzen, a doctor of ninjutsu, applaud.

He even began to think wildly, wondering whether he could follow suit and use teaching aids to reduce the difficulty of learning certain ninjutsu.

However, his joy did not last long, as Sarutobi Hiruzen realized that this teaching method seemed to have a very fatal flaw.

If this problem cannot be solved, then this teaching method will ultimately be just a castle in the air and will be difficult to popularize in ninja schools.

So the biggest question now is, has Hideki noticed this flaw and found a solution?
……

Not long after, there was a knock on the door of the Hokage's office.

"Hokage-sama, Kimura Hideki has been brought here."

"Let him in."

"Yes!"

Afterwards, Hideki walked into the Hokage's office.

Sarutobi Hiruzen, who had already put away the crystal ball, first looked Hideki up and down, then jokingly said:
"I haven't seen you for a few years. I didn't expect that you've grown so tall, Xiushu, and you've become a handsome boy."

"Do you have a girlfriend now? Do you want me to introduce you to one?"

"Now that you are a teacher at the Ninja School, your life and work are stable. It's a good time to complete your lifelong event..."

What's wrong?

Will people start to urge me to get married now that I have come to the ninja world?

Because the scene was completely different from what he had imagined, Hideki was speechless.

However, considering the declining birth rate of Konoha ninjas and the current situation of not enough leeks to harvest, the Sandaime's behavior of playing matchmaker is not surprising. Of course, he also knows that the Sandaime is doing this more to chat with him in order to shorten the distance between them.

So he naturally went with the flow and said with a relaxed smile:
"Hokage-sama, please stop teasing me."

"Now my energy is focused on doing well in puppetry class, how can I have time to have a girlfriend?"

Of course, what’s more important is that the Third Ninja World War is about to begin. How can he have the time to find a partner right now?
If the Sandaime promised now that he would not be allowed to go to the front line, Hideki would accept the offer without hesitation even if he was introduced to a girlfriend who was a dozen years older than him, a compulsive gambler, and even had a mental disorder called hemophobia.

When Sarutobi Hiruzen heard Hideki mention the puppetry class, he also got to the point and said:

"That's right, young people should really focus on their careers."

"I heard that you went pretty well in your first puppetry class today. It seems you even invented a new teaching aid?"

Have you heard yet?
As expected, this old man is very bad and never tells the truth.

Hideki couldn't help but complain in his heart.

He has strong chakra control and is also sensitive to the chakra fluctuations in the surrounding area.

So when he felt a hidden chakra fluctuation in the sky while in class, he knew that it was the Sandaime who was using the telescope technique to spy on him in class.

However, he was not too dissatisfied with this. After all, the more curious and attentive Sarutobi Hiruzen was about his courses, the more beneficial it would be for the implementation of his future plans.

So Hideki didn't wait for Sarutobi Hiruzen to say more, and took out the handle and a small Charmander puppet beast and said with a smile:

"This is the teaching aid I designed. Could you please take a look at it, Mr. Hokage, and see if there is anything that can be improved?"

"Easy to say, easy to say."

Sarutobi Hiruzen took both with a smile, but his swiftness still revealed his impatience.

A man remains a young man until he dies.

To be honest, he had been envious of this pocket puppet beast since he saw the children trying it out in the crystal ball. Now that he had the chance to play with it, how could he miss it?

He quickly connected the handle cord to Charmander's back, and then used the handle to control Charmander to wreak havoc on the desk like a little monster.

The smooth and skillful movements that were so painful that Hideki couldn't help but look sideways:

Chang Wei, you still say you don't know martial arts?
Sarutobi Hiruzen also just remembered that according to what he had just said, he should have just heard of this pocket puppet beast and shouldn't be able to play with it so well all of a sudden.

Fortunately, Hideki immediately clapped his hands in admiration and said:
"As expected of you, Hokage-sama. You can control it so skillfully right after getting started."

When Sarutobi Hiruzen saw Hideki's sincere look, he didn't know for a moment whether Hideki was pretending to be stupid.

However, he was happy to go with the flow. After saying a few perfunctory words to change the subject, he began to carefully observe the puppet beast and the handle over and over again.

"Hideki, you are very thoughtful. The design of this teaching aid is really ingenious. It must have taken you a lot of time."

Although he had never systematically studied puppetry, Sarutobi Hiruzen, who was proficient in sealing techniques and various mechanical ninja tools, easily understood most of the design principles of Pocket Puppetmon and couldn't help but admire Hideki's ingenious ideas.

But more importantly, he felt Hideki's enthusiasm from the design of this teaching aid.

If you don't really want to teach students well, it would be impossible to come up with such sophisticated and complete teaching aids at the beginning.

"Thank you for the compliment, Hokage-sama."

Hideki said sincerely, "Actually, the things used in it are not complicated, so it didn't take me too much time."

There was some truth in what he said, because with the help of the magical brainstorming technique, it only took one day from design to completion for this set of teaching aids...

But Sarutobi Hiruzen shook his head and said:

"Hideki, you are too modest..."

“The truth is simplicity. The ability to achieve your goal in the simplest way is real skill.”

After praising Hideki, Sarutobi Hiruzen felt that he had laid enough groundwork, so he decided to get to the most important topic.

So he asked, "But Hideki, the materials for this set of teaching aids shouldn't be cheap, right?"

(End of this chapter)