Early July, Konoha Year 44
At the main gate of Konohagakure...
Hundreds of civilians and shinobi had gathered, eagerly awaiting the return of their heroes from the Rain Country front.
It had been half a month since the end of the Third Great Ninja War. The battlefields had been cleared, the wounded transported back ahead of time, and now, at last, the main forces were returning home.
At the front of the welcoming crowd stood the Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, alongside the village elder, Danzō Shimura. Akio, not wanting to reveal his real identity, appeared in his "shopkeeper" guise, standing quietly among the crowd with his apprentice Obito and his daughter Sara.
Leading the shinobi forces was Kagami Uchiha, followed by a group of elite jōnin headed by Orochimaru. Behind them trailed the ranks of chūnin and genin, the new chūnin who had "won" their battlefield experience tickets among them.
"Jiraiya's not here? Off gathering material again?" Akio chuckled, shaking his head. His expression was a mix of mild curiosity and disappointment.
He had rather looked forward to seeing what ridiculous scene Jiraiya might cause basking in all that public admiration. As for Orochimaru, his cold, snake-like face drained all the life out of the celebration.
Still, Akio couldn't shake a faint feeling that something about Orochimaru had… changed.
"Has he already started experimenting on humans?" Akio wondered silently.
Next to him, Obito's fighting spirit practically blazed out of his body, his eyes locked intensely on Might Guy. It was worth noting that in the recent Chūnin Exams, Obito had been defeated by Guy.
But that defeat had turned out to be a blessing in disguise: awakening his double-tomoe Sharingan had inflated Obito's confidence, and now he was burning to "settle the score."
If Sakumo hadn't been away in Uzushio testing Kakashi's prosthetic arm, Obito might already have gone to "call him out."
The shinobi forces basked in cheers for a while at the gate. After a few minutes of Hiruzen's "Will of Fire" speech, they finally dispersed, each heading back to their own clan compound or home.
"Alright, show's over. Let's go," Akio said casually.
Obito's expression was strange, an uneasy mix of fear, anxiety, and hope.
"Um, Sensei… did you… see Rin?" he stammered.
Akio blinked, then instantly understood. He let his face fall into a look of sorrow.
"No… I didn't see her. I'm afraid Rin… might not have made it. War is cruel, Obito."
Beside them, Sara gasped softly and covered her mouth in surprise.
Tears welled up in Obito's eyes. "No… no way! We must've missed her!"
"Obito, you have to accept reality. I'm just as heartbroken as you are about Rin"
"I don't believe you!"
Obito turned, about to bolt, but Akio caught him by the arm.
"So, even this won't trigger a third tomoe, huh?" Akio sighed under his breath.
Obito froze, confused by the remark.
Sara, still covering her mouth, was now struggling not to laugh.
"Father, you're teasing Obito again. Rin came back days ago."
Akio chuckled and shrugged. "What can I say? The kid's got an 'easy-to-awaken' constitution. I just wanted to… test a theory."
Seeing Obito's bewildered look, he continued, "Think about it, did you see any wounded in that returning unit? After a war like that, that's impossible. Konoha just didn't want to alarm the public, so the wounded were secretly sent straight to the hospital. Rin's a medical-nin, so she came back earlier and has been working nonstop at the hospital."
Obito's eyes widened before he suddenly glared at Akio and sprinted off toward Konoha Hospital without another word.
"Father, I think Obito's angry," Sara said, half amused.
Akio rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Maybe I went a bit far… but it's for his own good. Without some emotional trauma, when's he ever going to awaken three tomoe, let alone the Mangekyō?"
A week later.
Obito's temper had faded as fast as it came. Now he was back to chattering in front of Akio, full of excitement about all the new developments in the village.
"Sensei, you wouldn't believe the faces my uncles made when they found out I'd awakened my Sharingan and that I already had two tomoe! They were totally stunned!"
"That Guy really is strong, though. I can only fight him evenly now that I've awakened my eyes. But I've started training in the clan's advanced Fire Release techniques. I'll surpass him soon! When Kakashi gets back, I'll give him a good beating too!"
Akio sat there with a blank expression, listening to Obito's nonstop boasting, inwardly sighing. Thank goodness he hasn't awakened three tomoe yet or he'd probably ascend into the heavens by now.
"Sensei! Did you hear? Lady Tsunade and Lord Orochimaru are both taking on disciples! Rin's been preparing for that all week!"
That finally made Akio react.
"Oh? Why don't you go apply too?" he asked with a teasing smile.
Obito and Minato's team bond didn't prevent him from apprenticing elsewhere.
Obito glanced around nervously, then whispered, "Sensei… don't you think Lord Orochimaru is a little… hard to approach?"
Akio laughed. "At least you're not a fool."
Obito apprenticing under Orochimaru would've been nothing short of a disaster.
Still, Akio paid close attention to the matter, it might yield a few witness points, after all.
Over the next few days, Akio personally got involved in both Tsunade and Orochimaru's disciple selection processes.
Tsunade's process was formal, essentially a full-scale medical-nin examination for candidates under fifteen. After multiple rounds of screening, and a slight nudge of assistance from Akio, she ended up selecting two disciples: Rin Nohara and Shizune.
Rin showed greater talent for medical ninjutsu and monstrous strength, while Shizune excelled in poison formulation and antidote techniques.
"Monstrous Strength Rin, huh?" Akio murmured, struggling to imagine what that would look like. Then he silently offered a prayer. "Obito, my boy, you're on your own."
As for Orochimaru, the situation there made Akio uneasy.
"You're saying Jiraiya took a disciple in the Rain Country?"
When Orochimaru nodded, Akio frowned slightly. "The Rain Country again? How convenient…"
"That fool, who knows what he's thinking. The new disciple does have some ninjutsu potential, but he's hardly young anymore," Orochimaru said with an amused smirk.
Akio didn't bother prying further into Jiraiya's choice. Instead, he gave Orochimaru a pointed look. "You'd better stay away from human experiments."
Orochimaru nodded lightly, not denying it. "Understood, elder."
When it came to his own disciple selection, however, Orochimaru did things entirely differently from Tsunade. There were no tests, no trials, not even interviews.
He simply went to Hiruzen, glanced through a few pages of the candidate roster, and stopped at one name.
"This one," he said flatly.
Hiruzen rubbed his temple. "Are you sure you don't want to conduct any kind of examination?"
"No need."
"…Fine, then it's decided. The child named Anko Mitarashi will be your disciple."
Akio earned ten witness points from that event, but he couldn't shake a faint sense of unease.
"Tsunade's disciple selection made sense, careful, thorough, fair. But Orochimaru's… felt like he was picking a toy at random. Then again…" Akio sighed. "That's just like him."
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