Chapter 27 - Hitting a plateau (1/2)

After the end of the battles, the higher-ups quickly went back. If not because it would have been impolite, Minato reckons that they would have left directly after his battle.

The students finally passed the last test: Ninjutsu.

Bunshin, Henge, and Kawarimi were the three basics Jutsu taught at the academy from the second year onwards. Thankfully, Jiraya became the 'sensei' of Minato a month after the first Taijutsu battle at the academy, and so he gave him the scrolls for those three Jutsu. Without knowing them officially, it would have been a pinch for Minato to graduate.

Apart from the basics, he did not teach him anything more. The rest of the time he deigned to check upon him were spent with Jiraya begging to let him use Inazuma characters into his Icha Icha series. Even if there are no real author rights in this world, it would be unbecoming of Jiraya to steal without asking for permission. Minato was unwilling to let his personages play in a third rate pȯrn book, but at the same time not willing to offend Jiraya by refusing him completely. Even if he appeared to be a good-natured guy in the anime, in the end, he doesn't know him personally well enough to ascertain it. And he will not make such a rookie mistake as thinking that because he was a good guy on TV it was ok. Kakashi is a good guy...Kakashi killed hundreds. In the end, they were good to Naruto, not him, so he can't confuse it.

They came to a consensus. Minato will help him with character design while he promised to never use his manga characters.

While waiting for his turn, Minato was thinking of his battle against the Chunin instructor.

'All those hours spent doing mental battles were truly useful. Even if I didn't fight anybody in real, this battle allowed me to see that it was the same. I spent most of my time doing it, thankfully all this time was not wasted. In the end, battle experience is the most important thing, even Kaguya, who was by far more powerful than anyone lost. If she was good at fighting, she would have completely decimated them with her level of chakra. I spent the majority of those ten months on that, so the rest of my ninja arts did not improve so much, but at least the most important, my taijutsu is top-notch.

Now that I have hitten a plateau in all things concerning my body, I can begin to truly focus on other things. My clones trained in those arts but it can't compare to me doing it directly because my chakra is too thin when I make some. With my mental and physical regeneration, which means chakra regeneration, if I train myself it will be far faster. And a chunin training can't compare to a genin. Using the backlash of numerous Kage Bunshin to increase my mental energy begins to lose its efficiency too. Even if it was still useful, now that I'm not in the academy and will do missions outside I can't do this sort of training anymore'

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Later this day, having aced the last exam, Minato went to celebrate his success with his mandem at Yakiniku Q.

”Haha, it was hilarious how you trick them all Minato, everybody was thinking that you were going to use ninjutsu out of frustration because you were on the losing end, but it was just a diversion!” Tsume laughed, banging on the table recalling the expression of the chunin, when he finally realized that he was tricked before being knocked out.

”But how did you know the Fireball Jutsu?” Inquired Mikoto, he did not have a clan to teach him Jutsu, so he should not know any...Well, maybe it was from his clan records.