NOVEL WEB Chapter 75: The Formation of Root
After carefully considering the many issues revealed in the recent espionage incident, Hiruzen Sarutobi agreed to the request Danzo Shimura had made recently.
Root was originally a training base of ANBU, but now it was reorganized into a new organization similar to ANBU. However, its operations would remain hidden within the shadows of ANBU, initially focusing specifically on investigating internal espionage activities within Konoha.
However, as time passed and Danzo gained more manpower, Root gradually evolved into an organization that specialized in training spies, creating chaos across both the Ninja World and Konoha.
Now that he had been suddenly handed so much power, Danzo was overjoyed. However, due to Hiruzen's current shortage of personnel, he did not receive sufficient agents. Forced to rely on recruits from his own clan, Danzo was able to get the newly formed Root operational.
Yet to grow further, he needed to recruit more members. At that time, Danzo had not yet developed the authority he would later possess. More importantly, many clans were still controlled by senior elders from the Warring States Era, who took a firm and arrogant attitude, offering Danzo no respect at all.
Although these clans had suffered greatly during the Second Ninja War, they still retained much of their former strength—strength that hadn't yet been severely weakened by the Third Great Ninja War. As a result, Danzo suffered many rejections without being able to retaliate, leaving him increasingly frustrated.
After all, no one wanted to send their clan's talented youths to work under another's command, causing Danzo's mental state to approach a breaking point. He began to feel bitter and resentful, believing that if he had been chosen as Hokage, people would have respected him more. This planted the seeds for his later ruthless power struggles.
It wasn't long before Danzo even adopted the same arrogant attitude as those elders, recruiting many talented youths from their clans without consent as an act of revenge.
Recently, Shiyu Uchiha learned from Minato Namikaze about something: Mito Uzumaki had invited Minato to her home again. After confirming Minato's talent in Space–Time Ninjutsu, she directly passed on the Flying Thunder God Technique to him.
Currently, in addition to training in Sword Techniques, Minato mainly focused on mastering this technique. However, even with his immense talent, cultivating such an S-rank advanced Ninjutsu technique was no easy task.
Especially since Minato possessed no knowledge of Sealing Technique at all, Kushina Uzumaki tutored him personally. Perhaps this was part of Mito Uzumaki's intention—to strengthen the bond between Minato and Kushina.
After rescuing Kushina Uzumaki, Shiyu Uchiha and Minato Namikaze were ordered by Hiruzen Sarutobi to train in Sword Techniques together under the guidance of Hatake Sumao.
Kushina even brought Shiyu's fiancée, Ling Uzumaki, along to observe, something Hatake Sumao didn't mind.
At that time, Kushina Uzumaki stood as the matriarch among her fellow Uzumaki clan members. Though she held a certain dissatisfaction toward Shiyu, believing him to be a womanizer unworthy of her admiration—especially when compared to the devoted Minato—once Mito Uzumaki had given her approval, and considering Ling's high regard for Shiyu for having saved her life, Kushina's objections were simply ignored.
Shiyu Uchiha also participated in Kushina Uzumaki's rescue. Given Kushina's personality, she couldn't bring herself to speak ill of Shiyu Uchiha behind his back, though she would never hesitate to express her opinions openly. While Shiyu Uchiha never bothered to explain himself, he held no ill feelings toward Kushina—after all, she was far better than someone like Hiruzen Sarutobi.
Therefore, for the sake of her best friend's future happiness, Kushina hoped that Shiyu Uchiha and Ling Uzumaki could interact more and develop feelings for each other, which would benefit them greatly in the future.
At first, Shiyu Uchiha felt somewhat uneasy about Ling Uzumaki's arrival. However, since Ling was his fiancée, and Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki worked to ease the tension between them, the two slowly grew more comfortable with each other as they spent more time together, and things continued moving in a positive direction—even if true romantic love still seemed out of reach.
While Shiyu Uchiha and Minato Namikaze were practicing sword techniques, Hatake Sumao observed their swordsmanship. Seeing Minato's performance, he realized that Minato had already chosen his future path: focusing primarily on the Body Flicker Technique (including the Flying Thunder God as one of its forms), combined with kunai for effective damage. At this stage, Minato had yet to experience the Tailed Beast Ball, so the idea for the Rasengan hadn't formed in his mind.
Noticing that Minato lacked sufficient offensive power, and knowing that all the jutsu he possessed for increasing damage were lightning-natured, while Minato primarily focused on wind nature chakra—although Minato had only mastered one wind nature technique so far, his understanding of wind nature's characteristics and shape transformations was already quite impressive, making it unnecessary for him to relearn lightning nature.
Most importantly, the lightning nature secret jutsu that Hatake Sumao possessed were all family heirlooms of the Hatake clan. Even as the clan head, he had no authority to pass them on outside the clan.
Wanting to further enhance Minato's offensive capabilities, Sumao approached Hiruzen Sarutobi, hoping he could provide Minato with some Wind Release Ninjutsu, especially since Minato was Jiraiya's chosen apprentice.
This put Hiruzen in a difficult position because, according to Konoha's regulations, civilian-born ninja—classified as Supplementary Ninja—could only obtain jutsu by redeeming them with mission merits. He couldn't directly grant Minato special privileges without a proper reason.
At the moment, Minato's accumulated merits were only enough to redeem a single C-rank jutsu—an outcome largely thanks to the merits earned from rescuing Kushina Uzumaki. However, Sumao suggested that for Minato's optimal development, ideally several jutsu covering both nature transformation and shape transformation should be provided.
Hiruzen highly valued Minato, seeing him as a younger version of Hatake Sumao, and understood the importance of nurturing such talent properly, so resources shouldn't become an obstacle.
He started feeling resentful toward Jiraiya, who was supposed to be Minato's mentor. If Jiraiya had been around, none of this hassle would have been necessary—he could have handled it himself.
But thinking about Jiraiya gave Hiruzen an idea. After discussing with Hatake Sumao, they reached a decision: they directly used the merits Jiraiya had earned while establishing himself in Amegakure and used them to redeem jutsu for Minato instead.
What happened was completely unexpected for Hatake Sumao. He had only wanted to get something from The Third Hokage at first — never saw this coming.
But isn't the result excellent? Afterward, upon learning about Jiraiya's merits, Hatake Sumao waved his hand with a sweep, just like a shopper on a spree — buy, buy, buy! He directly acquired five [Wind Release Ninjutsu] techniques and plenty of cultivation resources for Minato Namikaze. It was a great haul worth celebrating, even though Jiraiya had used up all his merits.
Both The Third Hokage and Hatake Sumao were over the moon with the result. As for the only loser, Jiraiya, he was currently interacting with his three new pupils and was absolutely delighted.
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