Pupet Master in Konoha

September of the 44th Year in the Konoha Calendar.

Although it's early autumn, the lingering heat of summer hasn't quite dissipated.

On a scorching morning, Konoha Ninja Academy marked the beginning of a new semester.

"Wherever the leaves of the tree fly, the fire will grow endlessly. The fire will illuminate the village and allow the new leaves to sprout again..."

On the high platform in the playground, Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Third Hokage at the time, was giving a speech during the opening ceremony of the new school year.

The content was the same old cliché.

It was all about the Will of Fire, the spirit of sacrifice, and other worn-out ideas that everyone was tired of hearing.

However, the young ninjas in the audience, who had never seen much of the world, were still as excited as ever, with their small fists tightly clenched and eyes filled with fanaticism.

I suspect that as soon as the Third Hokage gives the order, they'll grab their kunai, shout "Waaagh!" and rush straight to the front lines without hesitation.

"Tsk, tsk, the Third Hokage's speech skills are getting better and better. If this weren't the opening ceremony, I'd have thought it was a pyramid scheme presentation..."

At the back of the line of teachers next to the high platform, a handsome young man with black hair tied in a high ponytail observed the scene calmly, but couldn't help but let out a mocking sound in his heart.

It had been nineteen years since he reincarnated into this world as Kimura Hideki.

After years of fighting in the real and cruel ninja world, his feelings for the original work had long since faded.

Although the Third Hokage in front of him wasn't as shrewd as some conspiracy theories suggest, Hideki, having personally experienced various irrational systems in Konoha, found it difficult to respect him.

Now, listening to the other man's speech about the Will of Fire, Hideki felt even calmer and almost wanted to laugh.

Perhaps the only thing left in his heart was a little sympathy for the children in front of him.

Hideki couldn't help but glance toward the head of the First Hokage on the distant cliff.

"Oh, I wonder what the god of ninjas would think if he saw this scene..."

"Wasn't his original intention for establishing the Ninja Village to allow children to study and play freely instead of heading straight to the battlefield?"

However, Hideki's brief emotion quickly turned into a quiet sigh, dissipating with the wind in the frantic air around him.

Because in reality, he didn't have much capital to sympathize with the children...

As a worthy time traveler, Hideki didn't have any extraordinary lineage or tricks. He was just an ordinary orphan.

The only thing worthy of praise in his life was that, after receiving half of a textbook on puppet techniques captured from a white-haired jounin, he had successfully mastered the secret puppet technique taught by Sunagakure through self-study based on the knowledge and imagination from his previous life.

Not long ago, the village promoted him to special jounin because of this, and he became the envy and jealousy of many civilian ninjas.

But Hideki didn't feel much pride in his heart.

Because he knew that in the increasingly troublesome ninja world of the future, not to mention special jounins, even real jounins would be no more than slightly larger ants, unable to control their life or death.

Not to mention that the steps of the Third Ninja War were getting closer and closer...

If he didn't want to lose his life in the war that would engulf the entire ninja world a few years later, Hideki had to take advantage of the last moments of peace and grow stronger as soon as possible.

The reason Hideki was present at the Ninja Academy at that moment was precisely for this purpose.

In addition to his own abilities, the strength of a puppeteer depends heavily on the strength of the puppets themselves.

The power of a puppet comes from the accumulation of various resources, such as higher-performance materials, better equipment, more sophisticated processing technology, advanced mechanism designs, and runic techniques...

This makes Puppet Jutsu different from other ninjutsu that rely on one's imagination. It is more technological.

The important thing is the group effect and collective effort, rather than relying on one person to work alone behind closed doors.

Even a genius like the Red Sand Scorpion wouldn't have been able to master such magnificent puppet arts at such a young age if he hadn't inherited the years of accumulation from the previous Masters of Puppetry in Sunagakure.

As the only puppeteer in Konoha, Hideki had once improved his skills by stealing lessons from rival puppeteers and their puppets on the battlefield of Sunagakure.

It was a pity that the bonus period had already passed.

Ordinary puppeteers or puppets no longer had much reference value for him, and he didn't dare to provoke powerful puppeteers easily, so he had fallen into a bottleneck period.

Desperate, Hideki had no choice but to refocus his attention on the Hidden Leaf Village, which he both loved and hated.

Because he had fully realized that if he wanted to continue on this path, he couldn't just limit himself to stealing lessons and working in isolation. He had to establish a puppet research and development system centered around himself.

Therefore, it was almost Hideki's only option to help Konoha train more puppeteers and use this as leverage to acquire more talents and resources for his own use.

Becoming a professor at the Ninja Academy to teach puppetry was the first step in Hideki's plan...

…

The long speech of the Third Hokage continued.

Judging by his eloquent attitude, I fear this won't end anytime soon.

Hideki, who had finally suppressed a yawn, decided to take this moment to continue perfecting his plan in his mind to become stronger.

At that moment, someone suddenly approached him stealthily and gave him an elbow jab in the arm, interrupting Hideki's thoughts.

Hideki turned his head and saw a young man with an inverted red triangle pattern on his cheek winking at him.

"Senior Jaw, what are you doing here?" Hideki asked in a low voice, a bit surprised.

The young man's name was Inuzuka Jaw, and he was a few years older than Hideki. He was also a special jounin.

Hideki and Jaw had been teammates for a while, so the two had a pretty good relationship.

Upon hearing Hideki's question, Inuzuka Jaw's smiling face suddenly fell. He sighed and said:

"Forget it, I was doing well in the tracking class, but I got unlucky, and this year they sent me as a training officer. I'm basically a lesson instructor."

"Otherwise, who would be foolish enough to volunteer to be a teacher?"

At this, Inuzuka Jaw spoke curiously:

"By the way, Hideki, why are you here?"

Hideki responded with a pleasant smile:

"What a coincidence. I'm also here to teach training classes, specifically puppet jutsu, and yes, it's voluntary."

"..."

Inuzuka Jaw's expression froze upon hearing this.

He didn't expect this idiot to be standing next to him…

The so-called "training course" is actually a special program organized by the school.

Originally, it was part of Princess Tsunade's plan to promote medical ninja reform.

This meant additional courses would be offered at the ninja academy to select and train students with medical ninjutsu talent early on, shortening the training time for medical ninjas.

The ultimate goal was to have a medical ninja in every squad.

Although Tsunade's plan wasn't entirely successful, the system persisted.

Now, as manpower becomes increasingly scarce, the major departments have begun to follow the example set by medical classes, organizing courses in schools to scout and nurture talent early on.

In addition, the academy has embraced a trend of offering various courses, such as agriculture, court etiquette, and flower arranging, allowing students to disguise themselves as specific identities and professions for future missions.

After this series of developments, the current training course system was finally established.

The reason Hideki was able to successfully introduce puppet jutsu classes at the academy was due to this system.

Since training courses are far more specialized than regular subject classes, and only meet twice a week, departments often send people to work part-time as instructors.

It seems that Inuzuka Jaw was caught up with the tracking class, so he had no choice but to come teach.

He hated this so much that he naturally didn't believe Hideki volunteered and even imagined some outdated drama about Konoha's high-ranking officials pursuing civilian geniuses and demanding they pass on their inheritance.

But, being soft-spoken himself, he couldn't do much, so he could only offer a few kind words to comfort Hideki:

"Teaching puppetry sounds good~"

"Hideki, being sent to teach at the academy means the village must take puppetry seriously."

"If you can train more puppet masters for Konoha, it's not impossible to establish a new puppet arts department in the future and become its head!"

"Senior Jaw, you're really thinking about the future. I haven't even started the first class yet."

Hideki waved his hand modestly.

"Besides, puppetry isn't easy to learn. I'm still worried if I'll be able to teach it to the students."

"I see..."

Inuzuka Jaw seemed to suddenly think of something. He stroked his budding beard and said:

"Speaking of which, the puppetry techniques from Sunagakure might not be well-received here at the academy."

"If you want the kids to be willing to learn how to handle puppets, Hideki, I'm afraid you'll have to put in more effort..."

Hideki couldn't help but be a bit surprised when he heard this but quickly realized what Inuzuka Jaw meant.

As a puppeteer, Hideki naturally knew that puppets had a bad reputation in Konoha and even in the ninja world.

After all, traditional puppeteers often had grotesque designs painted on their faces, and their fighting style involved hiding in the shadows, controlling terrifying-looking puppets to kill enemies with hidden weapons and poison.

It's hard not to feel offended by such behavior, which takes obscenity to the extreme.

However, since Inuzuka Jaw specifically reminded him, it meant that this problem might be more serious at the ninja academy…

Indeed, during the Second Great Ninja War, the Sunagakure puppeteer faction, led by Chiyo, caused Konoha a great deal of suffering.

Considering that the parents of the academy's current students were also the main force involved in the war at that time, the children have been exposed to these events since they were young, and many lost family members to the puppeteers. Naturally, their impression of puppets will be quite poor…

Hideki, who wanted to understand all of this, couldn't help but break into a cold sweat, silently thinking how lucky he was.

If it hadn't been for Inuzuka Jaw's reminder, he might not have realized the severity of the problem until tomorrow's class when he found the classroom empty.

Although this training course offers students a month-long selection period where they can visit various classes before choosing which one to take, Hideki knows that the first impression is crucial. The success or failure of the first class largely determines the outcome of the course.

You must understand that all of his plans hinge on this puppetry class. If it doesn't succeed, the following plans won't be able to proceed as expected.

"Oh, it looks like I'll need to change the content of the course I had planned..."

Hideki silently thought to himself.

"First of all, of course, we need to reverse everyone's prejudice against puppets and create a new style of puppetry that differs from the dark and terrifying style of Sunagakure, one that incorporates Konoha's unique characteristics."

"Actually, this was already part of my earlier plan, but now it seems I'll have to put in extra effort."

"But stereotypes are like a massive mountain. They can't be completely changed in a short time."

"Therefore, during this process, I think we need to make the lessons as novel and interesting as possible to attract and retain more students."

"In that case, maybe we'll need to use the 'edutainment' approach..."

Hideki sighed inwardly, looking a little hesitant.

Adding more interesting projects to teaching and allowing students to learn through entertainment is indeed a good way to stimulate enthusiasm for puppetry.

But in terms of efficiency, this is obviously not as good as diligent study and practice; otherwise, it would have been promoted fully a long time ago.

Only a few years have passed since the Third Great Ninja War. Hideki is racing against time to advance his plan to become stronger. It's really hard for him to have the patience to lower efficiency and play house with the little kids...

But thinking about this, Hideki unconsciously glanced at the young ninjas not far away.

For some reason, seeing those innocent faces, his slightly impulsive thoughts gradually calmed down, and he let out a long sigh of relief.

"Alright..."

"The learning efficiency of edutainment might not be very high."

"But in the long run, keeping the children's enthusiasm for puppets alive might be the best way to nurture true puppet masters."

With this decision in mind, Hideki couldn't help but look again at the portrait of the First Hokage in the distance.

It's a pity that it's currently very difficult for him to make the beautiful vision of Senju Hashirama, who wanted to avoid sending children to the battlefield, a reality.

But if it's just about allowing the children to gain a little happiness in the learning process and adding some color to their otherwise gloomy childhood, then he might just be able to do that.

When Hideki finally made up his mind, the opening ceremony came to a close.

"... Then I declare that starting today, the new school year at the Ninja Academy officially begins!"

When Sarutobi Hiruzen finished speaking, a burst of warm applause erupted from the high platform.

And Hideki's new teaching career officially began at this moment...