7 Chap.7 Graduation

It has been three years of continuous efforts and some headaches. It turned out that being the first of the promotion was not as easy as I thought. I completely forgot about Lee's mastery of taijutsu, so just beating him already resulted in a lot of hours spent exercising and sore muscles. The only reason I ended up winning without a doubt is because of the food I've been eating these years, all provided by myself.

I have gained a lot of mastery over the power of the devil fruit and now the transformation into food happens at a much faster rate, as well as having a greater invigorating effect. Over the years, the System has given me more quests that have almost always rewarded me with new recipes, and I discovered something very interesting. Certain recipes have special effects when eaten and not just the effect that is already present from my transformed ingredients. The only pity is that they are all temporary.

For the genjutsu lessons, my rival was definitely Sasuke, the strawberry-eyed ninja. Come on, you will not deny me that it really is so. He has the color and the tomoe looks like seeds! The look on his face when I called him that for the first time in public is priceless, too bad I didn't have a camera with me then. Weeks passed before peers stopped calling him that.

Ninjutsu was the easiest for me, I remembered a lot of advanced control training exercises from the series and practiced them in secret. After all, I got the chakra overnight and that meant my initial hold on it was even worse than Naruto's with the nine tails interference.

Tomorrow is graduation and I must say that the time at the academy has been very rewarding. I even found out that I have talent as a sensor ninja, which was a complete surprise, albeit a very welcome one.

Now the bad news? Danzo learned about me and my peculiar ability.

I won't lie, he nearly peed my pants when I ran into him turning a street corner. The bastard looked me up and down like a piece of meat and left without saying anything.

He was terrified.

There is only one way to prevent Danzo, the man who dares to enter the Uchiha district with a spoon for his eyes, from leading you to the dark side. You have to go to the Third Hokage and punch him between the eyebrows that you are a good seedling for the future of the village, not an expendable tool. You have to believe that you have steeped yourself in the will of fire and that you live to die for it.

I spent days in anguish thinking of a plan and luckily for me, one ended up forming in my head.

Sarutobi has always complained about the paperwork his position entails and the mental fatigue it causes him. So I thought of a way to fix that. And no, I'm not going to point out that with the clone technique he could do his job several times faster. My intention is to stay protected until Orochimaru takes him out of the way. So I went to his office in the afternoon, when fatigue begins to overwhelm him, and offered him a special bento.

I know, I was also surprised by how easy it was to get into his office, the man only has three ANBUS in the office and even I could feel his location. Perhaps the benefits of being a sensor ninja?

Anyway, my bento contained one of the first special effect recipes I got: Sanji's Pilaf (One piece).

Not only is it delicious, but it has the temporary effect of refreshing the spirit and the mind.

I think it's obvious that I'm not going to give the old man anything that can help him get stronger.

This man has to die if I want the village to prosper at some point!

The more prosperous I am, the safer my clan will be, the better my future business will be, and the less I will have to worry about my personal safety.

He acted like an old man touched by my concern, but if he thinks I didn't see how he discreetly put away the unopened cup of instant ramen, then he takes me for a fool. I think the only reasons he agreed to eat it are:

1-You need to appear accessible to the next generation.

2-Surely he was somehow able to verify that he was not poisoned or drugged.

3-I was sick of eating fast food.

4- He has heard of the fame of my dishes.

5-I don't know what it could be, but being Sarutobi, surely it's another conspiracy.

He ate to taste, praising the good work of the plate and when he noticed that his fatigue disappeared and he felt good again, he was stunned. I capitalized on his strong impression and told him about my dream of setting up a ninja grocery business. Hell, I think he even got into Naruto's Talk no jutsu mode from when I got into the role. For a second I felt my IQ drop a few points.

Sarutobi was delighted with the idea and I even made a deal with him. The conditions were that I, Tony Akimichi, would provide two free Sanji Pilaf bentos a day while he was in the village, to the Third Hokage for life. In exchange, Sarutobi gave me a document with his seal and the Hokage's signature, effective immediately, that I would NEVER be recruited by ROOT and the village would NEVER delve into my trade and culinary secrets while I made my company headquarters in the village.

In all honesty, I just asked him not to be in ROOT.

The rest was what I assume, a long-term investment for the benefit of the village. What the old man doesn't know is that the document he has given me only gives me a temporary obligation of… how long exactly did the chunin exams take? a few months?

For a few months of free bento, Danzo couldn't take me to the dark side and neither he, nor the embittered advisors, nor whoever is the future Hokage, will be able to delve into the secrets of my future company. As long as I am based in the village, my business has become legally untouchable.

Of course, I'm not stupid. I'm well aware that if Danzo wants something, he'll try to do it on the sly, he'll use rumours, deny his involvement and all that.

I'll think about something later, my immediate objective was achieved and more than that. I made sure to make dozens of copies of the document and hide several copies in secret places just in case.

—Come to think of it, how are you going to split up the genin teams? Tony wondered. My presence would cause one of us to be left out, unless they form a team of four, but it would seem strange to me. Will the teams I know change? I'm a bit curious as to who will be my captain...

The graduation happened the next day and as expected, everyone received their ninja band except Naruto. He still has to go through Iruka's rescue, right? It doesn't matter, he will see it when the groups are formed. Maybe he can even ask her to teach him the shadow clone technique. Or at least he hopes so, because otherwise it means that he will have to take his place along with Strawberry-eyed Sasuke, Ahem! Uchiha meant and Sakura, the bipolar screamer. Seriously, Sakura went on missions with her pink hair and matching clothes, she practically screamed: I'm a bullseye! How did she survive to become Tsunade's disciple?

After the celebratory banquet at the Akimichi clan, Tony went to his room to claim the reward he had been dreaming of for the last few weeks.

[The host has successfully completed the mission!]

[Rewards are being handed out.]

Tony looked at the information on the two rewards and felt his mind explode.

—F*CK! I mean it?

He reread the descriptions three times and went to wash his face with cold water to make sure he wasn't in a dream.

"My goodness, I think Rob smoked the same thing as Kojima." How did you come up with this?!