"One hundred million."
Kiyohara said it plainly.
Another one hundred million.
Tsunade's mouth opened slightly.
"…How much?"
"One hundred million."
Kiyohara repeated it.
For a shinobi, that number really was staggering.
After all, a hundred million ryō was an astronomical sum for most ninja.
The only people who could hear that and stay calm were the likes of Jiraiya—someone with extra side income and enough personal strength to keep earning.
Jiraiya had actually completed more S-rank missions than Orochimaru.
Tsunade stared at Kiyohara, her eyes full of shock.
"Y-you… where did you get that much money?"
"Gold dust."
Kiyohara answered.
If Tsunade had actually saved her money properly, she could've had that much too.
An S-rank mission paid a minimum of one million ryō, and usually ranged from one to ten million.
Tsunade had completed ninety-five S-rank missions in total. At the absolute minimum, that alone was ninety-five million ryō. Factoring in variable payouts, she should have had at least one or two hundred million.
And that didn't even include the rest of her mission history or the inheritance of the Senju clan.
The only reason Tsunade had ended up buried in debt was because she gambled too much.
"With Magnet Release, refining gold dust is pretty efficient. I can make quite a bit in a month."
Kiyohara said.
Tsunade fell silent for a moment.
She was mentally calculating just how much money she'd really lost over the years.
"Sensei, want to invest?"
Kiyohara smiled.
Tsunade considered it carefully for a while, then nodded.
"I want in too."
She stood, walked over to him, and bent down, bracing both hands on the bed at either side of him.
Her face was very close now—close enough for him to clearly see the curve of her eyelashes.
From this angle, the pale curve inside her collar was fully visible.
Her collarbones were delicate, the line between them deep, rising and falling faintly with each breath.
Kiyohara forced his gaze back up.
"How much can you put in, Sensei?"
Tsunade thought for a moment.
"Ten million ryō."
Kiyohara looked genuinely surprised.
"You still have that much money?"
he asked.
By all logic, Tsunade shouldn't have much left.
Very few shinobi could casually pull out ten million ryō. Even if you dragged Jiraiya in, it would be the same.
Jiraiya only reached that level of S-rank mission income much later in life, around his fifties. Right now, he was still far from as wealthy as he'd be in the future.
Tsunade shot him a glare.
"What, you think all I do is lose money?"
"Not exactly."
Kiyohara smiled.
Then he realized it—this was money Tsunade had actually managed to save over the last while.
She hadn't gone to the casino during this stretch, so naturally some money had accumulated.
Tsunade huffed.
"I'll give it to you tomorrow."
Then she paused and added,
"But… can I get a little more of the shares?"
Kiyohara looked at her.
"That depends on how well you perform, Sensei."
Tsunade raised a brow.
"You brat, getting ahead of yourself, are you?"
Kiyohara smiled faintly.
"Just hug me, Sensei."
Tsunade froze for a second.
"…That's it?"
"Yeah."
Kiyohara nodded.
She looked at him and hesitated.
Then, slowly, she reached out.
And lightly hugged him.
Her body was warm and soft, carrying a faint fragrance.
Kiyohara honestly had no idea where that scent came from.
Maybe it was because the Strength of a Hundred Seal had kept Tsunade's body locked in its peak state all this time, so even now she still had the soft natural scent of a young woman.
Then Tsunade let go and stepped back.
She was about to say something when she suddenly saw Kiyohara take something from his robe.
A necklace.
A golden chain with a teardrop-shaped golden gem hanging from it.
"This is…"
"My gift."
Kiyohara stood up and moved behind her.
"To celebrate the victory in the war."
He lifted the necklace.
"It's for you, Sensei."
Tsunade froze slightly as he fastened the necklace around her neck.
The cool metal settled against her collarbone.
From Kiyohara's angle, he could see the pale nape of her neck, with a few golden strands of hair resting there.
And below that were the clean lines of her shoulders, and the pale skin hidden just under the collar of her top.
The necklace was in place.
Kiyohara withdrew his hands.
Tsunade instinctively lowered her eyes and looked at the golden teardrop now resting below her collarbone.
It sat against the pale curve of her chest, brushing lightly against the First Hokage's necklace.
"Do you like it?"
Kiyohara asked.
Tsunade was a bit of a money-lover herself. He figured she'd appreciate something that glittered.
Her golden-brown eyes lifted to him.
"It's beautiful."
she said softly.
As a woman, Tsunade could obviously tell that her disciple's feelings toward her weren't entirely ordinary.
At first, when she'd let him move in, she had thought he was still just a kid.
But so much time had passed now, and Kiyohara clearly wasn't one anymore.
That question was starting to sit right in front of her.
"What's wrong?"
Kiyohara noticed she'd gone strangely quiet.
"Nothing. I was just wondering how much this cost."
Tsunade shook her head.
Because when she thought about it carefully, the only real issue left between them was age.
But she had the Strength of a Hundred Seal. Even fifty years from now, she wouldn't look any older.
"I made it myself, using high-purity gold dust."
Kiyohara said.
Whenever he gathered gold dust, he naturally ended up with some especially pure pieces.
And the larger his chakra reserves grew, the higher his efficiency became.
Which meant the proportion of high-purity gold dust he collected kept rising too.
It was a positive loop.
Even Rasa couldn't match that.
Kiyohara figured that in a few years, Rasa would probably start declining little by little.
The drop would be slow, but once the body passed its physical prime, decline was inevitable.
Shinobi were still human.
They could combine physical and mental energy into chakra, but chakra still followed the laws of aging and death.
For ordinary civilian-born shinobi, decline could start as early as twenty-five.
For clans with stronger natural bodies, like the Sarutobi, Uzumaki, or Senju, it might begin at thirty or thirty-five instead.
But no matter what, the body eventually aged.
Once the body aged, physical energy declined, and chakra followed.
Kiyohara, however, didn't have to follow that rule.
First, he carried bloodlines from all three great sage lands.
Second, every inheritance shattered another limit and pushed his power upward again.
"You little brat."
Tsunade flicked him on the forehead.
To the current Kiyohara, the force didn't hurt at all. If anything, it tickled a little.
"I'm going."
Tsunade turned toward the tent flap.
After a few steps, she suddenly stopped.
"Oh, and that necklace… I really like it. I'm going to prepare the money."
Then she lifted the curtain and left quickly.
Now Kiyohara was alone again.
He stood there, watching her disappear, the corner of his mouth curling up slightly.
Tsunade, in the end, was still human.
And as long as someone was human, they would have wants and needs.
At that thought, Kiyohara rubbed his chin.
He wasn't like Jiraiya—the type to talk endlessly and never act.
Jiraiya shouted about loving Tsunade, but then ran all over the world obsessively searching for the Child of Prophecy.
And the only basis for all that was the Great Toad Sage's prophecy.
Kiyohara honestly didn't understand why Jiraiya believed in it so fanatically.
Kiyohara only knew because he stood outside the story and already knew how things played out.
But what was Jiraiya's actual basis for that kind of faith?
Or had the Great Toad Sage demonstrated his prophetic ability in private too?
Either way, the truth was that the only person who had really stayed by Tsunade's side all this time was Shizune.
And now Kiyohara had been added to that.
He had a strong feeling that the day he truly became the rebellious disciple was getting closer and closer.
"Yeah… I'll test the waters in a bit."
He could feel Tsunade wavering.
They had already been together for so long that their everyday interactions felt almost like family.
So to break that pattern, all he needed was the right opportunity—the moment to pierce through that final layer.
…
A few days later, the Kumogakure forces began withdrawing in stages.
That was when everyone knew for certain the war really was over.
The wounded and the shinobi began regrouping together and moving back toward Konoha in an orderly way.
Of course, each major front still left behind some forces in case another nation decided to invade.
"It's finally over."
Kiyohara looked at the vast black mass of people.
War was an incredibly troublesome thing.
Before a war, you had to prepare routes, supplies, provisions.
After a war, there were still treaties, compensation, personnel transfers, and endless cleanup to deal with.
As one of the commanders, Kiyohara had spent the past few days buried in exactly that kind of work.
"Let's go."
he said.
Kurenai was standing beside him.
"Are they really taking all those prisoners back?"
"More or less."
Kiyohara nodded.
"The higher-ups already made Hiruzen Sarutobi give up Iwagakure's benefits and step down over that, but now that the war ended in a crushing victory, giving up even more would just look weak."
Kiyohara shook his head.
The leadership in Konoha would never allow Hiruzen to do that.
People always talked as if only Danzo, Koharu, and Homura were the ones deciding things, but in truth, the Land of Fire's officials were part of the equation too.
Otherwise, the daimyo would know nothing about what was happening in the shinobi village.
By the same logic, most of the Twelve Guardian Ninja came from Konoha and the Fire Temple.
"These prisoners will make the coming negotiations go much more smoothly."
Kiyohara said.
"I see."
Kurenai nodded.
Then she happened to glance to one side and saw a blonde, blue-eyed female ninja.
That over-the-top fullness made Kurenai instinctively compare her own figure to the woman's, and she suddenly felt a little defeated.
Kurenai's chest was large, but it was still clearly smaller than that woman's.
She felt like the woman was nearly Tsunade-level.
Kiyohara followed Kurenai's gaze and gently rubbed her head.
"That's Samui from Kumogakure. The one behind her should be Mabui."
Kurenai nodded.
"What about the Raikage and the jinchūriki?"
she asked curiously.
"They're being held and transported separately."
Kiyohara said.
Minato was handling most of that with him.
It was too important.
If one of them escaped during transport and launched a Tailed Beast Bomb at long range, Konoha would immediately suffer catastrophic casualties.
"Right."
Kurenai nodded. She understood.
After chatting with her for a bit longer, Kiyohara sent Kurenai off to finish packing up for the return.
…
A few more days passed.
On the streets of Konoha, the crowds were so thick it was almost impossible to move.
The roads in Konoha were wide, but with the number of people out there, it still felt shoulder-to-shoulder.
Once word spread that Kiyohara and the others were returning in triumph, huge numbers of people came out to see.
"They're here! They're here!"
someone shouted, pointing toward the horizon.
A dark tide of people was slowly moving in from the distance.
Kiyohara and the other high-ranking shinobi were at the very front.
He wore a black chainmail layer under a gray chest guard not too different in style from Tsunade's.
Beside him were people like Fugaku Uchiha and Hiashi Hyuga, the elite of Konoha lined up in one row.
Behind them stretched an endless sea of shinobi.
And at the very back was the line of prisoners, staggering forward under sealing restraints.
That was only part of the total number of captives. A great many Kumogakure shinobi had escaped during the chaos.
Konoha simply hadn't had the manpower to guard all of them, so they had only kept the most important prisoners.
"Long live!"
"Long live Konoha!"
"Long live Captain Kiyohara!"
The cheers rose one after another.
Countless villagers tried to rush forward with flowers, only to be stopped by the security line. All they could do was wave from a distance and shout the names of their heroes.
"Kiyohara! Kiyohara! Kiyohara!"
No one knew who started it, but before long his name had turned into a single roaring chant echoing under Konoha's sky.
Kiyohara lifted a hand slightly.
That handsome face wore a faint smile, his eyes passing over the sea of familiar faces.
Looks like my popularity's not too bad.
Kiyohara touched his own face, secretly feeling that while his achievements mattered, what really made his fame spread so fast was probably this face.
After all, Sasuke had collected an army of fangirls at the Academy on looks alone.
And Kiyohara was basically Sasuke Plus. Of course he wasn't going to lose out.
"Please don't just shout my name. This victory doesn't belong to me alone. It belongs to everyone."
It was only a single sentence, but it made the crowd even more excited.
Fugaku, standing nearby, couldn't help the twitch at the corner of his mouth.
Kiyohara's popularity was honestly getting absurd.
He glanced at Kiyohara's face, then thought about his own square features and stern expression.
Yeah… it was a little hard to compete with that.
Thinking about the coming Hokage selection, Fugaku tried forcing a smile onto his face too and waved to the crowd.
The only other person whose smile looked just as stiff was Hiashi Hyuga.
Both of them were old-school shinobi—serious by nature, not used to this kind of public display.
The others were much more at ease.
Some of the shinobi along the edges were even chatting with villagers as they walked.
Tsunade stood beside Kiyohara with her arms folded.
A faint smile rested on her beautiful face.
"You're more famous than I am now, brat, and I'm supposed to be your teacher."
Kiyohara turned his head toward her.
"Without you, Sensei, there wouldn't be a me today."
Tsunade huffed and looked away.
But the corners of her mouth kept lifting no matter how hard she tried to suppress them. Her pride was obvious.
The procession slowly moved through the streets toward the Hokage Tower, surrounded by the cheering crowd.
Along both sides of the road, countless female shinobi were standing on tiptoe trying to catch a better look at Kiyohara.
Some blushed.
Some gasped.
Some whispered to each other.
"He's so handsome…"
"He looks even better than the rumors said…"
"I heard he still isn't married…"
Kurenai, walking in the middle section of the procession, heard all of it and frowned slightly.
Her hand unconsciously tightened around Red Moon's hilt.
Rin, walking beside her, had heard the same thing.
She lowered her head and bit her lip, saying nothing.
At the very end of the road, on the steps of the Hokage Tower, Hiruzen Sarutobi stood waiting.
He was dressed in the familiar Hokage robes, his hat resting on his head.
On an occasion as important as this, the man who was never without his pipe had come empty-handed.
In fact, he hadn't smoked since yesterday.
The smell of tobacco on him was very faint now.
Behind him stood Koharu Utatane, Homura Mitokado, and… Danzo Shimura.
Kiyohara stopped at the foot of the steps.
He looked up and met Hiruzen's gaze.
"Hokage-sama."
Hiruzen looked at him and smiled warmly.
"Good. Good."
He stepped down the stairs and came to stand in front of Kiyohara.
Then he reached out and patted Kiyohara hard on the shoulder.
The force wasn't light, but it carried the warmth of an elder.
"You all worked hard."
Kiyohara shook his head slightly.
"It was our duty."
Hiruzen nodded, then let his eyes sweep over the forces behind him, the cheering villagers, and finally the long line of prisoners.
The Raikage, the Two-Tails jinchūriki, and the Eight-Tails jinchūriki had all been secretly brought back by Minato the day before.
So they weren't in today's procession.
Hiruzen turned and started up the steps toward the Hokage Tower.
"Come with me."
Kiyohara followed.
Tsunade, Minato, Fugaku, Hiashi, and the others followed after him as well.
The doors of the Hokage Tower slowly closed behind them, shutting out the roar of the crowd.
…
The Hokage's office was packed.
Shinobi filled the room, and even the benches were all occupied.
Tsunade sat beside Kiyohara with one leg crossed, her pale feet swinging lightly.
Hiruzen Sarutobi sat in the main seat, his pipe releasing thin streams of smoke.
"Today's meeting is only about one matter."
He looked across everyone in the room.
"From today onward, I will no longer serve as Hokage."
The moment those words fell, the office went completely silent.
Everyone had known that day would come eventually, but hearing it said out loud still shook them.
After all, many of them had grown up under the rule of the Third Hokage.
And Hiruzen Sarutobi had reigned longer than any Hokage before him.
Hashirama and Tobirama Senju had both died far too early.
"Hokage-sama…"
someone began.
Hiruzen raised a hand and cut him off.
"Don't call me Hokage anymore."
He paused.
"From here, the elders of Konoha will choose the Fourth Hokage."
His eyes swept over the room.
"Before that, the list of official Hokage candidates will be finalized."
He lifted the pipe again and took a drag.
"This has always been Konoha's custom since the village was founded. It is the tradition we have always followed."
The atmosphere in the office turned strange.
The clan heads exchanged glances.
Then what exactly had Hiruzen's own time as Hokage been based on?
The civilian shinobi all lowered their heads, each caught in their own thoughts.
Everyone understood that what came next would determine Konoha's course for many years to come.
And not just Konoha's course—the future interests of their clans, and their own interests too.
Hiruzen's gaze passed across every face.
"The candidate list will not be long."
he said slowly.
"Anyone whose name enters that list will be a shinobi who has rendered outstanding service to Konoha, with both strength and reputation."
He paused again.
"The rest of you may return and begin preparing for the vote."
Everyone stood and began filing out.
Kiyohara stood too.
But just as he reached the door, Hiruzen's voice stopped him.
"Kiyohara, stay."
Kiyohara halted.
Tsunade glanced back at him, blinked once, then stepped out and closed the door.
Inside the office, only Hiruzen, Koharu, Homura, and Kiyohara remained.
"Sit."
Hiruzen gestured.
Kiyohara sat back down.
Hiruzen looked at him.
"In the coming days, a lot of people may approach you."
he said.
"You should rest when it's time to rest, train when it's time to train, and then wait for the result."
Kiyohara looked at him.
"Third Hokage, what are the actual standards for becoming a Hokage candidate?"
Hiruzen smiled faintly.
"War merit, reputation, strength, and… the approval of the higher-ups."
He paused.
"But don't get complacent. You're far from the only Hokage candidate."
"I understand."
Kiyohara nodded.
~~~
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