Author Note-
Just a Side story/interlude.
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I, the great Jiraiya, was not merely gazing upon the wondrous form that is the female body. No, this was research. The kind that requires careful observation, repeated fieldwork, and a generous expense account. Frankly, the village should have thanked me.
My arrival here had nothing to do with the Third Shinobi War. Of course it didn't. Wars are loud, obvious things. Explosions. Casualty lists. Shinobi marching with grim faces and empty eyes. If I wanted that, I'd have gone somewhere sensible like the front lines.
And it certainly wasn't my fault that people talked around me.
They talk because they think I'm distracted. Because I'm smiling. Because my attention appears to be firmly focused on curves instead of consequences. They mistake indulgence for ignorance, and I have never corrected them. It's a survival skill, really.
So when a merchant complained that trade routes had shifted again, not closed, just… rerouted. I laughed and blamed bandits. When a retired shinobi muttered that patrols were tightening even in places far from the fighting, I waved it off as overcautious commanders. When a drunk insisted that he saw bright lights flickering in areas no battle had touched, I told him he was feeling the aftereffects of cheap sake.
All perfectly reasonable responses.
Still, I listened because trade routes don't change without pressure. Patrols don't tighten without fear. And strange lights normally mean Justsu. Which means Shinobi.
This War wasn't just being fought with jutsu and bodies. It was grinding the land down. Stretching supply lines thin and forcing villages to lean harder on their shinobi, and shinobi to lean harder on the world itself.
I took another drink and laughed louder than necessary, because that's what people expect from me.
But behind the grin, the pattern was already forming. Not a single disaster. Nor one decisive battle.
Just a thousand small stresses accumulating across borders and neutral towns alike. Cracks in the foundation of a world at war.
And for the first time that night, I found myself thinking that this war wasn't going to end with a bang.
It was going to end when something finally gave way.
It was during my ruminating that a person caught my attention from the far corner of my eye.
A messenger.
He didn't shove through the crowd or announce himself. He moved the way experienced shinobi did when they didn't want to be remembered. Quiet steps, eyes down, presence minimised. He waited until I drifted away from the table, until the laughter and noise covered them both, and only then did he press the scroll into my hand.
The seal on it was unmistakably the Hokage's.
My grin didn't fade at first. Habit held it in place as he muttered something crude to no one in particular and wandered a few steps farther, toward a narrow alley between buildings where lantern light thinned and voices dulled.
Only then did he break the seal.
The coded message inside was brief. Too brief.
You missed the birth.
Complications. Return. Now.
That was all.
No flourish. No explanation. No attempt to soften the words. I read it once, then again.
Then slower, as if changing the pace might make the meaning shift.
The noise of the street seemed to fall away, receding, like sound underwater. My grin slipped off my face without ceremony.
"You missed the birth."
It wasn't an accusation.
Jiraiya exhaled slowly through his nose. Births happened. Even during war. Especially during war. Shinobi learned early that life didn't wait for better timing.
Complications. Words carried weight, and to a shinobi, nothing was heavier than that word.
My mind immediately drifted to Kushina's seal, for what else could it possibly be, before they were calling for my return. However, surely Minato, with all his brilliance, would be able to handle something like that.
Perhaps the problem was… Medical. And wasn't that a horrible thought? The kind of problem Minato wouldn't exaggerate, and Kushina wouldn't ask for help unless they were already desperate.
Jiraiya folded the scroll carefully, his hands steady despite the tightness creeping into his chest.