The first day of the academy was a whirlwind of activity in the Might family household. Duy was trying to decide which of the three jumpsuits I had made for him should be worn for my most "YOUTFUL" day. All three were made from the same material, and in the same style. I told him he was being dramatic and he shook me as he explained the gravity of the day. Now obviously I couldn't tell him that I had been just as nervous dropping my children off at school once upon a time. So I decided to let things ride.
The run to the academy was harder than any workout they were likely to have us do according to my memories of the show. Duy decided we were going to run on our hands all the way to the front gate.
"MY SON! IT IS TIME TO DISPLAY YOUR YOUTH TO THE VILLAGE! WE MUST RUN ON OUR HANDS ALL THE WAY THERE TO ENCOURAGE THE FUTURE LEAVES OF KONOHA!"
Having been thoroughly divorced from shame since the diaper days, I figured it would be a good exercise and reduce dads anxiousness. Two birds, one stone.
So I said "Then let us show forth our youth father."
At which point he started weeping aggressively and we flipped to our hands and took off. He was screaming about blooming youth and I was trying to keep up.
When we got to the gate families were there hugging, encouraging, or warning their children. Mikoto was there with who I assumed to be her father and mother. Around them was a sizable Uchiha delegation delivering kids at all ages. Mikoto who had jerked when we arrived was looking at us like she couldn't comprehend what was happening. Her father was frowning and her mother hid a smile behind a fan that looked to cost more than our entire household, chickens and all.
I could see the loud candy boy with his parents who were in rich silks acting as if they were superior to everything.
There was the Hyuga clan sending off a few children, looking placid as a lake.
The Nara, Yamanaka, and Akimichi were gathered and mingled together with laughter and snacks. I looked for Choza but didn't see him through the throng of people. Of course the problem could be that I was still upside-down doing a handstand.
I flipped myself up and searched for Choza. He was mingling with who I assumed to be Shikaku and Inoichi. I caught his eye and he waved to me, as I started to walk over and talk with him I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Duy. He looked serious as he bent down to look me in the eyes. "My son." He started with an air of solemnity "You are beyond most of these new seedlings and it will be hard for you to grow much in shallow ground. But it is important for taller trees to shade saplings. I want you to let your youth explode. I want you to be safe. I want the world to see Might Tai."
As he said this, tears gathered in his eyes and his hands trembled on my shoulders. It hit me once more how young my father really is. He's only 20 years old, sending off his child to a school that teaches children to kill its enemies, and regards its graduates as tools.
The wind must have blown dust in my eyes, or maybe there was one of those bug guys near, because moisture dripped out of them in streams. I gave my father a hug and said "I'll make you proud dad. I'll help these kids along, I will grow stronger regardless of the ground I am planted in. Thank you for being my father. I am proud of you."
At this point the waterworks were in full blast. We separated, gave each-other nice guy poses, and Duy took off yelling about the springtime of YOUTH"
I glanced around me and noticed most of the Uchiha were looking at me with twitchy fingers. Mikoto looked haunted and her mother had ditched the fan and was laughing openly.
It genuinely didn't bother me at all. Duy is generally the best dad so sometimes that means playing along with his antics. Plus he let me start a moonshine business at 3. He might have had his reasons but any other man I know would have taken it personally that they couldn't provide so their three year old was making plans to support the household.
Speaking of the shine, we moved the operation into a self built shed on the edge of the property. With our schedules now being what they are, we didn't want the house to burn down while we were away if Duy gets called on a mission. Now that I lived in the home full time, we had a pretty good system going to keep that part of our purse full.
There was a call to attention from inside the gate and families turned to see a chunin teacher who spoke loud enough for us to hear that the Hokage would be speaking to us shortly.
A young Sarutobi Hiruzen casually did some handsigns and pulled up a slab of earth to speak from. He put his hands behind his back and spoke " Today marks another year in which this academy of my sensei's design invites students into her doors. It will challenge you, teach you and help you to grow."
Hurizen took his hat off and put it to his chest, and with eyes that seemed to hold everyone in place continued. "As the Hokage of the village hidden in the leaves, it is my duty to spread the will of fire to every generation who take solace within its walls. Konoha is a village built on the idea of not sending children into war. That ideal was broken before it had much of a chance to take root. The world outside these walls is against the peace we seek. Whether for grain or gain, conflict will come again. I tell you this not to scare you but to make an abiding promise to you seedlings who are standing before me. The ideal of no child seeing conflict is just that, an Ideal to strive for. I want that more than anyone here! However, it is not a promise I can make. I can, however, promise this. If and when conflict arises, we will be ready. I promise that the lessons here will make you strong, if you take the teachings seriously, train as you should, and grow together as comrades, the battles ahead will be conquerable."
At this point he put his hat back on and put his hand out infront of him as if grasping the sun which was rising in the distance. "When the tree leaves dance, one shall find flames. The fire's shadow will illuminate the village, and once again, tree leaves shall bud anew." This Village is our family. We all fight together to protect it."
A flame appeared within his hand burning brightly and forcing the wind around him to rise thanks to the heat. He then continued his speech. "To the youth standing here today. You are the future of this village. The new sprouts on the great tree of Konoha. Take advantage of all that is here to nourish you and grow into strong limbs that can shield us from the wind and the rain."
The Hokage stepped off his earth pedestal and slapped it with both hands. It sunk back into the ground and looked as if it had never existed.
I was honestly expecting something completely different from Hiruzen. I thought maybe a long meaningless brainwashing speech was incoming once i figured out what was going on. Clearly things are different than I thought they were. Either he was always this inspiring and just dropped the ball with old age and coming out of retirement, or something had shifted. The part that caught my attention the most was the part about the academy pushing us. From what i remember, it was terrible, if their goal was to train competent ninjas. Of course that is like 30 years away and who knows how much things will change in that timeframe.
The Chunin in front of the gate then began calling names and separating us into different classes. For first years there was no "best class" that stipulation didn't come until the second year and beyond. I heard my name and was told to go to the south section of the yard.
Choza and Mikoto were already standing there, with Choza waving me over happily. Once all of the new students were sorted into the 4 classes, our teachers came out and led us into our designated classrooms. Our Sensei was a large heavily muscled man with laugh lines around his eyes. Once he stepped in the classroom he invited us in and assigned us to our seats. I was put next to Choza and across the isle from Mikoto.
Once everyone was in their spots our sensei introduced himself and wrote his name on the board.
"Good morning children. My name is Chikuma Iroh. You can call me Kuma-sensei. I like bojutsu, good sake, and teaching. My dream is to train you all into protectors of this village. The first thing that I would like to happen is for everyone to introduce themselves when I point at you and for you to tell me your likes and dreams as I just demonstrated."
He started to point down the rows of students from the front to the back. There were two rows of children shouting how their dream was to be the strongest in the village or the richest ninja, before I recognized someone. It was Leaf boy. turns out his name was Shimura Saburo, he liked being in the strongest clan in the village, he disliked weaklings and his dream was to be the God of Shinobi.
I sighed and shook my head. One of the great tragedies we witness almost daily is the tragedy of men of high aim and low achievement. Saburo had the look of this already.
I didn't know Shimura Saburo. He wasn't featured in the story I knew, but I did not have a good impression of him after watching him sneer and scoff at the dreams of the others around him.
By the time I had finished with that thought Mikoto was introducing herself. She liked gardening, her clan, and surprisingly her dream to be the next Uchiha clan leader.
Can women even be clan leaders? I guess the Inzuka clan had Tsume in the future. So maybe it isn't out of the realm of possibility.
Choza on the other hand was already the clan heir. He liked tasting new food and his dream was to open the greatest restaurant in the world and try every food there was to eat. I can get on board with that. Wait until I introduce him to burgers.
Kuma-sensei wrote something on his paper without looking up.
Then his finger got to me.
I stood.
Every child in the room already knew at least one thing about me by then, though not all the same thing. Some knew Duy was my father. Some knew I had opinions about breakfast. Some knew I was odd. A few had heard something about eggs, or tonic, or the little house with too many animals for its size. Villages do not wait for facts before making stories.
Name first.
Then I thought, very briefly, about lying in the harmless social way children do.
Then I decided against it.
"I'm Might Tai," I said. "I like training, good beef, and food that does what it's supposed to. My dream is to create the best beef steak in the world."
There was a beat of silence.
Then one boy in the back laughed.
Choza nodded like I had said something deeply respectable.
Kuma-sensei's mouth moved at one corner. "Food that does what it's supposed to."
"Yes."
"What do you mean by that?"
I looked at him.
Then at the room full of children.
Then back to him.
"It means if you're going to ask a body to work," I said, "you ought to feed it like you mean it."
This time the silence landed differently.
It broke a second later when Saburo muttered, "That sounds like something a grandfather would say."
I sat down and said, "They usually survive long enough to learn a few things."
Choza made a choking noise into his sleeve. Saburo wasn't quite smart enough to get it so he just made a confused scoffing noise.
The morning lessons that followed introductions were what you'd expect from the first day. Rules. Structure. Basic posture. Classroom habits. A few words about history and service to the village delivered with enough solemnity that even the children who didn't understand them knew they were expected to sit still while hearing them.
Kuma-sensei was not sentimental about any of it.
"The Academy exists," he said, writing the word discipline in clean characters across the board, "to produce shinobi who can think, move, follow orders, and stay alive long enough to matter."
No one laughed at that. The classroom went still. Good. Although the words were harsh I was glad he was speaking the truth. He did not see us as cherubs but raw material.
By midday he had us outside. He lined us up in spaced out rows and showed us stances first. Always a good sign of a teacher starting with fundamentals.
Children reveal themselves quickly when asked to stand properly. The impatient wobble. The over-proud lockout. The lazy lean. The ones imitating older siblings instead of listening to their own center of gravity.
Kuma-sensei walked the rows, correcting by touch and voice both.
"Bend here."
"Not so wide."
"Weight under you, not ahead of you."
When he reached me, he paused.
I had already settled into the stance Duy favored for foundation work It was a solid stance.
Kuma-sensei nudged one shoulder with two fingers and I didn't budge.
"Who taught you?"
"My father."
He just nodded and moved on.
We did leaf exercises after that.
That was where the room sorted itself a little harder.
Some children had nothing yet. Some had too much excitement and no control. Some could gather a trickle of chakra well enough to make the leaf stick if they concentrated fiercely.
I did not intend to show off.
Intentions, like pigs, do not always respect intentions.
Kuma-sensei handed out leaves and gave the basic instruction. Small output. Steady focus. No forcing. Let the chakra cling, not shove.
That part I could do.
I laid the leaf against the back of my hand, breathed once, gathered a narrow stream, and let it settle.
It held.
Across from me, Saburo was sweating through his second attempt and glaring at his own chakra like offense alone might improve it.
Choza got his leaf to stick to his palm, looked delighted, lost focus, and watched it tumble off againl.
Mikoto succeeded on the first try and did not smile, which I respected more than if she had.
Kuma-sensei stopped beside me.
"Again," he said.
I did it again.
This time to the forehead, because I knew he wasn't asking from curiosity.
The leaf held.
He grunted once and moved on.
That was all.
But children are excellent naturalists when it comes to hierarchy. By the time the exercise ended, I could feel the room's assessment of me shifting.
Not genius. Not prodigy. Something worse, socially speaking.
Competent.
At lunch, the courtyard turned into a smaller version of the adult village. Clusters, trades, posturing, alliances already trying to form around whoever seemed funniest, strongest, easiest, or safest.
I sat with Choza under the shade by the wall. Mikoto drifted over after a minute with a small headnod.
Choza opened his lunch and nearly sighed with happiness.
Rice, meat strips, something pickled, sweet bean dumpling.
Boy's got a good mother.
I unwrapped mine.
Duy's folded egg was still warm in the center.
I've got a good dad.
Choza looked at my lunch, then at his, then at me. "You always get food that looks like it was made by somebody who's trying to help you win."
"That's because it is."
Mikoto looked down at the herb folded into my egg. "Perilla?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"It helps."
"With what?"
"Recovery. Digestion. Flavor. Morale."
Choza perked up. "Flavor matters to morale?"
"Immensely."
He nodded at once.
Saburo and two others wandered close enough to make rudeness a choice.
He looked at our lunches, then at Choza's dumpling, then at me.
"So what?" he said. "Are you going to lecture us about candy again? Huh cow-boy?"
The other kids laughed not knowing how close they were to the mark.
I looked Saburo dead in the eye and took a bite first.
Chewed.
Swallowed.
Then said, "Only if you insist on giving me material."
One of the other boys made a confused sound.
Saburo scowled. "I can eat what I want. At least I can afford to buy candy. You guys are so poor I can smell it on you."
"You can eat whatever you want," I agreed. "You can also feel terrible later and call it a mystery."
He opened his mouth. I kept going.
"I don't like you very much but against my better judgement, I'm going to give you some advice. It's better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than open it and remove all doubt."
That got Choza laughing hard enough he had to put his lunch down.
Even Mikoto's mouth twitched.
Saburo went red.
"You sound like somebody's grandfather."
"I keep hearing that from children with weak meals and weaker minds."
He stomped off after that, dragging the other two with him mostly I don't think they were smart enough to move on their own.
Choza wiped his eyes. "You really do just say whatever you think."
"No," I said. "I edit constantly. You should be grateful."
That sent him off again.
The afternoon got more serious.
Not because the lessons changed.
Because the children did.
Fatigue reveals more than introductions.
Feet dragged. Focus wandered. Tempers shortened. Saburo who had been cocksure all morning started missing easy instructions once his sugar wore off. A girl from the back row who had barely spoken at all turned out to have excellent balance and terrible endurance. Choza's body did fine until the heat rose.
I saw it before he did.
Breathing getting ragged.
Weight leaning wrong.
Attention blurring at the edges.
When Kuma-sensei had us repeat a simple step-turn-strike drill, Choza lost the line of his hips and nearly tipped himself sideways.
I caught his sleeve.
"Breathe."
He blinked at me.
"Slow. In through the nose. Again."
He did, more from obedience than understanding.
"Don't chase the movement," I said. "Get your feet under it first."
He reset.
Tried again.
Better.
Kuma-sensei saw it too, because of course he did.
He said nothing then. But later, while dismissing us row by row, his eyes passed over me once and stopped.
"Tai."
"Yes, Kuma-sensei."
"You like fixing things?"
That was a dangerous question.
"Yes."
His gaze shifted briefly toward the children still fumbling sandals and lunch cloths and pride all at once.
"Learn the difference," he said, "between helping and interfering."
Then he turned away before I could answer.
That was, I suspected, my first real Academy lesson.
Outside, parents and siblings were waiting in varying degrees of composure. Duy stood out among them the way a bonfire stands out in a dark field, which is to say immediately and against all attempts at reason.
The moment he saw me, he raised both hands.
"MY SON!"
I walked to him with dignity intact mostly because Choza and Mikoto were watching and I have no shame.
Duy took one look at my face and smiled.
"You survived."
"Yes."
"And?"
I glanced back once at the Academy building.
At the children pouring out of it. At Choza, already reaching for more food with the calm inevitability of the tide. At Mikoto, pausing by the herb strip again, fingers brushing one leaf as if to check whether the day had damaged it. At Saburo, still angry at the world for refusing to be impressed on schedule.
Then I looked up at Duy.
"It's not hopeless."
His grin widened.
On the walk home, I thought about sorting.
The Academy sorted children by attention, effort, endurance, talent, clan, courage, noise, obedience, appetite, luck.
The village sorted them even earlier than that.
Some would thrive in it. Some would get sharpened into something useful. Some would get lost, or used up, or left behind while everyone politely called it natural.
I could not fix that.
Not yet.
But I could see it.
And seeing a thing clearly is the first insult you offer any system built on pretending not to notice its own costs.
By the time we reached the house, the yard smelled like straw, feed, dust, and moonshine.
Something in me unclenched.
The hens needed checking. The goats needed water. The pigs needed watching because if left unsupervised they would eventually either escape or unionize. The shine needed a little alchemy to help it along.
I finished with everything I needed to do before I let myself sit.
Then, with the evening settling around the fence line and the sounds of the village softening into supper and gossip and distant doors, I opened my notebook and wrote:
Academy, first day.
Children are children.
Choza needs better lunch timing.
Mikoto notices roots before leaves.
Saboro is an idiot.
Kuma-sensei sees more than he says.
Must learn where advice helps and where it only invites resistance.
I paused.
Then added one last line beneath it.
A good field still grows weeds, grain, and medicine side by side. Watch carefully.
Inside, Duy shouted that dinner was ready.
I closed the notebook and went inside..