Chapter 5 – The Grand Money-Making Plan Takes Shape
"Lord Hokage."
"Oh, it's you, Mitsuki. What brings you here now? Is there an issue at the Ninja Academy?"
"Yes, Lord Hokage!" Yamada Mitsuki stood at attention, excitement written all over his face. He hadn't expected the Hokage to remember his name. Without wasting a moment, he handed over a neatly prepared file.
"I discovered an exceptionally gifted civilian student in this year's intake. As soon as I compiled the details, I came to report in person."
"His name is Taichi Matsushita. His parents died in the Second Great Ninja War, and he's lived in an orphanage ever since. Today was his very first chakra training session—he managed to refine chakra in less than twenty minutes."
"Oh?" Sarutobi Hiruzen took the file, reading as he listened to Mitsuki's report.
When his eyes fell on Taichi's stated dream, his brows lifted slightly. 'To protect,' huh?
Clearly, to Hiruzen, this was even more important than chakra refinement speed. In Konoha, geniuses were not rare. But a genius who upheld the Will of Fire—that was someone truly worth the Hokage's attention.
"Very good, Mitsuki. Keep a close eye on this Taichi Matsushita—he may well become a pillar of the village in the future," Hiruzen said. "Also, these two—Might Guy and Nohara Rin—are promising as well. Make sure they receive proper guidance."
"Yes, sir!"
While Yamada Mitsuki was reporting to the Hokage, Taichi himself had just come home from a day at the Academy. But his mind wasn't on schoolwork—it was on a different challenge entirely: how to make money as quickly as possible.
This wasn't just about buying medicine, tools, and supplies for his own training. The future of the orphanage was at stake. More importantly, it was tied to whether Yakushi Nonō could safely break away from Root.
In the original timeline, Nonō could have left, but Danzō Shimura had seized control of the orphanage's funding, using it to force her into carrying out Root missions. If the orphanage had its own steady income, Danzō's leverage would vanish.
Even if there were other complications, removing one major weakness was still a victory.
The problem? Taichi was just over six years old—too young for most jobs. Anything ninja-related, like making tools or explosive tags, required knowledge he simply didn't have yet.
After thinking it over, he decided to draw on knowledge from his past life—maybe he could invent something unique and turn a small profit.
He brainstormed: food, clothing, housing, daily needs… but those industries either required too much manpower or operated on a scale far beyond what a small orphanage could manage. Time was also a problem—his own training came first.
After much thought, he still hadn't found the right idea. It was already past six o'clock, and hunger began to gnaw at him. He headed to the kitchen to make some ramen.
But halfway through cooking, he froze, staring at the garlic in his hand.
Because of the orphanage's financial troubles, Taichi often had to help supplement their food supply—fishing in rivers, climbing trees for birds, and so on. But this was the shinobi world—and here, the fish and birds were anything but docile. Annoy them, and you might get bitten or clawed. Try to take them home for dinner, and they'd resist even harder.
After enough encounters, injuries were inevitable. Light wounds could heal naturally, especially with Nonō's medical ninjutsu. But there was one time…
He and some friends had gone to steal bird eggs, only to be caught by the mother bird—a massive creature with a wingspan over two meters. Taichi had shielded his friends during their escape and taken a vicious peck to the arm, leaving a hole clean through.
The injury was serious enough that Nonō rushed him to Konoha Hospital immediately. That visit opened his eyes: in Year 42 of Konoha, the village's medical care was still poor. Even their disinfectants and anti-inflammatories were barely effective. Without medical ninjutsu, the death toll in every ninja war would have been far higher.
And when it came to fighting infection, one substance stood out above all—penicillin. But producing it required complex conditions, and it might not even exist in this world.
However, there was one thing this world certainly had—garlic. And from garlic came allicin, a natural and powerful antibacterial agent…
Allicin was cheap, easy to produce, and highly effective for sterilization and anti-inflammation. In a world like the shinobi continent—where every few decades erupted into another global war—such medicine could become indispensable.
The thought made Taichi clench his fist in excitement. This could solve my money problem!
Without wasting time, he wolfed down the rest of his ramen, then gathered every clove of garlic he could find in the kitchen.
Producing allicin wasn't complicated. Taichi decided to use an extraction method with a relatively high yield—organic solvent extraction.
First, he procured a jar of white liquor and distilled it several times to raise its alcohol concentration. Then he crushed all the garlic into a fine paste and soaked it in the high-proof liquor.
Of course, pure alcohol would have been even better for extraction, but given his current resources, he had to make do.
Finally, he distilled the garlic-infused solution again, collecting the oil-like liquid that remained—garlic oil, rich in allicin.
Looking at the meager result—barely two or three grams of oil from an entire kilogram of garlic—Taichi felt a pang of anxiety. Whether this plan succeeded or failed would depend on the upcoming tests.
A glance at the clock reminded him that it was late, and he hadn't yet done his daily training. Carefully, he poured the precious garlic oil into a glass container and stored it in the refrigerator before tidying up.
Now, it was time to train.
---
[You train in Basic Taijutsu. Your related insights improve.]
[Basic Taijutsu skill level increases. EXP +1]
[Your focus during Basic Taijutsu training increases your "Ninja Apprentice" job EXP by +1]
...
[You train in Basic Meditation. Your related insights improve.]
[Basic Meditation skill level increases. EXP +1]
[Your focus during Basic Meditation training increases your "Ninja Apprentice" job EXP by +1]
Since he now had an additional skill—Chakra Refinement—Taichi shortened his taijutsu and meditation sessions, setting aside an entire hour to work solely on refining chakra.
He'd discovered something interesting: as long as he didn't refine more chakra in one go than his body could handle, the process was actually beneficial—strengthening and maintaining his physical condition.
The problem was, chakra leaked away naturally once refined. Maintaining a steady level in the body was a challenge. Since realizing its strengthening effect, Taichi had been thinking of ways to solve this—perhaps making refinement an automatic, subconscious process, or finding a method to reduce chakra leakage. But those solutions would require much more knowledge than he currently possessed.
For now, his only option was to refine chakra periodically to keep it at a stable level.
---
[You train in Chakra Refinement. Your related insights improve.]
[Chakra Refinement skill level increases. EXP +1]
[Your focus during Chakra Refinement training increases your "Ninja Apprentice" job EXP by +1]
...
[Congratulations! Your Ninja Apprentice job level has increased.]
[Attribute Points +1 | Skill Points +1]
At the very end of his training, the progress bar that had been on the verge of filling finally tipped over—his job level had gone up.
---
Name: Matsushita Taichi
Profession: Ninja Apprentice Lv. 2 (0/200)
Talents: Diligence Makes Up for Lack of Talent, Scholar
Age: 6
Constitution: 9
Strength: 10
Agility: 9
Spirit: 18
Chakra: 800 (4,200) —Maximum daily refinement before causing bodily harm
Attribute Points: 6
Skill Points: 6
Skills:
Basic Taijutsu Lv. 6 (124/1000)
Basic Meditation Lv. 6 (765/1000)
Chakra Refinement Lv. 1 (42/100)
Evaluation: A small fry in the shinobi world. Aside from hard work, you have no other choice.
--
Staring at his stat panel, seeing the tangible growth each day brought—this was Taichi's greatest source of joy. It was proof that every single day, he was becoming stronger.