By the time Gekko Chizan woke up, it was already the next day.
He had slept so comfortably that when he stretched lazily, he immediately sensed something was off.
First of all, there was an IV drip stuck in his hand. When he raised his arm—hm, it was full of blood. Oh well, small issue, no big deal.
Looking closely, the infusion tube was over a meter long, and half of it had turned red. He quickly put his arm down in a panic.
But lowering his hand only caused it to touch someone.
"Mm? You're awake?"
"Hey hey hey, what's with your IV line? Why is it all red?!"
Pakura had been woken up by Gekko Chizan's movement, and as soon as she opened her eyes and saw a red tube, she snapped fully awake in shock.
"Calm down, calm down, Pakura-san, I just accidentally stretched a bit and back‑flowed some blood."
"It's no big deal. It'll be fine in a moment, the blood will flow back into my body soon."
"But... why am I here?"
Gekko Chizan tried to reassure Pakura while also feeling a bit puzzled.
"Shouldn't I be in the Anbu medical ward?"
Pakura saw that Gekko Chizan's face was no longer pale and finally relaxed.
She said grumpily, "Your Anbu people contacted Sayo-san and said you came back from a mission and were hospitalized."
"Sayo-san was terrified, thought you'd lost an arm or leg."
"I came to watch over you because Sayo-san had to go back to take care of the two little ones."
After hearing this, Gekko Chizan chuckled slyly with an indescribably perverted tone.
"Oh? So that means you spent the whole night in the same room with me?"
"Yeah, so what? If I didn't stay with you, were you just going to be left here to rot?"
Pakura felt a shiver all over from hearing his laugh. If he hadn't just recovered, she definitely would've smacked him.
The very next second, Gekko Chizan's face suddenly changed to one of deep grievance!
"You... you actually took advantage of me while I was hospitalized? I'm still a pure... ahem... young man!"
"You touched me all night long! What are you going to do about it?!"
Pakura's eyes went wide. She had no idea someone could be this shameless.
Touched him all night? Bull! Who was it that carried her out of the bathroom back then???
She, the actual victim, hadn't said anything, and now this bastard was turning it around on her?!
Seeing her face go from pale to red to black, Gekko Chizan burst into laughter.
"Just kidding, just kidding! Don't hit me, I'm warning you—I'm still a patient!"
"If you hit me, that's taking advantage of the weak!"
Pakura was so furious she nearly exploded, but somehow ended up laughing instead.
"I really shouldn't have bothered with you, you damn scumbag!"
"Go die!!"
Just as she stood up, Gekko Chizan grabbed her by the arm.
"I said I was joking! Why are you so humorless all the time?"
Pakura felt the warmth and strength from her wrist, and for some reason, her whole body softened, and she sat back down.
"Hmph, I'm telling you, if you joke like that again, I'll..."
As she spoke, she made a scissor gesture with her fingers, which made Chizan tremble in fear.
Holy crap, this woman's scary when she's serious. Always threatening to snip something.
Suddenly he thought maybe Tsunade was better after all. At least Tsunade wouldn't go around snipping people. Hmm… no, wait. With Tsunade, it'd probably be a whole chain of cracks instead. One punch and your bones would be powder.
Yikes. Never mind. Neither option is good!
Suddenly, Gekko Chizan smacked his forehead. He remembered something important.
"Pakura, quick, help me buy something, it's important."
"Hmm? Buy what? You're still like this and thinking about food?"
"It's not food! Go buy a bunch of big cloth sacks—you know, the kind people use to store rice at home. Hurry, get at least a few dozen!"
He had brought back a ton of gold sand. He hadn't counted it, but it was definitely a lot.
"What do you need that many bags for?"
Pakura was full of confusion. She had no idea what Gekko Chizan was planning.
But that wasn't all. He continued:
"Right, also buy some storage scrolls. Go to the southern part of the village—there's a shop that sells ninja tools."
"They sell them there. As for the money, ask Sayo-san for it. Just tell her I'll pay her back double later!"
"Come on! Don't just stand there, go! Come back to me once you've got everything!"
Holding the IV bottle in one hand and pulling Pakura with the other, Gekko Chizan urged her to go.
Although she was still very confused, she followed his instructions.
First she went home to get money, then bought the bags.
She ended up buying 50 large sacks, then headed toward the ninja tools shop Gekko Chizan had mentioned.
She didn't buy many scrolls—just 10. Mostly because they were super expensive: one cost 3,000 ryo, the same price as 50 bowls of ramen.
Thank goodness Chizan had looted a bunch in the Land of Grass earlier. Otherwise, they'd have gone bankrupt this time.
When she returned to the hospital, Gekko Chizan had already gotten the doctor to remove the IV line.
He was afraid Pakura wouldn't be able to find him, so he waited right at the hospital entrance. When he saw her walking up with a huge pile of stuff, Gekko Chizan grinned.
Grinned like a bandit.
"Come on, come on! Hurry up, I've been waiting forever!"
Before Pakura could even speak, Gekko Chizan grabbed her arm and activated the Flying Thunder God Technique.
In her vision, they first instantly left the village and then soared in one direction.
After a series of Flying Thunder God jumps, they finally reached their destination.
The sudden flash of gold light made Pakura instinctively cover her eyes. It took a while before she could adjust.
And then she went completely crazy.
A mountain of gold—it was literally a mountain of gold.
"My god! Is this for real?!"
Seeing Pakura's excited expression, Gekko Chizan laughed heartily.
This was exactly the reaction he was hoping for. After all, a mountain of gold in front of anyone would be a shock.
"Chizan, where did you get this from?!"
"There's no way this isn't mixed with rocks, right?"
Seeing Pakura's utterly incredulous face, Gekko Chizan spat.
"Don't talk nonsense! I can tell you with absolute certainty, what you're seeing is a gold mountain—made of gold sand!"
"This is my spoils of war!"
Gold sand? Wait… why did that sound so familiar?
Pakura suddenly felt something was off. Her expression turned very complicated as she looked at Gekko Chizan and asked:
"Gold sand? Is it what I think it is?"
Gekko Chizan flashed a big white grin and said happily:
"Yup, it's exactly what you think. I got this from Rasa!"
So it was true! No wonder the gold sand looked so familiar.
"Don't tell me your last mission was fighting Rasa?!"
"No wonder you ended up in the hospital. Rasa's even stronger than I am. He's the next Kazekage, you know!"
"Are you stupid?! The moment he attacked, you should've retreated! That's Magnet Release!"
Gekko Chizan said nothing, just stared as Pakura's cheeks turned red while she shouted at him.
But how could he not hear it? Deep in her voice was worry.
When she finally stopped, Gekko Chizan smiled and began speaking calmly:
"Pakura, you know? Hearing you worry like that makes me happy. At least you didn't hesitate just because the opponent was from Sunagakure."
"Second, how do you know I wasn't up to the challenge?"
"Let me tell you, Rasa had it worse than me this time. I beat him thoroughly, and I raked in a ton of gold sand. Look—this entire mountain."
"You only get a chance like this once in a lifetime. If I hadn't taken it, I'd regret it forever."
"Besides, once Rasa becomes Kazekage, he won't leave the village. Trying to snatch gold sand from him then would be a fantasy!"
Chizan placed a hand on Pakura's shoulder, feeling joyful inside.
After all, Pakura cares about him and worries about him—and that's enough.
"You stupid bastard. Even if you're short on money, you shouldn't take such risks…"
"I'm currently… just a trainee teacher, but Principal Hatake already gave me a salary…"
Pakura's voice faltered as she spoke. Seeing her shaky, Gekko Chizan laughed again.
"Forget it, forget it. Once you're officially on staff, then worry about it."
"I've been making money for years—I know which deals to take and which to avoid."
"Since I have this chance, no reason to pass it up. Now let's get to work."
"Stop dragging your feet—help me bag the gold!"
"Where are the sacks? Bring them out!"
Gekko Chizan loved money—it's true—but he's not reckless. Otherwise, his Transparent Release would have made him filthy rich already.
He took a handful of gold sand and breathed fire on it, quickly refining it into gold.
Seeing this, Pakura also jumped in to help. Together they did a real-life test: 'true gold fears no fire.'
By the time all gold sand was refined and packed into sacks, hours had passed. Everything Gekko Chizan brought back had been processed and stowed away.
"Phew, not bad! This sack is small, but can hold one tael of gold just fine."
"Thirty-two sacks total—wahahaha!"
"One tael of gold is about 3 million ryo!"
"Thirty-two sacks! We're millionaires!!"
Gekko Chizan was ecstatic as he stared at the bags of gold.
Even Pakura didn't expect the gold sand to refine into a full 32 taels—that's so much!
"Where are the scrolls? Pakura, hurry, we have to preserve this money properly!"
"Ha ha ha ha!"
Pakura hurriedly pulled out the 10 scrolls. Gekko Chizan immediately unrolled them.
Then he stored 3 gold sacks in each scroll. He kept the remaining 2 sacks as everyday spending.
"Pakura! Let's go! I'm in a great mood today! I'll treat you to the best grilled meat in the village—it's super delicious!"
.
.
A/N: As for gold prices, I did some math for everyone.
I used a conversion of 300 R per gram (not the current price, just for reference).
Don't faint.
Kishimoto once said: Tsunade's debt equals Jiraiya's savings.
Jiraiya's savings were astronomical—he completed 138 S-rank missions.
And each S-rank mission pays at least 1 million ryo.
Black market bounty: Asuma's is 35 million ryo. So the protagonist isn't overly wealthy. No need to be too surprised.
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Pls Drop some Power Stones
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