Hakushi carefully examined the application form for Medical Ninja Training.
Not only did it include information about applying for medical ninja training, but also the village's subsidies and resource allocation after becoming a medical ninja, including explicit details about salary.
It was also noted that, on the battlefield, medical ninja are the least likely type of ninja to die.
Because medical ninja almost always remain in the main camp, where they're responsible for treating the wounded.
Even if there's a medical ninja in a squad who needs to go to the front lines and is unfortunately captured by the enemy, it's highly likely the enemy won't kill the medical ninja but will imprison them instead.
Whether as a bargaining chip or to force the captive medical ninja to treat their own wounded, these are problems that all the great Ninja Villages have to consider.
There's no other reason—there are simply too few medical ninja in the Ninja Realm now.
Every medical ninja is a precious village resource.
Even if the enemy catches a medical ninja, they can't bear to kill them.
With all these benefits, medical ninja are indeed the type of ninja with the lowest mortality rate.
The prerequisite for becoming a medical ninja is to undergo a test—only those with Yang Attribute Chakra can be trained.
If you don't have Yang Attribute Chakra, even with a strong desire to become a medical ninja, you'll be turned away—at best, you can work as an assistant or nurse, in other words, just do odd jobs and menial chores.
A couple of days later, Hakushi submitted his application form and handed it to his homeroom teacher, Fujimura Daiga.
There were a few others with Hakushi—they all wanted to become medical ninja, too.
After school, Fujimura Daiga brought them to a classroom that had been vacant for a while. There, a few ninja in ninja suits, wearing animal masks, waited—they were members of the Anbu directly under the Hokage.
Here, there were about thirty to forty students gathered. The Anbu ninja checked each one in turn. If you had Yang Attribute Chakra, you stayed; if not, you were eliminated.
Twenty-three were chosen, and Hakushi was one of them—all twenty-three had Yang Attribute Chakra.
The Anbu ninja told Hakushi and the others that they would be the first batch of medical ninja officially trained at Konoha Village Ninja School. Until now, medical ninja hadn't been cultivated from a young age at school—most came from self-teaching backgrounds, their skills uneven.
This time marked the establishment of a truly formal experimental class for training medical ninja—
The First Medical Ninja Training Experimental Class.
Hakushi and the others in the first experimental class had lessons every day after school from three o'clock until five o'clock.
Every day, they received nearly two hours of training.
Because they were medical ninja, their graduation exam would be much easier in the future, and they'd receive many extra subsidies every year.
The teacher for Hakushi's class was a Special Jonin from Anbu, an expert in medical ninjutsu, who was promoted to Special Jonin for this purpose.
In terms of medical ninjutsu mastery, this Anbu Special Jonin was one of the best in Konoha.
According to him, the foundational medical theories of the Hokage's Anbu fell under his purview as well. Konoha's upper echelon placed great importance on the results of this first medical ninja training experimental class, hoping that in a few years, dozens of excellent medical ninja would emerge to lower the casualty rate on Konoha's front lines.
In the first class, the Anbu ninja handed out several textbooks to each student and required them to master all the important points within six months. There would be a weekly theory exam, and outstanding students could earn rewards.
Rewards could be ninja techniques or monetary support.
Hakushi skimmed the materials; it was all stuff he already knew, but to avoid drawing attention, he decided it was best to stay average.
Grades… being neither at the top nor the bottom is fine—a bit above or below average works too.
But maintaining a middle position is actually very hard.
After all, some questions aren't something an average student could answer, so he had to analyze the questions: which ones to answer, which not to, which ones to only get partly right, and which ones, even if he got them right, wouldn't arouse suspicion—all of this was an incredibly profound art.
Fortunately, over the last two years, Hakushi had gained a wealth of experience, so it really wasn't difficult for him to handle.
He needed to give the impression of having a solid foundation, but only being able to get about half right on advanced questions—just like an average student.
Sigh… he was getting better and better at pretending.
If he kept this up, he'd honestly be no different from an average student.
The bell rang to signal the end of class. Hakushi left the first experimental class's classroom—it was already five in the evening.
The students in the first experimental class studied medical ninjutsu two hours more every day than regular students.
But the benefits were obvious—especially for civilians not born into a ninja clan, being a medical ninja was a pretty good path.
Judging the time was about right, Hakushi quickly ran toward the wooded area behind the school.
Ruri was already waiting for him there.
This was a training ground that Hakushi and Ruri shared.
Very few people ever passed through here, making it fairly private.
And since their strength was increasing, any ordinary ninja coming near would trigger the traps here and alert the two of them.
It wasn't just Hakushi who didn't want to be disturbed—Ruri didn't like interacting with unrelated people either.
Because they were inside the village, these traps were only meant to imprison intruders, not kill them.
"You're late."
At the moment, Ruri was wearing only a black bodysuit, her straight black hair fluttering gently in the breeze. Arms crossed over her chest, she wore an expression of impatience from waiting.
Hakushi didn't mind—or rather, he was already used to it.
He glanced around—dozens of shuriken littered the ground, and there were numerous pits stained with scorch marks; he guessed that after school Ruri had been practicing Shuriken Throwing Jutsu and Fire Style Ninjutsu here.
Judging by the number, state of the shuriken, and the burned pits, Ruri was getting even better at Shuriken Throwing Jutsu and Fire Style Ninjutsu.
"What shall we do today? Free battle?"
"No, this time let's play a blindfolded fighting game. The loser has to clean up the area."
Hakushi nodded, accepting the rules of the game.
Ruri occasionally came up with some pretty weird battle game ideas.
For instance, there was a game before where you stood in place and kept throwing shuriken at each other—whoever moved their feet first lost. Hakushi was outplayed and lost that one.
So, with no need for buildup or any dramatic atmosphere, they both closed their eyes and instantly separated, and as the wind stirred, their fists collided.
"Sorry, Ruri, this time you can't use your Sharingan. It's a bit unfair, but these are the rules you set, so I'm definitely going to win."
Hakushi grabbed onto Ruri's slender lower leg as she kicked, a confident smile on his face even with his eyes closed.
"Hasn't anyone told you that insubordination comes with a heavy price?"
"I only know that a man can't always be on the bottom!"
After all, he had the soul of an adult, yet kept getting beaten down by an eight-year-old girl—and it had been going on for two years.
It could be said that managing to overpower Ruri just once was one of his lifelong ambitions.
"What a boring sense of pride!"
Ruri snorted coldly, but her expression turned serious.
Don't think that just because she always suppressed Hakushi, that his growth rate wasn't fast. He always stayed right on her heels, giving her a constant sense of being threatened and about to be surpassed.
The most important thing was, not all of Hakushi's energy went into training—he also devoted a chunk of effort to research.
If she was careless, he might really succeed in rebelling and turning the tables.
Hakushi knew that in a real fight, he actually had little advantage over Ruri in many aspects.
Especially their Chakra gap—Hakushi's Chakra wasn't strong enough for reckless use, but Ruri was different. As a genius of the Uchiha Clan, once she'd awakened the Sharingan, her Chakra level exploded upward.
This is the biggest difference between Blood Marked Ninja and ordinary ninja.
A ninja with a bloodline is really something else.
A ninja with a bloodline who also works hard is even more impressive.
Sure enough, just as Hakushi was figuring out how to win, his shoulder was grabbed; after a shoulder throw, his body flipped, then his arms were twisted behind his back—he could feel Ruri's soft body sitting astride his back, pinning him down.
"..."
Hakushi opened his eyes, filled with humiliation—he'd been pinned down again.
When would a Transmigrator finally stand up for real?
In the end, Ruri still helped the defeated Hakushi clean up the training ground.
Tough talk, soft heart.
In fact, if you ignore Ruri's slightly cold way of speaking, her personality was actually pretty gentle… probably… maybe.