"I'm calling bullshit!" Yohei blurted, the swear slipping out before he could stop it.
Saori clapped both hands over her mouth, eyes wide.
Hiashi's Byakugan snapped open instantly—he had to see exactly what had just happened.
Only Minato lit up like he'd solved the universe. He clapped his hands together, grinning ear to ear. "That's it! That's exactly it! Taiichi, you're a damn genius!"
Without missing a beat, Minato raised his own right hand and started gathering chakra.
The first part came easy—a perfect spinning blue sphere formed in his palm. But the moment he tried to twist the chakra flow inside, the difficulty spiked. The ball warped wildly, threatening to explode, yet under Minato's iron will it slowly calmed again.
It wasn't that Minato's chakra control had suddenly matched Taiichi's. His ridiculous mental energy simply let him brute-force the same precision.
After long minutes of careful tweaking, the sphere finally stabilized. A low, humming blue orb pulsed in his palm.
Everyone stared, waiting to see what it could do.
Minato didn't keep them in suspense. He walked to the same thick tree Taiichi had used and pressed the ball against the trunk.
Shhhk—
The sound of chakra boring straight through wood.
BOOM!
The entire tree exploded into fine powder.
"It worked!" Saori cheered. The whole squad crowded around, slapping Minato on the back and congratulating him.
Minato was beaming, but he still gave credit where it was due. "Taiichi, thank you—seriously. Without you this jutsu would've taken forever."
"Minato-senpai, you're too humble," Taiichi laughed, waving it off. "You already had the technique almost finished. I just nudged you with one tiny spark of inspiration."
Minato didn't argue. He'd remember the favor, but they were basically brothers at this point—no need to keep score.
"Hey, Taiichi," Minato said suddenly, eyes sparkling, "why don't you name it? Something cool, flashy, badass—make it legendary!"
The group went dead silent. Everyone was thinking the same thing: Oh no.
Taiichi's face twitched. The name Minato was about to drop already had his own name baked into it.
Before the walking disaster of naming sense could open his mouth again, Taiichi cut in fast.
"Rasengan."
"Huh?" Minato blinked.
"I said we call it Rasengan."
"Rasengan… yeah!" The others jumped in immediately. Anything was better than "Super Flashy Spinning Taiichi-Inspired Orb." Besides, Rasengan actually sounded badass.
And just like that, the only one hurt in this world was Minato. He stood there muttering to himself, "Super Flashy Spinning Taiichi-Inspired Orb sounds perfectly fine to me…"
---
Once the laughter died down, the squad settled around the fire again. This time the talk turned technical—real ninja problems, tricky jutsu questions, things they'd run into on missions.
With two elite Jonin right there, Minato and Hiashi were happy to play sensei and answer everything.
The next morning, after a full night's rest, the squad set off again for the forward base.
They reached the camp by noon.
After one very thorough identity check, they finally met the new supreme commander of the northern front—Orochimaru.
He'd only arrived two days earlier and was already buried in work. The previous commander had been an old, experienced Jonin with zero actual leadership talent. In peacetime that was fine—he just had to hand out missions and keep things running. But now the whole camp was a mess: troops didn't know their officers, officers didn't know their troops, everything was chaos. Orochimaru's arrival was the only thing starting to fix it.
Orochimaru toyed with the recovered defense map, eyes sliding over the six new arrivals with open hunger.
Namikaze Minato and Hyuga Hiashi were already elite Jonin everyone knew about.
But Team Taiichi's reputation from the southern Sand border had also reached his ears—especially Matsushita Taiichi. Orochimaru still couldn't believe he'd missed how monstrous this kid actually was.
"Minato," Orochimaru said without wasting time, "since your squad is here, stay a while. We're short-handed."
"Uh… Lord Orochimaru, we still need to report back to the village—" Minato started, hesitant. They hadn't been ordered to reinforce the northern front.
"Your mission ended the moment that map reached my hands," Orochimaru cut him off smoothly. "Besides, I won't keep you long. I'll issue proper orders through the usual channels."
Minato glanced at Hiashi and Taiichi. Neither objected, so he nodded. "Understood."
Orochimaru's smile widened. He immediately started handing out assignments.
Minato and Hiashi—both full Jonin—were sent straight to the front lines to sabotage Cloud supply lines.
Yohei, Saori, and Kazema were grouped together for border patrol.
Taiichi, however, was held back and assigned to the rear medical camp.
"In the front lines we don't need another Jonin-level fighter," Orochimaru said flatly, "but the rear desperately needs an outstanding medical ninja."
The previous commander's incompetence had funneled most of Konoha's medics south to the Sand front, leaving the Cloud theater critically short on healers.
That became obvious the second Orochimaru personally escorted Taiichi into the medical tents.
"See, Taiichi?" Orochimaru's voice was cold, but the words warmed every wounded shinobi in sight. "This is where your skills are truly needed."
Taiichi stared, stunned. This wasn't even full-scale war yet—just pre-war skirmishes. Yet the medical camp was already overflowing. Lightly wounded soldiers had been bandaged and kicked out to make room for the critical cases.
"Lord Orochimaru… how did it get this bad?" Taiichi's voice shook. "Konoha's medical system shouldn't be this broken."
"One incompetent general can exhaust an entire army," Orochimaru sighed. "The last commander hid the real situation and mismanaged everything. He's already been dragged back to the village in chains."
"Fuck," Taiichi spat. "Which idiot put him in charge? How did the higher-ups let this happen?"
Orochimaru gave him an amused look, waiting until Taiichi felt the stare before answering lightly, "An old Jonin from the Sarutobi clan. Same generation as the Third Hokage."
Taiichi shut up instantly. Not out of fear—just bone-deep exhaustion.
He didn't waste another second. Two Shadow Clones popped into existence beside him, and all three walked straight into the medical camp.
Plenty of the medics had worked with him back at Konoha Hospital. The moment they saw him, their faces lit up with surprise and relief—especially when they noticed Orochimaru himself had brought the reinforcement.
"Taiichi! You're on the front too!"
"Taiichi, with you here we can finally breathe!"
Taiichi greeted every one of them politely while his clones immediately moved to the lightly wounded. Green Mystical Palm light flared from their hands. A single patient was fully checked and healed in minutes.
Orochimaru watched from the side. A few minutes of observation was all it took for him to realize Taiichi's medical skill had already surpassed Tsunade's in pure healing efficiency.
His eyes gleamed with raw hunger—like a predator that had just spotted the perfect meal.
Meanwhile, Taiichi's real body reached a critically wounded shinobi. The medic currently treating him stepped aside instantly.
Taiichi formed a chakra scalpel, sliced the man's clothes open with one clean motion, and the nurses rushed to clear the fabric. A tree-like lightning burn covered the left side of the patient's chest—classic Cloud ninjutsu. Taiichi pressed a diagnostic palm to the wound.
Heart in ventricular fibrillation. Another minute and the guy would have coded.
No fancy equipment here. Taiichi didn't hesitate.
His left hand blazed with thick green life energy, pouring vitality straight into the man's body. Even Orochimaru in the back row could feel the sheer density of that healing chakra.
Taiichi's right hand hovered over the heart, sensing the exact rhythm. At the perfect moment his fingers clenched—crack—a precise electrical jolt hit the heart.
The patient jerked once. The monitors showed normal sinus rhythm again.
The immediate crisis was over. The rest—burn treatment—was child's play for a Mystical Palm user.
Orochimaru watched the entire flawless sequence, then quietly slipped out of the tent, heart pounding with excitement.
Terrifying brat. Using two chakra natures at once, with that level of timing and precision… even he couldn't do it.
So this was the true inheritance of Tsunade? Bullshit. This was already surpassing the master. The Third's intelligence reports were laughably outdated.
Back in his command tent, Orochimaru sat down amid the mountain of paperwork, but his mind kept drifting to Taiichi.
A talent this valuable couldn't be allowed to wander off. Conventional methods wouldn't work—he and Taiichi had no real relationship, and he couldn't compete with Jiraiya's influence.
Orochimaru rubbed his temples, already plotting.
---
The arrival of six more shinobi shouldn't have changed much in a camp this size.
But when four of those six were operating at elite Jonin level, everything shifted.
Stuck high-difficulty missions finally got cleared. The medical camp started emptying as wounded soldiers recovered and returned to duty.
More manpower was freed up. For the first time in months, the northern front began moving in the right direction.
On the third day after their arrival, Taiichi finally stepped out of the medical tents. Three days of nonstop healing had cleared the worst of the backlog. The camp no longer looked like a slaughterhouse floor.
In those three days Taiichi had also built his own quiet legend. He held no official rank, yet every single person who saw him greeted him with a respectful "Lord Taiichi."
That same afternoon he walked into Orochimaru's tent carrying a long supply list.
"Lord Orochimaru, these are the medical instruments the camp is missing. With this equipment, even basic-trained civilians could handle emergency first aid. Please request them from the village."
Orochimaru scanned the list—over a hundred different items, quantities varying. He gave a small, mocking smile… then answered without hesitation.
"So many? Fine. Since it's you asking, Taiichi, it's no problem. I'll demand every last piece and have them shipped with the next resupply convoy."
Taiichi's mouth fell open. He had ranked everything by priority in case the request was too big. He never expected Orochimaru to agree so easily.
For a moment, Taiichi was genuinely moved. He finally understood why, even after Orochimaru defected in the original timeline, so many people still chose to follow him.
Since Orochimaru was in such a good mood, Taiichi pushed his luck.
"Lord Orochimaru, the medical camp is stable now. I'd like to rejoin my squad and take on some field missions."
Orochimaru looked up, surprised. He really didn't want to let Taiichi out of the rear—such a priceless asset could die on the front lines.
But considering Taiichi's strength (rumored to be on par with his medical skill) and his status, Orochimaru finally nodded.
"Very well. But if the medical camp needs you again, you come immediately."
"Understood!"
Taiichi practically bounced out of the tent. He'd already promised Yohei and the others yesterday that today they could finally run a mission together.
Alone in his tent, Orochimaru pulled out the recent mission logs for Team Taiichi. A faint smile curled his lips.
"Impressive… a Chunin squad with a captain who's already super-elite, and the rest of the team aren't far behind. I wonder if the teacher even knows about this?"
A three-tomoe Uchiha, a kunoichi specialized in sealing—real talent.
And yet this same squad had been saddled with… Kazema. The guy was dragging the whole team's average down.
Orochimaru flipped to Minato's report from the previous pursuit mission. Kazema's performance had been… abysmal.
A familiar scent of conspiracy drifted through the air.
In the empty command tent, a low, eerie chuckle echoed.
"Heh heh heh…"