In the Land of Fire, within Konoha Village,
a pale-faced Gen Takuno sat in Ichiraku Ramen, savoring one of the village's iconic dishes while listening to the chatter around him.
A hint of melancholy slowly crept across his otherwise impassive expression.
The conversations in the ramen shop were lively and chaotic, but the hottest topic lately revolved around the youngest jōnin in Konoha: Hatake Kakashi.
Although he had earned the rank some time ago, his youth still sparked endless discussions and sighs of admiration.
Lately, however, the talk had shifted. Kakashi had returned from the war against Iwagakure bearing an implanted Sharingan that refused to fade!
Word was that his left eye had been gravely injured, and he had inherited the power of the Sharingan—a kekkei genkai—from his fallen comrade, Uchiha Obito.
The Sharingan was the prized bloodline limit of Konoha's Uchiha clan. Even among the Uchiha themselves, awakening it was rare, and most who did only manifested a single tomoe—let alone the two-tomoe Sharingan now possessed by the outsider, Hatake Kakashi!
Pairing such a legendary dojutsu with one of the most talented shinobi in history made for endless village gossip. Everyone was eager to see what kind of "chemical reaction" it would produce.
Gen Takuno couldn't help but scoff inwardly. At this point, who could foresee that the Sharingan would prove more curse than blessing for a genius like Kakashi?
It wasn't that the Sharingan lacked power—far from it—but it was ill-suited to Kakashi's current age and condition.
Even as a jōnin, he was only twelve years old. His body hadn't fully matured, and his chakra reserves remained relatively modest.
Without Uchiha blood, the Sharingan stayed perpetually active, constantly draining his chakra. With such limited reserves, this extra burden severely stunted his natural growth and development.
Of course, the Sharingan was undeniably a formidable kekkei genkai that dramatically enhanced combat ability—no one could deny that.
The ideal path would have been to seal it away until his chakra capacity grew, allowing him to mature while gradually mastering its power. Proficiency might suffer slightly at first, but given Kakashi's prodigious talent, that minor setback would hardly matter.
This solution shouldn't have been difficult to conceive. After all, Kakashi had Kushina Uzumaki—a sealing jutsu master—as his sensei, and Minato Namikaze, who had learned even more advanced barrier and sealing techniques under her guidance.
It wasn't that they couldn't seal it; rather, Kakashi likely refused because the eye was a precious memento from his late friend, Obito Uchiha.
"Obito Uchiha's Sharingan..."
Gen Takuno murmured under his breath, a flicker of envy in his eyes. He, too, desperately wanted that Sharingan—with its space-time Kamui ability, no less.
But thoughts of Uchiha Madara lurking behind Obito, and the Fourth Hokage standing behind Kakashi, quickly doused the idea. He was merely a special jōnin of Konoha. That status still offered him plenty of conveniences, so he had no intention of throwing it away just yet.
Shaking his head helplessly, a fierce gleam ignited in Gen Takuno's eyes—not because he'd devised some new scheme to steal Kamui, but because...
"Finally... has this moment arrived?"
He gazed at his own pale reflection in the clear ramen broth, his expression distant. He had waited far too long for this day.
At twenty-seven years old, Gen Takuno, a special jōnin of Konoha, had essentially reached the ceiling of his potential. Any further gains would come only from picking up niche ninjutsu, offering negligible improvement.
It wasn't for lack of effort. His diligence rivaled that of Might Guy himself.
Of course, that didn't extend to taijutsu. He had tried that route, but his talent was painfully average—nowhere near Guy's freakish level of hard work. Pushing harder would only destroy his body.
Aware that his chakra capacity and physical prowess were mediocre at best, and lacking the convenient "system" cheat so many transmigrators seemed to receive, Gen Takuno felt only numb resignation.
The Naruto world was anything but peaceful.
In his twenty-odd years here, he had lived through both the Second and Third Shinobi World Wars. Survival had been sheer luck.
In those conflicts, ordinary genin were mere cannon fodder, chūnin were slightly sturdier fodder, and special jōnin?
They carried the title of "jōnin," but in truth, their strength equated to that of elite chūnin—elite cannon fodder, at best.
Gen Takuno wasn't afraid to die. He simply refused to perish in some meaningless, forgettable way.
He still didn't understand how he had arrived in this world. One moment he closed his eyes in his old life; the next, he opened them as a Konoha villager with all his previous memories intact—no dramatic truck accident required.
In hindsight, perhaps the infamous "truck-kun" wasn't just for inflicting trauma... maybe it was also meant to deliver the system.
Gen Takuno shook his head. Dwelling on it now was pointless. If the system hadn't appeared yet, it probably never would. At best, it might arrive with the protagonist's era or the start of the main story.
Did he possess any remarkable qualities? Yes, one: extraordinarily precise chakra control.
But even with such mastery, his total chakra reserves were pitifully low.
To this day, at twenty-seven, his chakra pool remained at the level of an average chūnin. It might even decline further with age...
Ridiculous.
Without his exceptional ninjutsu talent to compensate, he might never have reached special jōnin at all!
The thought left Gen Takuno frustrated. No system, no prodigious talent—it felt downright unfair.
Still, there was always a path forward. His foreknowledge from his previous life could serve as his cheat.
For instance, the forbidden technique he'd long coveted—the Chimera Technique (or as he thought of it, the "Demon Sprout Technique")—had finally become attainable.
He had been monitoring the jōnin named Hiruko for quite some time. He hadn't acted earlier not for lack of opportunity, but because he needed confirmation that Hiruko had successfully developed the technique.
This moment aligned perfectly: Hiruko was already spying on Kakashi's Sharingan and secretly attempting to use puppetry on him. That timing strongly suggested the Chimera Technique was at least mostly complete.
Soon after, Hiruko's forbidden experiments would be exposed, leading the Sannin to hunt him down. He would flee Konoha to collect complete corpses bearing kekkei genkai. According to Gen Takuno's memories, that sequence should unfold around now.
During this window, Hiruko would make another attempt on Kakashi using his puppet techniques. All Gen Takuno needed to do was wait patiently for Hiruko to leave his hidden experimental base.
Gen Takuno took a deep breath. His free hand subtly formed a seal.
"Summoning Technique: Clairvoyance Jutsu."
In the next instant, his vision seemed to pierce through the walls of Ichiraku Ramen and soar to the concealed experimental base.
Perched on a large tree beside the base, a crow preened its glossy black feathers while its red eyes kept vigilant watch below.
This was Gen Takuno's summoned creature. It had started as an ordinary crow, but through careful nurturing with his chakra, he had awakened a sliver of intelligence, turning it into his personal summon.
"Still no movement?"
Viewing the base through the crow's eyes, Gen Takuno wasn't surprised. Even if word had reached Hiruko, acting in broad daylight would be foolish.
After observing a while longer, he released the clairvoyance technique.
Now he simply had to wait for his summon to alert him. Unfortunately, as an ordinary crow, it lacked the advanced anti-summoning capabilities of inherited contracts, but it could still transmit a chakra signal within a reasonable range.
After a moment's thought, Gen Takuno summoned additional crows to encircle the base from a safe distance, keeping watch.
With preparations complete, he lifted his large bowl of Ichiraku Ramen, drained the remaining savory broth, and let out a satisfied sigh.
"No wonder the protagonist never gets tired of it. The taste really is top-notch."
"Boss, the bill, please."