The scenery was vast, and the clouds drifted by in the sky as Kakashi spoke to Naruto and the others. The familiar yet somewhat boring words floated around, and Logan turned his head away.
His mood dispersed in an instant. The vast Konoha lay beneath his feet, basking in the warm sunlight. From the rooftop, the bustling village was fully visible. The breeze blew gently, causing him to lose focus for a moment. He had many opportunities in the past to overlook Konoha from such a height but hadn't experienced it in recent years.
Ordinary people and Ninja families lived below. At night, every window would light up, each light holding a story he wanted to know. Now, he had reached the starting point of the plot, and looking up, he saw the grand, immovable faces on the cliff. The sunlight clearly outlined their undulating contours.
People sometimes have moments of emptiness. Logan blinked his eyes and realized the surrounding conversation had stopped at some point. He turned back, aware of the current setting.
It was okay when he's not looking at it, but when he looked at the scene, he was startled. All four people in Team 7 were staring at him.
"Uh, what's happening?"
Logan slowly uttered half a sentence, wondering if they had already finished introducing themselves during his daze.
Kakashi, now standing upright instead of leaning against the railing, seemed to be staring at him with his perpetually half-open right eye, making Logan feel inexplicably guilty.
"Oh!" Realizing the hint, Logan pretended to suddenly understand and started clapping, "Kakashi-sensei said it very well."
"..."
He then faced Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura, "You must remember Kakashi-sensei's teachings and keep progressing on the path of Ninja!"
Logan almost blurted out, 'Today, you take pride in your alma mater; tomorrow your alma mater takes pride in you'. However, he soon realized that the situation was off.
The atmosphere turned awkwardly silent. Sasuke had covered his face and turned around, Naruto had a black question mark on his face, and Logan understood that he had gotten the situation wrong.
Logan forced a smile and looked at Kakashi, finding that his expression was quite gloomy.
"Rai Den Hat Tori... you haven't introduced yourself yet!" Kakashi squeezed out the words, and suddenly felt exhausted. He thought it was okay for Logan to take it easy, but ignoring the first meeting entirely was too much!
"Yes, Sensei, you haven't introduced yourself yet." Sakura also spoke at the right time, and glanced at Kakashi sympathetically, 'Wait, that's not right, doesn't it seem that I deserve the sympathy more to be assigned to such a strange team?'
"Ah, I see. My apologies, I got distracted just now." Logan raised his hand awkwardly, coughed lightly, and took a few steps forward. As the second teacher of Team 7, he indeed needed to introduce himself.
Recalling the original plot in his mind, he said, "My name is Raiden Hattori, I am eighteen this year... Well, no, I'm twenty this year... uh, how old am I again? Seems hard to calculate."
The different timelines of the Real and Ninja Worlds confused Logan momentarily.
Sakura didn't know how to complain with her eyes, so she turned slightly and said to her companion, "Is this guy following Kakashi-sensei's routine, 'There are many people I like, and there are many people I hate...', and now 'I'm eightt... well, no, twenty... it's hard to calculate' So, does anyone know his age?"
Naruto and Sasuke remained silent, expressing their inability to answer. Thinking about it this way, their team clearly has one more teacher than other teams, but why does it feel even more unreliable?
"Anyway, even though I look young, I am about Kakashi's age. Sigh, looking youthful isn't a crime..." Logan clapped his hands, generously giving an answer.
Kakashi clenched his fist, wanting to say something but then deciding not to bother.
Logan's words left Naruto and Sakura, but not Sasuke, feeling a bit surprised.
"Raiden Hattori..." Naruto thought hard, and suddenly, his eyes lit up, "I remember! You are the ANBU teacher who taught us a lesson once before!"
"Ah yes, three years ago I did teach a class to the Academy's students. Uzumaki Naruto, I have an impression of you." Logan said to Naruto with a chuckle.
As if thinking of the scene when Logan was demonstrating the Body Replacement Technique that day, the way Naruto and Sakura looked at Logan became more serious.
At that time, Aida threw out a soul-chasing and soul-screaming kunai, but Logan easily dodged it. This left a very deep impression on the children who attended that class. Even after all these years, they still remembered it vividly.
"My likes? A leisurely and beautiful life, I suppose. As for dislikes, it's hard to say right now..." He continued, "As for future ambitions and such, well, it's a bit embarrassing to talk about."
"That's it!" Logan shamelessly concluded his introduction.
'As expected, just like Kakashi-sensei, he essentially didn't say anything.' Sakura thought to herself.
Logan signaled to Kakashi, who nodded and stepped forward, " Alright, now that everyone has introduced themselves, tomorrow, we will conduct a four-person, hmm, actually, it's five-person survival exercise."
"Five people? Our Team 7?"
"Exercise? Why? Aren't we supposed to start performing missions now that we're Ninja?"
Kakashi's words sparked confusion. Once the situation quieted down, he adopted a serious expression, "The graduation exam of the Ninja Academy is merely to select those who might become Ninjas. Following that, there is a more brutal test with a failure rate of over fifty percent Those who don't pass will be sent back to the Academy for retraining!"
Hearing this, Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura were stunned. This was completely beyond their expectations, and no one had mentioned it to them before.
'Here it comes, the scary Kakashi.' Logan watched silently, letting Kakashi maintain his mysterious act. The Jonin Instructors did have the right to test the children in the newly formed teams, serving as an additional layer of certification after the Academy's graduation. However, most Jonin Instructors merely went through the motions and they rarely failed students unless they were utterly incompetent.
Unfortunately, Kakashi is an exception. He sounded like bluffing, but historically, he genuinely sent kids back to the Academy if they failed his test. The mentor-student structure of three Genin under one Jonin would be maintained for quite some time. If the Jonin Instructor bluntly says that they can't teach these children or wouldn't teach certain children, then there wasn't much that could be done.
"Tomorrow morning, we'll meet at the training grounds at five, and bring your ninja tools. And... remember, don't eat breakfast." Kakashi's tone suddenly turned low and ominous, exuding a hint of malicious aura.
"You'll throw up."
Everyone instantly felt a heavy pressure that pressed on their shoulders and even affected their breathing. Even the usually unflappable Sasuke felt his heart skip a beat by Kakashi.
Logan coughed lightly, choosing not to expose Kakashi's scare tactic.
"That's all. Dismissed!"