Chapter 264: Classic Revisited

"Stop asking me, I really don't know." Obito, being ruthlessly grilled in his dream, muttered subconsciously before waking up.

To avoid being late, he had learned his lesson and deliberately did his exercises during the day and trained at night, but unexpectedly, those problems still lingered in his mind, tormenting him over and over again in his dreams.

"Don't tell me I slept until ten again?" Obito's expression turned serious—that would mean he was way too late.

When Obito saw the number the clock's hour hand pointed to, he instantly breathed a sigh of relief and smiled. It was only 8:10, still a long way from ten o'clock.

"Wait, the assembly time isn't ten o'clock—it's eight thirty!" Obito suddenly realized that even though he wasn't late, he was almost late.

He threw on his clothes and washed up at lightning speed, grabbed a piece of bread, and said goodbye to his grandmother, "Grandma, see you later. I'm going out to train."

"Make sure to rest," his grandmother reminded him with a kind smile.

Obito stuffed the bread into his mouth and chewed as he ran. The training ground was far from his house, but if he sprinted at full speed, he could probably make it just in time for 8:30.

But just as Obito was wondering who his last teammate would be, his peripheral vision caught an old woman sitting on a bench, looking distressed.

Even though he knew he was almost late, Obito instinctively ran over to the old woman and asked with concern, "Ma'am, are you feeling unwell? Should I take you to the hospital?"

"I just strained my back. If I sit here and rest a while, I should be fine," the old woman said, forcing a smile when she saw a child eagerly coming to help.

"That won't do. You need to take your health seriously. How about I take you home to rest? Don't mind my size—I'm really strong. Carrying you around the block wouldn't take much time," Obito said after thinking it over. Even if she didn't go to the hospital, going home where someone could look after her would be safer.

With that, Obito flexed his arm hard to show the old woman how strong he was.

"Oh, right, I'm a ninja." Looking at his own arm, Obito felt it might not be convincing enough, so he pointed to the forehead protector on his head.

Obito boasted for a bit, then demonstrated a one-handed handstand on the spot, and finally managed to convince the old woman to accept his help.

"Shadow Clone Jutsu!"

Obito formed hand signs and performed the Shadow Clone technique. This was the great idea he had come up with to both help people and avoid being late—the real body would continue to the destination, while the clone would assist those in need.

Obito looked at his Shadow Clone nervously. As good as his idea was, if the clone didn't cooperate, it would all be for nothing.

"Ma'am, let me take you home," the Shadow Clone said without waiting for Obito to speak, and voluntarily lifted the old woman onto its back, heading toward the address she had given.

"I won't bad-mouth Tobirama today. This Shadow Clone actually has its merits." Obito grinned. This way, he would never be late again.

Next, Obito dashed toward the training ground at top speed. As he got close, the terrain became flat enough for him to see three figures in the distance—two short and one tall—but they were still too far away to make out clearly.

As the distance shrank, Obito gradually made out the colors of their hair: brown, blonde, and white.

Seeing the blonde hair, Obito instinctively felt a surge of joy. But when he saw the white hair, an ominous feeling welled up inside him. He was sprinting too fast to think much about it, though, and in one burst, he charged right in front of the three of them.

"Huff, huff… I'm not late, am I?" Obito panted.

Kakashi was stunned when he saw Obito. He didn't have the team roster—Hiruzen Sarutobi had just informed him that there was a new team and the name of the team's supervising teacher.

So when Kakashi arrived and saw Rin Nohara, he was a bit surprised. He hadn't expected to run into her among so many teams.

"Why are you here? Is your teacher Minato-sensei too?" Kakashi couldn't help asking.

Given how unreliable Obito was, Kakashi thought he might have simply gone to the wrong place.

"Rin, that surprising teammate isn't Kakashi, is it?" Obito looked up, saw Kakashi, and was dumbfounded. He asked Rin.

If it was true, he had to admit—this was certainly surprising in every sense.

Obito desperately hoped Rin would shake her head, but unfortunately, reality couldn't be changed. Rin nodded with a smile and said, "Yeah, surprising, isn't it?"

Obito was shattered. He felt like someone was meddling. Kakashi was in his genin team, and now Kakashi was in his graduating team too. Had being around Kakashi so long transferred his bad luck to Obito?

"Damn it—there's definitely a fix in the team assignments!" Obito silently raged at whoever made the team placements.

"Then you're late," Kakashi said after hearing their exchange. He realized he and Obito had been put in the same team again.

"It's past 8:30 now."

"I was late because I was convincing an old lady to accept help." Obito explained quickly, afraid Rin might misunderstand.

Slap!

Minato clapped his hands to get their attention, then said with a warm smile, "Alright, since it was to help someone and he wasn't late by much, let's let it slide."

"Even though we've all met a few times, let's do self-introductions to get to know each other better. I'll go first."

"My name is Minato Namikaze. I have quite a few things I like—researching jutsu, reading, and trying out my friends' new cooking recipes are all my hobbies. My dream is to become Hokage and protect the village." Minato briefly introduced himself.

"That friend must be Teacher Muyue," Obito complained in his heart. He had been too busy being amazed by Kakashi just now, but now that he thought about it, it was pretty strange that Minato became his instructor.

After saying goodbye to Teacher Muyue, it turned out that the new instructor was actually Minato Namikaze, who was extremely similar to Teacher Muyue.

"My name is Rin Nohara. I like planting flowers and drawing. I hate war. My dream is to save more people injured in war and make war disappear." Then Rin Nohara introduced herself.

"I'm Obito Uchiha. There are many dishes I like, but I like anything Teacher Muyue makes. I hate doing problems and war. My dream is to become Hokage and end war." Obito followed right after.

Hearing Obito's dream, Minato gave him a look of approval.

"I'm Kakashi Hatake. If I had to say what I like, right now I like training. As for my dream, I'd rather not say." Kakashi said after thinking.

As for his dream, he actually wanted to say protecting comrades, but with Obito here, wouldn't that be equivalent to telling Obito that he wanted to protect him? Just the thought of it was too much for Kakashi.

"That's pretty much the same as saying nothing," Obito said speechlessly. Such a brief self-introduction already had little content, and Kakashi had to omit this and refuse to say that.

Kakashi remained indifferent, directly ignoring Obito's words.

"Now that you all know each other, we're going to start our first training exercise." Minato took out two bells and said with a smile.

"This training is mainly to test your teamwork. If you work together and snatch the bells from me, you succeed."

This was a training trick Minato had learned from those veteran instructor jonin, who said that everyone who used it praised it.

"So why are there two bells? If we grab one bell, does the whole team succeed, or only the person who grabs the bell?" Obito asked curiously.

At the very beginning of the internship, Muyue also had them grab bells, but Muyue used three bells.

Obito stumped Minato. Now he also felt it was a bit strange. Why only two bells? It was naturally impossible for one person to be fated to fail; the training wasn't about elimination.

"Because I only have two bells on me right now. But as long as any one of you grabs them, you all pass." Minato said after zoning out for a while.

He remembered that yesterday that veteran jonin said the essence of this training was to go easy. Once he detected that the students were cooperating and attacking hard, he could pretend to be careless and let them take the bells.

"If you can't complete it, this training will continue until you can. You can attack me anytime." Minato said after hanging the bells on his waist as a reminder.

He didn't know Rin Nohara's specific strength, but Obito and Kakashi's taijutsu was decent. Minato had seen them train once; their movements were very fast.

After finishing the explanation, Minato leaned against a tree and started reading a book, quietly waiting for Kakashi and the others to attack.

"If they fail to grab the bells, should I comfort them or act a bit strict?" Minato thought distractedly as he read.

It was his first time teaching students, and they were all Muyue's disciples. If he didn't teach them well, how could he explain himself to Muyue?

"Obito, Kakashi, have you done similar training before? You don't seem surprised at all." Rin Nohara called Kakashi and Obito together and asked curiously.

It was hard to say about Kakashi, but based on her understanding of Obito, he would definitely ask all sorts of questions.

As Rin Nohara expected, Obito nodded and replied, "Yeah, during the internship back then, Teacher Muyue also had us grab bells."

"That's a bit of a shame. I wish I had been chosen back then too." Rin Nohara felt regretful. She was the only one without experience, and she didn't want to be the one holding the team back.

"Actually, it's nothing. This training is all about cooperation; experience doesn't matter." Obito comforted with a smile.

Having been taught by Muyue for so long, Obito also recognized the importance of intelligence. Although Muyue was mysterious, they at least knew some of Muyue's abilities, while Minato was a complete stranger. So he felt that grabbing bells from different people meant there was no such thing as experience.

"The only intelligence we have right now is that Captain Minato is very strong and possesses an extremely fast Body Flicker Technique. We need to gather more information." Kakashi spoke up at this point.

That Minato was very strong was something they had learned from Muyue, and as for the Body Flicker Technique, they had seen it once on the battlefield. It was so fast they couldn't even see it.

"First, set up traps. Then, while gathering intel, lure him into the trap zone." Kakashi began to plan the tactics.

Against an opponent as strong as Minato, better traps could provide them with more opportunities.

"Rin, come with me. I learned a ton of traps from Teacher Muyue." Obito didn't argue with Kakashi, but looked ready to show off.

Although he had already defeated Kakashi, Obito knew he was no good at tactics and strategy, so he didn't argue with Kakashi.

"Here, and here, and over there." After observing the positions, Kakashi also began setting traps together with Obito and the others.

Having suffered losses from Muyue before, Kakashi sent out shadow clones to keep an eye on Minato the whole time while setting traps, to prevent Minato from using shadow clones to trick their real bodies and seize the opportunity.

The traps were set. Learning from the shadow clones that Minato had never moved, Kakashi initiated the next step.

"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!"

Obito quickly formed hand seals, concentrated chakra in his throat, and spat out a fireball three meters high toward Minato's position.

Swish, swish, swish!!

Kakashi threw several shuriken to the side, reducing Minato's room to dodge.

"Fire Release: Flame Bullet!"

Minato did not dodge; instead, he smiled slightly and performed hand seals on the spot to use a Fire Release ninjutsu.

In actual combat, he basically never used the five basic nature transformation ninjutsu, because performing hand seals to use ninjutsu didn't match his specialty, the Flying Thunder God. But that didn't mean Minato didn't know the five basic nature transformations. After all, he hadn't mastered the Flying Thunder God as soon as he became a ninja; in the past, he had practiced quite a bit of Wind Release and Fire Release.

Minato spat out blazing flames that formed a huge fireball, which, after canceling out Obito's Great Fireball, continued to burn toward Obito and Kakashi.

"Fire Release..." Kakashi silently noted this ninjutsu and then dodged.

Kakashi gave Obito a look; Obito understood and nodded, and together they ran toward the trap area.

The students began to attack, and as their teacher, Minato assumed they were ready and immediately chased after them.

Swish swish swish!!

As soon as Minato entered the woods, Rin Nohara immediately activated the traps she had set, and a large number of shuriken flew toward Minato.

"Wind Release: Great Breakthrough."

Minato, who had been on guard since he hadn't seen Rin, immediately used Wind Release to spit out a gale that blew away all the incoming projectiles.

"He also knows Wind Release." Kakashi recorded this new information once more. Generally, jonin had two types of nature transformations.

"Leaf Great Whirlwind!"

Just as the projectiles were launched, Obito charged forward and kicked a whirlwind kick at Minato.

"Your coordination is passable, but it would be better if one more person joined the attack." Minato dodged the attack, seized the opportunity to grab Obito's leg, lifted him up, and said with a smile. He didn't understand why Kakashi hadn't attacked together.

"Hehe, Minato-senpai, you'd better be careful now. We're not just this capable." The captured Obito said without panic, grinning.

Minato threw Obito toward a nearby large tree.

Bang!

Obito dissipated into smoke — it was a Shadow Clone.

"He can use a Fire Release of this level even with a Shadow Clone. It seems they're more outstanding than I thought." Minato was somewhat surprised inwardly.

Minato didn't have time to think much; Kakashi and the others' attack rhythm was very tight, and immediately two thick wooden pillars came crashing toward him.