"Brat, this great sage finally makes the exhausting effort to return to the village, and this is how you treat me?"
"Meow, I also finally returned to the village, and the first thing I see is you doing something highly illegal."
"What illegal? I'm gathering critical literary material!" Jiraiya roared indignantly. He launched into a desperate defense, throwing out nonsense lines like "It's all for the manuscript" and "An author's observation doesn't count as peeping."
Unfortunately for him, his only audience was the cat's silent, judgmental mockery.
Gathering material? Ridiculous.
Come to think of it, Jiraiya hadn't handed over his share of the book royalties in months. Takeshi wasn't exactly hurting for cash, but Kuraokami had a lot of mouths to feed. If that passive income dried up, they would eventually eat through their reserves.
When Takeshi brought the missing money up, Jiraiya immediately looked guilty and lost his nerve. Where was he supposed to get cash now? His novels generated a fortune, sure, but he'd burned through almost all of it traveling, "accidentally" spending Takeshi's cut along the way.
"Well, you've been making fantastic money yourself lately. And you know, my noble journeys around the world cost, "
"Meow, I bet you blew it all in some 'special' bars."
"No, don't talk nonsense!" Jiraiya hurried to argue.
Nearby, the summoned toad remained completely paralyzed under a paw, terrified the vicious feline might suddenly decide to eat him. Takeshi's terrifying reputation in Mount Myoboku was currently even worse than Gamabunta's.
Actually, it wasn't just Mount Myoboku. Very few creatures in the entire summoning realm weren't deathly afraid of him. Ever since he had forcibly relocated the Giant Clam, everyone knew the cat had a habit of violently evicting people. No one dared pick a fight anymore.
Jiraiya took Takeshi out for barbecue, made a solemn promise to pay him back, and forcefully signed an IOU. He then took him to a second restaurant before the cat's anger finally cooled.
He felt unbelievably unlucky. He'd specifically checked in advance, Minato and the elder toads had sworn the cat had relocated to the frozen north and rarely visited Konoha. And yet the exact moment Jiraiya returned, the menace was waiting for him?
Agony. Watching his wallet grow significantly thinner, Jiraiya was on the verge of genuine tears.
"All right, kid, I need to go see Tsunade. I have no idea why she summoned me back..."
"Meow?"
"She made it sound incredibly serious. The letter wasn't clear, and it'd take a while to explain." Jiraiya waved wearily, looking mentally and physically exhausted.
He'd been traveling, sightseeing, and casually gathering material, then a strict, imperial-style summons had dragged him all the way back. If Tsunade didn't give him a massive justification for this recall, he would definitely snap.
He sighed heavily, packed his remaining supplies, and trudged toward the Hokage Building.
Takeshi didn't stop him, nor was he interested in tagging along. There were only a few valid reasons Tsunade would recall the Sannin: Shisui's disappearance, the White Zetsu army, and the Rinnegan. It broke down into logical stages. At first, it was likely about Shisui, but now Tsunade was definitely going to demand answers about Madara's eyes.
'Feels like I've screwed Jiraiya over again. Huh. Why did I think "again"?' Takeshi mused.
Without his intervention, Nagato would probably have plunged into full-blown villain mode by now, obsessed with making the world feel pain. Madara had put immense pressure on the boy, accelerating his combat growth significantly. With Yahiko still breathing, Nagato had absolutely no reason to fall into darkness.
"Meow~ I'll go check on Madara first. If nothing is happening, I'll head back to my own place early."
With the IOU safely tucked away, Takeshi was perfectly content. Sure, Jiraiya might default, but he didn't truly care about the cash. Worst case, he could whip the paper out at an opportune moment just to torment him. Whether he got paid or not, there were always points to be earned.
Such a monotonous yet delightful life.
He fiddled with his system interface. At this point, he had almost zero desire for the higher-level powers. Very few beings could survive a direct fight with him anyway. But to prevent the Otsutsuki from completely hacking the power scaling later, he felt it necessary to stockpile points.
Jiraiya would just have to suffer a bit. It would be decades before those dim-witted aliens finally arrived. Their lifespans were so drastically skewed that a thousand years felt like a brief nap to them.
Takeshi didn't use the Flying Thunder God. Sometimes it was genuinely nice to stroll down the dirt roads and experience walking like an ordinary civilian.
The borders of Konoha seemed to have expanded outward again. It looked like Orochimaru hadn't defected, and the early end of the war made the village's civilian population spike. Part of it might also be leftover war funds being violently digested via real estate.
Passing by the outskirts, he saw a sprawling construction site. A young boy in an Anbu mask was directing a crew.
"For this block, we'll need you to use chakra to create a Two-Story House."
"Right!"
"Make it about half the size of the previous one."
'Yamato?' Takeshi stopped, watching the boy nod repeatedly before flying through hand seals.
Wood Release: Two-Story Building!
With the final seal struck, a fully formed wooden structure violently sprang up from the dirt, settling neatly into the cleared zoning area.
This was completely absurd. It was a pure zero-cost business venture. This definitely had to be Tsunade's brilliant idea, right? Was it really structurally sound to make housing purely out of hastily manifested chakra constructs? They looked like incredibly shoddy buildings.
Takeshi wanted to complain, but didn't know where to start. The workers were cheering loudly, quickly moving in to reinforce and decorate the fresh timber. Tsunade's imagination seemed to have taken a highly business-like turn.
Forget it. Not important. He rose and bounded toward the research laboratory.
Orochimaru's facility wasn't far outside the walls. Coming through the main entrance properly this time, Takeshi immediately noticed the jarring architectural differences. The lab's sterile decor resembled a modern city from his previous life, while Konoha looked like a quaint historical district by comparison.
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