Chapter 530: The Female Ninja of Sunagakure
As for everyone else...
Kakashi opened his mouth, wanting to refuse. But after thinking it over, he realized that Naruto and Konohamaru were still just kids. If the two of them could each successfully teach even one person, that would already be impressive.
As Konoha's master technician, Kakashi believed that with greater ability came greater responsibility.
Teaching a few more people wouldn't hurt.
Afterward, the group returned to Sunagakure.
Gaara flipped through the roster of Sunagakure's ninja, carefully selecting candidates one by one.
Yet after spending a long time sorting through them, he only pulled out a single file.
Kakashi couldn't help but ask in confusion, "Only one person?"
Has Sunagakure's talent pool really declined to this extent?
Learning Sage Mode didn't require overwhelming strength.
Even someone like Konohamaru, who had just graduated from the Ninja Academy and was only a genin, had managed to learn it.
In the end, what mattered was talent and comprehension.
Gaara had spent all that time choosing, yet only one file had made the cut, while the rest of the stack was nearly gone.
Didn't that mean he had no confidence in almost everyone else?
Bang!
The Kazekage's office door was violently shoved open.
"Gaara, you can't choose people like this! You think you're doing it for their own good, but you're actually taking away their chance to become stronger! We're ninja first, and women second!"
Temari clearly already knew how Gaara had been selecting candidates.
She immediately began lecturing him as his older sister.
"Huh? Gaara, you filtered out all the female ninja? Why? Gaara... do you... discriminate against women?"
Naruto asked the last question very cautiously.
"Of course not! Naruto, what kind of nonsense are you talking about?! Gaara was only thinking of them!"
Kankurō immediately jumped to his feet after hearing Naruto slander Gaara.
"Kankurō, enough. This really is my mistake."
After admitting his error, Gaara took back several of the files he had originally set aside.
That finally gave them a respectable number of candidates.
Actually...
Even if there had only been one person, that wouldn't have been a problem.
When Iwagakure first started, weren't only Ōnoki, Kitsuchi, and Akatsuchi training?
In any case, it was obvious that all the files Gaara had excluded belonged to female ninja.
Whether it was due to some historical reason unique to Sunagakure or something else...
Among the named ninja of Sunagakure—that is, those who actually appeared in the original story—there were noticeably more women than men.
Generally speaking, if a ninja had a name in the story, they weren't weak.
With one exception.
Daimaru.
Temari's admirer who had once been revived by the Impure World Reincarnation.
He was so weak that he died while carrying out even a genin-level mission.
He had proudly given himself the impressive nickname "Red Sandstorm."
Then he died during a C-rank mission.
According to mission rankings, a C-rank mission was simply "a mission where injury is possible."
For example, Might Dai escorting two wealthy women on a shopping trip and carrying their bags counted as a C-rank mission.
Daimaru was essentially just a joke character.
Other than that, there were only a handful of named male ninja.
Especially among those who were still alive during Gaara's era and remained loyal to Sunagakure.
First of all, Elder Chiyo's younger brother, Ebizō, was ruled out.
The old man was already so old he could barely stand.
Gaara simply couldn't bring himself to ask him to come learn Sage Mode.
Among the remaining talented male ninja was Yūra, a ninja from the era of the Third Kazekage who was roughly Kakashi's age.
But Yūra was actually Sasori's spy.
After Sunagakure formed an alliance with Amegakure, Yūra became something like an ambassador between the two villages.
He wasn't exactly a missing-nin.
Even so, Gaara could no longer treat him as one of his own.
The other was Hōichi, the disciple of Bunpuku, the previous One-Tail Jinchūriki.
He was the only file Gaara had originally selected.
To be honest, judging by the same standards used for Yūra, Hōichi probably shouldn't have been chosen either.
Because Hōichi also had problems.
Whether in the original story or now, Gaara becoming Kazekage had always faced resistance and opposition.
Especially after Gaara adopted Shiromo's reform plan and brought the Daimyō's authority under the control of the Sunagakure Village as well, his opponents had gained even more reasons to object.
As time passed, however, those opponents no longer dared to oppose him openly.
Hōichi was someone who had been contacted by one of those hidden opponents.
He had been successfully manipulated into planning to eliminate Gaara.
Hōichi himself wasn't especially strong.
But his technique was highly specialized against Jinchūriki.
He could shoot out chains similar to those of the Gedo Statue, pulling a Tailed Beast's power directly out of its host.
No one knew why Bunpuku, himself a Jinchūriki, had invented such a technique and then taught it to his disciple.
Was he worried that future Jinchūriki might have lives that were a little too comfortable?
In any case, Hōichi was a potential rebel...
One who simply hadn't acted yet.
So Gaara intended to use Sage Mode training as an opportunity to change his mind and hopefully persuade him to accept Gaara as Kazekage.
The female ninja Gaara restored to the list were:
Yome, an all-around ninja three years older than Temari who looked like a little girl barely four feet tall.
Although she was as short as Ōnoki, she was exceptionally agile in taijutsu.
She was also highly skilled in the Mystical Palm Technique and medical ninjutsu.
On top of that, she was a sensory ninja.
Just like her name suggested, her eyesight was outstanding.
By narrowing her eyes, she could clearly see objects several kilometers away.
She had even developed a technique based on this ability.
As long as there were visual relay points like water droplets or mist within several kilometers around her, she could greatly expand her detection range.
Among ordinary ninja, it was an exceptionally powerful long-range sensory technique.
Saya, a twin-tailed puppeteer who fought using creepy dolls.
She might have been slightly inferior to Kankurō in puppet control, but she had one major advantage.
She built her own puppets instead of relying solely on existing ones like Kankurō.
Saya also possessed an ability similar to the Mind Body Switch Technique.
The final one was another medical ninja, Ameno.
She was Sunagakure's only Water Release user and was around the same age as the others.
All three possessed excellent talent.
As for the trio who trained under Pakura—Maki, Yukata, and Matsuri—Gaara didn't include them.
For one thing, none of the three had demonstrated exceptional talent yet.
For another, if they wanted to learn later, or after obtaining Pakura's approval, they could simply join the next batch.
With that, Gaara finished assigning everyone.
But Kakashi suddenly had a headache.
If only he hadn't asked that question earlier.
What would have been wrong with teaching just one person?
Why had he opened his mouth?
Now what?
Three female ninja...
Was he supposed to teach all of them?
If that happened, Kakashi would truly become the village pervert everyone talked about.
"I've got it."
"I think those three female ninja should be taught by Tokiwa-san. She's already mastered Sage Mode herself... Oh, right. Where is she?"
Kakashi looked around.
"Enough of that. She's resting at the place I arranged for her."
Temari waved him off.
"You take care of the remaining one, Kakashi. I'll handle these three."
She took the files for the three female ninja and handed Kakashi Hōichi's file instead.
"Thank you."
Kakashi accepted Hōichi's file and let out a sigh of relief.
"Hmph."
Seeing Kakashi's relieved expression, Temari curled her lip.
He probably thought teaching a male ninja would be much easier.
"What are you looking at?"
Temari noticed Naruto stretching his neck, trying to peek at the files in her hand.
She immediately frowned.
(End of this chapter)