'I wonder if I can eventually buy other things with the shop. I got a beginner's package so maybe after I finished all upgrades or meet certain conditions I could unlock something. A speaker in here would be nice for the slow days and those in VR won't hear it anyway.' Marashi thought as he saw the legendary Team 7 enter his store.
The team in question was amazed the moment they walked in. The store design was extremely captivating along with the technology that they'd never seen before.
Kakashi, being somewhat familiar with Marashi, found it even more bizarre. He remembered coming here with his father when he was young and kept doing so years after, but such a drastic change truly shocked him.
"Hey, Marashi, what's all this?" Kakashi even put his book away which surprised his students.
"Yo, Kakashi-sensei, you know this guy?" Naruto butted in.
"Just a new business venture." Marashi slid his book away directly addressing them.
"Ah, I was classmates with him in the academy." Kakashi didn't elaborate as usual.
"Really?!" Naruto practically had stars in his eyes. "So you're also a strong shinobi?! Jonin?!"
The others couldn't help but facepalm. Just because Kakashi was strong didn't mean his classmates were.
"Nah, I'm retired." The man in question deflected.
"Retired? Were you injured?" Sakura blurted out but then covered her mouth considering that could be very rude, but it wasn't without merit. Someone as young as him retiring was truly strange. An injury could explain it.
Marashi, who had quite a boring day outside of Hayate and his new book, decided to use his most powerful technique. Second only to the legendary Talk-no-Jutsu.
The Bullshit-no-Jutsu!
He immediately donned a reminiscing and mysterious expression.
"Yes, but I don't regret it. That time…" He sighed with a smile. "It was truly a spectacle."
Kakashi did not look amused. Years of being in the ANBU could instantly detect he was messing around with the kids, but he didn't say anything. Perhaps it could be a lesson for his students.
'I'm quite the teacher aren't I?' He patted himself on the back.
The kids look interested, noticing that there was a story. Maybe he really was as strong as their sensei at one point.
"What, what?! Come on, tell us!" Naruto's hands balled in excitement.
"Well, why not? Alright, about 8 years ago, I was out at sea when a distress call came from an island to the south of the Land of Water. This island was known as God's Valley. It was quite a beautiful place, but rampant slavery was commonplace by weaklings called Celestial Dragons. An empty title, at least in strength, as they were descendents of the rulers of God's Valley.
"There was a heinous shinobi known as Rocks D. Xebec, far beyond the kage of the five great nations. Some say that he had reached the level of Hashirama Senju, the God of Shinobi. He attacked this place in order to kill the Celestial Dragons to steal their wealth, but he didn't care about the civilian casualties, so I went there along with my rival. Monkey D. Garp."
As Marashi went on, he gained a nostalgic smile and an overwhelming sense of excitement.
"The battle was truly incredible. Individually, Garp and I were no match, but together we were able to defeat him after 7 whole days of battle. It was truly an insane battle of swordsmanship, brute force, and Haki. Naturally, Xebec died and we were left with intensive injuries."
Kakashi didn't know what to think. At first, it seemed like nonsense, but the expressions and retelling felt genuine. The emotions weren't fake, but what was real and what was nonsense?
Rocks D. Xebec in some unknown place south of the Land of Water? It sounded ridiculous, but life as a shinobi punishes those who think with common sense.
Look underneath the underneath.
Unknown to him, this way of thinking was actually hurting him. It was pure fiction! Peak fiction, but fiction nonetheless.
He also only vaguely knew Marashi, so he didn't really know how strong he was.
"Wow! That's so cool! Is this Monkey guy from Konoha?" Naruto really had stars in his eyes at this point. Even Sasuke and Sakura were affected by the story.
"No, he's from a place called Dawn Island. Haven't been there but we've crossed paths and fought before. We were rivals for over a decade. I don't know where he went after the battle." Marashi shrugged.
Kakashi focused on something else.
"What's Haki?" He hadn't heard of it.
"Ah, it's willpower harnessed into specific techniques like armor or giving abilities similar to sensors. It's sort of like Yin Release." He mentioned offhand.
Kakashi didn't really buy it, but the world was a big place. Could there actually be someone close to Hashirama's power without anyone realizing it? He didn't have an answer.
It doesn't matter, anyway.
"Well, that's cool and all, but what kind of business do you run now?" Kakashi switched the subject, suddenly feeling a headache coming on from deciphering truth from falsehood.
Naruto wanted to know more about the legendary battle, but he also took note of the weird things in the store.
"I run a Computer Cafe, basically you can play games with the equipment there." Marashi pointed to the PC and they nodded.
They couldn't understand how that was possible, but they'd soon be enlightened.
"So, how much?" Kakashi asked.
"500 Ryo per hour. You can either pay per hour with cash or get a game card that you can load money onto if you wish to play for multiple hours without your spot being taken if it's busy enough." Marashi explained and they nodded.
The money was hardly worth crying over so they thought nothing of it.
Marashi, handing out four game cards, led them to the PCs and showed them the functions.
Their expressions were priceless, and they wanted to play VR just as Hayate did.
All of them loaded Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 1.
+++
[Naruto Uzumaki]
After figuring out the menu, he jumped into the Campaign.
Mesmerized by the visuals, he was eventually thrown into the training mission where the game automatically adjusted to his smaller stature, and the characters would naturally not comment on it.
Soap being as short as Naruto in full military gear is very funny.
Unlike Hayate, Naruto struggled greatly at the shooting mechanics, having to even restart given that Soap shouldn't be this bad at shooting and making Gaz highly suspicious.
Naruto barely managed to scrape by and headed over to Price for the test.
You can imagine how that went.
45 seconds.
How? He missed targets and stumbled down the stairs. Flashed himself and he had to restart as he pointed the gun at himself by accident and died.
But, Naruto is an extremely stubborn individual and after seeing the record set by Gaz and Hayate Gekko, he locked in.
This feature was something Marashi thought was fun to add for a bit of competition. He naturally fixed some things to avoid it being cheesed like the bullets not being able to pierce through the walls like speedrunners do.
Eventually, Naruto got the hang of it after dozens upon dozens of tries, but his score…
25 seconds.
It's certainly not bad and quite good for his first time with the new style of combat, but…
He used his whole hour on it and was ejected from the game.
[Sasuke Uchiha]
The weapons were quite strange to him, but he eventually got the hang of it with the helper in the black void.
Moving on to the test, he didn't do too badly.
35 seconds.
After seeing the Gaz's and Hayate's records, he wanted to try a few more times.
Learning to handle his gun better, timing his flashes, and getting more used to a chakra-less body, he improved his time.
19.5 seconds.
He wanted to continue and try and beat it but he knew that he could come back later with the Mission Select option from before, so he proceeded.
His chosen difficulty was naturally ANBU, and growing up with a person like Itachi, he would be damned to choose something easier. If he were here, wouldn't he also choose this difficulty?
Sasuke bit off far more than he could chew. He wasn't like Hayate who had war experience and years upon years of being a shinobi on dangerous missions, but like Naruto, Sasuke did not give up in the face of adversity. He kept trying again and again, no matter how painful it was to get shot.
What if Naruto got farther than him? Could he be ahead of him? Those were the thoughts in his mind. He would never hear the end of it, so he kept pushing forward.
He reached about the middle of the first mission before his time was up.
[Sakura Haruno]
She, like her two teammates, struggled with the weapons, but surprisingly, she acclimated faster than them as it just clicked in her head. She wasn't the most physically capable person but her booksmarts clearly shined here. Accurately judging distance, how holding the gun affects accuracy, and the recoil control was something she was learning quite well.
As she did the test, it was quite something.
32 seconds.
Seeing that her score was quite far from Gaz's record, she tried it a few more times before moving on. The guns were fun to use so she didn't mind doing it again, but she didn't feel particularly competitive.
20.1 seconds.
Unbeknownst to her, if she did have a more competitive spirit, she could've beaten Sasuke's record, at least during the hour as her learning ability was greater. Their physical stats were all the same in the game anyway.
She chose the Standard difficulty. It would've been the lowest but its description was far too infuriating and humiliating to choose. Sakura also didn't feel like she had anything to prove and games were meant to be fun, so she chose an easier difficulty.
The game was very addictive and fun, especially the ending where she felt truly panicked and adrenaline pumping through her veins. After it was over, she hadn't felt such a sensation before and continued.
Her next mission was truly brutal. Being tied up and thrown in some kind of vehicle, watching the area around them made Sakura feel quite bad for them. It was truly hell.
She was then executed, but considering the difficulty, there was no pain since it was scripted. Sakura always liked books and felt quite drawn into the story.
As she was about to start the next mission, her time ran out.
[Kakashi Hatake]
Like his students, he got used to the gun mechanics, and like Sakura and Hayate, he got it down pretty quickly.
Going through the test a few times to acclimate himself, along with his vast shinobi experience, his time was quite incredible.
15.2 seconds.
So far, the game was fun and he continued.
He chose the ANBU difficulty.
While he did mess up a few times with the newly learned mechanics, he adjusted accordingly.
Escaping by helicopter and the explosion, he felt that it was an enjoyable experience.
Kakashi went through the same mission as Sakura, but he actually felt the pain from the execution, and he naturally listened along to the story, his interest growing.
He was sent on a mission to rescue Nikolai, it was a stealth-type mission and he took down his enemies with practiced ease, even getting a little creative with his knife.
His playtime ended once they met up with Kamarov with his progress saved.
+++
All of them woke up around the same time and walked over to Marashi with wallets and game cards in hand.
The owner in question just smiled.
"Would you like to buy more hours?" Marashi asked, unaware of how huge the commotion he had just caused getting Team 7 addicted to video games.
===
Omake: Hiruzen and Danzo…again (Starcraft 2)(Zerg vs Terran)
"A proxy 3-rax reaper cheese, Danzo, seriously? Do you have no shame?" Hiruzen saw the reaper obliterating his drones and microing his queen.
He went for a hatch first into pool and gas, while pulling off gas at 100 for ling speed, but he didn't scout, assuming Danzo would go for the macro game like last match.
"Whatever it takes to win, Hiruzen." Danzo was naturally satisfied as he had lost last game.
Next Match
"Hiruzen! A ling/bane all in?! It seems you're not as soft as I thought." Danzo couldn't help but compliment.
"Haha! I am the Hokage, naturally, I know when to be passive and aggressive!" Hiruzen nodded to himself.
Danzo was speechless.
When have you ever been aggressive in your tenure as Hokage? Was he asleep for it?
===
Thanks for reading! The next game will likely be here in the next few chapters and I can guarantee no one will see it coming. I have big plans regarding it as it has great potential.
Let me know your thoughts!
Later!