Chapter 36: Early Graduation

Another six months have passed since Ken helped Kakashi with his Sharingan.

Hiruzen surprisingly did not question him on why he gave the scroll to Kakashi or about the money he took from Kakashi.

Ken thought that it was either that Kakashi did not report it to Hiruzen or his grandpa was charmed by his cute looks that he let it go. He leaned more towards the second option. Only Hiruzen knew the truth.

Ken had managed to learn all the jutsus that he took from Hiruzen's library including Fire Style : Dragon flame bomb. (Karyū Endan). He had managed to reduce all of their hand signs to 6 except for Karyū Endan.

It was a jutsu developed by his grandfather's dad, the legendary Sasuke Sarutobi. Sasuke Uchiha was even named after this guy.

Ken remembers that in the anime when Hiruzen used this against the reanimated first Hokage and the second Hokage in his battle with Orochimaru.

Hiruzen managed to increase the intensity of the flames so much that the flames appeared to be a little white.

Honestly, It was Ken's most favorite and badass fire release jutsu tied with Madara's Majestic destroyer Flame.

He had to use 24 hand signs to use this jutsu as it was an extremely tough jutsu to learn and practice. He even had to take tips from his Grandpa to learn the jutsu. He could not use it as well as his grandpa though.

He did not take any new jutsus and still has not started training with his wind release and water release chakra natures.

According to his grandpa, it was better to master the first two chakra releases that he had started training in before going to train other chakra natures.

Other than that he had continued to train his six senses and reflexes with Mukai. He had done those obstacle courses countless times in the past six months.

He had also practiced the supercharging technique which made the jutsus stronger if you applied more chakra to it.

Ken had applied for the early graduation test rather than the normal first-year test.

He was not the only one to apply for early graduation. There was another student in the first year of the academy to apply for early graduation. No points for guessing, it was Itachi Uchiha.

There were another 3 students who applied for early graduation in the second year and 7 in the third year. Ken did not know anyone in the later years as he did not bother socializing. There were only four years in the academy.

Ken was originally confused by how many years a kid has to stay at the academy for a normal graduation.

In the canon, Iruka specifically said it took Naruto like 3 times to pass the academy to become a Genin. But the Konoha 12 passed at the same time as him and the same age. He was confused about this.

But he understood now how that would have happened. You see most clan kids are generally enrolled in the academy at the age of 8 and get graduated at the age of 12 years. Geniuses like Kakashi, Itachi and Ken are enrolled earlier so that they can start their journey as a shinobi at a young age.

But the age limit to enroll in the academy was 6 years now (Ken being an exception).

Naruto might have enrolled at the age of six while the others might have enrolled at 8.

Ken reached the examination area where Itachi was waiting for him. The other students from other years would be taking exams under different invigilators.

They had to first take a written exam on different subjects. Then there was a multiple choice test where there were questions like What would you do if your teammate was held hostage by the enemy? How would you act when enemy shinobi has surrounded you?

Then there was a shuriken throwing test that included throwing kunais as well as senbons. Ken aced it.

Next up was an obstacle course which was a walk in the park for Ken who did much more difficult and dangerous obstacle courses with Mukai.

The most boring test of them all was to show the inviligators your chakra control by sticking leaves on your forehead for 30 minutes straight.

He then had to perform the academy three jutsus- the clone jutsu, substitution jutsu and the transformation jutsu.

The next test was where he was to be put in a genjutsu and he had to break it in. Thanks to his high spiritual energy, the genjutsu that was put on him was so weak that he instantly broke through it. The examiner was very surprised by it.

The last test was that he had to last 10 minutes in a taijutsu fight against a chunin instructor.

Thanks to his reflex and sense training which also helped increase his speed, it was his sparring instructor who had trouble lasting 10 minutes against him.

The instructor was defeated within five minutes.

Ken was pretty upset about it "Who made you an instructor? And who promoted you to a chunin? Even Itachi could have given me a better fight. Just you wait, I will have my grandpa fire you."

While the chunin instructors tried to calm down Ken, Itachi also aced his tests and also defeated his taijutsu sparring partner.

'Monsters. One is graduating at the age of 7 while the other one is graduating at 6. My kid is playing with dolls and he is the same age as them.' The head instructor thought as he gave the two handbands on his hands to Itachi and Ken.

"Congratulations to both of you. You both have passed and have become the official shinobi of the leaf. This is the proof of your identity as a Konoha shinobi. Keep it safe. You will have to come back tomorrow to find out about your genin team and your Jonin sensei."

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