38 Tsunade's emotional decision

" Next Naruto. "

" Hai sensei! "

Naruto ran with giddiness towards Mizuki and Iruka. He was going to get his Ninja headband today, Mizuki sensei had made sure that he passed, and he wasn't about to disappoint his sensei's expectations!

" Alright Naruto, do the clone jutsu. "

" Hai Iruka sensei! You just keep that headband ready! "

A dry smile is all Iruka gave him as Naruto in all his enthusiasm, got into his stance for clone jutsu, with the seal done, Naruto said with the most concentration he could muster.

" Clone jutsu! "

* Poof *

As the smoke clears, Iruka eyes widened.

" Naruto... "

After looking towards the clone Naruto had just made, Iruka looked towards Mizuki again, who had been teaching Naruto for the entire month.

" Naruto.. your clone.. "

Giving a big smile to the now nervous blonde, Iruka tossed a head band towards Naruto.

"... Passed! "

" Yattaaaa! "

Naruto jumped as he celebrated his victory over the exams, his clone doing the same with him, very much like an actual shadow clone, it behaved as if it had a mind of it's own.

Though surprised, Iruka knew better, the clone didn't have a shadow, it was not a shadow clone. And that made Naruto's skill to control the clone like one all the more impressive to Iruka.

' Mizuki had truly done the impossible.. This was Naruto's weakest jutsu, and look at him now, his skill with clone justu is immense '

Seeing Naruto running out with a headband in hand, Mizuki could hear the gasps and dialogues from all around, his hearing having been strengthened considerably with his other senses.

Saying people were shocked was an understatement, and Naruto was having the time of his life. He was happily showing his headband while telling everyone how hard he has worked!

" Shut up Naruto!! "

* Bam *

Until a screech like that was heard and a hard hitting sound followed.

Iruka winced at that, as he looked towards Mizuki who had his lips thinned and eyebrows slightly frowned.

" She really knows how to get the mood down.. What does that girl have against Naruto. "

Mizuki shook his head as his sensitive ears picked Sakura telling Naruto to piss off because he was disturbing Sasuke kun with his happiness... somehow.

' Pathetic display. To try and gain attention of a crush by belittling another person nearby. '

Mizuki replied to Iruka after thinking for a while.

" She doesn't have anything against Naruto in particular, he is just an easy target, as everyone kind of avoids him or hates him. Beating him up makes her feel better about herself, nobody will stop her and she gains the attention of Sasuke, this is a win win according to her mind. "

Iruka winced once again as his friend directly laid bare what he didn't want to.

But he didn't blame Mizuki for using harsh words against a student.

It wasn't just the random beatings she gave Naruto, it was also the things she said, one time Iruka had heard her call Naruto an orphan as an insult towards him. Straight at Naruto's face, Naruto didn't come to the academy the next day and she didn't care.

But Iruka did, that was infact the beginning when something had clicked in him, he could understand Naruto. How would he not. HE was an orphan too.

Iruka was reminiscing as he thought back to when he had first visited Naruto after the academy, not as a teacher but as a friend.

He could see that time, Naruto was just like him, an orphan with nobody to care for him. He was just like him, wanting the attention of others with pranks and being the butt of jokes.

Thankfully Iruka had Mizuki for him back then, he still does and he couldn't feel more blessed. But Naruto had no one. He was always all alone, being beaten up at class and returning to an empty home, with nobody to nurse his wounds, but himself. He slept alone and ate expired food, only to wake up with stomachache and repeat yesterday all over again.. Naruto was stuck in a poisonous loop he couldn't get out of.

That was Naruto's whole life, until a month ago.

' Mizuki, you have brightened up Naruto's life just like you did mine.. I couldn't take action where you went ahead and solved everything on your own.. I am blessed to have a friend like you.. we both are. '

Iruka simply shook his head as he decided to ignore the situation again, he had tried to tell Sakura to change and take her Ninja career seriously, but all she was interested in was not eating anything, dieting as she called it. That would only make her body weaker as a Ninja, not getting nutrients but his concerns went into deaf ears.

Iruka had long since given up on Sakura, he didn't think she would reach far with a mentality like that, having nice theory scores was fun and all, but it didn't mean anything if you aren't capable of critical thinking and information gathering on the fly. Iruka being a teacher and actual Ninja, could tell that was all due to mugging up the textbooks, which was no use at all in an actual Ninja battle, they were barebones guide only, and only would ever offer a thinking direction.

Not having the capability to think on the fly would leave her paralyzed when actual results are needed, she would either create a mess of epic proportions or would take extremely wrong decision when most unwanted. All in all she would be liability to have in any team.

Mizuki infact seemed to agree with his thoughts.

" Don't care about her anymore, she wouldn't get far like that. In fact, the highest peak people like that can reach is to be a bad copy of someone good, nothing new or innovative can come from someone with capacity to only mug things up."

Mizuki looked towards Iruka's questioning expression and finished his sentence.

" And the lowest they reach? That will be a swift death on the battlefield, theory isn't much help after all as a kunai comes towards your throat. "

Iruka winced once more today, from the harsh words his friend Mizuki was saying about their student.

But he still didn't blame him, after all, Mizuki too was there when she had managed to call out every orphan in konoha as a joke, by wording it like that was a disgusting thing to be. Mizuki holding a grudge against her wasn't surprising.

Iruka was at least happy Mizuki didn't let that get into his mind and treated everyone equally.

Meanwhile Mizuki was thinking

' Tsunade invented all of her Justus or made existing ones better, created the whole medical system of the shinobi world and solved poisons from the most dangerous foes on the fly. Meanwhile Sakura was known as that apprentice of Tsunade or the third member of team seven. Even her peak was just everything Tsunade had force fed her, she had zero innovation. That showed particularly in the war when she couldn't heal Shikamaru at all, she was taking forever watching him die, meanwhile Naruto had to step in to keep him alive with his chakra cloak while fighting and distracted, Sakura had likely never seen a situation like that where katsuyu was out of commission, she remained stuck like a sitting duck doing nothing of value, meanwhile Tsunade came along and healed Shikamaru up as soon as she arrived. With one touch. Tsunade healed healed Shikamaru with one simple touch. '

Shaking his head at Tsunades decision to take an apprentice like Sakura, Mizuki understood, it wasn't one of a logical mind, it was an emotional one.

' Naruto was the student of Jiraya, Sasuke became the student of Orochimaru. On top of that she found too many similarities with Naruto and her brother and that was making her blind with emotion, she wanted to help Naruto, and she likely wanted the ' Sanin ' to actually work out this time around, and so she chose Sakura, the third member of team seven. '

Mizuki's assumptions weren't baseless. In fact they were incredibly clear to anyone who wanted to understand.

' Tsunade's Justus all required massive chakra and control, so much so that Tsunade, a Senju of all people thought her chakra was less than adequate for her fighting styles. Now came Sakura, with extremely tiny chakra amount, sure she had an okay control but that was because her chakra was so low, even Naruto with his immense chakra managed to reach her level anyway with tree climbing in like a day, it was nothing special anyone else couldn't do. Neither did Sakura have the necessary talent to take correct decisions or any innovation needed for medical justu, like at all, even in future she only ran straight and tried to punch people. Only incredibly stupid Ninja with a death wish or alien with only brawn and no brains would ever be hit by someone like that. '

Scoffing at the future, called Boruto, Mizuki shook his head, that won't happen anymore, he was here, Mizuki was the biggest variable, that disappointing next generation likely will never be born now that he was here, butterfly effect might not be as big of a deal as people made it out to be, but it was real, and Mizuki was no butterfly, no, he was a storm. He will make many waves throughout the ninja world.

' If anything, Sakura achieving what she did is a testament to how great a teacher and medical ninja Tsunade was than her own talent or mentality '

Well, it mattered not to Mizuki, he cares not what happens to any one of them, it simply was none of his concern or in his best interest to go and try to keep canon on track.

Mizuki was having plans of his own, and one important thing to do now.

" I gotta go, my Jonin promotion is about to begin "

Said Mizuki to Iruka as he packed his things and started walking out.

Mizuki wasn't in a very good mood, he still hadn't managed to figure out what was the reason for his unusual promotion, if he wasn't the academy instructor he would have thought he was being pushed along to get him a genin team, but, it wasn't a thought which Mizuki had even entertained.

This was happening because he was privy to some sensitive information being the academy instructor. The teams were decided in the second year itself! There was no wait for graduation, they already had an idea who was about to graduate and who wasn't from their performance for two years.

The Old Mizuki himself had filled in the team placement forms from the Hokage office a year ago! It was all set in stone from the very beginning. Even Naruto's graduation was going to happen one way or the other. If old Mizuki's events in canon didn't happen, Hokage likely would push Naruto along with his own authority.

That was one of the core reasons old Mizuki had pushed Naruto to do what he did, while Iruka never understood the intricacies and thought he had enough power to stop the graduation, old Mizuki knew something was up, Naruto was too close to the Hokage, so close that.. he just might manage steal the scroll?! That was the old Mizuki's idea.

' And he was right, Naruto did indeed get in and stole the scroll smoothly, the anbu likely thinking this was another one of his pranks let it go, but soon understood something was up and the events in the story happened. '

Mizuki had been cooking up something for a while to get out of this mess, he had some ideas but there was little progress to be made when he didn't know what was waiting for him exactly..