54 Refuge In Audacity - 5

For some reason, after he checked Daiki's seal out for him, confirmed that it was done well and sent a message back to the village with his summons for him, Jiraiya pretty much was done with him, didn't even invite him back into the whore house with him.

How rude.

'You're getting too much enjoyment out of this.' Isobu pointed out as he made his way through the gates of the Leaf Village, Tanzaku Gai was only about an hour or so away at top speed for him after all.

'Come on, he's a legendary ninja, don't tell me you didn't get a kick out of dropping our story on him and watching him cycle through different variations of shock.' Daiki retorted.

It truly was the little things that mattered the most in the end.

'Maybe a little, but you should be careful this does not come back to bite you, you've painted quite the picture of yourself after all.' the three tailed Bijuu replied.

Daiki honestly didn't see how. Sure, his excuse story painted him as a very pragmatic person willing to put his life on the line for the village should a threat arise to it and he was in the vicinity no matter how little of a chance he stood…

Actually, when put like that, he saw Isobu's point.

'Well, it's not like they'll ask something absurd of me like laying my life down anytime soon, I'm a Perfect Jinchuuriki, I should be about as valuable to the Leaf as Killer Bee is to Kumo.' Daiki shrugged, honestly, the most annoying thing was probably going to be people hanging over his shoulder or maybe trying to suck up to him to endear him even further to the leaf.

With that thought in mind, he made his way through the village, making his way straight to the Hokage Tower.

______________________________________

"Daiki-kun, what do you think of being Hokage?" the Sandaime asked.

…Wut?

______________________________________

Rewinding to less than a half an hour before, Daiki made his way into the office, finding the Sandaime Hokage already waiting for him.

The old man had divested himself of his hat, and had turned his chair around so he could stare out over the village from the window.

"Ah, Daiki-kun," he glanced back over his shoulder, a small smile on his face directed at him as Daiki closed the door to the older mans office behind his back, "Good to see you back, I hear you've had quite the adventure during your last mission."

Daiki idly glanced around the office, but he saw nobody else present and no chakra signatures in the immediate vicinity of the circular office.

"It was quite a trip for sure." he focused on the Hokage and nodded.

Sarutobi chuckled, "I'll bet," he replied, before spinning slowly around in his chair to face Daiki and directing his warm smile at the boy, "Before we get to anything else, I must say this. Thank you my boy, you have done much for the safety of this village during your mission and you deserve the highest praise I can give."

"…I mean you could also promote me to Jonin." Daiki replied, lips quirking up a bit.

The Hokage chuckled again, "Well, I dare say that isn't far off, in fact, I'd like to at least promote you to Chunin this very moment, you deserve that," he replied, "But, the chunin exams are coming up soon as you no doubt remember."

"Yeah?" where was he going with this?

"In pure fighting ability alone, even before your recent…changes, you were quite capable of performing the duties of a chunin," the Sandaime pointed out, "Now though, I suspect even without your new friends power, you have grown quite massively in fighting ability and that presents us with an opportunity."

"In the chunin exams?" Daiki raised an eyebrow.

"Indeed, it's just an idle thought I had while waiting for you to return," Sarutobi threaded his fingers together lightly, and looked him in the eye, "You are of course officially a genin right now, as such, eligible for the exams. And what I mean by this, is you're strong enough to put on a very good show during exams, I dare say, you could dominate the competition, no?"

Oh, he saw what he was getting at, "Maybe, there's a few other genin to look out for, but none I can see that I can't beat." Daiki nodded. The only real problem was Neji, not even Lee. Lee had a crippling weakness to Genjutsu and, well he now had access to a pretty powerful Genjutsu through Isobu.

But there was still roughly a month left before the Chunin Exams, and he could now use much more clones freely and had a bunch of Yagura's techniques ready and waiting for him.

With those, plus the Kiba blades, he wouldn't even need Isobu's chakra to beat the Hyuga.

"I like your confidence my boy," the Sandaime grinned a bit, "Assuming there are no special outliers, I dare say you will win this chunin exams coming up definitively and make quite the splash, that is, if you accept."

"Accept?" Daiki blinked.

"Yes, as I said, I'm of mind to promote you to Chunin here and now," Sarutobi nodded, "But, if you would like to hold off, I will use this Chunin Exams to gauge your ability in full as a shinobi myself, and, should you show the ability required, come the end of the Chunin Exams, you will skip straight past Chunin and become a Jonin."

Daiki blinked.

Before his eyes widened, "Wait, seriously?!" that sounded awesome! Forget toiling away after becoming a Chunin to get the requirements needed to become a Jonin, or at least qualify to be tested as one, if he did this, he would disregard all that annoyance and focus more on his grind.

…Or he could become a Chunin right here and now.

Honestly, objectively, no matter what one he picked, he was just winning here wasn't he?