Chapter 16 Library
He had stumbled upon that place when he was visiting his grandfather's office one time. Before he started training with Kurama, he often went there to observe. He had no intention of breaking in, but just wanted to know what that place was and whether it was important to becoming a ninja. But now...
"You know how to get in."
It wasn't a question, because he knew Kurama already knew him very well, and Naruto searched for information about the archives in his mind.
"Normally there aren't many people there. I've only seen Grandpa and Iruka-sensei go in there, and maybe one or two Jonins. There's a Chunin librarian there, but he locks the door and goes home around midnight, and then comes back with the other teachers an hour before class starts. There might be a chakra alarm there, though. I have a feeling some of the scrolls are confidential."
"I can sense the traps, if something is missing, will they notice?"
Naruto's mouth was full of eggs, and he said incoherently:
"I think so. The librarian takes inventory every morning and evening. If I take anything, he will find it within twelve hours."
Jiu Lama roared in dissatisfaction.
"I can't teach you ninjutsu out of thin air. Tailed beasts don't need to use hand seals to focus chakra like humans do. I can only teach you if you and I have references."
An idea suddenly occurred to Naruto's mind and he quickly swallowed the last bite of his fried egg and jumped up from the table.
He rummaged through his ninja tool kit, which sat next to his bedroom closet, exactly as he'd left it. It wasn't a perfect solution, but...
"reel?"
Naruto pulled out a triangular package from the second tool kit, which contained six blank scrolls tied together with wax paper bands, and he also pulled out a set of small brushes and ink from the bag.
"Are you sure this will work? Don't they have some kind of protection?"
Naruto checked the clock and saw that they had less than three hours until the teachers returned, so if he wanted to go, he would have to act now.
"The alarm will only be triggered if I try to copy the scroll with chakra." He sighed, "Which means I have to copy it by hand."
"That's going to take quite a while," Nine-Lama muttered, "but it's better than nothing. You'd better hurry up."
Naruto replied as he stuffed his things into his backpack, he knew that he would need those scrolls to make himself stronger, and if he really decided to do that, he had to act now before his anxiety took over.
Just as he was about to walk out of the house, he was stopped by Jiu Lama.
"window."
Naruto stopped and turned around. If he walked down the street, he would most likely be spotted. He also didn't know where the patrols were and couldn't avoid them. At least in this regard, he was experienced - most of his pranks were about avoiding patrols.
So he locked the door and climbed out of the bedroom window.
Running on the vertical wall was still difficult for him, especially when he tried to stay quiet. If he was not careful, he would inject too much chakra into the soles of his feet and leave a hole in the plaster wall.
But before he learned how to use chakra, he had already learned how to run on rooftops, so compared to his other training, this was a piece of cake for him.
He slipped into his grandfather's office through the window, which he knew was always left open in case of jonin-level emergencies.
Fortunately, even the Hokage would not be working at this time. The chakra trap on the wall recognized Naruto and did not activate.
He sneaked to the door and used the power of Jiu Lama to enhance his perception.
There was no one in the corridor, but the two people in the room at the end of the corridor made him alert.
However, that corridor was in the opposite direction from where he was going, and one of the ninjas was snoring.
He ducked down another corridor and stopped in front of a nondescript set of double doors.
There were several pots of plants hanging above the door frame, Naruto carefully climbed up the wall and took down one of the pots, at the bottom of the pot, he found the spare key, which was covered in dirt and moss.
The Chuunin Librarian wasn't supposed to have this key, and he knew full well that all spare keys to the Hokage's office room were supposed to be locked in a box in his grandfather's desk drawer.
He jumped down, using his chakra to land silently on the floor, and he also used the same method to eliminate the clicking sound of the key turning - this was the first technique Kurama taught him. He slipped into the room and locked the door, just in case.
The archives was a large room with a low ceiling and long bookshelves that stretched to the end of the room. The librarian's desk was squeezed into the corner, and the rest of the space was taken up by the bookshelves. It was difficult for two people to walk side by side.
He searched the short sides of the bookshelves for the Chinese labels - he didn't turn on the lights, as that would have been too risky - the moonlight filtering through the windows, combined with his own night vision, was enough for him to make out the words.
One part of the scrolls was arranged by level, and the other part was arranged by category. He walked straight to the area marked "D-level", where there was only one complete bookshelf filled with various ninjutsu, genjutsu and taijutsu scrolls. The ninjutsu part was further subdivided according to attributes.
He decided to start from here, because the scroll he brought obviously couldn't hold all the contents, and he didn't have much time.
The early morning hours passed like this, with several open scrolls laid out before Naruto, his own large scroll spread across his knees like snake skin, as he copied down various ninjutsu stroke by stroke.
It was boring, but the information on the scroll was deeply imprinted in his mind - the more he wrote, the more he understood the flow of chakra, and the more he understood the true purpose of those complex hand seals.
He noticed some patterns that he had never noticed before: almost all Fire Style Ninjutsu used the "子" seal, Wind Style Ninjutsu made extensive use of the "巳" and "未" seals, and the "辰" seal was almost only used in Lightning Style Ninjutsu, at least in low-level Ninjutsu.
He was so focused on finding the pattern of the seal that he didn't notice the passage of time when the sun began to rise. If Jiu Lama hadn't reminded him in time, he would have almost been discovered.
******
Later that day, Naruto took a chakra attribute test and failed miserably.
The strange thing was that, although he now more or less understood the properties, the wording of the test questions confused him to the point where he began to doubt himself, and by the end of the test he was so tired that he was not even sure if he had completed all the questions.
Kurama said that it slept longer in class than Naruto.
******************
Iruka had never been a very patient man, he knew it, his colleagues knew it, and his students knew it even better.
But what most people don’t know is that Iruka is not impatient, but he only reserves his patience for the people he cares about.
So, when he hurriedly locked the classroom door at night and prepared to go home to mark the test papers, he found that the three piles of test papers that were originally on his desk were missing - he just sighed in his heart.
He stared at where the test had been, next to the coffee cup in the corner of his desk, then resignedly turned away to look elsewhere.
He found his papers and put them in his bag, zipped it up, and slung it over his shoulder.
He walked briskly toward the door, but halfway there he stopped to adjust his sandals and rub the back of his neck wearily.
When he walked into the corridor, he saw Kakashi standing outside, leaning against the wall casually with his test paper in his hand. Iruka warned him with his eyes, but the other party showed no intention of returning it.
He knew that with Kakashi's personality, he would not do anything to make him angry. He just wanted to get his attention in this way, but Iruka also knew that Kakashi would not give up until he achieved his goal.
