Chapter 57 - Working on Projects

Morning came way too early, as it always does when you're pretending to be a responsible adult.

"Rise and shine, sunshine!" I called because that was what adults do in these particular situations — make mornings abnoxious. "The world's waiting for your beautiful faces!"

"Five more minutes," came Naruto's muffled whine from across the room, followed by what sounded like him falling off his bed.

"Morning, Naruto," I called out, not bothering to lift my head. "Ready to embrace another beautiful day of potential death and dismemberment?"

"Shut up, Eishin-pervert! I hate mornings and I hate you!"

"Aw, you say the sweetest things."

Meanwhile, Sai was already up and dressed, because of course he was. The guy probably sleeps standing up like some kind of creepy mannequin. "Good morning, Eishin-san," he said with that trademark empty smile. "The weather appears favorable for today's activities."

"Riveting observation, Sai. Really. Your morning enthusiasm is exactly what my soul needed today."

Sakura, on the other hand, was quieter. She sat on her bed in mechanical and heavy movements, staring at the floor with this weird mix of restlessness and... hurt? Good. My little psychology experiment from last night was working exactly as intended. Nothing like a bit of strategic exclusion to get someone's attention.

We trudged downstairs for breakfast, and let me tell you, the inn's idea of a morning meal was about as inspiring as watching paint dry. Rice, miso soup, and some pickled vegetables that looked like they'd seen better days.

I had packed enough barbecue to feed a small army for this mission. Sealed it all nice and neat in storage scrolls. But even the best food gets old when it was all you eat.

After our thrilling culinary adventure, it was time to split up. I stood and stretched, putting on my best 'responsible leader' voice.

"Naruto," I pointed at the blonde knucklehead, "remember what we talked about yesterday. Shadow clone training, but make it fit your style. Less quantity, more quality. Think strategic, not just 'throw a thousand clones at the problem.'"

"Got it," he nodded eagerly, paused, and then added with a mischievous smile, "sensei."

I ignored the sarcasm.

"And Sai," I turned to our resident emotional void, "stick with Naruto at all times. Learn to fight as a team, not just alongside one. There's a difference, and it might just save both your lives someday."

"Understood," Sai replied with an eerily pleasant expression.

As they headed for the door, I made sure to keep my back to Sakura. The cold shoulder treatment was an art form, and I was practically Michelangelo at this point. "I'll be in the room if anyone needs me. Try not to die."

Sakura started to follow them, looking meek and a bit distressed. Perfect. Just as she reached the door, I called out without turning around.

"Sakura."

She stopped, and I could practically feel her hope spike. "Come by later."

I didn't elaborate. Didn't turn around. Just let the words hang in the air. From the corner of my eye, I saw her shoulders tense, her mouth opening like she wanted to ask what for, but then she just nodded and followed the boys out.

Hook, line, and sinker.

Once they were gone, I headed back to my room and pulled out my project scrolls from my backpack.

The merchant surveillance was about as productive as trying to teach a fish to climb a tree—meaning absolutely fucking nothing. He had gone to sleep right after his little rendezvous with that elegant lady who'd been waiting for him. The most annoying part was that the bastard had a game.

Of course, the annoying bastard had lasted about as long as a mayfly in winter. Put it in, made some embarrassing noises, and called it a night. Pathetic, really. Though I had to admit, even that sad excuse for intimacy was more action than I'd gotten lately.

Everybody was having a fun time except myself.

I was so jealous. I sighed dramatically.

Other than that thrilling display of human disappointment, there'd been no movement from our target. I'd rotated my surveillance clones three times throughout the night – partly to stay updated, partly because I didn't want to deal with a memory overload if I left one clone there all night.

But that was how these types of missions went. Progress came at the pace of the target, not the watcher. Patience was just another tool in the kit.

So in the meantime, I figured I might as well work on some of the projects I'd started back in the village. The civilian-grade sealing scrolls were coming along nicely.

But the real project, the one that had been occupying my more... creative thoughts, was the pregnancy control seal. Now that was a piece of work that could revolutionize the shinobi world.

I stared down at my scattered notes for the pregnancy control seal, and honestly? The thing was getting conceptually out of control — pun absolutely intended. I had so many ideas crammed into this project that it was starting to look less like a practical seal and more like the fevered dreams of a very horny engineer.

"Christ, Eishin," I muttered to myself, running a hand through my hair. "Maybe spend less time thinking with your dick and more time thinking with your brain."

The problem was, I kept wanting to add more features. Temperature control, sensitivity modulation, compatibility with different body types, hormone balancing, cycle tracking, pleasure enhancement, chakra extraction, and ingestion — at this rate, I'd need a user manual thicker than most jutsu scrolls.

And while I had decent medical knowledge, was hitting its limits. This particular project was exposing some glaring gaps in my education. Turns out there was a difference between knowing how to patch up stab wounds and understanding the intricate biological systems I was trying to manipulate.

I needed help. Real, professional, medical-nin-level help. But who the hell do you ask for assistance with something like this without ending up with a reputation as the village pervert? And not the tolerated type of pervert.

My mind wandered to Big Titty Tsunade — probably drowning her sorrows in sake and bad gambling decisions somewhere out there. Now there was a woman with the medical expertise I needed. And the other expertise I wouldn't mind exploring, if I'm being honest.

I could almost picture it—tracking her down, charming my way past her legendary temper, get her horizontal and fucking her senseless until she was all relaxed and trusting to help with my little project. The fantasy had a certain appeal, but that's all it was. Fantasy.

I hummed as I ran my hand through my hair.

How about her never-was student?

Two birds, one stone, and all that jazz. Sakura Haruno, my current psychological project.

She didn't have any real medical knowledge in this timeline — nothing beyond the basic first aid they taught at the Academy, basic field aid, and anatomy.

But she'd been practically and subtly begging to teach her something, anything, for the past few days. I'd originally planned to use training as a carrot-and-stick method, dangling it just out of reach to keep her eager and compliant. A reward system for good behavior.

But what if I actually taught her? Really taught her, gave her resources, focused training, the works. She had the talent for it — hell, in another life she might've been one of the best medical-nin in the village. It was a debatable point, knowing the favoritism of her being the teammate of the Hokage and the student of another, but still.

And if she became my dedicated medical expert, trained specifically in the areas I needed help with...

The thought made me grin.

I grabbed a deck of blank cards from my backpack — custom-made beauties I'd originally intended for chakra manipulation training, like the one I had given the Naruto idiot for testing and ended up burning. Though the fault lies in me, I underestimated his chakra pool.

But now I was thinking esoteric, more specialized. These could be adapted for jutsu-specific training, particularly medical ninjutsu. The nature of iryojutsu made it perfect for this kind of application.

Most jutsu couldn't be broken down this way, but medical ninjutsu was different. Like the Rasengan, iryojutsu was all about chakra manipulation, if not more precise. Perfect for the card-based training I had in mind.

I picked up my brush, confident in my approach. I already had the jutsu formula mapped out in my head, knew exactly what modifications to make from the basic chakra manipulation cards. Hell, I was pretty damn good at iryonin myself.

Three ruined cards later, I was feeling significantly less confident.

The fourth attempt came out right and working, but I had high standards so I added it to the failure pile anyway — couldn't be too careful with prototypes.

The fifth card, though... that one sang. Clean lines, perfect chakra flow, activation sequence that hummed with potential.

I made five more copies, each one a little masterpiece of applied jutsu shiki theory.

These little beauties would accelerate Sakura's progress significantly. Compact, portable, and easy to use anywhere. More importantly, they'd serve as motivation to dive deeper into medical texts and theory.

Nothing like a practical, game-like training aid to make the boring parts seem worthwhile.

Pausing, I stared at the finished cards. "Chakra manipulation training card" and "iryojutsu training card" were mouthfuls. I'd need to work on the naming later. Maybe something catchier, more... marketable.

Not sure if I would sell them, but you never know.

Setting the medical cards aside, I turned to my other project – the civilian-grade sealing scrolls. Shihu had given me some helpful input on this one — when she still had brain cells I hadn't fucked loose.— and I finally had a rough idea of how to make it accessible to non-shinobi users.

The solution I ended up with was still buttons on a wooden housing that would activate pre-stored chakra for the sealing functions.

I'd still need a proper woodworker for anything truly elegant, but for now, a kunai and my questionable carving skills would have to suffice. The goal was just something that could be pressed physically—function over form. I could always refine the design later once I proved the concept worked.

I'd been at it for nearly an hour, hunched over on the floor like some kind of demented whittler, when someone knocked on the door. I looked up from my masterpiece of mediocrity, ink and wood shavings scattered around me like evidence of my crimes against carpentry.

"Come in," I called out, not bothering to move from my spot.

The door opened, and Sakura stepped in after a brief hesitation. She had this expression on her face — part frown, part determination, like she was psyching herself up for battle, trying so hard to be intimidating.

When she spoke, it was in the coldest voice she could muster.

"What do you want?"

I had to bite back a smile. The front she was trying to pull was almost cute, in a 'angry kitten trying to be intimidating' kind of way. But I knew exactly how to strip that facade away.

Turning back to my work, contrasting this morning's cheerfulness, I replied in the most disinterested tone I could manage, as if dealing with her was just another tedious interruption.

"Close the door." I gestured vaguely toward one of the beds with my kunai. "Sit."

Sakura stood rooted in place for a moment, clearly trying to maintain her defiant stance. I could practically feel her internal struggle — part of her wanting to storm out, part of her dreaded to know what I had in stock for her.

The silence stretched between us, broken only by the soft scraping of metal against wood.

But when it became obvious I wasn't going to acknowledge her further, wasn't going to give her the confrontation she'd psyched herself up for, the fight slowly leaked out of her posture.

Besides discipline, complete indifference seemed laughably effective on her.

In the original timeline and even in this one, Sakura had spent years obsessing over Sasuke, a boy who treated her with the same casual dismissal I was showing now, if not worse.

The pattern was so deeply ingrained it was almost masochistic—the harder someone ignored her, the more desperately she craved their attention. She'd built her entire sense of self-worth around chasing after someone who couldn't care less about her existence.

Now here I was, weaponizing that same dynamic, and she was falling into it like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Knowledge truly was power.