"Alright, job's done." Satori Hyūga looked at the several altered pet cats and dogs in front of him and clapped his hands together in satisfaction.
Then he formed a hand seal with both hands, and a wind-natured chakra emerged, blowing forcefully at them.
The dye that had not yet dried was immediately blown dry by the wind, removing all traces of dye.
"Let's go finish up the mission."
Satori Hyūga led the anxious Kushina and Minato Namikaze to the home of the issuer of the mission scroll, returning each pet one by one.
Some pet owners noticed nothing, while others were puzzled but kept quiet.
However, there were exceptions.
At the house of a wealthy merchant, a portly wealthy woman held a golden cat in her arms. Looking at the golden cat in Satori's arms, her eyes flickered with surprise.
"My little Mimi has already been found—you must have mistaken this one for hers," said the wealthy woman.
Kushina and Minato Namikaze were well-meaning children. Seeing that things had gone wrong, they grew anxious inside.
Satori remained calm and replied coolly, "Since you've already found your pet, then this similarly looking cat must not be yours."
"I just noticed it looked similar, so I took on the mission to bring it here for you to check. I didn't expect you'd already recovered your lost cat."
"The next time you find your missing cat, please remember to cancel your request—it increases the difficulty and complexity of our missions."
Facing the wealthy merchant's wife, Satori remained completely calm—and even shifted the blame back to her.
His calm demeanor actually eased the wealthy woman's suspicions.
Even if she did suspect Satori of cheating, he wouldn't budge an inch—after all, denial was always possible.
Once dyed, ordinary water wouldn't wash the color off.
What? They discovered the cat was dyed?
This cat was found in the wild; what did he have to do with its coloring? It wasn't like he had dyed it himself.
With this mindset, Satori calmly moved on to the next households, unshaken even when accused or exposed.
In just one afternoon, he finished every pet-retrieval mission.
Out of the nineteen assignments, three pets had already been returned, two confirmed dead, and one proven not to be the original pet.
Still, thirteen missions had been successfully completed.
By day's end, their three-person squad had completed twenty-three missions—something that ordinary ninjas couldn't complete in weeks.
Ordinary ninjas could only finish one or two such missions per day.
Using unconventional methods, Satori accomplished in one afternoon what others took one or two months to finish.
When they presented the completed mission scrolls to Jiraiya, his mouth opened wide in shock—he was completely stunned.
He stood rooted to the spot, eyes wide, staring at the massive stack of mission scrolls.
"These… all of these are missions you finished this afternoon?"
Unbelievably, he stared at the pile of scrolls, rubbed his eyes, and double-checked again.
"Did you just swap them out for D-Rank Missions?"
He glanced at Minato Namikaze and Kushina as he spoke.
In his eyes, compared to Satori Hyūga, the two of them were practically honest little angels who would definitely tell him the truth.
Kushina turned her head away, pretending to admire the scenery by the roadside.
Minato simply gave a bitter smile and told Jiraiya, "These aren't just D-Rank Missions. They're all leftover missions from the Mission Hall."
"Still don't trust us, Professor Jiraiya? That truly wounds me," Satori Hyūga sighed dramatically.
Scratching his head, Jiraiya felt something was off—but he couldn't quite figure it out.
He muttered suspiciously, "Could they have actually completed all these missions normally? But how could three kids finish so many?"
Once again, he turned his gaze toward the mission scrolls, this time reading them carefully and checking their actual content.
You wouldn't know unless you looked—and what he saw nearly made his jaw hit the floor.
Every single scroll was about finding lost pets.
Such missions were considered particularly troublesome among standard ones—after all, nobody knew where those pets had disappeared to.
They were time-consuming and exhausting, requiring extensive information gathering from locals and help from nearby residents.
Generally speaking, ninjas avoided such tedious tasks unless the rewards were exceptionally high.
Yet when he checked the listed rewards on the scrolls, they were nothing special at all.
"Satori Hyūga, what kind of underhanded trick did you use to complete all these missions?" Jiraiya shifted his gaze to Satori, voicing his suspicion.
In his mind, among the three kids, Satori remained the top suspect.
After all, being a member of the Hyūga Main House meant he had authority over the Branch House members.
Could it be that he secretly summoned members of the Branch House and used their Byakugan across Konoha to search for these pets?
But something like that would never work.
Even if the clan leader tried pulling such a stunt, there would be serious backlash within the clan.
And this brat, Satori, clearly didn't seem powerful enough to command that level of obedience.
Plus, Old Man Third would never allow such behavior either.
Satori gave a faint smile. "I just completed them the regular way. Don't go around framing innocent people."
"But…this doesn't make any sense," Jiraiya scratched his head, frustration and curiosity seeming ready to burst from his eyes.
How come he hadn't thought of such a fast way to finish missions?
Jiraiya started circling around Satori, bombarding him with questions nonstop.
"Just tell me already! I promise I won't mention it to anyone."
A glint passed through Satori's eyes as he gazed at Jiraiya. "Professor Jiraiya, this is *my* secret. And if you want to know, you'll have to trade something for it."
He eyed Jiraiya up and down, already calculating exactly how much profit he could squeeze out of him.
Jiraiya shivered slightly, sensing that Satori's look wasn't friendly—he seemed up to no good at all.
"What do you want?"
"Let me make one thing clear—I'm not asking for anything inappropriate."
Satori's eye twitched faintly, clearly exasperated at Jiraiya's unprofessional attitude.
"Master Jiraiya, you're one of the Sannin! You must have some incredibly powerful ninjutsu. Teach them to us!" Satori Hyūga said eagerly, rubbing his hands together.
As one of Konoha's pillars, Jiraiya's strength far surpassed most others. He knew countless ninjutsu techniques and even possessed Sage Mode.
Satori had his eyes fixed on it like a tiger poised to strike, and naturally wanted to ask for more in return if given the chance.
Although serving as a mentor, Jiraiya wouldn't simply hand down all his techniques to someone else. He would only pass down the most suitable ones.
According to normal circumstances, Satori felt that Minato Namikaze probably had a much better chance of being selected, while his own chances were much slimmer.
Firstly, because Minato had excellent character and personality—exactly the kind of traits a true ninja should possess.
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