Chapter 107: The Hokage's Seat

The server set a brazier upon the table and arranged plates of meat around it. Tonbo invited everyone to order freely. Kiba accepted the offer with the solemn commitment of a shinobi receiving an important mission.

The restaurant was busy enough that their table blended into the afternoon noise. Hana sat opposite Tonbo with the Haimaru Brothers beside her. Kiba claimed the place nearest the grill, then moved Akamaru onto his lap so the puppy could inspect every plate. Tonbo paid before the child could ask how much a jōnin earned.

"I am going to empty the kitchen," he announced.

Akamaru barked from the seat beside him.

Hana and the Haimaru Brothers watched Tonbo's smile. They had survived enough of his lessons to recognize preparation when they saw it.

Tonbo placed slices of beef over the heat. "You said you would look after Tenyu and Maki."

Kiba nodded around his first bite. "When I'm older."

"Protecting them would require becoming an excellent shinobi."

"I'll become Hokage. Then I can protect everyone."

"An ambitious answer for four and a half. What abilities does a Hokage need?"

Kiba stopped chewing. "Strength."

"Only strength?"

"A lot of strength."

Hana put one hand over her eyes.

Tonbo nodded as if Kiba had offered a profound answer. "You possess the most important qualification already: the intention to become Hokage. Your chances are excellent."

Kiba straightened. Akamaru looked at him with immediate admiration.

"Really?"

"Certainly. Intention alone is not enough, of course. A Hokage needs the ability to make that intention real."

"What ability?"

"In a little more than a year, you will enter the Academy. It teaches every foundation a future Hokage requires—combat, chakra control, tactics, intelligence, law, history, mathematics, field medicine, and cooperation."

Children from shinobi clans arrived with advantages. Kiba already recognized scents, understood basic pack signals, and had watched relatives practice the Four Legs Technique. Civilian children often encountered chakra theory for the first time in class. Those advantages could become weaknesses when clan heirs decided that inherited skills made every other subject unnecessary.

"The Academy is not only writing," Tonbo added. "You will run, throw weapons, practice stealth, learn formations, and study how villages make decisions. A Hokage who understands only fighting becomes a weapon someone else points."

Kiba's enthusiasm faltered at the length of the list.

Tonbo lowered his voice. "The Fourth Hokage once shared a secret with me."

That restored the child's attention. Kiba had grown up hearing stories about Minato. "You really knew him?"

"We served the same village during the war. He understood that victory depended upon preparation long before battle."

Tonbo had no need to invent that principle. Minato's career proved it.

"I am also working toward the Hokage's seat," Tonbo continued. "Unfortunately, I learned the secret late. You are younger. If you master it, you can become Hokage after me, and when you retire you may pass the position to Tenyu or Maki."

Kiba forgot the meat in front of him. "Tell me."

"Earn full marks in every Academy subject."

Silence held the table.

Kiba glanced at Hana. Their parents sometimes criticized even her results, and she had already begun serious training. "Is that difficult?"

"If it were easy, every student would become Hokage."

Kiba looked again at Hana. "Did you get full marks?"

"No," she said.

"Then I can beat you."

"Enter the Academy before you celebrate."

"Tonbo-sensei said I have the aptitude."

Hana turned a flat stare upon her teacher. Tonbo concentrated upon the grill.

"But you said I had a good chance."

"Because the others do not possess your determination. Difficulty only separates people who enjoy shouting about a dream from those willing to work for it."

Kiba considered written exercises an inconvenience beside running, tracking, and playing with Akamaru. He had not yet encountered the Academy's full curriculum and therefore had no evidence that perfect marks were unreasonable.

"I can do it," he said.

"Then your parents will be proud. Hana will be proud. Akamaru and the Haimaru Brothers will know you kept your word. The entire village will see that you began preparing before your classmates understood what preparation meant."

The appeal shifted with every name. Pride in himself might fade when an exercise became dull. Pride before Hana would survive longer. The thought of disappointing Akamaru reached deeper than either. Tonbo had spent years reading how memories, loyalties, and embarrassment altered decisions. Using the same understanding to make a child study felt almost harmless.

Confidence returned to Kiba's face. "None of them want it as much as I do."

Hana watched her teacher turn a boast into an academic obligation within the time required to grill one plate of meat. She should have warned Kiba. Instead she placed another slice on the brazier and waited to see how far Tonbo could carry the deception.

"There is another problem," Tonbo said.

Kiba leaned closer.

"Someone in your class may also claim that he will become Hokage. What will you do?"

"He'll be wrong."

"Suppose he repeats it every day."

"Then I'll defeat him."

"A Hokage who attacks classmates for having ambition will not remain popular. You need a better method."

Kiba frowned at the grill. His simple future had acquired competitors and rules before he even entered school.

Tonbo let him struggle with the question. An answer given immediately became another instruction. An answer reached after effort felt like the child's own discovery.

"I should get better marks than him," Kiba said at last.

"Exactly."

The praise landed harder because Kiba had earned it. Tonbo placed the best piece of meat on his plate.

"Strength remains necessary," he said. "So do judgment, allies, and the trust of the village. Every examination lets you prove one part before your rival can claim it."

Kiba nodded. "The Hokage's seat is mine."

"Not yet."

"It will be."

Akamaru barked agreement while Hana silently calculated how many evenings of study her brother had just promised without realizing it.

Tonbo ate at an unhurried pace. He could have frightened Kiba with Eightfold Flavor or trapped him in a formal exercise. Instead, the boy was constructing his own restraint from pride. If the ambition survived until the Academy, every poor grade would become evidence of a rival moving closer to the Hokage's seat.

The method could fail. Kiba might discover that he valued field training more than office, or learn enough about the Hokage's burdens to reject the position. Tonbo did not need the child to keep the title as a lifelong obsession. He needed Kiba to enter school believing that study served something he desired, long enough for discipline to become its own habit.

Hana finally understood the shape of the trap. Her brother had not been promised that perfect marks guaranteed the office. Tonbo had said they improved his chances. Every failure could therefore demand more effort without ever disproving the claim.

It was not the gentlest educational method. It might be the only one Kiba would remember.

Across the table, Akamaru pushed his nose beneath Kiba's hand. The boy scratched him absently, already imagining examinations he had never seen and victories over classmates he had never met.