Chapter 14: First Time Leaving The Village
Eastern coastal city of the Land of Fire.
In this world, Menma, who was leaving the village for the first time, had changed into a simple outfit and was strolling along the port docks of this city.
“Lord! Need a worker? I can do anything!” Along the streets near the docks, some unemployed commoners were seeking employment.
They were mostly in ragged clothes, sallow-faced and emaciated, and when they looked at pedestrians at the port, especially those in luxurious attire, their eyes were filled with fear and desire.
Menma had come all the way from Konohagakure and had seen too many commoners displaced by war.
At this time, the war between the Land of Fire and the Land of Lightning had entered its final stages, with both countries’ ninja forces confronting each other in the Land of Moon and the Land of Hot Water. Though there were occasional small-scale conflicts, both sides remained relatively restrained.
In addition, Cloud Village had sent a special envoy to Konoha for ‘peace talks,’ the war was about to end, and the coastal cities of the Land of Fire were gradually regaining their pre-war prosperity, with various merchant ships coming and going, including not a few from the Land of Lightning.
The Ninja World was not at peace.
Besides wars between the great nations, there were also rampant bandits, and the civilization level of the entire Ninja World was still stuck in the feudal era, with ‘daimyo, nobles, merchants, ninjas, commoners’ forming a rigidly hierarchical social structure.
Yes, even though ninjas possessed combat power far superior to commoners, their social status was only on par with merchants, and most of the time they even had to be employed by merchants to earn rewards.
Ninjas, who specialized in combat and killing, had status only slightly higher than commoners.
Of course, some rogue ninjas or wandering ninjas would kill merchants and rob them by force.
This usually happened to small merchants; great merchants generally had noble backgrounds, which ordinary ninjas couldn’t afford to provoke.
After all, if a noble was killed by a ninja, it would alarm a country’s highest ruler—the daimyo—and even the entire country’s noble class would pool money to put a bounty on that ninja.
To maintain the nobles’ ruling power.
This strange social structure had persisted for nearly a thousand years.
During the ‘Limited Tsukuyomi World,’ Menma had also researched this social structure in his spare time from training, finding it unbelievable.
Although much in the ‘Limited Tsukuyomi World’ was the opposite of reality, the social structure remained unchanged. Ninjas, though wielding superhuman power, had basically not encroached on national power.
A delicate symbiotic relationship formed between national governments and ninjas: ninjas had no desire to seize state power, and the state had no intention of replacing ninja clans and ninja villages.
Menma walked into a seaside diner.
“Customer, please sit. Just one?” The server enthusiastically came forward, not looking down on Menma just because he appeared to be only in his teens.
Come to think of it, the Ninja World’s social structure was also quite strange: technology developed quickly in some big cities, while other places were like ancient times.
In the manga and anime, classical buildings appeared at times, modern buildings at others, and even in some movies, they had aircraft carriers.
Menma found a seat by the window, where he could see the ships docked at the pier, took out two banknotes and dangled them in his hand: “One ramen set meal, no narutomaki. Also, are there any merchant ships going to the Land of Lightning recently? The safer, the better.”
As a ninja, Menma of course didn’t need to hitch a ride on a merchant ship; he was just using it as an excuse to inquire about the most powerful merchant here.
The server boy took the two hundred-yen banknotes with both hands and enthusiastically introduced: “The safest is definitely Lord Kado’s shipping company! They even have samurai and ninjas escorting.”
In this world, although ninjas were the mainstream, samurai had not gone extinct.
Not to mention the samurai of the Land of Iron, most countries had samurai ronin, who were mostly involved in underworld, thugs, bodyguards, and such.
After all, in the setting, ninjas generally didn’t get involved in commoners’ disputes, and ninja wars tried not to involve civilians.
But once war broke out, it was hard to control.
The two hundred ryō banknotes, minus the set meal cost, meant the server boy could get at least a hundred ryō tip.
The Ninja World’s currency system was complex, with basically every country having its own currency. As the strongest of the Five Great Nations, the Land of Fire’s currency was the most stable.
According to the manga setting, 1 ryō in the Ninja World = 10 yen.
In ‘Manga Chapter 150: Start of Training,’ Jiraiya gave Naruto three hundred-yen bills to go have fun, which was about 3,000 yen, equivalent to less than 200 RMB.
（In the early anime version, a bowl of Ichiraku Ramen cost 400 ryō, but in the manga it was 60 ryō, less than 36 RMB; here we adopt the simpler manga setting.）
“Kado?” When Menma heard this name, deep memories in his brain were awakened.
“Yeah, Lord Kado is a great merchant who rose up in recent years!” The server, seeing all these tips, introduced to Menma.
“It’s said that Lord Kado has nobles of the Land of Fire as backers; his fleet has free passage in these waters. Even the war of the past couple years didn’t affect him much.”
Menma listened quietly.
He vaguely remembered now: this was Konoha 54, nine years before Naruto graduated and the plot began in Konoha
Nine years later, Kado was already one of the wealthiest tycoons in the Ninja World, able to long-term employ S-rank rogue ninjas like Zabuza.
After all, Zabuza had attempted to assassinate the Fourth Mizukage, failed, and still escaped unscathed—a ruthless man, an elite jonin who could go five-fifty with Kakashi; his price wouldn’t be low.
Menma vaguely remembered that the reward for an S-rank mission was around one million ryō.
Moreover, Zabuza had Haku by his side, whose abilities were at least that of a standard jonin.
If Naruto hadn’t activated Nine-Tails mode, he really wouldn’t have been a match for Haku.
After the server boy stepped away, Menma rested his chin on one hand, looking out the window at the bustling docks, pondering the purpose of this village outing.
He had previously eliminated the White Zetsu around the orphanage, which only solved the problem temporarily. To completely stop White Zetsu from monitoring him, the best way was to move to a street block in the village center near the Hokage Building, or a street block near Hyuga Clan Territory.
Using the Anbu ninjas of the Konoha Building and the Sensory Division, as well as the Byakugan’s x-ray vision of the Hyuga Clan, it should make White Zetsu and Obito give up surveilling him.
But Menma’s main body was just a three-year-old child; it was impossible for him to live alone, let alone move to street blocks around the Hokage Building or Hyuga Clan Territory.
It would require not only money, but possibly some influence.
So, Menma planned to find a merchant as his pawn, preferably a Land of Fire merchant with some noble background.
After having him settle in Konohagakure, then find an excuse about adopting an orphan and select himself, he could move out of the orphanage.
As for why not directly find a Land of Fire noble to adopt him, it was mainly to avoid trouble.
To live long-term in street blocks around the Konoha Hokage Building or Hyuga Clan Territory, it was best not to control the pawn with illusion techniques; the pawn had to serve him willingly.
In that case, nobles accustomed to lording over people for centuries wouldn’t do.
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