“Hello. Can I help you?” Ren slid behind the counter and asked as Tenten approached him.

There wasn’t much to look at in the shop. He was selling seals, and thus, there were no items showcased in the room. There were only a several comfy sofas with small tables between them where brochures with the seals for sale lay.

“Oh. Hi. I am just looking around. My sensei promised to buy me something for the first anniversary of our team, and I was here two days ago. Some of the offered seals got my interest, but I have not made a final decision just yet.” Tenten said with a smile.

Ren nodded and took one of the brochures on the counter, passing it to the girl as he beckoned her toward the closest sofa and went to sit there with her.

“Anything in particular that caught your eye, young lady?” Ren asked with a small smile, giving Tenten a once over and he had to say, for as plain as she looked in the anime, the girl in reality was quite cute.

The double bun hairstyle was kinda meh, but if she let her hair down? She would be easily turning some heads. Then again, this girl was older than her canon counterpart, so that played a role, too.

Tenten blushed a bit at being called ‘young lady’, and her smile became just a tad bit more genuine. Compliments, even simple ones like that, were a very rare occurrence for her.

Neji was too proud and would rather sneer at her than admit he was a man. But Tenten did notice the erection he tried to hide when they were in co-ed baths as a team that one time during a mission several months ago.

And the less said about Gai and Lee, the better. They were just anomalies. She loved them like a family, but she would have been surprised if these two even noticed that she was a female. It was one of these things she doubted registered in their worldview.

Personally, she long ago locked them in the spandex-sexual box in her mind and threw the key away.

“I am a weapon specialist. That’s why I was thinking about getting the storage seal tattoo.” Tenten admitted, and Ren had a hard time preventing his expression from shifting into a wry one.

“That’s quite generous of your teacher.” He hummed, inwardly shaking his head.

Getting a storage tattoo was akin to getting a car. It wasn’t a cheap thing. He sold them for fifty thousand Ryo a piece. Which was approximately five grand in his previous world. And that was already fifty percent cheaper than anywhere else. They usually went for a hundred thousand.

Ren didn’t care, and when he entered the business, he simply slashed the price to half of the standard. That most definitely pissed off his seal master colleagues, as they now had to adjust their pricing to stay competitive.

But fuck them.

Even somebody who doesn’t know how to use chakra to create seals and has to use the old-fashioned brush and ink way, which was pretty much everybody who wasn’t him, only needs like three hours to make a storage tattoo.

The cost of materials is also negligible. Out of that hundred thousand Ryo, around ninety-five thousand is pure profit. It was disgusting how much the seal masters profited from that. And because of it, they restricted access by hiking up the prices and even refused to spread the knowledge around.

There were reasons why learning the sealing arts was hard. And some of them simply amounted to the masters of the craft being unwilling to share their know-how or deliberately refusing to teach their students certain techniques.

Unfortunately for them, Ren wanted these seals to be more widespread, so he made them more affordable. He could craft one of these in three minutes flat, and asking for fifty thousand Ryo a piece was still close to extortion for such a simple thing.

And yet, people still praised him for it. It was hilarious.

At the very least, Ren kept the feature where the seal would dissolve in around ten years. The body seals were usually permanent, but the seal masters put in a lot of research to figure out how to circumvent that for this particular seal. After all, with it dissolving every ten years, it created repeat customers.

Ren wanted to do away with it. To make Konoha stronger and set a new standard. But… there was a line he knew he should not casually cross. He already had enough enemies in Konoha. His competition already hated him for ruining profitable ventures for them just a little bit and forcing them to sell their seals cheaper. If he pushed them too far, they might do something unfortunate.

So, Ren kept this flaw in his seals to keep the relative peace.

“Yeah. I think Gai-sensei is feeling kinda guilty.” Tenten said with a sigh. “His specialty is taijutsu, and we tried, but I am just not built for it, so he trains my teammates way more than me because they are both taijutsu prodigies. I don’t think he has much of an idea what to do with me, to be honest. He does his best, but…” She helplessly shrugged with an uncomfortable smile, and Ren gave her a sympathetic look.

This was the problem with the current three-man cell apprenticeship system. Sometimes, even if you get a good teacher with a shining reputation and indomitable might, it does not mean he or she will be able to teach you anything special if your specializations have nothing in common.

Sure, Gai will cover the basics every Jonin teacher is supposed to teach their genins. He will definitely do his job perfectly in that regard.

And yet, nobody can argue that at the end of it, both Neji and Lee will come out of these years under his tutelage much better off than Tenten, who will lag behind massively in skill and ability.

The girl was relegated to a support role, not only because it fit her fighting style, but also because Gai simply could not give her anything that would elevate her prowess.

“If your teacher is willing to cough up the money for the storage tattoo seal, then I guess that is a good start.” Ren chuckled. “It’s a good trick. Some chunin use it as a cornerstone of their fighting style.”

The ability to store and materialize a weapon at will was dangerous. You ain’t catching a jonin with it, but anything under that level? Some ninjas did manage to become quite accomplished chunin with just this seal and their fighting skills, despite having no other ninja technique.

They are not going to get any higher than mid-chunin with only that. But it is still a testament to how useful such a simple thing could be and how far it could be taken.

“Yeah. I believe being able to swap weapons mid-fight without needing to pull out a storage scroll will give me a way more versatility.” Tenten happily nodded, and Ren pursed his lips.

‘Should I?’ He… hesitated and gave the girl in front of him a pondering look, which made the girl tilt her head in a bit of confusion.

It was none of his business. But at the same time, it grated on him. He should just sell her the seal she wished to have and be done with it.

But…

He kinda felt like meddling, you know?

Because it was such a monumental shame.

Tenten was cool. How many people can say they have a hundred percent accuracy with thrown weapons? She has a real gift. And she is squandering it.

It really grated on Ren’s nerves.

‘No. I really should not.’ Ren inwardly rebuked himself. ‘I already have enough problems between Ino, Hinata, the shop, the new clan, the clan politics, the seal research, and my own training. I don’t have the time to train another person. Even if only casually.’ He reasoned.

“Is something wrong?” Tenten asked, pulling Ren out of his reverie as he looked at her puzzled and slightly worried expression.

At that moment, Ren deflated.

‘Dammit.’ He let out an exasperated breath as he closed his eyes, knowing he had lost this internal battle. And he was not ashamed to admit it was in no small part due to the fact that he found the girl’s expression cute.

He opened his eyes and looked directly at Tenten. “Tell me, what is your elemental affinity?”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep