Chapter 94.6- One Thousand Hands

“Most of them managed to make it to the general genin corps. But from there, their fates diverge widely. Some of them manage to make it onto chunin squads and die in their second or third C-rank. Others group up together, go on D-ranks for a year, and then die on their first C-rank. And perhaps the worst is the category that are talented enough to make it to jounin squads with clan genin”

“Those like you” I added, as I flipped through the file, each document told the same story. Genin, mission, dead.

“Yes. Those ones manage to survive for significantly longer. They make it past their first year in 72% of cases. And then die in their second in 94% of the remaining cases.”

“What?” I asked, head snapping up from the file. The name I'd been reading sticking in my mind-- Yosuke Kira, dead in a C-rank mission before he even turned eleven.

“What do you think causes it?” He asked.

“Carelessness?” That was the biggest cause of death for shinobi, funny enough. For all the talk of how our profession made us naturally paranoid and whatnot, we were shoickingly good at getting complacent. It was probably because the human mind just could not stay dialed in 24/7 forever. Something had to give. Complacency would set in once the brain was convinced that the finer had passed, and then there would be a dead shinobi not long after. It was a tale as old as time.

“Nope. Over 90% of the fatalities occurred after one of the original genin team was promoted to the chunin. They’d lose a teammate in anything from one to four missions. The longest they managed to survive was seven missions.” He said.

“Because it is standard practice for the Jounin to be reassigned to high value missions while the chunin takes operational team lead” I surmised, picking up the next file.

“Exactly.”

“So what do you want?”

“You’ve seen the data now. Help me design a curriculum that achieves your Grandfather’s dream. ‘No more should our children need to pick up swords and die in our wars’ is what you told me he said on founding this village. Let’s make that a reality, Shori” He said, stretching out his hand. I took it, accepting his handshake.

“You’re still going to have to convince me to give you those orphans though.” I said, watching as his smile slid off his face.

“But—“

“You’ve convinced me a new curriculum is necessary. The data is damning and someone will have to answer for it, but you haven’t convinced me as to why these children should go to you and not Shiba.”

“Shiba is going to turn them into expendable tools. Bombs that he’d have no problem triggering himself if he felt it would give us the advantage.” He said.

“All for the good of Konoha. Convince me that investing even more into these children will be worth it” I said.

A/N: And that’s the chapter. In a lot of ways, Shori makes the same mistakes Hiruzen does, but he rationalizes it for the greater good. Shiba will never become another Danzo. But you should know by now that Shori is not above making sacrifices where he deems them necessary.