Chapter Twenty-Three: A Proposal

To be honest, it was somewhat inconvenient, but considering Tsunade's value, Karn still rose to answer. He let Tsunade wait outside for a moment, then, after changing his clothes, invited her in.

Once they were seated, Karn asked, "Tsunade, is there something you need?" If it was about medicine, it wouldn’t be appropriate for Konoha to send Tsunade to him again. Karn always refused to mix personal relationships into business transactions.

"I wanted to hear your opinion on something. After all, you know a bit of medical arts—your contributions to the battlefield emergency handbook are well-known..."

"I had nothing to do with that," Karn replied, shaking his head. "Tsunade, I am just a merchant. It’s best not to involve me in Konoha’s affairs."

"Don’t be so stingy," Tsunade said with a forced smile, waving her hand. "How about this: I’ll support your business and buy all the chocolate from your food shop this time. Besides, what I'm asking has nothing to do with Konoha—it's a personal concern. As a friend, help me out."

"We’re not friends, Tsunade. And the chocolate sells well enough; if you buy it all, others will blame my shop for not having any." Karn replied directly. But seeing Tsunade still smiling, undeterred, he sighed and said, "Fine, tell me. If it involves Konoha’s politics, I’ll pretend I never heard it and won’t answer."

"You’re really cautious. Konoha doesn’t see you as a spy," Tsunade pouted. She’d already heard from Granny Mito that Karn bore no malice toward Konoha, just overly cautious—he avoided political matters like the plague.

"It’s about training medical ninja. I just privately asked Professor Sarutobi, but he’s not interested; he has no intention of doing it. Reforming the medical system would reduce casualties among Konoha ninja... Should I bring it up at the next jonin meeting? That way, many would support my decision."

"Better give it up. It won’t succeed," Karn said, pouring cold water over her hopes. "Even if you rally all the jonin, it still won’t work."

"Why? It’s clearly the right thing to do. The battlefield has already shown how important medical ninja are."

Tsunade protested. It was obviously a good thing. Although Konoha now had Karn’s medicines, which effectively lowered the fatality rate among the wounded, medical ninja were irreplaceable. Increasing their numbers would not only safeguard front-line squads but also allow ninja to quickly regain their strength on the battlefield.

"As for war, I don’t know much. But training medical ninja must cost a lot of money and energy, right? Konoha seems a bit poor at the moment—otherwise, they wouldn’t have given me several properties to pay off millions in debt..."

Karn shook his head. His words made Tsunade blush slightly; such behavior did seem to exploit outsiders.

"And about the medical system reform—do you have any ideas or concrete plans?"

Tsunade was momentarily at a loss, glancing around before saying, "Plans... Aren’t they supposed to be discussed by everyone?"

"But you should at least have an initial plan: What’s the goal? At what age should training begin? Should you add a course at the ninja academy or establish a separate medical ninja school? What are the selection criteria? How will you assess them? How will the curriculum be prepared? How much will it cost? What will medical ninja’s compensation be, and will it attract people?"

"If you have all these ready, the Third Hokage would find it hard to refuse you. But if you just act on passion, there’ll be hundreds of reasons to reject you."

After Karn’s words, Tsunade was stunned. His advice sparked a revelation in her mind; she vaguely knew what to do next.

"You’re right..." Many ideas flashed through Tsunade’s mind, and she agreed with Karn. But he had mentioned too many things at once for her to remember, and she worried she might forget them once she returned.

"Don’t look at me. I told you, I’m a merchant. Medical reform affects many aspects of Konoha. What I said was just to guide you; don’t trouble me any further."

Karn finished and lifted his teacup, intending to see her off. Unfortunately, Tsunade didn’t catch the hint, so he had to plainly say he was tired and needed rest.

He then ushered Tsunade out of the house. Of course, if Tsunade didn’t want to move, Karn would never be able to force her out, but lingering would have been impolite.

After leaving Karn’s food shop, Tsunade hurried back to the Konoha hospital.

"Yangno, Aojie, come help me."

Tsunade called over two medical ninja most adept at organization, then explained to them what she’d heard from Karn.

"Help me draft a detailed plan. I’ll sort out the medical ninjutsu."

With the tasks divided, Tsunade set to work at what she did best.

Currently, the classification of medical ninjutsu was still unclear. The most practical was the Healing Palm Technique, but it required high chakra control. Tsunade planned to organize medical ninjutsu from easy to difficult, categorizing them by usefulness. If possible, she intended to develop some supporting medical techniques as well.

Tsunade even sought to write a method suitable for everyone to practice medical ninjutsu. Training a medical ninja was still difficult, but with a system in place, they could be produced continuously.

"Carefulness, patience... These are the foundation for selecting medical ninja. Some surgeries could even be taught at the ninja academy. Professor Sarutobi would never agree to a new medical ninja school, so for selection criteria, maybe use the Hemostasis Technique, written exams, and five standard surgeries? That’s much harder than the Clone Technique. Looks like I’ll have to mention this to Professor Sarutobi..."

Suddenly inspired, Tsunade remained at the Konoha hospital, working late into the night. Passing medical ninja were astonished. Some even suspected someone was using Transformation Technique to impersonate Lady Tsunade.

At this hour, Lady Tsunade should be at a tavern or casino, not burning the midnight oil at the hospital. It was highly unusual.

Around two or three in the morning, Tsunade felt the classification of standard surgeries was still vague and wanted to ask Karn, but, seeing the darkness outside, suppressed the urge.

"Tsk, I forgot to buy chocolate... I’ll check how much Kushina has left."

After completing most of the medical ninjutsu course outline, Tsunade suddenly felt a palpitation and wanted to eat chocolate, but remembered she’d forgotten to buy any today. The uneasy feeling genuinely unsettled her.

"Could something bad happen..."

Tsunade shook her head. The war was over; surely there couldn’t be so much misfortune.