Minato gingerly touched his right eye, which was swollen shut, and sighed tiredly as Kushina's right punch was so fast and powerful that it knocked him out in one go, and he didn't even have time to do anything. It was lucky that the furious Uzumaki had not found him in the middle of a busy street, but had come to confront him at the free training ground where he regularly practiced on his own, otherwise he would have been embarrassed.
But there was bad news, too - his relationship with his best and only friend was ruined, his source of new Fuinjutsu knowledge was almost certainly cut off, which meant no new money, training, or techniques from a useful acquaintance, except for those already promised.
Jiraiya-sensei was also very curious about his new knowledge of seals, immediately singling him out as a favorite among his students and even hinting at a personal apprenticeship. He was able to get together with him surprisingly quickly, because he was an orphan from the orphanage, despite the clan teacher. And now such an attractive opportunity hung in the balance.
The suspicion that he'd lost not only a friend, but someone more, Minato tried to chase away from him - Kushina-chan looked very blooming, despite her rage, and the slight makeup on her face was very unusual for a kunoichi who'd never used such feminine tricks before. All of this made one assume the worst.
One could only be glad that Uzumaki had simply opted for physical retribution rather than demanding back all the fuin copies removed from the gifts he had received from her for the time being. That such existed, Minato himself had mentioned. And right now, the idea of responding positively to a vaguely familiar shinobi's offer to share his knowledge didn't seem like such a good idea.
Namikaze realized that even clan knowledge, even if it had been obtained, could not be sold or disseminated, but it was impossible to increase his chances of survival in the shortest possible time. And Minato realized that the small whispers about the growing tension in the political arena of the great villages could lead to a new world war of shinobi.
And it would primarily be genin chunin like himself from the commoners who would die in it, not the clan elite, who were far better trained and equipped. Not to mention that of the graduating class, three people had already died on missions, and that was in peacetime. What would happen in wartime?
Minato was willing to pay a lot of money to avoid being among the ranks of the expendable, thrown into the war, even if it was the reason for the spoiled relationship with Kushina-chan. He'd already paid for himself - if he was a head taller than his teammates at graduation, having reached the average level of the clan's students with his own brains, talent and efforts, he could now give many of his classmates a head start and draw with the strongest, regardless of the advantage of genkai genkai and dojutsu. Jiraiya-sensei's sparring sessions were proof of that.
Shaking himself and pushing the heavy thoughts away, Minato rose from the ground and grunted at the pain that shot through his ribs on his right side. Apparently, Kushina wasn't satisfied with such a quick reprisal and added her feet a couple times on his motionless body.
Well, it's not broken, though the bruises will be decent. Trying not to disturb the "battle" wounds, the blond genin waddled to the hospital, rejoicing at the free treatment for all the teams being trained by his mentor. He would think about the possibility of correcting the situation and regaining the favor of the red-haired princess Uzumaki later.
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