Chapter 147
The news that the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, was going to take in the defected Rain Ninja, Haruto Saito, as his personal disciple spread like wildfire throughout the entire Hidden Leaf Village that very afternoon at an unbelievable speed!
The entire village was in an uproar! The focus of discussions, which had originally been on Tsunade and Jiraiya's safe return today, was completely diverted. Everyone was now talking about Haruto Saito and Hiruzen Sarutobi. Many even believed that the Hokage had gone mad!
There was no precedent for this!
The leaders of the Five Great Ninja Villages had never before taken in defected ninjas from enemy nations as their personal disciples! In fact, there had never been a case where a Kage accepted a foreign ninja as a student at all! Regardless of their age or whether they came from an enemy faction, they were simply not taken in!
One of the fundamental and crucial criteria for a Kage to accept a personal disciple was that the person had to be a native ninja of their own village!
After all, it was well understood that the personal disciples of the Five Great Kage had a significant chance of becoming the next generation's leaders!
Hiruzen Sarutobi himself was a prime example of this—his teacher was the Second Hokage, Tobirama Senju. The same was true for the Hidden Stone Village; the current Third Tsuchikage, Onoki, had been the personal disciple of the Second Tsuchikage, Mu!
For this reason, many people thought Hiruzen Sarutobi had lost his mind!
Was he taking such an extreme step just to show goodwill as part of some plan to integrate defectors into Konoha?
Of course, many didn't actually think Hiruzen Sarutobi was insane, but they suspected he had some hidden agenda. However, the cost of such a decision was too great for them to comprehend!
A Hokage's personal disciple held an extraordinary position in the Hidden Leaf Village. Even if they held no important role, even if they had no right to attend high-level meetings, it was understood that any one of them could eventually become the Hokage!