After Kushina lifted the lid, something magical happened; the moment the lid was uncovered, a red light emitted. However, as Kushina and Minato looked closely, there seemed to be no light, just the dish's excessively vibrant red color.
Looking at the strikingly red Mapo Tofu, Kushina swallowed and said, "Mutsuki, you didn't mention it would be this spicy. It looks really spicy!"
She initially thought Mutsuki would just add an extra chili pepper, but observing the color of the Mapo Tofu, Kushina felt like the entire dish was dominated by spiciness.
"This dish is indeed a bit spicy, but it's not just about spiciness. It also has great flavors, fragrance, heat, crispiness, and numbness," explained Mutsuki.
Hearing Mutsuki describe the dish, Minato took a spoonful and tasted it first.
"Spicy!" Minato's first impression of eating the Mapo Tofu was spiciness, indescribable spiciness. He felt that Mutsuki's level of spiciness was particularly intense for him.
The spiciness took Minato, for a moment, to a world filled with flames, where everywhere was erupting in fiery, scorching intensity.
However, this Mapo Tofu wasn't just about spiciness. Various flavors soon exploded in Minato's mouth, immersing him in the delight of the cuisine.
"Delicious!" Minato praised earnestly.
Having said that, Minato quickly scooped several spoonfuls of tofu into his bowl to continue savoring them.
Seeing Minato eagerly devouring the dish, Kushina knew that it must be exceptionally tasty, so she took a bite too.
Indeed, it was numbingly spicy, but also aromatic. Kushina even found meat in it.
"It really is delicious!" Kushina quickly scooped several spoonfuls of tofu herself.
Despite its spiciness, it was just too tasty, and Kushina couldn't control herself.
After the meal, the delicious Illusion Mapo Tofu became the topic of conversation during their post-dinner chat.
When Mutsuki listed the ingredients for the Illusion Mapo Tofu, Kushina raised a question:
"Mutsuki, did you forget an ingredient? Isn't there supposed to be meat?"
Kushina remembered tasting meat in it.
"There's no meat in the ingredients," Mutsuki affirmed.
"But I clearly tasted something that seemed like meat," Kushina said, puzzled.
"I did too," nodded Minato.
"The flavor is like meat, but it's not actually meat; it's processed soybeans," explained Mutsuki, sharing the principles behind it with the two.
"It's amazing; soybeans can produce this flavor!" Kushina found it truly miraculous.
Minato also felt that Mutsuki's culinary skills were unheard of and unseen; soybeans could actually mimic the taste of meat.
As Mutsuki had to go help his disciples with training, he quickly bid farewell to Minato and Kushina, promising to show them the cooking process when they had time.
Arriving at the Southern Boundary Forest, Mutsuki routinely assisted his disciples with training.
Shisui was practicing the Phoenix Sage Flower Nail Crimson Jutsu, Guy was working on strengthening his physique and becoming familiar with Soru, while Obito continued his efforts towards mastering Soru.
As the training time approached its end, Obito asked Mutsuki:
"Yumi-sensei, how can one teach Ninjutsu to others?"
"Why are you asking that? Whom do you want to teach?" Mutsuki inquired.
"My good friend, Nohara Rin. She's also part of the summer special training, in Group B," Obito informed Mutsuki about today's events.
"I feel like I've explained it quite clearly, but Rin still can't grasp it," Obito sighed.
Mutsuki was somewhat speechless. Just as Obito described, he felt Obito's teaching level was similar to Naruto's – teaching Ninjutsu was almost like showing the technique once and letting the person figure it out themselves.
On Mutsuki's side, he indeed possessed knowledge of how to be a qualified teacher. After all, he was an education major, and that was his area of expertise.
However, based on Obito's current performance, Mutsuki felt that entrusting these matters to Obito might not be very effective.
"You better master Ninjutsu yourself first," Mutsuki said, tapping Obito's head with his fingers.
"Could it be that even the all-powerful Mutsuki-sensei has no solution this time?" Obito lowered his head, feeling somewhat disappointed.
However, Obito quickly thought of a good idea. Since he couldn't teach Rin and Mutsuki couldn't make him an excellent teacher, why not just have Mutsuki teach Rin directly?
"Yumi-sensei, actually, Rin's grades aren't that good. I think she urgently needs your guidance," Obito recommended to Mutsuki.
Hearing Obito's words, Mutsuki fell into thought. Currently, the system only has four disciple positions, with only one vacant spot left. It was clearly impossible to assign it to Rin.
However, he could treat her as an informal disciple without confirming with the system for now.
After a moment of consideration, Mutsuki saw two advantages in teaching Rin.
One benefit is that it can better motivate Obito to strive in his training, and the other is the opportunity to convince Kakashi to come over as a disciple.
Kakashi also possesses S-rank potential and is already on the fast track to rapid growth, making him a good choice.
"Then go talk to Rin. If she's willing to come here to study, she's welcome," Mutsuki said.
Hearing Mutsuki's agreement, Obito cheered directly. He had approached this with a trial mindset, as he couldn't force Mutsuki to teach Rin.
"As expected, Mutsuki-sensei is all-powerful!" Obito exclaimed in excitement.
Just thinking about practicing together with Rin got Obito extremely excited. He couldn't wait to fast-forward to tomorrow and share this good news with her.
...
The next day, Ebisu went to the training ground in the morning as usual, preparing for the special training.
"Why does it feel like everyone is looking at me?" Ebisu muttered, sensing gazes from all around.
Last time, when he was the sole occupant of the promotion list, he gained quite a bit of attention. However, yesterday his performance in Group A was not good, so there was no reason for everyone to be paying attention to him.
After all, he had just been promoted, and it was reasonable for him not to be able to beat the original members of Group A.
"Ebisu, I never thought you, this guy who looks so serious on the surface, would be up to something big behind the scenes," Shiranui Genma joked, thumping Ebisu's chest.
They were all students from Class 4-6, and their relationship was quite good.
Upon hearing Shiranui Genma's words, although Ebisu didn't know what happened, he instinctively felt something was wrong.
"If you have time at noon, let me experience that Confusion Jutsu. I want to challenge my weak points" Shiranui Genma joked.
"Confusion Jutsu?" Ebisu vaguely guessed what had happened and felt his heart sink.
"You don't have to pretend. Do we still need to hide our relationship, especially now that people from all three Groups know about it? There's no point in continuing to pretend," Shiranui Genma said.
"Just admit that you've developed a more adult-oriented Ninjutsu. Boldly own up to it," Shiranui Genma remarked.
"Adult-oriented Ninjutsu, and everyone from the three teams knows...?" Ebisu, who had a sense of what was happening, suddenly felt his vision darken, nearly fainting.
"It's really not something I developed. I just made a suggestion!" Ebisu felt like he was bidding farewell to his dream career as a ninja academy instructor.
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