It had been over three years since Leon Foster awakened his golden finger.
Every time he opened the system, the interface of the Naruto mobile game would appear, flashing an ad: "Top-up to VIP10 now and instantly receive Desert Gaara!"
For the past three years, Leon had tried countless methods to top up: dollars, pounds, rubles, even gold and diamonds—none of it worked. Every time he attempted a transaction, the same message appeared: "Top-up failed."
After three years of frustration, Leon gave up trying to become a VIP. He even went out of his way to convert money into Chinese yuan to try again, but the result never changed.
Upon opening the Naruto panel, what greeted Leon was an image of himself and a hazy night view of Konoha Village. His starting character wasn't the standard Naruto Uzumaki, but himself—Leon Foster.
Over these three years, Leon had thoroughly explored the golden finger system. Each day he could sign in once, earning rewards like copper coins, reputation, explosive tags, soul jade, Rinnegan stones, delicious ramen, ninja recruitment scrolls, and even premium currency—gold coins, normally obtainable only through top-ups.
Copper coins and reputation were essential for upgrading summoning techniques and enhancing summoned beasts. Copper coins were also needed to upgrade gear and skill scrolls. Thankfully, the system allowed conversion between copper coins and U.S. dollars at a 1:1 rate. But in all this time, Leon had only ever exchanged his money into copper coins—never the other way around. He never had enough.
Soul jade and Rinnegan stones were used to strengthen divine artifacts, though Leon still had no clue how to obtain those. As for the ninja recruitment scrolls, he barely earned one or two a month via sign-ins, and sometimes none at all. The supposed VIP bonus of double rewards was forever out of reach.
Gold coins from sign-ins were capped at 50 per month. A single standard recruitment scroll cost 168 coins, with special and limited-time recruitments completely inaccessible to him.
Most game modes—Team Raid, Trial Grounds, Arena, Leaderboards, Ranked Matches, Valley of Plenty, Ninja Tournament—were all greyed out and inaccessible. He didn't know if special conditions were required to unlock them.
However, ever since joining the Continental Hotel's assassin organization, the "Organization" section of the game lit up. The Task Gathering Hall also became accessible, which logged all the assassination jobs he accepted through the hotel. But there was a catch—only three missions could be accepted per day, and they had to be taken by his in-game character.
The missions were ranked from D to S class, each offering different rewards. More importantly, the hall introduced non-assassination tasks: protection, escort, delivery, search missions—everything was valid.
Leon even opened a private agency outside the Continental Hotel, naming it the "Foster Agency," to handle such tasks. As long as the mission was recognized by the Task Gathering Hall, he'd selectively accept it.
There was also a built-in training ground in the system—not the in-game sparring area, but a true, immersive training field like Training Ground 8 from Naruto. Here, Leon could practice ninjutsu, taijutsu, genjutsu, and even kunai-throwing. The only downside was the lack of combat simulations, which made it hard to gain real battle experience.
Still, the training ground significantly boosted his abilities over the past three years. Thanks to it, he could now use several types of jutsu proficiently. Building such a large, secluded space near the Continental Hotel would've been insanely expensive otherwise.
Over these thirty-six months, Leon earned fifty ninja recruitment scrolls. True to Tencent's stingy nature, he used them in batches of ten. After all, not every scroll yielded a ninja or ninja fragments. Sometimes it was just coins, reputation, or materials.
In the end, he recruited only three ninjas. Why so few? Because duplicates converted into fragments instead of unlocking new characters.
To recruit a C-rank ninja, ten fragments were needed. For B- and A-ranks, forty fragments. For S-ranks, one hundred fragments. There was no consistent logic, and ranking up ninjas required even more:
1-star to 2-star: 30 fragments
2-star to 3-star: 60 fragments
3-star to 4-star: 100 fragments
4-star to 5-star: 200 fragments
Each upgrade boosted their attributes, but the grind was hellish. Especially in this world, where the system was now a real-life golden finger, collecting enough fragments was a nightmare.
Even so, the three ninjas Leon had—though only C-rank—were powerhouses in the early stages of the Marvel universe, where major threats had yet to emerge.
His three recruits:
Sasuke Uchiha (without Sharingan)
Skills: Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu, Lion Combo, Chidori
Iruka Umino
Skills: Chalkboard Eraser Shuriken, Barrier Technique, Roar of Love
Rock Lee
Skills: Infinite Barrage, Leaf Whirlwind, Primary Lotus
Once a ninja was recruited, Leon gained access to all of their techniques. He also received a standard C-rank chakra pool. Furthermore, he could train chakra himself.
The only annoyance was that this version of Sasuke could already use Chidori but lacked the Sharingan, making it impossible to track high-speed targets. He'd only gain Sharingan abilities after successfully recruiting a Sharingan version of Sasuke. And whatever Sharingan level that version had was fixed—no upgrades allowed.
Still, one Chunin and two Genin were more than enough to wreak havoc in the Marvel universe's early days. Unless he was hit directly by bullets or explosives, his assassination skills remained formidable.
After all, most basic ninjas had high attack but low defense.