Knowledge
This small book was driving him crazy. Minato stared at the tattered notebook he'd been carrying for the past few weeks. As the prodigy student of the Toad Sage, himself a student of the Third Hokage, he'd just been tasked with sorting through old archives. After the first wars, any information on important techniques or passages for maintaining alliances was valuable, even if it was in an archive over a decade old.
And so Minato found himself poring over documents for weeks. The book was in a closet filled with moldy papers. It had no title. And to Minato's surprise, when he opened the cover, the text was foreign. The words seemed vaguely familiar, but he couldn't understand a single passage.
He showed the book to Shikaku, who was equally puzzled. There were many dialects within the great nations, but shinobi primarily spoke one language. It made communication during missions between villages much easier. Why a book like this would be in the Hokage's office was a mystery. Normally, Minato would ignore this. The book wasn't useful if no one could read it. But there was something that irritated him. He muttered the words silently to himself. Deep in his subconscious, he knew he had seen words like these. So, against all logic, he put the little book in his pocket.
In an attempt to solve the mystery, he took the book to Konoha's main library. Historians were familiar with many languages. However, they, too, had difficulty identifying and translating the text, leading Minato to believe the language was rare. But that didn't make any sense. Many people sent letters to the Hokage, but only those from notable people survived. If high-ranking officials spoke this language, surely historians would have recognized it.
Undeterred, Minato's next stop was the coding department. It was only when he arrived inside the building that he stopped to think about what he was doing. All the coders had been very busy with the hints of the new war. His request wasn't urgent; it was merely a selfish whim. Minato sighed and turned on his heel, walking back toward the Hokage tower.
Over the next few weeks, he showed the book to his friends. He didn't expect much. It would have been a miracle if even one of them had recognized the text. Choza accused Minato of trying to play a trick on him. Everyone else shook their heads in confusion.
The book was burning a hole in his pocket at this point.
Minato thought most things were always an incentive to learn something new to spend precious time worrying. There were a few exceptions; his friends, his sensei, and his family among them. But every once in a while, something like this would appear and challenge him.
When Kushina arrived back in Konoha after a rather long mission, his mind was still occupied. She noticed his bad mood immediately and asked him what was wrong. Minato shrugged and gave an evasive answer. The last thing he wanted was to tell Kushina about the book. She would scoff. She wouldn't understand why such a small thing was consuming him. To save himself the embarrassment, he left the book at home.
Of course, Kushina found it anyway. He was sure she had a supernatural ability to find new ways to embarrass him. Minato had prepared to explain the whole story when he took the book. She raised an eyebrow questioningly, looking between him and the book. He would have told her not to bother, but she started talking.
"Tafiya gabas har sai ka ga farin kogon."
Minato was stunned into silence. Her voice took on a tone he'd never heard her use before. It was a strange accent, but not unpleasant. The words were soft but almost hissed, like a breeze on a beach shore.
"Why do you have this?" she asked. She couldn't answer. Her brain was rapidly trying to process what had just happened. Now it made sense why the words seemed so familiar. She must have seen something similar in Uzugakure.
"What does it mean?" he asked. Minato walked over to where she was on the couch and sat down. Kushina looked at him amused. She couldn't understand why he was so interested.
“Walk east until you see the white cave. It looks like this page is for directions. It was probably for a mission.” So the information was useless after all, Minato thought. However, he felt a sense of calm wash over him now that the puzzle was solved. “You never answered my question,” Kushina pressed.
"What was that again?" he asked guiltily. He hadn't heard anything she'd said after translating.
"Why do you have this?" He repeated, waving the book in the air.
"I found it in the office on the third floor, but that's not important. You never told me you could speak another language. What's its name?"
"So you stole it?" Kushina smiled broadly and flipped through the pages. "Well, it doesn't look like there are any state secrets in here, so you shouldn't get into too much trouble." His curiosity was eating him alive, and she knew it. "It's called Ryukan."
"I thought I was going crazy," he admitted. "The words seemed so familiar, but I couldn't pinpoint where I'd seen them before. Now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever heard anyone in Uzugakure speak it."
"I'm not surprised. It's practically a dead language. Now it's only taught to children as a way to explain the history of fuinjutsu." Her eyes had a distant look as she reminisced. "I used to hate going to class."
"Say something else." The request left her mouth before he could stop it. There was something about the way her lips formed the words that paralyzed him. Kushina looked at him strangely, but played along.
“Sunana Kushina na yashi. Na yi farin cikin haduwa da ku.” He was simply speaking another language. The fact that she found him so attractive was worrying.
"What did you say?"
“I introduced myself. To tell someone your name, you would say Sunana Minato.”
“Sunana Minato,” she copied. Kushina instantly brought her hand to her mouth to stifle her laughter.
"Mhmm, your enunciation is terrible."