The crescent moon hung high in the night sky.
After eating his fill, Akira politely bid farewell to Mito-obasan and Tsunade.
Instead of using chakra to leap across rooftops as usual, he chose to stroll home at a leisurely pace.
A hundred steps after a meal keeps the doctor away.
Mito-obasan’s cooking was incredible, far better than anything Akira could make himself.
His own meals were merely edible, nothing more.
This wasn’t a prosperous era.
Only a few years had passed since the Warring States Period, and supplies were still scarce.
Many ingredients and seasonings were difficult to obtain, and Akira couldn’t be bothered putting too much effort into cooking.
Besides, guys can survive on rough meals.
So after unexpectedly enjoying such delicious food, he ate until his stomach was completely round.
Mito-obasan had been delighted as well.
Watching Akira devour everything she’d made was the greatest compliment a cook could receive.
After wandering home at an easy pace, he closed the doors and windows before unrolling the sealing scroll Mito had given him.
Inside were nine basic sealing techniques.
Looking through them carefully, he found techniques like the Evil Sealing Method, which suppressed an opponent’s chakra Elemental sealing formulas such as the Fire Sealing Method and Water Sealing Method, designed to counter the five basic chakra natures of Fire, Wind, Lightning, Earth, and Water The Four Limbs Heavy Seal for restraining movement The Finger Engraving Seal for transmitting messages; and the Contract Seal used against summoned creatures.
Akira recognized several of them immediately.
Kakashi had once used the Evil Sealing Method.
Jiraiya had demonstrated the Fire Sealing Method.
He couldn’t quite remember where he’d seen the Four Limbs Heavy Seal before.
The Finger Engraving Seal…
Wasn’t that the one Jiraiya used to leave behind his dying message?
And the Contract Seal…
Minato had used it during the Night of the Nine-Tails to sever Obito’s control over Kurama.
None of these were especially advanced sealing techniques, but for an ordinary shinobi, they were more than sufficient from genin all the way through jonin.
As for sealing Tailed Beasts…
That required techniques on an entirely different level.
Thanks to the system, Akira only needed to read through the scroll once.
Every sealing formula was instantly mastered.
The knowledge imprinted itself firmly into his mind.
Unfortunately…
Sealing techniques consumed enormous amounts of chakra.
With Akira’s current reserves, he could only cast a handful before running completely dry.
The Uzumaki Clan’s naturally powerful life force granted them chakra reserves comparable to Tailed Beasts.
To an Uzumaki, sealing techniques were as effortless as ordinary attacks.
For everyone else…
They were ultimate trump cards.
I’m seriously jealous of Mito-obasan.
She’s stacked with three different buffs.
The Uzumaki bloodline.
A Tailed Beast.
And the Strength of a Hundred Seal.
She practically has infinite chakra.
After mastering every technique recorded within the scroll, Akira unexpectedly grasped another high-level sealing technique on his own— The Five Elements Seal.
The principle was simple.
Once he had mastered the five elemental sealing formulas, combining them naturally produced the Five Elements Seal.
Akira remembered Orochimaru strengthening Naruto’s Nine-Tails seal with this technique while disrupting Naruto’s chakra flow, drastically reducing his chakra control.
Jiraiya had later removed it.
It was a remarkably powerful sealing technique.
A pleasant surprise.
Feeling unusually lucky today, Akira opened the Wish System.
Quite a lot had happened over the past few days.
He’d fought Number 207’s group.
He’d casually dropped a few memorable quotes in front of the class.
He’d also become the Academy’s biggest study fanatic after discovering the library, earning plenty of complaints from his classmates.
As a result, his Reputation had reached two hundred points again.
Enough for two wishes.
A brilliant shooting star streaked across the sky.
When the summoning animation ended, Akira received one passive talent…
And a weapon.
The talent was…
potentially useful.
Or perhaps completely useless.
It was a passive ability called Light Footing.
━━━━━ SYSTEM ━━━━━ [Light Footing] Effect: Whenever you fell from a great height, he would be completely immune to fall damage.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Thinking about it…
Throughout Lara’s adventures, she’d fallen from cliffs countless times and somehow walked away with nothing worse than a few scratches after surviving plane crashes.
So this ridiculous durability had been because of this talent all along.
If an overworked office employee got this ability…
They could probably threaten to jump off a building just to negotiate better severance pay.
…What a depressing thought.
As for shinobi…
Since they spent most of their lives jumping across rooftops and trees anyway, falling to death wasn’t exactly common.
Which made this talent feel rather underwhelming.
Shaking the strange thoughts from his head, Akira turned his attention to the second reward.
It was…
A recurve bow.
Compared to the bow he’d crafted himself, it could launch arrows farther with the same amount of force.
That was about it.
Its greatest advantages were superior balance, longer range, and respectable killing power out to around two hundred meters.
By comparison, Akira’s homemade longbow was only reliable out to roughly one hundred meters.
Anything farther became a matter of luck.
After examining it for a while, he stored it away.
Bows rarely played a major role in shinobi combat.
Still…
It had been free.
There was no reason not to keep it.
Maybe it’d prove useful during bandit suppression missions someday.
Though…
If I can pull weapons this time…
Could I eventually draw firearms?
Lara used plenty of guns too.
Quietly wondering about the possibility, Akira tidied up the house, washed up, and headed to bed.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Meanwhile, elsewhere in the village…
Inside the Hokage Building.
Tobirama sat behind his desk, frowning as he examined a scroll lying before him.
It contained Akira’s complete background investigation.
His family history.
His daily behavior.
Even nearly every word he’d spoken had been meticulously recorded.
After all…
Anyone who approached the Nine-Tails’ Jinchuriki had their entire ancestry investigated.
Tobirama’s eyes settled upon one particular sentence.
“Only sheep gather in flocks.
Beasts always walk alone” He fell silent.
Am I a beast…
or one of the sheep?
Brother is probably the beast…
…Although he never walks alone.
Standing before him was an Anbu operative.
A young Sarutobi Hiruzen.
He had personally delivered Akira’s report from Uzumaki Mito.
“So…” “This kid created an A-rank ninjutsu at six years old?” Tobirama reread the report before sighing.
The new generation truly surpasses the old.
I’m getting old.
When did I invent my first A-rank technique…?
Ten years old, I think.
Talented people emerged one after another like fish crossing a river.
He quietly committed the name Akira to memory.
When he found the time…
He intended to cultivate the boy personally.
After all, any young genius whom his sister-in-law had personally verified with her ability to sense malicious intent…
Was unquestionably a worthy successor to the Will of Fire.
Picking up the notes Mito had sent regarding the Rasengan, Tobirama studied them briefly.
It didn’t take long before he understood the technique’s principles.
Following the development path Akira had proposed, he mentally simulated its future possibilities.
It worked.
Without hesitation, Tobirama classified the Rasengan as a forbidden technique.
Everyone knew forbidden techniques were simply high-level ninjutsu reserved for the strong.
After pondering it for a moment, Tobirama immediately realized how perfectly it complemented his own fighting style.
Flying Thunder God…
Teleport directly into the opponent’s face…
Then follow up with a massive Rasengan.
Most enemies would die on the spot.
Another devastating technique for ending battles before the opponent even understood what had happened.
Tobirama decided he’d make time to learn it himself.
The world was still at war.
And when it came to trump cards…
The more, the better.
After all…
You never knew when you might need one.