Two days later, at the gates of Furuki Town.
"Thank you for everything over these past two days," Saiki said with a polite nod toward Mifune.
Mifune returned the smile. "Are you sure you have to leave so soon? You couldn't stay a few more days?"
"Unfortunately not. The situation at the front is critical. Plus, the weather is only getting colder. If we wait any longer, the passes might freeze over completely, making travel even more difficult. We must take our leave," Saiki replied simply, turning to face the long road ahead.
"Thank you for your hospitality!" Tsume added her own gratitude before hurrying to catch up with Saiki.
Watching them walk away, Mifune instinctively rubbed his chest. He wasn't wearing his usual heavy samurai armor today, but a loose black robe. At his collar, thick layers of white bandages were clearly visible.
With every breath, Mifune felt a dull, throbbing ache in the muscles beneath the bandages. Every deep inhalation reminded him of Saiki's final strike. If the boy hadn't pulled his blow at the very last microsecond, Mifune would currently be a corpse.
"Lord Mifune... are we truly just letting them walk away?" Okisuke asked, unable to suppress his frustration.
Mifune's gaze hardened. "If we tried to force him to stay, do you want to see this entire town buried with us?"
"Forgive me! I spoke out of turn," Okisuke immediately bowed his head.
Saiki was only ten years old, yet he wielded such apocalyptic power. His future potential was literally incalculable.
Looking up at the grey sky, Mifune sighed internally. A genius of that caliber... if he became an ally, he would be an unparalleled asset. But if he became an enemy, he would be an existential threat to the entire nation.
Assassinating a prodigy before they reached their prime was a common strategy, but you needed the actual strength to pull it off. They didn't have it.
Walking on the thick, packed snow, Saiki left absolutely no footprints. His chakra control was so flawless he had achieved true "snow-walking."
"Interesting," Saiki muttered, a faint smirk playing on his lips.
Walking on snow without leaving a trace is vastly more difficult than walking on water. Snow is porous and easily compressed. If you use too much chakra, you crush the structure and leave a print; if you use too little, you sink.
Furthermore, chakra naturally generates heat, which melts the snow, making it even harder to leave no trace.
Even Tsume Inuzuka couldn't maintain that level of microscopic chakra control. The moment her focus wavered, her boots punched deep, obvious holes into the snowdrifts.
Hearing Saiki mutter to himself, Tsume, who had just post-holed into another drift, asked curiously, "Saiki? Did something happen?"
Saiki chuckled. "Nothing major. Just someone back there having some... dangerous thoughts about our departure."
Tsume's eyes instantly sharpened, her voice dropping to a low, tactical whisper. "Are they planning to ambush us?"
Seeing her instantly shift into combat mode, Saiki quickly reassured her. "Relax, Sensei. It was just a subordinate offering a stupid suggestion. They aren't going to do anything."
Tsume let out a breath but kept her guard up. "Are you sure?"
"Relax, relax! Mifune isn't an idiot. He knows exactly how wide the gap between us is." Seeing his absolute confidence, Tsume finally relaxed.
"Sensei, you take the lead on navigation. I trust my internal compass, but in this whiteout, I can't guarantee we won't end up walking in circles."
Looking at the featureless, blinding white landscape, Tsume nodded. "Don't worry. Leave the tracking to me."
In the Land of Fire, it was merely late autumn with a brisk chill in the air. But here in the Land of Iron, it was a frozen wasteland. The snowdrifts on the ground were waist-deep; if they weren't using chakra to walk on the surface, they would have been completely immobilized.
Even with chakra, the brutal environment severely hampered their travel speed. Every step required constant focus. By the time the sun began to set, they still hadn't crossed the border out of the snowy nation.
"Looks like we'll have to make camp for the night," Tsume said, surveying the darkening, frozen landscape with a weary sigh.
Even for ninja, battling this kind of extreme environment drained stamina and chakra at a vastly accelerated rate. Despite wearing thick, heavy winter clothes, a sheen of sweat was visible on Tsume's forehead.
Saiki looked toward the horizon and pointed. "There's a small copse of trees near the base of that mountain. We'll set up camp there."
Tsume nodded. They pressed on, their shallow footprints quickly erased by the falling snow.
Within the shelter of the trees, tucked against the base of the mountain to block the wind.
"Earth Style: One Bedroom, One Living Room Jutsu!"
Saiki's hands blurred through a sequence of signs. He slammed his palm into the snow. The earth roared and instantly rose, shaping itself into a crude but structurally solid earthen cabin.
Tsume couldn't help but marvel. "That is an incredibly practical jutsu. Saiki, where do you find the time to learn all these techniques?"
He had mastered the Nature and Shape Transformations for Wind, Lightning, and Water, and possessed a clear working knowledge of Fire and Earth. To have partial mastery over all five elements at age ten was mind-boggling.
Saiki waved his hand dismissively with a smile. "It's not hard, Sensei. I just tinker with things when I have free time."
Knowing his personality, Tsume just rolled her eyes. Comparisons were truly odious; thinking about his talent just made her feel inadequate.
She had trained brutally hard for years, and all she had mastered was the Inuzuka clan's Beast Mimicry Taijutsu!
And she hadn't even mastered the most advanced secret techniques of her own clan yet.
Stepping inside the earthen cabin, the thick walls instantly cut off the screaming wind. It felt significantly warmer immediately.
To trap the heat, Saiki had only left a small ventilation hole near the ceiling. The interior was pitch black. Saiki pulled a scroll from his pouch, unsealed a candle, and with a snap of his fingers, ignited it. The warm, flickering light pushed back the darkness.
Looking around the empty dirt room, Saiki smiled. "Sensei, why don't you set up the interior? I'll go gather some firewood."
"Oh, right. Everything we need is in here." Saiki dug around in his pouch and handed her the scroll containing their camping gear, tent, and supplies.
"Got it." Tsume took the scroll with a nod.
Saiki turned, stepped out of the cabin, and sealed the earthen door behind him.
He scanned the immediate area, then used a Body Flicker and vanished into the trees.
Inside the cabin, Tsume got to work. She unsealed the pots, pans, the tent structure, and the sleeping bags.
However, as she surveyed the room, she froze. She suddenly didn't know what to do, because the main "living space" only contained a single, large earthen bed.
It wasn't exactly a "crude" setup. When Saiki had constructed the cabin, he had designed the earthen bed to be connected directly to the earthen stove. Once a fire was lit in the stove, the heat would channel through the bed, turning it into a massive, heated sleeping platform.
It was brilliantly designed for warmth and comfort in this climate. The problem was... there was only one bed. He clearly hadn't considered the implications of them sleeping together.
In the past, squeezing onto one bed wouldn't have been an issue. He was just a ten-year-old boy.
But after their intense dual cultivation session two nights ago, the dynamic between them had become incredibly complicated. Sleeping in the same bed now made Tsume severely hesitant.
For the past two days, Saiki hadn't mentioned the dual cultivation at all. Tsume had assumed they were silently agreeing to pretend it never happened. But this current setup was a massive test. Did she just share the bed with him? Did she wait and bring up the "incident" herself? Or did she make up an excuse and ask Saiki to build a second bed?