Chapter 401: Target: Sage Art; Preparing to Head to Mount Myoboku
Naruto stared at his right arm. Just moments ago, the flesh had been a mangled, necrotic mess, the skin peeled back and the muscles shredded from the inside out. Now, smooth skin stretched over healthy muscle. He clenched his fist, feeling the familiar surge of strength coursing through his veins. The agonizing, bone-deep pain had vanished without a trace.
"Amazing... This is amazing!" Naruto leaped up from the dirt, wildly swinging his arm in wide arcs. "It's completely healed!"
Uchiha Akira rose to his feet, calmly brushing the dust from his pristine robes. "Do not celebrate so quickly." His voice was cool, cutting through the boy's excitement like a blade. "Just because I can heal it does not mean you can afford to abuse it."
Akira locked eyes with the young jinchuriki, his gaze darkening with absolute seriousness. "Naruto. Do you even understand the underlying principles of the Wind Release: Rasenshuriken you just unleashed?"
Naruto blinked, his hand instinctively reaching up to scratch the back of his blonde head. "Principles? Isn't it just stuffing a ton of Wind Release chakra into a Rasengan, and then... boom?"
Akira exhaled a slow, measured breath. The boy truly was the most unpredictable ninja alive, operating entirely on raw, unpolished instinct.
"To put it simply," Akira began, his tone taking on a lecturing edge. "The moment your Rasenshuriken detonates against a target, it does not just explode. It generates countless microscopic wind blades, far too small for the naked eye to track. Millions of these blades act as miniature scalpels. They pierce the cellular structure, severing the enemy's entire chakra circulatory system and inflicting irreversible, catastrophic damage."
Naruto's blue eyes widened, sparkling with awe. "Awesome! Doesn't that make it totally invincible?"
"The destructive output is certainly adequate," Akira conceded dryly. "However, in its current state, you are forced to use it as a melee strike. When you slam that jutsu into your enemy, your own hand and arm remain trapped at the very epicenter of the storm. Those microscopic wind blades do not discriminate. While they shred your enemy's chakra network, they are simultaneously butchering your own meridians."
The goofy grin instantly slid off Naruto's face. A bead of cold sweat rolled down his temple. "B-Butchering my meridians?"
"Precisely." Akira's voice dropped to a glacial chill. "If I had not intervened with Yang Release to forcefully regenerate your dying cells, your arm would be permanently crippled right now. Forget about weaving hand seals for a jutsu. You would never have possessed the motor function to hold a pair of chopsticks again."
Naruto flinched, his shoulders hiking up as he subconsciously tucked his right hand behind his back. "Then... what am I supposed to do?" he stammered, looking down at his boots. "I put so much blood and sweat into developing this jutsu..."
Was he supposed to just lock it away? Never use it? All those grueling days of training, all those shadow clones popping from exhaustion—would it all amount to absolutely nothing?
"Perfecting this technique is not an impossible task." Akira observed the boy's inner turmoil, a faint, knowing smirk playing at the corners of his mouth. "You merely need to solve two fundamental flaws. First, your physical vessel must become durable enough to entirely ignore the backlash. Second, you must learn to throw the jutsu, rather than wielding it like a crude drill."
Naruto's head snapped up. "Throw it?" he echoed incredulously. "But... the Rasenshuriken's shape completely collapses the second it leaves my hand!"
He had already attempted that during his training. The compressed chakra was violently unstable. The moment he released his physical grip on the sphere, it would detonate prematurely.
"That is simply a lack of high-level chakra control," Akira replied smoothly. "Tell me, do you recall that subordinate you took in a while ago?"
Naruto blinked, utterly lost.
Seeing the boy's blank, innocent stare, Akira shook his head, a heavy sigh escaping him. "The toad. Gamabunta."
Naruto slapped his thigh, a loud smack echoing in the quiet clearing. "Oh! You mean that giant toad with the terrible temper!" His excitement quickly morphed back into confusion. "But... what does the Chief Toad have to do with my training? Are you saying Gamabunta is supposed to help me throw the shuriken?"
Akira closed the distance between them in a single, fluid stride and lightly flicked two fingers against Naruto's forehead. "Gamabunta hails from Mount Myōboku. It is recognized as one of the Three Great Sage Regions of the shinobi world. Hidden within those lands is an ancient discipline. A power known as Sage Art."
"Sage Art?" Naruto rubbed his forehead, his curiosity piqued. The name alone carried a heavy, ancient weight.
"At its core, Sage Art requires you to absorb the ambient natural energy from the surrounding environment," Akira explained, his voice taking on a methodical rhythm. "By perfectly balancing that external energy with your own internal physical and spiritual chakra, you enter an elevated state known as Sage Mode."
"While active, Sage Mode triggers a qualitative leap in your physical vitality, your sensory perception, and your overall chakra reserves. But most..." Akira paused, letting the silence build the anticipation. "You can use that natural energy to envelop the Rasenshuriken in a stabilizing shell. That invisible layer will allow you to hurl the jutsu across the battlefield like a true, physical shuriken., with the protective coating of natural energy shielding your cells, your arm will be entirely immune to the jutsu's backlash. And the destructive yield? It will multiply several times over."
Naruto's blood began to boil. A multiplier on its already terrifying power? The ability to throw it safely from a distance? That would make him an unstoppable force on the battlefield.
"I want to learn it!" Naruto roared, his fists clenching as adrenaline flooded his system. "Akira-sensei! I have to learn this Sage Art!"
Without missing a beat, he bit his thumb, drawing a bead of blood, and rapidly cycled through a familiar sequence of hand seals. "I'll summon Gamabunta right now and make him drag me to this Mount Myōboku! Summoning Technique!"
He slammed his palm into the dirt.
A tiny puff of white smoke plumed upward.
The smoke cleared. The ground remained completely empty. Not even a tadpole appeared.
Naruto stared at his hand, utterly dumbfounded. "What gives?" he yelled, frantically inspecting his palm. "I definitely used enough chakra!"
Akira shook his head, watching the boy's frantic confusion with mild amusement. "Save your energy. We are currently inside the Tianyu dimension. This is an independent spatial realm, completely severed from the primary reality of the shinobi world. The summoning contract cannot bridge the gap between dimensions."
"Oh..." Naruto muttered, the realization finally dawning on him.
"Besides," Akira continued, straightening his posture. "It is far more appropriate for Jiraiya to escort you to Mount Myōboku. He holds a primary contract with the toads and understands their customs. Conveniently, I need to inspect the situation at the front lines anyway."
Without waiting for a response, Akira reached out and clamped a firm hand onto Naruto's shoulder. In his eye sockets, the concentric ripples of the Rinnegan flared with a deep, ominous purple luminescence.
"Brace yourself," Akira commanded softly. "We are leaving."
Before Naruto could even draw a breath to reply, the fabric of reality warped violently around them. Space twisted into a spiraling vortex, swallowing their figures whole and leaving behind nothing but empty silence.
Border of the Land of Fire and the Land of Grass.
Konoha Front Line Command Post.
Inside the dimly lit command tent, the air was thick with tension and the smell of burning wax. Jiraiya leaned heavily over a sprawling topographical map spread across the central table. Deep lines of stress were etched into his face, his brow furrowed so tightly it formed deep creases.
"Iwagakure's troop movements are becoming increasingly erratic," Jiraiya muttered, tracing a scarred finger along a contested border route. "They keep sending these splinter units to infiltrate our flanks. They are like a swarm of flies—annoying, persistent, and impossible to swat away completely."
Standing beside him, Hatake Kakashi looked equally drained. The silver-haired jounin's visible eye was bloodshot, his posture carrying the heavy weight of consecutive sleepless nights. For the past several days, Kakashi had been leading rapid-response squads, desperately putting out fires across the shifting warzone. They had slaughtered countless enemy shinobi, yet Iwagakure's reserves seemed terrifyingly endless.
"It is a textbook war of attrition," Kakashi stated, his voice a low, gravelly rasp. "They are not trying to break our lines in a single push. They want to bleed our stamina dry."
The words had barely left his mouth when the atmosphere inside the tent violently warped.
A harsh, unnatural hum vibrated through the air as the space in the dead center of the command room rippled like a disturbed pond. A pitch-black vortex tore open out of thin air.
Kakashi's reaction was instantaneous. A kunai flashed into his grip, his body blurring as he positioned himself squarely between the spatial tear and Jiraiya. From the shadows of the tent, four Anbu operatives materialized smoothly, their short swords drawn and killing intent locked onto the anomaly.
But the killing intent dissolved a second later as a familiar, boisterous voice echoed from the depths of the void.
Uchiha Akira stepped casually out of the swirling distortion, dragging a wide-eyed Naruto by the shoulder.
"Whoa! Is this the front line command post?" Naruto chattered, craning his neck to inspect the heavily fortified tent, completely oblivious to the drawn weapons surrounding them.
Recognizing the imposing figure of the Uchiha patriarch, Kakashi lowered his kunai. The Anbu operatives melted back into the shadows, and the suffocating tension in the room evaporated into collective relief.
Jiraiya blinked, straightening up from the map. "Akira? How did you get here so quickly? I just dispatched the intelligence report to the village."
Akira ignored the map entirely. He strode across the room, casually pulling out a wooden folding chair, and seated himself with the relaxed authority of a king holding court.
"I received your report," Akira said dismissively, crossing one leg over the other. "Do not waste your energy worrying about Obito's trivial maneuvers. He is nothing more than a stray dog barking at shadows."
Before Jiraiya could press the issue, Akira raised a hand and pointed a slender finger at the blonde teenager standing beside him.
"My primary reason for coming here is him."
Jiraiya and Kakashi shifted their gazes, staring at Naruto in unison.
"Naruto?" Jiraiya asked, scratching his chin in mild confusion. He looked the boy up and down, noting the dirt on his clothes but finding no obvious injuries. "What happened to him?"
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