Chapter 45: Recovery and Reflection
After leaving the battlefield, Kitsuchi treated Ishiro's abdominal wound, fortunately, not a serious one. Kitsuchi, Tanaka, and Shouhara then made a makeshift stretcher and carried Ishiro back toward the Land of Earth.
They traveled swiftly for some time before finally pausing to rest in a secluded forest. After taking soldier pills to replenish chakra, Kitsuchi organized shifts for keeping watch. Ishiro was exempted due to his exhaustion and injuries—after all, he had been the busiest member of their group for the past several days.
The earlier battle had put enormous pressure on Ishiro, particularly those tense moments when Shouhara narrowly avoided being killed by the ice spears. With adrenaline gone, the accumulated mental and physical exhaustion quickly overtook him, and Ishiro fell deeply asleep.
When he awoke, he found their hiding spot had changed. Not knowing how long he'd slept, he realized they must've moved locations while he rested.
Seeing Ishiro awake, Kitsuchi explained they'd already traveled another full day while he slept, which surprised Ishiro greatly.
They continued this pattern, with Tanaka and Shouhara taking turns carrying Ishiro, for over ten days until finally returning safely to the village. By that time, Ishiro's wounds had mostly healed.
Given the unexpected severity of this mission, Kitsuchi decided Team Five deserved a ten-day break to rest and digest their experiences. Kitsuchi himself took the sealed scrolls containing their foes' remains directly to the Tsuchikage's office.
How the village extracted intelligence from the Mist shinobi was no longer Ishiro's concern. Instead, he decided to use the ten-day break to handle the backlog of things he'd set aside.
Indeed, Ishiro had plenty to do. Chief among these was returning to help with the Barrier Division's research. Given his recent injury, focusing on sealing techniques rather than strenuous physical training made sense.
After resting at home for a night, Ishiro went straight to the Barrier Division early the next morning. He carefully reviewed the division's latest findings and participated in several sealing experiments, ensuring his sealing technique remained sharp.
Unfortunately, five days passed in a blink. Feeling physically recovered, Ishiro shifted back to physical training.
Once back in shape, he headed to the village's intelligence exchange to use his contribution points to obtain information on Kekkei Genkai.
The encounter with Mizunotsuki Kagami left Ishiro deeply shaken. For a transmigrator like himself to be caught off guard by a mere Ice Release ninja was embarrassing.
Though the core secrets behind bloodlines were well-protected village secrets, general intelligence about other nations' Kekkei Genkai was widely available and required few contribution points—after all, the village wouldn't risk its shinobi's lives by withholding such intelligence.
Ishiro exchanged for a pile of scrolls and spent the entire day carefully studying the various bloodlines across the ninja world.
Upon finishing, Ishiro mentally berated himself. His previous perception of Kekkei Genkai had been overly influenced by his memories from the original Naruto story, particularly from the viewpoint of the main characters. The protagonists, after all, regularly encountered powerful Kekkei Genkai users, thus exaggerating their commonness.
In reality, Kekkei Genkai were rare—few existed in villages like Iwagakure, Kumogakure, and Sunagakure. However, Konohagakure and Kirigakure possessed several powerful bloodlines.
The ninja world defined Kekkei Genkai not merely as the combination of two chakra natures, but as any special ability inheritable through bloodlines. The Uzumaki clan's massive chakra reserves, for example, qualified as a bloodline trait.
Similarly, eye-based Kekkei Genkai such as Sharingan and Byakugan weren't simply chakra combinations. Kirigakure's Kaguya clan, with their unique Shikotsumyaku (Corpse Bone Path), also fit this broader definition.
Some bloodlines were of limited practical use, like the Kurama clan's bloodline ("Red Eyes"), providing mostly supportive abilities. However, most bloodlines significantly enhanced combat capabilities.
What Ishiro found particularly intriguing was that even among bloodlines formed by combining two chakra natures, differences in their level of development existed.
Bloodline development had two main stages. The first was externally combining two chakra natures to perform bloodline techniques. The second involved internalizing this combination within the body, altering physiology enough to pass the bloodline through genetics.
According to the intelligence, once a bloodline reached the second stage, descendants usually either directly awakened the bloodline (skipping stage one entirely) or failed to awaken it altogether.
What excited Ishiro the most was another revelation: reaching stage two of bloodline development gradually improved physical constitution, dramatically increasing chakra reserves and strengthening physical prowess. It was essentially genetic enhancement from the root.
Ishiro recalled his battle with Mizunotsuki Kagami. Kagami cast an enormous B-rank jutsu (producing thousands of ice needles), forcibly created a powerful ice prison (another near-B-rank cost), and repeatedly used multiple C-rank jutsu, yet his chakra was nowhere near depleted. Clearly, Kagami's bloodline provided massive chakra reserves.
Moreover, the intelligence also confirmed his suspicion about power scaling: potent bloodlines like Ice Release boosted the strength of techniques by nearly a full rank. Ishiro had personally experienced how Kagami's B-rank ice technique approached A-rank power, something few normal Jonin could match.
Though S-rank jutsu existed above A-rank, they were usually desperate moves reserved for Kage-level battles—sealing the Nine-Tails or defeating Orochimaru. Most Kage relied primarily on B-rank jutsu in battle, occasionally utilizing a few carefully timed A-rank techniques.
Thus, a mere Chunin-level ninja with sufficient preparation could wield jutsu stronger than many Jonin. This alone highlighted the terrifying potential of bloodlines.
Yet these insights applied mainly to fusion-type Kekkei Genkai. The ninja world's strongest bloodlines weren't combinations of nature chakra, but hereditary traits like Sharingan, Senju, Uzumaki, Hyuga, and Kaguya. These bloodlines stood atop the shinobi world.
Setting down the intelligence scrolls, Ishiro sighed deeply. It became clear why Orochimaru became obsessed with researching bloodlines—such power was simply unfair.
Two equally talented shinobi—for instance, Orochimaru was already astonishingly gifted, yet his peak was ordinary Kage-level, far weaker without giant summonings. However, facing someone like Uchiha Itachi, whose natural genius matched his own, but possessed a top-tier bloodline, Orochimaru stood no chance.
Understanding this, Ishiro began yearning deeply for a bloodline of his own.
He realized that, no matter how hard one worked, their potential was inherently capped. Compared to others, he might excel, but the descendants of bloodline clans inherently had higher ceilings. Currently, he was still growing, barely able to consistently beat even average Chunin, so this frustration wasn't deeply felt yet. But Ishiro foresaw a future where he hit his limit, watching as the Kekkei Genkai geniuses inevitably surpassed him. Just imagining that frustration made him restless.
Leaving the exchange, Ishiro wandered home murmuring, "Bloodlines... Kekkei Genkai…"
Returning in a daze, he sat blankly on his bed until he shook himself awake, slapping his cheeks. "I'm a transmigrator! So what if I don't have a bloodline? Can't I develop one myself?"
After all, Tsuchikage Onoki hadn't originally possessed Dust Release—it was later learned, not inherited. Clearly, Iwagakure possessed methods to train Kekkei Genkai.
Yet Ishiro knew that even if he could access those methods, mastering them was another matter entirely. Still, he resolved to earn enough village contribution, intending to approach Onoki directly after his next major achievement to request the opportunity. Given the village's current favor towards him, it wasn't an unreasonable ask.
With that decision made, Ishiro shelved his worries about bloodlines. For the remaining four days, he chose to focus intensively on refining his Earth Spear Gun and Earth-Style Wall jutsu, further reducing their hand seals.
Four days wasn't overly long, but it wasn't too short either. Given Ishiro's excellent chakra control and improved chakra reserves, he expected noticeable progress.
Indeed, thanks to the methodical approach he learned from sealing techniques—listing potential improvements and testing each systematically—he successfully reduced the Earth Spear Gun from twelve seals down to ten and Earth-Style Wall from ten seals to nine. Encouraged, he felt certain he could simplify them even further given time.
Ishiro also sensed applying this analytical method could similarly enhance his two versions of Water Thread.
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