Taiichi's private training ground.
Spring breeze rippled across the pond.
He held his breath and locked in, tuning his body to peak condition.
Right hand out. Wind power formed in his palm—but not what he wanted. He kept feeding it, and the visible wind vanished, leaving only a faint blue ball of pure wind-attribute power.
He nodded, satisfied. Normally he couldn't pull that off. The second attribute power left his body it always turned into its natural form—breeze, gale, blades for wind; flames for fire; streams for water; dirt and rock for earth; bolts for lightning.
Keeping it as raw attribute power outside the body? That only clicked once his power control hit Lv11.
And that was the key he needed to fuse for an inherited bloodline limit.
He stared at the wind ball in his right hand, then stretched out his left. Water-attribute power condensed the same way, a pale blue orb floating above his palm.
Both hands up in front of his face. He poured every ounce of focus into it. Two thin threads slowly stretched out from each ball, inching closer until they touched.
At first contact they slipped from his control and exploded into breeze and droplets. Lucky it was just tiny threads—no real damage. The scattered water got blown around, making the air even cooler.
Taiichi kept the power rock-steady, letting the strands touch, probe, and adjust, constantly tweaking the balance.
Every few seconds a puff of mist burst in front of him, catching the sunset and flashing rainbow colors.
An hour flew by. Sweat beaded on his forehead. The crazy mental focus plus his already wiped-out body pushed him right to the limit.
But Taiichi, deep in the zone, didn't notice. He kept grinding the fusion like a madman, totally cut off from the world.
Until—
Boom. Boom.
His exhausted mind couldn't hold the balls anymore.
Wind power erupted into a raging gale full of razor blades.
Water power surged into a violent whirlpool that swallowed everything.
In a heartbeat the double hit left him covered in cuts. He didn't choose to skip the fire body technique—it kicked in automatically the second he got hurt, trying to fix him.
But when the flame-form body got slammed by the water surge, fire and water clashed so hard it drained his power like crazy. When it started bottoming out he panicked and shut the fire body down fast.
First time he learned just how brutally water counters fire body on a big scale.
Lying battered in the mud, Taiichi finally had time to think. Way too close. Almost died from his own stupid experiment.
He really lost his head—knew he was wrecked but still tried fusing a bloodline limit. Served him right getting shredded.
Gritting through the pain, he forced himself up. Every move pulled every wound, muscles twitching nonstop.
Fire flashed, evaporating the water on him. He triggered fire body again—way easier this time. Flames surged over every cut. Once it settled he was fully healed except for his beggar rags.
No more pushing luck. He staggered back to his room, ripped off the torn clothes, rinsed quick, then collapsed into bed. A few breaths later soft snores filled the room. He was out cold.
The exhausted Taiichi never noticed that even though the reckless try blew up, it wasn't a total waste.
Training in progress—
Wind and water attributes combining. Skill: Ice-attribute nature transformation Lv0 (1/100)
Next morning Taiichi finally woke up groggy after sleeping straight through. Clock by the window said 7 a.m.
Yesterday must've wrecked him bad. Even his strong internal clock didn't wake him.
After washing up he grabbed bread and demolished breakfast at the table. Only then did he check yesterday's gains.
Eyes went wide. Wider. Almost popped out.
Then came a wild burst of laughter. The sound scared birds in the yard—they stopped and stared like "what idiot is making that creepy noise?"
It took a while to calm down. The skill was formed now, so next was just constant practice and grinding. No need to rush.
He stuck to the usual morning routine: taijutsu, meditation, kenjutsu.
By the time he finished, the sun was high. He popped a shadow duplicate to handle ninjutsu grinding.
Main body packed up and headed to the Leaf hospital. Still had his part-time gig there, plus he wanted to check on Sister Nonou.
Leaf hospital was slammed. Border fights heating up meant more staff pulled to the front, leaving the place even busier.
After lunch Taiichi barely got a few words with Nonou before patients forced them to start afternoon work early.
He just finished setting a dislocated leg and was writing the chart when another patient plopped down.
"Ah, Rin, Gai, look—it's Taiichi!"
The loud yell made everyone shoot annoyed glances at the loudmouth.
Soft white hands clamped over the big mouth. The owner bowed sorry to the whole room.
Taiichi knew who it was the second he heard the voice. Just didn't expect the guy to still be that reckless—even in a hospital.
Finishing the last word, he looked up at his old buddies.
Obito had Rin's hands locked over his mouth but looked totally blissed out.
Gai stood beside them covering his own mouth—Obito had just beaten him to the shout.
"What happened?" Taiichi asked, curious. Obito was cradling his left arm—looked broken.
"Eh—" Obito sighed first, turning to give Gai a resentful stare.
Rin didn't hold back. "Taiichi, here's the deal. These two set up a taijutsu spar at the training ground."
She paused, voice half-sympathetic half-amused. "Gai's taijutsu improved a ton lately. His power control—" she searched for words "—is still figuring-it-out stage." So during the spar he didn't hold back, went a little too hard.
She glanced at Gai, whose face was practically steaming.
"Ah~ haha! Sorry! Obito, seriously, I didn't mean it!" Gai's face burned red. Hand never left the back of his head. Then he snapped into a perfect ninety-degree bow. "Got carried away, too into it! Youthful blood rushed to my head! Saw you dodging so fast I wanted to test my limits! Didn't realize your bones were a tiny bit more… delicate than I expected? Anyway, super sorry!"
The apology was worse than none. "Delicate" set Obito off again, yelling he only slipped for a second and let Gai land it.
They bickered then made up on their own. Buddies—getting hurt in training was normal.
Taiichi took Obito's arm. Green power glowed around his palm as he checked the damage. Everyone went quiet.
"Good news—no full break, just a hairline crack plus the dislocation. Pop it back, rest a few days and you're fine!"
Obito's eyes lit up. "See? Told you it was nothing. Plus with Taiichi here it'll be fixed in no time." He looked at Taiichi, full of hope. "So~ how long till I'm good? I've got shuriken drills this afternoon!"
Taiichi grinned. "What are you thinking? Bone and tendon injuries take a hundred days even with my skills. Recovery still needs time." He steadied the arm. "Hang in there, setting it now."
Before Obito could protest—crack—the joint popped back.
Obito's yelp got stuck in his throat. He swallowed it deep.
Then Taiichi's palm glowed healing light again, covering the crack, boosting bone cell repair.
"How come everyone's training so hard lately? You're the second academy kid I've treated today." During the lull Taiichi asked casually.
"Haha, Taiichi you didn't hear? We're graduating soon. Yamada-sensei already told us, so of course we gotta grind extra hard to ace the exams and get a good squad."
Obito was still bragging loud, but Taiichi's hands froze. They should still have a year. Village forcing them early.
War hasn't even started and they're shoving ungraduated kids onto the battlefield. Hiruzen Sarutobi you really deserve to die. Will of Fire in your mouth is just empty words now.
Pushing down the anger, Taiichi kept treating while sharing real tips for new agents—stuff he learned the hard way.
Rin listened with sparkling eyes. Obito's face lit up. Gai's blood pumped hard.
Ten minutes later, treatment done. Taiichi wrapped the arm quick. "With my healing plus your recovery the bone will be solid in two-three days, fully good in a week."
Key warning: "During that time no taijutsu at all. If you gotta train stick to ninjutsu."
"Ah, no taijutsu?!" Obito deflated, but under Rin's stare grumbled, "Fine, fine. Thanks, Taiichi."
"And you, Gai—once my arm's good you're sparring extra with me!" Obito growled at the still-grinning Gai.
"No problem, leave it to me!" Gai thumped his chest, smile goofy but packed with sincerity.
Taiichi cleaned up fast, patted Obito's shoulder. "Keep it wrapped, change dressing on time. Alright you three, go do your thing. I've got a ton more patients."
"Got it!" they chorused. Gai carefully helped Obito up, Rin right behind. The three rushed out in a whirlwind, leaving Taiichi watching their backs with a helpless smile and head shake. He pulled focus and moved to the next patient.
After finishing his hospital shift Taiichi walked back to the orphanage with Nonou. They ate dinner there, played with the kids a bit, then he headed home.
Border fights starting meant more kids at the orphanage. Today a new face—another family broken.
The eternal theme of the ninja world is peace, but from ancient times through warring states to the five great nations, war never stops. You crave most what you lack most.
Last time peace got close was Hashirama Senju and Madara Uchiha using pure power to crush the whole ninja world and force temporary peace.
What were they thinking? With that strength why not just unite everything? Why split into five nations, and why not live longer?
Soon as they died the short peace fell back into war.
Wars got bigger and more frequent. Leaf's only 46 years old and we're heading into the Third Great Ninja War.
Taiichi could only stare at the sky, speechless. Looked like the ninja world's peace still depended on him, the chosen one, to make it happen.
Back home he dispelled the shadow duplicates that were out training, absorbed the memories, then dove straight back into bloodline limit development.
He split off four more shadow duplicates, each with only a tiny bit of power, and set them grinding on their own.
Main body condensed the smallest possible amount of attribute power and started fusion attempts. With yesterday's lesson he'd rather burn tons of mental energy on control than risk too much power and lose control again.
That scene was nightmare fuel—minutes from blowing himself up.
As time passed Taiichi occasionally managed to fuse a tiny speck of wind and water power. Every successful merge bumped the experience points a little.
That's why he couldn't stop—the finish line was right there, all it needed was hard work.
Of course it wasn't always smooth. Fusing different attribute powers was dangerous tech or the ninja world would've had way more people who could do it solo by now.
Take the high commander—called the ninja tech professor, masters all five elements, but even he never fused his own.
Not that he didn't want to. He just didn't have the power.
Look—in this short time Taiichi's four shadow duplicates already blew up one after another from the fusion attempts.
And this was outside the body. Inside? He'd be half-dead.
Don't say other agents could just fuse outside first. Only at this level do you realize how insanely hard it is to release attribute power outside without it turning into its natural form.
At least the high commander couldn't do it. In the whole Leaf maybe only Tsunade, the medical expert, had this level of power control.
When mental energy hit the limit Taiichi stopped today's session. He glanced at the panel.
Ice-attribute nature transformation Lv0 (7/100)
Nice—one night added 6 points. At this rate just 17 days and Ice Style fusion complete.
Taiichi daydreamed happily, almost drooling.
But that was just fantasy. He wiped the imaginary drool and pulled his thoughts back. Real situation way more complicated, and the true test wasn't outside the body—it was inside!