[Name: I'm Xiao Ming]
[Class: Hunter]
[Sub-class: Doctor]
[Level: lv40 (0/33500)]
[Chakra/Nen: 9110 / 7110 +1000 +500 +500]
[Essence: 3808]
[Experience Pool: 175950]
"Tokubetsu Jonin limit… half-step Jonin."
Hyuga Akira looked at his level. In terms of actual combat power, he should now be at the upper limit of jonin, half a step away from elite jonin.
The problem still lay with chakra.
His chakra reserves were too small, limiting how many ninjutsu he could use. Nine thousand chakra wasn't nearly enough for anything.
He took out the items dropped by the twelve ninja and tossed all the useless ones into the furnace.
[Essence: 7401]
His total essence now reached 11209.
Only three useful items remained.
[Skill: Fire Dragon's Flame Elbow]
[Skill: Fire Dragon's Crushing Fang]
[Skill: Arc of Time]
He had also obtained other Dragon Slayer Magic skills, but Akira didn't intend to pursue the Dragon King system. One Dragon Slayer Magic was enough.
His goal was the Naruto Six Paths system, focusing on fire attributes for now.
He already had four Dragon Slayer Magic skills. With six more, he could combine them into Fire Dragon Slayer Magic.
That skill would greatly increase his combat strength.
Finally—
The reason he kept Arc of Time was because it was a little bugged.
This skill could reverse time. It was one of the very few abilities in the game involving temporal manipulation.
If he had enough experience, he planned to max it out.
If he ever faced an unstoppable danger, he could use it to reverse the situation.
[Arc of Time (lv1) – Exp: 0/5000 – Trait: None]
"As expected, anything related to time is an experience sink," Akira sighed helplessly.
Five thousand experience just for level one—that was the hallmark of a top-tier skill. Maxing it would take a long time.
A kunai appeared in his hand, which he casually tossed into the distance.
He activated Arc of Time.
The kunai instantly returned to his hand.
Finally, Akira looked at his 170,000 experience points.
"What I need most right now is to fuse a Fire Release."
He poured all his experience into Great Fire Dragon Technique.
The Ultimate Seven Elements were all incredibly powerful skills. If he could combine even one of them, he would secure a place among the top fighters in the ninja world.
Because of his early disadvantages, he probably couldn't reach the absolute peak like Senju Hashirama.
But at minimum he could reach Kage level.
And inside his awakened skill, with abundant chakra, he could even surpass that—becoming beyond Kage level, recreating Hashirama-level power.
[Fire Release: Great Fire Dragon Technique (lv3) – Exp: 0/2000]
[Fire Release: Great Fire Dragon Technique (lv4) – Exp: 0/4000]
[Fire Release: Great Fire Dragon Technique (lv6) – Exp: 0/16000]
[Fire Release: Great Fire Dragon Technique (lv9) – Exp: 0/128000]
This alone consumed 126,000 experience points.
[Experience Pool: 49,950]
"To max out Great Fire Dragon Technique, I still need more than 120,000 experience."
Akira felt the shortage deeply.
With the remaining experience, he invested it into Great Fireball Technique.
Cost: 25,500 EXP
[Great Fireball Technique (lv9) – Exp: 0/25600]
[Experience Pool: 24,450]
The rest wasn't enough to upgrade Fireball again, so he put it into Great Flame Technique.
[Fire Release: Great Flame Technique (lv6) – Exp: 0/16000]
[Experience Pool: 8,450]
For now, the other skills would have to suffer.
His plan was to focus entirely on combining Fire Release first, then upgrade other abilities afterward.
Akira carefully felt the changes in his skills. His Fire Release power had clearly improved.
Though the remaining 8,000 experience points looked pitiful.
Still, he had plenty of time to grind more experience later.
"There aren't many Hyuga who specialize in Fire Release…"
Akira rubbed his chin.
…
"Indeed, very rare."
Sarutobi Hiruzen was reviewing Akira's reports.
Many survivors had escaped from the northeastern front, and all information regarding Hyuga Akira had been sent to him.
Root ninja Crow had also added additional details.
So was Akira ANBU or Root?
Akira himself had strong opinions about that.
When would Root finally stand up for itself?!
"Specializes in Fire Release… long-range combat."
Hiruzen studied Akira's fighting style.
Combined with his substitution technique that allowed near-instant movement—almost like Flying Thunder God—
Hiruzen still refused to believe it was truly just a substitution technique. He rubbed his forehead.
He had never seen a Hyuga fight like this before.
Weren't they all close-combat specialists?
That was exactly why the Hyuga clan had been deployed to the Kumogakure front—the Raikage's forces also favored close combat, and the Hyuga's Gentle Fist naturally countered them.
Yet somehow Akira had developed an entirely new combat style for the Hyuga clan.
From the moment he entered the battlefield, he possessed overwhelming battlefield control.
And the method was replicable.
Akira probably used some strengthening ninjutsu combined with Fire Release and kunai to form long-range attacks.
If every Hyuga adopted this approach…
Hiruzen could easily imagine the clan becoming a terrifying force capable of determining the outcome of battlefields.
Akira's strategy wasn't impossible to replicate.
The real obstacle lay with the Hyuga clan itself.
They were stubbornly devoted to Gentle Fist, refusing to learn other ninjutsu. On top of that, branch family members' war merits all belonged to the main family, meaning they couldn't exchange those merits with the village for new techniques.
The result was a vicious cycle—no one in the branch family ever learned new ninjutsu.
Meanwhile, the main family used those merits to trade with the village for various benefits.
In the end, Hiruzen realized the core problem lay entirely with the Hyuga main family.
He scratched his head in frustration.
The Hyuga clan hadn't always been like this. In the past, when the village gave orders, they followed them.
But in the early years of his Hokage reign, he had delegated significant authority.
Now the Hyuga clan had considerable autonomy.
For example:
Only one branch of the main family needed to serve as ninja for Konoha—other main family members were treated as ordinary civilians.
They also had administrative control over branch family members.
At the time, those concessions had been political bargains to stabilize his rule.
And unlike the Uchiha clan, the Hyuga had never caused trouble.
Yet now those decisions had become a problem.
No one could challenge his Hokage position anymore.
But reclaiming the authority granted to the Hyuga clan would be difficult—and mishandling it might trigger resistance from other ninja clans.
Hiruzen regretted it deeply.
If he had known the Hyuga clan possessed such terrifying battlefield dominance—not just reconnaissance abilities—
He would never have made that deal.
At the very least, Konoha's current battlefield situation wouldn't be this miserable.
"No," Hiruzen muttered, gritting his teeth.
"We cannot abandon this level of battlefield dominance."
If one person could suppress an entire battlefront—
What if there were ten Hyuga like him?
Winning the war was more important than avoiding Hyuga resentment.
"I'll have to start with Hyuga Akira."
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