Konohagakure of the Land of Fire.
Along both sides of the streets, the figures of shinobi had already begun to shuttle past, and from the direction of the training grounds, the faint sounds of kunai cutting through the air and shouting could be heard.
Takuno stood in front of his own door, spreading open his still-childish palms as his gaze fell upon the clear lines of his hands.
He furrowed his brows slightly; an unerasable, indescribable sense of dissonance constantly lingered in his heart, as if an invisible membrane existed between his soul and this body, or perhaps the laws of this world held a subtle rejection toward him.
He concentrated his mind to trace the source of this bizarre feeling; however, amidst his churning thoughts, everything seemed to return to a certain designated "normal" trajectory.
The exact state a child born and raised in Konoha for six years ought to have.
Helplessly, he shook his head and let out a sigh that was barely audible.
Six years.
Since that meteorite named "transmigration" smashed into his life and hurled him into this conflict-ridden world called Naruto, a full six years of time had already passed.
During these long two thousand-plus days and nights, on countless nights spent tossing and turning, he had anticipated with utmost piety the arrival of that light symbolizing a "cheat"—the legendary "System."
He had imagined a cold, mechanical notification voice ringing in his mind; he had imagined an attribute panel floating before his eyes that only he could see; he had imagined the surprises brought by a novice gift pack...
That was practically the standard-issue entry ticket for almost every transmigrator novel protagonist, and his greatest reliance for establishing a secure life in this peril-filled shinobi world.
However, reality was as cold as iron.
Until today, until this very moment, the "System" he had looked forward to with craned neck remained completely without news, without even a thread of its existence ever being revealed.
Let alone substantial help, he hadn't managed to touch even a single illusory "hair" of it.
In his heart, he couldn't help but feel a sliver of self-mockery: "In this day and age, without a system, how do you even have the nerve to call yourself a transmigrator? Could it be that the transmigration script I pulled is a counterfeit?"
Unwillingness and helplessness interwove in his heart for a moment before Takuno shook his head, dispersing these useless emotions.
Forcibly bracing his spirits, he walked in the direction of the Shinobi Academy.
Since destiny allowed him to transmigrate here yet was too stingy to bestow a cheat like a "System," then as a form of compensation, he ought to possess a talent far surpassing ordinary people, right?
For instance, a massive amount of chakra rivaling the Uzumaki clan bloodline, an unparalleled talent for ninjutsu, and so on...
He had to be special; otherwise, what was the meaning of this transmigration?
However, destiny seemed to particularly enjoy playing tricks on him.
During the next few years of his Academy career, cruel reality acted like bucket after bucket of cold water, completely dousing the remaining flames of luck in his heart.
He was forced to recognize a fact: his talent, even within this Konoha Academy of an unremarkable era, could only be described as mediocre.
His chakra volume, even when compared horizontally against students of the same grade, belonged to that smallest handful at the very bottom, and refining it was slow and arduous.
The only thing that could be called a slight bright spot was merely that in terms of understanding and mastering ninjutsu, he could more quickly comprehend the mysteries of hand signs and the principles of jutsu formulas.
Looking at those dazzling names among his peers—the geniuses of the Uchiha, the Byakugan of the Hyūga—all of them possessed specialties that drew side-glances.
The tiny sense of superiority in Takuno's heart instantly vanished into thin air.
A clear template took shape in his mind: fair theoretical understanding, impoverished chakra, strong chakra control...
No matter how one looked at it, this resembled Sakura from the original work.
But was he, Takuno, willing to merely be another "Sakura"?
Even if Sakura eventually joined the ranks of the strong through sheer effort and was already an outstanding individual within the scope of a "normal person," this fell far short of his goal!
What he craved was transcendence, breaking the limits of the mundane, and possessing power sufficient to control his own destiny in the future world-ending crisis—not merely becoming an outstanding individual among ordinary people!
He must seek a transformation!
An intense craving to become stronger drove him to begin frantically recalling, pondering, and retrieving all memories regarding Naruto in his brain.
What he needed were those forbidden techniques that could ignore mediocre aptitude and allow a mundane flesh-and-blood body to achieve a leap in its life hierarchy!
After countless days and nights of screening and deliberation, finally, two names surfaced in his mind:
The first was the secret treasure that Takigakure relied upon to join the ranks of "villages possessing a Tailed Beast," the Earth Grudge Fear!
This technique could seize the hearts and chakra natures of others for one's own use, and could be called an evil shortcut to creating an artificial Jinchūriki.
The second was the ultimate fusion ninjutsu developed by the Konoha rogue scientist Hiruko, the Chimera Technique!
This technique was even more tyrannical, capable of forcibly fusing the Kekkei Genkai and vitality of other shinobi, gathering thousands of grand powers into one body!
These two were undoubtedly heaven-defying, destiny-altering techniques custom-tailored for "ordinary people"!
However, how to obtain them?
Earth Grudge Fear?
That was the treasure that Takigakure regarded as its life!
Setting aside the fact that Takigakure's location was hidden and its tracks hard to find, even if he luckily found it, relying on his status as a mere Genin—or currently, just an Academy student—and wanting to steal its ultimate treasure from a powerful ninja village that had once been allocated the "Seven-Tails" due to its strength?
This was no different from an ant shaking a tree, seeking his own death.
The probability of success was so bleak it was near zero; even calling it one in ten thousand was an overestimation.
Then, what about the Chimera Technique?
Takuno sank into a deeper level of pondering.
A severe problem lay before his eyes: according to his memories, Hiruko, the creator of the Chimera Technique, was very likely still conducting secret research in some dark corner of Konoha at this moment,
Or perhaps he hadn't even started the research yet! At this point in time, whether the Chimera Technique itself had been created was a massive question mark.
Wanting to obtain it now? It was simply a fool's dream.
But...
The eyes within Takuno's gaze slowly began to light up.
Compared to the unreachability of the Earth Grudge Fear, his understanding of the Chimera Technique and its creator, Hiruko, was much more profound!
This meant that he could completely afford to wait!
To wait until Hiruko truly completed the development of that forbidden technique capable of fusing bloodlines.
He could lie low, secretly lay out his pieces, gather intelligence, accumulate strength, and then at the most appropriate moment—when Hiruko achieved success—set up a precise plan to take the secrets of the Chimera Technique as his own with the minimum cost!
Furthermore, in the process of waiting for the target fruit to ripen, he could already begin to set to work preparing for the future fusion!
Thinking up to this point, even Takuno's breathing grew slightly rapid.
The choice of fusion targets was the key to whether the Chimera Technique would succeed or fail!
With almost no hesitation, his thinking instantly anchored onto a single target: the bloodline of the Uzumaki clan!
That hair as crimson as fire symbolized unparalleled vitality and a sea-like volume of chakra!
This could precisely make up for his current greatest shortcoming!
More crucially, the Uzumaki clan were direct descendants of the Sage of Six Paths, and their bloodline contained the source of power close to the progenitor of the shinobi world!
A bloodline like this—whether it was the massive vital energy contained within itself or its extremely high quality as a "descendant of the Six Paths"—perfectly matched his requirements for a fusion material for the Chimera Technique!
Now that the plan was finalized, Takuno poured his entire mind into the effort of realizing it.
The Uzumaki clan bloodline ought to have been something within his easy reach.
After all, even within the Uzumaki clan, not everyone in the clan was a shinobi; there were always mundane, ordinary people who existed.
However, Takuno's goal was not an ordinary bloodline.
He knew deeply that to serve as the key to carrying the "Chimera Technique," he had to choose those Uzumaki shinobi bloodlines that had been quenched through actual combat and had proven their own value.
This placed a massive obstacle before him: with his current strength, how could he seize this power from an Uzumaki shinobi?
Takuno began near-frantic training, attempting to elevate his strength in the shortest amount of time to accumulate power for seizing the bloodline.
Yet destiny was like a cold joke.
Just as his strength was about to reach his expectations, the Uzumaki clan encountered a catastrophe of total annihilation!
In this tragic clan-extermination action, aside from Konohagakure—who was on good terms with the Uzumaki clan—staying out of it, the remaining four great ninja villages actually seemed to have reached some sort of cruel tacit understanding, all participating within it.
Takuno possessed information from the original work and was naturally not completely unprepared for this.
He had already secretly prepared the forehead protectors of the four great ninja villages, and right now was precisely the time for them to be put to use.
He quickly selected an appropriate forehead protector to wear, blending into this bloody torrent of plunder without any hesitation.
His plan was concise and bold: on the chaotic battlefield, watch for an opportunity to use sealing jutsu to grab a deceased Uzumaki bloodline.
This ought to have been an opportunity that was extremely easy to succeed in amidst the chaos.
However, reality dealt him a head-on blow; the anticipated chaos did not appear.
The unity of action and strictness of discipline among the allied forces of the four great ninja villages far exceeded his imagination.
They seemed to be precisely manipulated by an invisible hand, acting on orders, stopping on prohibitions, with clear divisions of labor.
Although his disguise was not see through, allowing him to hide among them, he discovered to his despair that all the corpses of the Uzumaki shinobi—after being briefly collected or inspected—were actually thrown into roaring fires, instantly turning to ashes!
Takuno's eyes stared dead fixedly at those leaping flames.
One by one, the bodies of Uzumaki shinobi carrying his entire hope were twisted, blackened, and finally dissipated one after another within the blazing fires.
He could only watch with wide eyes as his throat felt as if it were throttled by an invisible hand.
He could not move, let alone dare to stop it.
Any abnormal action would immediately expose him, and the only outcome of exposure was being torn to shreds by the surrounding allied shinobi.
When the final corpse that could possibly contain the bloodline he required turned to blue smoke within the fire, Takuno stood frozen in place as if all his strength had been drained.
The soaring firelight reflected his soul-shattered face, and the air was filled with a nauseating smell of burning.
The Uzumaki bloodline... was gone!
His lips parted slightly, yet he could not produce any sound; only a massive shock and sense of absurdity surged within his chest cavity.
If he had known it would be like this, why had he been so obsessed with a shinobi bloodline?
He should have lowered his stance long ago to obtain the bloodlines of those ordinary Uzumaki clansmen!
But... who could have foreseen it?
Who could have foreseen that these four great ninja villages could actually cast aside their past grievances to execute a destructive action that followed orders and stopped on prohibitions so strictly?
This seamless disposal, which targeted any "accident," felt as if there were an eye in the unseen depths staring dead fixedly at him, thoroughly crushing his hope within its palm.
"Is this... reasonable?" A silent questioning exploded within his chaotic mind.
"No! This is not reasonable at all!"
The despairing roar ultimately only turned into a silent howl in the depths of his heart.
The plan he had meticulously woven, the sweat of his day-and-night bitter training, appeared so pale and powerless in the face of destiny's cruel joke, ultimately exchanging for only a patch of cold ash and an unyielding, bitter anger that reached deep into his bones.
Takuno finally got what he wished for, bringing the Uzumaki bloodline under his control, and he placed it inside a laboratory that still appeared somewhat crude.
He gazed intently at that sample of bloodline harboring powerful vitality before him, yet his brows could not help but tightly furrow.
A subtle sense of dissonance shrouded his heart, always feeling that... somewhere held an unspeakable wrongness.
However, this doubt was quickly suppressed by the joy of success.
After all, being able to obtain an Uzumaki bloodline with such high adaptability was in itself an immense stroke of luck.
He shook his head, throwing this bit of unease to the back of his mind as his thoughts immediately turned toward the next, even more arduous target: the Uchiha bloodline.
The difficulty of obtaining Uchiha blood far exceeded that of the Uzumaki bloodline.
The relationship between the Uchiha clan and the Konoha high-level constants had always been tense, with heavily guarded barriers.
Wanting to quietly obtain the bloodline from a Uchiha clan member inside the village? With his strength as a Chūnin, this was an almost impossible task to complete.
The strength of the Anbu and Police Force members patrolling inside Konoha was unfathomably deep, and the interior of the Uchiha clan compound was even more heavily guarded, airtight and impenetrable.
With his strength, the slightest carelessness would result in being discovered; at that time, not only would the plan fall through, but he would also become a criminal to the entirety of Konoha.
Moreover, he knew deeply that he absolutely could not leave Konoha at this moment; no matter how Konoha might sink in the future, it remained the strongest ninja village in the current shinobi world and was the sanctuary for his training.
As his gaze swept across the tranquility outside the window, Takuno's thoughts had already drifted toward the gunpowder smoke that was about to ignite in the distance.
War became his sole reliance.
As Konoha's trump card, the Uchiha would inevitably rush to the battlefield.
Upon the battlefield, sacrifice was unavoidable, and recovering the corpses of fallen Uchiha to prevent them from being snatched by the enemy was a necessity.
This task usually fell upon the shoulders of shinobi who mastered sealing jutsu.
"This is precisely my opportunity." A sharp light flashed through Takuno's eyes.
He happened to be proficient in this field; as long as he blended into the recovery unit to get close to the remains of the Uchiha, the opportunity would be within easy reach.
Perhaps even the bloodline of the Byakugan holders, the Hyūga clan, could be simultaneously obtained through this avenue.
However, the war had not yet erupted; he needed to utilize this precious buffer period to wholeheartedly delve into a critically important secret technique: the Chakra Isolation Technique.
This was a key link in another plan.
The horn of war blew.
Takuno smoothly joined the logistics unit according to plan, becoming a member of the Sealing Corps responsible for handling the corpses of the fallen.
He stepped onto the battlefield filled with anticipation, as if the Uchiha bloodline was already waving at him.
However, reality dealt him a heavy blow.
He did indeed find the corpse of a Uchiha, lying coldly upon the scorched earth.
But when he attempted to implement the plan he had rehearsed countless times in his heart—stealing the beams and changing the pillars, using a prepared fake corpse to replace the true body—a bone-chilling coldness seized him.