Admiration Is the Emotion Farthest from Understanding

Admiration Is the Emotion Farthest from Understanding

"Are you sure you're ready?"

Lin Ke asked again and again.

Yuan Wei pounded his chest, making it thump, and said confidently, "Of course. I have one hundred percent faith in you, Boss!"

I don't even have that much faith in myself...

Lin Ke grumbled inwardly. After a slight hesitation, he raised his hand and reminded him, "If you feel any discomfort, say so immediately. I can dispel the technique at any time."

He had spent a week testing it with his own shadow and the shadows of animals before asking his two companions to help test the ninjutsu.

Yuan Wei and Xia had not hesitated at all and agreed immediately. That instead made him worry that the Shadow Clone might have some other hidden harm.

Their feelings toward Lin Ke, who guided their training, leaned more toward idolization than simple friendship between companions.

When a leader appeared who excelled at everything, possessed a steady and mature personality, and was willing to help them, admiration would inevitably develop over time.

People were creatures of habit. After succeeding again and again under someone else's guidance, they would eventually believe in that person without thinking.

They had not considered at all that experimenting with a New Technique was actually full of danger.

Blind trust and admiration...

Lin Ke looked at Yuan Wei, who wore an easy smile and was even discussing with Xia just how miraculous their boss's technique might be, then laughed at himself.

Sure enough, admiration was the emotion farthest from understanding.

He extracted chakra, divided it equally, formed hand seals, and released it—

Shadow Clone Technique! Lin Ke carefully and seriously separated Yuan Wei's shadow from beneath his feet.

"Hah..."

Yuan Wei's breathing immediately became rapid. After taking a moment to recover, he said, "Boss, it feels like I suddenly used up a huge amount of chakra."

"Are you sure you're okay?" Rather than caring about his technique, Lin Ke instinctively worried about his companion first.

Yuan Wei took a deep breath and curiously stared at the bare ground beneath his feet. The experience of having no shadow was quite novel. He replied casually, "I'm fine. I just feel a little tired."

Lin Ke paused, then asked, "How much chakra do you think you used? About half?"

Yuan Wei furrowed his brow and thought seriously for a long while. Chakra was inherently something that fluctuated. Physical strength, one of its raw materials, slowly recovered while also being continuously consumed through movement. Quickly determining how much chakra one had left and expressing it in more concrete figures required a certain degree of chakra control.

"Seems like... about half," he said uncertainly, then added, "Anyway, it was a lot."

Lin Ke nodded and directed Shadow Yuan Wei to rise from the ground and begin moving.

Its speed and strength were completely identical to the original body's.

Based on the tests from the past week, the shadow's durability should also be exactly the same as the body's.

When the shadow was injured, it consumed the physical strength stored within it to repair itself. Damage could not regenerate, and even being smashed to pieces would not affect the original body. However, injuries or death to the original body would directly interfere with the shadow.

"Boss." Yuan Wei called out eagerly. He wanted to try fighting his own shadow.

Lin Ke made a combat-ready gesture, then gave the shadow an order—

Fight.

When commanding the shadows of other animals before, he could only give simple actions and could not micromanage them. The shadows possessed instincts connected to their original bodies, so there had been no trouble getting them to move.

This was the first time he had controlled a human shadow other than his own.

Bang!

Yuan Wei and his shadow lunged at each other in nearly identical postures. The two "people," fighting with the exact same taijutsu style, made for a rather interesting sight.

Every response to an opponent's attack was exactly the same, truly like a mirror image.

After they grappled for a while, Yuan Wei suddenly formed hand seals and used the Clone Technique. The shadow chose the wrong target, and Yuan Wei kicked it flying, shouting, "Boss, it can't use ninjutsu!"

The moment the shadow landed, it turned two-dimensional. Then it abruptly sprang up from its two-dimensional state, becoming a three-dimensional figure again as it charged at the original body.

It did not tire and did not fear. Even though it could not use ninjutsu, it remained difficult to deal with in taijutsu.

The two figures, identical in size, height, and build, became entangled once more.

Thud! Yuan Wei used another small trick to knock the shadow away, panting as he said, "My physical strength is suddenly being drained really badly!"

"Stop." Lin Ke had the original body stop, then controlled the shadow to move around the clearing. "Feel carefully. Is your physical strength being consumed?"

Yuan Wei frowned and sensed it for a while before giving an affirmative answer. "Yes."

When separated from the original body, the shadow took away half of its physical strength. Once that taken physical strength was exhausted, it began drawing upon the original body's physical strength. It could inherit the original body's combat instincts but could not refine chakra. Blunt attacks had almost no effect on the shadow...

Lin Ke summarized the Shadow Clone's characteristics.

After a while, the resting Yuan Wei called out, "It's back."

Lin Ke looked up. The Shadow Clone had indeed been dispelled, and the shadow had returned beneath the original body's feet, but—

Why? Why had it returned before exhausting all of the original body's physical strength?

What had caused the technique to be dispelled?

With new doubts in mind, he began the second round of testing.

The second attempt was still exactly the same. After the shadow exhausted the half of the physical strength it had taken away, it began draining the original body's physical strength. Yet for some inexplicable reason, it would suddenly stop, ending the technique as well, and the shadow would return beneath the original body's feet.

The duration did not match his estimate. This time, it had even become a little shorter.

However, after testing it two more times, Lin Ke grasped the key point and realized an important blind spot regarding chakra—

To a certain extent, chakra reserves and physical strength were the same thing. After all, physical strength was one of chakra's important raw materials. But one thing needed to be noted.

All the chakra currently in a person's body was not equivalent to that person's chakra capacity, much less their total physical strength.

What did that mean? Physical strength recovered after being consumed. Only after it had been repeatedly drained dry was all physical strength truly gone, and chakra completely exhausted, leaving not even the tiniest bit of physical strength to squeeze from the body.

But the chakra divided equally by the Shadow Clone was the chakra currently in reserve!

Even his Shadow Clone was anchored to the chakra reserves at the moment of separation. Therefore, when the target's "entire" physical strength was exhausted, the technique naturally dispelled itself. Yet the physical strength recovered during that time was not counted by the Shadow Clone.

To put it in more game-like terms, suppose the opponent had 100 points of physical strength. Lin Ke's Shadow Clone effect consumed half of his own current physical strength, instantly deducting 50 points of the opponent's physical strength, then slowly drained the remaining 50 points before returning to the original body.

But the opponent was not dead. Their physical strength would slowly recover.

Was it worth using half of one's physical strength to drain a large amount of the opponent's physical strength while creating a temporary expendable fighter with the same taijutsu level as the opponent?