Ninja Village Merger

After defeating another crocodile-animal ability user, Ao took several long breaths, then shook his head and stepped back into the group.

Facing the gazes of the other Jonin, Ao slightly shook his head and said in a low voice, "I couldn't see any problems. And... Lord Mizukage, you must have undergone modification too, right?"

Suikazan Fuguki chuckled and patted his chest. "I got lucky. My modification wasn't as risk-free as these kids', but compared to the risks, the increase in strength was much greater than what these kids got!"

Hearing this, the eyes of the Jonin lit up. Even ninjas at the Jonin level could be enhanced? That was truly good news!

As for danger... anyone who had made it to Jonin in Kirigakure understood that a lack of strength was the greatest danger! More often than not, even if you wanted to take a risk to grow stronger, you would not have the opportunity!

And although the kids' enhancements were far less potent than Suikazan Fuguki's, they were enough to create large numbers of Jonin. Jonin might have seemed unremarkable in the Naruto manga, but in reality, the Jonin of any ninja village were absolute elite pillars. Saying they were one in a hundred among ninjas was still understating them.

The most unusual thing about Jonin was that they were almost impossible to replicate. Genin and Chunin could perhaps be trained in large numbers, but if someone lacked the talent to become a Jonin, no amount of training would help.

Some Jonin were born with Chakra reserves far beyond ordinary people. Some were naturally strong and gifted in Taijutsu. Some could draw inferences from one example when learning Ninjutsu. Others simply came from Secret Technique clans or bloodline clans.

In any case, you needed at least one trait that surpassed ordinary people. If you were truly mediocre, becoming a Chunin would already be your limit in this lifetime.

And talent was difficult to change. Even within bloodline clans, there were plenty of ninjas who could never awaken their bloodline abilities and could only remain Chunin or Genin for their entire lives.

From the beginning, Chakra had never been some internal-energy system that could grow through years of cultivation. There was no specific method for training it in the first place.

That was because it was fundamentally a system of taking drugs and consuming people. The Otsutsuki's main method of increasing Chakra had originally been planting trees, burying people, and eating the fruit. Their lesser method was directly refining people into pills and similar things.

In theory, the amount of Chakra each person could extract had already reached its limit from the moment they were born.

Training the body and improving physical fitness to feed back into Chakra could only bring one closer and closer to that limit. Other than consuming people and human modification, there was no true way in this world to increase one's Chakra limit.

Forget methods that could truly raise one's Chakra limit—even abilities that temporarily increased or stored Chakra could be called S-Rank Ninjutsu, such as the Eight Gates Formation and the Yin Seal.

However, human modification in the Ninja World was still in a very crude state. Even Orochimaru, the foremost Scientist, did not dare claim much confidence in it, while Kirigakure had not achieved anything at all.

Now that they had seen Vegapunk's results, these country bumpkins from Kirigakure were naturally overjoyed.

Seeing the faintly fanatical look in the Jonin's eyes, Vegapunk knew the time was right and directly issued an order to Suikazan Fuguki in his mind.

Suikazan Fuguki waved a hand. "This is the third matter I wanted to discuss! Sea Ninja Village was able to be established because Dr. Vegapunk's technology greatly increased the strength of every Sea Ninja. As long as the two ninja villages merge, Dr. Vegapunk will likewise become the head of Kirigakure's research department!"

The Jonin exchanged glances. Although the original Kirigakure had never even had a department called a research department, they could tell what it did from the name alone. More importantly, if Vegapunk joined their ninja village, would that not mean they could enjoy Vegapunk's enhancement technology as well?

At this point, these ninjas no longer had any resistance to merging the two ninja villages. Instead, they all bowed their heads willingly. "We will follow Lord Mizukage's orders in all things!"

A faint smile also appeared on Vegapunk's face. That was precisely why he had created a noble identity for himself. If Vegapunk had revealed this technology as a ninja, the first thought of these people from Kirigakure would definitely not have been cooperation or merger. They would have tried to control Vegapunk and torture the technology out of him.

But if he had the identity of a Daimyo or noble, that was completely different.

After that, the various terms of the ninja village merger were negotiated by Nico Robin, who had arrived later. Of course, it was really only a formality, since the leader across the negotiating table was also one of Vegapunk's people.

Nico Robin was extremely unconcerned about power. Naturally so—both the Daimyo and the Mizukage were on their side, and Vegapunk controlled the core technology. Kirigakure could keep all those minor details and scraps of authority if it wanted them.

Still, she ultimately made a request that left Kirigakure somewhat speechless: Kirigakure's name had to be changed to Sea Ninja Village.

"The name Kirigakure was forged by generations of our ancestors with Kunai and blood. I don't think changing it to Sea Ninja Village is a good idea. It would greatly weaken our ninja village's deterrence!"

Mei Terumi crossed her arms over her chest and looked at the smiling Nico Robin across from her, arguing her case.

"A new era needs new development. Besides, other than deterrence, the Blood Mist also had quite a few negative effects, didn't it?"

Nico Robin wore a calm smile as she spoke with clear logic:

"More importantly, the original Kirigakure only occupied Water Country. Although the other island nations at sea had close ties with Kirigakure, they were ultimately not truly within Kirigakure's sphere of influence."

"Now that the ninjas of every maritime nation have formed an alliance, it is only natural to use the broader name Sea Ninja! At the same time, it can wash away some of the entrenched bad impressions that the Bloody Mist left on other countries."

Mei Terumi's chest rose and fell several times. What did she mean, the Bloody Mist's bad impression? That was far too harsh!

Yet even Mei Terumi knew perfectly well that the Bloody Mist Policy had indeed given Kirigakure a much worse reputation abroad. Granted, that brutal system had significantly increased Kirigakure's mission completion rate, but under such intense pressure, the actions of many Kirigakure ninjas often left employers terrified.

Not to mention that matching that extremely high mission completion rate was an equally high employer death rate whenever missions failed!

After all, once Kirigakure ninjas failed and returned to Kirigakure, they often faced severe punishment. Under such circumstances, many ninjas simply chose to defect, and killing their employer for a final payout before doing so was hardly uncommon.