Genitsu ultimately did not agree. It was not yet time to help her train.
Compared to training, Genitsu finally had the chance to study Kazue's body.
The basement of Kazue's home.
"This is quite a nice place. It couldn't be more suitable for conducting experiments."
A faint smile appeared on Genitsu's face as he pressed Kazue onto the operating table, drawing blood and conducting observations in one smooth motion.
"Genitsu-san's expression has become very grave... Has my body mutated too, like those parasitic bugs?"
Kazue still wore that false smile as she spoke calmly.
Dressed in a white lab coat, Genitsu nodded slightly. "It seems you were mentally prepared. If you want to gain strength through this method, you have to pay a price. We still don't know exactly how far your body has mutated, but I suspect... it's very bad."
At ten years old, not even eleven, this mediocre person had already surpassed ordinary Chunin in terms of strength.
With such an extreme increase, Kazue might already have begun developing cancer inside her body.
After examining her carefully,
"Just as expected, there's something wrong with your cells. They are fewer in number than those of ordinary people and multiply faster, but their lifespan is shorter... And some scattered cells are extremely active, endlessly dividing themselves. This is... cancerous transformation."
After drawing more than a dozen tubes of blood, Genitsu discovered the problem and spoke flatly.
Cancer cells.
Given the situation, Kazue could practically be considered an early-stage cancer patient.
And it was cancer throughout her entire body—her internal organs, muscles, fibers, bone marrow, and brain, all of it.
"Cancerous transformation... I've never heard of such an illness. How much longer can I live?" Kazue remained remarkably calm.
Perhaps she had long since come to terms with this. To break free from her mediocre fate, she was willing to pay the price.
But Genitsu did not answer immediately.
He directly sent some Chakra into her body. Once those cancerous cells were stimulated by the Chakra, they immediately underwent strange changes, their vitality becoming even more astonishing.
This power called Chakra...
"If you stop accepting my power now, then with your physique, you might be able to slow the deterioration. Optimistically, living another ten to twenty years won't be a problem."
"But you will no longer be able to maintain your current rate of progress. Even preserving your current strength will be difficult."
Genitsu looked at Kazue, who lay quietly on the operating table.
Kazue fell silent for a moment before finally speaking.
"...Genitsu-san, please help me train."
"Have you decided? Because you have frequently received my power, a great number of healthy cells in your body have been killed, weakening your constitution to a certain degree. Your ability to bear my power will also decline, making your body worse still... It's a vicious cycle. If this continues, you can live for at most three more years. If things get worse, you only have one or two years left."
Genitsu gazed deeply at the person before him.
To keep up the image of being a genius, was it really worth going this far...? To spend one's entire life merely to bloom brilliantly for that fleeting instant?
But Kazue, did she truly understand what cancerous transformation meant? Even with an all-purpose energy like Chakra, which linked spirit and matter and could temporarily suppress certain things that should have happened... cancerous transformation had never been merely cancer...
A faint smile appeared on Kazue's face as she said with her usual smile, "Genitsu-san, a genius like you could never understand how I feel... You were born a genius. Being a dead last for the past few years was only because you were awakening an entirely new bloodline."
"But I am different. From the moment I was born, I was a mediocre person. That was the definition my clan gave me: mediocre talent, mediocre comprehension, and even the chance of awakening the Sharingan in this lifetime should have been infinitesimal."
"Can you understand that feeling? In the Uchiha clan, a prestigious family that pursues strength, everyone has their own place and fully displays the value of their entire life. A mediocrity like me has no value at all."
"When I accidentally discovered that place, the place Genitsu-san had created, the intense stimulation it brought to my body made me realize that the turning point of my fate had arrived."
"For an entire year, I ate every plant there, then began eating the soil. I desperately absorbed that power that could stimulate my body. I could feel myself growing stronger. The moment I awakened the Sharingan, in the dead of night, I knelt on the ground and wept bitterly..."
"One year... If I can have one year to bloom with a brilliance I have never possessed in my entire life, then I am more than willing, even if the price is offering my life to the devil."
Kazue sat up directly, got dressed, and calmly combed through her long black hair.
A great deal of black hair silently fell away.
Kazue's movements did not pause in the slightest, as though she had not seen it at all.
Truly remarkable.
Everyone had their own obsessions. A bird that had tasted the thrill of soaring would never allow itself to remain in a chicken coop.
"Kazue, perhaps I can find a way to save you before you die." Genitsu spoke calmly. "Though I have some ideas, you should not place too much hope in them."
Kazue smiled. "No, that's not it. I remember that when you killed Yantie, you once said... that anyone infected by you was beyond saving."
"That's right, I did say that. But if it is you, if you can go this far, then naturally you can do something even crazier. You... might be able to find another path."
Genitsu spoke frankly.
Chakra.
It was a power formed from the union of spirit and body. From matter to energy, from the living world to the Pure Land, this power existed everywhere.
Chakra had to be refined by combining an individual's soul power with the life force of the 130 trillion cells within their body.
Ordinary cells would die after dividing a certain number of times, but cancer cells were universally acknowledged maniacs of division, capable of endlessly replicating themselves.
If all cancer cells could be controlled and used as stored bodily energy for refining Chakra... perhaps some lifespan could be extended.
"In this world of Naruto, ninjas seemingly don't get cancer. Is it because, when Chakra is refined, the life energy of cancer cells is drained away, suppressing or even eliminating them? Or is it truly as I guessed—that almost absurd possibility..."
Genitsu watched Kazue's departing figure as she slowly walked away.
There were too few samples, especially considering that being a ninja was inherently a life-or-death profession. Those who lived to fifty were exceedingly rare.
Whether some of his conjectures could work still required more meticulous calculations and screening, followed by final experiments.
As for this thing called vitality, between endlessly dividing cancer cells that were "immortal" in a certain sense, and Chakra, what exactly was the relationship...?
"Kazue, if you can truly survive this ordeal, perhaps you really can become a roc soaring above the nine heavens... Silent for ten years, then astonishing the world with a single cry!"
Before you continue