Training, poison-making, researching Sealing Jutsu, practicing the Nature Transformation of elemental Chakra...
Other than the addition of poison-making, Chiba's day was no different from every day of the past fifteen days.
After finishing all that, Chiba decisively went straight to sleep.
That night, he dreamed of nothing.
And nothing happened.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
In the morning breeze carrying the slight chill of late autumn, beneath the still-bright but no longer warm sunlight, the familiar sound of flesh striking wood continued to ring out behind the Japanese-style wooden house.
Then, after several thousand strikes, it came to an end amid a light sheen of sweat.
There didn't seem to be any change in speed today.
After completing his daily taijutsu training, Chiba withdrew his foot from the final side kick and looked at the wooden post, whose center now bore a conspicuous depression smaller than a fistprint. This thought crossed his mind.
By his sense of time, he had finished his taijutsu training today at the same pace as usual—not fast, not slow. Unlike yesterday, he did not clearly feel that he had completed it faster.
"Forget it. It doesn't matter."
However, Chiba seemed to be in an especially good mood and did not care in the slightest about whether his taijutsu training was faster or slower.
Then, as usual, after standing still to rest for a while, he entered the bathroom. Under the invigorating shock of cold water pouring over his head, the last traces of weariness and drowsiness were washed away.
Feeling refreshed, Chiba quickly cooked and ate his meal, then sat down at the low table and began recalling the feeling from yesterday.
As he recalled it, the Chakra around him gradually began to change. A faint, golden-like radiance slowly spilled from his shoulders, much like the manifestation