S-rank...
And it had been completed.
This Taki Chiba, Konoha's strongest ninja...
The hand clutching the scroll trembled faintly. Shikamaru Nara's expression gradually settled, but the shock in his heart and the upheaval of his common sense only grew stronger. At this moment, he was nearly speechless.
His eyes remained fixed on the scroll before him, as though he intended to spot even the slightest flaw or trace of forgery. Yet after examining it again and again, he found nothing wrong.
This scroll was genuine.
It genuinely recorded a ninjutsu.
An S-rank ninjutsu that had already been developed and completed.
Earth Release, Thousand Needle Hell! Of course, the specific training method for this ninjutsu had already been erased. Only the name of this S-rank Earth Release ninjutsu remained, along with some of its creator's descriptions of it.
However, Shikamaru Nara could still tell that this ninjutsu had been completed. Otherwise, there would have been no need to erase every detail, leaving behind only its name and description. Clearly, it had been completed and proven effective before the details were removed.
Moreover, aside from the thick black strokes used to erase the training method, the handwriting on this scroll matched Taki Chiba's, and there were no signs of alteration whatsoever. It was certain that this scroll had once recorded a complete ninjutsu, with no traces of revision.
And that meant Taki Chiba had developed this S-rank ninjutsu.
After all, S-rank ninjutsu were generally protected under layer after layer of security. Not just anyone could learn them. Only those who had made tremendous contributions to the village, or when the village deemed it necessary, could be assigned an S-rank ninjutsu—setting aside whether they could master its immense difficulty.
The qualification to learn one alone eliminated the vast majority of ninja.
Furthermore, most