Self-Created Ninjutsu

The survival exercise ended pleasantly. After exchanging contact information with Kushina, Genma returned to the Academy for his regular classes.

Genma could not predict what impact White Fang's survival would have. But no matter what, war was unavoidable. With no trump card to speak of, Genma began considering creating his own ninjutsu.

In the original story, the only self-created ninjutsu described in any detail was the Rasengan.

But Genma had no intention of learning it. Setting aside the possibility of being mistaken for stealing it, his limited Chakra reserves were a serious weakness on their own.

For someone like Genma, with ordinary bloodlines, using the Rasengan would be obviously too taxing.

Still, if he wanted to create a similar ninjutsu, the Rasengan's development process was highly instructive.

The first stage of the Rasengan involved gathering Chakra in the palm. For Genma, whose Chakra Control had already reached the point where he could walk on water with ease, this was far too simple. He could skip it entirely.

The second stage involved continuously and steadily releasing Chakra, making the water inside a water balloon move until it burst.

This stage was a vivid example of Chakra shape transformation, and it was also the process of shaping the Rasengan.

What Genma needed was a ninjutsu that consumed little Chakra but possessed great power.

Spherical ninjutsu undoubtedly had limitless potential, but maintaining a spherical shape required an enormous amount of Chakra. He estimated that he could not choose a sphere.

After repeatedly considering what shape he wanted for his ninjutsu and combining it with all the shapes of ninjutsu he had seen in anime before, he thought of a cone. More precisely, a spiral cone, like an electric drill.

Cone-shaped applications were not uncommon in the Naruto World. For example, the Second Hokage's Hard Vortex Water Blade and Kimimaro's Bone Cone both looked incredibly lethal. They were excellent forms for breaking through a surface with a single point.

But how could he use something like a water balloon to help shape his new technique? That became another major problem.

He could not possibly go find a cone-shaped water balloon. That would be far too deliberate, and he would probably end up blindly imitating others.

After pondering bitterly for a long time, Genma came up with a clumsy method.

He remembered that Six Paths' two sons, Indra and Asura, had been born in an era when hand seals had only just been invented.

Later, the not-so-bright Asura had used a technique strikingly similar to the Rasengan, which gave Genma inspiration.

Back then, productivity had been low. Forget rubber—even clothes were made from coarse cloth.

Yet Asura had still relied on his own efforts to master a hand-signless ninjutsu that resembled the Rasengan.

The training process for that hand-signless ninjutsu was incredibly dull, but fortunately simple.

To solve the villagers' water supply problem, Asura used Chakra to dig wells again and again. In the end, he mastered that Rasengan-like hand-signless ninjutsu.

Genma wondered whether he could repeatedly bore holes into the ground with Chakra as well, then observe the shape of those holes to ensure his new technique formed a cone.

Genma tried several times, punching numerous holes through the flowerbed at home. Once he could steadily create cone-shaped holes, he felt his new technique had promise.

When Shiranui Hidekichi saw what Genma had done to the flowers in the courtyard, he was quite annoyed—but he also came up with quite a few ideas.

"Genma, do you want to make money while boring holes?"

As the man who had brought countless profits to the family, Hideyoshi was becoming more and more suited to being a businessman.

Glancing at Hideyoshi, whose intentions were clearly dubious, Genma replied expressionlessly, "If I can make money and create value, of course I want to. But don't make your idea too outrageous."

"Haha, why would a father cheat his own son? Everything I have in mind is practical. The clan is too busy during farming season, you know. With your talent for boring holes, you could probably take on plenty of work."

"Uh, is that really okay? Wouldn't people think I was stealing their livelihood? The families in the clan who farm should be having a hard time already."

"Ahem, it's fine. The clan needs a little farming expert like you. Just go help out. I'll pay you five hundred ryo a day. How about it?"

Five hundred ryo was the basic reward for a D-rank mission. But considering that he had not become a ninja yet, Genma nodded and agreed.

Five hundred ryo was a lot. It was already equal to three weeks of Genma's allowance. Earning five hundred a day sounded pretty blissful.

What Genma did not know was that, to an evil capitalist, five hundred ryo was utterly insignificant.

The next time Genma was digging holes in the flowerbed, Hideyoshi brewed himself a pot of tea and muttered comfortably, "Having money really is great. I don't have to farm at Second Uncle's place anymore. I didn't expect that brat to be so easy to satisfy. Hehe~"

Having found a method to shape his ninjutsu, Genma began considering the Rasengan's third stage.

The third stage was maintaining the Rasengan's shape while bursting a rubber ball a hundred times tougher than a water balloon.

The difference in toughness between a water balloon and a rubber ball made Genma understand that this stage increased the technique's power.

But power could not be judged just by looking, which was why the rubber ball served as a reference.

Compared to the Rasengan, Genma's new technique did not have such a simple structure. The Rasengan's method for increasing power could not be applied at all.

Still, ninjutsu existed to destroy and kill. Since the Rasengan could eventually snap a tree with ease, he could likewise use trees or rocks as targets to observe its power.

Having made up his mind, Genma began endless training. This sort of training seemed capable of driving someone obsessive. After training too much, he wanted to drill holes in everything he saw.

He had often overtrained like this before. It had happened when he trained with Might Duy as well.

So Genma was familiar with the symptoms. Rather than extinguishing the urge outright, he prepared small pieces of wood so he could drill holes wherever he was.

Thus, a new signature item appeared in his daily life—a wooden block.

Hard work paid off. Through continuously boring holes into the ground with Chakra and casually drilling small wooden blocks, his self-created ninjutsu finally made considerable progress in terms of form.

This breakthrough was not that its shape had become more stable. Rather, the spiral cone formed from gathered Chakra could now be made large or small, with its size freely controlled.

Though its power could still only handle dirt and small pieces of wood, Genma, who knew about the Rasengan and its related derivative techniques, was still delighted with this result.

For example, enlarging the Rasengan and increasing Chakra output created the Great Ball Rasengan.

He could likewise enlarge his spiral cone. In the future, he might be able to create a ninjutsu similar to the Great Ball Rasengan.

Next, he needed to increase the technique's power. But he still wanted to train using small wooden blocks, since the wood shavings could be kept to improve soil fertility.

Only now, when judging its power, he also had to check how long it took.

While Genma was feverishly developing his new technique, Kurenai's saber skills had become increasingly refined. Since her father did not support her, she secretly asked her father to obtain techniques that could add Genjutsu to saber techniques.

Genma did not want to learn that for now. He still preferred to first fully master his boxing techniques and Basic Saber Technique.

Moreover, he had a bold idea: integrate boxing techniques into saber techniques and create a saber style that belonged to him alone.

He had discussed saber techniques with White Fang. White Fang had also started by practicing Basic Saber Technique, then gradually formed his own style through countless real battles.

So Genma had the same plan. With White Fang's experience and the coming war, he had a chance to establish his own saber technique.

After planning everything out, he buried himself in training every day.

But Genma was not the only one becoming diligent. Many people in the class had begun working hard as well.

It was as though countless wolves were chasing them from behind, making him even less willing to relax in the slightest.

Once his spiral cone could instantly break down wood, Genma found himself another goal.

Drilling through rocks.

Thus, Genma entered another state in his daily life. He often carried a stone in his hand, and after practicing for too long, he would instinctively squeeze it a few times whenever he held one, like an old man who always wanted to fiddle with things.

But drilling through rock always produced crisp sounds like someone chewing corn chips, so he could only practice for a while during breaks at school.

His ninjutsu training had never been systematic to begin with, relying mostly on intuition. By the end of the term, he could only break rocks apart rather than pulverize them.

This pace made Genma feel a little miserable, but when he thought of how Minato had spent three years developing the Rasengan, he gritted his teeth and patiently endured.

Quite a few people were curious about Genma's persistent, drop-by-drop effort. Of course, more people kept their distance, as though they were looking at some strange freak.

Just as Genma finished crushing a stone with a series of crunching noises, Kurenai looked at him with a pale face.

"What is it? Am I being too loud?"

Kurenai nodded and pointed directly at her teeth. "It was fine at first, but after so long, I feel like my teeth are starting to hurt~"

"Uh, sorry. But why didn't you say something sooner? There aren't that many strange things about me, but you didn't need to put up with my weird habit like this, did you?"

"Using Chakra to shatter rocks is not an ordinary weird habit. You're developing a ninjutsu, right? I heard Kakashi developed an A-rank Lightning Style ninjutsu. I think the one you're developing can't be bad either."

Kurenai spoke with utmost seriousness, making even Shiranui Genma feel embarrassed.

Kurenai trusted him so much that a faint warmth flowed through his heart. It was as satisfying as being praised by the woman he loved most.

"Hehe, can I take that to mean you're keeping our family ninjutsu secret? Look, Rin and Obito are both so close to me. You could have sat with Rin instead~"

Though Kurenai did mean to help Genma keep it secret, she had not thought that much about it. Her face immediately flushed red. "N-no, that's not it..."

But only after denying it did she realize that no explanation seemed capable of clearing things up, making her pretty face turn even redder.

"Ahem, it's fine. I don't mind. What's yours is mine, and what's mine is yours. Mm~ How about you help me think of a name for this ninjutsu?"

"But I don't know what your ninjutsu looks like. How am I supposed to name it for you?"

Kurenai was overwhelmed with embarrassment and had wanted to distance herself from Genma again, but when the words reached her mouth, she somehow ended up agreeing halfway.

"It's fine. I'll draw it for you."

A few minutes later, Genma finished drawing the spiral cone and added many annotations.

Kurenai gave Genma a complicated look, then carefully examined the drawing.

"The shape references the Second Hokage's Water Style, Hard Vortex Water Blade, but it's made entirely of Chakra. Mm~ How about Hard Void Blade?"

"Good, good, good."

"No, it feels like a Wind Style Jutsu. How about Spiral Blade?"

"Mm, mm, that's pretty good too~"

"Mm~ No, no, it doesn't look like a blade at all. It looks more like a cone. How about Spiral Cone!"

Spiral Cone...

It seemed very close to Rasengan...

Shiranui Genma's heart began pounding. He was both impressed by Kurenai's talent for naming things and worried that people would notice this ninjutsu imitated the Rasengan.

But how could he reject Kurenai's goodwill? After thinking for a moment, Genma grinned foolishly and replied, "Spiral Cone is really great. I love it, Kurenai~"