Flying Thunder God Without Cost-Effectiveness

With Shuichi's intelligence support, the Konoha Ninjas were no longer as timid as before when facing the Puppeteers. The village developed a special combat strategy to counter the puppets' mechanisms, and it was quite effective.

For example, you can determine the number of mechanisms based on the size of the puppet, or probe whether the enemy will use ranged or melee attacks before engaging in battle.

"Is that so..." Shuichi felt that the Third Hokage was relatively kind and had no value in suppressing his information. "It's good that he can help the village."

"However, there are still some shortcomings in the intelligence from last time." He hadn't been idle during this free time; he had already finished researching the Dual-Blade Puppet.

"Hmm? What's lacking?" The Third Hokage's heart tightened again.

"That means it only applies to assessing most Puppeteers of Jonin and below. If used against top-tier Puppeteers, such as Chiyo from Sunagakure, it would be a huge disadvantage," Shuichi added.

This was his conclusion after examining the two puppets made by the Jonin Puppeteers; their design was rather simple and crude, and could not compare to the works of Chiyo and Sasori.

An ordinary Puppeteer can only create a decent puppet at best, because multi-threaded puppet control is extremely energy-consuming, which is why Puppeteers fear being approached at close range.

This is a relatively easy conclusion to draw, because Shuichi discovered that making puppets wasn't that difficult. With his skill level, he could even replicate the puppets of the Sunagakure Jonin. Therefore, it's impossible for the Sunagakure, the birthplace of puppets, to be so incompetent.

From this, we can draw an important conclusion. He raised one hand and said to the Third Hokage, "It's not that Sunagakure can't create exquisite puppets, but rather that the Puppeteers' control abilities are limited. They design the mechanisms according to their own capabilities, solely to maximize combat effectiveness."

For example, a particularly powerful Hidden Weapons launching mechanism can be concealed in a very small part inside the puppet's body. Such power is something every Puppeteer desires and can create.

However, this function likely requires four parts to work together simultaneously to launch successfully, while the Puppeteer can only smoothly control three parts; four parts are almost beyond his limit. If even one part is not controlled properly during battle, causing the mechanism to jam, it would have a fatal impact.

"Therefore, the main training for Puppeteers is to hone their control skills, rather than debugging mechanisms and setting the puppets to the mode they are most confident in controlling before going into battle."

This is a significant supplement to the previous information on Puppeteers, with some changes to the details. Instead of Puppeteers directly creating powerful puppets and then adapting to them, they modify puppets to match their own abilities.

Even a top-tier Puppeteer as skilled as Chiyo, who had experienced countless battles, chickened out when she saw Sasori's Hiruko undergo a change in its mechanism.

Because she understood Sasori's control abilities were at their limit before leaving the village, and Hiruko's mechanisms had already been adjusted to the level of maximum control. The fact that there was such a change when they met again could only mean that Sasori's control abilities had improved significantly, and the mechanisms inside might have completely changed.

"Phew... So, the upper limit of Puppeteer's combat power isn't the puppet itself, but rather the strength of their control over it?" The Third Hokage took a deep breath after hearing this.

"Yes, if you use the most sophisticated technology to assemble a puppet with countless mechanisms, capable of both close combat and ranged attacks, Chiyo can unleash more than 90% of its power, but in the hands of an ordinary Jonin, it might only be able to unleash 30%," Shuichi said confidently.

"Using only one puppet isn't impossible, but the risk is too high. If it's destroyed, we'll lose all combat capability. Using multiple puppets allows for better coordination, reduces the difficulty of designing mechanisms, and ensures sustained combat capability."

So Kankuro controlling a Gundam to wreak havoc is just a dream. The Gundam he controls is probably a fake Gundam, only able to stop and fire with one hand. If it were given to Sasori, it would be a real Gundam, capable of flying, burrowing, and providing overwhelming firepower.

After completing the information on the puppet, Shuichi immediately revealed his true purpose for staying. "Lord Hokage, look at the information I provided, it's priceless! Not only can it be used against enemy countries, but it might also inspire research in the village in the future. Giving him a few S-rank Ninjutsu wouldn't be too much to ask, would it?"

The Third Hokage snapped out of his daze and was speechless again upon hearing his words. He had just admitted that Shuichi's information was valuable, but then the boy added a lot more to it. How could he possibly guard against this clever little devil's tricks? Now he couldn't even try to lower the price.

"A few S-rank Ninjutsu won't do. I'll give you the chakra compression technique from last time," the Third Hokage said. "This Ninjutsu is extremely difficult. Even for me, it's very difficult to use in actual combat. It will give you plenty of time to practice."

"Water Severing Wave?" Shuichi. He was surprised when he heard the Third Hokage say that he could use it, since he didn't see the Third Hokage use this technique in the original work.

"That means the control is a bit lacking, making it difficult to use in actual combat." Even the Second Hokage, who was strong enough, could only obediently form hand seals and stand still to release this technique. It seems that the chakra control required is quite high, so it is understandable that the Third Hokage did not use it in actual combat.

Now that he has the Water Severing Wave, Shuichi has achieved more than half of his goal in staying here, but he does not leave immediately.

"You've already got your hands on the Ninjutsu, what else is there?" the Third Hokage said impatiently.

"Um... I wanted to ask about the Flying Thunder God Technique." Shuichi moment before speaking.

"Why would you be interested in this technique?" Sarutobi Hiruzen paused for a moment, then realized that he must have heard about it from Orochimaru or Namikaze Minato. "This technique isn't really suitable for you, and asking you to exchange it for an S-rank Ninjutsu is already a bit excessive. You shouldn't think about it too much."

"Why?" Shuichi asked curiously. "Tell me about it. It doesn't matter if I learn it or not, can't I just learn about it?"

"Orochimaru told me you have a very high talent for the Body Flicker Technique, so that's probably why you came to ask about the Flying Thunder God Technique!" The Third Hokage, hearing this, was no longer in a hurry. He decided to give Shuichi a proper lesson to prevent him from becoming overly ambitious and going astray. "Then I'll explain it to you properly."

"The Flying Thunder God Technique can be considered an advanced version of the Body Flicker Technique. Its characteristic is that it uses a technique to achieve the effect of instantaneous movement and traversing space, but..."

With the Third Hokage's explanation, Shuichi discovered that the Flying Thunder God he described was quite different from what he remembered.

First, there's the teleportation location. Users can throw Kunai bearing the Flying Thunder God Mark or imprint the mark on someone to serve as a teleportation point.

However, these functions have many limitations. For example, if the two marks are close together and the user is far away, the teleportation location cannot be determined.

At the same time, trying to mark the enemy with the mark before launching a sneak attack is completely unnecessary.

According to the Third Hokage, this function can only provide timely support to teammates, because the time required to inscribe the formula is not short, and it is almost impossible to do so while moving. By that time, the enemy would have already been killed.

Moreover, it consumes a lot of chakra. Once your opponent sees the technique, your movement and landing point will be locked, and they will definitely be on guard, making it difficult to launch a surprise attack.

Therefore, it's not worth going to such a high price just for a faster Body Flicker Technique. The Second Hokage only used this technique to launch surprise attacks when the enemy was off guard, and he also had to find a way to hide the mark so that no one would notice.

"This is probably the initial version of the Flying Thunder God developed by the Second Hokage." Shuichi guessed that the Flying Thunder God technique in the Scroll of Seals was likely like this, and for him now, it was an extremely useless skill.

Seeing Shuichi deep in thought, the Third Hokage continued, "For you, learning this technique would take a lot of time, and the effect isn't much better than the Body Flicker Technique. It's really not worth it."

"The reason this technique was Minato is because there weren't any suitable Ninjutsu for him in the Scroll of Seals, and there are also some other special reasons."

"His talent in ninjutsu is far inferior to yours. He only has a strong affinity for Wind Release, but there aren't any very powerful Wind Release Ninjutsu in the village for him to learn. Therefore, his style is completely different from ours. I don't know if this is a good or bad thing; it's a choice that Jiraiya and he made together."

After listening to the Third Hokage's words, Shuichi's mind raced through all the information about Namikaze Minato, and he quickly came to a fairly accurate conclusion.

This is closely related to the ninja's own style. Each member of the Hokage lineage has distinct characteristics, and they are generally skilled in Ninjutsu combined with some styles that suit them.

The Third Hokage was an all-around Ninjutsu user, Danzo specialized in Wind Release Ninjutsu.

Orochimaru possesses multiple attributes and versatile Snake Ninjutsu, Jiraiya multiple attributes and uses Yang Release, Barrier Ninjutsu, and more.

Namikaze Minato's style was very unique. According to Shuichi's estimation, he followed the path of Fuinjutsu combined with speed, making him unique in the Shinobi World. He almost abandoned traditional hand seal techniques.

Shuichi speculated that this was likely related to Kushina Uzumaki. Konoha possessed the complete Fuinjutsu of the Uzumaki Clan, but ordinary ninjas couldn't learn them at all. Even Orochimaru, who had practically searched through all of Konoha's Forbidden Jutsu, didn't know that there was Fuinjutsu Reaper Death Seal.

Under normal circumstances, he might have chosen to specialize in speed-based techniques Wind Release techniques, but since he started dating Kushina Uzumaki, he has been able to learn all the Fuinjutsu of the Uzumaki Clan without needing to exchange them for battle merits.

His ability to continuously improve the Flying Thunder God is based on a wealth of knowledge about Fuinjutsu. In a sense, his ability to soar to great heights with the Flying Thunder God Technique is truly a case of living off a woman.

Although the Third Hokage's explanation wasn't very thorough, Shuichi himself had already identified the problems through analyzing the original work.

He already has two paths: the Ninjutsu style and the speed style. Given his young age, learning more would be a complete waste, as he hasn't even reached the end of one of them yet.

At the same time, the current Flying Thunder God is far from the effect of Minato's improved version, and it has many shortcomings. As long as Minato doesn't hand over his improvements to the Flying Thunder God Technique to Konoha, no one else can learn it; it's his exclusive secret technique.

Others who want to study it will have to start from the basics of Fuinjutsu again, and there simply isn't enough time. Shuichi's training schedule is already almost full, so where would he find the time to learn Fuinjutsu from scratch?

The Second Hokage was likely able to develop the Flying Thunder God after Uzumaki Mito married the First Hokage. Minato was able to improve upon it by directly acquiring all the Fuinjutsu of the Uzumaki Clan, and he didn't have a girlfriend who knew Fuinjutsu to help him.

"We'll have to give up for now and accumulate merits in the Third Shinobi War. Once Hokage becomes Minato, he'll definitely put the new Flying Thunder God into the Scroll of Seals. We'll consider exchanging for it then."