The Chicken Rib Eight Inner Gates

The following month was nothing if not ordinary and monotonous.

Uchiha Mai often followed Might Duy to learn kicking techniques, pondering the legwork of Jean-Claude Van Damme, and in his spare time, he would beat Rock Lee to a pulp, euphemistically calling it "sparring."

The current situation in the ninja world was dire; the Third Great Ninja War was inevitable. Even if he survived that, there would still be the Uchiha Clan Downfall, and then the Fourth Great Ninja War...

The Sharingan gave Uchiha Mai near-infinite possibilities, but it also dragged him into a web of trouble. When the nest is overturned, no egg remains intact; he couldn't just let Konoha play the Uchiha to their deaths.

Should he pin all his hopes on these eyes?

The Uchiha's eyes were indeed overpowered, but what was truly broken were the Mangekyou, the Eternal Mangekyou, and the Rinnegan. Uchiha Mai could not guarantee that he would definitely awaken the Mangekyou.

Besides, if he did nothing every day but wait for his eyes to evolve, wouldn't that be a bit too pathetic?

He had to learn something and strive to become a well-rounded ninja, excelling in morality, intelligence, physical fitness, aesthetics, and labor.

Only hard work and sweat would never betray you; the loneliness endured during training would all be repaid when you showed off in the future.

As the saying goes, the expert is lonely; the strong are built upon endless solitude. If you cannot endure loneliness, you cannot become an expert.

After a month of grueling training, Uchiha Mai finally mastered Might Duy's kicking techniques and thoroughly grasped the legwork of Jean-Claude Van Damme, integrating them into his own system.

The Mai Style Ancient Martial Arts, a knockoff of the Yagami-Style Ancient Martial Arts, also saw the development of several new moves, becoming even more refined.

During this period, after getting familiar with Might Guy and his father, Uchiha Mai shamelessly asked to learn the Eight Inner Gates.

He wanted to see if he could be like his fellow transmigrators and pull off a "no-injury Eight Gates," "permanent Eight Gates," or "reverse-cultivated Eight Gates."

After all, it was a technique that kicked Madara Uchiha to the brink of death with a single blow; he was quite covetous of it.

Might Duy did not hoard his secrets. After considering it for a few minutes, he taught the Eight Inner Gates to Uchiha Mai. Don't talk about "yours" or "mine"—family secret techniques all belonged to Konoha!

This was the beginning of Uchiha Mai's breakdown.

After watching the details, Uchiha Mai felt his head was about to explode. This Eight Inner Gates was not what he had imagined; the difficulty of training was far beyond his expectations.

After some exploration, Mai finally understood the situation. There was a reason why, in the original plot, only Might Guy and his father had mastered the Eight Inner Gates to perfection.

It was unknown who created this ultimate secret technique, but it was highly unlikely to have been Tobirama. Before Might Duy obtained it, the Eight Inner Gates were even more of a "chicken rib"—tasteless to eat but a waste to discard—and basically impossible to practice.

It was like the "Star Transformation" technique from the novel Stellar Transformations; it was powerful in theory, but in practice, it was a death trap.

It was Might Duy who spent over twenty years annotating the Eight Inner Gates, plugging the leaks and filling the gaps, which allowed this technique—which previously only had theoretical potential—to be perfected enough to have a sliver of success.

Even so, it remained a semi-finished product.

Techniques like the Front Lotus, Reverse Lotus, and Morning Peacock from the original plot did not exist yet. For the Eight Inner Gates to truly reach perfection, it would require Might Guy to inherit Might Duy's mantle and continue the development.

Furthermore, even if Might Guy perfected the Eight Inner Gates to the level seen in the Fourth Great Ninja War, this secret technique might not be suitable for others.

The Morning Peacock, Daytime Tiger, Evening Elephant, and Night Guy were all taijutsu created by Might Guy based on his own characteristics; they were not necessarily suitable for anyone else.

Rock Lee, who could open five gates during the Chunin Exams, eventually faded into obscurity, likely because he lacked Might Guy's talent and could not develop his own set of Eight Gates-compatible taijutsu.

Chicken ribs, chicken ribs. Why is everything I, Uchiha Mai, can learn just this kind of flashy but useless chicken rib ability?

After weighing his options, Uchiha Mai abandoned the tempting idea of making the Eight Inner Gates his primary focus. Like Kakashi in the original plot, he just learned it casually.

He only hoped to open two gates in the future; that would be enough.

Uchiha Mai could endure loneliness and hardship, but the training method Might Guy used in the original plot was truly terrifying.

Training the Eight Inner Gates meant abandoning everything to pour 300% of your energy into it, with no guarantee of success, and even if you succeeded, you might not be able to use it many times.

This was not a wise choice.

He had the Sharingan and his own cheats; whether in terms of short-term gains or long-term benefits, they were no worse than the Eight Inner Gates. There was no need to kill himself over it.

After deciding to learn it casually, Uchiha Mai encountered another problem. Logically, his current physical strength and chakra levels were no worse than Might Guy's, but no matter how many times he tried to impact the Gate of Life, it remained unmoved.

Might Duy answered this doubt for Uchiha Mai: The Eight Inner Gates was a taijutsu that required the resolve to face a hundred deaths without regret to be mastered.

It didn't just have requirements for physical fitness; it also required willpower and determination. It wasn't something you could master just because your hardware was up to spec.

"This is a secret technique best suited for fools and stubborn people. You, Uchiha Mai, fight so cleverly; you are definitely not suited for this."

Even more of a chicken rib.

After fully grasping the situation of the Eight Inner Gates, Uchiha Mai lost interest in the technique. Trash, not even a dog would train this.

It was strong, certainly, but it lacked universality.

Shenxiu said: "The body is the Bodhi tree, the mind is like a bright mirror stand; wipe it diligently at all times, do not let it gather dust."

The Sixth Patriarch Huineng said: "Bodhi originally has no tree, the bright mirror is also not a stand; originally there is nothing, where can dust gather?"

The Fifth Patriarch believed Huineng had higher Buddhist nature and passed the position of the leader of the Chan school and his mantle to him.

Uchiha Mai liked this story, but he didn't think Huineng necessarily surpassed Shenxiu. Clearly, Shenxiu's approach was more suitable for everyone in this world.

The same was true for the Eight Inner Gates.

Learning the Eight Gates was like taking a chip to Las Vegas, going all-in every time, betting on big or small 32 times in a row; lose once, and you're dead.

You could quit in the middle, but you couldn't take the money with you if you did. If you wanted the money, you had to win 32 times in a row.

You couldn't ignore the near-zero probability just because of the ridiculously high final payout, thinking it was a venture with a high expected value.

A true poker master knows when to fold a hand that looks good but actually has a very low win rate.

Uchiha Mai understood this principle and would act accordingly, which was why he neither practiced nor was suited for the Eight Inner Gates.

Not long after abandoning the Eight Inner Gates, the graduation ceremony arrived.

The Ninja Academy was not set in stone; during this period, there were no flashy graduation exams. Once the ceremony concluded, graduates were immediately assigned to various teams.

After graduation, they would take on a few introductory missions; those who adapted could continue as ninja. Those who couldn't were kicked out to become ordinary villagers, and if they were truly desperate to be ninja rather than civilians, they would go to the reserve forces to grind out seniority.

Genin, after all, didn't require much talent—just grind for a few years and you'll make it.

It was a rather festive day, and the clan head, Fugaku, attended the graduation ceremony on behalf of Uchiha Mai as his elder.

In addition, ninja whose names were only heard in rumors, such as Sarutobi Hiruzen and Shinku, also attended the ceremony.

After the ceremony ended, the parents left the playground and classrooms, chatting and laughing as they either headed home or went to the offices to socialize.

They left a bunch of brats in the classroom to be picked over, just like cabbages in a vegetable market.

Asking for a recommendation vote is fine, right? This stuff doesn't cost money.