Five in the morning.
The sky over the Land of Rain was still a dim leaden gray. Not a trace of dawn could pierce through it.
"Get up!"
With a sharp bark, someone kicked the leg of the cot hard.
Nishikawa Tetsu blinked groggily and saw Uchiha Fugaku standing fully equipped beside the bed. The dark circles under his eyes looked even heavier than yesterday, but his gaze was startlingly bright.
"You have three minutes to wash up and get ready. Then follow me to the woods behind camp."
After saying that, Uchiha Fugaku turned and swept out through the tent flap. His hurried retreat practically radiated impatience.
Namikaze Minato rubbed his messy blond hair and yawned. "Fugaku-senpai gets up really early."
Nishikawa Tetsu quickly strapped on his ninja tools, the corner of his mouth lifting. "Maybe what I said last night kept him up."
A secluded stretch of rocky ground behind the camp.
Rain continued to patter down, polishing the rocks until they were slick and gleaming.
Uchiha Fugaku stood before a huge black boulder and took a deep breath. He turned to the two behind him, his expression solemn, as if he were about to perform some sacred ritual.
"Nishikawa Tetsu, watch closely."
Uchiha Fugaku began forming hand seals.
This time, he didn't move quickly. It was as if he were deliberately feeling how each seal guided the flow of chakra.
"Snake—Ram—Monkey—Boar—Horse—Tiger."
When he finished the last seal, Uchiha Fugaku didn't release his chakra right away as he usually did.
His cheeks puffed slightly, but he forcibly held back the urge to exhale. Following the theory Nishikawa Tetsu had proposed the night before, he frantically compressed the chakra in his mouth, trying to change the ratio of chakra to air.
A burning sting flared in his throat. The chakra was so densely packed that it was putting a strain on him.
"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique!"
"Whoosh—"
There was none of the usual deafening roar of a huge fireball sweeping across the landscape.
What Uchiha Fugaku exhaled was no longer a massive orange-red fireball several meters across. Instead, it was a beam of flame barely half a meter thick, its color an eerie, ghostly blue!
The blue flame shot through the rain like a high-temperature laser sword.
"Ssszzzz—"
When the flame struck the rock, it didn't explode. It made only a grating sound as it melted through.
The hard granite was like butter beneath a hot knife. In an instant, the flame burned a meter-wide hole straight through it, so deep its bottom couldn't be seen.
The edges had turned into molten lava, bubbling with dark-red blisters.
A pungent smell filled the air.
"This..."
Namikaze Minato's bright blue eyes widened, and he instinctively took a step back.
He could clearly feel the terrifying heat contained in the blue flame, far greater than that of an ordinary Great Fireball.
Uchiha Fugaku slowly exhaled a stream of hot white air and touched the corner of his slightly burned mouth. As he stared at the result, he couldn't hide his shock.
"And I used so little chakra," Uchiha Fugaku murmured.
Before, he would have needed at least a B-rank Great Dragon Fire Technique to cause this much damage. Now, he'd done it with a modified C-rank Great Fireball.
He whipped around and stared hard at Nishikawa Tetsu. "Is this what you meant by complete combustion?"
Nishikawa Tetsu walked over and crouched beside the hole to inspect it. Then he nodded.
"The mixture still isn't perfect; there's a little discoloration at the center of the flame. But the temperature has already exceeded 1,500 degrees. Congratulations, Fugaku-senpai. Your Fire Release has gotten stronger."
Uchiha Fugaku took a deep breath, calming his turbulent emotions.
The last trace of contempt vanished from his eyes as he looked at Nishikawa Tetsu. In its place was the respect one strong person showed another—even if that strength lay in the mind rather than the muscles.
"Since you've proven your theory..."
Uchiha Fugaku suddenly changed tack and spoke sternly. "It's my turn to correct your weaknesses."
He pointed to the towering trees nearby, each several dozen meters tall.
"I'm not worried about Namikaze Minato's talent. You're the one I'm concerned about, Nishikawa Tetsu."
"You have little chakra, so you can't afford to waste a drop. Right now, your chakra control is too crude."
"Tree climbing."
Uchiha Fugaku gave the brief instruction. "Without using your hands, attach chakra to the soles of your feet and climb. It's the best way to train fine chakra control."
At this point in time, tree climbing and water walking weren't yet compulsory subjects at the Ninja Academy. They were usually secrets taught by a Jonin instructor.
"Got it."
Namikaze Minato nodded without hesitation. He took a deep breath in front of a tree, then charged up its trunk.
One step, two steps, three steps...
Namikaze Minato reached a branch at the top of the tree and hung upside down without a wobble. He flashed a sunny smile down at them. "That wasn't... very hard?"
"..."
Nishikawa Tetsu and Uchiha Fugaku fell silent at the same time.
Monster, Nishikawa Tetsu muttered to himself.
That kind of control on the first try—no wonder he'd become the Yellow Flash.
Uchiha Fugaku's mouth twitched. Then he turned to Nishikawa Tetsu, his gaze seeming to say, "See? That's a genius. What about you?"
Nishikawa Tetsu shrugged and walked over to the tree.
Instead of rushing forward, he pulled out a small notebook and began jotting down calculations.
"What are you doing?" Uchiha Fugaku couldn't help asking.
"Calculating."
Without looking up, Nishikawa Tetsu replied, "I weigh forty-two kilograms. The tree bark's friction coefficient is about 0.6. Taking gravity and the slickness from the rain into account, the chakra I need to output should be..."
"Stop calculating! Get up there!"
At last, Uchiha Fugaku lost patience with Nishikawa Tetsu's dithering and kicked him in the rear.
Nishikawa Tetsu stumbled toward the trunk and planted a foot against it.
"Smack."
The bark beneath his foot burst apart, and he was flung backward, landing flat on his face.
"Too much chakra," Uchiha Fugaku commented coldly. "You're supposed to climb the tree, not kick it."
Nishikawa Tetsu got up and rubbed his backside, undiscouraged. "I see. There really is a gap between the theoretical value and practical results. My output was fifteen percent too high."
He'd made fun of Naruto and Sasuke when he'd watched the anime. Turns out he wasn't any better when he had to do it himself.
For the next hour, the woods echoed with the sounds of bodies hitting the ground.
Namikaze Minato sat atop a tree, enjoying the view. Uchiha Fugaku stood beneath it with his arms crossed, supervising, while Nishikawa Tetsu kept refining his chakra-output model with every fall.
He looked a mess, but Uchiha Fugaku's approval only grew.
He realized that although Nishikawa Tetsu lacked Namikaze Minato's terrifying, instinctive talent, he was a quick learner.
Every time he failed, he pinpointed the cause. He never made the same mistake twice.
At last.
Covered in mud, Nishikawa Tetsu stood on a branch ten meters above the ground and looked down. He let out a long breath.
"Dynamic equilibrium model for chakra adhesion and gravity: complete."
"Barely good enough."
Uchiha Fugaku snorted. Though he called it barely good enough, he knew that an ordinary Genin would need at least two or three days to master the technique. Nishikawa Tetsu had done it in just one hour.
"Now that you've mastered tree climbing, the principle behind water walking is the same. But before that..."
Uchiha Fugaku took two special sheets of paper out of his Ninja Tool Pouch.
"Lord Jiraiya entrusted you to me, so I'm responsible for you until the end."
"Now that you know tree climbing trains chakra control, it's time to find out your chakra natures, so you can start developing Nature Transformation."
He handed them a sheet each.
"These are Chakra Papers. Feed chakra into one and it'll burn if you have Fire, split if you have Wind, wrinkle if you have Lightning, crumble if you have Earth, and get wet if you have Water."
Namikaze Minato took the paper and gently fed chakra into it.
The paper split neatly down the middle, then wrinkled, and finally caught fire.
"Wind, Lightning, and Fire," Uchiha Fugaku said with a nod. "Those suit you. You could develop techniques with great cutting power."
Then both of them turned to look at Nishikawa Tetsu.
Nishikawa Tetsu held the thin sheet of paper between his fingers. He already had a good idea what to expect.
He slowly drew on the meager chakra inside him and channeled it into his fingertip.
The paper immediately crumpled. Then it grew damp, and at the edges, it even began to crumble a little.
"Lightning, Water, and Earth."
Uchiha Fugaku looked at the result in surprise. The deadweight had three chakra natures, too.
"Three natures? Your chakra's meager, but you've got quite a mix. Lightning is your primary nature, though?"
He studied Nishikawa Tetsu thoughtfully. "Lightning Release can activate your cells to increase your speed, and it can also give you tremendous penetrating power."
"Combined with your so-called science, you might be able to take a completely different path."
Nishikawa Tetsu stared at the crumpled Chakra Paper. In his mind, a series of terms had already appeared: electromagnetic induction, hydrogen production through water electrolysis, high-voltage current traps...
Looks like my Scientific Ninja Tools development plan has its power source.
A smile curled the corner of Nishikawa Tetsu's mouth.
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