As noon approached, Higashino Makoto set down the scroll in his hands and began making himself lunch.
Not long ago, Higashino Megumi had finally agreed to her son's request: she would stop getting up early to prepare a whole day's worth of meals before going to work.
For one thing, Higashino Makoto didn't want his mother working so hard. For another, reheating food always made it taste much worse.
Having lived a second life, Higashino Makoto had simple goals: train hard so he could enjoy the wonders of the Shinobi World without being casually killed by someone, and live a life different from the one he'd had before. But that didn't mean he wanted to live like an ascetic and deprive himself of life's comforts and pleasures.
Today, he planned to have steamed fish.
Higashino Makoto fished a live fish out of the bucket in the kitchen and promptly hurled it to the floor. The fish, which had been flopping about moments earlier, suffered a fatal blow and felt the call of the Death God.
After placing the fish on the cutting board, Higashino Makoto didn't start preparing it. Instead, he held his right hand over its body, and green Chakra gradually appeared around his hand.
This was a simple Healing Technique, a preparatory technique for the A-rank Medical Ninjutsu, Mystical Palm Technique.
The green Chakra was the legendary Medical Chakra. It could act as energy, stimulating the tissue cells in an injured area to regenerate and thereby heal the wound.
But not all Chakra could be used to perform Medical Ninjutsu. Only Chakra with a strong Yang Release nature could produce a healing effect.
How to cultivate it came down to precise Chakra Control.
As everyone knew, Chakra was the energy produced by a Ninja combining the Body Energy extracted from all the cells in their body with Mental Energy, in roughly equal proportions. If the proportions were wrong, it couldn't be extracted at all; the two energies simply wouldn't merge.
But that was the general rule.
To make one's Chakra reach the Medical Chakra level and produce a healing effect, one had to precisely adjust those proportions.
To become a Medical Ninja, one had to increase the proportion of Body Energy and reduce the proportion of Mental Energy while extracting Chakra. This gave the resulting Chakra abundant vitality. It was the simplest form of Yang Release training.
The higher the proportion of Body Energy, the greater the vitality and the better the healing effect.
That created a contradiction. Reducing the proportion of Mental Energy naturally weakened a Ninja's control over Chakra, yet Medical Ninjutsu demanded exceptionally precise Chakra Control.
It was a case of wanting both at once, which was why advanced Medical Ninjas were so rare.
Reverse the proportions, with Mental Energy taking the larger share, and one had simple Yin Release, suited to Genjutsu and certain Secret Jutsu.
That was why both Genjutsu users and Medical Ninjas needed extraordinary control over Chakra. They had to be able to extract Chakra even when Body Energy and Mental Energy were out of balance, then control it with even greater precision.
It wasn't something just anyone could manage. It took considerable patience.
Of course, this applied to ordinary Ninjas. Those born with exceptional genes were an exception.
For example, members of the Uchiha Clan were naturally gifted with a strong Yin Release nature, while the Senju and Uzumaki Clans were naturally gifted with a strong Yang Release nature.
Tsunade had become the greatest Medical Ninja in the Shinobi World through more than just her impressive chest.
Chakra Control training in the Shinobi World aimed at achieving precise control. The better one's control, the less Chakra was wasted when performing a Jutsu, and the faster one could learn Ninjutsu and the more powerful it would be.
That was the first stage, and the vast majority of people focused their efforts there.
The second stage was being able to stably extract Chakra while altering the proportions of Body Energy and Mental Energy. The greater the difference between the proportions, the more deeply one had developed their Yin or Yang nature.
Higashino Makoto was at this stage. Knowledge about Yin and Yang Release was hard to find in Konoha's publicly available materials. Most Ninjas didn't even have any concept of it. He had pieced it together from what he knew about the Naruto World in his previous life.
As for the Third Stage, he already had a theory, but it was too early to talk about that. Just progressing further into the second stage was a long-term undertaking.
There was no auxiliary scroll beneath the fish on the cutting board.
It was the sort of scroll with a special Jutsu inscribed on it, the kind Haruno Sakura had placed beneath the fish while learning to heal it from Tsunade. It helped apprentices extract Medical Chakra steadily. Higashino Makoto had used one when he first started out, but he no longer needed it.
Under Higashino Makoto's treatment, the fish came back to life and began bouncing around happily. It felt as if it could take on the world again.
Then a single blow to the head ended its life.
Fish: "???"
Seriously, man, what was the point? Couldn't you just put me out of my misery?
The chicken, duck, goose, and rabbit that had met the same fate at the Higashino Family home: "Fish bro, you're right."
After eating, Higashino Makoto headed out, borrowed his mother's library card, and plunged into the Konoha Library.
The books at home were limited, but the library had a much wider selection. Lately, he usually spent his afternoons here studying Chakra.
Konoha's library had books on the subject, including the properties of Chakra of different natures, as well as the principles and analysis of various Genjutsu effects.
They were works based on the accumulated experience of those who came before.
When the little rich girl was trapped in the Infinite Tsukuyomi, she had consulted all kinds of theoretical books on Genjutsu here.
Although it had been a Genjutsu world, Tenten had known she was trapped. The fact that she'd gone straight to the library to look things up showed that the real world must have had one too, and that she'd visited it.
These were all basic theoretical texts. There weren't any Ninjutsu or Genjutsu techniques one could learn to perform. Don't expect this place to be the hidden library of Shaolin Temple, with the Nine Yang Manual tucked inside the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra.
The methods for training in any Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, or Taijutsu were closely guarded secrets of the clans and villages. To get them, you had to earn merit and trade for them, or find a powerful teacher.
Most Ninjas believed that learning powerful Ninjutsu was all it took to become a formidable Ninja. They overlooked these most fundamental theories.
That was especially true of the brats who dreamed of becoming Hokage. They thought that if they learned a few powerful Jutsu, they could become Hokage.
Higashino Makoto, however, thought these theories compiled by those who came before were the most precious things of all. As for the Jutsu, they were merely the fruit borne by the tree of that knowledge.
The time flew by as Higashino Makoto instinctively trained his second-stage Chakra Control and studied his books. Before long, the sky began to darken.
Rather than go home, Higashino Makoto wolfed down several bowls of ramen, then headed to Konoha Hospital for class.
His mother, Higashino Megumi, often worked late several nights a week.
That was because, on top of treating patients during the day, she also taught classes in the evenings, training aspiring Genin who wanted to become Medical Ninjas.
The Ninja Academy offered basic lessons in medical knowledge, but anyone who wanted to continue their studies after graduating had to sign up at the hospital and learn through a combination of study and practice. That was the approach Tsunade had proposed back then.
Build a foundation at the Academy, then let the experienced guide the newcomers at the hospital.
The classroom was in one of the hospital's conference rooms, which had been specially converted for lessons. It was much like a Ninja Academy classroom, but more compact.
There were already more than a dozen students inside. There were more girls than boys.
The classroom wasn't even full, which showed just how few people had a talent for Medical Ninjutsu. Most students had squeezed into the seats near the front. After all, anyone who came here wanted to study seriously. Nobody wanted to sit by the back windows and slack off.
The students were mostly young, but all wore Konoha Headbands. They looked like they'd graduated a year or two ago. When they saw Higashino Makoto enter, they were a little surprised by his age, but nobody said anything.
The hospital had clearly given him permission to be there.
Higashino Makoto looked around and noticed that the three-seat desk in the front row on the left had only two people sitting at it, a boy and a girl. The girl sat in the middle, and the boy on the outside.
Without hesitation, he hopped into the empty seat on the inside.
"Hey, kid, someone's sitting there."
Higashino Makoto glanced at the speaker and paused. The boy looked about ten years old, with short black hair. Besides the Headband on his forehead, he wore goggles over his face.
No way, Higashino Makoto muttered to himself. He leaned back and, sure enough, saw a large Gunbai emblem on the back of the boy's clothes.
There was no mistaking that look. It was him: Uchiha Dreamer.
Then he looked at the girl in the middle. Just as he'd expected, she had the same brown hair as his mother, and a streak of face paint on each cheek. She was cute and sweet-faced.
It was definitely Nohara Rin.
Wherever Rin went, Obito was sure to follow. What a devoted guardian—and hopeless admirer.
Obito was here to learn Medical Ninjutsu? Please. He was just afraid someone would steal his goddess away.
"Come on, Obito, don't be so mean. He's just a junior," Nohara Rin said gently, stopping her companion from being rude.
But Higashino Makoto wasn't about to let him off easy. "Am I not a person? What am I, if I'm not a person?"
"Kid, you're pretty cocky. Judging by your looks, you haven't even been to the Ninja Academy yet. You're so young—what do you know about Medical Ninjutsu?"
"And what do you know? How many kinds of blood vessels are there in the human body? How do their characteristics differ when they bleed, and how should you stop the bleeding?
"Do you know how to clean a wound from a Kunai piercing your palm? And what should you keep in mind when using the Healing Technique afterward?"
"Uh..." Obito was a complete dunce when it came to studying. He had no idea about any of that. But that wasn't a problem; he quickly found another angle. "So what if you know all that? You're too young. Who let you into this class?"
"My mom did."
"Your mom? Hah! You're making me laugh. Who's your mom, anyway? You think she can order people around at Konoha Hospital?"
"My mom's the teacher giving you this class. Her name is Higashino Megumi. I'm Higashino Makoto."
"Uh..." Obito was finally at a loss for words. He couldn't say any more. What if he offended the teacher and cost Rin her chance to study?
Whenever Nohara Rin was involved, Obito became all hesitant and awkward.
"Oh, you're Teacher Hui's son? Now that you mention it, you really do look alike," Nohara Rin said, studying the junior who seemed to know his basic medical knowledge.
"Yes, senpai. My name's Higashino Makoto. I hope you'll look after me."
"I'm Nohara Rin, and this is my teammate, Uchiha Obito. It's nice to meet you."
"Likewise. I hope we can learn from each other and become excellent Medical Ninjas." As he spoke, Higashino Makoto raised his eyebrows at Obito.
"..." Obito was absolutely furious. Not only had the kid dared to chat so familiarly with his Rin, he'd even made sure to provoke him.
He had to beat the kid up good.
But that was all he did: think about it. He wouldn't actually hit a child. Before he became consumed by darkness, Uchiha Obito had been a kind and helpful boy.
He was just a little awkward.
Before you continue