Thunder Roar

After watching his father's demonstration, he excitedly imitated the process, closed his eyes, and anticipated extracting chakra from his body—but after a long while, nothing happened.

He opened his eyes in confusion, looking at his father as if to ask, "Are you messing with me?"

"I told you, extracting chakra for the first time is a bit tricky. You need to calm your mind, focus, and sense your body and soul. Only by glimpsing traces of physical energy and spiritual energy can you begin extracting chakra."

Though extracting chakra is a basic ninja skill, not everyone can do it. Moreover, the amount of chakra each person can extract varies, which further weeds people out.

Just this chakra requirement alone eliminates many youths who dream of becoming ninjas. Only those who successfully extract chakra and have enough potential in chakra volume to release jutsu can be considered candidates for becoming ninjas.

As for how many children ultimately become ninjas, just look at the number of genin graduating from the Ninja Academy each year.

But!

His son was bound to have the talent to become a ninja. He was certain of that.

Calming his excited emotions, Kaede sat steadily on the ground, emptying his thoughts and attuning to his body. In the midst of this, a mischievous flow of energy seemed to brush past his eyes.

Like a single drop of water falling onto a still lake, it stirred a long, rippling wave.

"There you are."

He formed hand seals at the right moment and began extracting chakra.

This time, it went smoothly. A strand of physical energy drawn from his body merged with a strand of spiritual energy from his soul, and Kaede's first chakra was refined.

"Hmm... This is..."

Mingye saw a coat of lightning-natured chakra suddenly envelop Kaede's body, its highly destructive energy crackling across the ground.

"This is a sign of awakening a Kekkei Genkai, but that's not right—Kaede's bloodline is supposed to be the Sharingan."

This unusual phenomenon, occurring when a young ninja extracts chakra for the first time, was a sign of awakening some kind of Kekkei Genkai. But now he was confused—this was indeed his son!

When Kaede refined his first chakra, he grinned in excitement, about to boast to his father about how quickly he'd done it—surely that made him a genius.

But in the dark inner world of his body, where only the faint blue glow of chakra had existed, countless pale lightning bolts suddenly burst forth from the void. A massive white bear, with crimson eyes and clad in armor, wrapped in thunder that made his soul tremble, stood before his spiritual body.

"Mortal, feel the power of the Thunder God!"

It raised its enormous bear paw and strode over to him, who seemed like a speck of dust. Opening its massive maw, it spoke, its voice as if it would tear his soul apart.

"ROAR—"

Turning into a white bolt of thunder, it circled him once before charging straight into his soul.

"Don't come near me..."

Kaede waved his arms feebly to block it—yes, feebly, because no matter how he swung his hands, he couldn't stop the white lightning from entering his soul.

"It hurts... I feel like I'm being blown up!"

He groaned in pain.

The tiny consciousness within his inner world began to swell, changing in an instant. Before long, it had expanded to half the size of the giant bear.

Cracks appeared on his soul, on the verge of collapse.

Only then did the soul stop growing and stabilize. His soul now looked like an inflated balloon, round and bloated.

"Phew..."

He breathed a sigh of relief. He'd thought he was about to explode, scared half to death.

"But what was that? That bear feels kind of familiar."

"Huh! What's this? I haven't been broken, have I? Did my brain grow a stone..."

He noticed five prismatic crystal-like gems floating in his soul's mindscape, their golden lines forming exquisite patterns, glowing with a mysterious, crystalline luster.

These things must have been left by the giant bear. He didn't know if they were dangerous, but after hesitating, he decided to test them.

After all, they were lying in his soul—if they were harmful, they'd be like a time bomb.

Hmm... Even if they were dangerous, he probably had no way to deal with it.

A wisp of consciousness touched one of the crystals. A faint ripple emanated from it, and a mysterious sensation flowed through his mind. He understood the crystal's meaning.

He touched the other four crystals with his consciousness, and they all responded.

"So that's it."

These five crystals were, more precisely, five runes.

They were the source of power for the demigod Thunder Roar Volibear, the embodiment of Runeterra's power—runes. They were the nascent forms of the Divine Body Rune, Divine Soul Rune, Thunder Rune, War Will Rune, and Nature Spirit Rune.

He had already learned the functions of the Divine Body Rune, Divine Soul Rune, and Thunder Rune. But the War Will and Nature Spirit runes were obscure and hard to grasp, as if he wasn't yet worthy of knowing their purpose—they resisted him.

As for why a certain bear would share the nascent form of its power source with him, granting him the talent of a nature spirit—well, that was a story about a bad-tempered bear who went out to fight, smashed the wrong person, and was forced by some powerful beings to make amends.

"So, little master here is a god now? Hehe, I'm grinning... I'm grinning..."

Though he only had the talent to become a nature spirit and still needed time to grow, that was enough, wasn't it?

Looking across the entire Naruto world, the only ones truly worthy of being called gods were Kaguya Otsutsuki and her family of three!

"What are you grinning about? Let me see what's going on with you."

Mingye smacked the back of Kaede's head, his face dark with an unreadable expression.

The Uchiha Clan, since ancient times, had only possessed the Sharingan as their Kekkei Genkai. Now his son had suddenly awakened some bizarre bloodline for him—if he didn't know this was his own seed, the kunai in his hand would already be sticking out of this brat's body.

With a grudge, he carefully guided his chakra into Kaede's body, trying to probe what kind of bloodline it was.

Chakra carried spiritual energy, allowing Mingye to clearly sense whether any strange bloodline had awakened in Kaede's body, but after a long while, he found nothing.

"Could I be overthinking it? This kid's just gifted, not awakening a bloodline."

Muttering to himself, he cast a brooding gaze at Kaede.

If it was just natural talent, then having such formidable lightning power right after first extracting chakra meant Kaede had tremendous potential in Lightning Release ninjutsu.

That seemed to be... maybe... just a tiny bit higher than his own talent.

Mm... probably... just... a tiny, tiny bit.

"Let's test your affinities."

Handing the Chakra Paper to Kaede, Mingye watched quietly, already foreseeing what Kaede's affinity would be.

"Channel your chakra into this Chakra Paper, and it will reveal your affinities.

Fire affinity—the paper will burn.

Wind affinity—the paper will be cut.

Lightning affinity—the paper will wrinkle.

Earth affinity—the paper will crumble.

Water affinity—the paper will get wet."

"Shwaa."

The Chakra Paper in Kaede's hand instantly crumpled together, with no further change, indicating he possessed only Lightning Release chakra as his single affinity.

"Mm. That's enough for today. You try extracting chakra for now—I need to rest."

Watching his father leave with wide-open eyes, Kaede sat cross-legged again and began refining chakra.

Like a child who had just gotten their first beloved toy, unable to put it down, he had already forgotten his father's warning to know when to stop.