"Brat, do you want power?"
The Nine-Tails could tell that Naruto wanted it, no matter what he said. Its chakra began seeping out through the bars.
It gathered around Naruto, and soon a Tailed Beast Cloak enveloped his body.
At the same time, the Six Thief Immortals inside him began to digest the Nine-Tails' power with all their might.
"Keep it coming, Nine-Tails."
The newly formed Tailed Beast Cloak slowly faded away. Feeling the abundant power in his body, Naruto couldn't help wanting more and taunted the beast.
The Nine-Tails was furious. If there was one thing he never lacked, it was chakra. Even if he used it all up, he could replenish it by absorbing Natural Energy.
Chakra poured out again, and this time, three tails appeared. Naruto's body in the outside world also began emitting chakra, but fortunately, the Six Thief Immortals quickly went into overdrive. The chakra disappeared, but Naruto's body puffed up as if it had been inflated.
In his mental space, Naruto frowned. He hadn't expected the chakra to be even more powerful than he'd thought.
"Nine-Tails, I'll come see you again next time."
Naruto didn't dare linger and quickly vanished.
Watching Naruto disappear, the Nine-Tails finally reacted.
"Damn brat."
He began to wonder what had happened. Where had all that chakra gone?
The Fourth Hokage had set up the Eight Trigrams Seal to let Naruto absorb the chakra that leaked from the Nine-Tails and convert it into his own. He had truly put a lot of thought into it.
The Nine-Tails knew that, of course. But this time, the other party had absorbed so much chakra. Something about it felt wrong.
Naruto woke up and saw what he looked like. His brow furrowed at once.
"This is a problem. I wonder if I'll be back to normal by tomorrow."
If he suddenly turned into a fat guy tomorrow, people would definitely get suspicious.
That was the downside of chakra. Though this energy filled the world, humans focused on developing techniques to use it. In simple terms, they only cared about attacking. Chakra filled the body—more specifically, the flesh and meridians. Only Tsunade's clan had developed the Yin Seal, something akin to a dantian.
It was a little like cultivating immortality. Not only could it store chakra, it could also keep one young.
That was Naruto's situation. His body was full of chakra. Unlike an ordinary ninja, he didn't leak chakra outward, but he still had no idea how to solve the problem.
The Six Thief Immortals was a cultivation method centered on the internal organs. It had no way to store energy in a dantian.
"Right, the internal organs."
Naruto's eyes lit up.
The five organs, the Five Qi, the Five Deities.
He'd almost forgotten about his cheat—the Saint's Theft. He activated it with all his might and began gathering the chakra throughout his body in his five organs.
The heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys.
After who knew how long, Naruto felt his body changing.
His body returned to normal, and more importantly, his senses grew sharper. He also grew a little taller, and his physique became more defined.
"What a miraculous cultivation method. I wonder if I'll be able to cultivate into an immortal one day."
This small improvement made Naruto very happy. The improved Six Thief Immortals had also gained some offensive ability. His energy—in other words, chakra—could now corrode things. Since the Six Thief Immortals was based on the internal organs, digestion and absorption were the most fundamental abilities it granted.
Rubbing his chin, Naruto decided he wasn't interested in corrosion. Spitting at someone in a fight was too childish. He could use it to attack, but he still didn't know any jutsu. Absorption, on the other hand, was different.
This ability could absorb other people's chakra. The first person who came to mind was Sasuke.
"Come to think of it, if I absorb Sasuke's chakra, could I awaken the Rinnegan? If not, I could absorb his blood."
As for eating Sasuke, Naruto wasn't that crazy.
He could try it sometime, but right now, the most important thing was dealing with his current situation.
He was late getting up and, all in all, the Ninja Academy wasn't that strict. Besides, Naruto had a special status. Even if he skipped class, nobody cared.
That morning, Naruto went to school to check in, then skipped class to train.
Since Naruto had suddenly grown much quieter lately, fewer people paid attention to him. Still, his friends who genuinely cared about him noticed the change. Shikamaru had wondered about it too—Naruto seemed to have changed a lot recently.
Naruto brushed all their questions aside.
In an empty lot, Naruto began working out.
Thinking about exercise naturally made him think of a certain bald guy.
He tried a workout routine, and while it wasn't completely useless, it didn't do much. Naruto already had plenty of stamina, and with the Six Thief Immortals making him even stronger, his body had become more powerful still.
After finishing another set of push-ups, Naruto was at a loss. He barely felt anything. This wouldn't do; it wasn't working as exercise at all. He thought for a moment, then looked toward the large rocks by the river. He ran over and tried to lift one. It was a little too heavy.
He switched to one he could lift easily and kept training.
The sun sank in the west, and the day came to an end. Naruto finished his last exercise and stretched. His expression brightened a little. He had no system to show him the results of his workout, but he could feel that his body had become more agile.
As long as he could see the results, he'd have the motivation to keep going.
"Not bad. Starting today, I'm going to train my body. Keep it up!"
The results were encouraging, and Naruto gave himself a pep talk. After washing up by the river, he headed home, bringing a few fish along. Even though he was a ninja, catching a few fish was still quite difficult. He tried practicing Water Walking, but understanding the principle was one thing; putting it into practice nearly blew up the river.
With so much chakra, precise control was difficult. Even releasing a little caused a huge blast of air and a shockwave, just like the Second Hokage. Naruto was curious, of course. It seemed like that might make a decent attack, but it would waste a lot of chakra.
As the Old Celestial Master had explained, if chakra was money, then jutsu were weapons. Ordinary people turned their money into weapons and attacked with them. Naruto, unable to find a weapon, wanted to beat his opponent to death with a gold brick.
As for developing jutsu himself, he wouldn't use a Shadow Clone to test them on his own body. Naruto wasn't that stupid. Though he could recover, it wasn't time for that yet.
On the way home.
"Isn't that the fox-demon brat? I feel like I haven't seen him around lately. Maybe he's been off doing something bad."
"Must be. Look at the fish in his hands. He probably stole them from someone."
Naruto ignored the looks of disgust people gave him, but their quiet whispers made him fly into a rage. He had been walking down the middle of the road when he suddenly stopped. Head lowered, his eyes narrowed.