Of course Hyuga Hoshishaku knew who Sai was from reading the original story.
Team 7's backup, Sasuke's substitute, a poor soul raised in Root from childhood. He was one of the survivors after Danzo copied the Bloody Mist Village's methods and forced a pair of brothers to kill each other.
He was a pretty tragic character. If he hadn't eventually married Ino and become the police chief, turning his life around, Hoshishaku would have felt sorry for him.
But the system said he was actually a jōnin?
Hoshishaku figured the kid only knew Super Beast Imitating Drawing and ink-based secret techniques. At best, he should have been a Special Jōnin. How had he become a jōnin?
Even with "Ninja World War" in front of the title, surely that wasn't enough to make him a jōnin?
At that moment, memories of Sai's training began to merge with his own.
Gradually, the contempt he'd felt vanished.
Sai might not have been a powerful jōnin.
But his versatility was off the charts.
His secret technique, Super Beast Imitating Drawing, was a Yin Release Chakra nature transformation technique—a weakened version of "manifesting the imaginary."
He could bring his drawings to life.
By imbuing the creatures in his paintings with Yin Release Chakra, he could give them a brief life and make them appear vivid and lifelike.
He could also draw anything he imagined, then summon it into the real world, where it would automatically fill out into a complete, three-dimensional object.
Hoshishaku had now gained the training memories for several of Sai's main techniques.
His primary technique was Secret Technique: Super Beast Imitating Drawing.
Those memories included the ink creatures Sai often drew: Ink Bird Hawk Hunt, Ink Lion Armor Collection, Ink Serpent Kusama Snake, the rideable Cloud Bird, and the Fujin Raijin A-Un Fist, among others.
There were also basic techniques from the Ink Series, including the Ink Mist Technique for confusing enemies, Ink Substitution, an advanced version of Substitution Technique, and Ink Torrent, a simple, brute-force technique that hurled massive ink bricks.
The most powerful was a combination technique: Sealing Technique: Tiger Staring Down.
It was a combination ninjutsu that brought together a Sealing Technique and a secret technique.
The user could draw a tiger on a Sealing Scroll, then use a secret technique to make it leap off the scroll and transform into a giant ink tiger that chased down the enemy. Once it sank its teeth into them, it would drag them into the Sealing Scroll and seal them away for good.
Of course, in the original story, Sai had used this technique to try and drag in Uchiha Madara while he was in his Impure World Reincarnation state, but it hadn't worked.
That showed that this thing was useless against enemies on too high a level.
He just didn't know whether, if he managed to maintain Sage Mode in the future and replaced the chakra powering his techniques with Natural Energy, turning all his ninjutsu into senjutsu, their power would increase enough to let him seal someone above his level.
As Hoshishaku felt the memories associated with these abilities, he let out a regretful sigh.
After getting the C-rank and B-rank cards, he'd already formed a theory.
Now that he'd obtained an A-rank card belonging to a jōnin, his theory had been confirmed.
The ninja cards in this system seemed to grant only a ninja's techniques and corresponding physical attributes—not anything else.
Take Sai, for example. If Hoshishaku only got his techniques and physical attributes, then at most he could become a Special Jōnin.
That was because he hadn't gained Sai's combat instincts, such as which move to use against different kinds of enemy attacks.
Nor had he gained Sai's physical conditioning—the strength, reflexes, and overall physical toughness built up through years of training, which weren't shown on the system panel.
These overall attributes and combat experience were also essential parts of a ninja's strength.
He hadn't noticed the problem when he got the C-rank card, purely because a Genin didn't have much combat experience to begin with.
The B-rank card, Ajisai, hadn't given him any combat experience either. He'd gotten lucky and assumed it was normal for a support ninja not to have much experience fighting.
Now his theory had been confirmed.
Even after gaining the abilities of several ninjas, his overall strength still wouldn't exceed that of a Special Jōnin.
After all, he knew next to nothing about being a ninja.
For that matter, if he didn't activate his Byakugan, he might wander into an Explosive Tag in the wilderness and lose his life.
He was basically a glass cannon—some strength, but it didn't count if he couldn't land a hit, and one knock would shatter him.
Looks like I can't go on lazing around after gaining ninja abilities.
Instead, I'll have to practice them properly and use them in all kinds of battles to build real-world experience and bring all my abilities together.
After spending over half an hour reviewing his situation, Hoshishaku opened the System Panel.
Sai's jōnin-level strength had given him a considerable boost in chakra.
The increase was enough for him to feel a noticeable difference in his body.
[Name: Hyuga Hoshishaku] [Life Force: 760 (+95)] [Spiritual Energy: 690 (+300)] [Chakra: 20050 (32000)] [Techniques: Natural Energy Body Tempering Technique, Gentle Fist Series, Summoning Technique, Sealing Technique, Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu, Lightning Style: Chidori, Multi Shadow Clone Technique, Rasengan, Secret Technique: Super Beast Imitating Drawing, Secret Technique: Ink Series Ninjutsu] [Special Abilities: Byakugan (Second Evolution: 40%), Space-Time Talent, Lightning Style Chakra Shape Transformation, Yin Style Chakra Nature Transformation] [Secret Scroll: Rebirth (Unlocked: 2/10)]
Looking at his attribute panel,
Hoshishaku exhaled.
His chakra was now at the standard jōnin level.
With a little over 50,000 chakra, he was among the more talented jōnin.
He'd also gained Yin Style Chakra Nature Transformation in the Special Abilities section, which was a welcome surprise.
But his growing number of abilities was making his combat style a mess.
And he'd have to find a way to explain how he'd acquired them, one step at a time.
As far as he knew, Super Beast Imitating Drawing was a technique Sai had developed himself, so Hoshishaku could easily pass it off as his own creation and use it openly.
As for the other techniques, there'd be no problem explaining them either, except that he'd need to go to Teacher Tobirama and pretend to learn Multi Shadow Clone Technique.
So what he had to do next was train his body until his physical attributes beyond what the panel showed were sufficient to use these techniques.
Then he had to train his combat instincts, build up experience, and master his current abilities as quickly as possible, preparing for the ones he'd gain in the future.
That way, it wouldn't be long before he truly had the strength of a jōnin.
Two more months passed.
Summer had arrived.
Hoshishaku had finished learning all the prerequisite Sealing Techniques for the Flying Thunder God Technique.
Now he'd begun learning the Flying Thunder God Technique itself.
But his routine was still the same as before: he learned at the Senju Clan Grounds.
Yuto had also come along for the fun and was learning the Flying Thunder God Technique with him.
Hoshishaku figured the kid had come to study the Flying Thunder God Technique because he didn't have many friends besides him.
In fact, even the reason his lessons were being held at the Senju Clan Grounds was that Yuto had pulled some strings.
It was pretty nice, though. Senju Tobirama doted on his nephew without any principles whatsoever.
Hoshishaku guessed it was because the boy had nearly died as an infant, and Tobirama had raised him by his side since he was little.
Besides studying the Flying Thunder God Technique, Hoshishaku had also been practicing Sai's secret techniques.
In two months, he couldn't claim to have mastered the full power of both secret techniques.
But he wasn't far behind Sai. The only real gaps were combat experience and physical conditioning.
And today, after finishing his Flying Thunder God Technique lesson, he took Yuto—who could now stand—up into the sky with him.
Before you continue