New Skill: Spirit Network

Hyuga Seisen returned home and first washed his clothes, which were soaked in foul sweat, then took a comfortable hot bath.

Feeling refreshed all over, he lay on the bed and closed his eyes to rest.

The moment he closed his eyes, he found himself uncontrollably taking stock of his abilities.

The Quincy powers had given him formidable long-range capabilities.

When the enemy lacked intelligence on him, he, a mere Ninja Academy student, could even kill a chunin.

However, because his physical attributes had yet to improve, his Quincy Fusion Rate was not particularly high.

As a result, his efficiency in using Spirit Particle Gathering to form arrows was equally poor.

It consumed a great deal of energy and was slow to form them.

Therefore, Sacred Arrow could only be effective when he had the initiative.

But once he lost that initiative, things became difficult for him.

When he had killed the two bounty hunter brothers—

His first shot had instantly killed one of them.

But after he lost the initiative, he had racked his brains and set trap after trap, only to nearly perish alongside his opponent.

That result had only been possible because his opponent had lost his reason to rage.

Therefore, he estimated that his overall strength was, at best, only a little stronger than a genin.

Given his current condition, although the Stone Gate occasionally granted him its Favor—

Most of those favors were skills, offering limited improvements to his most fundamental chakra reserves and physical attributes.

No matter how many skills he had, they could only improve his all-around combat ability.

But the most fundamental pillars of a ninja's strength should come from talent, chakra reserves, aptitude, physical attributes, and the like.

Skills could only be regarded as tools for utilizing those foundations, or perhaps amplifiers.

Take the Flying Thunder God, for example.

The Flying Thunder God was indeed a groundbreaking, overwhelmingly powerful ninjutsu.

But what truly made it powerful was how perfectly it brought out Minato's talent for space-time techniques, exceptional neural reflexes, and learning ability.

Even if an ordinary person learned the Flying Thunder God, without reflexes as superb as Minato's, teleporting before an enemy would only mean delivering themselves to their death.

The three people who had learned the Flying Thunder God alongside Shiranui Genma could only use it for simple teleportation.

If there was still some room for debate with an S-rank ninjutsu like that—

Then Madara's Majestic Destroyer Flame perfectly explained what this meant:

"It isn't that the ninjutsu is weak. It's that the person is weak."

So, for a genuine increase in his hard strength, he would still have to wait for his body to gradually develop through growth and training.

Only after increasing his chakra reserves and physical attributes would he see a substantial leap forward.

"But all that takes time. How am I supposed to get through things before then?"

"The Third Shinobi World War is imminent. If I don't find my place by then, I'll just be cannon fodder."

His head ached.

"First, I'll put all the Energy Crystals I've saved lately into my Fusion Rate."

He entered his Sea of Consciousness and discovered that, including today's thirty, he had accumulated ninety Energy Crystals.

He poured all of them into his Fusion Rate at once.

The Energy Crystals were rapidly consumed, while his Fusion Rate steadily rose from 36.02%.

But when it reached 40%, it abruptly stopped.

A line of text appeared.

[Your imprint Fusion Rate has reached 40%. You have unlocked a new racial skill.]

[Spirit Network—compresses dispersed spiritual energy in the atmosphere and visualizes it in the form of ribbons or mist. It can be used to quickly locate nearby targets or track their movements.]

Spirit Network?

Wasn't that the one Uryu Ishida had used early on to show off in front of Ichigo?

He carefully sensed the details of the skill.

He discovered that, just like Sacred Arrow, because he could not sense spiritual power, the target of compression had become chakra instead.

With a thought, he activated the skill.

Around his body, numerous ribbons unfurled like blooming flower buds.

The ribbons floated and swayed in midair, some white and some blue.

He grabbed one of the closer ones.

To his surprise, it was his grandmother's presence.

Could it even sense ordinary people?

Then the blue ones must belong to ninjas.

He sensed another blue ribbon nearby. It was unexpectedly Hyuga Kaze's presence.

He reached out and caught it, only to find that it really was him. He was in the kitchen.

His father had actually returned from a mission.

He was extremely excited as he sensed one ribbon after another, identifying whom each belonged to.

Some belonged to people he knew, while others belonged to people he did not.

During this process, he discovered that the skill had another method of activation.

He could activate it within his consciousness without having to manifest it.

The range would be much smaller, though.

However, that did not make much difference for people with sensitive perception and high Spiritual Pressure.

That was also why captain-level individuals were rarely seen using Spirit Network in the later stages.

They only needed to sense things directly in their consciousness, which was much faster than manifesting it outright.

He compared it to the Byakugan's perception.

He found that using Spirit Network within his consciousness gave it a considerably smaller range than the Byakugan.

But its advantage was that it activated faster than the Byakugan. With a single thought, he could sense everything.

Once manifested, however, Spirit Network's perception was no weaker than the Byakugan's.

If he increased its output, its sensing range could even surpass the Byakugan's.

At the same time, the details they perceived each had their own strengths.

It was like visible light and invisible light; the details they used to perceive the world were different.

Thus, the worlds they revealed each emphasized different details.

"This is an excellent complement to the Byakugan's perception."

Hyuga Seisen nodded, thoroughly satisfied.

He added the last ten Energy Crystals to his Fusion Rate as well.

His Fusion Rate rose again, settling at 40.52%.

The Energy Crystals were completely exhausted.

He looked at his personal information.

Race Imprint: Quincy (Ordinary, Fusion Rate: 40.52%)

Talent Skill: Spirit Particle Gathering

Racial Skills: Sacred Arrow, Spirit Network

Crest: Innate Full Soul Power

Kekkei Genkai: Byakugan

Chakra Attributes: Water, Lightning

Energy Crystals: 0

This time, it was Spirit Network. He wondered what skill would unlock next time.

The Quincy had quite a few good things.

Hyuga Seisen was looking forward to it.

After changing into clean clothes, he decided to go outside for some fresh air.

Walking through the streets, Hyuga Seisen took in the sights of Konoha.

Before he knew it, the holiday was nearly over.

When he had first transmigrated here, he had resisted this world.

Now, he had fully integrated into it.

He discovered that Konoha's streets had a highly developed commercial sector, with every sort of industry imaginable.

It was difficult to imagine that a settlement of this scale was named under an administrative designation like "village."

As he passed an intersection—

He suddenly sensed something unusual behind him. In his perception, a gaze was fixed on him...

Hyuga Seisen continued forward without revealing anything.

With his current strength, and without activating the Byakugan—

He should not have been able to sense someone behind him.

Moreover, this was inside the village. Safety should have been guaranteed.

"Hyuga Seisen!"

A cold, steady voice devoid of emotion came from behind him.

Only then did Hyuga Seisen turn around as if he had been suddenly called, wearing a perfectly timed expression of confusion.

Sure enough, on the rooftop of a house diagonally behind him, a ninja wearing an animal mask stared down at him.

ANBU?

Or Root?

Seeing his blank expression, the other party lightly leaped down from the rooftop and landed without a sound.

"I am an ANBU-affiliated member, codename Wildcat."