Barrier Technique: Reversed Golden Bell

Konoha Izakaya.

"Them?

They were all right. They barely made Chunin. Becoming Jōnin?

They still had a long way to go," Tobitake Tonbo responded.

Talent really determined a person's entire life!

As far as he believed, when it came to ninjutsu, aside from certain forbidden techniques, he was no worse than the Third Hokage.

Yet even after carefully summarizing his experience and teaching the three little ones, their strength could only be said to have improved fairly quickly.

They could not be called geniuses.

An ordinary Jōnin was their limit.

"You're still not satisfied? They're only fourteen and have plenty of room to grow!

Unlike me, I'm already seventeen and still just a Chunin.

I probably won't ever become a Jōnin!" Sheng Shimon sighed.

He looked at Tobitake Tonbo. Now this was a true genius.

Whether it was his own learning ability or his ability to teach others, he was outstanding in every regard.

"Enough about that. Cheers to you returning to the Analysis Division."

Clink!

The two of them happily drank.

Tobitake Tonbo was genuinely happy. This was the life a Hokage ought to have.

A wife, friends, a superior, a father, disciples...

At any rate, he did not have to worry about all that infighting among the higher-ups.

Besides, the Analysis Division did not have much to do, so there would not be any mutual suspicion among colleagues.

The work was simple. He only needed to read memories and report them.

The two chatted and laughed.

Until Ayame came over, grabbed him by the ear, and dragged him home.

Tobitake Tonbo's home.

"Drinking again? Do you even need to come home anymore?" Ayame stood with her arms crossed, staring at him seriously.

Tobitake Tonbo said, "Haha, communication between colleagues is still necessary."

For some reason, Ayame's personality had subtly changed after they got married.

In some ways, she was no longer simply a girl, but the mother of the household.

And unlike other wives, whose personalities remained unchanged after marriage, Ayame seemed to have been influenced by him and had grown increasingly different from everyone else.

Just then, Ayame's face flushed slightly.

"Tonbo, we're still doing something immoral tonight."

"Something immoral?"

Tobitake Tonbo looked at her slightly tipsy face and immediately understood.

Honestly, if she wanted a child, she could just say so!

For a time, beneath the sheets, they continued their bloodline.

Training Ground No. 98.

Whoosh, whoosh!

Kunai split into six poles and were embedded at special positions throughout the training ground.

Trees, rivers, the ground...

"Barrier Technique: Reversed Golden Bell."

Tobitake Tonbo formed hand seals, more than a hundred of them.

Chakra surged out from within him. The tags tied to the kunai in the six directions began reacting to one another.

An enormous golden bell enveloped Training Ground No. 98.

When he formed the final seal, the golden bell inverted.

Without a sound, the entire training ground vanished, leaving only a vast stretch of empty land.

Birds hidden in distant trees widened their eyes at the place that had suddenly disappeared.

Screech! Screech!

After crying out a few times, they flew away with a flock of other birds, leaving behind several clumps of droppings.

Beneath the ground, an illusory golden bell took shape.

A golden bell that only Tobitake Tonbo could see.

Inside the bell was the entirety of Training Ground No. 98. The mountains, rivers, and forests were all within it, completely undamaged.

"After more than two years, this Barrier Technique is finally complete!"

Tobitake Tonbo sensed his surroundings and his own sensations.

There was no difference from before. He was still standing in the middle of the training ground. The river was still there, and the trees were still growing perfectly well.

Only the area covered by the barrier had a boundary.

Other than that boundary, nothing seemed to have changed. The sun was still overhead, and the water still flowed slowly.

From outside the barrier, however, there was only a flat expanse of land.

This was the ninjutsu he had painstakingly developed through sealing techniques and barriers to protect his family against Pain's ultimate attack.

It was a spatial barrier. Without special abilities, it was impossible to attack the inside from outside. As for spatial ninjutsu like Flying Thunder God and Kamui, whether they could enter still needed to be tested.

Kamui was probably impossible, since it had no coordinates.

As for Flying Thunder God, it should be able to enter if there were coordinates.

But how many people could actually manage that?

There was only one drawback. The barrier he could create was only this large. To set it up across all of Konoha, he would need the approval of the Hokage and those two old geezers.

The Third Hokage would not do. He was too indecisive. He would have to wait until Tsunade took office before arranging it.

"The disturbance just now came from here."

As he pondered, a voice reached his ears.

Three figures approached from afar.

Looking at the empty land, all of them were stunned.

Such a huge training ground had actually disappeared.

Yet the bare land told them this was not an illusion.

"The Uchiha Military Police Force?" Tobitake Tonbo thought.

He wondered whether the Sharingan's perception could see through it.

Shisui Uchiha rubbed the soil between his fingers, then swept his gaze around the area.

"What's going on? Was someone practicing ninjutsu?" one Uchiha asked.

"From the looks of it, it seems someone used an enormous Earth Release to level this whole area?" another Uchiha said in confusion.

Shisui Uchiha said, "No. It wasn't ninjutsu."

The Sharingan opened.

His eyes widened sharply, and Three-Tomoe Sharingan appeared in them.

He observed everything within the training ground.

He wanted to find more clues in the surroundings.

The more he looked, the deeper his frown became. At the boundary of the flat land, the river seemed to enter another space the moment it reached the plain, then emerge again from another side of it.

Shisui came to the boundary of the plain, wanting to see how the water passed through.

He found that it was as though a river had always existed ahead of him, still flowing normally.

"Genjutsu?"

Shisui had faith in his Sharingan and could not believe this was Genjutsu.

Still, he tried it, disrupting the chakra within his body.

Nothing changed.

The other two Uchiha did the same.

"What exactly is going on?"

The three gathered together, all frowning in silence.

"Could spies be attacking? But why make such a huge disturbance?"

The startled birds earlier were enough for ninjas to judge many things. Something must have happened here just now.

They were deeply puzzled by this.

Shisui Uchiha made a prompt decision. "Return and report this to Lord Hokage."

"Why report it to Lord Hokage? Patrolling Konoha is clearly the Military Police Force's responsibility," one Uchiha said.

To them, something like this should be investigated by the Uchiha.

"Uchiha matters are also village matters," Shisui Uchiha said gravely.

The clan members were becoming increasingly radical.

He sensed the actions and words of those around him. Every movement and every sentence revealed dissatisfaction toward the Hokage, and it made him deeply sorrowful.

"Tonbo, I brought your lunch!" Ayame carried a lunchbox as she walked toward the training ground.

What greeted her eyes were three fierce-looking Uchiha, while the familiar surroundings she knew were gone, flattened into level ground.

The smile vanished from her face. Tears welled up in her eyes as she looked at the three of them. "You're from the Military Police Force. Where is my husband?"

A bad feeling rose in her heart. Tobitake Tonbo had not been arrested by the Military Police Force, had he? Her husband had said he was researching some kind of ninjutsu.

As she thought of this, tears streamed down her face.