A week later, in the Land of Water.
Outside a remote valley, a battle had just ended.
Enta Uchiha panted lightly as he looked at the corpse of a Kirigakure rogue ninja on the ground, his Three-Tomoe Sharingan slowly spinning.
Lin Ze stepped out of the shadows, deftly took out a blank scroll, and sealed the corpse inside.
"That makes five this week."
Enta Uchiha looked at Lin Ze, his brow slightly furrowed. "Can constantly taking Bounty Station jobs and hunting down these small fry really increase my strength? Can it help me awaken the Mangekyō?"
There was a trace of doubt and urgency in his voice.
Over the past week, Lin Ze had taken him through the border regions of the Land of Water, specifically accepting bounties on Kirigakure rogue ninja or hostile shinobi.
The process had not been easy, but most of their opponents had only been at the special jōnin level, with an occasional jōnin or two. For an Uchiha jōnin like him, they had not put him under much pressure.
What he craved was a qualitative change, a breakthrough, not this sort of quantitative accumulation.
Lin Ze put away the sealed scroll and said evenly,
"Accumulation is necessary. Combat hones your skills and familiarizes you with the feeling of being on the brink of death."
"And anger, resentment, the thirst for power... these emotions will settle and ferment through constant killing."
He paused and looked at Enta Uchiha, subtly guiding him.
"Besides, our next target won't be as simple as today's."
Enta Uchiha's gaze sharpened. "What do you mean?"
"Tomorrow, we'll encounter a Kirigakure ANBU squad."
"They're true elites."
The next day.
Near an abandoned port, Lin Ze and Enta Uchiha encountered their targets.
There were only three of them, but their matching animal masks,