Main World.
Spring, Year 21 of Konoha.
British Continent.
Imperial Palace, Consort Jin's bedchamber.
Tsunade sat before her dressing table, holding a wooden comb and slowly combing her long golden hair. In the mirror, her face still bore the flush of her recent training, and the fine sweat at her temples had not quite dried. Her Quake Release training had reached a bottleneck-Peak Kage strength was enough to let her do as she pleased in the Shinobi World, but within this unfathomable Imperial Palace, she always felt it was not enough. Toyotomi Yinglang pushed open the door and walked in, carrying a cup of hot tea.
"Finished training?" He set the teacup on the dressing table.
"Yes." Tsunade put down her wooden comb, took the cup, and sipped. "I've completely mastered Quake Release's 'Mountain-Crushing Fist,' and 'Sea Splitter' is nearly there too. But 'World-Breaking' is still a little short-I can never quite get the frequency of the vibrations that penetrate barriers right."
"World-Breaking requires perception of a barrier's energy structure, not brute force." Toyotomi Yinglang sat beside her. "You've only just begun learning Color of Observation, so naturally you can't perceive a barrier's energy nodes. Once you train Mind's Eye Style to its intermediate stage, 'Mind Perception,' World-Breaking will come naturally."
Tsunade nodded and took another sip of tea. "You didn't come to see me today just to give me training pointers, did you?"
"Of course not." A faint smile curled Toyotomi Yinglang's lips. "Big Tsunade, are Devil Fruits powerful?"
Tsunade paused. Of course she had heard of Devil Fruits-the Empire's biggest recent undertaking had been planting that Devil Fruit tree in the Heavenly Court. Zoan, Paramecia, Logia, Ancient Zoan, Mythical Zoan... all sorts of stories had already spread through the palace. But she had yet to see for herself