If he continued using chakra to summon large amounts of water around his body after summoning the water tornado...
Then, while using chakra to maintain its defensive form, he could spread the excess water outward to attack his enemies, achieving both offense and defense.
However, that required a fairly high degree of chakra control, and Nobuhiko could not manage it yet.
After getting a feel for it, Nobuhiko dispersed his chakra and watched the spectacular sight of the water tornado dissipating.
A bold idea suddenly occurred to Nobuhiko.
Once he had enough chakra, he absolutely had to summon a water tornado dozens or even over a hundred meters tall on the battlefield, then send it crashing down like the Milky Way falling from the heavens to see whether he could clear the battlefield outright.
Before that, though, he still needed to keep practicing and first try to reduce the hand seals to three.
Unfortunately, most of the Second's notes covered ideas for developing ninjutsu. Only the advanced techniques had detailed training instructions recorded; minor C-rank ninjutsu like this did not even get a mention.
Since he had already successfully performed the ninjutsu just now, Nobuhiko did not rush through the hand seals this time.
Instead, he began forming them slowly again, sensing the flow of chakra inside his body.
After sensing it a few times, Nobuhiko gained some understanding.
The Ox seal mobilized chakra, while the Monkey, Hare, and Rat seals made it flow and gather around his body before unleashing the ninjutsu.
In other words, as his chakra control and proficiency with the ninjutsu continued to improve, one day he would be able to unleash Water Shockwave with just a single Ox seal.
It did not matter. There did not seem to be much difference between making one Ox seal and clapping his hands together. Nobuhiko felt no particular obsession with the hand-clapping part for now; he would already be quite satisfied if he could perform ninjutsu with a single seal.
The sky gradually darkened, and after unleashing Water Shockwave twice more, Nobuhiko left, thoroughly satisfied.
On the way, Nobuhiko thought that, since he had learned another ninjutsu, he would celebrate with a deluxe tonkotsu ramen.
Ichiraku Ramen.
At this point, Ōtsutsuki Ichiraku was still only a young man of around twenty.
"Nobuhiko, you're here." Teuchi greeted Nobuhiko with a smile when he saw him.
Thanks to his dad's love of Ichiraku Ramen and his habit of bringing Nobuhiko along, Nobuhiko had also built a relationship with Ōtsutsuki Ichiraku ahead of time.
Originally, he had thought he could use that connection to hide in the ramen shop when Pain invaded Konoha.
But now, Nobuhiko felt capable of exchanging a few moves with Pain when he invaded Konoha. After all, he remembered all the intel on the Six Paths of Pain.
He did not know whether he could win, but protecting Tsunade should be no problem.
"Uncle Teuchi, one large deluxe tonkotsu ramen," Nobuhiko replied.
"Coming right up. Just a moment."
Before long, Teuchi brought over a large bowl of ramen and set it before Nobuhiko.
"Time to eat."
Nobuhiko eagerly picked up his chopsticks and dug in.
He had to admit, Ichiraku Ramen really was a hundred times better than the tonkotsu ramen from his university cafeteria in his previous life.
The bowl looked packed to the brim, covered with chashu, meatballs, fatty beef...
But Nobuhiko finished it in no time. Still wanting more, he picked up the bowl and drank the broth too.
"Burp."
Finally, he was satisfied.
That hit the spot. It really hit the spot.
Just as Nobuhiko finished paying and was about to leave, he suddenly spotted two familiar faces heading toward the ramen shop.
"Raidō, Aoba," Nobuhiko greeted them.
Namiashi Raidō and Aoba Yamashiro also spotted Nobuhiko and immediately exclaimed in shock, "Nobuhiko, you're still using a shadow clone to attend school?"
Nobuhiko had been all smiles, but the corners of his mouth twitched at their words.
Damn it, I was nice enough to say hello, and you immediately bring up my embarrassing moments.
So I used up all my chakra practicing ninjutsu before, and my shadow clone disappeared with a poof in the middle of class. What's the big deal? How do you still remember that?
"No, I'm not. Don't make things up," Nobuhiko argued.
Seeing that Nobuhiko still refused to admit it, Namiashi Raidō immediately said bluntly, "You're still denying it? Aoba and I clearly saw you at school when we skipped class. We only just got here, but you've already finished eating. How do you explain that?"
Aoba Yamashiro helplessly covered his forehead.
Nobuhiko was utterly stunned by what he heard.
You skip class, and you think you have the right to criticize me for not attending?
How can you stand on the moral high ground and criticize me with such complete confidence?!
When Namiashi Raidō saw Nobuhiko fall silent, he thought Nobuhiko felt guilty and grew even more animated. "And do you know what your shadow clone does at school every day? He sleeps!"
Sleeping was one thing, but the problem was that he came first in every exam, whether practical or theoretical.
Coming first was one thing too. Maybe he was just talented.
More importantly, why did someone who slept through class all day get his reflections on the Will of Fire circulated throughout the entire school? Apparently, they had even earned praise from the Third Hokage himself.
The more Namiashi Raidō thought about it, the angrier he became. He listened attentively in class every day, never arrived late or left early... never arrived late, yet his grades were always worse than Nobuhiko's-shadow clone's.
"The heavens are unfair!" Namiashi Raidō complained, feeling wronged.
Watching him go from impassioned outrage to looking utterly aggrieved, Nobuhiko could not be bothered to argue anymore.
After all, they were classmates, and these two were the only people in his entire class Nobuhiko had heard of. He had never heard any of the others' names in the original story. Perhaps in the Third Shinobi World War, they had all...
In other words, these two might be the only classmates he had left in the future. This was war!
These two were probably the only ones in the entire class who would survive the Third Shinobi World War. No, counting himself, that made three. Nobuhiko affirmed that firmly.
"All right, all right, stop sulking. How about I treat you both to ramen today?" Nobuhiko asked, suddenly finding the pair much more agreeable. The moment Namiashi Raidō heard that, he stopped feeling wronged.
Aoba Yamashiro thanked Nobuhiko.
While waiting for their food with them, Nobuhiko asked with a sigh, "Has anything important happened at school lately? My shadow clone falls asleep as soon as he gets to school, so it's practically like I haven't been attending at all."
The corner of Aoba Yamashiro's mouth twitched.
"Nothing major that requires you to attend in person has happened yet."
Reassured by that, Nobuhiko decided to keep sending his shadow clone to school.
Then he gave him a look and left him to work it out himself.
They chatted a little more, and once the ramen arrived, Nobuhiko paid and made a carefree exit.
On his way back to the old Senju residence, Nobuhiko kept thinking about whether there were any other ways to grow stronger.
Then he realized he was truly a disgrace to transmigrators, so stupid he could be put on display.
Shadow clones!
After learning the technique from Dad last year, why did I only think of using it to attend school?
That level of wastefulness almost rivaled Tsunade walking barefoot on the ground.
At the thought of being able to use shadow clones to help him learn ninjutsu from now on, Nobuhiko felt brimming with strength once again.