Rinto had spent four full days holed up in the underground laboratory.
Three chakra lamps burned day and night. The stone table was piled high with ruined draft paper, covered in densely packed anchor structures and corrections. He had worn through nearly half a box of charcoal pencils. Charcoal dust and iron filings clung to the cuts on his fingertips, and new scratches appeared before the old ones healed. Yet he seemed not to feel a thing, his pencil racing across the paper while he muttered nonstop.
"Fuck, the anchors are dispersing too fast. The moment the chakra leaks, the whole structure collapses."
"Uzushio's locking anchors are inscribed into sealing arrays. How do I stabilize them if I build them directly inside flowing chakra?"
"Rotational nesting? Right, use the Eight Trigrams Seal's rotational logic. Let the anchors rotate with the chakra flow, and they won't scatter."
Over those four days, he had barely closed his eyes. When hungry, he took a couple of bites of dry flatbread; when thirsty, he gulped cold water. His entire mind was buried in that half-volume of the Complete Record of Uzushio Sealing Jutsu and that insane idea—discarding ninja-tool vessels and using chakra directly to build dynamic configurations in the air, achieving Barehanded Jutsu Casting.
For more than a decade, all his research had been based on "vessels." Whether starfall iron or crystal jade, he always needed a fixed medium in which to engrave anchors and patterns. Only by letting chakra follow fixed channels could he switch and fuse its natures. But the Land of Whirlpools' Sealing Jutsu had taught him that chakra itself was the best vessel.
If Sealing Jutsu could inscribe chakra anchors in the air, on the ground, and even inside human bodies, why couldn't he build dynamically reconfiguring structures directly out of chakra? No engraving patterns beforehand, no preparing vessels. With a thought, chakra could follow preset logic and instantly construct anchors, fuse natures, and release ninjutsu, giving him even greater freedom than an innate Kekkei Genkai.
But understanding the theory was one thing. Putting it into practice was harder than reaching the heavens.
Anchors fixed in iron were static. Engrave them accurately, and they would stay in order. Anchors inside flowing chakra, however, were alive. The slightest carelessness, the slightest disruption in the chakra flow, and they fell apart. At best, the ninjutsu collapsed. At worst, chakra backlash would blast him.
He had tried countless times.
The first time he tried a Wind Release blade, the anchors failed to stabilize just as the chakra gathered. The wind blade exploded at his fingertips, leaving them numb and making him curse for ages.
The second time, he tried Ice Release fusion. He injected both water and wind chakra, but the fusion anchors failed to lock. The two kinds of chakra collided, splashing icy water all over him and making him shiver.
The most dangerous attempt was a simplified version of Dust Release. He built the deconstruction anchors, but everything went wrong during reconstruction. Translucent white light nearly exploded at his fingertips. He forcibly dispersed the chakra, yet the residual shock still numbed his arm and burned a patch of blisters into his palm.
"Damn it, it's still the locking." He crumpled the ruined paper into a ball and tossed it aside, staring at the Uzushio rotational anchor structure drawn on the paper. His eyes were red and bloodshot from sleeplessness, but he felt no drowsiness at all. The Land of Whirlpools' Sealing Jutsu inscribed anchors onto a fixed medium, then powered them with chakra. What he wanted was to generate anchors directly from chakra, dispensing with the medium entirely. It was like building a tower out of thin air, with even its foundation made of chakra.
He pulled out the yellowed record and turned to the pages on "instant-cast seals." He had handled them so often that the writing was almost smudged away. They explained that the Land of Whirlpools' Jonin could lay seals directly in the air with chakra without drawing sealing arrays beforehand. They relied on a technique called "Chakra Anchor Condensation," using their own chakra to forcibly lock flowing chakra particles into fixed anchors, then link them into an array.
"Chakra Anchor Condensation..." he murmured, his fingertips unconsciously tracing the paper. The lines in his mind suddenly connected.
He had always been thinking of building the complete anchor structure first, then injecting chakra. He had the order backward. He should use his own chakra as a guide, condense the core anchor first, then build the channels and fusion structure simultaneously along that core anchor. Wherever the chakra flowed, anchors would condense. It was like forming hand seals for Sealing Jutsu, except he did not even need the hand seals-he could construct all the "seals" directly with chakra.
Once that thought clicked, everything became clear. He dropped the book and dispensed with drawing on draft paper. Standing before the rock wall at the back of the laboratory, he took a deep breath and closed his eyes, breaking down the entire Wind Release blade configuration in his mind, down to every anchor and every strand of chakra's path.
The next second, he opened his eyes and raised his fingertips. Chakra slowly surged out. Without a vessel or pre-engraved patterns, relying solely on his exquisite control of chakra anchors, he instantly condensed more than a dozen miniature anchors in the air at his fingertips. Wind-nature chakra flowed along them and compressed. A wind blade sharper and faster than the ones he had released through ninja tools instantly formed and slashed hard into the rock wall, leaving a cut whose bottom could not be seen. Even the hard basalt was sliced cleanly.
It worked.
Without a vessel or advance preparation, he had released precise Wind Release Ninjutsu bare-handed.
Rinto stared at his fingertips, stunned for two seconds. Then a startlingly brilliant light burst into his eyes. He did not stop, immediately trying Ice Release. Water- and wind-nature chakra surged out together, and fusion anchors instantly condensed at his fingertips. Bone-chilling cold spread, and a thick layer of solid ice instantly formed over the rock wall, freezing even the cracks in the stone. It flowed even more smoothly than when he used a crystal jade vessel.
The more he tried, the more excited he became. Lava Release, Explosion Release, Lightning Release, dual-nature Kekkei Genkai fusion-he could produce them at will. No hand seals, no vessels. With a thought, chakra built anchors according to the configuration and completed the nature fusion, more than twice as fast as releasing it through ninja tools.
Finally, he steadied himself, stared at the rock wall, and drew a deep breath, preparing to try the most complex one: Dust Release. Wind-, earth-, and fire-nature chakra surged from his body simultaneously. The core deconstruction anchors condensed first, followed immediately by dynamic reconstruction anchors building themselves along the chakra flow. The three chakra natures were instantly broken down into particles and precisely recombined. Translucent white light shone at his fingertips, forming a small cube that hovered steadily, without the slightest sign of losing control.
He pushed his fingertips forward, and the white light struck the rock wall. Silently, the hard basalt vanished into nothingness, leaving a smooth, even opening without a speck of dust. Compared with releasing it through a ninja tool, it consumed thirty percent less chakra and formed twice as fast. Its control was precise to the extreme, dissolving only the part he wanted to dissolve without the slightest damage to the surrounding wall.
It worked! It had finally worked!
He leaned against the rock wall and let out a long breath. All the strength drained from his body, and only then did he feel the overwhelming exhaustion and the burning, desperately hollow sensation in his stomach. After four days and nights without rest and more explosions than he could count, he had finally crossed this threshold. From a "researcher who engraved ninja tools," he had truly reached the threshold of chakra's essence.
From now on, he would no longer need to rely on vessels or worry about losing materials or destroying his ninja tools while fleeing. As long as he still had chakra, he could casually release ninjutsu of all five natures, Kekkei Genkai, and even Dust Release, a Kekkei Tōta.
He had just picked up the dry flatbread on the table and taken barely two bites when the entire underground laboratory suddenly shook violently. Stone chips rained down from overhead onto his drawings, covering a large portion of the anchor structure he had just drawn.
Rinto's brow instantly furrowed, and his temper flared.
Damn it, again?
He set down the flatbread and placed his fingertips against the stone wall. His perception spread along the anchors he had laid earlier, and he instantly grasped the situation outside.
It was not a single group that had found his door. Several forces that had intruded were fighting in the ruins, and the fighting had turned vicious. Their indiscriminate ninjutsu blasts had triggered the Land of Whirlpools' deep sealing arrays, setting off a chain reaction of rampages. Seals were erupting chaotically across the entire island, and several defensive lines he had placed in the middle layer had been blasted apart by the rampaging seals.
The cause was laughably simple.
Kabuto had brought the Sound Ninja along, intending to use his knowledge of Sealing Jutsu to sneak around toward the laboratory. Instead, he had run into Root's pursuit squad near the palace ruins. The two sides were already enemies. Danzo and Orochimaru had fought openly and covertly for years, and their men began fighting the moment they met.
Root's men had brought large quantities of sealing tags and explosive ninja tools. To force Kabuto into the open, they used large-scale Earth Release to blast apart half the palace ruins. As luck would have it, they hit the core of a massive sealing array buried underground by the Land of Whirlpools. It was a seal left behind to perish with the nation when the Land of Whirlpools fell—a Martyrdom Sealing. The moment it was triggered, it set off a chain reaction, activating every surviving seal for miles around.
For a time, the entire ruin was filled with purple light from erupting seals, turbulent currents of distorted space, chakra-draining suppression arrays, and explosive seals that sent rubble flying. It was utter chaos. Kabuto and the Sound Ninja dodged quickly, but three Root operatives were caught directly in the blasts. The survivors frantically dismantled seals, only to make things worse, expanding the rampaging area farther and farther.
The Iwagakure and Kirigakure shinobi hiding in the shadows were swept into the rampage as well, too busy saving themselves to do anything else. A few unlucky ones were swept away by spatial seals without even a fragment of bone remaining.
What infuriated Rinto even more was that the violent tremor just now had come from an out-of-control explosive seal detonating less than five hundred meters from the laboratory. Not only had it shattered several of his defensive lines, it had shaken the underground laboratory's structure. Even the books on the stone table had slid from the shock and nearly fallen to the floor.
These people had not only pursued him to his own territory, but were setting off random explosions on his doorstep, triggering a seal rampage, nearly ruining his drawings and books, and delaying his research.
Rinto's face was icy, and he could not suppress the anger in his eyes. Originally, he had not cared whether these people lived or died. They could fight however they liked and die however they liked, so long as they did not bother him. But now these lunatics had blasted trouble right onto his doorstep. If he did nothing, the rampaging seals would engulf his entire underground laboratory.
He casually brushed the charcoal dust from his clothes, carefully locked the half-volume of the record inside a stone cabinet, and checked that all his core drawings were put away before turning to leave. The stone door opened and closed again. His steps were not fast, but with every footfall, the rampaging chakra around him seemed pressed down by an invisible hand. Even the stray aftershocks of seals drifting through the air dispersed instantly.
By then, the palace ruins had become a chaotic hell.
Purple sealing patterns glowed across the broken walls. Rubble and turbulent currents of distorted space flew everywhere. Root's men were trapped in a patch of ruins by seals, their captain frantically hacking at the sealing arrays and cursing nonstop. Nearly half his men had fallen. Kabuto and the Sound Ninja hid behind a broken tower, dismantling approaching seals while watching coldly, waiting to reap the spoils. But the rampaging seals kept spreading, and they were about to be swept in as well.
Two Iwagakure ninja were trapped by paralysis seals, struggling desperately. Two of the Kirigakure shinobi had simply fled, while the rest were withdrawing toward the edge of the island, not daring to venture any farther in.
Just as Root's captain finally managed to slash open a seal and was about to lead his men out, he suddenly felt a bone-chilling gaze settle on them.
Rinto stood on a broken wall nearby, his black cloak snapping in the wind. His face showed little expression, but the coldness in his eyes made everyone present shudder. He held no ninja tool or engraving knife, simply standing there empty-handed, barely revealing any chakra fluctuations. Yet whenever the rampaging sealing patterns came within three meters of him, they instantly dimmed, as though afraid of him.
"Rinto!" The Root captain's eyes instantly reddened. Forgetting the seals, he gave a hand signal, and the remaining ninja immediately moved to surround him. "Seize him! Lord Danzo's orders were to bring him back alive, or bring back his corpse!"
The Root ninja were just about to charge when Rinto, without even lifting his eyelids, lightly raised his fingertips. There was barely a sign of chakra stirring before more than a dozen Lightning Release blades instantly condensed in the air. So fast that only a streak of lightning remained, they struck the kunai and sealing tags in the ninja's hands with pinpoint accuracy.
Several sharp cracks rang out. Every kunai snapped, and the sealing tags exploded into scraps of paper. The ninja convulsed from the numbing lightning, their hand seals instantly falling apart.
"I don't care how you fight or how you die." Rinto's voice was level, yet carried irrepressible anger as he spoke each word. "Get off this island. If you dare set off random explosions here and disturb me again, next time it won't be your kunai I cut."
"Don't get too arrogant, Rinto!" The Root captain gritted his teeth, already halfway through his hand seals. "You think we're afraid just because you can fire off Dust Release at will? Today we brought a sealing array specifically designed to counter you. Even if you can cast ninjutsu bare-handed, don't think-"
His words abruptly stopped before he could finish.
Rinto could not be bothered to listen to his nonsense. His fingertips shifted slightly, and three chakra natures instantly surged out. Deconstruction and reconstruction anchors condensed directly in the air, and translucent white Dust Release light instantly formed. It was not aimed at the men, but at the rampaging sealing arrays behind them.
The white light swept past. The violently erupting sealing arrays, along with the rubble and broken walls beneath them, silently vanished into nothingness. Even the seal cores in that area were stripped away completely, and a broad swath of rampaging chakra instantly settled.
The entire ruin fell silent.
Everyone was dumbfounded.
Casting Dust Release at will was one thing, but using it to dismantle sealing arrays?! Those were high-level sealing arrays left by the Land of Whirlpools. Even a professional Sealing Squad would take ages to dismantle them, yet he had casually dissolved the seals and the stones together with a single Dust Release?
The Root captain's face was white as paper, and his hands trembled in the middle of forming seals. He had thought that however powerful Rinto was, he still needed ninja tools to release Kekkei Genkai and Dust Release. But he had seen that attack perfectly clearly. No vessel, no hand seals-just precise Dust Release released at will. This was already beyond his understanding of ninja.
Behind the broken tower, Kabuto's smile vanished as well, and his golden pupils contracted. He was more shocked than anyone. Having followed Rinto for two years, he knew better than anyone that Rinto's research had always relied on ninja-tool vessels. How long had it been, and he could already achieve Barehanded Jutsu Casting? He could even release Kekkei Tōta at will. This man's rate of growth was terrifying.
Ignoring their shocked looks, Rinto swept his gaze over everyone and said coldly, "I'll say it one more time. Get out."
The Root captain gritted his teeth. Looking at his few remaining subordinates, then at Rinto's casual demeanor and his ability to take lives with a flick of his hand, he finally felt afraid. However important Danzo's orders were, he had to be alive to carry them out. Against a monster who could release Dust Release at will, their handful of men would not even be enough for one beam of white light to dissolve.
"Retreat!" he forced through clenched teeth. Taking his remaining men, he fled toward the edge of the island, stumbling and scrambling, not even daring to retrieve their fallen ninja tools.
Rinto's gaze turned to Kabuto behind the broken tower. Kabuto hurried out with a cautious smile plastered on his face, hastily waving his hands. "Mr. Rinto, we had no intention of disturbing you. We were merely caught up in this. We're leaving now, right now."
He knew Rinto's temper all too well. Cross his bottom line, and he would attack even Orochimaru's people without hesitation. Kabuto hurriedly led the remaining Sound Ninja toward the shore, not daring to linger for a moment or even cast another glance toward the laboratory.
The remaining Iwagakure and Kirigakure shinobi had long since been scared out of their wits. While Rinto was not looking, they had already slipped away without a trace.
In less than ten minutes, the ruins that had just been utter chaos were empty. Only rubble, decaying white bones, and scattered sealing patterns that had not fully settled remained.
Rinto did not pursue those who fled. He had no interest in exterminating them. As long as they left the island and stopped bothering him, that was enough. Frowning at the sealing arrays still erupting sporadically around him, he found them a nuisance and swept beams of white light from his fingertips, dissolving every out-of-control seal along with its core.
His method of dismantling seals was even more brutal than that of the Land of Whirlpools' sealing masters. Whatever their structure or logic, he simply used Dust Release to strip away anchors and vessels together, ending the problem for good. In less than half an hour, he had forcibly quelled the seal rampage throughout the island's central region.
Only once everything settled did he turn back toward the underground laboratory, anger still lingering on his face as he cursed. "Damn lunatics. Wasted half my day. I'd only just crossed that threshold, and they interrupted my train of thought."
Back in the laboratory, he first checked the books and drawings. Only after confirming that nothing had been damaged did he breathe a sigh of relief. He replaced everything the tremors had knocked loose, swept the stone chips off the table, and sat back down on the stone stool.
While casting Dust Release bare-handed just now, he had discovered another problem. Chakra Anchor Condensation was still a little too slow. When condensing anchors for three natures simultaneously, there was still a timing discrepancy of one ten-thousandth of a second. Although it did not affect the release, against a faster opponent, that delay would be an opening. Moreover, chakra consumption was still somewhat high. Prolonged use demanded too much chakra for ordinary ninja to manage.
He picked up his charcoal pencil and was just about to draw a new optimization plan when he suddenly paused.
The commotion this time had been too great. Konoha, Orochimaru, Iwagakure, and Kirigakure all knew he was in the Land of Whirlpools, and now knew he could release Dust Release bare-handed. Even if he had driven these people away, more and stronger people would only come afterward. Even Kage-level figures might come in person.
The Land of Whirlpools might not remain peaceful for long either.
But he had no intention of leaving. There were sealing texts here he had yet to finish reading, a secure underground laboratory, and the layers of defenses he had laid. Even if more people came, he was confident he could drive them away. At worst, he would modify every seal on the island and turn it into a forbidden zone where anyone who came would die. Then he would see who still dared disturb him.
As for the ninja villages' schemes and the threats posed by Kage-level figures, he did not take them to heart at all.
He could even cast Kekkei Tōta bare-handed. So long as it let him research in peace, he would dissolve anyone who came to cause trouble.
Rinto shook the stray thoughts from his head, cast all those troublesome threats aside, and returned his attention to the anchor structure on the paper. Outside, night had fallen again. The chakra lamp illuminated the side of his face, and his eyes held nothing but densely packed lines. Driving away several groups and quelling the seal rampage mattered less than the half-finished optimization drawing in his hands.
Only one thing filled his mind now: how to increase anchor condensation speed, how to reduce chakra consumption, and even whether he could turn this Barehanded Jutsu Casting configuration into a reproducible structure that ordinary ninja could learn.
As for those who kept pursuing him, if they dared set foot on this island again and delay his research, he would not mind showing them what true despair meant.