One-Handed Hand Seals? The Princess of Konoha
Still, Rock Lee ended up battered and bruised every time.
"Oh, right, this is for you!"
Tenten reached into her ninja tool pouch.
She took out a storage scroll and handed it to Chiya Rikuto.
"These are the materials you listed last time. I had my family prepare all of them!"
Tenten spoke happily.
After she made up her mind to become a puppet master,
Rikuto had given her a list of expensive materials and told her to have her family gather them.
He said she could use them to make herself a real combat puppet for training when the time came.
Tenten had been looking forward to it for a long time.
In particular, after seeing the results of her training over the past few days,
even her parents, who had initially been somewhat skeptical, were very supportive of her becoming a puppet master.
That was because puppet masters generally didn't have to fight people head-on.
In fact, if they hadn't been unable to sway their precious daughter, who had cried and made a fuss about attending the Ninja Academy,
Tenten's parents wouldn't have wanted their daughter to become a ninja at all.
After all, they were among the richest people in the Land of Fire and frequently hired Konoha ninja to guard their family's merchant caravans.
Tenten's parents knew all too well how dangerous the profession of a ninja was.
"Oh? That fast?"
Rikuto raised an eyebrow.
But he wasn't particularly surprised.
After all, he knew perfectly well that this little rich girl was never short of money.
Her family also ran a weapons shop, so resources of this kind were the last thing they lacked.
"Then wait for my good news!"
He smiled and nodded.
Without standing on ceremony, he put the storage scroll away.
He had finished the puppet's design long ago and had just been waiting for the materials to arrive.
Rikuto waved to Tenten and leaped lightly into the air.
He jumped from the rooftop to a nearby tree and headed straight for the training ground. "I'm off! Rock Lee and Neji are still waiting for me!"
[P.S.: Here's a picture to test everyone →_→ Anyone who recognizes them all needs to be locked in a little black room.]
Chapter 13: One-Handed Hand Seals? The Princess of Konoha [Fourth update, please support]
"Bang... bang..."
On the spacious training ground,
Rock Lee, covered in injuries, let out a scream.
A palm strike sent him flying, and he landed in a heap.
Across from him, a boy in training clothes with stark white eyes stood proudly.
"It's no use, Rock Lee..."
Looking down at Rock Lee, whom he had easily defeated, Neji Hyuga said indifferently, "No matter how many times you come at me, you'll never be my match!"
"The gap between a dead last and a genius can't be bridged by a couple of impassioned slogans!"
"Damn it, I won't give up, Neji..."
Rock Lee lay there, battered and bruised, his fists clenched in unwillingness.
But he wasn't discouraged.
Instead, he looked at the haughty Neji Hyuga with determination and shouted, "One day, I'll prove that hard work can defeat genius!"
"Neji, you went too far..."
Rikuto, who had long since guessed the outcome and was used to seeing it, walked over.
Looking at the battered, injured Rock Lee, he said helplessly, "Rock Lee is our classmate, after all!"
Neji was unmoved and snorted. "He brought it on himself!"
Anyone would be annoyed at being challenged every few days.
The ever-proud Neji Hyuga was naturally no exception.
He wasn't the other boy's whetstone.
If Rock Lee wanted to challenge him, he had to be prepared to suffer for it.
At least, Neji felt he had already held back enough and had only made him suffer a little.
If he had gotten serious and used Gentle Fist techniques,
Rock Lee would have suffered more than superficial injuries.
"Rock Lee, you're being too reckless..."
Rikuto didn't think Neji had gone too far.
He raised his right hand before his chest and calmly formed hand seals with one hand.
A soft green light emerged from his palm as he pressed it against Rock Lee.
He treated the external injuries Rock Lee had just sustained challenging Neji, along with those he had inevitably picked up in his daily training.
Looking at Rock Lee, who lay there in a sorry state but was otherwise fine, he warned him again, "You need to balance training with rest. Pushing your body relentlessly will only backfire, and you might even end up covered in injuries and ailments!"
"One-Handed Hand Seals?"
Neji Hyuga was somewhat shocked at the sight.
Coming from a distinguished clan, he understood far better than Rock Lee what One-Handed Hand Seals meant.
After countless rounds of training, some powerful Jonin could simplify the hand seals for low-level, basic Ninjutsu like the Three Basic Techniques, but even they couldn't necessarily perform them with one hand.
What's more, the Mystical Palm Technique was an A-rank Medical Ninjutsu, not something the ordinary Three Basic Techniques could compare to.
"Rikuto, you can already do this?"
He truly hadn't expected it.
Chiya Rikuto could even do something like this.
That meant he could perform even advanced Ninjutsu with one hand.
In a fight, it was as though he had one more hand than his opponent.
Especially when locked in a stalemate with a target, he could catch them off guard by suddenly performing Ninjutsu with one hand, making it impossible to defend against.
But then he thought of Rikuto's absurdly refined Chakra control, which left others far behind.
That made it somewhat easier to understand.
"Yeah, after constant training, I can just barely manage it!"
Rikuto shrugged.
There was no trace of pride on his face.
In fact, with his precise control over Chakra,
he could use the Mystical Palm Technique at this level without forming hand seals at all.
He simply didn't want to appear quite so monstrous.
"That's amazing!"
"Unbelievable..."
Both Rock Lee and Neji
couldn't help looking at Rikuto in amazement.
But just then, Rikuto raised an eyebrow.
As if sensing something, he looked in the direction of the Konoha Gate.
"Hm?" He had sensed a fairly powerful Chakra suddenly appear there.
Clearly, it wasn't an invasion.
The person had entered openly through the gate.
"That Chakra feels strangely familiar, but also very unfamiliar..."
Rikuto was astonished.
His eyes flickered thoughtfully.
"Could it be..."
Meanwhile...
At the Hokage building,
inside the office on the top floor,
"Lord Hokage..."
An Anbu member wearing a cat mask suddenly appeared.
Kneeling on one knee before Third Hokage Hiruzen Sarutobi, he reported, "The gate guards just sent word that it seems... Lady Tsunade has returned!"
"Oh?"
The Third Hokage, who had been handling confidential documents with a pipe in his mouth, sprang to his feet in surprise. "Tsunade? She's back?"
"Yes!"
The Anbu member responded.
Hiruzen Sarutobi frowned, full of doubts.
Before the Third Shinobi World War had even ended,
Tsunade, who had grown increasingly dissatisfied with the Konoha High Command, had left the village with her disciple Shizune Kato.
Over the years,
she had paid no attention to the village's affairs.
She and her former teacher had become like strangers.
She had shown no intention of returning even when Fourth Hokage Minato Namikaze sacrificed himself.
Why had she suddenly come back?
Had she changed her mind and decided to stay in the village?
Having a medical expert with such remarkable skills and strength stay to safeguard the village
would clearly be a good thing for the village.
But at the same time, it made the Third Hokage think of other things.
Initially, the protracted Third Shinobi World War had left the village badly weakened. Although it was on the winning side, it had voluntarily given up its demand for compensation from Iwagakure to bring the fighting to an end as quickly as possible.
To quiet the voices of discontent,
he, the Third Hokage, had taken responsibility and stepped down to make way for someone more capable.
In the end, he had supported the rise of the Yellow Flash, Minato Namikaze, the disciple of Jiraiya, one of the Sannin, and thus his own disciple's disciple.
After the Fourth Hokage sacrificed himself during the Nine-Tails' Attack eight years ago.