Chapter 72: A Miracle, Made by a Miracle Himself (part 2)

Holding Sarah's palm in the darkness, Menma explained his intentions and what was going to happen.

"Sarah, I'm going to infuse a little chakra into your body to check whether your chakra pathways are connected.

If they're fully developed, it means you can learn to become a ninja.

If they aren't, don't worry, I'll teach you every sword art I can find and turn you into a samurai instead.

That path is harder, but its rewards are just as sweet.

Now… this might hurt a little, so bear with me."

This was a method he had came up with in the Konoha library, studying texts on ninja development and chakra theory, writings from an old shinobi who had recorded his thoughts many years ago.

He'd even tested this method with Phantom and Raven, using it to measure the development of chakra nodes in their bodies.

In fact, he'd even used it on himself regularly, after learning that starting from different nodes, revealed new chakra pathways and made his chakra release better.

Through this, he had managed to explore every chakra path in his own body, allowing him to release chakra from virtually any point.

But Phantom and Raven were both ninja and they already had chakra networks in place.

Doing this on a civilian was far more dangerous as a single mistake could cripple her arm permanently with no known cure in this world.

Kurama and Minato watched silently from the seal space as Menma slowly began the process. Cutting a portion of his chakra as finely as possible, then refining it even further with each try until it was thin enough to slip into Sarah's small and weak chakra nodes, obviously unused.

Minato was stunned.

"This… this method, he really is a prodigy!

He has developed a technique that could grade someone's potential as a shinobi before they even have stepped into the school or tried any training!"

Kurama side-eyed him and scoffed.

"Sure, it's clever.

But what's even more terrifying is that he's thinking like this at two years old.

You're all excited about his method but I can't get over the fact that he's operating out-of-the-box like this when he should still be learning to walk in a straight line. He is way more mature than his age."

Kurama's words silent Minato. Indeed, his child was too mature. Maybe, he should focus more on the fact that from his birth till now, Menma never truly had a childhood...

Meanwhile, Menma had finally refined his chakra stream to the point it was hair-thin.

Taking a deep breath, he nodded at Sarah, who was visibly nervous and asked her to stay calm, while he was checking her body. Sarah nodded nervously. She was too excited. If she was truly able to become a ninja, then maybe she could protect those dear to her from harm. Thinking about this, she closed her eyes and waited for Menma's answer.

Menma, also closing his eyes, gently let his chakra flow into her arm and followed his chakra's path with his own awareness.

The chakra first connected with the nodes in her palm, a good sign.

That meant she would have no issue performing hand signs or channeling chakra through weapons.

As it traveled upward, some of the pathways ended in dead nodes. Something normal. Others, made a complex network. He didn't bother others and followed the thicker ones all the way up.

Slowly, a downward current took form, wide and stable enough to allow chakra flow to and from hand.

Everything was going well… until his chakra reached the final node in her arm, the point that connected the entire arm's network to the main chakra system.

There, his chakra stopped.

Hard.

Like it had hit a sealed wall.

Menma's awareness was blocked entirely.

He wasn't disappointed, not yet.

Instead, he retracted his chakra and started scanning smaller paths that he had ignored before, searching for alternate routes.

But every single one led to the same dead end, which shouldn't have happened.

Why...?

He couldn't understand. There should be more passes, connecting her arm to her body.

But there wasn't another one.

It meant only one thing. Sarah couldn't become a ninja.

Her chakra network, at least in this arm, was incomplete.

Opening his eyes slowly, Menma prepared to break the news, but when he looked at Sarah, he saw her hopeful, bright eyes staring up at him.

She was waiting for an answer.

An affirmation.

Something.

And Menma… couldn't bring himself to crush that light.

Hiding the sadness, fear and confusion that had filled his eyes, he took a deep breath, gritted his teeth, and whispered in a soft voice:

"Sarah, this next part… might be painful. Because you haven't trained from childhood, some of your chakra passways are blocked. I need to open them up. So please bear with me."

Sarah who wasn't aware what Menma said was a dead sentence for many children, nodded happily, looking forward to becoming a ninja as this was what Menma's word meant. Once he opened them up, she would become one.

So happy! Hehehe...

Seeing her happy smile and nodding head, taking a deep breath, once again, Menma sent his chakra back into her arm.

His mind, however, was clouded.

What do I do?

There's nothing in the textbooks about this point.

No scroll, no teacher, no experience had prepared him for this. No words about any solutions.

He looked around the junction in her chakra network, desperate to find another method.

But he found nothing.

Just that same, final block.

His awareness hovered near it, uncertain.

Should I force it open?

Doing so might burst the entire network in her arm, like the danger of forcable opening the gates.

Unless… unless there was a functioning system behind that gate… then maybe, just maybe, her chakra system could stabilize under an equal pressure to prevent it from being ripped apart. Also something needs to drill the pass not just push it open but how should I...

Wait...!

What if I could enter from another node instead?

Check the backside of the gate, open it from there, just like how a wine bottle's cap is opened by drilling...

Thinking fast, Menma's eyes flew open with intensity. He pulled Sarah toward himself, close by, face to face, placing her palm carefully on his lap, never breaking the chakra connection that was flowing into her.

Before Sarah could ask what was going on, Menma gently pressed two fingers just above her heart, and a stream of visible red chakra flowed from his fingertips into her chest, vanishing into her body.

At first, everything seemed normal.

But then, a burning pain surged through her body.

Sarah groaned involuntarily, her breath caught. The heat made her feel like her insides were boiling. She instinctively wanted to pull away, to stop the process, but Menma calmly urged her:

"Stay still… please endure it. The treatment is beginning."

Sarah didn't know what to do. Her instinct screamed for her to push him away, to make the pain stop.

But as she looked at the boy in front of her, his face serious, entirely focused and sweating dripping from his bangs and forehead, she realized:

He was doing this for her.

He was enduring something too, something harder.

And maybe… if she could just hold on a little longer, she might be able to help him in return.

So, she gritted her teeth, bore the pain, and let the chakra violate her body, sweat dripping silently from her brows onto the floorboards.

Surprisingly, Snow didn't interfere with the closeness between the two.

Instead, the white cat stepped forward, rubbing herself gently against Sarah's side, pressing into her tightly, offering her warmth and comfort in a way Sarah hadn't felt since her mother.

And strangely, it worked.

Snow's soft presence calmed her.

On the other hand, Menma, who was hyper-focused, took a step at a time.

The chakra he had sent into Sarah wasn't ordinary.

It was chakra produced from the cells near his heart, a special chakra with healing properties he had discovered while relaxing in the hot springs back in Konoha, and moving it outside of his body was so hard that his entire will was binding it from going rampage or rushing back to his heart.

As it traveled into Sarah's chakra network, he guided it specifically toward her heart channel, letting it flow gradually to all points of her system and his mind tightly followed its progress, directly to her arm and heart.

He was relieved to find that the passage beyond the arm's blocked gate was healthy and complete, meaning the only thing preventing chakra flow was the flesh and wastes blocking the connection.

If he could break through from both sides simultaneously, while protecting the passway, the passage could open safely.

Kurama and Minato, watching carefully from within the seal, focused their senses to monitor what Menma was attempting, with utmost focus.

Menma began to act.

First, he compressed his chakra tightly on the both sides of the blockage, creating a barrier to absorb the impact once the gate was forced open.

He also used the dense chakra from his heart to form a needle-like tip, ready to pierce through the sealed node on both sides, pointing them straight at each other.

Once he made sure everything was ready, he took a deep breath, holding it in, bracing himself, Then, he began to gradually increase the pressure inside Sarah's and shoulder, moving the needles toward each other.

The chakra pressure rose slowly.

The sealed node vibrated faintly as it resisted the intrusion.

Menma's mind remained completely calm and controlled, adjusting the force to the exact limits of her pathways.

The moment of impact was near.

Sarah, feeling the movements around her shoulder, suddenly felt a heart wrenching pain, deep in her shoulder. It was so intensive that she cried out loud, but suddenly gulped it inside her chest.

Unbeknownst to Menma, the trap door to the cargo hold creaked open, making a sound, and letting the sea's roar to enter the cargo hold.

Sarah sweating hard from pain, panicked, wanting to wake Menma out but a feeling told her that doing so, won't have a good results.

Footsteps echoed faintly as someone began to descend the ladder.

Someone was coming.

And if they saw what Menma was doing right now, it would be very, very bad.

Snow, alerted by the faint sound, quickly retreated into the shadows, hiding within the darkness and ready to strike if anything went wrong.

Murakami stepped slowly onto the wooden planks, careful not to make a sound. The other slaves remained dead silent, each holding their breath, as they know how tyrant he could be.

Murakami walked toward the last few cages, eyes sharp, and finally stopped in front of his target. He leaned down and peered inside, checking if anything seemed off.

Inside the cage, everything appeared calm and dim.

The food tray sat untouched beside the gate. Menma lay pale and slightly sweaty, slumped to one side of the cage in the same position he'd been since morning.

Sarah was curled beside him, her forehead wet with cold sweat, her breathing labored, likely suffering through yet another nightmare. She had many of them since arriving on this ship.

Murakami observed the boy's dry, bloodless lips and nodded silently. It looked like the boy had truly stayed put, weakened by the poison. That suited him fine. He had plans, and the more compliant the boy remained, the smoother those plans would go.

After watching for a while longer, he straightened up and exited the cargo hold, closing the trap door with a faint click.

Once Murakami left, Menma exhaled deeply.

"That was too close."

He had nearly been caught in the middle of action, while pretending to be poisoned.

Turning his head, he looked at Sarah, who was still wincing from the residual pain, her hand gripping her shoulder.

But luckily the operation had been a success.

He had completely and safely unblocked the sealed chakra pathway in her arm a procedure that, to his knowledge, no one else in the world had ever managed. A proud smile crept across his face.

Gently, he helped Sarah sit up and lean against the bars for support. Then, placing his fingers again on her palm's chakra node, he sent a small amount of chakra through, carefully examining her flow.

It was smooth.

The node was open, stable, and allowing chakra to move freely from her heart to her arm and back.

Menma nodded in satisfaction.

Next, he pressed his fingers to her chest once more and resumed the chakra flow, hoping to identify any other blockages scattered throughout her body.

It didn't take long.

There were several.

He quietly explained to Sarah what he had done and what was he going to do, promising her that once finished, she could start to learn arts of being a ninja. He asked her to bear with it just a little longer, as that was the only price she had to pay for achieving something many wished for but we're unable to achieve. She nodded despite her pain, trusting him and his abilities, giving her life, like many people before, to his hands. She would wait for the day she could stand behiyhin and cheer on his pass, helping him remove some of residency on his way.

Menma, relieved about her mentality, pramised her he would successed and once again and dive inside her body.

In order to finish it in the shortest time, he memorized the locations of every remaining blockages and planned his operation.

Then, taking another deep breath, he began a rapid but careful procedure, a chakra-surgical technique he had honed during his time as a battlefield doctor.

In the sealing space, both Kurama and Minato stood in stunned silence, watching the miracle unfold.

Menma was doing something unattendable for any other life on the planet.

Minato, with shock beyond words, said dryly.

"If the major powers discovered this ability...

They would stop at nothing to capture him.""

Because what Menma had achieved was more than just healing.

He had found a way to turn anu non-ninja child into something borned to be a ninja. That meant the large percentage of children that were rejected because of leakage of talent now could become the new forces the village needed desperately.

Minato was sweating. The truth hit him like a thunderclap:

"Konoha didn't lose a child…

We lost a diamond mine that could've built an entire city out of gemstones."

Kurama was equally shaken but not afraid.

He wasn't thinking about Konoha or any one village.

He was thinking about Menma's dream. One he had stayed awoke for hours to write about.

"A world where every child stood at the same starting line.

A world where talent wasn't inherited…

But earned, through efforts."

Such a world would not only be revolutionary.

It might be the only way to achieve eternal peace and prosperity.

And this boy, barely two years old, had just opened the first page of a new story for the world.

One where fate was no longer an absolute.

A new road had opened.

In a world corrupted by alien threats and divine immortals, while driven by greed,

a single child was forging ahead, alone.

Carrying the hopes of billions on his small shoulders,

followed only by two fragile companions.

...a girl who once wished to die and a cat, abandoned by her mother.

Menma finally finished opening the blockages and, after a final check, he withdrew his fingers, cutting the flow of chakra.

Clearing his sweat, he turned his head to give the happy news to the girl, but what he saw shocked him. Sarah had passed out, now sweating nonstop.

Inside her, the chakra he had left behind after operation, along with the pitiful amounts of chakra produced by her own cells, entering the passways and nodes, had begun to circulate in her chakra veins.

From her heart to her head, from there to her stomach, then to the lungs and limbs, finally back to the heart, ready to circulate again.

Each time a single cycle was finished, small amounts of chakra would be absorbed by weak cells, feeding them and empowering them, letting them shine with a light they never had before. Old and sick cells died and were devoured by healthier and younger cells, replaced to perform better.

Muscles and tendons vibrated slightly, rearranging themselves to better transfer and make power. Liver and kidneys worked nonstop to dissolve poisons and harmful matter and throw them out of the body.

Slowly and pitifully, she was becoming better, stronger, more endurable and more refined, like a coal, being reformed into a diamond. It is slow, painful and hard, but once finished, it is the most beautiful thing on land, thought by everyone.

Menma, breathing hard, looked at the pained Sarah. She was in pain and had a high fever. Not only that, her body was spasming and shaking here and there, and her heart was also beating hard and fast, but there was nothing he could do.

He thought hard, trying to remember what he was supposed to do, but nothing came to mind. Without detailed monitoring or modern medicine, he couldn't do anything.

While feeling annoyed about his incompetence, he helped Sarah lay down and made an oath he would never forget, that he would learn the medical system of this world as soon as he could.

Thinking of it, he remembered the bottle of healing pills he had. Turning to a dark corner where Snow was hiding, he asked her to bring him the bottle. Snow jumped from one shadow to another, quickly hopping out and coming to him with a bottle in her mouth.

He grabbed the bottle and thanked Snow, then quickly opened the cap and fed Sarah one healing pill. He waited for the results. Not long afterward, Sarah's shaking eased a lot and her breathing became more stable, but she was still unconscious.

Menma gave the bottle back to Snow and sat down next to Sarah, watching her condition all the time, ready to interfere the moment he was needed.

Hours passed slowly and painfully. Murakami, who had finished his duties for the day, took time to go below the deck to check on the children.

Reaching the cage, he was ready to make a sarcastic remark to the children or just silently watch them sleep, but what he saw, stopped him from doing any of that.

Sarah was lying down, covered by Menma's shirt and sweating hard. Menma, on the other hand, was cleaning her sweat, comforting her whenever she murmured something.

Sarah was sick and that was bad. A sickness on the ship could kill anyone and possibly everyone!

He quickly opened the gate door and stepped inside. Placing his hand on top of her head, he checked her temperature. It was burning in fever. This was dangerous. He couldn't let her stay here no matter how he looked at it.

Turning his head to look at Menma's eyes, hidden under his hair, watching his every movement. He slowly reached and hugged Sarah, trying to take her away from him but a hand caught his wrist tightly. He tried to pull it out, but the grip was really firm. Taking a deep breath, he looked at Menma.

"Listen up, boy. I need to take her somewhere else to take care of her better. I can't let her stay here. Even if she can get better, I won't allow my other goods to get infected either. But don't worry. I'll try my best to heal her up, not because I like her or anything. No."

"Because she is the second most expensive thing on this ship, following you. These should make you satisfied enough. Also, I'll take care of her personally, and don't worry. I won't stimulate her as I'm well aware of how much a mind can affect the recovery of a sick person. This much should be enough for you to let go of me, right?"

Even though what he said was completely logical and most importantly, the truth, Menma still didn't let go.

"I'll take a look at her once a day to check on her. I won't take any poison either until she is safe. If you think hunger is enough to stop me from cutting your ship in two, you are dreaming. Don't do anything wrong as I'll eradicate you and everyone on this ship, one by one, with my own hand!"

Saying those, Menma locked eyes with Murakami letting his killing intent, one carefully nurtured by Kurama's hatred and pain, to flow toward Murakami.

Murakami was instantly petrified by Menma's bloodlust. It was as if he was being stared at by a beast that knows nothing but slaughter. Luckily, Menma's aura disappeared very fast as he let go of him.

Breathing hard and staggered, Murakami knew who the beast on his ship was and what it had given him was an ultimatum.

Nodding hard, Murakami agreed to the said conditions, and slowly stepped out of the cage, holding Sarah.

He didn't even bother to close the gate, because now, he understood that nothing but the beast himself and the light life in his arms could stop that monster from walking out of his vessel's cage.

He walked out and stepped toward his own clean and tidy room, with enough light and fresh air. Placing Sarah on his bed, he carefully tied one of her hands to the bedside and then went out and grabbed a few medicines he had.

The ship slowly sailed on the sea, toward the distance, completely cut off from the world around it while the gears of the world continued to turn in the same rhythm, unaffected by the things happening everywhere around it.

Slowly and steadily. Moment after moment...