Chapter 254: My Great Breakthrough is a bit... off

One day later, at Konoha's Training Ground Seven…

[Wind Release: Gale Palm!]

Link successfully completed the ninjutsu. As his chakra vanished into thin air, faint interwoven currents of colorless airflow appeared around his palm.

If they were tinted, it might have looked a bit like the swirling data that appears in the protagonists' hands during "Digimon Frontier" when they Arm-Evolve, except these were dozens of little gusts of wind in constant motion.

Since Orochimaru and Namikaze Minato were busy cracking Senju Tobirama's technique, Link couldn't just sit idle—he needed to scoop up all the ninjutsu he could learn.

"Whew…"

He raised his palm, making a fist. The wind, still gentle against his skin, parted as it drifted slightly, but quickly re-formed around his knuckles.

Its buffeting force blew his clothes and hair in shifting, chaotic directions, and as the air churned, a faintly whistling noise arose.

[Armed Evolution!]

Under Utakata's bemused gaze, Link rubbed his fist with his palm. Nothing happened; the swirling air currents never collided among themselves.

Stepping forward, he picked out a piece of rock and slowly brought his hand close to it.

"Ugh—" The wind shredded the surface of the stone into fine dust, which whirled upward.

The destructive power seemed decent enough.

But the sound was unbelievably grating—the constant grinding and slicing of rock, not unlike fingernails scraping a blackboard.

Link mustered a little more strength, striking a pose with determined eyes. Then he took a swing at a larger chunk of stone nearby.

Boom!

The streams of wind around his fist accelerated along with his punch, easily shattering the rock.

[Chakra's being consumed…]

Link understood: in his hands, Gale Palm had morphed into something akin to a mini "Lightning Release Chakra Mode." The difference was, it didn't increase his speed but rather boosted his defense.

It somewhat resembles Earth Spear—both were forms of elemental-chakra–enhanced bodily reinforcement.

Sadly, it only covered his hand for now. If it could blanket his whole body, that'd be amazing.

He didn't care about the hand signs. Thanks to Mystical Palm Jutsu, his sign-weaving speed was unmatched; he could produce any sequence he wanted, pushing it to the physical limit of his hand movements.

Nevertheless, it was still pretty handy—especially for delivering heavier blows in close combat against objects. As for striking or restraining actual people, he wasn't short on methods; whether it was the Five Elements Seal or Body Pathway Derangement, landing a touch basically ended the fight.

Against inanimate objects, though, there was a lot of room for improvement. Gale Palm would constantly consume chakra to cut, crush, or pulverize external matter, while hardly draining any chakra if it touched nothing. It was a jutsu that could be kept active during battle.

Its only flaw was that he couldn't use it simultaneously with other "palm-oriented" ninjutsu. Something strange like Mystical Palm Jutsu could still function normally, but if he released Five Elements Seal, Body Pathway Derangement, or the Delicate Illness Extraction Technique, the Gale Palm effect would get canceled. A minor nuisance, but he could simply toggle it on or off.

[And now for Wind Release: Great Breakthrough…]

Recalling the contents of the ninjutsu scroll, Link noted that Great Breakthrough and Gale Palm weren't too different in principle. It was like comparing Earth Release: Double Suicide Decapitation to Earth Release: Hiding Like a Mole. The concept was the same.

With Great Breakthrough, you blow wind from your mouth; with Gale Palm, you generate it from your hand. Both use physically generated airflow, then reinforce it via wind-natured chakra, thereby leveraging a larger current from the natural environment to strike an opponent.

Actually, that was how most ninjutsu worked in the best scenario: harnessing what nature already had. For example, Water Release is most effective where there's actual water—tiny chakra expenditure can produce a large-scale technique. Or the famed Lightning Release: Kirin, which harnesses natural lightning.

Why is it that when the same amount of chakra is released, Earth Release yields the largest-scale techniques? Because there's earth everywhere. Hurling a mass of dirt at your enemy can inflict damage without fussing about how to generate that extra destructive power.

Wind is everywhere, too, but pure blasts of air alone don't do enough damage. You need more chakra to intensify or compress it. Meanwhile, Earth Release can just shape existing terrain and slam it over, so the same chakra cost yields a bigger effect.

Of course, Earth Release had its own shortcomings. Apart from Iwagakure's "Rock" secret arts and Explosion Release, most earth-style jutsu from other villages had fairly limited ways to inflict damage.

There was another small "secret" in the shinobi arts:

Any nature produced solely by chakra—be it water, fire, lightning, earth, or wind—disappears once that chakra disperses. Techniques relying purely on chakra can do huge damage, like Tailed Beast Bombs or Rasengan, which, given some shape manipulation, can destroy matter at the cellular level.

But the problem is that late-stage villains—Nagato, Obito, Madara, Kaguya—could absorb chakra-based attacks. Actually damaging them required natural energy—making the attack senjutsu-based—or physical matter.

Strangely, the more advanced the jutsu is, the less effective it becomes against those final bosses.

Sigh.

Brushing off these thoughts, Link quickly refined wind-natured chakra, formed seals, and released: [Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!]

What was the effect?

He paused. After his chakra vanished, he noticed nothing happening. Instead, it felt a bit like Delicate Illness Extraction—something intangible had attached itself to him. With a single thought, he should be able to place it on himself or others.

But as he hesitated, that sensation disappeared, just as the "invisible illness" or "malady" from Delicate Illness Extraction would dissipate if not used.

Strange for a C-rank ninjutsu. Typically, standard Great Breakthrough uses a moderate chakra amount, but not so little that it ends in under a second.

Another powerful mutated jutsu?

This time, Link increased the standard chakra usage by threefold, re-cast the technique, and swiftly placed that weird sensation on himself.

[?!]

Suddenly, his mind felt crystal-clear, as though he'd opened a secret. A flood of knowledge from who-knows-where popped into his head, coalescing and combining. He got the sense that his, uh… sewing skills had skyrocketed to a divine, near-perfect mastery.

After about ten seconds, the knowledge faded. He felt a pang of regret, missing that ephemeral state of being a "tailor-savant," able to sew or mend any garment.

[Wait, that's the "breakthrough?"…]

Shaking off the peculiar sense of loss, Link realized that Wind Release: Great Breakthrough turned out to be a technique that caused short-lived "breakthroughs" in random fields. That was a huge jump for him, going from near-zero sewing skill to professional level.

Truly a "great" breakthrough.

But it wasn't exactly practical.

With a perplexed look, Link tried releasing Great Breakthrough again.

[My skill at going to the bathroom is now godlike! Please address me as the Master of—no, wait… 'Saint of Poop?!']

[I can poop three pounds in a single go!]

A few moments later, he shook his head, feeling once again that sense of regret from losing his newly "mastered" skill. Pressing a hand to his forehead:

[Random. It's random. And there's me—once again dealing with a rogue-lottery ninjutsu…]

Link had never felt such loathing for a "roguelike" mechanic. If it were just Substitution Jutsu that was random, fine. But Great Breakthrough? So that's the deal. It rummages through all his possible "skills" and temporarily grants a huge leap in one at random?

Even bodily functions like pooping? Does breathing count, too? I guess I can "inhale three liters of air at once," so call me the Saint of Lungs?

Damn. Still… it might have some research value. He could cast it on other people, right? Possibly to train up a scientific maniac?

Link's mind churned with possibilities. Finally he decided maybe it was still worth messing with, so he cast the Great Breakthrough on himself once more.

This time, he got an advanced endurance for stifling emotional frustration. He felt that no matter how the world misunderstood or insulted him, he could smile through it all—like some "top-tier turtle."

His eyelid twitched. Determined not to give up, he fired off yet another Great Breakthrough. This time, he watched in disbelief as the fingernail of his left pinky finger spontaneously grew—so much so that it dragged on the ground. Then, when the jutsu expired, it shrank right back.

During the whole process, he had zero control over the nail. It just grew, as if naturally.

Feeling equal parts disconcerted and exasperated, Link rubbed his cheek. Indeed, once an original ninjutsu's name drifts too far from its effect, the "mutated result" gets downright bizarre.

This "Great Breakthrough" apparently can temporarily break one's constraints in any domain—be it a learned skill, bodily function, or mental capacity. And the effect is random. The entire "lottery pool" is full of random nonsense.

If he wanted to deploy it effectively…

A vision flashed in his mind: he's confronting Ōtsutsuki Kaguya, shouting "Break forth!"—only for his pants to tear open in a giant rip like a snake's mouth. Kaguya, dumbfounded, claps back with an Eighty Gods Vacuum Attack, and blood sprays everywhere.

Link cringed at the phantom pain, reflexively checking his crotch. Thank goodness everything was intact. So this technique was, like Substitution Jutsu, something to practice occasionally in hopes it might produce a golden result.

[Maybe it'd be helpful for making shadow clones with random super skills, like a "master tailor shadow," or—well, hopefully not that 'poop' one, since clones don't… poop…]

He stood in place, letting his imagination run wild.

Hiding nearby, Uchiha Sasuke and Utakata slipped into contemplative silence:

[First Link trains a wind jutsu, then he lengthens his fingernails, then he checks his crotch…]

[What in the world is he doing?]

~~~

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