Chapter 134: Planning the Bloodline Limit

Chapter 134: Planning the Bloodline Limit

The next day, Ishiro returned to the Eastern Front camp and reported his whereabouts to Kitsuchi.

Just as he was about to leave, Kitsuchi called him back to discuss something.

"Ishiro, your three disciples have progressed very quickly, especially Kawakita. Recently, when Shiden has had free time, he occasionally gives him some pointers. Now, this kid's strength has stably reached the chunin level."

"The other two are doing well too. Chiko Tomoe, that little girl, has a high aptitude for ninjutsu. She's already mastered the six Wind Release techniques you taught her, and she's even managed to simplify several of them. Although her combat ability is still somewhat lacking, that's a common problem for ninjutsu specialists in the early stages. She can also be considered to have reached the chunin level."

"Kajiyama Ri is also doing well. This kid has great tenacity and a good head on his shoulders. He's found a direction for developing his own ninjutsu. Although it'll take quite some time to finish, as he continues developing it, his understanding of Water Release will deepen, and his strength is steadily increasing."

"Your three disciples can all be considered to have chunin-level strength now. Shouldn't we start thinking about their promotion?"

Ishiro hesitated upon hearing this and said, "I've only been training them for a little over a year, and during that time, I haven't really taken them on many high-level missions. Wouldn't promoting them so soon seem rushed?"

Kitsuchi thought for a moment and said, "I've considered that too. The Third Great Ninja War is about to break out. The village is gradually easing the promotion standards to prepare for the war. By their current standards, they certainly qualify. You can let them get promoted first, then have them take on more missions as a three-man team to gain experience."

"Besides, the situation around the camp is getting increasingly unstable. There will be no shortage of opportunities for them to gain real combat experience."

After thinking it over, Ishiro said, "Alright, let's go ahead with the promotions. By the way, easing the standards for promotion won't mean reduced rewards, right?"

Kitsuchi shot him a look and said, "Of course not. The war has only just started. The village isn't so strapped for resources yet."

Ishiro knew that the village's loosening of promotion quotas was aimed at young ninjas to give them a better chance of surviving the initial stages of war.

The younger the talent, the more likely they would be given this opportunity. Apart from the current batch of fresh academy graduates, Ishiro's three disciples were among the youngest candidates.

Unlike the newest graduates, though, Kawakita and the others would not receive special treatment that allowed them to delay battlefield deployment. That privilege was reserved only for the newest academy class.

Thinking about this, Ishiro walked out of Kitsuchi's office and headed toward the training ground where his three disciples were practicing.

Seeing Ishiro return, the three kids immediately gathered around him excitedly, eager to share their recent progress.

"Teacher, Shiden-senpai said I've fully mastered C-rank sword techniques and even started to learn B-rank ninjutsu..."

"Ishiro-sensei, I've mastered all the Wind Release techniques you left for me! I even managed to reduce the hand seals for Wind Release: Breakthrough by twelve!"

"Teacher, I've found my own Water Release technique, and I'm planning to..."

Listening to their excited chatter, Ishiro suddenly realized he hadn't checked in on their progress for quite a while. When had it started?

It seemed like ever since Kitsuchi and Shiden had arrived at the Eastern Front, he had been busy with practical training, focusing solely on improving himself, sometimes training nonstop for a month. Then he had spent another ten or so days back at the village.

Altogether, it had been about forty or fifty days — almost a month and a half — since he'd properly paid attention to his students. He was starting to feel like a bit of a negligent teacher.

Thus, Ishiro calmed himself down and spent an entire day seriously teaching the three kids, analyzing their current progress, and offering tailored advice.

After finishing the lessons, Ishiro told them about Kitsuchi's suggestion regarding their promotions.

The three immediately erupted in cheers, never expecting they'd be promoted to chunin so soon.

After letting them celebrate for a while, Ishiro said, "But don't get too excited yet. There's still one month before you return to the village for the chunin exams. During this month, Captain Kitsuchi will arrange a series of high-difficulty missions for you. If you fail to complete them, you can forget about promotion."

Rather than being discouraged, the three became even more fired up, itching to get out and start missions right away.

Ishiro wasn't just trying to scare them. From the next day onward, Kitsuchi began assigning them one C-rank or B-rank mission per day to toughen them up.

Since they were stationed on the frontlines, missions generally didn't take long to complete, but they were all fairly dangerous. For example: killing enemy scouts, finding enemy spies hiding among nearby villagers, patrolling the borders and the rocky coastline, clearing out increasingly active bandits, or hunting down rogue ninjas who had recently infiltrated the Land of Earth.

Although the three weren't individually strong compared to most chunin, their teamwork was excellent, and when cooperating, they could handle one or two chunin-level enemies without too much risk.

One month quickly passed.

Standing before the trio, Ishiro reviewed their mission records: in just one month, they had completed nine B-rank missions and eleven C-rank missions. Except for two missions that failed due to unexpected circumstances, the rest were completed successfully.

This surprised even Ishiro, who realized the three must have been pushing themselves to the limit. After going through the reports, he smiled and said, "You all did very well. Get a good night's rest. Tomorrow, I'll take you back to the village to participate in the chunin exams."

"Yeah!!" The three cheered excitedly. Kawakita, in particular, got so carried away that he pulled at an arm injury, causing Ishiro to laugh heartily.

Over the past month, all three had accumulated some minor injuries, but since the camp had medical ninjas on standby, they had been properly treated. A night's sleep would be enough to recover almost fully.

The next day, Ishiro led his three students back to Iwagakure. Given the tight schedule, they traveled in a rapid marching formation and arrived at the village in just three days.

The village had opened up the promotion eligibility to a wide range of candidates. Several hundred genin had registered for the chunin exam this time.

According to what Ishiro had heard, there would be around a few dozen slots available for promotion.

With war looming, the village wasn't planning to make chunin selection as complicated as Konoha's traditional system.

Because the standards had been loosened, the exams wouldn't require participants to fight a seasoned chunin like in past years.

The rules were simple: all candidates would draw numbers and compete in four randomized matches. Based on their performance, the instructors would select who would be promoted.

This year's chief examiner was none other than Ikura.

As the only ninja aside from Onoki to have broken through a certain bottleneck, Ikura's strength made him more than qualified to oversee the exams.

Assigning Ikura as chief examiner was also part of the village's plan to build his prestige.

The day before the matches, Ishiro and his students arrived back at the village. Considering the kids had been away from their families for quite some time, Ishiro announced that they had the day off.

The three children cheered and quickly dispersed to visit their families.

Ishiro didn't concern himself too much with the upcoming exam. As a seasoned elite jonin who frequently interacted with the village's upper echelons, he understood the village's thinking very well.

As long as his students didn't perform terribly, even if they failed to promote this time, once the war started and casualties mounted, they would eventually be promoted anyway. The only difference would be whether it happened sooner or later.

For Ishiro, this return to the village was a break as well.

Over the past month, while his disciples had been frantically completing missions, Ishiro hadn't been idle either.

He had officially started training in chakra fusion.

Following the detailed methods recorded in the secret archives, Ishiro began his experiments.

The steps were laid out clearly:

Step one: Use Clone Technique to coordinate with the main body and perform two different elemental jutsu to create a combination technique.

Step two: While cooperating, make the two types of chakra merge externally to create a combination effect at the source.

Step three: Release two different chakra natures simultaneously with both hands.

These were all preparatory stages. Once he completed them, he could formally attempt chakra fusion.

For Ishiro, the first step wasn't too difficult. The only major issue was that — aside from Wood Release (commonly believed to be a fusion of Water and Earth Release) — there were no other known bloodline limits based on chakra fusion.

This meant Ishiro had no templates to reference.

However, he had one major advantage: he didn't care how powerful the bloodline limit he developed was. He only cared about mastering the process itself.

His true goal was to elevate his life level.

Thus, Ishiro didn't fuss over how useful the resulting bloodline limit would be in combat. He simply chose a relatively simple concept to work with: Porcelain Release.

Inspired by the process of crafting ceramics, he based it on the combination of Earth's stability and Water's adaptability.

The resulting bloodline limit's main characteristic would be Molding — using Water Release's flexibility for shaping, and Earth Release's stability for maintaining form.

With a clear direction, Ishiro created a combined jutsu for the first step: Water Release: Water Shockwave + Earth Release: Rock Shatter Technique.

It only took him two days to successfully complete this combination. Watching the mixed torrent of water and stone rush forward, Ishiro couldn't help but regret not thinking of it sooner.

Compared to the wide but low-damage Water Shockwave technique alone, embedding it with fine stone fragments drastically boosted its lethality.

If the caster could control the movement of the embedded stones within the water, concentrating attacks on specific targets, Ishiro believed the technique's rank could even be upgraded by one level.

After achieving this success, Ishiro immediately convinced Kitsuchi to have all frontline ninjas train in this new combination jutsu.

He even experimented by combining Water Shockwave + Rock Shatter + Lightning Conduction into a three-element hybrid jutsu.

The results were even more astonishing: Water Shockwave covered a wide area, Lightning Conduction paralyzed enemies, and Rock Shatter delivered precise follow-up attacks.

The combined technique was powerful enough that even jonin wouldn't dare take it lightly.

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