20: SS Rank Ninjutsu

While Izayoi and Hinata were out shopping with Hanabi…

Near the Uchiha clan grounds, beneath a massive waterfall on the Naka River—

If a member of the Hyuga clan were nearby and activated the Byakugan, they would discover a hidden cave beneath the waterfall.

At that moment, loud noises echoed from within the cave, though they were drowned out by the sound of rushing water.

Anyone touching the cliff wall near the waterfall could feel occasional tremors from within.

A blue light pierced through the darkness of the cave.

A blue-and-white sphere, like a balloon filled with water, swelled rapidly in size.

Moments later, the basketball-sized energy sphere shot into the darkness.

Boom—

With a thunderous explosion, shockwaves howled and gravel scattered.

The dust clouds didn't make it out of the cave before they were swept away by the wind.

Once everything settled, another energy sphere appeared and shot even deeper into the cave, unleashing another violent explosion.

The cave itself had clearly been blasted out by this type of energy sphere.

"The core is complete. Now I can start forming the smaller spheres inside."

At the mouth of the cave, illuminated by the light, Izayoi's shadow clone organized the day's results.

He had already mastered the basics of the anime-original technique Super Hurricane Chain Sphere—essentially evolving the Rasengan to just below the size of the Big Ball Rasengan.

It had taken Izayoi two whole years to reach this point.

Now he finally understood why Naruto needed shadow clones to assist him in creating the Big Ball Rasengan after three years of training.

Naruto couldn't even form a one-handed Rasengan—trying to increase the size to that extent while maintaining balance and preventing the chakra from detonating was nearly impossible.

Even for Izayoi, it took two full years to raise his chakra control to this level.

Simply amassing chakra into a large sphere wasn't particularly hard.

The real challenge was compressing so much chakra and making it spin at ultra-high speed.

It was practically hell-level difficulty!

After all, the Rasengan was already one of the most advanced chakra shape transformations, ranked A-level in difficulty.

The Big Ball Rasengan easily sat between A- and S-rank.

No wonder S-rank techniques were considered secret arts—no amount of talent or effort could guarantee success.

Just creating one large energy sphere was this hard already.

To form five smaller spheres inside it? That was at least as difficult as Naruto's mastery of the Wind Style: Rasenshuriken.

And to inject five different chakra nature transformations into those five mini-spheres?

Just thinking about it gave Izayoi a headache.

If successful, it wouldn't just be S-rank—it would qualify as SS-rank in terms of difficulty.

Even Ōtsutsuki Asura couldn't achieve something like that.

But for Izayoi, it had become his goal.

Right now, his potential surpassed even that of Ōtsutsuki Asura, who had needed to inherit power from Hagoromo.

If purple-rank chakra control wasn't enough, then he'd upgrade his chakra control trait to gold-rank.

Once he successfully developed the Super Hurricane Chain Sphere, he could become like Naruto—one signature move could carry him through any battle.

No matter the opponent, he'd solve it with a "maru" (sphere).

Sitting cross-legged in front of the waterfall, Izayoi's shadow clone continued gathering chakra in his hands, forming basketball-sized energy spheres. This time, he didn't throw them.

He trained until he ran out of chakra, at which point the clone dissipated into a puff of white smoke.

The fatigue and experience were all transmitted back to the original body.

Izayoi, who was feeding mochi dumplings to Hanabi, merely raised an eyebrow—then returned to normal as if nothing had happened.

Even Hinata, who had been secretly watching him all this time, hadn't noticed any changes in Izayoi.

Ever since mastering the Rasengan and beginning to develop the Super Hurricane Chain Sphere, Izayoi had rarely trained with his main body.

He let shadow clones do the training in the cave. As for himself, he only sparred with Hinata occasionally at the abandoned training grounds.

He was absolutely certain that Hiruzen Sarutobi had used the Crystal Ball Technique to spy on him at some point.

Over the past two years, Izayoi had sparred with Uchiha Sasuke once every week or two.

He didn't believe that these unscheduled duels with Sasuke hadn't caught Hiruzen's attention.

After all, before leaving Konoha, Uchiha Itachi had first reported to Hiruzen, then threatened Shimura Danzo.

If he weren't worried about exposing his Byakugan, Izayoi would've activated it just to check if any Anbu were monitoring him.

Since his shadow clones were always doing the training, Izayoi had long since learned to control how much chakra they used. The fatigue feedback was always within acceptable limits.

Once Hanabi finished eating her sticky rice dumplings, Izayoi continued accompanying her around town. He would use Body Flicker Technique to give her a "ride," or let her climb trees and walk on water.

Although Hanabi hadn't started training yet, she had seen the battles between Hinata and Neji, as well as Hinata and Izayoi's training sessions. Just like in the original story, this inspired her to become gentle yet strong—just like her older sister.

So aside from being a little gluttonous, Hanabi didn't really like playing with kids her own age. She much preferred flying across rooftops with Izayoi, enjoying the thrills like it was a roller coaster.

Once she reached the age where she could extract chakra and start training, she would definitely become even more clingy.

"Big brother, see you!"

"Bye-bye."

After playing with Hanabi until dusk, Izayoi smiled and waved goodbye to the clingy little sister-in-law.

Then, instead of going home, he headed to the market to buy some ingredients before instantly moving to the vast and empty Uchiha clan compound—where only Uchiha Sasuke lived.

"You're here."

In the courtyard, Sasuke looked up from his training with a face full of fighting spirit as he saw Izayoi carrying two bags.

"Let's eat first. We'll fight after. Might as well take a break," Izayoi said with a smile.

"Alright."

Sasuke didn't object.

As night fell, the two of them sat at the edge of the veranda eating hotpot.

Later, when the night was deep and quiet, two small silhouettes darted through the clan grounds like arrows, disappearing into the forest.

Boom boom boom...

Whoosh whoosh whoosh...

The sounds of impacts, heavy objects hitting the ground, and projectiles slicing through the air echoed through the night forest.

BOOM—

Soon after, an explosion erupted, casting red flames into the dark.

But the fire was quickly extinguished.

Half an hour later, the two small figures emerged from the forest.

Under the moonlight, the contrast between Izayoi and Sasuke was stark.

Izayoi's clothes were neat and spotless, like not even a speck of dust touched them.

Sasuke, on the other hand, was in tattered clothes, his body covered in burn marks.

His exposed skin still bore faint scars.

Yet, despite his exhaustion, his eyes gleamed with sharp light—clearly, he had gained a lot from the battle.

"I win again."

Looking at Sasuke, Izayoi smiled and said, "As agreed, I get to check out your family's ninjutsu archive."

"Do whatever you want. There's not much in there anyway," Sasuke replied indifferently.

After the Uchiha clan was wiped out, the village handled the burial of the bodies.

In exchange, all their scrolls were confiscated.

Even the inheritance left at home consisted only of a few low-level elemental jutsu scrolls.

Sasuke had asked the Third Hokage about the advanced ninjutsu scrolls from his family, and Hiruzen had told him the village hadn't touched them—they were likely taken by Itachi.

Sasuke didn't really mind that the village took the clan's scrolls.

Hiruzen had promised him that once he became a ninja and was strong enough to lead the Uchiha clan, he could apply to the village to retrieve the land deeds and the scrolls.

Right now, he just wasn't strong enough to guard them.

Izayoi knew that Hiruzen's words were true.

Aside from forbidden techniques like Izanagi and Izanami, the Uchiha clan's scrolls really weren't anything worth coveting.

Compared to a truly powerful Uchiha ninja, those scrolls were worthless.

Just like the inheritance Izayoi's parents had left behind.

Still, Sasuke's family ninjutsu library was useful for Izayoi.

His chakra shape transformation skills were highly developed, but his chakra nature transformation was nearly zero.

Training in the five elemental releases would improve his nature transformation.

To perfect the Super Hurricane Chain Sphere, Izayoi had to master all five chakra natures, and to such a degree that they could integrate into the technique.

For Wind Release, he could follow Naruto's example from the original story. For the other four elements, he'd have to learn through ninjutsu and comprehend them on his own.

Or wait until graduation to ask his jonin instructor for guidance.

Of course, there was one shortcut—a way to instantly obtain the most advanced nature transformations without any training.

And that was... to awaken the Rinnegan or the Tenseigan!