A flurry of thoughts raced through Seimei's mind, but he quickly reined them in, focusing entirely on the tiny speck of natural energy now integrated into his body.
Compared to the vast ocean of chakra within him, this bit of natural energy was like a single grain of sand in the sea—utterly minuscule.
Yet, despite its small size, its presence was astonishingly potent.
In Seimei's perception, it shone like a beacon in the dead of night, impossible to ignore.
At the same time, controlling this energy was proving to be surprisingly difficult.
That tiny bit of natural energy, ever since entering his body, had been stirring up his chakra, causing a slight imbalance between his physical and mental energies.
It wasn't hard to imagine that if he absorbed too much natural energy—beyond a certain threshold—his chakra would spiral out of control.
The consequences of that could be unpredictable, to say the least.
This was one of the major challenges of mastering Sage Mode.
Fortunately, Seimei's chakra reserves were massive, giving him a high tolerance threshold. As long as he stayed within that limit, the risks were manageable.
What's more, the existence of his proficiency panel would give him a significant edge.
That's right—ever since he absorbed that tiny bit of natural energy, Seimei had sensed a change in his panel.
With that thought, he opened his proficiency panel.
In an instant, a familiar translucent light-blue screen materialized before him:
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Name: Uchiha Seimei
Age: 14
Physique: 28
Spirit: 30
Chakra: 166,500 (1,923,450 → 1,928,490)
Natural Energy: 1 (1,928,490)
Bloodline:
- Sharingan: Eternal Mangekyo (20,000/100,000) → (20,035/100,000)
- Byakugan (3,551/10,000)
- Wood Release (310/10,000) → (311/10,000)
- Lava Release (558/5,000) → (559/5,000)
- Ice Release (348/5,000) → (349/5,000)
- Storm Release (845/1,000) → (848/1,000)
Skills:
- Chakra Refinement: Lv7 (3,684/20,000) → Lv7 (3,702/20,000)
- Natural Energy Sensing: Lv0 (1/100)
- Wood Clone Jutsu: Lv8 (25,500/50,000) → Lv8 (26,700/50,000)
- Body Extremity: Lv8 (13,000/50,000)
- Chakra Control: Lv8 (8,350/50,000) → Lv8 (8,360/50,000)
- Natural Energy Control: Lv0 (1/100)
Mastered Skills: [None]
---
Compared to yesterday, the panel was mostly unchanged, except for three new additions:
First, Natural Energy.
Second, Natural Energy Sensing.
Third, Natural Energy Control.
The Natural Energy stat, listed below Chakra, showed the amount of natural energy currently in his body, with the number in parentheses indicating his maximum capacity.
Right now, he had only that one point of natural energy, but his upper limit matched his maximum chakra capacity.
The reason was simple: to create Sage Chakra, physical energy, mental energy, and natural energy had to be balanced perfectly at a 1:1:1 ratio.
In this case, the maximum amount of natural energy he could handle was equal to the total chakra his body could contain.
Of course, this was just a theoretical limit.
At his current stage, forget absorbing 1,928,490 points of natural energy—even 100 points would likely disrupt his energy balance.
The consequences of that didn't need explaining.
To prevent this, the newly appeared Natural Energy Sensing and Natural Energy Control skills would be crucial.
The former allowed him to sense natural energy more easily, which in turn let him absorb it faster.
The latter gave him greater control over natural energy, allowing his body to handle more of it without losing control.
It wasn't hard to see that if he could raise the proficiency of these two skills, mastering Sage Mode would be practically guaranteed.
And when it came to grinding proficiency, Seimei was a pro.
With a thought, he split his focus. One part of his mind kept the tiny bit of natural energy in his body stable, preventing it from causing chaos. The other part opened his senses, reaching out to detect the natural energy in the air and attempting to draw it into his body.
This time, he immediately noticed a difference.
That initial point of natural energy had flipped a switch in his body, making the process of sensing and absorbing natural energy noticeably smoother.
In just a moment, he managed to capture another point of natural energy and pull it into his body.
Seimei opened his eyes and glanced at the proficiency panel.
As expected, his Natural Energy stat had increased by one point.
At the same time, both Natural Energy Sensing and Natural Energy Control had gained a point of proficiency, moving from Lv0 (1/100) to Lv0 (2/100)!
The change was so small that Seimei barely noticed any difference.
But that didn't stop him from continuing.
And so, the morning passed in a flash.
By mid-afternoon, as Seimei absorbed yet another point of natural energy, a strange sensation washed over him.
In that moment, his perception of natural energy became several times clearer. With a single sweep of his mental energy, he detected multiple points of natural energy in the air.
This confirmed to him that even his shadow clones could handle sensing natural energy without his main body needing to intervene.
As for capturing it?
With a flicker of thought, Seimei's mental energy formed a hand, effortlessly grabbing one of the natural energy points and pulling it into his body.
The process was now several times easier.
Moreover, the natural energy he absorbed no longer showed signs of going out of control like before.
In fact, his ability to control it had improved significantly.
Seimei immediately understood what had happened.
If he wasn't mistaken, his Natural Energy Sensing and Natural Energy Control skills had leveled up.
With a thought, he opened the proficiency panel again.
Sure enough, both skills had advanced from Lv0 to Lv1, meaning he had officially crossed the beginner threshold.
"Phew…"
Letting out a long breath, Seimei finally allowed a small smile to creep onto his face.
The level-up of these two skills made the past half-day of grinding—neglecting his Body Extremity training—worth it.
With entry-level Natural Energy Sensing and Natural Energy Control, he could now delegate the task of leveling these skills to his shadow clones.
Once their proficiency reached a high enough level, he could start attempting to fuse Sage Chakra and master Sage Mode.
Of course, his ultimate goal was to use this to accelerate the strengthening of his body.
However, that would take a considerable amount of time.
And right now, Seimei wasn't willing to wait that long.
So, he had an idea: could he fuse a small amount of Sage Chakra before fully mastering Sage Mode and use it to boost his body's strengthening efficiency?
This wasn't a whim—it was the result of careful consideration.
Acting on the thought, Seimei first adjusted the All-Encompassing Seal technique on his body, freeing up a small space.
Then, he cast the technique again, creating a new pocket dimension in his abdomen.
Compared to the pocket dimension at his forehead, this one was much smaller, capable of holding only about 1,000 points of chakra.
But that was more than enough.
Using his Lv1 Natural Energy Control, Seimei gathered the hundred or so points of natural energy he had accumulated over the past few hours and directed them into the pocket dimension in his abdomen.
Next, he drew an equal amount of his own chakra and sent it into the same space.
These steps were straightforward. The real challenge came next.
Inhale… exhale…
Seimei took a deep breath, then slowly let it out.
He calmed his mind as much as possible, focusing all his attention on breaking down the chakra in the pocket dimension into equal parts of physical and mental energy.
Then, he carefully guided these two energies to approach the natural energy.
Following the same method used to fuse chakra, he began combining the three energies.
Time ticked by, second by second.
Ten minutes passed.
Since this was his first attempt, Seimei proceeded with extreme caution.
Fortunately, the results didn't disappoint him—perhaps because his foundation was so solid.
In the end, after ten minutes, he successfully fused over a hundred points of Sage Chakra.
This was his plan to utilize Sage Chakra ahead of schedule: by using the All-Encompassing Seal to create an isolated pocket dimension, he could carry out the fusion process outside his body.
This way, no matter how little natural energy he could control, he could send an equal amount of chakra to fuse with it, creating an equivalent amount of Sage Chakra.
This neatly sidestepped the issue of his massive chakra reserves overwhelming his limited control over natural energy.
Of course, this was something only he could pull off—others wouldn't be able to manage it.