The Forest of Death.
Beneath the cliff and the waterfall.
The setting sun flowed through the forest like spilled honey. The treetops sifted the last handful of golden light. A few sparrows flitted through the branches, chattering away as if they could scatter the chill rising from the spray.
The shadow clone standing on the cliff finally ran out of chakra and dispersed.
Konome forced herself to endure the exhaustion. Her feet traced the Eight Trigrams. Her hands fluttered like butterflies.
From time to time she struck out with what looked like a light, floating palm.
Deep blue chakra streaked through the air in an elegant curve. Paired with her agile movements, it did not look like a taijutsu drill at all. It looked like some kind of refined and gorgeous dance.
If Hyūga Neji were here, he would have been stunned.
Because what Konome was using right now was not the standard Hyūga Eight Trigrams Palm. It was some unknown taijutsu where every strike still used the Eight Trigrams chakra method, every attack was a fusion of chakra and body.
Without even noticing she had already mastered the entire foundational layer of Eight Trigrams Palm.
But instead of going up step by step toward the so called Eight Trigrams Sixty Four Palms, she had combined the Eight Trigrams principles with the techniques of the Takatori War Dance. Every move had that dazzling, graceful Takatori flavor.
A flick of the arm.
Her glowing palm landed lightly on the trunk.
Buzz.
A light flashed.
Konome paused for half a second, then jumped nimbly to the side.
A cracking noise came from inside the banyan.
Chirp chirp chirp.
The sparrows nesting in the branches let out panicked cries. The violently swaying crown startled them into taking off.
Craaaack.
The giant banyan, using the spot where Konome had struck as the cut line, slid downward bit by bit until it could no longer support itself.
Boom.
The tilting crown slammed down where Konome had been standing a moment earlier and kicked up a puff of yellowish dust.
Whoosh.
A sudden gust rose.
Invisible wind rolled up the dust and at the same time blew away the group of sparrows that had been about to launch a poop attack on her.
Air was still swirling around her.
Konome stepped out of the haze. Her Byakugan covered the thick stump to check the result of her training.
She saw that where her palm had struck, the wood fibers had been completely pulverized by the force.
But the palm force had only smashed through one third of the trunk. The remaining two thirds were cut cleanly, the cut smooth as a mirror, as if sliced by an invisible blade.
Konome looked at the savage wound on the banyan and her eyes lit up.
This was exactly what she had imagined for the Sun Chasing Style.
This technique was born from the hard soft unity of the Takatori War Dance. It used the extreme power of Strong Fist and the precision and speed of Gentle Fist to drive wind natured chakra straight into the enemy's body.
Like hammering in a nail.
Strong Fist was the hammer.
Gentle Fist was the nail.
Once the wind chakra was driven in, the terrifying tearing effect would explode inside.
Konome did not know and did not care what Hyūga point blocking was supposed to look like. She only knew that if razor sharp wind pressure was stuffed into a tenketsu, it would be enough to shred the enemy's meridians together with flesh and bone.
Of course, the stronger the effect, the harsher the price.
Nothing in the world was perfect.
The Sun Chasing Style had brutal prerequisites.
Byakugan level chakra control. Wind Release nature transformation. Shikotsumyaku body control. Plus three taijutsu schools mastered at the same time.
Looking across the whole shinobi world, the only people who could even meet those conditions were Konome Taketori and the still sealed Ōtsutsuki Kaguya.
The front door was this strict. The training itself was just as bad.
That strike just now, which looked so casual, was actually the result of her splitting her attention three or even four ways. It had very high demands on stamina, on brain power, on Byakugan visual output, and on chakra nature control.
That palm had been charged for several minutes.
She had failed countless times before it finally worked once.
There was a lot of luck involved.
And ninja battles usually decided life and death in seconds. No enemy would stand there like a tree and wait for her to finish charging her strike.
Right now the Sun Chasing Style was only a prototype. It needed constant polish so it could be used smoothly. Only then could it be called a real school.
Konome was still far from that point.
When her Sun Chasing Style fully matured, it would be a shinobi body art even more frightening than Kumogakure's Lightning Release Chakra Mode. Konome even dared to say that the upper limit of the Sun Chasing Style was the ceiling of shinobi body arts.
This move will be called
Sun Chasing Style, First Form Sky Rend.
She gave this strike, which almost gathered every bit of her current ability, a name that sounded good.
The first step was always the hardest.
With the foundation of her own nin taijutsu laid, Konome was in a very good mood.
The joy of getting stronger washed away a lot of the fatigue from the last three days.
Do not ask her why it was three days.
The Water Release clone and the Wind Release clone had both dispelled. The exhaustion she was feeling now was three days worth stacked together. With her physique and bloodline she could have borne even more.
But her chakra was not enough.
After learning the Eight Gates and using the power of the Gate of Life to organize the life force naturally leaking from her body, her usual chakra volume was about mid jōnin level.
Splitting into two clones to practice extremely chakra hungry Water and Wind Release was already close to her limit.
If she wanted more, she would have to open the Gate of Pain and forcefully trade life for chakra.
Trading lifespan for cultivation speed.
She was not on the verge of death. Her chakra was still growing. Her path forward was not blocked. She did not want to walk that extreme path yet.
The fatigue in her body grew stronger.
Her Byakugan's power spread through her body.
Body Domination activated quietly.
Nerve signals were blocked at the cerebral cortex. Once the body's feeling of exhaustion was cut off, only excitement remained in her mind.
It was not that she refused to suffer.
It was that with her bloodline ability, every time she trained she could filter out the pain. It was like only eating the sweetness of getting stronger and never tasting the bitterness afterward.
The more she trained, the more she wanted to train.
She did not know if this would become addictive.
Uh oh.
Was Might Guy a training addict because of this?
When she remembered that the second gate of the Eight Gates, the Gate of Rest, could block the feeling of fatigue, she suddenly understood why Might Guy was doing pushups and frog jumps in the street all the time.
Please do not let me be infected by Might Guy.
Konome shivered.
She quickly picked up her now cold cloak and threw it over her shoulders.
She absolutely did not want to be wearing a green jumpsuit in the future, hopping alongside Might Guy through Konoha's streets.
If that image ever came true, the ones trying to destroy the shinobi world would not only be Ōtsutsuki Kaguya.
Looks like I really should control my training volume. Maybe I should give myself a day off tomorrow.
Konome finished dressing and was quietly thinking.
"Konome!"
Suddenly.
A happy voice came from a distance.
Konome looked up. Hyūga Neji had his Byakugan open. He was carrying two scrolls and leaping quickly through the branches.
A few jumps later.
He landed right in front of her.
"Here. The Eight Trigrams Palm Rotation you wanted, and the Eight Trigrams Vacuum Palm." Neji's handsome face showed a proud smile. He held the scrolls out with both hands.
"So fast?"
Konome was genuinely delighted. She grabbed them and opened them right away.
Neji's work efficiency was not just a little better than Hinata's.
"Take your time with the Vacuum Palm. I will help you practice the Eight Trigrams Palm and the tenketsu work first."
"Okay."
Konome nodded casually, her whole mind already drowning in the secrets written on the scroll.
As for the day off she had just planned, she had already tossed it out of the village.
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