The Academy courtyard was silent. The class formed a semicircle, leaving an open space for Asahi and the substitution post, which seemed to mock him from about 10 meters (≈33 ft) away.
'Shit,' Asahi repeated in his head.
"Come on, Asahi! You can do it!" Arashi shouted, breaking the tension. "Just do whatever you were doing with that leaf!"
'If only it were that simple,' Asahi thought, wiping the sweat (more from nerves and exhaustion than heat) from his forehead.
"No pressure, Asahi," said Iruka-sensei in a kind voice that somehow only added more pressure. "Just remember the fundamentals. Feel your own chakra, feel the target, and then... well, you know the rest."
Asahi took a deep breath. 'Iruka's right. Fundamentals.'
He closed his eyes.
Feel yourself. He focused inward. His chakra was there, but it felt weak, like a low hum instead of the usual roar. The night of mental practice had drained him to the bone. 'I barely have any fuel.' But there was something. Enough.
Feel the target. He extended his senses. He could sense the presence of the wooden post. It was… bland. Empty. 'A dead chakra signature.' Perfect. Easy to distinguish from his own.
The seals. He raised his hands. His movements were slow, almost trembling from exhaustion.
'Good. Here it comes. The moment of truth.'
His reincarnated brain analyzed: 'Kawarimi is an evasion jutsu. The moment my body senses the "intention to evade," it will tense every muscle to jump.'
And just as he predicted, the instant he formed the seal, the CLICK was deafening in his mind.
His knees flexed instinctively. His calves tensed, ready to launch… not toward the post, but to the side. His body was trying to dodge a nonexistent threat.
'NO!' he shouted internally, waging a war of a split second against eight years of reflexes.
Instead of fighting the tension, he did something radically different. He relaxed.
He forced his knees to loosen. He forced his shoulders to drop. He made his whole body limp, like a ragdoll.
And then, in that state of total muscle relaxation, he sent the chakra command.
'I need to… write my signature there. Write the post's signature here.'
The world felt… elastic.
'POF!'
A small swirl of leaves and dust rose where he had been standing.
The courtyard was utterly silent.
Asahi opened his eyes.
The world was… different. Seen from a slightly lower angle. The air smelled of sap and wet wood. He looked down. He was standing on the flattened grass where, a second before, the post had been.
He turned slowly.
There, where he had been standing, with a half-formed panic frozen on its wooden face… was the substitution post.
He had done it.
"YES!!!" Arashi roared, breaking the spell. "HE DID IT! HE REALLY DID IT! FINALLY!!"
Sakura had her hands over her mouth. Sasuke squinted, his analytical mind processing the mechanics of what he had just seen: the tension, the sudden relaxation, and then the jutsu.
Asahi didn't join the celebration. He staggered and had to put a hand on his own substitute (the post) to stay upright. He was completely drained. The jutsu had consumed the last drop of his exhausted chakra.
"Impressive," Iruka murmured, approaching. He placed a proud hand on Asahi's shoulder. "I knew you could do it. You understood the core of the problem."
Asahi just nodded, too tired to speak. But in his mind, fireworks were exploding.
'I got it.'
It wasn't just the Kawarimi. It was everything.
'I'm not trying to become Iruka-sensei. I project Iruka-sensei's image onto my chakra. It's a Henge, not a transformation.'
'I'm not trying to create a physical clone. I project an image of light and sound. It's a Bunshin.'
The revelation was so deep he almost laughed. All these clan kids, with chakra systems functioning properly from birth, did it instinctively. But he, due to his 'defect' (his obsessive physical training), had been forced to deconstruct the very nature of the jutsu.
And unknowingly, he had tapped into the most powerful combination of his body.
Asahi knew none of this.
He leaned on the post, dizzy and pale, but with a triumphant smile.
'I won,' he thought. 'I've hacked the system. I may have started in hard mode, but I just found the developer menu. I'm the damn God now.'
The rest of the class looked at him in a new light. He was no longer the weirdo who failed. He was the weirdo who failed… until, suddenly, he didn't.
"Alright, Asahi," said Iruka, smiling. "Go sit down. You earned it. The rest of you, I want ten successful substitutions before lunch!"
As Asahi walked toward the bleachers, he felt a gaze. Naruto was sitting alone, as usual, and gave Asahi a small, almost imperceptible nod.
'Hahaha,' Asahi thought, returning the gesture. 'Thanks for the tip, future Hokage.'