Chapter 26: Studying Wind Release Ninjutsu
Having to feign ignorance twice and then pretend to be fascinated by stories he already knew, Kaito felt mentally exhausted.
He decided not to eat his usual ration bars anymore and instead went to Ichiraku Ramen for lunch.
His thought was: "I've saved a lot of money lately; I need to treat myself well today!"
After lunch, he began studying the Shadow Clone Jutsu.
After carefully reading through the scroll, he thought: "This is undoubtedly the most complex jutsu I've encountered so far. The process of molding chakra is extremely intricate. It's honestly amazing how Naruto learned this in less than a day! However, this Shadow Clone technique is actually more flexible than I initially assumed from watching the series."
The chakra distribution for Shadow Clones doesn't necessarily have to be evenly split among each clone.
The percentage of chakra each clone receives depends entirely on the caster's intent and skill level.
One could create clones with minimal chakra to serve as distractions, or allocate more chakra as needed for specific tasks.
Another important difference he discovered was that dispelling a Shadow Clone doesn't return all of its remaining chakra to the original body.
Instead, some chakra is inevitably lost during this process.
However, as one masters the technique, this loss decreases—though it never drops to zero.
So in the future, he would need to be mindful of how many Shadow Clones he created, otherwise his chakra would be depleted rapidly.
After finishing his analysis, he began practicing the Shadow Clone Jutsu.
His understanding of the basic Academy jutsu proved somewhat helpful as a foundation.
The training continued for some time.
Kaito noticed that his chakra was consumed extremely quickly during this training.
He could only practice for about an hour before his chakra was completely depleted.
So starting the next day, he began practicing the Shadow Clone Jutsu first thing in the morning, then again at noon, and finally once more in the evening—for a total of three hours of dedicated training per day.
The remaining time was spent either on taijutsu training or meditation to recover his chakra.
He also carried a few leaves with him to practice his Wind Release nature transformation whenever possible.
By the ninth day, he was finally able to create his first Shadow Clone.
Kaito found that while molding the chakra was relatively difficult, the actual execution was somewhat easier than the Body Flicker Jutsu had been.
Six more days passed, and he was finally able to create an acceptable Shadow Clone.
It looked identical to him and contained approximately half of his chakra.
However, using his sensory perception, Kaito detected that during the formation of the Shadow Clone, some chakra was lost in the process, resulting in a slight reduction in the clone's total chakra amount.
This was concerning, but not unexpected.
He decided to test the clone's capabilities first.
He had the Shadow Clone enter his bedroom, write down any random number somewhere, and then dispel itself.
The Shadow Clone walked into the bedroom and wrote "8196" on a blank scroll.
After dispelling it, Kaito received all the information and verified that the memory transfer worked correctly.
He thought: "Hmm, this works perfectly."
He then created another Shadow Clone.
This time, he used a kunai to stab the Shadow Clone's arm, causing the clone to immediately dissipate.
He waited a few seconds and then concluded: "Good, I received the clone's memories, but the physical pain wasn't transferred to me. So this jutsu should be safe to use in actual combat situations."
Then he created a Shadow Clone again, this time having it perform the three basic Academy jutsu.
The Shadow Clone executed these techniques just as competently as he could.
He couldn't safely test the Body Flicker Jutsu at home, so he decided to test that capability later.
Then he had the Shadow Clone attempt to perform the Shadow Clone Jutsu itself.
The clone succeeded in forming the hand seal.
But the very next second, both clones were forcibly dispelled.
Kaito sensed that their chakra had become extremely unstable just before dispersing.
After thinking about it carefully, he came to a conclusion:
"The Shadow Clones were dispelled because they didn't have sufficient chakra reserves. Although shinobi can technically create Shadow Clones with relatively small amounts of chakra, the clones still need to maintain a certain minimum chakra threshold to remain stable."
And Kaito's single Shadow Clone had barely exceeded this critical limit.
Did this mean that after using several jutsu, his Shadow Clone would disappear due to insufficient chakra even if it still had some remaining?
This realization alarmed him considerably.
He quickly rushed to a nearby small training forest.
After using the Transformation Jutsu as a disguise and confirming that no one was around, he created a Shadow Clone.
Understanding the test plan, the Shadow Clone began performing the Body Flicker Jutsu repeatedly within the original body's sensory range, while Kaito carefully monitored the clone's chakra levels.
The Shadow Clone initially possessed about 49% of Kaito's total chakra.
When the clone's reserves dropped below 41%, it automatically dissipated.
After confirming his suspicion, Kaito sighed heavily.
"Right now, it seems impossible for Shadow Clones to assist me in intensive jutsu training. But honestly, it doesn't really matter much, because I can't maintain extended jutsu training sessions before my own chakra runs out anyway."
After complaining for half a minute about his insufficient chakra reserves, he decided: "Well, it doesn't matter for now. This limitation was somewhat expected. I hope that someday in the future, my chakra reserves will be large enough to use Shadow Clones effectively for training! For now, I just need to master this technique thoroughly!"
Over the next five days, he practiced the Shadow Clone Jutsu until he achieved an acceptable level of proficiency.
Now there was virtually no chakra loss during the initial formation of Shadow Clones.
As for the chakra loss when the clone dispelled and returned its remaining chakra, it was approximately 5%.
Kaito noticed that this loss percentage was gradually decreasing with continued practice.
After completing his Shadow Clone training to his satisfaction, he decided it was finally time to begin practicing elemental ninjutsu.
However, he decided to wait another ten days before returning the scroll to the Hokage.
This way, Hiruzen would slightly underestimate his learning speed and natural talent.
On the 21st day of summer vacation, Kaito went to the Academy Library.
Along the way, he thought extensively about Wind Release ninjutsu.
His thoughts were: "Finally, I'm going to start learning Wind Release techniques. In the Naruto series, Wind Release is probably portrayed as the weakest of the five basic elements. Although Naruto has Wind Release affinity, all he really uses effectively is the Rasenshuriken. Temari does have quite a few techniques, but she relies heavily on her giant iron fan!"
"Kakuzu uses Wind Release: Pressure Damage, which demonstrates considerable destructive power. There's also Wind Release: Great Breakthrough used by Orochimaru, and perhaps Wind Release: Gale Palm used by various shinobi. Finally, the Vacuum-series techniques used by Danzo are also very destructive. It's unfortunate that, apart from Temari, no major character really specializes in Wind Release ninjutsu. And the total number of Wind Release techniques shown in the series is quite limited."
Fortunately, however, this world's Library contained many more Wind Release techniques than were shown in the anime.
Kaito hoped he might be able to build a complete combat system centered around Wind Release.
Last time he had only read their titles and descriptions, but this time Kaito was going to thoroughly study the actual technique scrolls.
Then he would organize a comprehensive list of jutsu to learn in a logical progression.
However, this time Kaito also hoped to read descriptions of higher-ranked Wind Release techniques, which would be very helpful in making strategic training decisions.
Upon arriving at the Library, he carefully browsed through Sections E and D and compiled a list of all the Wind Release jutsu he could currently access and train:
E-Rank Wind Release Jutsu:
Wind Breathing Technique
Wind Clone Jutsu
Wind Levitation Technique
Projectile Control Technique
Wind Muffling Technique
D-Rank Wind Release Jutsu:
Gale Palm
Great Breakthrough
Dust Wind Technique
Wind Cutter
Air Bullets
Pushing Gale
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