Chapter 436: Is This What Being a Genius Is Like?

Chapter 436: Chapter 436: Is This What Being a Genius Is Like?

Recalling how smoothly he had just executed the Shikotsumyaku secret technique, Kagami lowered his eyelids and narrowed his eyes, murmuring to himself, "Is this what being a genius is like?"

The Ten-Finger Drilling Bullets he had just used had felt completely natural, without the slightest trace of awkwardness—as though it were simply an instinct ingrained into this body.

For Kagami, whose talent was merely average and who had always needed painstaking practice before he could proficiently use a ninjutsu, this feeling was extremely unfamiliar.

Reining in his wandering thoughts, Kagami slowly walked to the center of the training ground.

Snap...

He snapped his fingers crisply.

Before long, several puppets walked out from the storage room.

These puppets had all been acquired by Kagami through various channels in the past. He had placed them in the training ground and used Tenseigan chakra to grant them a certain degree of autonomy, allowing them to serve as his training partners.

Clack, clack...

As their bodies trembled, gleaming blades sprang out from the limbs of the puppets. Immediately afterward, they charged toward Kagami from every direction, attacking him in all sorts of bizarre and unpredictable postures.

Not only did Kagami refrain from activating his Byakugan, he even closed his eyes, lowering his center of gravity slightly.

Feeling the subtle changes in the air currents around him and listening to the various sounds rapidly drawing closer from every direction, Kagami thought to himself,

"I can feel them!"

Whoosh...

In an instant, just as the puppets closed in on him, Kagami’s figure transformed into an afterimage.

Like a phantom, that afterimage weaved among the puppets, narrowly avoiding their attacks again and again. Yet despite how perilous the situation should have been, there was an inexplicable sense of ease to his movements—as though this were nothing more than a game.

"This is it!"

As he twisted, turned, and darted between the attacks, realization dawned in Kagami’s mind.

What he was using right now was none other than the secret technique recorded in the Kaguya Clan’s scrolls—the Dance of the Willow!

The Dance of the Willow was one of the more advanced secret techniques among the Kaguya Clan’s many arts. By sensing the surrounding air currents and judging the sounds around them, the user could respond to an enemy’s attacks. It was an advanced form of nin-taijutsu that could be performed purely through the body’s instincts—even without the use of one’s eyes!

Clang! Clang! Clang...!

Suddenly, a rapid series of metallic clashes echoed throughout the training ground.

Kagami came to a stop.

The slender bone blades protruding from his palms, elbows, shoulder blades, and other parts of his body slowly retracted back inside him.

In that brief instant just now, he had launched the bone-blade attacks of the Dance of the Willow. Within only a few breaths, the puppets surrounding him had been sliced into pieces.

And it wasn’t just the puppets themselves.

The metal swords and blades equipped on them had also shattered across the floor after colliding with his bone blades!

Crouching down, Kagami examined the fragments of weapons scattered across the ground. He discovered that the breaks along the fragments were remarkably clean, almost as though they had been sliced apart by an even sharper blade.

After pondering for a moment, Kagami flicked his right hand.

A bone spike immediately extended from the center of his palm.

Then, with his other hand, he took out a kunai from the ninja pouch at his waist.

Clang...

He struck the bone spike against the kunai.

Accompanied by a sharp metallic screech, the kunai forged from refined steel was instantly sliced apart by the bone spike!

"It’s this sharp!?"

Instead of feeling delighted, a trace of worry arose in Kagami’s heart.

As one of the candidates for his Wind Release clone, Kagami had extremely high expectations for this Type-A Wind Release clone. And precisely because of that, he didn’t need this clone’s Shikotsumyaku to be overly powerful.

After all, the stronger the Shikotsumyaku was, the more severe the bloodline disease would become!

What he truly needed was for this clone to develop its Wind Release abilities, thereby maintaining a balance among his various elemental clones.

"Phew..."

After letting out a breath, Kagami decided that he would use the Shikotsumyaku as little as possible from now on.

Immediately afterward, he began considering Kekkei Genkai primarily based on the Wind nature.

There were many Kekkei Genkai related to the Wind nature in the shinobi world, such as Ice Release, Scorch Release, Dust Release, and so on. However, there weren’t many Kekkei Genkai in which Wind Release served as the primary chakra nature.

Magnet Release, which had gradually become something of a standard ability among Sunagakure’s Kazekage, was one of them.

The Magnet Release Kekkei Genkai used Wind as its primary nature and Lightning as its secondary nature. By using Wind-natured chakra to stimulate Lightning-natured chakra, the Lightning chakra would enter an abnormally active state and acquire magnetic properties, thereby allowing the user to manipulate metal.

Depending on the individual shinobi’s chakra attributes, the properties of this magnetism would also differ slightly.

For example, the Third Kazekage’s Magnet Release allowed him to manipulate ordinary Iron Sand, while the Fourth Kazekage’s Magnet Release allowed him to manipulate the far rarer Gold Dust.

Kagami had already examined the chakra natures of this Type-A Wind Release clone.

Its primary nature was Wind.

In addition, it possessed Yin, Yang, Lightning, Earth, and Water natures.

The only chakra nature it lacked was Fire.

Therefore, this Type-A Wind Release clone was fully capable of attempting to cultivate Magnet Release.

And because Kagami had possessed the Third Kazekage Human Puppet for quite some time already, his understanding of Magnet Release was probably second only to that of the current Fourth Kazekage.

Back when he had first mastered the Spirit Descent Technique, he had repeatedly descended into the Third Kazekage Human Puppet and personally experienced what it felt like to use Magnet Release.

As a result, he understood its principles perfectly—how to use Wind-natured chakra to stimulate Lightning-natured chakra, keeping the Lightning chakra in a state of high-frequency vibration and thereby generating magnetic force.

Before long, Kagami summoned the Third Kazekage Human Puppet into the training ground.

After borrowing some Iron Sand from it, he began attempting to cultivate Magnet Release.

For Kagami, who had already cultivated two different Kekkei Genkai—Ice Release and Blaze Release—combining two different chakra natures wasn’t particularly difficult.

However, Magnet Release was different from both Ice Release and Blaze Release.

Ice Release and Blaze Release focused on merging different chakra natures together to produce a change in nature. Thus, the key word behind both of them was ’fusion.’

Magnet Release, however, was different.

Simply fusing Wind-natured chakra and Lightning-natured chakra together would never produce Magnet Release.

The key to Magnet Release wasn’t ’fusion’—

it was ’stimulation.’

Without knowing this trick, no matter how talented someone was or how enormous their chakra reserves were, they would still be unable to cultivate Magnet Release.

To anyone else, this trick might have been an earth-shattering secret.

But for Kagami, who possessed both the Third Kazekage Human Puppet and the Spirit Descent Technique, it was knowledge he had mastered long ago.

Recalling the sensation of using Magnet Release while descended into the Third Kazekage Human Puppet, Kagami closed his eyes and concentrated fully on controlling the Wind-natured chakra within his body.

Little by little, he used the Wind-natured chakra to stimulate the Lightning-natured chakra, causing the already inherently unstable Lightning chakra to become increasingly active.

And just as Kagami focused on manipulating his Wind-natured chakra to continuously stimulate the Lightning-natured chakra—

among the small cluster of black Iron Sand before him...

several grains slowly began to float into the air...