Naruto: The Age of Ninja Swords Begins in Kumogakure

Chapter 12 The Blade of the Night Moon

Finally, the blade stopped one centimeter above Tamura Hiroshi's head, almost touching his scalp.

"Huff huff..."

Tamura Hiroshi was breathing heavily, sweat was beading on his forehead, his face was flushed, his heart was beating almost twice as fast as usual, and his arms holding the knife were trembling slightly.

This is a side effect of the previous outburst. Even though he has improved his comprehension and raised his chakra control to the limit he can reach at this stage, such a long period of high-intensity outburst still puts a burden on his body and even causes damage.

At the same time, Fauci's explosive power was too strong. Every impact was a severe test for his arms, and he felt that there were multiple muscle strains in his arms.

"The teacher is too strong. Even when I unleashed my full power, I couldn't make the teacher take a single step back."

Taking a breath, Tamura Hao sheathed his twin swords into the sealing technique on his arm guards, marveling at his teacher's power.

The opponent was far stronger than him in both strength and speed. He hadn't even used ninjutsu; he had simply used chakra to amplify his physical strength and calmly blocked his powerful combo attack.

He unleashed over a hundred blows but failed to injure his opponent in the slightest. His subsequent counterattacks then overwhelmed him, forcing him to retreat repeatedly.

He truly deserves to be a Jonin who has mastered ninjutsu and taijutsu, and he is also worthy of being the future Eight-Tails Jinchuriki.

Of course, the main reason is that he is too weak. His current fighting strength is probably about the same as Rock Lee's when he didn't open the Eight Gates during the Chunin Exams in the original story.

And it was in a burst of power, so it couldn't last long; it was over in less than a minute from the start to the end of the battle.

It hasn't even been three minutes!

The main problem was that his chakra was exhausted, and he simply couldn't fight against Fukai based on his physical abilities alone.

Fukai glanced at the ninja sword, whose blade was almost serrated, and sighed inwardly, but he was quite satisfied with the student.

"Your outburst just now was very powerful, enough to fight against a Chunin who specializes in taijutsu. It is rare to have such strength at the age of ten."

Choosing this long sword to compensate for the lack of ranged ninjutsu attacks is a wise move, especially against opponents like puppeteers who are equipped with elaborate mechanisms; this makes the fight safer.

To possess such strength at the age of ten is no exaggeration to call someone a genius. If it weren't for the fact that his chakra reserves were a drawback, making it difficult for him to sustain his initial burst of power, he would be a true Chunin in strength.

Of course, strength is only one part of the ninja rank assessment. For Chunin, tactical command ability is more important, which is not yet apparent.

"I have put in several times the effort of an ordinary person to achieve what I have today."

Tamura Hiroshi shook his head, feeling quite helpless. This was a difference in physical aptitude, something that couldn't be improved through hard work alone.

In this world, talent and aptitude determine the upper limit, while effort only determines the lower limit.

Without the bloodline of the Otsutsuki, one is not even qualified to become the Ten-Tails' Jinchūriki.

"You are too young now, and your physique has not fully developed. It is not suitable for you to focus on strength. Moreover, your swordsmanship and sword techniques are mainly based on thrusting and secondary on slashing. You are more suitable to focus on explosive speed."

Afterwards, I will guide you in cultivating the nature transformation of the lightning attribute. Once you have mastered it, you can use lightning attribute chakra to stimulate your nerves and bones to increase your burst speed.

Moreover, the burst of speed puts much less strain on the body than bursts of strength, making it more suitable for your current age and physique.

Then comes practical combat. You have almost no real combat experience. Although your basic swordsmanship is solid, it's relatively rigid. You need a lot of practical combat to bring your swordsmanship to life.

Fauci offered advice and outlined a general plan for the student's training over the next period of time.

"Am I right? Ah Hao is a rare genius."

At that moment, a figure flashed to the side of the two, it was Ye Yue Ai.

Night Moon Ai had arrived long ago and watched the entire battle between the two.

Although it was only a short minute, he found it very interesting and was slightly surprised.

He knew his junior brother was a genius, but he had previously thought his talent lay in the development of weapons and ninja tools, or rather, in his novel ideas.

But who would have thought that he was also so talented in cultivation and combat?

He had a clear view of the battle just now and could clearly see that his junior brother was improving in actual combat. Even when facing the offensive Fukai, his response was becoming more and more fluid.

If it weren't for the huge difference in strength and the depletion of chakra, they could probably have held on for a while longer.

"Brother Night Moon!"

Tamura Hiroshi greeted Yozuki Ai.

"Come on, I have prepared medicinal baths and medical ninjas for you."

Ye Yue Ai put her arm around Tamura Hao's shoulder and led him out of the training field.

I came here specifically to take this junior brother to a medicinal bath.

Fukai followed, wanting to talk more with the student about his future cultivation, especially to understand his thoughts on his future path.

……

"Isn't this medicinal bath a secret recipe passed down by the Night Moon Clan?"

Upon arriving at the three large barrels and looking at the medicinal liquid inside, Fauci was greatly shocked.

He had used the body-refining medicinal bath of the Night Moon Clan, which was very effective in cultivating his body and could also repair hidden injuries.

However, they only enjoyed it less than ten times, mainly because it was too expensive. A single tub cost a million taels of silver, and even though their family had some wealth, they couldn't afford too many medicinal baths.

Most importantly, this is a secret medicinal bath passed down by the Yotsuki clan. It has even been improved by the Second Hokage by gathering the secret medicines passed down by many families in Kumogakure, making it priceless. It is a closely guarded secret of the Yotsuki clan and the Raikage lineage.

It's very strange that Ye Yue Ai brought that child here to enjoy this kind of medicinal bath.

"This is far more advanced than the medicinal bath you enjoyed back then. It's what our Night Moon Clan uses to temper our hand blades. My father's Hell Thrust was also honed through years of practice with the help of this medicinal bath."

Ye Yue Ai proudly stated that this medicinal bath was the most perfect one, while the previous full-body body tempering method was merely a simplified version.

However, this kind of medicinal bath is too expensive. Each of these three large tubs costs ten million taels of silver. In the past, they could only use small tubs to simply temper their palms and then cultivate the secret hand-blade technique passed down by their Night Moon family.

The core secret technique of their Night Moon Clan is to hone their heirloom hand blades with lightning-sharpness through grueling forging, which allows them to unleash devastating lightning strikes with unparalleled skill.

That is why, although the Lightning Strike Level Chiyo Dance is only a C-rank ninjutsu, its power is no weaker than an S-rank ninjutsu, and it can even break through the defenses of tailed beasts.

His father further developed an even stronger Hell Thrust, which he used to suppress the rampaging Eight-Tails and Two-Tails on several occasions.

Now he has lavishly used ten times the amount of medicinal bath, enough to temper his entire body.

"Ah Hao, this is a secret medicine passed down only by our Night Moon family. The cost of one of these large barrels is ten million taels of silver, so three barrels would cost thirty million taels. Each medicinal bath can last for a month, and you can do it once a month. Can you handle it?"

Turning her gaze to Tamura Hao, who was intently watching the three large barrels of medicinal liquid, Ye Yue Ai pinned her hopes for future benefits on this junior brother.

This junior apprentice is alright in other aspects, but his ability to make money is truly outstanding.

The current income is already quite impressive, and it will increase significantly in the future, surpassing the village's overall income in just a matter of time.

I came up with this crazy idea after discussing it with my father.

By leveraging their junior brother's financial resources, they could maximize the strength of the three of them, at least improving their physical abilities.

Previously, the Night Moon Clan had limited resources and could only use this precious medicinal bath to temper their palms and forge a family heirloom hand blade. But now they can go a step further and temper their entire body.

Once the body is fully tempered to its limit, the power of the ninjutsu will be unimaginable.

(End of this chapter)