Konoha, reported by the Fourth Hokage at the start.

Chapter 72 Absolutely Impossible

night.

Following the trail of Li Yaoying's clone, Sarutobi Tensuke and his wife arrived before Ryoma and Jessica from another team and found Li Yaoying's clone heading north.

In a valley filled with golden fallen leaves, Li Yao's shadow clone sat on a boulder in the center, eyes closed, focused entirely on maintaining his chakra perception.

After receiving the thoughts from Li Yao's main body, the shadow clone stopped moving forward and stayed in the valley to wait for the ninja team to arrive, so as to determine whether it was the time of the Ninja World War.

However, because the shadow clone's chakra perception ability is not as strong as the original body, Li Yao's shadow clones must concentrate in order to expand the range of chakra perception.

"Why haven't they found them yet?"

Li Yao was somewhat puzzled. The shadow clone's tracks were very clear, so someone should have come looking for it by now.

However, there was no chakra fluctuation within a two-kilometer radius of chakra perception.

Unbeknownst to Li Yao, four kilometers away in the sky, Sarutobi Tensuke and his wife had already arrived and were watching Li Yao from the air above the rocks in the valley.

"Is that Li Yao?"

Sarutobi Tenjuro asked, "It's too far away; I can't see."

Sarutobi Ayase, with one eye closed, nodded and said, "It's Li Yao."

Sarutobi Ayase can connect with the eyes of the giant bird, a super-beast illusion, beneath her feet, and gain the vision of one of the bird's eyes, allowing her to see objects four or five kilometers away as clearly as an eagle.

She could see Li Yao sitting on the rock clearly and wouldn't mistake him for someone else.

"Let's go down then," Sarutobi Tensuke said.

"Shouldn't we test it out?" Sarutobi Ayase asked. "We don't even know if this Li Yao is a shadow clone."

"No need." Sarutobi Tenjuro shook his head and said, "Shadow clones can't last too long. We'll know whether Li Yao is still around tomorrow or not."

The Shadow Clone Technique, especially the Multiple Shadow Clone Technique, is listed as a forbidden technique because after the shadow clones are released, the memories experienced by the shadow clones are also brought back to the original body.

Once the Multiple Shadow Clone Technique is used to create more than ten shadow clones for more than an hour, the main body will be immediately impacted by the memories of those ten shadow clones for more than an hour after the shadow clones are released.

This memory is enormous.

Most people simply cannot withstand the impact of such a sudden memory; their brains would be directly damaged by this memory shock, turning them into idiots.

If Li Yao here is a shadow clone, then that means this shadow clone has existed for at least ten hours.

The memories accumulated in this time are no less than the memories accumulated by ten shadow clones in one hour.

If it weren't for knowing that Li Yao's soul was special and that he could use the Spirit Transformation Technique, Sarutobi Tenjuro would have immediately assumed that the Li Yao in the valley ahead was his true form.

Ordinary people simply cannot withstand the memory impact of a shadow clone existing for ten hours.

Even for him, being instantly struck by the memories of a shadow clone that had existed for more than ten hours would cause mental damage, and it would take him a week to recover.

Sarutobi Tenjuro didn't believe that Li Yao could withstand the memory of the shadow clone existing for more than twenty hours by tomorrow morning.

That's not as simple as one plus one.

The longer the shadow clone exists, the stronger the impact of the accumulated memories on the original's brain and mind will be, multiplying in intensity.

The shadow clone possesses twenty hours of accumulated memories, and even with Li Yao's special soul, Sarutobi Tensuke believes that Li Yao cannot withstand it.

If Li Yao here is a shadow clone, then it will automatically dissipate by midnight at the latest.

Soon, it was midnight.

Seeing that Li Yao was still in the valley, Sarutobi Tenjuchi smiled slightly and said, "It seems that this is Li Yao's true form."

Sarutobi Ayase smiled and affirmed, "Shadow clones couldn't possibly exist for this long."

Both of them were certain that the Li Yao in the valley was the real Li Yao, while the one that Longma and the others found was Li Yao's shadow clone.

Half an hour after Sarutobi Tensuke and his wife found Li Yao in the valley, Echizen Ryoma and Hyuga Sika also found Li Yao in a small village in the south.

They communicated through the eagle drawn by Sarutobi Ayase, and both knew that they had found Li Yao. The only thing they needed to determine was which side was the real Li Yao.

It now appears that what's on their side is Li Yao's true form, while what's on Echizen Ryoma's side are shadow clones.

The Sarutobi Tensuke couple held this belief until sunrise the following morning.

They were completely stunned when they received the letter from Echizen Ryoma and Hyuga Sika via the Super Beast Imitation Painting Eagle as the sun rose in the morning.

"impossible!"

"Absolutely impossible!"

Sarutobi Tensuke's face was filled with disbelief.

Sarutobi Ayase's beautiful eyes were also filled with shock at this moment.

The letter stated that the Li Yao they found was still there this morning and had not disappeared. The two asked if the Li Yao they found was still there and whether it was a shadow clone.

"this……"

Sarutobi Ayase was at a loss for words, so she could only look to her husband, Sarutobi Tenshu, who also knew the Shadow Clone Technique.

Sarutobi Tenjuchi had recovered from his shock. He took a deep breath and looked at his wife, saying, "Ayase, you're controlling the birds remotely. I'll use Shadow Clone Technique to attack Li Yao. We can only test the waters."

No matter how Li Yao dared to let the shadow clone exist for more than twenty hours, even if he could be immune to the memory impact of the shadow clone's elimination like he was immune to genjutsu, it doesn't change the fact that the existence of the shadow clone is itself a ninjutsu.

Releasing ninjutsu naturally consumes chakra.

Maintaining the existence of shadow clones is a process that continuously consumes chakra.

The shadow clones must have consumed a lot of chakra to exist for more than twenty hours, so the chakra they currently possess must be very little.

If it's a shadow clone, test it with a few attacks to increase its chakra consumption. The shadow clone will naturally dissipate due to lack of chakra.

In this way, it would be easy to find out whether Li Yao in the valley was a shadow clone.

"What about Ryoma and the others?" Sarutobi Ayase asked. "Should we have them test the waters too?"

Sarutobi Tenjuro frowned and thought for a moment, then said, "Let them test the waters, but they must focus on ranged attacks and not get close without permission."

The way Li Yaoying used his clones shocked Sarutobi Tenjuro. He was now somewhat unable to distinguish whether the two Li Yaoying clones had a real body or not.

So it's safest to test the waters first.

However, I still reminded them to stay away from Li Yao.

Illusion techniques require distance to be cast. As long as a safe distance of 100 meters is maintained, many illusion ninjas will be unable to cast illusion techniques from a distance.

"Then I'll inform them first."

Sarutobi Ayase redraws an eagle, carrying Sarutobi Tenshu's orders, and flies to find Echizen Ryoma and the others.

After finishing, Sarutobi Tenjuro immediately created a shadow clone and headed towards the valley.

Above him, in the air, were thirty ink-wash birds painted by his wife, Sarutobi Ayase, following him.

(End of this chapter)