Konoha: Starting with Sage Mode

Because Tsunade suddenly knelt down and kissed his forehead, then said gently, "Kirito, promise your sister, you and Nawaki must come back alive."

After saying that, she took off the precious gem necklace, which was called the Death Necklace in the original story, from her neck and placed it around Kirito's neck.

Chapter 159: The White Fang Squad

"Sister, this is something very precious to you, I can't accept it."

Kirito blushed instantly when Tsunade suddenly kissed his forehead. Then he saw Tsunade take off the First Hokage necklace from her chest and place it around his neck, politely declining with a surprised expression.

"Please accept this. It's a keepsake from my grandfather, and I'm giving it to you now. I hadn't decided what to give you for your birthday, but now I've decided on this. I hope it will protect you and bring you back safely."

Tsunade lightly flicked Kirito's forehead with her finger, revealing a kind smile.

Seeing this, Kirito could only blush slightly and accept it.

Tsunade nodded in satisfaction when she saw the necklace Kirito had given her. She stood up again, put her hands on her hips, straightened her body, and then smiled at Kirito, saying, "Let's end today's training here. If we continue fighting here, this place will be destroyed. I still have some things to take care of at the hospital, so I'll be leaving now."

After saying that, she left without any hesitation.

Kirito watched Tsunade's dashing departure, then gripped the necklace at his chest tightly, a strange glint in his eyes.

Meanwhile, in the woods not far away, Chizuru stared intently at Tsunade's departing figure with her three-tomoe Sharingan.

Suddenly feeling a chill, Nawaki instinctively tried to distance himself from Chizuru. He then went to find Kirito and replaced Tsunade as Kirito's new Sacred Beast Puppet Performance Tester.

Kirito gladly accepted Nawaki's free labor.

Before long, Rope Tree, who had opened the four gates, collapsed to the ground due to the side effects of the Eight Gates Technique. In front of him were Kirito and the Genbu Puppet, who were completely unharmed.

After nearly half a year of hard work and the expenditure of a large amount of physical resources, Rope Tree has now successfully opened the fourth gate.

With the four gates open, Nawaki immediately possessed the strength of an elite Jonin, and his movement speed reached the level of the Body Flicker Technique, allowing him to launch continuous and fierce attacks on the enemy. Combined with his mastery of Konoha's taijutsu, Konoha Dragon, his explosive power was no weaker than the monstrous punch that Tsunade had just used.

"You're done for so quickly? Your burst lasted far too short. My puppet's skin wasn't even broken yet."

Kirito looked at Nawaki, who was now slumped on the ground, and said sarcastically.

"Wait, give me a few minutes, I'll be back to normal."

Rope Tree said weakly, his face showing deep resentment.

Although he understood that Kirito was terrifyingly strong and had never beaten him before, he was still too abnormal now. He couldn't even defeat one of Kirito's puppets. It was simply outrageous.

"Alright, let's go back and practice some more. Do you know how much this Xuanwu puppet cost? Five hundred million. Don't even mention you, even Tsunade might not be able to break through its defenses."

Kirito, seeing that Nawaki was not convinced, continued to belittle him.

He knew Nawaki's personality all too well; he was a stubborn optimist with an extremely strong ability to withstand pressure. The more he was discouraged, the stronger his ambition became.

"Five hundred million! Where did you get so much money?"

Upon hearing the cost of the Genbu puppet, Nawaki immediately looked up at Kirito with a shocked expression.

He gets 100,000 yen in pocket money every month. Five hundred million yen is a huge sum of money. It's hard for Nawaki's little brain to imagine how big that would be. It's enough for him to eat his favorite Ichiraku Ramen for the rest of his life.

In an instant, the scene of being swallowed up by countless Ichiraku Ramen noodles flashed through Nawaki's mind, and his gaze toward the Genbu puppet became fervent.

"Of course I made the profit, you should be happy. With it, our safety on the battlefield will be greatly improved. In the future, when you use the Eight Gates Technique and the side effects appear, it will be your closest partner."

Seeing the surprised expression on Nawaki's face, Kirito squatted down, touched the tortoise shell of the Genbu puppet beneath him, and smiled with satisfaction.

The Eight Gates technique is powerful, but its amplification ability lasts for too short a period of time.

With Rope Tree's current strength, he'd be lucky to last half a minute after opening all four gates. Once that time is up, Rope Tree will immediately become a useless piece of trash who can barely move.

At this point, Rope Tree needs someone to protect him, otherwise he will definitely be easily finished off by the enemy.

On the battlefield, if a four-person ninja team temporarily loses an important combatant in order to protect Nawaki, the danger will definitely increase significantly.

Therefore, with this in mind, Kirito specifically created the Genbu Puppet, a defensive puppet with super strong defensive capabilities, and the Suzaku Puppet, a flying puppet with high mobility.

If Nawaki collapses due to the side effects of the Eight Gates technique, the Genbu puppet can become his temporary shelter, sustaining him until he regains his fighting strength.

At the same time, the enormous amount of chakra in Nawaki's body also came in handy, as his chakra would become a backup hidden energy source for the Genbu Puppet to activate the Puppet Technique: Machine Light Shield Seal.

Kirito specially designed a sealing technique on this Xuanwu puppet that can absorb the chakra within a ninja's body.

The reference for this sealing technique is Earth Release: Earth Prison Hall, and Kirito named this sealing technique Sealing Technique: Earth Prison Hall.

In fact, later on the battlefield, Nawaki served as a chakra charger for his two sacred beast puppets.

"Tch, I don't need this thing to protect me. I'm a Jonin now. If any of those fools dare to mess with me, I'll smash them all to pieces with my fists."

Rope Tree said stubbornly.

However, despite saying that, his eyes were darting around, staring furtively at the Xuanwu puppet.

He had just personally experienced the Xuanwu puppet's defensive capabilities, and they were terrifying.

After he opened the four gates, no matter how fiercely he attacked with his steel fists while dodging the chakra shield activated by the Xuanwu puppet, and even later used the Konoha Taijutsu Secret Technique Konoha Dragon God taught to him by Teacher Chen, he still couldn't break through the tortoise shell.

Such terrifying defensive capabilities would certainly give him a headache if they were an enemy, but if they were a teammate, they would make him feel very safe.

He was well aware of the side effects of the Eight Gates Technique; once those side effects took hold, he would be useless.

He was very worried about this, fearing that he would become a burden to Kirito and the others, so he had been working hard to overcome this weakness.

For example, he secretly studied the Healing Palm Technique, a medical ninjutsu, hoping that his shadow clones could use it to speed up the elimination of side effects. Unfortunately, he couldn't learn it, but he did improve his control over chakra.

Now that Kirito has such a powerful defensive puppet, it seems he no longer needs to worry about the side effects of the Eight Gates Technique.

"Bullshit! Once we're on the battlefield, you have to listen to me. Don't be impulsive and rush in to fight the enemy. Tsunade is hoping we both come back alive from the battlefield. After you open the Eight Gates, if you feel your body can't take it anymore, hurry back to the Genbu Puppet, understand?"

Seeing that Nawaki was being stubborn, Kirito immediately put on a stern face and said...

"understood."

Seeing this, Rope Tree nodded seriously.

"Alright, you guys have had enough fun, it's my turn."

Suddenly, a cold voice appeared, making Kirito and Nawaki feel a chill run down their spines.

"Chizuru, are you also planning to help me test the puppet's performance?"

Kirito had noticed Chizuru long ago, but he hadn't come over yet for some reason. Now that Chizuru had finally arrived, he greeted her with a smile.

"What? That woman could help you, but I can't?"

Chizuru glared at Kirito with her Sharingan and said coldly.

Kirito was a little confused by Chizuru's glare, but realizing that Chizuru was angry, he had no choice but to go along with her and quickly replied, "How could that be? I'd love to welcome you! Come on, come on, attack with all your might!"

The next moment, a large number of fiery red runes appeared on Chizuru's body and spread all over her body. Then her body shape also changed rapidly. Her skin became paler, her hair grew longer and turned silver-white, and two small horns appeared on her forehead.

At the same time, a powerful chakra that was extremely similar to Sage Chakra also erupted from her body.

Since he last infused the cursed seal within Chizuru's body with Sage Chakra, allowing it to grow and upgrade, and completely merge with Chizuru's body, Chizuru finally succeeded in sensing natural energy through the cursed seal and using it as a conduit to create a special kind of chakra.

This chakra is also a mixture of chakra and natural energy, but it is not Sage Chakra.

In terms of ability level, it is above chakra and natural energy, but below sage chakra.

Kirito calls this special chakra Cursed Seal Chakra.

After repeated verification, Cursed Seal Chakra, like Sage Chakra, can amplify ninjutsu, although the amplification is lower than that of Sage Chakra.

Chizuru completed the hand seal in less than half a second and spat out a huge wave of black, high-temperature fire from her mouth.

Fire Release: Great Fire Annihilation!

"She's got a bit too hot-tempered."

Kirito used chakra threads to pull the rope tree onto the Genbu puppet, then activated the mechanical light shield on the Genbu puppet, using the chakra shield to block the incoming black flames.

The power of the Great Fire Annihilation, amplified by the Cursed Seal Chakra, is indeed astonishing.

In no time, the chakra shield was covered in cracks.

Left with no other choice, Kirito activated another chakra shield on the Genbu puppet. The two chakra shields overlapped, and the crack was immediately repaired, firmly blocking Chizuru's Fire Release: Great Fire Annihilation.

"It's not over yet."

Chizuru said coldly when she saw that her strongest fire-style ninjutsu could not break through the tortoise shell of the Xuanwu puppet.

As she spoke, she immediately drew her famous sword, Thunderclap, from her waist and engaged in fierce combat.

The moment it was drawn, a surge of lightning chakra covered the sword, with a large amount of black electricity coiling around it.

Suddenly, a deafening clap of thunder sounded.

A flash of lightning streaked across Kirito's eyes, and Chizuru suddenly appeared in front of him, her lightning-infused sword piercing through the chakra shield, but ultimately stopping just in front of Kirito's forehead.

The reason was that the black snake on the tail of the Xuanwu puppet tightly bit the sword, making it difficult for the lightning battle in Qianhe's hand to advance even half an inch.

"Humph."

Upon seeing this, Chizuru let out another cold snort.

The black lightning on the sword surged again, and a black current shot out from the tip of the sword, striking Kirito's forehead and scorching a small patch of skin.

Upon seeing this, Chizuru released her grip on the sword hilt and quickly dispelled the cursed seal on her body.

"After activating the curse seal, the power of your lightning strike has increased significantly, especially after being covered with that black lightning from before, its penetrating power has been greatly enhanced."

Seeing that Chizuru had stopped fighting, Kirito also controlled the Black Serpent to release the lightning battle, then caught it and returned it to Chizuru, praising it.

"Go back and wipe your forehead clean, don't leave any marks, I'm going back now."

Chizuru looked at the charred area on Kirito's forehead, her cold expression softening slightly, and she said somewhat awkwardly.

As soon as she finished speaking, she used the Thunder Strike Secret Technique and quickly disappeared from Kirito's sight.

"What's wrong with this girl?"

Kirito watched Chizuru flee as if running away, sighed, then touched his forehead and skillfully used the Palm Healing Technique to peel off the charred skin from his forehead.

"This woman is indeed terrifying..."

Rope Tree, who had witnessed the entire battle, muttered to himself.

……

The next day, at eight o'clock in the morning, on an open space in the back mountain of Konoha Village.

Kirito looked down at the gemstone necklace hanging around his neck, then recalled Tsunade's graceful and beautiful figure, and murmured, "Did Tsunade cast a death blessing on me?"