Konoha: Starting with Sage Mode

As for how Orochimaru obtained the Akimichi clan's secret techniques, it most likely came from his good teacher.

The Sarutobi clan and the Ino-Shika-Cho clans are practically inseparable.

The Sarutobi clan is superior to the Ino-Shika-Cho clan, so it's not surprising that they were able to obtain the Akimichi clan's secret techniques.

While it's certainly unacceptable to operate on one's own body, if one can use this opportunity to deduce and obtain a portion of the Akimichi clan's secret techniques, then this compensation would be quite worthwhile.

The Akimichi clan's secret technique, the Multiplication Technique, requires Yang-attribute chakra to unleash and possesses considerable power, providing an astonishing enhancement to strength.

Kirito happens to lack the means to use Yang-attribute chakra attacks.

Even if he doesn't use it himself, he can use it to reward his subordinates later.

After Kirito finished reading the contents of the scroll, he closed his eyes and quickly recalled them dozens of times. Once he was sure he had completely memorized the contents of the scroll, he decisively used the sealing technique, Reverse Four Symbols Seal (a watered-down version), on the scroll.

As space distorted, the scroll Orochimaru had given Kirito disappeared.

At the same time, underground in Konoha, at the Root headquarters, in the Root leader's office, Orochimaru, who was having a "pleasant conversation" with Danzo, suddenly paused, a look of surprise on his face.

"What's wrong, Orochimaru?"

Danzo noticed Orochimaru's change in expression and immediately asked warily.

Although he was confident in the defenses of Root headquarters, he never believed that this meant he could rest easy. He now felt that Orochimaru must have discovered an enemy he was unaware of.

Of Hiruzen's three disciples, he admired Orochimaru the most. Not only was Orochimaru exceptionally talented and strong, but he was also ruthless and merciless towards his enemies. He was also an outstanding researcher and was very suitable to stay in Root.

"It's nothing, just found an interesting little fish."

Orochimaru stuck out his tongue, licked his lips, and laughed excitedly.

"Really? Can you tell me the name of this interesting little fish?"

Danzo said, his eyes narrowing, a cold glint flashing in them.

He knew Orochimaru quite well; once he discovered something interesting, he would definitely try every means to get it.

Therefore, Orochimaru is likely to do some bad things.

He hates surprises the most, and he doesn't want Orochimaru causing trouble in the village right now.

"Don't worry, I won't touch this little fish for now, it won't affect your plans."

Orochimaru sneered.

The prodigy he favored, no one but him could touch him.

Chapter 50: The Shrine Maiden

One week later, at night, in an inconspicuous house in the residential area of ​​Konoha.

An ordinary-looking middle-aged ninja pushed open the door and came out. His name was Akasa. He was 35 years old and an unremarkable Chunin in Konoha. He was currently a teacher at the Ninja Academy.

As an older single man, Chi Sha's nightlife was dull. To relieve his loneliness, he went to a nearby bar for a few drinks, just like he always did.

Chisha arrived at the tavern, ordered a few bottles of cheap rice wine and some snacks from the familiar signboard girl, and then sat alone in a corner, drinking by himself.

Before long, he was already quite drunk, his face flushed, his eyes glazed over, and he began to utter incoherent ramblings that no one else could understand.

Not long after, he slumped onto the table, drunk.

Chisha passed out drunk, and the other drinkers around him paid no attention to him, because there were too many people like Chisha who drowned their sorrows in alcohol, and he was not a big deal.

The patrons didn't care, but the shopkeeper couldn't ignore it. He quickly instructed his staff to move Chisha to an empty room at the back of the shop to rest, so that new customers could come in and spend money.

Not long after Chisha was taken away, a new guest arrived—a middle-aged samurai who looked extremely poor.

The shopkeeper didn't recognize the middle-aged samurai, who was clearly not a regular customer. However, she didn't lose her enthusiasm just because he looked poor. She still warmly invited him to come in and sit down, in the very spot where Akasa had just been sitting.

The samurai ordered a few bottles of cheap sake, drank them, and then drunkenly paid the bill and left.

An insignificant Chunin came to a tavern to drown his sorrows in alcohol. After getting drunk, he was dragged away. Soon after, a down-on-his-luck samurai came in to take the place of the ordinary Chunin. He also drowned his sorrows in alcohol and eventually left drunk.

Everything seemed so ordinary that it went unnoticed by anyone in the store.

The samurai finally staggered back to his lodgings, a dilapidated house. As soon as he entered the cheaply rented room, he collapsed on the floor and fell fast asleep, snoring loudly.

The woman of the house covered the samurai with a blanket with a look of disgust and left the room.

As the mistress's footsteps faded into the distance, the samurai suddenly opened his eyes, continued snoring, and threw something out of the open window with one hand.

The next moment, a long tongue suddenly appeared, wrapped around the object, and then disappeared into thin air.

After the samurai finished throwing his things away, he closed his eyes again and continued to snore loudly.

At that moment, a small snake hidden in the corner silently left.

Soon after, in an underground space in the forest outside Konoha Village, a candle stuck to a wooden table was lit, and the surrounding darkness was immediately dispelled.

Before the candle, a man with long eyebrows was looking at a piece of paper, his face showing deep solemnity.

The note didn't contain much; it only said that a new transfer student named Kushina Uzumaki had arrived at the Ninja Academy that day, and that she had red hair.

"Mito Uzumaki's clansmen, huh? In that case, it's time to replace Konoha's Jinchūriki, or rather, it has already been replaced."

Ebizo placed the piece of paper in his hand on the candle flame, watched it turn to ashes, and pondered.

This intelligence is undoubtedly very valuable.

As a high-ranking member of the Sand Village, Ebizo understood the meaning of Jinchuriki and what it meant when a Jinchuriki was replaced.

"Konoha has some impressive methods. They managed to replace the Jinchuriki without anyone noticing. If that's the case, then the Senju clan's defenses aren't as strong as the previous intelligence suggested. Perhaps we should consider making a plan."

Ebizo slowly tapped the table with his index finger. After a long while, a strange light flashed in his eyes.

A gust of wind blew out the candlelight in the room, and everything returned to darkness.

……

Late at night, in the basement of the Nawaki family's residence in the Senju clan's territory, where a large number of scrolls were stored.

Kirito sat cross-legged on a tatami mat, closed his eyes, and assumed a meditation posture.

Around him, four black incense sticks were stuck in the four directions. Each stick was as thick as a thumb and emitted bluish smoke when lit.

The wisps of green smoke emanating from the four black incense sticks were in a very strange state. Instead of spreading outwards, they transformed into four thin streams of green, flowing in straight lines and into Kirito's body at the center.

Smoke is an unconscious substance and does not move on its own.

Clearly, the reason it was moving at this moment was that Kirito, who was at the center of the four black incense sticks, was inhaling the blue smoke into his body in an unknown way.

Soul Incense—that is the name of the four black incense sticks. They are precious items recorded in the art of spirit transformation, used to assist in the cultivation of spirit transformation techniques. They originate from the distant land of demons and are said to have been made by priestesses to feed demons.

Kirito was unaware of the true value of the Soul Incense, but the black incense he was currently using was made by the shrine maiden Miroku herself and was of the highest quality, top-grade Soul Incense.

Who is the priestess Miroku? She is the current guardian priestess of the Land of Demons, a powerful priestess with the ability to suppress demons and monsters, and her status is equivalent to that of a daimyo in various countries.

Kirito was able to obtain such high-quality Soul Incense entirely thanks to the help of the Senju clan. With the help of this top-grade Soul Incense, his Spirit Transformation Technique progressed very smoothly, almost like making rapid progress.

He has been practicing the art of spiritual transformation for three weeks. During this time, his soul has become increasingly powerful. The time his soul can leave his body has increased from a few minutes at the beginning to an hour before he feels tired. The range of his soul perception has also expanded to one kilometer.

Within a kilometer, no living being can escape his soul perception.

After about two hours, all the incense sticks had burned out, and Kirito's spiritualization technique training for the day came to an end.

Suddenly, a white, transparent Kirito emerged from Kirito's body and then stretched.

Soul out of the body.

Kirito once again emerged from his body in spirit form.

The next moment, Kirito's spirit body rapidly became more and more transparent, until it was impossible for ordinary people to see it with the naked eye.

Invisibility is one of the innate abilities of spirits.

However, Kirito still possesses chakra even in his spirit form. Therefore, bloodline limit eyes like the Byakugan and Sharingan can still see Kirito, but they only see a mass of chakra and cannot see his true form at all.

Kirito, of course, had a way to deal with the weakness of his spirit body. He decisively mobilized the chakra within his body and laid down a large number of sealing techniques on the surface of his spirit body, temporarily giving the spirit body a layer of sealing barrier, temporarily shielding the chakra within the spirit body, so that it could not be seen by the outside world.

Kirito's method at this time is to use a sealing barrier to block external perception.

Konoha has the Byakugan's bloodline limit, so naturally some people are worried about the secret being leaked and have developed sealing barrier techniques to counter the Byakugan's eye techniques.

Among the sealing techniques that Mito taught him were several sealing barrier techniques that could seal off the Byakugan's abilities.

The sealing barrier technique he is currently using is called Nightfall Seal, which is also the sealing barrier technique currently used by Root Headquarters.

After Kirito patched up the loophole in the spirit, he began to control the spirit to fly upwards in the air, ignoring any obstacles, and arrived above the Nawaki family's house in no time.

"Let's have a pleasant night tour tonight too."

Kirito felt the night breeze, looked at the bright moon in the night sky, and smiled.

Chapter 51: A Shocking News from a Night Stroll

Night strolls are a daily practice session for Kirito since he mastered the Spirit Transformation technique.

Through repeated nighttime outings, Kirito gradually gained his own insights into the use of the Spirit Transformation Technique, and became increasingly adept at using it.

He looked down at the house below, his eyes seeming to have X-ray vision, clearly seeing the souls of all the living things inside.

This is the innate spiritual vision ability of a spirit, also known as soul vision.

Kirito can use this ability to see the souls of others without being hindered by any object.

In his spiritual vision, the soul within each living being is a ball of fire, and these fires are of different colors, with various colors and some even having a mixture of multiple colors.

He later learned from Mito that the reason why the soul color in a human body is different is related to the nature of the chakra cultivated by the individual.

The souls of those without chakra or who have not cultivated chakra nature are white. Once a certain type of chakra is cultivated, the color will change.

Upon learning this, Kirito couldn't help but think that chakra was truly amazing, capable of altering not only human bloodline genes but also the soul.

So he boldly hypothesized that perhaps the soul, like the human body, has genes, called soul genes.

The knowledge involved is too advanced. Kirito has only proposed a hypothesis so far. To verify it, he needs to continue to work hard to become stronger, learn more, and make more money.

At first glance, the most conspicuous soul in the Nawaki family is undoubtedly Mito. Mito's soul fire has seven colors, which is undoubtedly related to the complete Yin-Yang and Five Elements attributes.

However, compared to the soul flames of the others in the room, Mito's seven-colored soul flame was far too small, like a candle flickering in the wind. Although it was very bright, its weakness was immediately apparent.

"Ah~"

Upon seeing this, Kirito couldn't help but let out another silent sigh, his face showing deep reluctance.