Chapter 378: Arrogance
Ishiro's spiritual power was the strongest. He had only been struggling before due to a lack of direction and training methods, which was why he had remained at the first stage. But now that he knew the direction, and having experienced the second stage in advance with the help of his Mind's Eye, he was the first of the three to enter the second stage.
With his current spiritual power, Ishiro estimated that as long as he had a complete training system, it wouldn't be difficult to reach the third stage in a short amount of time.
However, Ishiro did not plan to continue the research himself. Because Katsumata had now been initiated, the first step of expanding a new field, which he had summarized himself, was complete. Next was the second step, and this matter could be handed over to Katsumata. This was the benefit of having many disciples: when there was work to be done, the disciples would do it.
Over the past three months, Ishiro had entered the shrine on average once every three days. At first, he needed the help of his Mind's Eye and the Tailed Beasts to sense the voices each time. After a few times, he could perceive the scattered spiritual power within the shrine just by sensing alone. During his last entry, with the help of Little Saiken and his S-rank ninjutsu, the Mind's Eye, he was already able to distinguish the soul seal on the statue with relative clarity.
At the same time, Ishiro also carefully observed the entire shrine, but he disappointingly found that although the shrine could imprison the chaotic spiritual power inside, it had nothing like a soul seal on it. However, this instead strengthened one of Ishiro's ideas: the things on the shrine itself were definitely no worse than the statue. It was just that his own level had not yet reached the point where he could sense them.
After a delay of three months, it was time for Ishiro to return to the village. However, before returning, he planned to do one more thing.
"Third, use Earth Release to lift this shrine up. I'll use the Super Light-Weight Rock Technique to take it away," Ishiro said.
At first, Ishiro had only wanted to move the statue, but now he had decided to move the entire shrine.
Ōnoki nodded. He was familiar with this task; it wasn't the first time the two had cooperated. To deal with White Zetsu, Ishiro and Ōnoki had placed steel plates under many important buildings in the village, and they had cooperated in the same way back then.
"Earth Style: Rising Earth Technique!" Ōnoki slapped his hands on the ground, directly lifting the shrine along with several meters of the surrounding land. It was raised to a height of about five meters, similar to the height of the shrine itself. Finally, Ōnoki very considerately separated the shrine and its foundation from the ground. Ishiro only needed to step forward and use the Super Light-Weight Rock Technique to fly away with the entire structure.
But there were still a few things to handle.
Ishiro first called the chakra avatars of Little Saiken, Little Chōmei, and Son Gokū to the side.
He said to Son Gokū, "Son Gokū, we have to part ways. You have two choices. First: the seal remains as it is. I won't close it on you, but you have to agree to the conditions I mentioned last time."
"Second: you split off a part of your entity that contains your life force, just like Little Saiken and Little Chōmei. I will take your entity with me. You can have it watch over Little Saiken and Little Chōmei, to make sure I don't lead them astray."
"You can choose one option, or you can choose both. I hope you choose the second one. That way, Little Saiken and Little Chōmei will also be happier."
The two little ones understood what Ishiro meant. Before Son Gokū could speak, they immediately began to pester and act cute.
Ishiro actually understood Son Gokū's thoughts. After he had deliberately let it be for three months, it no longer wanted to return to its cage. But it was too proud to admit it. So, Ishiro spoke very tactfully, hoping it would make a concession for the sake of Little Saiken and Little Chōmei.
As expected, in the end, Son Gokū reluctantly agreed.
While Ishiro was negotiating with the three Tailed Beasts, goodbyes were also being said elsewhere.
Katsumata was thanking Rōshi. While researching Yin Release with Ishiro, Katsumata had sought out Rōshi in his search for a training method. He had taken an interest in Rōshi's knowledge of Buddhism, as Rōshi had studied some Buddhist principles to suppress the spiritual impact of the Four-Tails, and the statue in the shrine happened to be in the image of a monk. So, Katsumata had learned a lot of the Buddhist theory of this world from Rōshi. And as it turned out, these theories were a great help in his breakthrough.
Elsewhere, Ōnoki was also giving some instructions to Deidara's trio. They had been graduated for two years, and it was time for them to go back and take the Chunin Exams.
When Ishiro returned after reaching an agreement with Son Gokū, he heard Ōnoki roaring at Deidara: "You brat, go back and train properly! If you dare to cause trouble everywhere, I'll break your legs!"
Ishiro was speechless. It seemed Deidara still had the same personality. However, compared to the original story, this Deidara had much less arrogance. In the original Iwagakure, apart from Ōnoki, no one could suppress him. And Ōnoki was old and hoped for Deidara to inherit the title of Tsuchikage, so Deidara had developed an arrogant and fearless personality. The reason the original Deidara was willing to join the Akatsuki was also because the members were all powerful ninja like him, which gave him a sense of finding his own kind. Deidara felt that being with anyone other than Ōnoki in Iwagakure was like playing house.
But the Deidara of this life did not have that arrogant air. For one, Iwagakure was not short on geniuses, so no one had put Deidara on a pedestal from an early age. Second, Ōnoki himself did not see the personality-flawed Deidara as a successor, so his method of training had changed. So, the current Deidara was proud, but not haughty.
If nothing else, among Ishiro's many disciples, quite a few had become Quasi-Jonin within two years. And Deidara? Ōnoki had deliberately suppressed him to temper his character. It had been almost two years since his graduation, and he was still at the chunin level. And in this group, Kawakita gave Deidara a very strong feeling. Although Kawakita's strength was not public, as a genius, Deidara could still vaguely sense a feeling of pressure. Although the current Deidara was very skilled, it was also a fact that he had not yet reached the level of a Quasi-Jonin.
Ishiro came to Rōshi and said, "Senior Rōshi, I have discussed it with the Four-Tails. I will release the restraining function of its seal, and it guarantees not to harm the people of Iwagakure and the Land of Earth. So, I will not close the seal."
After Ishiro finished speaking, before Rōshi could reply, Son Gokū snorted coldly, then directly dissipated into chakra and returned to the sealing space.
The next moment, Ishiro sensed a violent fluctuation from within the sealing space, vaguely accompanied by Son Gokū's pained cry. Not long after, a Son Gokū, similar to the previous ones, came out of the sealing space.
The others didn't understand what had happened, but Rōshi could roughly guess. Because just as this small Four-Tails was being separated, he suddenly felt as if he had lost something. For a moment, his mind was even a little dazed.
That was the loss of life force. Fortunately, this time it was the Four-Tails voluntarily splitting itself. The part it separated mainly contained its own life force; Rōshi was only affected. It was unlike last time when Ishiro was extracting the Six-Tails. The Six-Tails had resisted with all its might, and the only reason a portion could be extracted was because Utakata's life force was easy to draw out. So, Utakata had died, while Rōshi only felt dizzy and drained.
Ishiro used his Mind's Eye to sense this new, small Son Gokū. With his now-introductory level of Yin Release, he couldn't detect any difference between it and Little Saiken and Little Chōmei. This was a good thing; it meant that his method of splitting the Six-Tails and Seven-Tails was sound.
Ishiro marked out another area on the Gedo Statue fragment for Son Gokū as its dwelling place.
Next, Ishiro gave a few more instructions to Kawakita, Kajiyama Ri, Takuhiro Uchiyama, and Akio Wada, and then, under the cover of night, he used the Light-Weight Rock Technique to take a portion of the people back.
In Ishiro's returning party were Natsuki and Katsumata, who were to study Yin Release; six genin participating in the Chunin Exams; and three mini Tailed Beasts.
With Little Saiken and Little Chōmei providing chakra support, although the journey was arduous, Ishiro did not stop, flying directly to Iwagakure.
Considering that some monster might be sealed in the statue of the shrine, Ishiro did not place it too close to the village but directly at Han's former residence. Han had moved next door to Ishiro, so his place was vacant. But the infrastructure here was complete; there were even several layers of underground iron plates to guard against White Zetsu clones.
After arranging for a few Anbu squads to guard the shrine in rotation and protect Katsumata and Natsuki who were studying Yin Release, Ishiro took the others back to the village.
The village's barrier team was startled again after sensing the chakra of Little Chōmei and Son Gokū. Fortunately, the barrier team had experience this time. They sensed Ishiro at the village gate, so while maintaining normal alert, they were not so worried.
After completing the village entry procedures, Ishiro dismissed the team and went straight home with the three Tailed Beasts.
When Son Gokū saw that Kokuō was also wearing an Iwagakure forehead protector, it felt a little awkward.
But Ishiro didn't say much. Instead, he registered the missions for Little Saiken and Little Chōmei. The two little ones had helped him persuade Son Gokū, so Ishiro gave them each an A-rank mission. During the exploration of the shrine, Ishiro had entered several times with the help of the two little ones, which counted as a B-rank mission for each. On the return trip, the two little ones had helped Ishiro move the shrine back, which he counted as a C-rank mission for each. And Little Saiken still had the A-rank mission from the beginning.
So now, the mission records of the two little ones were quite impressive, and the rewards were also plentiful. In front of Son Gokū, Ishiro let the two little ones receive their money and contribution points. Then he encouraged them to go spend it in Iwagakure. In the process, the two little ones inevitably bought many things for Son Gokū as well.
At first, Son Gokū tried to find all sorts of excuses to refuse, but in the end, it had no choice but to accept. Son Gokū had no money and didn't want to be indebted to the two little ones. But it had nothing, and the feeling was unbearable.
What to do? After returning to Ishiro's home, while the two little ones were in the sealing space organizing the things they had bought that day, Son Gokū came out of the Gedo Statue fragment by itself and said to Ishiro, "Tsuchikage, I want to go on a mission too."
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