The forest had never been so quiet.
The birds didn't chirp. The wind didn't whistle. Even the trees seemed to hold their breath as Sora stood barefoot on the stone platform Ayame had carved into the mountain cliff weeks ago.
No distractions.
No interruptions.
Just him, his broken body, and his roaring chakra.
This was where true training began.
---
Morning – Post-Recovery
Sora had awakened before sunrise, his body still aching from the failed confrontation with the Ghost. Despite the fever still clinging to his skin, he had stood on shaking legs and said only four words to Ayame:
"Train me. No mercy."
She hadn't smiled.
She had nodded.
Now, they stood face to face on the plateau, soaked in the golden light of dawn. A scroll hovered mid-air behind Ayame, unraveling itself with seals older than most shinobi bloodlines.
"This training will break your bones, burn your chakra coils, and strip you of control," Ayame said calmly. "You will scream—your chakra will scream louder."
Sora didn't blink. "Let it."
---
Phase One – Pressure Chakra Control
Ayame placed six weighted chakra seals along Sora's limbs. Each seal distorted gravity and resisted chakra flow, like fighting a river with your veins.
"Walk the edge," she ordered, pointing to a narrow ridge—no wider than a scroll—curving along the cliff.
Sora took his first step—and collapsed.
The seals dragged his body down like he wore boulders strapped to his bones. His chakra flared to compensate, but it was too rough, too wild.
"You're flaring. Not flowing," Ayame snapped.
He clenched his jaw.
Again.
Step.
Step.
Fall.
Again.
Each time, he rose—bruised, bleeding, but not broken.
By noon, he was halfway across.
By dusk, he had walked the whole curve.
Once.
Ayame didn't praise him.
He didn't expect her to.
---
Phase Two – Chakra Compression and Expansion
That night, Sora sat in lotus position beneath the moonlight, sweat slick on his skin. His chakra flowed through his system like a river threatening to flood its banks.
Ayame instructed him without emotion: "Compress your chakra into a point smaller than a senbon needle. Then expand it wide enough to fill the sky."
"It's impossible," he muttered.
"Good," she replied. "Do it anyway."
His chakra howled. Not in pain—but in resistance. Every ounce of his being rebelled. Compression triggered heat; expansion caused spasms. His fingers twitched involuntarily. His breath shortened. His vision darkened.
He screamed once—but it was silent.
Not from restraint.
From the sheer intensity of the internal battle.
---
Nightfall – Flashback Echoes
Midway through meditation, Sora saw it again:
A memory not from this world.
A battlefield.
Mountains floating in the sky.
Warriors of light and shadow clashing with weapons that tore the fabric of reality.
He stood among them—older, taller, crowned with swirling black flame and eyes not like the Sharingan… but something deeper.
He wasn't Sora in the memory.
He was someone else.
Something else.
And then—he was falling.
Back into the cold.
Back into this broken little body of a boy in a world not his own.
He gasped and opened his eyes.
Ayame was already kneeling beside him.
"You're trembling," she said.
"I saw it again," he whispered.
"The other life?"
He nodded slowly.
Her fingers hovered an inch from his cheek, not quite touching.
"Don't lose yourself to the fragments," she said. "This life is the only one that matters now."
He wanted to believe her.
But the hunger inside him—it remembered everything.
---
Final Phase – Chakra Resonance Clash
At dawn, Ayame attacked him.
No warning.
Just kunai in her left hand, a genjutsu strike in her right, and a wall of fire chakra pouring toward him from behind.
His body moved before his mind.
He countered the genjutsu—biting his tongue mid-cast to anchor himself. He devoured the trailing edges of the fire jutsu with a vortex of spatial energy, absorbing only enough to avoid overloading.
And the kunai?
He caught it with his bare hand.
The blade sliced into his palm—but he didn't drop it.
Ayame stared at him, Sharingan spinning slowly.
"You're adapting too quickly," she said.
"I'm surviving too quickly," he replied.
For a long moment, silence hung between them.
And then she did something unexpected.
She stepped forward and hugged him.
Tightly.
No words.
No warning.
He froze—startled by the warmth, the softness, the contrast to her usual steel.
"I can't lose you," she whispered. "Even if you become a god, you'll still be my boy."
His arms slowly rose, uncertain—then wrapped around her in return.
"I won't be a god," he said.
She pulled back, looking him in the eye.
"I'm not so sure anymore."
---
Elsewhere – Root Intelligence Division
Danzo stared at the latest report with a frown.
"Subject Sora: Rapid adaptation. High chakra resonance. Predatory learning patterns. Emotional tether to Ayame Uchiha confirmed."
He looked to his top enforcer, a man known only as Mantis.
"Prepare the Anbu Disruptor Squad. And bring me the final version of Project Ghost."
"Yes, Danzo-sama."