"So? What Genjutsu did you want to teach us?" Saul inquired.
Kurenai smiled. She appreciated his assistance. Yakumo looked up at her now, listening.
Kurenai shimmied her right hand in-between the folds of her bizarre dress. Out came pink, flowery petals, and immediately the Genin were hit with a light, yet pleasant fragrance.
"You two didn't think I was wearing such a dress just for show, right?"
She twisted the pink petal in two fingers, grinning.
"These petals are kept alive with my chakra. It is infused within, over time, until even their very scent can establish a link between my chakra and my opponents."
Yakumo nodded, but Saul was still full of questions.
"Kurenai sensei. What exactly do you mean by a link? And how would you activate a Genjutsu through just pure chakra? Doesn't it need an associated technique?"
The woman picked up a twig from the ground. Tossing up a petal, she balanced it along the end of a stick.
"This stick could be a so-called link. Its length travels from my hand up to the petal. If that stick is filled with my chakra, the pure chakra can act as a carriage to deliver my Genjutsu. So yes, you still need a technique. The medium is merely the foundational step."
The medium could technically be anything that contained your chakra. Whether it be by scent, direct touch, or even a tree branch, as long as your chakra entered another's body they could be subject to a Genjutsu.
Saul continued to inquire. "But wouldn't that method be massively diluted? Scent spreads in a sphere and is carried along with the wind. Only a small fraction of the chakra you send out would actually reach the target. I cannot see a Genjutsu like the mind body palm ever taking effect with so little chakra."
Kurenai smiled, "Right on the point as always, Saul. But you're missing something. Most Genjutsu are not like the mind body palm. They do not have a comprehensive effect. Rather."
She formed a couple of hand seals. "Would you care for a demonstration?"
Saul nodded.
Her voice started coming from behind him. "Most Genjutsu only affect specific areas of the mind. With such a small target, the Genjutsu does not have to have much power if the only part it affects is merely a fraction of the whole. Can you find the target, Saul?"
Saul turned his head to Yakumo, who looked completely unbothered. She wasn't hearing what he was hearing.
"Auditory. You only hijacked my sense of hearing."
Once he understood, he could feel it. Her chakra, permeating the air, entering within him every time he breathed. He focused on the area within where her chakra had gathered, his ears.
"Release!"
Saul heard a small pop as he returned to listening to Kurenai explain to Yakumo,
"-also have an effect that attempts to impair the target's judgement. As long as the person believes what they're experiencing is real, they will not attempt resistance. This leeway is also an opening to strengthen your hold, slowly affecting your opponent more and more."
She waved at him. "Welcome back Saul, that was quick! I didn't even get to finish explaining to Yakumo before I demonstrated it on her as well."
"No problem, go ahead Kurenai-sensei."
Saul loved things like these. The spiritual, almost magical aspect of chakra was uniquely fascinating to him. It was a big part of why he spent so much time and trouble acquiring those 'test subjects'. Aside from the potential utility such techniques would offer, he was also simply fascinated with how they interacted with the body. Genjutsu was more about the connection between people than anything else - it could not be cast without a target. The kind of things he wanted to learn should not be known by Konoha.
Already his head was swimming with ideas with the priceless insight from the woman known as the foremost Genjutsu expert in Konoha. Kurenai went on to explain how higher level techniques, such as her Tree Binding Death, actually grew stronger and stronger the longer her target was within the Genjutsu. Signs to look for to tell one was under a Genjutsu. How to conceal your own casts of Genjutsu. Etc. She was much more comprehensive with the practical side of things now rather than just talking about the basics - Saul loved it.
"Are you ready for your demonstration, Yakumo?"
The woman coldly nodded.
Kurenai made a few hand seals, then turned back to Saul.
"Watch, Yakumo is a true genius. As the inheritor of the Kurama Clan Kekkai Genkai, she should take even less time to break-"
"Sensei. Are you going to cast it yet?"
Kurenai looked at Yakumo with shock. What in the world...?
She laughed nervously, "Yakumo, what I cast was an auditory Genjutsu. You shouldn't have been able to hear me just now."
"Oh."
Yep, Yakumo was a monster. She must have quite simply rejected Kurenai's influence. Even when he used the Mind-body palm on her, she could break free or reverse the Genjutsu in an instant if she wished. Even someone of Hinata's caliber, who had chakra that massively eclipsed his, could not break free from his mind-body palm. Their Sensei was outclassed to begin with. Like a heavyweight boxing champion trying to take a fist fight with a great blue whale. There was no comparison at all. Would the fish even know it was being attacked?
With sweat running down her forehead, Kurenai smiled in an attempt to regain her composure.
"To start off, you two will need to cultivate a medium to transmit your Genjutsu. Flowers are perfect in this case, but it can really be anything, as long as it is living, emits a scent, and carries your chakra."
Yakumo looked at him and gave him a beautiful smile, running her fingers along the yellow tulip in her hair. Then she turned back to Kurenai, her face turning cold again.
"I believe I already possess this prerequisite."
"Does it contain your chakra, Yakumo?"
"You should know, Sensei, that tulips only bloom for two weeks out of the entire year. This tulip is not naturally grown. Rather, I made it myself."
Kurenai laughed nervously, "You must be kidding."
"You think so?" Yakumo smiled.
From her palm, suddenly something started to take shape. First, a deep, beautiful red. The light curled into petals, coalescing into the shape of a bulb. Next was the stem. Green light extended from the bottom, forming a long vibrant cylindrical shape all the way down to the base, where two leaves shot up to form the entire flower. It swayed with the wind in its natural beauty.
Kurenai's mouth was wide open. She had never, not once, seen anything like this. Of course she had heard tales from the Kurama clan, but she had never believed them. Genjutsu was merely an illusion, no matter how advanced. Yet...
Was Yakumo descended from some sort of goddess? How could she create objects from nothing but chakra!? There were no hand seals used either - this must have been something more innate.
Yakumo handed it to Saul. Kurenai's eyes widened even further at the sight, but she forcefully calmed herself down. This girl... Didn't she know what that meant?
The brown haired woman's lips were curled into a small smile as she put one finger across her lips. The gesture meant to be quiet. Her little girl had really grown up, huh.
"You're really something special, Yakumo. Well, if that's the case, then... I guess there is no harm in teaching you two the Jutsu I had in mind in advance. You can practice it with each other once you've both prepared your chakra mediums. What I'll be teaching you was originally named Demonic Illusion: The False Surroundings Technique."
Kurenai chuckled, "I just call it the illusion technique. It's a C-rank Genjutsu that forms the basis of many other visual centric illusions, affecting only what the enemy sees. Memorize these hand seals."
Kurenai taught them thoroughly, making sure they remembered the hand seals required and the tenketsu to use to activate the Genjutsu.
Like the Body Flicker Technique, the Illusion technique was layered in parts. Two to be exact. The first part was sending out a gentle wind that spread your chakra throughout a spherical area. As long as your target breathed, you could form a link to them with the Genjutsu.
The second step was managing the chakra connected to your medium, controlling the illusion. Users of the Jutsu were advised to focus on small, static things as objects in motion were hard to visualize even though they could be created with the jutsu. Overall it was a very simplistic technique worthy of its C rank. It was also extremely effective.
The longer the jutsu was active undetected, the more chakra of yours entered into the body of your enemy. This meant the illusions shown could gradually grow more potent, going from something as simple as a changed number on a signboard to the entire building vanishing as if it had never been there to begin with.
Saul was quite happy with it as his first ranged Genjutsu. Now all he needed was a proper medium to start learning the technique. What exactly should he use...?
Author's Note: Alright we are so back! Second ch of the day coming in hot! Please let me know any ideas you guys have for what he should use for his Genjutsu medium - I don't exactly want Saul to be a flower boy LMAO. Anyways I hope you all enjoyed the chapter; time skip incoming.