Little snake maru flicked its tongue, and the gallbladder meridian of foot-shaoyang within its body vibrated from weak to strong—of course, a snake has no feet or hands, but that doesn't stop it from possessing this meridian—it was just missing the foot segment, limited only to the gallbladder function part. But when it vibrated, the Chakra it released was the same!
With Yin and Water complementing each other, it gradually found an optimal frequency under the changing vibrations, allowing the Chakra to reach its extreme.
Shadows spread within the shadows, and the entire little snake was also covered by shadows within the shadows, escaping through the shadows at an incredible speed... escaping through the shadows... It was unknown if the Nara Clan's Secret Technique had such an effect, but for Ino, this was a very "natural" application, only needing to coordinate with the final step of the Substitution Jutsu to substitute at any position within the shadow formed by the Secret Technique—theoretically, within the range of the shadow, it could teleport.
Silent, breathless, and formless.
Though there was starlight in the night, the shadows were continuous; even where the starlight shone, it was still a shadow compared to the brightness of day.
little snake maru traveled without obstruction.
Following a straight line, little snake maru moved out in one direction and soon left Konoha; by the middle of the night, it had reached the border of the Land of Fire. It didn't know the specific direction, nor did it need to—it just needed to roughly know its location, which it could figure out by listening to people's conversations during the day.
It only knew it was getting further and further from Konoha, reaching the seaside where the air felt distinctly cold and damp.
The connection between Ino and little snake maru also began to feel faint—this weakness was reflected in their perception.
The stable relationship connecting them remained firm, like a pulled silk thread; though it became thin due to the spatial distance, making it hard to feel each other, the thread was still resilient and far from the point of breaking.
But—
"This distance should be considered a limit, right? After all, any further and I won't be able to feel it; even if there is a connection, still..."
Ino thought of a metaphor:
It was like two people in a thick fog, each holding one end of a rope and connected by it.
These two people couldn't see each other in the fog but could communicate by tugging the rope. However, once the rope became long enough, although they still knew the other end existed, they could no longer communicate through tugging because of the length—the rope's function was reduced to the connection itself.
"If the distance increases further, it means little snake maru will temporarily act independently, influenced by my thoughts to do certain things and make certain judgments. To know what it's doing again, I'll have to wait for the distance to shorten..."
"So, this distance is a controllable distance..."
"Next, let's try... the extreme!"
The extreme of shadows.
While Ino was thinking, little snake maru completed its "positioning"—it silently crawled onto a ship and, through the cargo, text, and other information on board, deduced that this location was the easternmost coast of Konoha. This was a merchant ship on a coastal trade route, traveling south from the Land of Lightning in the north, circling the Land of Fire to the Land of Wind; this was the easternmost part of the Land of Fire.
After completing the "positioning," little snake maru escaped through the shadows to a deserted mudflat... the second meridian, the third meridian, the fourth meridian... originally it was just shadows.
But as the number of vibrating meridians increased, they formed a symphony, a concerto of high and low notes from different scales, and the shadows gradually became pitch black, with an indescribable Yin-coldness within the darkness. little snake maru was covered in pitch black and Yin-coldness... the fifth meridian... at this point, no more changes could be seen. Once the "pitch black" reached its limit, no amount of further change could be perceived.
Only a mass of absolute black was twisting and spreading, and the places it covered were as if space had been forcibly erased, becoming a kind of two-dimensional darkness.
When the twelve principal meridians all vibrated, a Nature Transformation that could truly be called "extreme" was born—it was the extreme Nature Transformation of shadows.
This Nature Transformation caused little snake maru to irreversibly turn into a shadow, never able to change back into little snake maru.
When the absolute blackness contracted and collapsed, finally shrinking back into the shape of a snake, it was a pitch-black snake shape; in a three-dimensional world, it seemed two-dimensional, showing no thickness from any angle. All light was absorbed by its body, not letting a single bit escape, just like a Taotie.
Its body twisted slightly and then abruptly disappeared. The next moment, it appeared in Ino's room, splitting into strands of black hair hidden within Ino's near-silver blonde hair... "Ino, why do you have black hair?" little snake maru was hidden obviously; those unfamiliar might not notice, but it certainly wouldn't escape Mrs. Yamanaka's eyes.
Ino reached out her hand, and the black strands hidden between her hair crawled out one by one, gathering in her hand into a snake shape over a meter long.
"Mom, this is a little cutie I caught... I've controlled it with a Secret Technique to test how long I can keep it under control..."
Mrs. Yamanaka looked for a long while but simply couldn't tell what this thing was.
"What is this? Why does it look like a snake?"
..."It is a snake."
Ino was speechless herself—if little snake maru weren't a part of her "limbs" now, an extension of her mind and body, she wouldn't be sure if this thing counted as a snake—it probably, likely wasn't; after the extreme Nature Transformation, it had become the shadow itself, a completely new form of life.
"It's just a snake that has undergone an extreme Nature Transformation—a Shadow Style transformation. It's very impressive!"
little snake maru twisted into a ball in Ino's hand, and large shadows spread out from the living room, which sunlight couldn't hinder in the least.
Nana and Kana, who were walking over, hadn't reacted before they were instantly swallowed by the darkness, disappearing from where they stood. When the darkness receded again, they were already in the living room. The two of them drew their Kunai, looking vigilant as they formed a back-to-back combat formation—"Who is it?" Then they realized, "Princess Ino, Madam, you..."
Ino giggled and said, "Don't worry so much, I was the one who brought you here just now. You don't need to be nervous."
"Just... what was that?"
A pitch-black humanoid shape in the form of Ino gathered, then dispersed, turning into strands of black hair and returning to Ino's body...
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