"No wonder it's the ultimate eye technique capable of controlling planetary orbits. Even before it's fully developed, just a bit of chakra movement already pulled a meteorite down from space."
"Even if that technique isn't complete yet, I've got a strategic deterrent up my sleeve now."
After flying a good distance, Kenjiro descended from the sky. While rapidly flickering from place to place with Body Flicker, he thought to himself.
The power of the Tenseigan far exceeded his expectations.
Unlike the Rinnegan, which comes with its own rule-breaking abilities to control life and death, the Tenseigan's power lies mainly in destruction.
Its gravitational and repulsive forces alone were already insane. He couldn't wait to unlock the Tenseigan Chakra Mode.
Since his Shadow Clone didn't have a good reason to break away yet, Kenjiro wasn't in a rush to return to the group. After circling back into a safe range, he pulled out the scroll gifted by his new friend and began to study it.
He had only skimmed it earlier to confirm it was genuine. Now he sat down to read it properly.
The scroll wasn't about basic puppet techniques—that kind of stuff was trash to someone like Kenjiro , who could remotely control puppets without limit.
What he was reading was the method for crafting human puppets.
"So this is how they preserve Kekkei Genkai and jutsu... Damn, that guy really was a genius."
After reading for a bit, Kenjiro couldn't help but marvel aloud.
"No wonder his talent was listed as Puppet Master (Purple). This kind of chakra core is on a whole other level. Even the Otsutsuki Clan's puppetry from the moon doesn't come close."
He then unrolled another scroll, which described how to make a chakra core for a human puppet.
The chakra core is the most important component of a puppet.
Using chakra threads alone is nothing more than a glorified marionette show.
Top-tier puppets are outfitted with tons of traps, mechanisms, even elemental chakra-based attacks. And those aren't things you can trigger just with strings.
A puppet needs a chakra core installed. By channeling chakra into it through the threads, all of its built-in abilities can be activated at will.
How powerful a puppet is depends entirely on what the creator packs into it.
But Sasori of the Red Sand had taken it even further.
Instead of just building puppets from raw materials, he turned human corpses into puppets, infusing materials directly into the body.
Then he modified the puppet's heart—the chakra core—so that the puppet could still use its Kekkei Genkai and jutsu from when it was alive.
This was basically a new school of puppetcraft.
As the originator of this style, Sasori definitely lived up to his system tag—Puppet Master (Purple).
In Kenjiro's eyes, Sasori's human puppets were even more suited to him than the Otsutsuki Clan's puppets from the moon.
"Wait a second..."
Suddenly, a spark of inspiration lit up in Kenjiro's mind, and he looked thrilled.
"Maybe I can take the human puppet even further."
Sasori's human puppets were kind of like Pain's Six Paths technique in essence.
In the original Fourth Ninja War, Uchiha Obito created six paths using tailed beast Jinchuriki, and they could still use their chakra and abilities from life.
This proved that both Pain's paths and human puppets could preserve the user's former power.
The only difference was that human puppets required chakra thread control, while Pain's Six Paths couldn't stray too far from the Outer Path statue or they'd lose signal.
But the Tenseigan... could patch both flaws.
With the Tenseigan's wireless puppet control, as long as the puppet was within long-distance vision and its chakra core still had chakra, Kenjiro could control it freely.
Even in a spatial corridor linking Earth and the Moon, the puppet could still receive commands.
If these puppets could use Kekkei Genkai and jutsu... and if he could even replenish their chakra remotely... wouldn't that be an upgraded version of the Edo Tensei immortal army or a mass-produced Pain corps?
The more Kenjiro thought about it, the more viable it seemed.
He hadn't unlocked Yin-Yang Release yet, so he couldn't fuse everything together just yet.
But he could start building a whole bunch of puppets now. Once he had Yin-Yang Release, all he'd need to do is insert the Yin-Yang black rods—and they'd be ready to upgrade.
That night, Kenjiro smoothly rejoined the group.
Aside from Hinata, no one in Team 8 or the convoy had guessed that the meteor was summoned by him.
Taking a long detour to avoid the Art duo, the team and convoy spent another three days on the road before reaching their destination.
Along the way, they avoided a mountain village that radiated a chakra signature stronger than Kurenai's.
Mr. Nishimura and his people lived in a remote mountain village.
Such villages were everywhere in the Land of Rivers.
But ones like this—who'd found a mine and even figured out how to extract and sell resources—were rare. That's what made Nishimura so impressive.
Because the village was so underdeveloped, and they arrived around noon, Kurenai declined his invitation. She took out the mission scroll, got his signature and a positive review, and led Team 8 on the return trip.
Unlike the hike on the way there, the trip back was a rapid journey with the Body Flicker—each leap covering several meters, sometimes over ten.
At that speed, they'd be back in the Leaf Village within two days, max.
That's the difference between ninja and normal people.
In this world where tech was still primitive, ninjas were the ultimate all-in-one tools—the most reliable grunt workers money could buy.
"This was your first C-rank mission. Tell me how it felt."
After a few jumps, they slowed down to walk. Kurenai looked at the three and asked.
"Exhausting." Kenjiro answered honestly.
"It was kinda exciting at first, but then it just turned into a physical and mental torture."
Hinata and Shino nodded in agreement.
"Escort missions are always like that." Kurenai said with a laugh.
"Boring, time-consuming, and the pay sucks. Ours was a little special though—traveling through mountainous Land of Rivers terrain, almost running into an S-rank rogue ninja and a mysterious powerhouse. It's rare for a C-rank mission to go this badly."
"Thankfully Hinata had her Byakugan. Otherwise we might not have made it."
As she said that, Kurenai patted Hinata on the head.
Hinata softly replied. "It's what I'm supposed to do."
"So obedient. What a lucky guy, huh, Kenjiro?" Kurenai said teasingly, clearly trying to play wingman.
But Hinata and Kenjiro both had their own plans in mind.
They just smiled silently, ignoring her attempts to help.
Two days later, in the afternoon, Team 8 finally returned to the Leaf Village.
This C-rank mission had taken them exactly half a month.
And for all that effort, each of them got a generous reward of... 23,000 ryo.
For a C-rank mission, that was actually really good.
Considering the village takes a cut, the jonin instructor gets a share, and the rest is split between the team, a payout of 23,000 each meant the original reward must have been well over 100,000.
Most C-rank missions range from 30,000 to 100,000.
So getting paid that much made sense.
Still, if given the choice, none of them would've wanted to take this mission again.
Noticing how worn out they looked, Kurenai smiled and said. "You've got three days off. Go home and get some rest."
"Yes!"
Team 8 disbanded on the spot.
"See you tomorrow, Kenjiro-kun."
Even though she looked tired, Hinata didn't go to Kenjiro's place like usual.
After only a few baths in the wild, all she wanted now was to soak in her own tub, sleep in her own bed, and show up tomorrow feeling fresh and pretty in front of him.
Kenjiro's chakra healing couldn't help with fatigue. So he had to use another method.
He suddenly leaned in and kissed Hinata's forehead, then waved and smiled. "Sleep well. See you tomorrow."
Then he vanished in a flicker.
Hinata stood frozen for a few seconds, eyes wide. She quickly looked around—only to lock eyes with a smirking older woman nearby.
At that moment, Hinata's neck and face flushed bright red, steam practically rising from her head as she bolted in embarrassment.
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