Ryusei quickly realized that because of Minato's near-constant presence on this front, from the beginning, Iwagakure's forces had changed their entire formation style.
They no longer scattered into small units like before, like usual shinobi forces.
Instead, they stayed closer, building networks of defense across the mountain ridges.
Every choke point was heavily guarded, and between them, scattered, not valued sensory shinobi, sacrificial, short-lived, but efficient, relayed information through the rough terrain.
The high altitude worked in their favor; enemies were slower there. It was a cold stalemate.
By now, Iwagakure had already made peace with all the other villages besides Konoha, and the other nations had done the same. That was why the war was still going on.
Ryusei could move through it unseen if he wanted to.
The problem wasn't slipping past those sensory lines or rock climbing; it was what waited inside them.
Han, the Five-Tails' jinchūriki, obviously wasn't alone. Rōshi, the Four-Tails, was stationed in the same camp nearby, alongside other elites, for obvious reasons.
The remaining Iwa elites now all grouped together constantly it seemed.
That didn't scare Ryusei. He could take on hundreds of Iwa shinobi head-on if needed, as well as those remaining elties.
The issue wasn't strength; it was logistics.
He wasn't planning to just skim some chakra this time and run, like the last time.
He wanted more. Much more. Bigger reserves.
But to do that, he'd need time, peace, isolation.
Ideally, he'd have to capture the jinchūriki himself, take him away for a while.
And that brought the next problem.
Why not just extract the entire Tailed Beast, then?
Simple. What use was raw power if you couldn't control it?
A strange beast sealed inside you without cooperation wasn't power; it was a time bomb in your own chest, waiting to tear you apart the moment you slipped.
Ryusei despised that kind of risk, sharing his body, his mind, his sanctuary, with anything he couldn't fully control.
He could seal the beast, sure, but only if Ashina helped.
Ryusei still couldn't perform the full Eight Trigrams Seal on his own, the kind of Uzumaki-level technique required for a tailed beast.
But that meant letting the old man inscribe fuinjutsu directly onto his body, and even for Ryusei, that was a dangerous proposition.
"What if Ashina has already somehow figured out the micro seal I hid inside my own chakra network?" he thought grimly."Would he try to do the same to me then, at that time? A mark for a mark, so we'd keep each other in check?"
That wasn't a deal Ryusei would ever accept.
He'd rather destroy the entire seal system than let someone else hold even that much leverage over him.
Additionally, for example, he had no reason to worry about the Akatsuki yet.
Their full plans were still far from this era's reach.
He didn't worry about destroying the "plot" because he already inadvertently did it through various ripple effects he created.
And the Hokage faction? They already saw him as an enemy.
Nothing he did now could make it worse.
Iwagakure itself? Please. What could they possibly do from halfway across the continent? Where would their army even pass?
Soon enough, Ryusei would also surpass even Onoki, their proud old Kage and the strongest man their village could still put forward.
No, the only real danger was balance.
Power had to fit into his body, into his system, without breaking it. And the truth was, he didn't want to become some beast's jailor or best friend.
Naruto and Killer B could pull that off.
They were built differently, optimistic, childish, weirdly pure.
"Too much autism, not enough pragmatism," he thought dryly. "I can't babysit a raging ox or play therapy with a horse made of chakra."
For him, it was enough to bind the beast, siphon its power passively for his usual techniques, and draw on it more directly only when necessary.
That boiling kind of chakra, pure heat and pressure, was the perfect fit for his current fighting style after all.
He didn't need the armor Han wore either.
Ryusei already had better control.
With his Byakugan precision and fine-tuned chakra manipulation, he could contain and redirect the pressure inside his body itself, turning it into raw internal power.
Han's fighting method relied on that bulky armor with its furnace on the back, an external boiler storing Kokuō's Boil Release, a blend of fire and water chakra that heated his entire system and magnified his physical strength and performance through steam pressure.
Ryusei didn't need such crude equipment. He could generate the same internal effect himself, compressing chakra through his tenketsu to build that explosive pressure without a single piece of metal touching his skin.
And instead of lugging around some clunky external furnace, he'd store and regulate that power inside a sealing array of his own design.
As the plan came together in his mind, his lips curved slightly. He already knew what to do.
He would almost certainly strike that camp tonight.
The camp where Iwagakure's highest elites and its two living weapons were now resting.
***
Ryusei moved across the rocky highlands like a shadow given form.
His chakra was so tightly contained that even sensory specialists would have to squint through their own perception to catch a glimpse of it.
As he drew near the outer perimeter of the Iwagakure encampment, he quietly formed the seals and created a dozen shadow clones.
Each clone scattered instantly, weaving through the terrain in perfect coordination. Within seconds, they split into attack formations, descending from multiple directions to unleash chaos on the camp.
Explosions echoed through the valleys as the clones initiated their preemptive strike, using elemental jutsu and precise strikes to simulate the approach of a large assault unit.
Ryusei himself was masked, untraceable, his true purpose completely hidden.
Nobody would have been able to tell that all this came from a single infiltrator.
Through his heightened sensory link, he tracked every chakra pulse within kilometers.
He was searching for one presence in particular, Han, the Five-Tails' jinchūriki.
That enormous, compressed energy signature burned like a contained star in the distance, surrounded by several smaller but potent ones.
He steadily closed in on the target.
At the same time, his shadow clones were already engaging Iwagakure's best Earth Release units.
The ground itself became the battlefield's weapon.
Iwa shinobi turned the land into a living trap, raising earthen walls, launching massive stone bullets, and opening pits that swallowed clones whole.
The terrain kept reshaping every second, the air filled with dust, and the deep rumble of colliding earth.
Some used Earth Release offensively, compacting rocks into devastating projectiles or creating unstable terrain to slow the enemy.
Others focused on defense, layering walls and domes, or disappearing into the ground only to ambush from below.
Ryusei's clones countered with overwhelming precision. Large-scale combination techniques erupted across the frontlines.
Fire and Wind fused into sweeping infernos, Lightning arced across soaked terrain, and Water Release waves burst beneath the ground to flood tunnels and choke out ambushers.
He'd anticipated this entire scenario. Long before entering the camp, he knew Iwa's sensory units would eventually pick him up, no matter how carefully he suppressed himself.
So he created the clones to buy time, to drown the field in confusion, to make it impossible for them to tell where the real threat was coming from.
But even Ryusei couldn't stay undetected forever.
As he pushed through the chaos toward Han's chakra, several larger signatures converged on his location at once.
Han was moving toward him. So was Rōshi, the Four-Tails' jinchūriki—his molten chakra blazing through the mountain mist.
Alongside them came Kitsuchi, the hulking commander of the Iwa front, and the current leader of the Explosive Corps, Takuya, whose chakra flared with unstable, condensed energy.
Within seconds, they'd surrounded him.
"There's movement! Multiple intruders!" shouted Takuya, detonating clay birds in the air to scatter the clones.
Kitsuchi slammed a fist into the ground, scanning the terrain with practiced precision. "No—this chakra… It's too focused. One's different from the rest."
Rōshi's molten aura burned brighter, the air around him shimmering. "That one's mine. I'll melt him myself."
Han's calm but heavy voice followed, muffled by his armor. "We'll handle him together. Don't let him get close."