Chapter 588: Teaching Kenbunshoku Haki
"Barring any unforeseen circumstances, I should be able to stay in Konoha for a while. During that time, I'll be training all of you," Minato said with a slight cough.
Embarrassed or not, he still wanted to fulfill his responsibilities as their instructor whenever he had free time.
Obito and the others were Minato's only three disciples. Being too busy with the war to guide them was unavoidable, but if he had free time and still refused to shoulder his responsibility, then he would no longer be Minato Namikaze.
After that, Minato led the three of them to one side.
Since Obito and the others had learned most of their abilities from Mugetsu, Minato did not need to give too much guidance in ninjutsu.
Moreover, unlike Mugetsu, who had a detailed training plan, Minato had not personally trained Obito and the others for quite some time.
Under those circumstances, Minato believed the most effective form of training was real combat.
Combat training was universal training, something every ninja used, from Genin all the way to Jonin.
"Fighting Minato-sensei, huh?" Obito scratched his head and thought of Minato's Flying Thunder God Technique.
He really wanted to learn that ninjutsu, but he absolutely did not want his opponent to know it. It was simply too troublesome.
No matter how strong his Azure Flame or Kakashi's No Thought Strike was, none of it meant anything if they could not hit the target.
Kakashi remained calm. Only difficult training held any meaning. If the opponent were too easy to defeat, it would not count as training at all.
Rin showed a thoughtful expression, quickly reviewing all of Minato's abilities in her mind.
"Are you ready? If so, let me know in advance," Minato said with a smile.
Kakashi nodded. Rin nodded as well. Seeing that, Obito also indicated that he was ready.
"Then, begin!"
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!
The moment Minato finished speaking, he pulled several Flying Thunder God kunai from his ninja pouch and flung them toward the group.
"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique!"
Obito rapidly formed hand seals and exhaled a mass of flames, creating a giant fireball.
Boom!
The exploding fireball knocked away the incoming Flying Thunder God kunai.
Obito had no good way to deal with Flying Thunder God, so the best he could do was keep the marked kunai from getting too close.
"Summoning Technique!"
"Summoning Technique!"
Kakashi and Rin both used the Summoning Technique, calling forth their respective Pokémon.
Nin beasts were part of their strength, so there was no reason not to use them.
"Awooo!"
The moment Lycanroc appeared, it let out a howl. Its eyes locked onto Minato, who stood opposite Kakashi and the others, and it immediately began gathering chakra.
Milotic, meanwhile, moved in front of Rin and protected her while activating Aqua Ring, surrounding herself with a layer of healing water.
[Rock Slide!]
Lycanroc performed Earth Release Chakra Nature Transformation on the large amount of chakra it had gathered, forming a giant rock that it hurled at Minato.
"Lightning Release: False Darkness!"
Kakashi focused his breathing, enhanced his Lightning Release Chakra Nature Transformation, and condensed a large amount of chakra before releasing a wide sheet of sharp lightning.
Whoosh!
Minato had no intention of taking the attack head-on. He immediately used Flying Thunder God to flash away.
"Summoning Technique!"
While Minato was focused on defense, Obito took the opportunity to summon Charizard as well.
"Roar!"
The moment Charizard saw Milotic nearby, it let out an excited cry. Even its daily urge to burn Obito with the first flame of the morning weakened a little.
The atmosphere on the battlefield only excited it further. This was a chance to fight alongside its goddess.
Without another word, Charizard flew into the air, gathered chakra, and unleashed blade after blade of wind at Minato.
After summoning his nin beast, Obito activated his Three Tomoe Sharingan to enhance his observation.
When fighting Minato, the power of their ninjutsu was secondary. The real problem was hitting him at all.
Obito, the three of them, and their three Pokémon all attacked with full power. For a time, explosions rang out without pause, and the training ground quickly became a complete mess.
"These really are all excellent nin beasts," Minato thought to himself.
Obito and the others had already summoned their partners on the battlefield before, but at that time, Minato had been preoccupied with a far more difficult task. On a battlefield with more than three thousand people, everything had been too chaotic for him to pay close attention to their performance.
Now that he was fighting Kakashi and the others directly, he realized that all of their nin beasts were extraordinary, and Rin's Milotic was even stronger than Rin herself.
"In that case, I'll have to be a little more serious."
Minato formed hand seals and created two shadow clones.
Training was still training. Minato could not truly go all out, because if he did, Kakashi and the others would have no way to resist at all. They would just get beaten down without learning anything.
The purpose of combat training was to strengthen combat ability, learn how to deal with different kinds of ninja, and accumulate battle experience.
If the gap was too great and the battle became completely one-sided, it would be very difficult to achieve any training effect.
The moment Minato brought out more of his strength, Kakashi and the others immediately felt the pressure increase.
That was because even Minato's shadow clones could use Flying Thunder God, though they were slower than the original body.
The awkward part was that even those slower shadow clones were still too fast for Kakashi, the quickest among the three of them, to catch up with.
After several exchanges, Milotic accidentally ended up with a Flying Thunder God mark placed on her body.
The next moment, Minato's original body arrived with a Rasengan in hand. He struck Milotic away, then threw out another Flying Thunder God kunai.
When Rin reacted and tried to attack him, Minato instantly switched positions with the thrown kunai and smashed her to the ground with a fierce elbow strike.
Since this was training, Obito did not panic too much. He immediately activated Flame Breathing Chakra Mode.
In truth, with his current chakra reserves, he could not maintain Flame Breathing Chakra Mode for long.
He had already activated the Sharingan shortly after the battle began and had used a number of ninjutsu, so his chakra consumption was already high.
But Obito really had no better option, so he could only gamble.
Half a minute later, Obito, injured across the back, fell to the ground.
A few minutes after that, all three of them, along with their three Pokémon, were lying on the ground, panting heavily.
"It really doesn't work. Flying Thunder God is basically impossible to defend against," Obito could not help but complain.
He had never expected to win from the beginning. After all, their opponent was their own instructor, a young powerhouse whose name already resounded throughout the ninja world.
Still, being beaten down so cleanly and so thoroughly left him feeling a little unwilling.
"Once I learn Flying Thunder God, Kakashi's going to get beaten like this by me too!" the optimistic Obito told himself, quickly cheering himself back up.
Mugetsu had already said he would teach him Flying Thunder God. Just not now. Obito still needed to grow stronger first.
Still, Obito felt that with Mugetsu teaching him, he would definitely be able to learn it.
"My chakra is still not enough," Kakashi sighed inwardly.
If he had more chakra, he definitely would not have looked so miserable just now.
That limitation forced him to make choices during battle. He could only use certain ninjutsu, otherwise he would not even have enough chakra left to activate Lightning Release Chakra Mode.
"You've all already done very well. When I was your age, I wasn't as strong as any of you," Minato said with a smile as he wiped away the fine sweat on his forehead and praised them.
Minato was not exaggerating.
As they were now, Obito and Kakashi had already surpassed most of Konoha's Jonin.
Even Rin, whose direct combat ability was a little weaker, still counted as one of the stronger Jonin in Konoha in terms of overall capability.
At that moment, Minato's feelings were truly complicated.
His disciples were so outstanding, and naturally he was happy for them because he genuinely liked all three of them.
But he also knew very well that this excellence was not because of him as their instructor. It was because of Mugetsu's efforts.
That led Minato to wonder, if he had not been separated from Obito and the others for so long because of the war, would they actually have ended up weaker than they were now?
Because in terms of teaching ability, he was not as good as Mugetsu.
That thought left Minato feeling strangely lost. How had failing in his duties somehow turned into a good thing?
"Hehe, I think it's because Toad Uncle isn't as good at teaching as Teacher Mugetsu, so he couldn't fully bring out Minato-sensei's talent," Obito said with a grin, clearly proud of himself.
Minato said nothing.
Though he felt a little sorry for Jiraiya, Obito's words were actually fairly accurate.
Even so, Minato felt that comparing anyone's teaching ability to Mugetsu's only led to one conclusion: Mugetsu's teaching ability was simply outrageous.
After the confirmed list for the Kenbunshoku Haki special training class was finalized, the procedures were quickly completed, and the class officially began.
Including Minato, the final roster contained twenty-seven people, seven more than the original twenty.
Among them were Root ninja, members of certain ninja clans, and relatives of advisor elders.
At this point, Mugetsu had already appraised not all, but most of Konoha's officially registered living ninja.
Relying on his excellent memory, he was already very familiar with all the participants in this special training, even if that familiarity only existed one way.
This Kenbunshoku Haki special class was different from previous special trainings. There were only three hours of lessons each day, and all of them took place in the morning.
It was not that Mugetsu was unwilling to teach longer. The nature of this training was simply different.
In previous special trainings, even when he taught Breathing Techniques to Root and ANBU, it had never been only about the breathing techniques themselves. There had also been plenty of other material, because the core purpose was to improve combat strength overall.
This time was different. The goal of the training was simply to teach those sensory ninja how to learn Kenbunshoku Haki.
After making his calculations, Mugetsu concluded that three hours was the optimal length for teaching. If the sessions went longer than that, the actual effect would weaken considerably.
Since the lessons were not especially long, Mugetsu did not set aside a specific break period. He simply told them to rest on their own if they became tired.
"The sensory ninjutsu I'll be teaching you is called Kenbunshoku Haki. When learning this sensory ninjutsu, you can set aside your past experience with ordinary sensory ninjutsu for the time being, because the two are fundamentally different," Mugetsu began after everyone had arrived.
Even when localized into a sensory ninjutsu for this world, the training method of Kenbunshoku Haki was still vastly different from the usual sensory ninjutsu of the ninja world.
Everyone nodded and carefully memorized his words.
Before arriving, they had all received warnings from different sources. They already understood that this special training was extremely important, and learning Kenbunshoku Haki could practically be considered a mission in itself.
"When you first begin learning Kenbunshoku Haki, you'll be able to sense chakra within a certain range, detect attacks outside your line of sight, and…"
Mugetsu then began explaining the various abilities of Kenbunshoku Haki in detail.
That point was also important, because he wanted to avoid anyone mistakenly believing that simply learning Kenbunshoku Haki would immediately allow them to sense malice.
"When Kenbunshoku Haki reaches a certain level, you can choose a direction for further training. You can pursue a wider range of perception, or you can pursue deeper and more precise perception. The ability to sense malice falls into the latter category."
Minato had already been learning Kenbunshoku Haki from Mugetsu for some time, so his expression did not change much.
The other sensory ninja, however, all looked shocked.
If they had been ordinary ninja with no understanding of sensory techniques, they might not have thought too much about it. But as specialists in sensory ninjutsu, they instantly understood how powerful this technique called Kenbunshoku Haki really was.
They also immediately understood why its training method differed so much from ordinary sensory ninjutsu. If such a powerful sensory ninjutsu were trained the same way as normal ones, that would have been the strange part.
Compared to standard sensory ninjutsu, Kenbunshoku Haki not only had far richer functions, but also an incredibly high ceiling.
"During the early stages of training, try not to rely on your eyes. Instead, learn to obtain information through spiritual perception."
After briefly explaining its functions, Mugetsu led the sensory ninja into the formal training process for Kenbunshoku Haki.
Since the teaching time was not particularly long, Mugetsu did not include a fixed break period. He simply told them to rest on their own if they felt tired.
"Today's lesson is over. Same time, same place tomorrow," Mugetsu announced exactly three hours later and dismissed the class.
The sensory ninja all froze for a moment, each of them looking unsatisfied.
At that moment, they truly wished Mugetsu were the type of teacher who loved dragging class out and would continue speaking for another half hour.
Kenbunshoku Haki was simply too difficult, more difficult than any sensory ninjutsu they had ever learned.
Of course, no one actually tried to stop Mugetsu and beg for more instruction.
After all, this was Blazing Sun Mugetsu, the man who dominated battlefields. The fact that someone like him was personally teaching them ninjutsu was already incredible luck.
[Lecture completed.]
[Rating: S]
[Reward: Perception comprehension increased, Kenbunshoku Haki +10, Sensory Ninjutsu +3]
Mugetsu glanced at the lecture rewards. Perhaps because the lesson had been short and there were not many participants, the rewards were rather average.
Still, he did not care much.
He was not actually relying on Kenbunshoku Haki to find White Zetsu in the first place. He was using Appraisal.
The true value of this ANBU captain position was not in increasing the proficiency of his Kenbunshoku Haki.
Its real value was that from now on, Mugetsu could proactively organize different training programs whenever he wanted and raise the proficiency of whatever skill he chose to improve.
At the moment, Mugetsu's next plan was to organize a large scale sealing technique class in order to raise his Sealing Technique level.
If he wanted to upgrade the Yang Seal in a short period of time, then he needed a higher level of Sealing Technique first.
.....
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