The scroll unfurled, inch by inch.
Nothing exploded, nothing stabbed or burned her the moment it opened.
Across the top ran four bold characters: Multiple Shadow Clone Technique.
Beneath them were the full chakra flow diagrams and the matching sequence of hand seals. At the very end, a thin line of tiny script read:
I know you can see.
I sold the Shadow Clone scrolls for a tidy sum. Guy says you want this one, so I am giving it to you. We are even. Do not come bother me about anything else. Kakashi
So he had predicted her angle.
No surprise. Kakashi was several cuts shrewder than Guy. Guy had blundered his way into a ten-billion-ryo debt and pledged a lifetime of labor. Kakashi, meanwhile, had likely pocketed who-knew-how-much from the ninja tool shop owner and fobbed her off with one Multiple Shadow Clone.
Konome set the scroll down, unsure whether to be pleased or annoyed. The jutsu she had been fixated on had fallen right into her lap, but her plan to leverage a favor into nature transformation tutoring had been read and countered.
Life went up and down like that.
Forget it. First learn the hard-won jutsu.
She dropped her pack, sat cross-legged on the mat, and spread the scroll on the floorboards.
Then she bent over it with the keen hunger of someone who had worshiped this training cheat of a technique for a very long time.
The Multiple Shadow Clone Technique was developed by the Second Hokage. It created real, physical doppelgangers and was meant for gathering intel in dangerous environments.
The base Shadow Clone and its Multiple variant used the same seals. The latter simply demanded far more chakra and carried serious risks, so its difficulty rose from B-rank to A-rank and it was classed as forbidden.
The scroll was not complicated. The language was crisp and to the point. After a brief preface came only the chakra route through the meridians and the hand seals. No discussion of principles, no development notes. Clearly this was Kakashi's own copy, not an official village original.
Konome matched her flow to the diagram and nudged chakra along the prescribed path.
Minutes ticked past.
Her Byakugan's precise control shone again. Under that cold, exacting sight she shepherded the chakra through bend after bend, along a path that forked and twisted and forked again, until at last…
A dead end.
Hm?
Wrong turn?
She frowned and reread the route.
No mistake.
Was the path itself wrong? Had Kakashi given her junk on purpose?
Unlikely. She had not asked him for the scroll. He had brought it of his own accord. Why bother sabotaging it?
This did not add up.
She halted the flow and read the scroll end to end.
Damn it.
Kakashi, you idiot.
In the far corner under the route diagram, tucked where no sane person would look first, were a few tiny lines of warning.
Warning: every shinobi's meridian layout varies and may not be fully open. If your channels conflict with the route, you would be best served abandoning this training. Proceeding anyway risks unknown harm.
Who taught you to put the critical note at the very bottom of the method?
The fact that the kids in your future team did not die of your teaching is a miracle.
Oh, wait.
You never taught them much of anything.
Never mind, then.
Konome withdrew her earlier praise. As an instructor, Kakashi lagged far behind Guy. In fact, he barely edged out Iruka.
She returned to the Shadow Clone route and this time read every character, teasing out several more hidden tips. Many jutsu failed not only because of chakra nature differences, but because the user's meridian map simply did not match the route. A small mismatch could be patched by adjusting the path. A true dead end meant a major reroute.
At best, your technique fizzled.
At worst, it killed you.
Which was why most shinobi, when a route fought their body, chose to walk away.
The best jutsu was the one that fit you.
No point dying for one that did not.
That was ordinary logic.
Konome was not ordinary.
She could develop new jutsu.
She could also develop herself.
Byakugan turned inward.
Chakra surged like tidewater through her channels and crashed against a dam that would not give. The route was blocked.
Body command, engage.
Dead-ash pupils shed their veil and sank into her meridians.
A soft click, as if some hidden latch had slid.
The blockage opened.
Not only there. Other channels budded new branches like rootlets and linked into the newly cleared path. What had been a cul-de-sac folded into her body's great loop.
She could not rewrite a technique.
She could rewrite herself.
If the mountain would not come, then she would walk to the mountain.
The tide rolled on.
With the dead end gone, chakra poured forward, taking the remodeled highways with ease. There was nothing left to stop it.
Multiple Shadow Clone Technique.
When the circuit closed and her seals snapped into place, the chakra's quality changed.
Boom.
Smoke filled the room and then thinned.
Five Konome Taketori sat in a neat row on the floor, identical in form and clothing. The real one in the center felt a rare, hollow ache. Only a fifth of her chakra remained.
"How do you all feel?" the original asked, eyes skimming her copies.
"Byakugan functions normally," said the one on the far left, veins threading out as she swept the room.
"Shikotsumyaku works, but the body cannot undergo large-scale morphs. Too much deformation destabilizes the simulated chakra body," said the second from the left, bones clicking as she made fine internal adjustments.
"Eight Gates is a no," said the third, shaking her head. "The instant I try to open a gate, the clone's chakra framework begins to shear."
"Tailed Beast water release is fine," said the fourth. Ripples gathered at her gesture and a wave chased itself through the air.
The original nodded. "Thoughts on the technique itself."
Clone One: "Still chakra simulation. It just switched from pretending to be someone else to pretending to be us."
Clone Two: "Mechanism unclear for now. Same as the Three Basic Techniques. We cannot drop the seals the way we can with Water Release."
Clone Three: "My hunch is that Shadow Clones hinge on the mysterious Yin and Yang aspects of chakra. Without that theory we cannot push farther."
Clone Four: "We all think with the same mind. Committee meetings are pointless. And you do not need to fret over our safety."
She smiled, and the others smiled with her.
No one understood you like you.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Don't forget to add this story to your Library, drop a review, and leave a Power Stone if you enjoyed it!
Craving more chapters? Join my Patron to unlock advance releases and dive deeper into the story!
[email protected]/_theon
Change @ to "a"