Stepping into the courtyard of the Senju compound, Hidetada found the grounds swallowed by an uncharacteristic silence that he had become used to. The air was cool and carried the scent of wet stone and blooming night jasmines. He raised an eyebrow, half-expecting Mito to be waiting there to chastise him for his tardiness, but the stone paths remained empty.
The moonlight reflected off the ground of the garden, creating pale, ghostly ripples in the dark. Focusing, he sent a soft pulse of chakra through the soles of his feet and into the earth. The vibration traveled through the foundations of the complex, returning to him with the familiar, large chakra signature of his grandmother in her study. He slipped off his geta, the wooden soles clacking softly on the stone before he stepped onto the polished floorboards of the interior.
After a few sharp turns through the winding corridors, he reached the door to her study and raised an arm to slide it open. But then he paused, his hand hovering inches from the wood. A faint, sharp chakra of the unmistakable signature of a seal placed on the opposite side of the wall alerted his senses.
Fuinjutsu was an ancient and stupidly time consuming, mind you, art, first discovered or invented by the Uzumaki clan—if you ignored all that bullshit going on with Hagoromo—before it was popularized in the other clans. It was an art of precision, written in a specialized script of Fuin designed by the Uzumakis that demanded a master's hand for calligraphy. Out of everything Hidetada had pursued, mastering the elegant, sweeping strokes of the shitty Kanjis had been the most grueling.
Then there was the main structure of the seal mainly comprised of two parts. The central character that defined the purpose and the swirling lines or geometric patterns that dictated how and in what manner the chakra flowed through the seal. Complete knowledge of the Uzumaki glyphs were needed to write down the purpose of the seal and a strong hand was needed for the drawing of geometric shapes. There were several variables and variations needed for more complex Fuinjutsus such as the Flying Raijin, which didn't quite work on the same logic. Then again, any seal based on Space-Time was needlessly complex.
Following that, seals had four main, defined purposes. The most common of the four being, obviously, Sealing. It could be used for trapping a physical object, an elemental attack or even a living being inside a scroll or a body. Then it was followed by the opposite of Sealing, which was, Unsealing, used for summoning tools, weapons or suppressed chakra. This was followed by warding or creating barriers and then finally, there was suppression, which was a high level technique used for the shutting down of the flow of chakra in a person's body or paralyzing them.
Then finally, there was the medium of sealing. The easiest way to make seals was obviously through chakra conductive ink and paper but they could be made with blood or carved into a surface using chakra.
These were mainly the basics of the craft. However, as death drove innovation, it had inspired more and more people to make new seals that couldn't even be categorized, the ones that were at the top of his head being the Curse Mark and the Four Symbols Seal. They were similar to the seals involved in the sealing of a tailed beast but not quite exactly the same.
The genius of Orochimaru was sort of terrifying once you realized that he had accomplished all of this without the help of a Fuinjutsu master, especially without dying, but he probably hadn't made those seals yet if the timeline added up correctly.
The trap behind the mahogany door was unusual, even by his own standards. It was not something Mito had taught him before. It functioned on something like a lock-and-burst mechanism. Four seals were placed at the corners, linked by a hidden thread of chakra. If a single seal was disrupted or destroyed, a pulse would race to the remaining three, triggering an immediate explosion. It was sort of ingenious that even most masters would have been fooled by it if they did not possess the precise chakra sensing skills as he did, and this seal in particular was only leaking a minuscule amount of chakra, which was to be expected of something made by his grandmother's hands. Even then, it was common knowledge that no seal was truly efficient when it came to cutting down the leakage of chakra.
Tracing the outlines of the seals etched into the door with his chakra, he devised a plan. Most people would have approached the seal by sending a sharp, precise thread of chakra to each of the seals to destroy all of them at the same time, yet fortunately, Hidetada was not like most people.
Placing his hand on the door, he sent forth an immense pulse of chakra through it. The seals made no noise as they were oversaturated within a fraction of a second, yet he felt the satisfying sizzle as they burnt up. Most seals had a fallback in case someone tried to do exactly what he had done. However, even seals had a limit to how much chakra they could absorb in a set amount of time. All he had to do was overload it before it even had time to react. The amount of chakra that he had just sent through the door would be more than even a seasoned Jonin's entire chakra pool.
"How crude and cumbersome," Mito's haughty voice drifted through the wood. Hidetada pushed the door open to find her sitting amidst a sea of scrolls, her vibrant open red hair swaying gently as she shook her head. An amused smile appeared on her lips as she spoke to him. "As expected of you, Hidetada."
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He grumbled good-naturedly as he stepped inside, closing the door behind him. "Bah, cut me some slack grandma, I am just sticking to my strengths you know?"
Hidetada dropped down opposite to her with a tired sigh as he closed his eyes, leaning on his arms for support. Today had been quite an interesting day, meeting all those important canon characters, but all he wanted to do was fall asleep now. Then again, tardiness was not something he valued in himself.
The room was dimly lit by a few flickering candles that cast long, dancing shadows against the walls lined with ancient texts. The smell of old parchment and ink was thick in the air. Huffing, Hidetada opened his eyelids and sat straight, looking into Mito's amused blue eyes. She looked quite pretty with her long hair falling down in waves instead of being restricted in her strict bun. "You look quite tired today, did anything interesting happen?" His grandmother waggled her sharp eyebrow at him with a smirk.
It was difficult to avoid the urge that sprang up instinctively for him to twitch his eye at the suggestive tone. Still, he managed to control himself and replied to her question with a hum, "Yes I did indeed meet quite a few interesting people today, that reminds me actually." Hidetada paused, rubbing his smooth chin as he stared at her. "Do you know any Kinjutsu going by the name of the Eight Gates?"
Humming to herself, Mito tapped her finger against her red lips thinking. "The Eight Gates huh.. Eight Gates.. Oh! Do you mean the Eight Inner Gates?" She looked at him expectantly with suspicion in her eyes. She waited for his eager nod before continuing, "Hmm, yes I remember now. The Eight Gates are specific points located in the brain, spinal cord, abdomen and the heart within a person's Chakra Pathway System that act as limiters on the body's energy flow. While chakra allows for extraordinary feats, the body naturally restricts this flow to prevent physical collapse. By opening these gates, a ninja can surpass their physical limits, though at the cost of extreme strain or death."
Mito nodded to herself at the recollection before looking at him with even more suspicion. "And why exactly are you asking about this? I'll let you know, that though the power obtained by opening these Gates is immense, they are not worth it for you." Hidetada waved his hands in front of himself hurriedly to assuage her worries. "Don't worry, I don't plan on using them. There was just this person I met who couldn't use his chakra effectively due to a malformation on his Tenketsu, so I was wondering whether this technique could help him."
Raising an eyebrow at his explanation, Mito considered asking where he had even learned of the existence of this Kinjutsu before realizing that he had been reading and researching dangerous Jutsu from a young age. Instead, she asked him curiously, "Do you know how to open the Gates however? While I know of their existence, I have never seen anyone using them."
With a slump, a sigh escaped Hidetada's lips. "I was hoping that you would know something about it." While he hadn't been expecting her to actually know about how to open them, he was still a little disappointed. "Eh, I guess I'll just have to figure it out myself, shouldn't be too hard."
It was definitely gonna be hard, but why live in reality when he could live in his fairytale world.
An amused unladylike snort escaped Mito at his statement before she regained her composition and looked at him with a smile. "That's the attitude you should have. I believe it shouldn't be too difficult for you if you put your mind to it." And she wasn't lying. Anything Hidetada fully put his mind to, it would be discovered and cracked as long as he maintained his motivation. It was quite frightening if she really thought about it. Even in her long life, she hadn't met anyone who was nearly as talented as him.
He nodded his head at her statement. If anyone could figure out how to open the Eight Inner Gates by themselves, it would be Hidetada Senju of course.
"Oh, yeah! I forgot to mention, I met the Heir of the Uchiha Clan." Mito stared at him as she processed the words. The heir of the Uchiha Clan... that would be.. Mikoto Uchiha if she was not wrong.
The thought of the girl made her smirk as she stared at Hidetada's face. "I always knew you were going to be a heart breaker once you grew up, but going for the heir of the Uchiha Clan? I underestimated you."
An amused scoff fell past his lips as she said that. Maybe he shouldn't have told her that at all? Mito was definitely not gonna let it go for at least a few more months, and that is only if he never mentioned her again.
The Uzumaki woman on the other hand was thinking about something else entirely as she rubbed her chin in thought with her eyes narrowed. The thought of a Senju and Uchiha together tickled her memory. She was definitely forgetting something, but what was it?
A snort came forth unbidden once again as she remembered. "That actually reminds me of Hashirama and.. Madara." Mito scowled as she reminisced about her late husband before speaking up, "If Madara would have been a girl, your grandfather wouldn't even have looked at me once."
And Hashirama hadn't even glanced at her twice when she was married to him. It was always about Madara this, Konoha that. Maybe she had misjudged the relationship between him and his Uchiha boytoy? No friends were supposed to be that close, right?
Quickly scrubbing that thought away from her head, Mito turned her attention back on Hidetada as he started to speak with humour, "Stop putting it like that, I only met her out of pure chance and luck." He lied through his teeth before continuing, "And that is not even considering the fact that she is more likely to be married to her first cousin than me. Freaking incestuous Uchihiggas."
Tobirama's hate for the Uchihas hadn't been lost and forgotten after all, she observed. And what the hell was a Uchihiggas?
Mito decided to not pay the word any more attention than it deserved. The term was probably made by her dead brother in law. Where had Hidetada picked it up from though?
Deciding to let go of those thoughts, she brought the attention back onto the important matter that they had been trying to solve for the past few days. Mokuton possessed immense capabilities, but it could be made even better.
Outside, the wind picked up, making the bamboo chimes on the porch clatter softly against each other. The shadows in the study lengthened as one of the candles burned out, leaving a faint trail of smoke curling toward the ceiling.
"Did you succeed in combining Wood Release and Fuinjutsu?"
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Word Count: 2170