Current Status: Divided Focus
Description: From now on, you possess three hearts and dual soul-consciousness.
Refresh Countdown: 167:59:58
Staring at the status panel, Shawn was utterly baffled.
He felt that, back in his school days, even if his language scores had barely passed, there was no way he had misunderstood this idiom so badly.
"Divided focus" means this?
Are they interpreting it differently over in some other world?
Probably so.
But—
Shawn instinctively lowered his gaze to his chest.
"Three hearts… am I a downgraded version of Kakuzu now?"
He pressed a hand against his chest. He couldn't feel any extra heartbeats.
Yet at that moment, his vision changed.
He could see his own heart.
A real, beating heart of flesh and blood—
And outside it, overlapping and enveloping it, were two additional translucent hearts, faint and unreal.
Three hearts.
"So… if someone targets my heart, I effectively get two damage negations?"
Shawn quickly extrapolated, then turned his thoughts inward.
"And the dual soul-consciousness should work the same way?"
"If that's the case… can I truly multitask?"
"Two souls—then mental attacks like the Mind Body Switch Technique would be far less effective."
"And for training or combat…"
One mind, two uses.
Shawn attempted it.
The moment he did, he entered an indescribably strange state.
It felt as if he had two brains, each capable of thinking independently.
"…Amazing."
His eyes lit up.
He casually tried a classic test—drawing a circle with one hand and a square with the other.
Perfectly smooth. No interference whatsoever.
Meaning—
At this moment, his body could be fully controlled by two independent consciousnesses, each handling separate tasks.
"Then what about chakra control…?"
Shawn immediately sprang to his feet, spreading both hands and simultaneously gathering chakra.
The next instant, with swirling air currents—
Two Rasengan formed in his palms.
Effortless. Seamless.
Of course, even without dual consciousness, this could be achieved through extensive practice—but never this quickly, never this cleanly.
After a moment's thought, Shawn dispersed one Rasengan, focused on the remaining one in his right hand, and infused it with Wind Release chakra.
Instantly, the pale-blue Rasengan brightened.
Its core turned a blazing white, and the surrounding airflow became razor-sharp.
Wind Release: Rasengan.
A technique Shawn hadn't fully completed before—
Yet now, it came together with astonishing ease.
"Two souls working in tandem… this coordination surpasses even shadow clones."
"And then…"
His thoughts immediately jumped to Wind Release: Rasenshuriken.
Two soul-consciousnesses, division of labor—the difficulty would plummet.
With this state, could he even develop a complete Rasenshuriken?
One that could be thrown without relying on Sage Mode?
If Rasengan was merely optional for Shawn, a throwable Rasenshuriken was an entirely different matter.
"…Let's try."
The temptation was irresistible.
Nature transformation was no longer the bottleneck.
What remained was maintaining the Wind Release Rasengan while pushing its shape transformation to the extreme.
One soul stabilized the jutsu.
The other focused entirely on reshaping it.
Shawn began.
More Wind Release chakra poured in, carefully guided and compressed.
The Rasengan swelled.
Its weight deepened, forcing Shawn's hand to sink slightly.
Bang!
It collapsed.
Again.
Shawn grabbed his right wrist with his left and tried again.
And again.
Repeated failures.
Yet—progress was undeniable.
Eventually, chakra exhaustion caught up to him. Sweat poured down his face as he sat back to rest.
"S-rank techniques really aren't something you casually invent…"
Shawn sighed—but he was smiling.
With Divided Focus, he was confident it was achievable.
Then his attention returned to the status panel itself.
And only now did he notice something strange.
Beside the current status, an additional entry had appeared:
Swordsmanship Expert — Permanent
Shawn's heart skipped.
Permanent?
But that status had already refreshed… hadn't it?
"…Wait."
A realization dawned on him.
"Is it because I trained swordsmanship during that period until my actual level reached the status threshold—so it became permanently solidified?"
"If that's the case, then why didn't Heart and Word as One do the same…?"
His thoughts froze.
"That status was different. I acted that way because the status forced me to. I never truly accepted or internalized it—I never tried to make it my own."
That had to be it.
Which meant—
Shawn stared at his status panel.
If he trained Divided Focus the same way—maintaining it even without the status buff—could he also make this permanent?
"Wait."
Another question surfaced.
"If I already master it… do I still need the status at all?"
This cheat really was inhumane—no intelligence, no manual, not even basic explanations.
Grumbling inwardly, Shawn reassessed.
The permanent Swordsmanship Expert status was far from useless.
He had achieved expert-level swordsmanship because of that status.
And that status didn't just grant skill—it granted talent.
Without solidification, he would only retain the skill level, not the expert-grade talent itself.
Could that talent push his swordsmanship even further?
Shawn didn't know.
But talent was never something to scoff at.
So the real problem was—
How did he permanently solidify Divided Focus?
"One-mind-two-uses can be trained," Shawn reasoned.
"Even if it's not as smooth, achieving it should satisfy the solidification condition."
"But the three hearts…"
Only one name came to mind.
Kakuzu.
The Earth Grudge Fear Technique.
But—
Even ignoring whether he could defeat Kakuzu—
Completing dual-consciousness training and acquiring Earth Grudge Fear within seven days?
That was nearly impossible.
His good mood evaporated.
This felt like—
The pants were already off, and now you're telling me it won't work.
Frustration gnawed at him.
Even with Konoha's intelligence network, tracking down Kakuzu wasn't something done overnight.
And Shawn couldn't mobilize Konoha's full resources anyway—especially not yet.
What about obtaining it from Takigakure?
Did the village even still possess Earth Grudge Fear?
And even if they did—would they willingly hand it over?
Shawn knew the answer.
No. Absolutely not.
With a long sigh, he suppressed his greed.
"For now… I'll focus on using this status purely for training."
"Shadow clones and Wood Release clones can benefit from it too."
The thought energized him.
Sleep could wait.
Seven days.
Far too short.
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