Naruto: The Ninja World's Life Buyer

Chapter 23 Ballistics

Five o'clock in the morning.

Waste treatment plant.

Sosuke arrived right on time.

He was in amazing shape today; he even walked with a spring in his step.

Genzo was drinking when he saw Sousuke and his eyelids lifted slightly.

"Did you take your medicine?"

Yuanzao's nose twitched.

He could smell the faint medicinal scent on Sousuke's body, as well as the unmistakable aura of blood—the unique scent of high-grade ninja beast meat.

"I've had something good to eat." Sosuke put down two bottles of the most expensive sake—bought from Zuiyuelou, each bottle costing three thousand taels.

When Yuanzhao saw the exquisite wine bottle, his eyes widened instantly.

He snatched the bottle and eagerly twisted it open.

A rich aroma of wine wafted out.

"Excellent wine!"

Genzo took a big gulp, a look of ecstasy on his face.

What are we practicing today?

"Keep practicing the transformation technique."

"Is it still the Wind-Transforming Demon's Shuriken?"

"No, I won't change anything inanimate today."

Yuanzao put down the wine bottle.

"Become a human today."

"Isn't it easy to become human?" Sosuke asked in a hoarse voice.

"Easy?" Genzo sneered. "It's easy to become alive. It's hard to become dead."

"dead?"

"Yes. A corpse."

Yuanzao pointed to a deep pit not far away.

That's a pit for burying non-recyclable waste.

"Jump in."

Sosuke jumped in.

The pit is very deep, about two meters.

It was full of mud and sewage.

"Lie down."

Sosuke lay in the mud.

The icy touch instantly soaked into the clothes.

"To become a dead Iwa ninja."

Genzo looked down at him from above.

"Characteristics: Throat slit, excessive blood loss, pale face, dilated pupils."

"Most importantly—dead silence."

"No breathing. No heartbeat. No body temperature."

Sosuke forms a hand seal.

Transformation.

A horrific wound appeared on his neck, the flesh torn open.

His face turned deathly pale.

Hold your breath.

The source commanded.

Sosuke held his breath.

One minute.

Two minutes.

The lungs begin to lack oxygen, causing chest tightness and shortness of breath.

His instinct made him want to inhale.

"Don't move," Genzo's voice came. "I'm watching your chest. If it rises or falls even slightly, I'll throw a stone."

Sosuke forcibly suppressed the urge to inhale.

He began experimenting with using chakra instead of oxygen, allowing it to flow slowly in his blood to maintain a minimum level of oxygen supply to his brain.

three minutes.

Sosuke's consciousness began to fade.

Just then.

Splash!

A bucket of stuff spilled over.

It's swill.

Leftovers, mixed with fish bones and shreds, were poured over Sosuke's head.

stench.

Slippery.

A few flies buzzed over and landed on Sosuke's "wound".

A fly even crawled into his nostril.

itch.

An excruciating itch.

That's a physiological reaction that humans absolutely cannot tolerate.

I feel like sneezing.

I wanted to reach out and scratch it.

"Those are corpse worms." Genzo's voice was utterly cold. "On the battlefield, when you play dead, crows will peck at your flesh, and rats will bite your ears."

"If you move, the enemy will come back and finish you off."

"Hold on."

Sosuke's fingers trembled slightly.

puff.

A rock came crashing down.

It hit him squarely in the thigh.

"It moved. Let's try again."

Sosuke deactivated his transformation, panting heavily, and expelled the flies from his nostrils.

He gagged and wiped the swill off his face.

"Continue." Genzo showed no pity whatsoever.

the second time.

This time, Sosuke lasted four minutes.

Until a mouse crawled into his trouser leg.

That furry sensation crept up my thigh.

fear.

Nausea.

Sosuke's efforts failed him once again.

"waste."

Yuan Zao cursed.

"If it's a real ninja, let alone a rat, even if a poisonous snake crawls into your crotch, you can't move unless it bites you to death."

"Again!"

This practice session lasted for the entire morning.

Sosuke died countless times in that mud pit.

It was doused with swill, crawled on by rats, and hit by stones.

At the end.

He was numb.

When he lay down again, becoming that Iwa ninja corpse.

His heart was as still as water.

It's not a rhetorical device; it's a physiological state of stillness.

He unintentionally mastered the technique of controlling his heart rate with chakra.

He reduced his heart rate to thirty beats per minute.

His body temperature dropped to the same icy cold as the surrounding mud and water.

The mouse is back again.

It sniffed at Sosuke's chest.

Then, it actually stopped on Sosuke's stomach and began to gnaw on a piece of bone in the swill.

It mistook Sosuke for a real corpse.

Or it could be part of the garbage.

Yuanzao, watching this scene, finally nodded.

"He's not quite dead yet, but he's almost dead."

Yuanzao reached out his hand.

"Come on up."

Sosuke did not respond.

He waited another minute until the mouse ran away before slowly opening his eyes and deactivating his transformation.

He climbed out of the pit.

It reeked of a foul stench that made people want to stay away.

But he stood very straight.

There was something new in his eyes that he hadn't seen before.

That is absolute control over the body.

"congratulations."

Genzo threw the bottle at Sosuke.

"You've passed this hurdle."

Sosuke took the bottle and took a sip.

The pungent liquor washed away the swill-like taste in my throat.

"The Three Body Techniques are complete."

"After the Three Body Techniques comes the Art of Killing."

Yuanzao picked up another bottle of wine and took a swig.

"A ninja isn't a magician. Even if you transform into a flower, you still can't kill your enemy."

"You need to have teeth."

He pointed to the ninja tool bag that Sousuke had placed on the ground.

"Draw your shuriken."

Sousuke picked up his ninja tool bag and pulled out a shuriken.

This is a very common type of iron four-cornered shuriken, with its edges sharpened very much.

"That target."

Yuanzhao pointed to a dead tree trunk twenty meters away.

A red circle was drawn on the tree trunk.

"Shoot it."

Sosuke took a deep breath.

He exerted force with his wrists and twisted his waist.

Whoosh.

The sword in his hand flew out.

Draw a parabola.

笃.

It got stuck in the mud two meters away from the tree trunk.

"..."

Sosuke was somewhat embarrassed.

"Pretty cool pose," Genzo commented, "but his aim is practically blind."

"Shurikenjutsu may seem simple, but it's all about calculation."

Genzo picked up a sharp stone.

"Wind speed, gravity, the angle of your wrist movement, and even the frequency of your breathing can all affect the landing point."

Whoosh.

Yuan Zao raised his hand.

The stone flew out like a bullet, hitting the center of the red circle precisely.

penetrating.

"Practice it."

Yuanzao yawned.

"Throw it away, then pick it up. Then throw it away again."

Sosuke began practicing.

Ten shuriken, practiced for a whole morning.

Throw it out, then pick it up.

Throw it out, then pick it up.

dull.

tedious.

Moreover, his arm muscles began to ache.

Sosuke stopped.

Even for him, who had been strengthened by the flesh of ninja beasts, this amount of exercise was too much to handle.

"What are you doing?"

Seeing that Sousuke had stopped, Genzo frowned and asked, "Who told you to stop?"

Sosuke's arm hung in mid-air, his muscles twitching from the buildup of lactic acid.

"My muscles are cramping," Sosuke said honestly. "If I keep training like this, my tendons will rupture."

This is science.

It is also the rational thinking he developed in modern society.

But in the ninja world, rationality is sometimes just an excuse.

"It's broken?"

Genzo chuckled.

"On the battlefield, even if your hand is broken, you still have to use your teeth to bite down on a kunai and kill people."

Genzo walked over and struck Sousuke's twitching arm hard with his iron crutch.

pain.

Excruciating pain.

But this tap seemed to have hit a certain pressure point.

The spasms miraculously subsided.

"This is the application of chakra," Genzo said coldly. "Use chakra to control your muscles, instead of letting your muscles control you."

"The ninja beast meat you ate wasn't meant to make you fat. It was meant to make you overdraw your resources."

Sosuke fell silent.

He picked up his shuriken again.

"Continue." Genzo sat back on the tire. "This time, add movement. Keep throwing until I tell you to stop."

Sosuke started running.

He began to move and jump, trying to find his balance on the uneven ground.

With each move, a shuriken must be thrown.

The accuracy is still very poor.

Nine out of ten shots miss the target.

"What are you thinking about?" Genzo's voice followed closely. "You're thinking about where to land? Wrong."

"A shuriken is not a bow and arrow."

"What you need to think about is the 'line'."

"From your fingertips to the target's throat, there is an invisible line."

"Connect this line."

Sousuke gritted his teeth.

Sweat blurred my vision.

As he ran, he tried to catch that elusive line.

This is a tedious ordeal.

Until the sun sets.

Sousuke threw out his last shuriken.

笃.

It hits the bullseye.

Although it was just luck, he remembered the feeling of resistance as his fingertips brushed against the air.

"Your accuracy is still too poor. You'll have to practice every day from now on. I'll teach you shuriken techniques tomorrow."

Genzo glanced at the sky.

"Go buy some steel wire. The thinnest kind, the kind that can cut through bone."