Chapter 55: Rest, Reflection, and a Silent Watcher
The journey back to Konoha felt longer than the fight for survival. It took over a day of steady travel, the tension of the forest gradually giving way to the guarded familiarity of Fire Country roads. Upon finally passing through the great gates, Ragnar and Might Dai went straight to the Mission Assignment Desk to officially close their ill-fated "C-rank."
Almost immediately, a summons arrived from the Hokage's office—for Might Dai.
Ragnar didn't collect the mission reward. He pushed the entire, substantial sum across the counter towards Dai. The Eternal Genin sputtered protests—Ragnar had done the lion's share of the killing, had saved his life multiple times.
"It's yours," Ragnar stated, his tone leaving no room for debate. "You need it more."
He understood the politics about to unfold. Hatake Sakumo and his ANBU team, with Kushina in tow, would have returned hours ago, reporting directly to Hiruzen. The Hokage would be scrambling to piece together the story. A Kumo kidnapping, a slaughtered ANBU team, a missing Jinchuriki retrieved… and reports of monstrous blue flames and a child fighting jonin.
Ragnar had already prepped Dai during their return. Take the credit. Say you opened the Gates. Say you fought the Kumo ninja to a standstill. Say nothing of my flames, nothing of the red-haired man. My "strange power" was just enhanced taijutsu and willpower. The Eight Gates were a known, if terrifying, Konoha trump card. A Genin mastering them to such a degree would be shocking, but explainable. It would draw the Hokage's intense scrutiny and, more importantly, his focus away from Ragnar's more esoteric secrets.
Dai, bound by his promise and his overwhelming gratitude, had agreed. With his character, he would sell the lie with passionate, tearful conviction.
As Dai was led away by a stern-faced chunin clerk, Ragnar didn't head for the ANBU underground entrance. He went "home," to his sparse, surface-world cabin. The trip had been a gauntlet. He needed rest, and more importantly, solitude to process it all.
Walking through Konoha's streets, even he could feel the change. The usual lazy afternoon hum was tighter, sharper. Civilians in tea shops spoke in hushed, anxious tones. The smell of coming rain wasn't just meteorological; it was the scent of mobilization, of young men being called to banners. Shinobi moved with more purpose, their eyes scanning not just for local threats, but for the shadows of distant wars. ANBU patrols on the perimeter walls were thicker, more visible. The Second War was no longer coming; it was breathing down the village's neck.
None of that was his concern today. He was eight, and he was spent.
He reached his hut as dusk painted the sky in bruised purples. He decided: no training tonight. Just sleep, and the cold calculus of gains and losses.
That night, lying on his thin pallet, he replayed the battles. The Kiri assassins—brutal efficiency. The Kumo jonin, Armani—overwhelming power, a lesson in the gap that still existed. Every clash reinforced Sakumo's assessment: he was a powerful, blunt instrument. He lacked a true signature, a technique that could decisively end a fight against a peer or superior without exposing him to counter-attack.
The Phoenix flames at Lv4 were that answer. He knew it. A Mythical Zoan's power, now significantly upgraded, could change the dynamics of any battle. But to use it was to invite questions he couldn't answer. Blue flames that required no hand seals? That could heal and attack? In a village that dissected bloodlines and "Kekkei Genkai," it was a ticket to a lab or a forced loyalty oath. Might Dai was an idiot savant of taijutsu; he could be explained. A boy with an unknown, potent flame-release bloodline? That was a political and military asset to be controlled.
All of this stems from one thing, he thought, staring at the dark ceiling. Insufficient strength. Strength enough to not just survive encounters, but to dictate terms. To be feared, not managed. The looming war… it was a vortex of death, but also a forge of opportunity. Experience points on a mass scale.
He pulled up his status panel mentally.
Host: Ragnar
Abilities: Conqueror's Haki Lv3, Observation Haki Lv3, Armament Haki Lv3, Tornado Fist Lv2, Shave Lv3, Moon Walk Lv3, Thirty-Six Pound Phoenix Lv3. (10,000 EXP to next level)
Devil Fruit: Tori Tori no Mi, Model: Phoenix Lv4 (50,000 EXP to next level)
Weapon: Yama (Demon Blade)
Experience: 5,300/50,000
The numbers were daunting. 50,000 EXP for the next fruit upgrade. A small fortune of death. He closed his eyes, letting exhaustion pull him under.
Dawn came. Routine was a lifeline. He rose and began, not with flashy techniques, but with the foundation: the body.
Before his cabin stood a reinforced training post, its surface sheathed in hammered iron. He began. One thousand straight punches. The impact was a steady, rhythmic THUD-THUD-THUD that shook the post and sent jolts up his arms. One thousand uppercuts. Five hundred side kicks. Five hundred chops. It was monotonous, brutal, and necessary. Blood soon slicked his knuckles, sweat soaked his shirt. His breath sawed in and out, his heart a pounding drum in his chest. His enhanced physique, fed by Haki and the Phoenix, responded—the torn skin on his knuckles began to itch and close within the hour, the muscle fibers knitting with visible speed.
After the physical purge, he sought a different kind of training.
He climbed onto his roof, sitting cross-legged facing the rising sun. He closed his eyes and released his Observation Haki.
Not as a focused sensor, but as a wide-band receiver. He let his consciousness expand, thinning out, seeking not hostile intent, but… presence. The sigh of the waking earth. The whisper of the wind through new leaves. The hum of insects, the slow pulse of sap in trees, the distant murmur of the village itself. He emptied his mind, becoming a vessel.
And in that state, he saw it.
Through the lens of Observation Haki, the world was alive with energy that had nothing to do with chakra. It was purer, wilder, older. The power of nature itself. Swirls of verdant life, flickers of untamed fire, pulses of deep earth, sparking motes of lightning. They danced around him, elemental sprites indifferent to human concerns.
Tentatively, he reached out with his will, using his Haki as a conduit. He didn't command; he invited.
A trickle responded. A wisp of green, a spark of gold. They flowed into him, not through chakra pathways, but merging with his very being. Inside, they reacted with his native chakra, catalyzing, transforming. The result was a new, denser, more potent energy—Senjutsu Chakra.
But it was unruly. Volatile. Like trying to hold lightning in his bare hands. His Observation Haki became a regulator, a delicate valve controlling the intake. Too much, and he felt the energy buck, threatening to turn on him, to overwhelm his consciousness with a primal, destructive rage. He'd seen the results in his old world's fragments—the berserk state, the loss of self.
He stopped when he reached his current limit. Two distinct rivers now flowed within him: his normal, chunin-level chakra, and a smaller, but infinitely denser and more dangerous stream of raw nature energy. They coexisted, separate, refusing to mix.
He had tried before. Channeling Senjutsu Chakra into a Rasengan had resulted in a violent, unstable eruption that nearly took his hand off. Normal chakra worked fine. The problem was control, and something else…
Sage Mode.
The realization hit him like one of his own punches. In every instance he could recall, the users of this power didn't just wield the energy; they first transformed themselves. They entered a state where their bodies became attuned, became partially of nature, able to safely channel its fury. That was the missing step. He was trying to pour ocean water into a clay pot. He needed to become a coral reef first.
But who could teach him Sage Mode? Jiraiya was out there somewhere, but his training was legendary and specific to Mount Myoboku. The other locations were myths. He was on his own.
Forget it, he decided, opening his eyes and hopping down from the roof. The morning was bright. I have other cards. The Sage path can wait.
He spent the rest of the day at the ANBU headquarters, filing a bare-bones mission report that focused on the Kiri ambush and his fight alongside Dai. He saw no sign of Sakumo. The place was a hive of quiet, urgent activity, whispers of "Land of Rain" and "deployment orders" everywhere. He left as soon as he could, the weight of the coming conflict a tangible thing in the air.
On his walk back, he saw squads of Uchiha, their clan fan prominent, moving with purpose towards the main gates. They ignored him, their minds on a larger stage. The clan was being mobilized, likely as part of Hiruzen's "vanguard" deal with Tateyama.
Evening found him back on his roof. The sun was a dying ember on the horizon, its last light gilding the faces on the Hokage Monument. Hashirama, Tobirama, Hiruzen. Stone giants who had shaped the world with their will. Ragnar watched them, not with awe, but with a cold, measuring ambition.
Your era is passing. A new one is coming. And I will carve my face on that cliff, or I will break the mountain trying.
As the final light faded, plunging the monument into silhouette, his sharp eyes caught movement below.
A girl. Vibrant red hair like a spill of blood in the twilight. Kushina.
She was approaching his cabin, her steps hesitant, her posture tense with a nervous energy he couldn't quite parse. She didn't look up. She reached his door, found it ajar, and peeked inside.
"Not here again!" he heard her mutter, a note of frustration in her voice. She stamped a foot. "He never even closes his door!"
But even as she complained, she carefully pushed the door fully shut, checking the latch. "Then again… his place is so empty, even a thief would leave disappointed," she said to herself, a small, fond smile touching her lips despite her apparent annoyance.
From his perch, unseen, Ragnar watched. The cold ambition in his eyes didn't soften, but something else, a faint, unfamiliar flicker of… something… passed through him. He didn't name it. He simply watched as the girl, having performed her small, silent act of care, turned and walked back into the gathering Konoha night, unaware of the eyes following her from the shadows above.
(End of Chapter)
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