30 30: Power

Seija felt... stupid.

Two full years had now gone by since she first joined the orphans. She was now ten years old. Everyone was getting stronger and stronger...

Except for her.

Sure, her chakra quantity and physical strength had increased by a lot, simply thanks to her body developing and growing older. But she had made damn near zero progress on any of her real abilities. Not on her Ninjutsu, her Yin Release training, even her Taijutsu was struggling to improve beyond simple martial arts advancement.

She had trained only what she could hide, and what the others already knew about. Namely, her Taijutsu, her Dojutsu, and her Summoning Jutsu respectively.

Taijutsu was easy enough to practice. She sparred against Jiraiya on most days, since the orphans were still too unskilled to match her. When Jiraiya was away, she sparred against her Shadow Clones like Nagato did before Yahiko and Konan caught up to him.

Yin Release was a dud. It was the only basic Release in her entire Jutsu collection that she didn't have any new techniques for. Only the academy clone Jutsu. And unfortunately, Jiraiya couldn't help her with this either since he also sucked at Yin Release even worse than she did. Despite being a Jonin, he didn't have even a single Genjutsu in his repertoire.

For Dojutsu, she had - while wearing her mask - practiced activating her Byakugan and Sharingan at the same time. At first it was just one or the other, then after a few months of constantly activating both of them during training with the orphans she could activate both, with one in her left eye and the other in her right. A neat trick, but it made her feel unbearably dizzy if she did it for more than a minute at a time.

A year into training she figured out how to 'fuse' them. Her Byakugan's ability to read her own chakra network allowed her to trigger them both at the same time. Of course it wasn't that simple, and she'd almost immediately damaged both of her eyes in such a way that they became blurry for a few hours until they regenerated.

After that attempt, slowly but surely, she managed to navigate the process more and more delicately, opening and closing different pathways, only allowing those that crossed over between the two Kekkei Genkai to remain active, while cutting off excess pathways that would overload the eyes with more chakra than they could handle. And now she could activate a mixed 'Byaku-Sharingan', which took the form of both eyes at once.

The veins around her eyes were no longer necessary to fuel the eyes with more chakra, since she already had plenty of chakra flowing through her network. She also applied this vein-less feature to her usual Byakugan as well as the new one, since there was no reason not to.

Within the fused eyes the red of the Sharingan had turned white, like the Byakugan, but the three black tomoe and the black pupil remained. Intriguingly, the small blind spot at the back of the eyes had also vanished with this fusion, likely due to the Sharingan's visual improvements filling in that final gap for the Byakugan.

Naturally, activating and maintaining this eye took far, far more chakra and wore the eyes out far faster than regular usage of both eyes individually would do. But she could still maintain it for just over ten minutes at a time. As opposed to over an hour each for both of her eyes separately.

Her final improvement was with her summons. With the advent of her tenth birthday she had become just barely strong enough to summon every mid-Chunin rank monster that she had found. This was huge, as this meant that most early elemental and flying wyverns that she had discovered just became available to her, with a notable few that she had taken a particular liking to.

Such as the much more traditional-styled red wyvern that she had witnessed years ago.

[-Monster Species: Rathalos-]

[Body-type: Flying-Wyvern]

[Category: Large Monster]

[Body length including tail: 11 meters]

[Traits: flight, fire breath, pair summon]

[Rideability: 7/10, This remarkably simple monster has a long neck that's easy to grip. Can fly with skillful agility. Slow on land. Lacks fur or feathers that would be even easier to grab than the neck, so the rider may have to use chakra to hold on at times.]

[Approximate individual threat level: Chunin]

This one in particular, the one that she had spotted briefly fighting that Nargacuga from a distance, was one of her new favourites. It was a relatively fast flier and unlike its female variant - a 'Rathian' that she had later encountered in the Wildspire Waste - it doesn't have any annoying, venomous spines covering its body.

She also apparently had the option to summon both the male and female at the same time if she wished, as they seemed to be a pair.

So yes... she had gotten stronger, she supposed... but the others were all well into high-Genin levels of strength now, and she was finding her own gains extremely lackluster by comparison.

On the topic of the others, their strength had truly skyrocketed after learning the Shadow Clone Jutsu. Starting with Konan, whose Paper Release Kekkei Tota was hard-carrying her strength at the moment.

Yep, that's right. A Kekkei Tota.

'I still can't believe I never saw it sooner before my eyes fused. She's weaving earth, wind and water into all of her paper Jutsu alongside the usual Yin-Yang manipulation that every bloodline uses. Three elements: Kekkei Tota. One of only two in all of existence... that have been discovered at least. She's arguably even more abnormal than Nagato or even myself if you consider this.' Seija mused to herself.

Konan's accelerated training meant that she had already begun to touch upon the deeper secrets of her power. Namely, she could now completely transform one of her limbs at a time into paper, and could use paper to heal herself by turning a wounded spot into paper and then filling in the torn gaps with new, fresh sheets.

Yahiko hadn't really focused on anything, aiming to become something of an all-rounder that would be good at everything. Of course, this hadn't quite worked and he was more average at everything in reality. But still, for a child of minimal talent with what seemed to be zero special bloodlines backing him up, he was doing remarkably well for himself.

'I swear that he keeps meeting wild birds wherever he goes, though... Just yesterday I found him feeding a small flock of finches out the back of the cabin. I get that people called him a natural leader back in the old timeline, but bird-whispering feels a little extreme to be an example of that, right?' Seija thought to herself.

Nagato had actually undergone the least change in actual power after all of Jiraiya's encouragement. Not for lack of effort of course; he had actually become rather enthusiastic about training after the first year. It was simply because his Rinnegan was so absurdly powerful already that everything else that he learned felt like mere drops in the bucket.

And he learned everything. His Rinnegan possessed the same copy ability as the basic Sharingan, so of course he could learn any non-bloodline technique by merely observing it. And then his Shadow Clones would practice it to make sure it was usable in battle. Like this, Nagato quickly rose to become the most powerful member of their group, besides Seija of course. But that gap was closing, fast.

'I can't hold it back anymore. I need to tell them. They all know I'm keeping something hidden anyway. They've just been waiting for me to say it. Waiting for me to admit that I'm holding myself back because I didn't think I could trust them to keep a damn secret... Ugh... I should've done this over a year ago. We all trusted each other even back then. God fucking damn it...' She lamented before taking a deep breath.

'Jiraiya is outside right now. Everyone else is indoors... I'll let him break the news to them, I still can't bring myself to do a big announcement.' She stepped out of the door and removed her mask as she went.

"Hey... Sensei?"

- - -

Jiraiya was hanging out the laundry. It was one of the Land of Rain's rare sunny days, so he set up a line and hung out their clothes to dry. As he was sorting through the different shirts, he heard the voice of the person he'd sensed sneaking up behind him.

"Hey... Sensei? Do you... have time to talk?" Seija quietly asked him.

That was unusual, Jiraiya thought. Seija was never quiet. Rather, she only had two volume settings: silent, and loud. Well, not 'loud' per-se... more like 'direct' or 'purposeful' rather. For her to be embarrassed enough to speak quietly meant that this was something important.

'Is it finally time? Konan bet Nagato a hundred-Ryo that Seija wouldn't reveal her secret backstory to the group until I'd already left. Looks like he's getting a bit of extra pocket money...' He internally chuckled to himself. But externally he remained calm.

"Yeah, Seija? What do you need to talk about?" He smiled at her.

"...How much do you know about a man called Danzo Shimura?"

"..."

Silence. Jiraiya's mind was turning.

'Ok... THAT is not what I expected her to lead with. This might actually be much more severe than I was expecting. I know that my old sensei's teammate was unhinged and that he's definitely been up to some shady stuff in the background... but it has something to do with her as well?'

"...I know a bit. Enough to know that this is serious. Follow me." He put down the remaining clothes he was holding and led her out of earshot of the cabin, to the edge of a nearby forest.

"...Alright, this is far enough. So, Seija. Is this where the grand and dramatic backstory is revealed?" He joked.

She blinked at him.

"Well there goes any early emotional weight I was aiming for..." She complained at him before sighing and continuing, "Yes. You have a right to know, and more importantly: hiding my true capabilities is causing my strength to stagnate."

"Haha!" He chuckled. Seija realised that he must've already figured out that she was holding herself back months ago.

"Well, lay it on me, then." He insisted.

And so the explanation began. Naturally she started it with a question.

"Alright. First of all, what do you know about Danzo's experiments in his various hidden laboratories?"

He hummed and brought a hand up to his chin.

"Hmm... Not a whole lot unfortunately. The man is seriously paranoid about info-leakage and that honestly only makes him look more suspicious."

She nodded and decided to get straight to the point.

"Right, well about thirty years ago he performed a seriously absurd experiment. He tried to create what he would call an 'ultimate tool' using the combined blood of over a dozen different clans from across the Five Great Nations, and everywhere in between." She continued,

"The end result of that experiment was, of course, a failure. Only a single child born to become an 'ultimate tool' survived the process, and he ended up with horribly unstable chakra that ended up almost destroying his core during a failed awakening. Did you know about any of this?"

Jiraiya was already surprised that something like this had even been attempted. Everyone knew that bloodlines were volatile even on their own, to attempt to mix them even in a controlled environment would be ridiculous.

"I did not. I'm guessing you're related to this surviving boy somehow?"

"Correct, sensei. Specifically, he's my father. My mother rescued him from Danzo's lab after she sensed his ruined chakra core through the ground beneath her feet. She met him in secret, and a few months later she broke him out, stole a bunch of stuff from Danzo's lab and her own clan's treasury, and together they fled to a small town in eastern Rain."

"If he's your father... that would mean, then, that you have all of those bloodlines, correct?"

She smiled, now completely and utterly red-faced by how well he was taking this absurd explanation. She had forgotten how easily Jiraiya could get serious if he ever wanted to. He wouldn't have become Konoha's spymaster in the future if he couldn't.

"That's right. There's a list of them that I keep in the giant scroll. More importantly for my identity, however, is my mother's clan. Whose genetics I also obviously inherited and are the primary reason as to why I couldn't risk telling you, a Leaf ninja, about my past." She pointed up at her eyes and let them transform.

[Byakugan]

Jiraiya showed no outward change in expression, but she just knew that this had caught him off guard.

"That's... I see. I understand now, Seija, why you felt like you couldn't tell me about this. Your mother is a Hyuga, and your father is some kind of fused bloodline chimera... I would've kept it hidden too, if I were in your position."

"Exactly. By the way, it's almost insulting how well you're taking this, sensei. I had to psyche myself up for this day for weeks, you know? At least show some kind of reaction!" She protested.

He let his stoic visage crack as he laughed, "Hah! Oh trust me, Seija, I'm super freaking out internally right now. One of Konoha's most influential clan's Dojutsu and a whole bunch of other bloodlines, all in the body of someone with the actual common sense to use them?! You're terrifying me here, kid!"

She had a little giggle at that. She knew he was mostly saying it to make her relax more.

"Actually, sensei it's not just one. Would you like to see something that would make the Hyuga elders cry blood from pure rage if they ever saw it?"

"Sure, let me see it."

She deactivated her Byakugan and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, three black tomoe had appeared in each of them. Jiraiya slapped his knee and doubled over laughing.

"Pfffftt! Hahahaha, this is priceless! Those two clans hate eachother so much and you're telling me that you've not only obtained both of their Dojutsu, you've even somehow mixed them into one?!" He failed to hold it in this time.

"That's right! And now you understand why I had to be kept hidden from Konoha. My very existence there-"

"Would cause a civil war." He finished her sentence for her with a grim expression, "Zero doubt. It would happen for sure."

"Now..." He continued. "Do you have any of those other bloodline powers unlocked?"

"I do. I used my Byakugan to look inwards at my own chakra network to help me figure them out. Since I can see the exact chakra natures, I can... Sensei why are you looking at me like that?" She tilted her head at him.

He had given her a strange look when she mentioned seeing chakra natures.

"...Seija, I don't think that's a power that the Byakugan is supposed to have." He said, "I've worked with a few Hyugas in the past but none of them ever mentioned anything like that."

Seija was confused. This whole time her Byakugan was apparently doing something weird that it wasn't supposed to be able to do? She'd had no idea.

"Wait, what? But I've been using it to do that this whole time!"

"That power you just described sounds more like the unique sensory ability beloning to a clan I know about. One of my teammates, Tsunade, is close with them. They're called the Uzumaki clan, and one of their clan's unique techniques was called the Mind's Eye of Kagura. It allowed them to sense for several miles around them if they put some effort into training it, and with such accuracy that it was the only sensory technique that could read individual elemental chakra natures like that." He took a breath and spoke his conclusion,

"If you can see chakra natures, then that's not a power originally from your Byakugan. The Uzumaki bloodline is where that power really comes from, assuming you have it. I'd advise focusing more on that technique in the future. That's a power too precious to ignore, and it seems like you're close to figuring it out already if it's automatically activating alongside your Byakugan."

"...Huh. I... Ok." She could hardly speak at that revelation. To think she had such a great sensory ability and she just ignored it in favor of her eyes. Or rather, it had integrated itself into her eyes, somewhat, but her Byakugan's range was still less than 500 meters. While the true Mind's Eye of Kagura would be able to see for multiple miles.

"Well, that's that I guess, Jiraiya-sensei. I have a few other Kekkei Genkai to show off, but this conversation has exhausted me and I'd really much rather go to bed. I can trust you to explain the situation to the others so that they don't freak out when I start turning my arms to steel and summoning hurricanes during training, right?"

Jiraiya nodded, "Of course I can do that for you, Seija. It'll be nice to show Nagato that he's not quite reached your level just yet. I think he's starting to feel guilty about the power of his eyes again." He tiredly admitted.

"Ha! Yeah, Nagato's always been like that. Even back when were were really young he always had that overly selfless attitude."

They bantered as they walked. Seija hadn't felt this comfortable for quite some time.

And she couldn't wait to start really throwing her weight about once more. Poor Yahiko was going to get tossed around so, so much.