42 42: Specified Style

Seija had monitored the whole situation from Reincarnator Number #2's perspective in the Chat. Apparently, Number #51 had suffered a run-in with Kakuzu, of all people. It should've been impossible that he only got out of that situation with a nasty bruise and a mildly injured spine, but apparently he had help from an unlikely source.

'So his System lets him draw from a gacha pull which, if he gets lucky, can include a random fictional character whenever he completes a quest? That's... dangerous.'

Reincarnator #6 had swiftly met up with Reincarnator #51 shortly after his successful retreat, and she was able to speak to him directly rather than forcing everyone to play a game of 'telephone' through Reincarnator #2 and his friend, Kei.

Reincarnator #51, who apparently is named Yosuke, was surprisingly eager to share the details of how his Summoning System worked. This is where the dangerous part came in:

The summons weren't technically under his control.

They were compelled to not attack him, so at the very least they couldn't kill or harm him. Plus, he apparently had a Fate-esque command spell on his hand that would refresh once per week. So, at most, he could give them a single irresistible command if he absolutely needed to in an emergency.

So far, he hasn't needed to use it. He only had a single summon, Killua Zoldyck from Hunter X Hunter. Seija recognised the name. She'd been a pretty big Hunter X Hunter fan herself, back in the day. Killua, thankfully, was a heroic character who mostly didn't mind doing good things for his friends' sake, even if he could get a little snarky or catty at times.

But what Seija was worried about was what would happen if either Yosuke or someone else with the same type of System summoned a villain from another world. They had more than enough villains to deal with in Naruto already, they really didn't need some jackass like Aizen Sosuke, or All for One, or even, god-forbid, Griffith showing up and making the world even worse.

She'd watched Fate as well. She knew those command spells couldn't hold a summon forever, and Yosuke only had one command spell to use per week, rather than the three that a Master from Fate would have for the course of a Holy Grail War, which would generally last about that same amount of time. If he ever got more than one Summon, he'd be seriously shafted if multiple of them decided to go rogue and start causing chaos.

Seija sighed and closed her System.

'I can't worry about this right now. There isn't anything I can do about it short of murdering anyone with that kind of System as soon as I see them. And I'm not a damn psychopath, so I'm sure as hell not going to do that.' 

She had time to think about all of this while she and her friends were on break from training, but her break time was coming to an end.

She and Nagato were currently working throught their new training routine. Since they'd both run into issues regarding their overwhelming strength causing accidental deaths, they figured it was high time that they got their asses in gear and properly practiced new techniques that could help them to subvert the issue.

The first order of business was to get some Genjutsu into their arsenal. Seija's giant scroll contained a vast multitude of Ninjutsu, Taijutsu, and even a few esoteric Fuinjutsu texts that were given to Konan for her to study alongside her Paper Release. But for all of those techniques, the scroll didn't contain even a single Genjutsu beyond the basic Academy Clone Jutsu. 

Fortunately, this little problem was resolved by the fact that Seija and the others were now official shinobi of Amegakure. After their mission was reported as successful they were given permission to purchase new Jutsu from Amegakure's own library. Normally, these would be prohibitively expensive to any new Genin who'd only just signed up, often requiring them to complete dozens of missions to be able to afford even a single C-Rank Ninjutsu like the Fireball technique.

For Seija? That was chump change; Not even one percent of her money. Her scroll contained her family's entire life's savings, plus the small fortune that her parents stole from the Hyuga Clan. So the first thing Seija did upon deciding to improve their training was to head into this library and purchase a wide variety of Genjutsu that they'd never had access to before.

So, the two of them set to work practising on Yahiko and Konan, the only two among them who didn't have either a Sharingan or a Rinnegan to make breaking out of a Genjutsu trivial.

- - -

Days later, after taking - and returning from - an easy mission to guard a caravan moving weapons to the edges of the Land of Rain in preparation for the war on the horizon, Seija remembered something about her Genjutsu training that she had foolishly forgotten about over a year prior.

'This training will also double as an opportunity to finally improve my command over the Yin Release that I need to awaken my other Kekkei Genkai.' Seija thought to herself with a hum.

Although that put Seija at something of a crossroads, she realised,

'Should I try to learn every single one, Jack-of-all-Trades style? Or should I double down on the ones I know and try to improve them as much as possible?' 

Yes, that was the issue she came to once she began practicing with her new Genjutsu collection. See, Seija knew that she could practice all of her dormant Kekkei Genkai, if she really wanted to. But she was also keenly aware that the leading method to gain proper strength in this world was to focus on one or two things that you were really good at and stick to them.

Hashirama Senju only used Wood Style against his greatest foes, despite having access to other techniques like Fuinjutsu, and of course the Wood Style's two constituent elements, Earth and Water. Then you had someone like Might Guy, who in the future would go on to defeat even Kage-level opponents like the 'Tailless Tailed Beast' Kisame using only his Taijutsu. To say nothing of what would happen when he opens his Gate of Death, giving up his life in exchange for immense power.

Even Naruto Uzumaki himself focussed on his Multi Shadow Clone Jutsu and his Rasengan, even after he learned how to use Wind Style.

The characters in this world proved that the best way to the peak was through honing the techniques you personally preferred to use, and that you were best at using.

You could learn other tricks and styles, of course, but spreading yourself thin was a recipe for disaster. Hiruzen Sarutobi, for example, may have been a Kage who decided to spend several decades honing every basic element to a high level of mastery, but he was still the weakest Hokage in history. Every other Hokage had focussed on something, and thus every other Hokage had ended up stronger than him.

Seija didn't want that to be her. Who cares if she could potentially shoot balls of Lava Release, then switch to firing a few Storm Release laser beams, then throw out a few spears of Ice Release, and cycle through a dozen different Kekkei Genkai on a small scale when ALL of that could be washed away by a single meteorite from Madara Uchiha? And she wouldn't be able to do a single damn thing to stop it.

'No. No way am I going to let that happen to me. It's best if I focus on what I've already got, and what synergises well with those things.' 

Ironically, this was the exact opposite ideology to the one that she had followed when she was training with her mother. Back then, her mother had fervently reminded her to learn as many different Styles as she could, so that she wouldn't get countered by an element with an advantage over her own.

Now that she was older and able to run the costs and benefits through her mind on her own, she found that what she had now was a good enough baseline to launch off from and work towards building higher, rather than wider. She had four out of the five basic elements trained to a high level, with only Water trailing behind the others. Even then, she could still use a good handful of Water Style techniques if she really needed to.

She believed that now would be a good time to review her options for the future and see what she could start working towards.

She looked over her list of bloodlines from Danzo's lab. The few she currently had unlocked were the Byakugan and Sharingan, which were kind of their own thing separate from the elements. Then there was Steel Release, Explosion Style, and Typhoon Release. That was already a pretty wide selection, and it covered her bases rather well.

Steel Release was her strongest defensive tool. It could turn her already-durable body into near-unbreakable steel flesh. She also remembered faintly that this Kekkei Genkai could be used to produce weapons that could be launched at enemies. 'A technique used by Metoro Konjiki in the Gaara novels,' Seija mused. She'd read that on the wiki while browsing it one day during her past life. 

Then there was Explosion Style. Seija only had access to the standard function of this Kekkei Genkai, which was to create powerful short-range explosions from the user's hands and feet. It greatly increased her close-range threat level, and it paired spectacularly well with her Taijutsu, just like Steel Release did.

In the future, a young man named Deidara would push this Kekkei Genkai to new heights by combining it with a Forbidden Technique that allowed him to give life to clay animals, sending them to attack his foes and then remotely detonating them from far away. But of course, Seija didn't have access to that Forbidden Technique, and didn't really want to either. The hand-mouths were just a little too weird for her tastes.

Finally, Typhoon Release covered her super-wide area attack options. This was for when Seija really just wanted to rip apart a whole fucking battlefield with a giant tornado. It was powerful, but inflexible. Unless she somehow learned Sage Mode and got some practice in using Nature Energy to support her Jutsu, she wouldn't be able to direct this attack anywhere other than directly around her immediate location. So she certainly wouldn't be throwing tornadoes at anyone any time soon, that was for sure.

All in all, this kit was fairly well structured already. Close-quarters were completely covered. Seija felt like she could probably out-match even a Jonin when it came to Taijutsu, between her Explosions, her Steel skin, and her Sharingan.

Mid-range was mostly covered by her other Ninjutsu at the moment, but Typhoon release could cover a pretty wide area too if she pushed it. The only area where she struggled at the moment was long-range. She had her Byakugan and her Sharingan to massively improve her long-distance vision and accuracy, so that wasn't an issue, but none of her current techniques could get past maybe sixty meters, at most? Hell, technically her longest-range attack right now was just to throw a kunai as hard as she could. It kinda worked, but it was hardly going to threaten anyone above Chunin-level.

So... what Kekkei Genkai could help her with long-range attacks? She wondered. Searching through her memories it was actually very hard to find examples of Kekkei Genkai techniques firing at genuinely long distances.

Lava Style, Boil Release, and Scorch Release were all crossed off the list. As far as Seija had seen, none of those Kekkei Genkai had any truly long-range capabilities. Then there were Ice and Storm, which were both also on her list and had displayed a number of long-range attacks throughout the series... but those elements ran into a completely different issue.

'I... don't have a high enough Water affinity for those.' 

Yep.

Seija's only affinity that was noticeably lower than her other four was coming back to bite her in the ass. She could feel it whenever she prodded the unused Kekkei Genkai slumbering in her core using what little Yin chakra she could manipulate. The others were practically begging to flow out into her chakra network just like the ones she already had, but Ice and Storm were being blocked by something which, given that she found this also blocking Boil when she checked it, could only have been her lacking connection to Water.

Again, she could use a few Water Style Ninjutsu just for coverage - which was more than most people could do with any of their own weakest elements - but she hadn't practiced it anywhere near as much as she did even for Fire, and especially not as much as her main three favourites: Earth, Wind, and Lightning. Judging by how long it took Hiruzen Sarutobi to do the same, practicing her Water Style long and hard enough to actually increase her effective affinity for it could take years even with her Shadow Clones helping to cut down the time.

Shadow Clones whose time would be better spent working on almost anything else... Like the things she was already focussing on.

So... what was left? She racked her brains and checked the list again to see if there was anything, anything at all that she missed...

'Oh my god.'

And there it was. Right there in the middle of the page, practically hidden amongst the other available Kekkei Genkai. An option that she could honestly say she had almost forgotten entirely for how little its actual name was mentioned in the series.

Magnet Style.

The elemental fusion of Earth and Wind. The power to command metal objects from a distance, and also magnetize enemies to make your attacks lock-on to them without even needing to aim.

Seija was baffled that she could allow herself to forget this option. It covered everything perfectly! It would provide the long-range coverage she needed. Heck, it was flexible enough to work at almost any range. She reckoned it could also be used to control any steel weapons that she could create using her Steel Release. It even used two of her highest affinities!

And one final thing:

'Firewall, do you think it's possible for me to create a Kekkei Tota out of this?'

"[This is an unusual question to ask me, of all beings. I do not know. I am not an Oracle-type System. I am afraid that I cannot even guess as to whether or not it is possible.]"

'It makes sense though, right? I've tried already, and fusing Earth, Wind and Lightning doesn't work at all. It doesn't even give a clue, let alone an actual sign of how to fuse them. But if I ALSO add in Explosion, which is the fusion of Earth and Lightning, along with Typhoon, the fusion of Wind and Lightning, and finally with this Magnet Style, the fusion of Earth and Wind...'

"[Then you would have collected every possible fusion of Earth, Wind and Lightning before making a Kekkei Tota. We still do not know if that is even possible to do, even if you get that far... but by all means, attempt it. You have proven yourself to be a skilled researcher of Ninjutsu already, and this world does not run on pure logic. Even if it should not be possible, fate has a tendency to gift people with what they want simply because it believes that they have earned it.]"

'What the heck does that mean?'

"[How to describe it in simple terms... it runs on... 'Anime Logic']"

'Ah, yeah that checks out.' 

Looking back through her memories for any other supporting evidence, she unfortunatly found nothing.

Had she been more interested in the topic back when she first read that wiki page, or if she had actually read the Gaara Hiden novel herself, she would have found out there was actually more evidence available. Metoro and Etoro Konjiki had combined their Steel and Lava releases into a powerful molten metal attack that they described as a 'pseudo Kekkei Tota'. This suggested that multiple Kekkei Genkai really could be fused to create a Kekkei Tota, although there was an equal chance that the Konjiki brothers were just boasting hyperbolically about their power. 

But Seija, unfortunately, didn't know anything about that.

Well, as Firewall said, she would just have to find out for herself...

...

...Right after she figures out how to keep Yahiko's slippery ass properly trapped in a Genjutsu without him immediately breaking through her shoddy casting. She was still stuck at the first step, after all. All this talk of Kekkei Genkai and Kekkei Tota was still a far-off reality for her. For now.