After a while, the white light dissipated, and Terachi was half-kneeling in front of the old woman. The Buddha image behind him had stretched out thousands of arms, protecting him, the old woman, and Naoko’s corpse.
The motionless King Ming had become very illusory after suffering this bombardment. It looked like it would collapse and dissipate at any time.
Pop, pop, pop… The lightning around Tonan also dissipated, and his eyes recovered human characteristics.
“You are truly a kind eminent monk.”
The voice had just fallen when….
Puchi~
Terachi felt a sharp pain in his chest. His eyes were wide open as he lowered his head in disbelief. He saw the old woman who had come back to life had transformed into Tonan. His hand had pierced his chest, grabbing his heart. Naoko’s corpse also turned into a cloud of white smoke and disappeared.
Terachi muttered in disbelief, “Impossible, even if it’s a… clone… I could have sensed the evil intention…”
Tonan didn’t waste time explaining things to a dying man. He slowly dug out the heart as Terachi closed his eyes and fell to the ground. Without the support of the senjutsu energy, his body withered, and he looked like a thousand-year-old dried corpse lying in a coffin.
The four flicker clones that had activated the barrier dispersed, and the golden barrier also disappeared.
At this time, Tonan’s real body walked over slowly from a distance and took the heart from the flicker clone’s hand. He raised it in front of his eyes. Terachi’s heart seemed to be still beating. A smile appeared on Tonan’s face, which was pale because of the aftereffect of chakra depletion and the Spirit of the Thunder God.
Bang!
The heart was crushed ruthlessly. Then, he dispelled this flicker clone too. The dark clouds in the sky gradually dispersed, revealing a crack from where sunlight sprinkled, shining directly on Tonan.
Not even a blade of grass was left within the area covered by the earlier barrier, but outside its range, it was still overflowing with vigor.
Coo, coo~ Coo, coo~
Flocks of white pigeons flew over from all directions as if celebrating victory, as they pounced on the spoils of war. Without the barrier’s obstruction, a cool autumn wind blew in, bringing along withered leaves.
Amid rustling autumn wind, leaves were swaying and fluttering aimlessly. After a long time, the black ferocious birds that had eaten their fill put on their pure white feather robes again and left chirping in satisfaction.
A dead leaf drifted along with the wind and floated down from above Tonan’s head. He squinted his eyes and spread out his palm. But just when the leaf was about to touch it, he suddenly disappeared.
In fact, from the first day he came to the Fire Temple, Tonan was wary of Terachi. After all, the Fire Temple was a ninja temple, and every monk had extraordinary combat power. Tonan didn’t believe such an old monk would be weak.
Besides, in the Buddhist tradition, the most powerful people were usually sweeper monks. Since Chigo had cultivated a mind eye, he wouldn’t believe that this sweeper monk hadn’t. Therefore, when Tonan walked out of the Fire Temple, he used Flicker Clone Technique, creating two clones.
Then, one flicker clone used Reconstruction Technique to transform into the old woman, and the other flicker clone transformed into Naoko. His main body cast hypnotic eye genjutsu on those two clones.
The hypnotic imprint was when one clone saw another clone, the spiritual fire would bloom in their hearts to disperse the darkness. After all, the minds of the clones with entities were not shared with the main body. They were similar to the independent living body to a certain degree.
The two clones kept their eyes wide open from start to finish and kept looking at each other at all times. The mind eye was a special perception technique that could perceive evil thoughts. But when there were no evil thoughts, nothing would be perceived.
In addition, Terachi had only focused on Tonan. He had no time to think much about others. The real Several Thousand Hands – Peak Expansion, its attack, and defense were terrifying. Tonan had to use White Fang’s unique technique, and borrow the power of nature. Even with all this, he could only keep up with the opponent.
If it was truly a battle without tricks, then even if Tonan had won, it would be a tragic victory. His amount of chakra was large, and his spiritual energy was powerful, but the power of his ninjutsu was a bit stronger, and his battle endurance was also a bit greater.
More ninjutsu meant more means to face the enemy. At Tonan’s level, to win against Terachi, he had to use unique skills and some tricks.
……
Half a month later, Konoha saw its first heavy snowfall of the year.
Ding, ding, ding…
The wind chime under the eaves swayed along with the cold wind. Snowflakes as light as a goose feather floated down from the sky, like silver flowers and white butterflies. The trees in the courtyard, stripped off their clothing by the cold winter, stood bare, enduring winter’s harsh cold.
Tonan sat in front of a heating stove and picked up a nursing bottle. He pecked it lightly with his mouth to test the temperature. A bit higher than human body temperature. It’s just right.
He looked at a baby in swaddling clothes in his arms and pressed the nursing bottle near its mouth. The baby instinctively opened his little mouth and sucked the milk greedily. After the baby was full, Tonan carefully placed him in the cradle. He then created a shadow clone to look after him.
Tonan himself walked out of the room and stood in the courtyard. He looked into the distance with his hands behind his back. Thousands of miles away in frozen wastes, even the setting sun seemed to have changed its color due to loneliness, turning a kind of hollow and desolate ash grey.
After Tonan took care of Terachi, he possessed senjutsu energy, and his strength increased greatly, so he rushed back to Konoha. However, on the day he returned, Sarutobi Hiruzen told him some news.
The good news was that the welfare institution was constructed. It was built in the most prosperous location in Konoha, and its area was about the same as the Ninja Academy.
But there were two pieces of bad news as well. One was from the information brought back by the ninjas who went to the Fire Capital. Naraku had established an adoption system, and he didn’t agree to send back the orphans Tonan had adopted.
The second was the issue of Konoha Orphanage. Utatane Koharu had been in charge of the orphanage. Hiruzen wanted to disband it and entrust all orphans in it to Tonan. But Shimura Danzo opposed this, and at the same time, Koharu and Homura expressed their support for him.
Their reason was that these orphans were all descendants of heroes. They should be supervised and raised by the village to avoid any accidents. Hiruzen couldn’t find faults with this reasoning, so he could only give up.
Now that it was peacetime, even the youngest wartime orphans were four or five years old. And children who had reached this age could enter the Ninja Academy if they were talented. If they were not, they could start to help various village departments working as assistants.
Especially, the various big clans of Konoha, regardless of orphans or old people, were firmly supported by the clan. Tonan had also recruited a dozen or so civilian elder people. He provided them with free food and drinks every day. He served them like they were his seniors.
As for orphans, it was just the one he had placed in the cradle. His father was a small clan’s chunin who had died on a mission. His mother, a civilian, passed away during childbirth. Due to various reasons, the baby’s clan refused to raise him, so he was handed over to Tonan.
Unexpectedly, because of his arrival, Hiruzen, the Hokage, was actually suppressed by Danzo. He truly didn’t know what to say.
“It seems I need to find an opportunity to show the ability of an adopted son, and fight for father Hiruzen’s influence. Otherwise, the welfare institution will just be in name only. Let alone becoming a helping hand, it will become a burden.”
More importantly, just about a year is left before the start of the third world war. In the unlikely event that Hiruzen loses power completely, once he enters the battlefield, he might not have to face just the enemies, but also traitors. Although Hiruzen was hard-hearted when dealing with the ninjas in the village, Tonan wondered why was he so soft-hearted when dealing with Danzo and the two Hokage Advisors?
He sighed helplessly, deeply worried about Konoha’s prosperity and stability.
