Nearly two weeks passed in the waking world.
Hinata remained in her hospital bed, her body suspended in quiet resilience. Though she did not wake, she was not alone, Kuro always at his side, vigilant.
Kurenai visited daily, sitting silently by her side, reading or humming songs only half remembered.
Kiba and Shino came often, their presences awkward but steady, sometimes bringing Akamaru and small bundles of flowers.
Asuma passed through once with Kurenai, nodding solemnly toward the girl who had forced even the hardened jōnin to reconsider the quiet ones.
Ino always brought fresh flowers.
Shikamaru and Chōji stopped by too, silent and uncomfortable, leaving small offerings—a bag of chips, a puzzle book.
Even Naruto gathered his courage and passed through that portal to that room, sometimes alone, sometimes dragging Sakura. He never stayed long, restless and guilty in his own way, but came.
And through it all, Hinata remained still.
<<<< o >>>>
In the Silver World, time did not flow as it did in the mortal realm.
Under Michel's careful hand, the currents of time were accelerated—days outside became months within.
During those months, Michel had done more than merely observe.
He meditated, not in body but in essence, unraveling the mysteries he had glimpsed but never truly understood.
He had learned much of this not through mere reflection, but through practice.
Night after night, he wove tendrils of silver dreamstuff into the sleeping minds of Konoha's ninja.
He called to them, inviting their consciences into the Silver World without their knowing.
And there, through reflection—not interrogation—he extracted echoes of their own beings, of their knowledge, of their experiences.
A Hyūga clan elder's taijutsu secrets and techniques.
A Hidden Leaf sensor's delicate chakra weaving methods.
Fragments of forgotten kenjutsu forms.
Jutsus, secret jutsus, chakra nature training.
Ancient sealing patterns, remnants of the traces of the forgotten lineage of the ancient Uzumaki.
Even forbidden techniques
He collected them all.
And one day, he would place them all at Hinata's feet.
Not as weapons.
But as wings.
<<<< o >>>>
These various encounters, now forgotten by those who had them, opened his mind.
He reflected on the nature of power itself, combining what he could appreciate about the power level of the ninjas and what he knew from his time reading the Naruto manga.
Overall Power Level, he now understood, was a fragile, shifting thing.
It was not determined purely by soul or body.
It was shaped by creativity, by experience, by will.
Victory was not promised by raw strength.
Victory was earned.
From Civilian to Genin, Chūnin, Jōnin, Kage, and beyond—these were not absolute states.
Even among the highest, there were divisions, 'Low' as new to the role, 'Medium' as somewhat experienced, 'High' as highly proficient an experienced in the role.
High Jōnin were often considered the equals of Low Kage. After all, many Kage are chosen from among the High Jōnin, though theory and practice seldom align perfectly.
And between a High Kage and a Low 9 Paths was a gulf as vast as the one between a Low Chūnin and an Elite Jōnin.
The souls of all the ninjas I met are at the level that I define as the Spiritual Soul, some like Hiruzen surprised me by using techniques to somehow try to equalize the difference such as the Ghost Transformation Jutsu, although its power is momentary, the strength that it is capable of reaching is surprising but in the end it is useless, Danzo's Magenkio Sharingan was another surprise even without being naturally his he showed a resistance that required effort to counteract, luckily in this Silver World where I brought them it is something that until little Hinata awakens under my domain, and that is a very real and unfair difference in power that is not coverable even with experience or stolen bloodlines.
After the stage of the Spiritual Soul, there is what I call the stage of the Gray Soul, I imagine that I reached it due to a combination of high harmony and when crossing the last threshold that is death my consciousness was compressed and gained more substance elevating my state of being,
This state, allows me to perceive the world around me. It has a similar sense to the byakugan, but more localized, about 50 meters around me. It allows me to perceive emotions and notice how close a soul is to dying.
It's not definitive, my suspicion is that all souls feel when the body that contains them is about to die or may die, and that disruption is what I notice.
After the Gray Soul stage, there is the Silver Soul stage, I accessed it by absorbing the natural energy of the world, to the limit that I began to absorb it continuously and thus maintain myself in this state permanently.
In this state my perception of the world increased exponentially now I notice the world more clearly and sharply and at much greater distances.
A perfect memory of my entire existence in this life and the life I had in my previous reality.
The ability to see and influence the subtle lines that souls create between them marking relationships, being able to enhance or destroy them.
The ability to enter the dreams of others and extract information from them and force them to forget things or dismiss the dreams themselves.
I suspect it is possible to reach this state without relying on natural energy, perhaps based on something similar to what happened with Hinata in her jump from spiritual soul to grey soul, an unimaginable pressure combined by nourishing oneself in a place with a higher energy level.
I know there is another level. If I had to name it, I could say it would be Golden Soul, as I've noticed during times of pressure that some of my silver soul threads take on a golden tinge at points of high stress, like when I tried to combat Jiren's poison.
About the body, if I had to define it I would say that all ninjas start with a body that I define as Yang Body (low, medium, high), there are particular cases for example like Takama Gin, his family created a technique to increase his body to superhuman levels based on fanning the flames of his body through pressure through his souls allowing him to cross the barrier and reaching what I can define as a Fire Body, the consequence is that this generates dissonance between body and soul making it almost impossible to mold chakra in exchange they have a superhuman body but it blocks their progress in a real way, I imagine that there have to be two levels higher than this one ... if I had to name them I would say that the next one would be Plasma Body ... and the next one Sun body, if we keep the fire theme.
With these thoughts in order, the truth of Soul and Body Dissonance, became more evident.
If body and soul were one step apart within the same tier, chakra could be molded with difficulty but perseverance.
If they were two steps apart—even within the same tier—then molding chakra became extremely difficult, but with great talent possible.
And if body and soul belonged to different tiers entirely… then they might as well be two species.
One could wield spiritual power, or physical power—but not both.
Michel saw now why certain bloodlines—Uchiha, Senju, Uzumaki—could breach these boundaries without suffering dissonance.
And he saw why others, like Rock Lee, could not.
<<<< o >>>>
The Silver World shimmered, vast and growing.
And Michel, though now only a whisper among the currents, smiled.
Because knowledge, once seeded, could outlast even death.