No more words were needed.
Those eyes themselves were the best answer to all of Kakashi's questions.
After such a bloody night, the birth of such a pair of eyes seemed perfectly reasonable.
Kakashi's lips moved, but in the end, he couldn't say a word.
Sasuke caught the fleeting pity in Kakashi's eyes and couldn't help but sneer inwardly.
In truth, his Sharingan had awakened during his days of fighting in the Soul Society.
However, Kakashi didn't know about these experiences, and Sasuke couldn't be bothered to explain.
Misunderstanding, sometimes, is the best disguise.
He deactivated his Sharingan as if the previous scene had never happened and asked flatly, "Is the test over? Can we start training now?"
But the shock on Kakashi's face had yet to fade. A three-tomoe Sharingan...
A seven-year-old child had not only awakened the Sharingan but had also directly reached its mature, complete form.
What did this mean?
Another figure involuntarily appeared in Kakashi's mind—the one hailed as a once-in-a-century genius of the Uchiha clan, Uchiha Itachi.
He remembered clearly that Itachi had awakened his Sharingan at the age of eight and had then gone through several years of training to evolve it to the three-tomoe state.
And Sasuke, before him, was only seven years old...
In this aspect, he had even surpassed the Itachi of that time.
"Even more amazing than Itachi..." Kakashi muttered to himself, his gaze on Sasuke growing more complex.
He took a deep breath, forcibly suppressed the shock in his heart, and got straight to the point.
"Sasuke, your talent is among the best I've ever seen, even surpassing your brother's. And you have these eyes."
He pointed to his own left eye. "Theoretically, you can, like me, quickly see through and copy most ninjutsu, learning far more efficiently than the average person."
His tone shifted, becoming serious.
"However, you have a fatal weakness."
Kakashi pointed out the core of the problem: "Your chakra control is just too poor."
Hearing this, Sasuke's brow furrowed slightly, a hint of confusion flashing in his cold eyes.
"Poor chakra control?" he repeated the phrase in a low voice, his tone clearly showing his bewilderment.
In his view, power was power. Whether it was Spiritual Pressure or chakra, wasn't it always the stronger, the better? What was this talk of control?
"That's right, very poor." Kakashi saw Sasuke's dismissiveness and gave him a more direct example.
"I can feel that the amount of chakra in your body is immense, several times more than mine even. This is also one of your talents."
"But."
Kakashi paused, holding up a finger. "Let's say, for example, that performing the Great Fireball Technique normally requires ten units of chakra."
"With my control, I might only need eight, or even fewer, to achieve the same effect. The saved chakra allows me to sustain a fight for longer."
He looked at Sasuke, his eyes becoming somewhat serious.
"But that fireball you just made probably consumed more than twenty units of chakra, yet its power wasn't even equivalent to one unit. Do you understand what that means?"
Kakashi spread his hands. "Having a vast amount of chakra but being unable to use it effectively will get you killed in a real battle."
Sasuke was silent.
Kakashi's words were harsh, but he couldn't refute them.
He recalled his days in the Soul Society. His Spiritual Pressure had indeed grown rapidly, but when fighting against experienced seated officers, he was always the first one to tire out.
Those captain-level Soul Reapers were truly exquisite in their use of Spiritual Pressure, far beyond his own capabilities. Whether it was converting it into blade pressure or infusing it into Kidō, there was not a single bit of waste.
That guy, Madarame Ikkaku, had even mocked him for it, saying his Spiritual Pressure was like a leaky sack.
So, this was the problem?
It seemed that whether it was chakra or Spiritual Pressure, control over power was a common principle.
"Annoying."
Having figured this out, Sasuke, though moved internally, was still unyielding with his words. "Get to the point. What are you trying to do?"
Seeing that Sasuke finally had a reaction, the corners of Kakashi's mouth curled up slightly under his mask.
Objective achieved.
"Very good. It seems you understand," he clapped his hands, returning to his relaxed demeanor.
"Then, our first training exercise for today is—"
He took out a kunai from his pocket, walked to a tall tree, then lifted his foot and, without any support from his hands, walked straight up the vertical trunk.
Kakashi hung upside down from a thick branch, smiling as he waved the kunai in his hand at Sasuke below. Then, he made a mark on the tree.
"Control your chakra and practice tree climbing."
Sasuke looked at Kakashi hanging upside down from the tree, a trace of disdain in his eyes.
"Tree climbing? Is this what you call training?"
"Don't underestimate it," Kakashi said with a smile. "If you can't even do this, then there's no point in talking about subsequent training."
Sasuke snorted coldly but didn't argue. The three tomoe in his eyes slowly reappeared.
He looked at the thin layer of chakra on the soles of Kakashi's feet and began to think.
"Attaching chakra to the soles of the feet to counteract gravity... it's quite similar to the technique Soul Reapers use to stand in the air, except we use Reishi."
Believing the principle was the same, he directly mobilized his chakra, gathered it at the soles of his feet, and stomped hard on the tree trunk.
Thud!
With a dull sound, he directly smashed a large piece of bark off the tree, sending wood chips flying.
Failure.
Sasuke frowned, then immediately realized the problem.
Spiritual Pressure was a pure force, focused on release and爆发, while chakra seemed to prioritize stable form.
"Mold the chakra into a shape like a suction cup, to stick stably to the surface of an object..."
Upon grasping this key point, the three tomoe in Sasuke's eyes spun at high speed, analyzing the flow of chakra on the soles of Kakashi's feet.
After failing just once, he was already walking on the tree as if it were flat ground, easily reaching the line Kakashi had drawn.
Kakashi watched this scene, a hint of admiration flashing in his eyes.
Sasuke didn't stop. He jumped down from the tree, and with a flicker of his body, arrived at the small river next to the training ground.
He glanced at the calm surface of the river, once again gathered chakra at the soles of his feet, and took a step out.
Ripples spread across the water's surface as his foot landed firmly on it.
Next, he began to run on the water, his speed increasing until he became a black afterimage.
Having completed all this, Sasuke's figure flashed back in front of Kakashi.
He looked up, his tone laced with impatience. "This boring trick is over. Now, can we get to the main point?"
"..."
For a moment, Kakashi was at a loss for words.
He sighed helplessly. "Alright, since you've perfectly mastered the application of chakra, let's start the real ninjutsu training."
Kakashi took a few steps back to create distance, his expression turning serious.
"Watch closely, Sasuke. Your chakra natures are fire and lightning. Let's start with Fire Style."
"This is a C-rank jutsu, Fire Style: Phoenix Sage Fire Technique!"
Kakashi formed the hand signs with a speed honed by over twenty years of being single.
Fwoosh—!
Several basketball-sized fireballs shot from Kakashi's mouth, accurately hitting the training posts in different directions in the distance.
As soon as he finished, he looked at Sasuke, ready to explain.
However, he only saw the Sharingan in Sasuke's eyes slowly spinning.
The next second, Sasuke moved.
He raised his hands and perfectly copied all the hand signs Kakashi had just made.
"Fire Style: Phoenix Sage Fire Technique!"
Several fireballs erupted from Sasuke's mouth. Although there were still some flaws, in terms of both power and form, they were already almost identical to Kakashi's demonstration.
Kakashi stared at the scene before him, a bit dazed, and couldn't help but raise a hand to his forehead.
"Sigh, I used to be the one copying other people's jutsu with this eye, giving them headaches."
"Honestly, teaching a genius is also a very tiring job."