"Alright… the rest has to come from raw stamina."
Raizen leaned back, letting the first gate of the Eight Inner Gates settle in his body. He could feel the power buzzing under his skin like a live wire, but the next gate was still locked tight. Even with his current strength, his five-year-old body simply couldn't handle the strain. Physical limits weren't something you could brute-force overnight. And at this age, pushing too far would just tear apart the foundation he was trying to build.
"Fine… if I can't use the gates yet, I'll make up for it with Bing Dun," Raizen muttered, eyes narrowing. Ice Release wasn't limited by his body's physical restrictions, unlike the Eight Inner Gates. That meant he could train it, even now.
He didn't have a deep understanding of Bing Dun yet, but one thing stuck with him from the system: one-handed hand seals.
One-handed seals were tricky, but mastering them would let him combine ninjutsu in ways most shinobi could only dream of. Two-handed seals were the standard — even the strongest could struggle with anything beyond ten at a time. But Raizen had his eyes on the legends: Bai, who could cast one-handed seals flawlessly, and Itachi, who could juggle ten in a single motion. That was his target. And at five years old, with soft, flexible bones, he had the perfect window to start.
"Time to get my hands bloody, literally," Raizen muttered, wincing as he bent his fingers into unnatural angles. The pain shot up his forearms and wrists, but he gritted his teeth. Pain was progress.
Hours blurred into days. Fingers cramped, knuckles scraped, and sweat soaked his small frame. But Raizen didn't stop. Each hand seal was a calculation, a puzzle — twisting, folding, connecting. Half a month later, he finally managed the basics of one-handed hand seals. Slow, painful, imperfect… but functional. A milestone.
"Water Style… Water Dragon Bomb!" he barked.
With a single hand, Raizen traced the intricate seal. For ten agonizing seconds, the ground trembled, and then a small jet of water erupted, coiling like a snake. The power was weak — barely a C-rank — but the principle was there. The Chakra output wavered, unstable from the strain of one-handed control, but Raizen's mind already raced ahead. Continuous practice would fix that.
"One-handed seals… check. Now for the next step."
He shifted focus to Bing Dun. Ice Release was a fusion of water and wind, and though the system had given him the ability, raw control wasn't automatic. He started small, merging the two Chakra natures inside him. Slowly, a chill crept along his arm, frost crystallizing on his skin. He watched as the air above the water in front of him shimmered faintly, an invisible frost forming.
Raizen nodded, lips curling into a smirk. "Yeah… this is it. I'm starting to get it."
The cold burned a little, but the thrill of progress coursed through him stronger than any pain. Ice Release was alive now, just waiting to be sharpened.