Chapter 113: Zanpakuto: Substitute
Have you ever been kicked at the speed of light?
For some reason, that line suddenly flashed through Minato's mind.
An instant later, an unimaginable impact struck him. His body was hurled away like a cannonball, weightless, spinning through the air.
In the next heartbeat, he forced his body to twist, dragging a long arc through the watery sky as he stabilized himself. He stared at the shimmering figure in front of him in disbelief.
...I got hit? When?
"Zanpakuto, retrieve it."
Amid the swirl of light and shadow, Kakashi's voice grew deeper and steadier.
The Zanpakuto that had pierced his heart slid down his body like white water, then melted into the black shadow at his feet and coiled around him.
It stretched, distorted, and rose. From that light and darkness, a tall, slender figure stepped out, his messy white hair faintly resembling Sakumo's. He wore an oversized white stand up collar coat, hands in his pockets, looking calmly at the stunned Minato.
"By communicating and reinforcing over time, I obtain the power of my future self," the man said. "If my technique is lacking, I strengthen my technique. If my strength is lacking, I strengthen my strength. If I am lacking in everything, I strengthen everything. Pretty impressive for a Zanpakuto, right?"
The handsome man stroked his chin, tilting his head slightly, watching Konoha's Little Sun with a half smile.
"But unfortunately, I can only use this ability once per battle. No enemy is going to stand there and chat with you for several minutes. And once the Zanpakuto marks an opponent, they always get a strange sense of foreboding. That is troublesome for me too. If I only get a few seconds of charge time, I am just an ordinary Kakashi. Even if I am fast and strong, I am still far behind the adults."
He shrugged lightly.
"Still, I should thank you, Minato. This might be the first time in my life that I have fully released my Zanpakuto. Before, I would feel the power begin to rise, then get locked in a cage and beaten up by those unethical adults. The ones I could beat would just find ways to stop my buildup. So this really is a first."
"I never imagined that once my Zanpakuto was completely unleashed, I would literally grow into my future self. And it turns out, the future me looks like this. So, Minato, shall we fight properly?"
"..."
He is strong.
Minato frowned slightly as he watched the tall, lean swordsman in front of him.
From reaction speed, to attack method, to that effortless attitude, this sudden change was something no ordinary ninja could produce.
Even Uchiha Kagami and Sakumo, who were battling in the distance, had not shown such a dramatic transformation. For Minato, who still knew almost nothing about what a Zanpakuto's Shikai truly represented, this was an unknown field.
So there was only one thing to do.
Test it.
"I could not ask for more."
Light flashed. Minato vanished and reappeared behind Kakashi in the blink of an eye.
As he formed a hand seal, he exhaled sharply. Chakra surged from countless cells, rushed up his throat, and burst from his mouth in a spiraling gale.
It was only a simple C rank ninjutsu, yet in the hands of the Hokage, the space around them dimmed, leaving only a heavy stillness before the storm.
"Wind Release, Great Breakthrough."
A pale blue chakra storm roared across the world.
Yet inside that raging wind, Kakashi, masked in white, simply stared at Minato, who was earnestly weaving the hurricane.
He reached out through the gale and flicked a finger against Minato's forehead.
"Without Sage Mode, chakra at this level cannot hurt us. You should know that."
His expression was hidden behind the mask, but Minato had every reason to suspect that the older Kakashi was smiling.
"For ninjas, information warfare is everything," Kakashi went on. "Chakra is essentially a struggle for authority. Just like now, ordinary wind chakra can barely affect those who hold a higher level of authority."
"What are you talking about?"
"Just what I said," Kakashi replied. "Ordinary chakra ninjutsu can no longer harm us. What you need now is refined control and extension. Only chakra with bloodline limits and beyond can interfere with us. In simple terms, our authority over chakra is fundamentally unequal."
He walked straight through the roaring gale as if basking in sunlight. To Minato's disbelief, the pale blue wind seemed to shy away from Kakashi, flowing around him in smooth currents, like butter parting under a knife. Not a single scratch appeared on his body.
Kakashi did not rush to attack. One hand tucked into his coat pocket, the other lazily twirling his gleaming Zanpakuto, he watched Minato with amused curiosity.
"That is why I said we will replace the ancient profession of ninja," he added. "From the start, we stand in different places. Ninjas need years of training, relentless effort, and stubborn will to build chakra capable of interfering with me. But anyone who has mastered Shinigami techniques naturally holds a certain degree of suppression over chakra."
"You know this too. Lower level chakra can be absorbed by higher level chakra. If I wanted, I could use an ability called Prosthetic Body, absorb all that scattered chakra into myself, and then release it again as my own power."
"It sounds unfair, doesn't it? But that is the reality for ninjas. Just like shrine maidens and samurai were helpless against ninjas, ninjas themselves are equally helpless against us."
"..."
For some reason, Minato felt an odd sense of déjà vu as he listened.
That long, patient lecture.
That unconcealed sense of superiority.
That faintly arrogant tone that made other people feel like students being scolded.
All of it felt deeply familiar.
Looking at Kakashi, who was speaking so confidently in front of him, Minato blurted out,
"Did Aizen teach you to talk like that?"
"I added some original lines of my own," Kakashi replied. "So you would know it was me."
"..."
"Ah."
Realizing what he had just admitted, Kakashi froze for a heartbeat in mid air, his flow of words suddenly jamming.
Compared to the neighboring battlefield, where the entire Hidden Leaf Village seemed about to collapse, the sky and earth falling and shattering under cataclysmic force, their own space remained a quiet canvas of blue sky and white clouds, stabilized by Danku.
And in that calm, the awkwardness between the two only grew more intense.
Minato really tried his best to stay hostile. He truly did.
But Kakashi was still just a seven or eight year old child. They had spent so many idle afternoons bickering over trivial things. On top of that, everything Minato had inherited from Aizen's work was undeniably valuable. It made it very hard for real hatred to take root.
And Kakashi himself was hopelessly unreliable.
He got caught rehearsing his speech, then stumbled halfway through it.
What was Minato supposed to do? Should he force himself to get serious and string together a few high level jutsu, pretend they were both fighting with everything they had?
Especially when, in the distance, thunder and fire raged like the end of the world, the earth shaking and the sky tearing apart, and here the two of them were, tripping over lines in the middle of a "life and death" confrontation.
There was definitely something wrong with this picture.
"...Ninjas are naturally bound to chakra," Kakashi continued after a long pause, acting as if nothing had happened. "But it is different for us Shinigami. For Shinigami, the core of battle is pure power."
"When chakra signals can no longer affect us, the nature of energy will fall into a clear hierarchy. No matter what the ability is, in the end it becomes a contest of power. Shinigami battles are battles of raw power. Whoever has more, wins. In a way, it is much fairer than the ninja system, don't you think?"
"..."
He already admitted it was you. Why are you still forcing yourself to recite the script?
We have already recognized each other. Wouldn't it be easier to just talk normally now?
And with Kagami and Sakumo over there trying to kill each other, was it not a little disrespectful to keep monologuing like this?
Minato glanced sideways toward the "next tent," and almost went blind.
The wind screamed. Flames devoured everything. Fragments of stone and light hammered against the shattered barrier, each impact shaking the world with a deafening roar. If one of those pieces pierced through to this side, this tranquil sea of blue and white would vanish into fire in moments.
He took another look at Kakashi, who stood calmly with his sword at his side, while Kagami howled in the distance and dragged down a massive meteor, black fire exploding as it slammed to the ground. The flood of light and flame crashed against the barrier with a thunderclap that rattled his bones.
Then Minato looked at Kakashi's serious posture again. His expression turned very strange.
"..."
"..."
An indescribable awkwardness settled over the space between them.
For both of them, this situation was beyond abnormal.
Just as Kakashi, feeling the tension himself, turned his gaze aside, Minato suddenly let out a crooked grin. His body blurred into a streak of light as he sprang forward.
"There is a gap."
"Varied..."
"Konoha's ultimate taijutsu," Minato shouted, fingers flashing into position, "Thousand Years of Death."
"Minato Namikaze, how old are you?!"
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