Chapter 49: Aftermath and a Green Dragon's Roar
Utter stillness.
The world seemed to have ended. The only sounds were the groans of settling earth, the clatter of loose stone, and the distant, panicked shouts from the village above. These echoes were the world's only soundtrack now.
The dazed spectators—Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Konoha guards, the Anbu, countless villagers—finally snapped back to reality. They stared, dumbfounded, at the scene of devastation. Their breaths caught, their hearts seeming to skip beats.
The symbol of Konoha's leadership, the Hokage Tower, leaned at a drunken angle.
The headquarters of its most powerful force, the Anbu, was a collapsed ruin.
And all of it… because of a sparring match.
A test against a boy named Shinra.
Hatake Sakumo remained stiff, feeling as if his internal organs had been violently rearranged. He had managed to deflect the punch, but the concussive force, compressed to an insane degree, had rattled through his entire being, threatening to tear him apart from the inside.
Kneeling on one knee, cold sweat plastered his hair and dripped from his chin.
Damn it all.
He'd told the kid to go all out. But he hadn't expected the kid to take that as an invitation to demolish the entire training ground and half the base!
A herd of mythical beasts stampeded through Sakumo's mind. He desperately wanted to get up and thump the brat senseless.
If he could move.
"You… kid…" he managed, forcing the frustration down and summoning a strained, wry smile as he pushed himself to his feet.
Shinra, now fully aware he'd drastically overshot the mark, offered an awkward, sheepish grin. "Ahem… Sorry about that. Got a little carried away."
Looking at that innocent, 'who-me?' expression, Sakumo's eye twitched violently.
"No… no harm done," Sakumo said through gritted teeth that wanted to be a snarl. "The point was to find your limits. Good. Strong. Far beyond my expectations."
For some reason, Shinra felt a sudden chill down his spine.
Sarutobi Hiruzen emerged from the newly-angled Hokage Tower, his expression a masterpiece of controlled, simmering ire. Dust streaked his Hokage robes.
"Hokage-sama, my apologies for the disturbance," Sakumo hurried over, bowing his head. "I was merely testing Shinra's capabilities. I didn't expect him to… fail to restrain his power quite so completely…"
"Hah…" Hiruzen let out a long, weary sigh that seemed to deflate him. "It's fine. Don't trouble yourself over it. To have such a… vigorous… young genius in Konoha, I should be overjoyed." He turned his gaze to Shinra, and his face miraculously rearranged itself into a kind, grandfatherly smile.
"That's a relief. Thank you, Hokage-jiji," Shinra said, pouring on the youthful innocence. He was, after all, penniless. If they presented him with a bill, he'd be paying it off for the next three lifetimes.
"It's nothing. You go on and rest. The Anbu will handle the… cleanup here." Hiruzen's voice was soothing.
"Right! Okay! Well, goodbye Hokage-jiji, Captain Sakumo!"
Shinra didn't dare linger another second. The words were barely out before he vanished in a blur of speed, fleeing the scene of the crime.
The moment he was gone, an aura of profound, icy menace descended upon Sakumo. Hiruzen's kindly façade vanished, replaced by the stern visage of the village leader.
"You," Hiruzen said, his voice dangerously low. "Fix it. All of it. The cost comes out of your mission stipend."
He turned on his heel and stalked back toward his leaning tower, leaving a shell-shocked Sakumo standing amidst the rubble with nothing but a bitter, helpless smile.
Five days passed in a blur of frantic activity for Konoha. The village hummed with repair crews and whispered gossip. Tales of Shinra's 'training accident' once again swept through the streets, each retelling more exaggerated than the last.
Shinra himself, however, enjoyed a period of blissful leisure. He trained on schedule, spent idyllic afternoons teasing and being teased by Kushina and Mikoto, and made solid progress. He'd finally grasped the fundamentals of the Strength of a Hundred technique. It was, at its core, a sophisticated chakra control exercise. With his enhanced mental faculties post-breakthrough, mastering its precise flow was challenging but not insurmountable.
Perhaps due to the 'incident,' Shinra didn't see hide nor hair of Hatake Sakumo. This suited him just fine, as a faint sense of guilt lingered.
His only official Anbu business was a visit to the custom forge to commission a weapon. Following Whitebeard's inherited instincts, he'd requested something specific. Today was the day to collect it.
After a quick wash and donning his Anbu mask and coat, Shinra slipped back into the now-repaired Anbu base. The 'Leaning Tower of Konoha' had been righted—a fact Shinra found vaguely disappointing. Some people had no appreciation for avant-garde architecture. The base itself was functional again, if perhaps a bit… newer-looking in certain sections.
He arrived at the equipment depot and handed over his claim ticket.
"Here to collect my weapon."
The clerk, an elderly man with sharp, intelligent eyes and steel-gray hair peeking from under a cap, took the ticket with a grunt. He glanced at it.
His entire demeanor changed.
He looked up sharply, his eyes scanning Shinra with open astonishment. "You're the one who commissioned that weapon?!"
Shinra wasn't surprised. The master smiths had worn similar expressions when he'd first given them the schematics.
"That's me. It might be a bit large. If it's easier, you can just point me to where it is, and I'll carry it out myself?" Shinra offered politely.
The old man ignored the courtesy, instead scrutinizing Shinra with deep skepticism. "A violent piece of work. Such fine materials, all wasted on a weapon no normal person could even lift! What was that boy Sakumo thinking?!" He grumbled, freely criticizing the Anbu Commander.
This old-timer has some clout, Shinra noted with interest.
Complaining all the while, the old man turned and shuffled into the rear armory. A moment later, he returned, hefting Shinra's weapon in one hand as if it were a walking stick.
Shinra's request had been modeled after a certain legendary blade from his past life: the Green Dragon Crescent Blade. While not a perfect replica, the result was a massive guandao-style polearm. Its weight? One hundred and sixty kilograms—over 350 pounds. More than five times heavier than its historical inspiration. It was the weight of two large men.
"Here. Catch."
A glint flashed in the old man's eyes. With a surge of chakra enhancing his throw, he hurled the colossal blade straight at Shinra.
A test. To see if the wielder was worthy.
The corner of Shinra's mouth quirked upward. He tapped a toe against the ground, propelling himself lightly into the air. His hand shot out and closed around the weapon's long, leather-wrapped haft.
WHOOSH—HUMMM…
The Green Dragon Crescent Blade, measuring over nine feet from tip to end, engraved with a motif of a dragon devouring the moon, came to life in Shinra's grasp. He spun it once, then twice, the air screaming in protest, the blade a silvery-grey blur of terrifying, dominating presence.
It was effortless. Before commissioning it, he'd already begun assimilating the bisento techniques from Whitebeard's memories. Wielding such a weapon wasn't about brute strength alone, but about leverage, balance, and ingrained skill. Sweeping through armies? That was the baseline. The sheer, awe-inspiring spectacle of it was undeniable.
The old man's jaw went slack. He stared as Shinra made the monstrous weapon dance like a lightweight training pole.
"You… you wouldn't happen to be that little bastard, Shinra, would you?!" The old man finally spluttered, the pieces clicking into place as he recognized the telltale, overwhelming physicality.
Shinra stopped his demonstration, slightly chagrined. "Ah… that's me. Do you have any… advice?"
"Advice?!" the old man snorted, though his eyes now sparkled with unconcealed admiration and approval. "Don't you dare! Just take your oversized toy and get out of here! And for heaven's sake, try not to collapse my depot this time!"
Taking the dismissal for the endorsement it was, Shinra offered a quick bow of thanks. He hefted the Green Dragon Crescent Blade over his shoulder—a gesture that would have crushed an ordinary man—and swept out of the Anbu base, feeling the satisfying, deadly weight of his new partner.
Watching the young man disappear, the old craftsman's stern expression melted away, replaced by a deeply pleased, almost paternal smile.
"That boy… he's a once-in-a-generation monster. What a blessing for our Konoha."
(End of Chapter)
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