As Aoba walked out of the ninja tools store run by Ten Ten, his heart ached with every step. Including the kunai he had damaged himself, ten kunai and ten shuriken had cost him a total of 150,000 ryo—five to ten times more expensive than regular ones.
Ten Ten, seeing his urgent need for the tools, refused to lower the price, forcing him to accept the steep cost.
The only consolation was that Aoba had exceeded his initial goal.
Creating sealing kunai and shuriken was simple, but finding the right opportunity to use them wasn't easy.
As always, White Zetsu would most likely be hiding dozens of meters underground, making it impossible to act.
Aoba had to carry the prepared ninja tools with him and continue with his other research plans.
The first task was to prepare the cells of the First Hokage. Orochimaru had only provided some samples, but that wasn't a problem.
The First Hokage's cells had excessively strong proliferation capabilities. With enough nutrient solution and chakra, more cells could be cultivated.
He anticipated that future experiments would consume a lot of this material, so he started preparing in advance.
However, over time, Aoba had to halt all his current experiments.
With the continued training, he had become completely immune to the erosion of natural energy.
This meant he could now begin working on his Sage Mode.
In the world of Naruto, there are four types of Sage Mode. Three of them represent the three great sage regions, while the fourth is the Sage Mode of the First Hokage.
The First Hokage was clearly a different dimension of existence. The Sage Modes of the three great sage regions each involve beast-like features appearing on the body once activated.
Moreover, the process of using Sage Mode is very cumbersome. Even someone of Jiraiya's level needed several minutes to enter Sage Mode.
But the First Hokage was different. Not only could he enter Sage Mode with just a clap of his hands, but his entire body, except for the facial markings, lacked beast-like features. It was considered a nearly perfect Sage Mode.
Now, the Sage Mode Aoba was about to achieve was, in some ways, even more perfect than the First Hokage's.
After absorbing natural energy, he didn't even have facial markings. His Sage Mode had no outward changes, but internally, the natural energy had fused with his chakra and mental energy to form a new type of Sage Chakra.
The only weakness was that Aoba's foundation was far inferior to the First Hokage's. His chakra was too limited, and his body wasn't strong enough to fully utilize this Sage Mode.
As large amounts of natural energy flowed into Aoba's body, he could clearly feel the changes.
Firstly, his five senses were enhanced comprehensively. Additionally, he developed a new sensing ability. This was due to the natural energy connecting his body with the surrounding natural energy.
In this state, he could sense the natural energy within a certain range around him. Anything covered by natural energy was within his perception.
Natural energy was everywhere. Though some places had dense energy and others had weak, overall, it was a balanced state.
This meant that after entering Sage Mode, he gained a sensing ability similar to the Kagura Shingan.
And this was just the beginning.
Aoba drew the Kusanagi Sword, and his Sage Chakra flowed into it, then he swung it forward.
He used only one-third of the force of his regular air-slashing attack.
In the next moment, a dazzling wind blade tore through the air. Several dozen trees with diameters of over fifty centimeters were severed cleanly by this strike.
He estimated that if he used his full strength, this sword strike could flatten this small area of forest.
Such cutting power was already a significant threat to tailed beasts.
However, this was not his real trump card. Aoba produced a metal ball the size of a walnut.
Blue lightning flickered around his hand.
He rarely used Lightning Release due to its higher consumption. After all, lightning was not as common as air. The air-slicing technique used a small amount of chakra mixed with the air to form a special wind blade.
But natural lightning wasn't easy to harness. Even if it existed, it wasn't easily utilized. All lightning had to be converted using Lightning Release techniques.
With the principle of conserving chakra and treating Lightning Release as a trump card, he rarely used it. Moreover, he didn't know many Lightning Release techniques.
During his time at the border, he had killed quite a few from the Cloud Village, but honestly, no ninja carried technique scrolls with them. At least, he had never seen any.
Ninjas, being of the assassin type, were very particular about what they carried. Unless necessary, they wouldn't carry extra items during missions.
He had attempted to develop the Raikiri technique but failed in the end. Mainly because Lightning Cutter was a lightning attribute variation of Chidori, which he didn't know...
Fortunately, the education from his past life had paid off. After spending a lot of time, he had managed to develop the effect of electromagnetic acceleration. This was his Lightning Release trump card, the Electromagnetic Acceleration Cannon.
However, in the ninja world, it couldn't be called an Electromagnetic Acceleration Cannon; the style didn't quite fit. So, he named it Lightning Release: Flash.
The main idea was that once this technique was used, enemies would only see a flash of lightning, hence the name Flash.
Aoba combined Sage Chakra with lightning, forming an acceleration sphere with the metal ball inside.
As he raised his hand and aimed forward, his will triggered. A red light flashed through the air. A small explosion occurred on a distant hillside.
The impact was not significant, but that didn't mean the power was weak. This technique was primarily a physical penetrating damage.
In that brief moment, the metal ball had penetrated through the forest and hit the hillside.
Aoba approached the hillside and conducted a detailed inspection. He concluded that this strike did not truly test the final damage of the technique.
Because the metal ball, in high-speed motion and collision, had exhausted all its mass before its kinetic energy was fully consumed.
In simple terms, the metal ball was completely spent during flight.
He estimated that with a larger or higher quality metal ball, it could likely pierce through the entire hillside.
Just as he was preparing to continue testing, a hawk's cry echoed overhead. It was Konoha's emergency assembly order.