Chapter 48.2- Gamer of the Desert

XXXXX- GAARA OF THE DESERT

Hiruzen Sarutoibi had been known as the professor, the God of Shinobi, for his famed knowledge of every jutsu within the Village Hidden in the Leaves.Gaara would have tried something similar with Suna earlier on, but never could find the time and the energy. Now, adding the knowledge of Iwa to that collection should have made the task much more daunting.

But now, it seemed possible. Why? The eyeball spinning languidly in his left eye socket, of course. Obito Uchiha’s Sharingan in Gaara’s hands made a world of difference. He already enjoyed a photographic memory from his high intelligence stat, but the Sharingan could do much more than that when it came to accelerating the learning of ninjutsu. The ability to see how the chakra in his body flowed at every instance allowed him to accelerate the speed at which he picked up new jutsu beyond every expectation.

With the sharingan, he wasn’t even obliged to commit himself to only focusing on the combat useful ninjutsu as he strived to learn every single jutsu that both Iwa and Suna had to offer.

“Do it again” He commanded the man standing across from him and watched as the Iwa Shinobi’s chakra moved to combine both the lightning and earth releases to form the famed explosion release. A puff of smoke flew out from his outstretched hand as he triggered the jutsu while under the grasp of Gaara’s genjutsu. It was a shame that the conventional wisdom turned out to be right in the instance. Everyone knew that the Sharingan could not copy Kekkei Genkai, but Gaara had only gotten where he was by questioning those things that everyone thought they knew. In this case, they were accurate. He could see how the chakra natures merged, but attempting to repeat that phenomenon in himself was basically impossible. Over a week of continuous attempts with no progress meant that his time and energy would be better spent elsewhere.

His wristband vibrated twice and he took a step back from the Captive Iwa shinobi. “Hold Still” He commanded with his spinning sharingan focused on his captive. Gaara scowled as he reached down to his pocket and took out the bottle of pills he carried around before swallowing two of them. They burned as they went down his throat, but he took the terrible taste with naught but a slight grimace. He’d managed to tinker the perfect set of supplements and drugs for his purposes, but making them taste good was a whole different beast that he didn’t even know how to tackle. Everything he’d tried or taught off was going to come with tradeoffs in the form of increased side effects or reduced efficacy. The present side effects were already reasonably close to the limits that Gaara would be able to accept in return for the present set of benefits.

“Now, show me what earth release jutsu you know” he ordered after he was sure the drug had gone down and would not be returning the same way it went.

XXXXXXX- JIRAIYA THE TOAD SAGE

He strolled from the hut that he’d built for himself to the one that Tsunade resided in. That was their chosen meeting point for the time they’d be spending on Mount Myoboku. The decision was made that they would seek out the help of the Kazekage brat, but they could only do that when they didn’t have any obvious weaknesses for him to take advantage of.

He, Tsunade, and Orochimaru were the closest thing to a team of unbeatable ninja that existed in the world, but Naruto was far from that. Especially with Akatsuki on the prowl, taking the time to allow the young man acquire enough strength that the S-rank criminals wouldn’t have an easy time of taking him, was a wise decision.

“Hyaaa” he heard the boy’s voice echo from behind him. He didn’t turn, knowing that both his apprentice and his familiar, Gamakichi, were being trained by Gamabunta in the toad taijutsu. Hopefully, a more formal taijutsu style would plug a lot of holes that he’d noticed in his godson’s hand to hand combat.

A/N; Snippet. Laptop’s about to die so that will be it for today.