Naruto: Cultivating to Immortality

Chapter 19 Refining the Soul

The sounds in the valley completely ceased, leaving only the corpses scattered on the ground and the ground soaked red with blood.

Under Hyuga Kanan's watchful gaze, no one escaped; they all turned into terrified corpses lying haphazardly in pools of blood.

After looking around and finding no survivors, Yuan Feiquanxiong and Yueguang Xinhuo quickly returned the way they came, their faces still showing the joy of completing their mission.

Yamanaka Ryuichi, however, looked serious and quickly approached Hyuga Kanan, asking in a low voice if anyone had escaped or gone into hiding. After all, this ravine was less than 500 meters from the road, and the wooden roadblocks and trap materials in the ravine indicated that these people usually used this road to rob passing merchants.

He breathed a sigh of relief when he received confirmation from Hyuga Kanan that no one had escaped or gone into hiding. If anyone had escaped or gone into hiding undetected, and information had been leaked to them, the enemy would likely have learned about the supply lines, increasing the chances of them disrupting them.

Their mission was to clear out the bandits along the route of these logistics transport teams, without exposing the logistics supply lines.

After everyone had arrived, Yamanaka Ryuichi checked the sky and made a decision. They decided to rest on the spot and replenish their strength and food.

Looking at the excited expressions on Quanxiong and Xinhuo's faces, and the strong smell of blood emanating from their bodies, Hyuga Kanan felt a chill run down his spine. They had just killed dozens of people, yet they could still look so happy.

However, seeing that Yamanaka Ryuichi didn't seem to care, he must have gotten used to this kind of killing.

Sure enough, Yamanaka Ryuichi looked at Yuan Feiquanxiong and Moonlight Nobuhiro with an expression of praise and a thumbs-up. The two seemed even happier to have received such approval.

There's something really wrong with this world. After glancing at the group, Hyuga Kanan silently sat down to the side, no longer watching their mutual praise.

When Yamanaka Ryu saw that Hyuga Kanan looked confused and upset, he took the initiative to explain.

It turns out that once a new genin becomes a novice, after completing a certain number of simple D-rank service missions, they will be assigned some bandit-suppression killing missions. This is mainly to let the novices see blood and gradually get used to killing.

"Ninjas aren't just about escorting and serving. Their most important function is killing. There's no room for sympathy or kindness in that. You're still a newbie and haven't experienced these things yet. Just accumulate experience slowly and don't overthink it."

Yuan Feiquan looked at Hinata Kanan with a smug expression, as if to say, "You should learn more from us seniors."

As darkness fell, everyone took out their prepared rations and began to eat, preparing for a good night's rest so they could continue their journey the next day.

Ryuichi Yamanaka quickly went to the ravine to clean up the mess, as he couldn't allow the corpses to rot and cause plagues or other infectious diseases, especially since this was within the Land of Fire.

The carnage he witnessed today left Hyuga Kanan deeply disturbed. Upon noticing Yamanaka Ryuichi heading towards the valley, he channeled his soul power to follow him, wanting to see how he would handle the scene of the carnage.

When Hiyori Kanan's soul power reached the valley, she sensed many gray orbs of light floating above the corpses, slowly dissipating into the world. Four of these orbs were larger, their gray tinged with white. The white substance controlled the gray orbs, preventing them from dissipating like the others; instead, they continuously shrank and drifted slowly towards a single location. Meanwhile, Yamanaka Ryuichi, trapped within the gray orbs, seemed completely unaware of these things, continuing to use earth-遁 (earth-遁 is a technique in Chinese fantasy novels) to bury the corpses.

As if realizing something, Hyuga Kanan immediately mobilized his powerful soul energy to envelop the gray orbs of light. The instant they made contact, Hyuga Kanan understood: these were the souls of the deceased leaving their bodies. Without the protection of the body, the fragile souls would quickly dissipate into the world.

Hyuga Kanan used his powerful soul force to envelop the gray light orbs, then immediately drew them back into his mind. He then poured all the gray light orbs into the Qiankun Inheritance Jade. Soon, the gray light orbs were refined into specks of blue light—pure soul energy that he could absorb.

The soul power silently absorbed these blue light spots, and soon finished absorbing them. Hyuga Kanan silently sensed it and found that the soul power had become slightly stronger, roughly equivalent to the effect of cultivating the Daoist Spirit Nourishing Technique for a week.

"Uh, thirty-odd gray light orbs only improved this much. How many of these orbs would it take to reach the Divine Sense Realm? Besides, I have no intention of killing others to obtain gray light orbs. After all, killing too many people would make my Dao Heart unstable, which would make it difficult to break through to higher realms in the future."

He was ultimately not a demonic cultivator; forcibly killing and refining others' souls was utterly dangerous, bordering on the absurd. A single misstep could lead to demonic possession and death. He pursued the Dao of Nature, aiming to form his own unique 'Dao Fruit'! After all, with his own Dao Fruit, if he could overcome the Heavenly Tribulation and become an immortal, his later potential would be limitless, and he could even live as long as the heavens.

However, when one encounters this unconscious gray energy, one can refine and absorb it. After all, even if one doesn't absorb it, it will slowly dissipate into the world and return to its origin.

Suddenly, he remembered the four unusual orbs of light that had been slowly drifting towards a certain place. Those must be souls possessing chakra; could he secretly steal them?

Anyway, the Sage of Six Paths probably wouldn't pay too much attention to a soul with only a little chakra. He probably wouldn't notice if I secretly stole a little bit. After all, with so many leeks to harvest, he probably wouldn't care if I missed a little bit.

With this in mind, Hyuga Kanan immediately sprang into action, channeling his soul power to pursue the four orbs of light that had just drifted away. He also wanted to test how much attention the Sage of Six Paths paid to these seemingly insignificant soul energies, and to test his ability to steal them in the future.

Dozens of meters away from the valley, Hyuga Kanan's soul power discovered the four special orbs of light. The white substance, like a traction cage, slowly carried the four gray orbs of light, while also protecting them from dissipating.

Hyuga Kanan immediately took action. He first used his soul power to envelop a ball of energy and guide it into the Qiankun Inheritance Jade in his mind. He was not in a hurry to refine it, and at the same time, he maximized his soul perception.

This is a test. If you sense the soul power of the Sage of Six Paths around you, immediately abandon the soul in the Qiankun Inheritance Jade and never try to steal souls containing chakra again. If you don't find anything unusual, then you can quietly absorb some weak souls that have died without bloodlines to increase your cultivation speed.

Ten minutes later, Hyuga Kanan felt no abnormality and breathed a sigh of relief. In just ten minutes, her back was soaked with cold sweat, and her mind was somewhat drowsy from excessive tension.

It seems the Sage of Six Paths doesn't pay much attention to such insignificant leeks. After all, he can't possibly monitor the entire ninja world all the time, nor does he have the power to do so. As long as his main course isn't touched, he doesn't care much about small fry. He can slowly test the Sage's limits later, while using his leeks to accelerate his own cultivation.

In an instant, Hyuga Kanan absorbed the remaining three orbs of light into the Qiankun Inheritance Jade in his mind and began to manipulate the jade pendant to refine these four orbs of energy.

The refining process lasted a full hour, so long that even when Yamanaka Ryuichi returned to his resting place, Hyuga Kanan didn't notice.

The pure energy refined from the Qiankun Inheritance Jade was far greater than what he had just absorbed. Hyuga Kanan immediately began to absorb it, sensing his soul power gradually growing stronger. After absorbing it all, he felt it was equivalent to the results of three months of arduous training.

Suddenly, he felt a surge of joy. After all, the ninjas who died on the battlefield were superior in both quantity and quality to those four regiments. Even if he could only steal a little bit, it would still save him a lot of training time and allow him to grow up faster.

On the rest of the journey, Hyuga Kanan and his three companions continued their cleanup mission, clearing out a total of five bandit hideouts.

Hyuga Kanan still hadn't made a single move, only serving as a scout. After all, they were just ordinary bandits; no samurai or ninjas were present.

After they cleaned it up, Hyuga Kanan would silently absorb and refine these soul orbs, strengthening his own soul power and accelerating his cultivation to the Divine Sense Realm.

It took them six whole days to reach the border between the Land of Fire and the Land of Rain.

Inside the border outpost, the Hyuga Kanan squad rested quietly, while also waiting for the arrival of the logistics transport team and support personnel, in preparation for completing the second half of their mission.

Unlike his relaxed demeanor in the Land of Fire, Yamanaka Ryuichi's expression was serious as he solemnly warned his team members about the precautions to take. After all, entering the Land of Rain was tantamount to entering a war zone, a true life-or-death struggle where any carelessness could result in casualties, or even total annihilation.

The group noticed their teacher's seriousness and responded in unison, their faces grave. Yuan Fei and Quan Xiong answered the loudest. After all, they had lost a teammate in the Land of Rain.

Inside the outpost, looking at the serious expressions on Yuan Fei and Quan Xiong's faces, Hyuga Kanan sighed slightly, realizing that he was really about to join the war.

Four days later, on the morning of the same day, a large number of people entered the border post, mostly children, all looking exhausted. That afternoon alone, two small teams of secret agents arrived from the direction of the Land of Rain, their faces grim and menacing.

The next morning, after the teams merged, they all set off. Hyuga Kanan's team continued to serve as the vanguard scouts.