A month passed. I kept at it with the Lightning Release: Thunderclap Spear.
Forming the initial spark was the easy part. Stretching it into a proper shape that gave the jutsu both its speed and punching power? That was the hellish bit. The spear needed to be narrow and dense to fly true, and keeping it stable while compressed was like holding lightning inside a straw. It kept bursting or warping just before release.
So I relied on shadow clones. Not for fun or shortcuts, but to grind out as many reps as possible. They gave me more chances to fail, which meant more chances to fix the mistakes. Thanks to that, I started making progress faster than I expected.
The feedback from the clone dispels wasn't too bad either. Since I wasn't learning anything new from scratch, the kickback mostly came as flashes of repetition and a dull ache behind my eyes. Nothing like the hellish backlash I got when using shadow clones to learn something brand-new. Still, it was enough to make sleep hard. It felt like pressure kept leaking behind my eyes, building up but never releasing.
A month of waking up with the same headache and going to sleep with it mocking me from behind my eyes. A month of trial and error, of chakra snapping apart before it ever became anything worth calling a weapon.
But today felt different. Maybe it was the stillness of the forest. Maybe it was the ache in my bones that came from pushing too far for too long. Or maybe I was just tired of failing.
My last clone had dispelled an hour ago. No more shared work. No more backup. Just me, the trees, and the crackle of lightning building between my fingers.
I inhaled slowly. Not deep. Not measured. Just enough to keep going.
Then I raised my arm, fingers pointed forward.
Spark.
Chakra bloomed in my palm, flaring into a jagged needle of lightning. I locked the base, then began feeding more chakra into it.
Shape.
I stretched it further, guiding the chakra into the shape I had been drilling for weeks. The needle widened slightly at the base and narrowed into a long, pointed tip. It wasn't just a spike anymore. It looked like a proper spear. The more chakra I compressed along its length, the more my hand trembled. My fingers twitched from the strain, nerves burning as I forced the current to stay sharp, stable, and aligned from start to finish.
Stabilize.
This was always the make-or-break point. Lightning wanted to scatter, to explode outward in every direction. But I held it. Forced it into line. I visualized the spear, thin, fast, and piercing, and pressed my chakra into that image until it stopped fighting me.
The lightning screamed in my palm.
The tip narrowed. The body aligned. A sharp hum filled the air, like metal under strain. The surrounding wind shifted toward the point, drawn in by the charge. My lungs filled with the sharp scent of ozone.
"Stay together… just a second longer."
Throw.
I launched it toward the tree ahead.
The second it left my hand, it howled.
The bolt tore through the clearing like a streak of blue fire. It sliced the air with a sound like tearing metal, then slammed into the thick tree trunk. There was no explosion of flames. No fire. Just a violent crack of pressure as the upper half of the tree blasted apart. Splinters rained down. Leaves fluttered like ash.
My ears rang.
I dropped to one knee, gasping. My hands shook from the effort, sweat dripping from my brow. The smell of scorched wood and air choked the clearing.
I looked down at my hand. Still trembling. Still aching. But intact.
I exhaled slowly as a grin pulled at the edge of my mouth.
"I knew I'd get it."
Then I let myself fall back into the grass. Cold, damp, grounding. I stared up at the sky, where clean white clouds drifted across a vivid blue canvas.
Just for a minute. I'd earned that much.
My chest rose and fell. My right hand twitched from the effort of shaping and throwing lightning over and over again. But this time, it had worked. The Thunderclap spear had launched clean. It had flown straight. No flickering. No instability.
Still… something about it bothered me.
Not the formation. Not the chakra balance. Just the release.
It felt like throwing a kunai instead of firing one. The motion worked when everything lined up perfectly, stance, focus, timing. But what about during a fight? When my position was off, or I had no room to wind up? What if I had to fire from cover? Or while moving?
I looked at my palm again.
There had to be a better way.
I thought about chakra flow. It wasn't some rare secret. Every shinobi learned the basics. Some used it to sharpen blades, like channeling wind into weapons. Others used it to reinforce strikes. The point wasn't damage. It was guidance and control. The ability to focus energy along a path.
The Thunderclap Spear scroll hadn't mentioned any specific method for launching. Probably because it was designed for raw power and simplicity. Most jutsu scrolls stopped at the basics. They assumed the user would adjust the release on their own. Or, more likely, that the standard throw was good enough.
But I wasn't aiming for good enough.
I didn't have a blade, yet. But I had my hand.
What if I used chakra flow to shape a path for the spear? Coat my palm and forearm with lightning chakra, not just to reinforce, but to guide. A thin track of elementally-aligned chakra, stable and dense, that would hold the jutsu steady and add acceleration when I released it.
A launch rail made of lightning.
I stood again, slowly, ignoring how heavy my legs felt. I channeled lightning chakra into my hand. Not a jutsu. Just raw elemental energy. I shaped it into a layer that spread across my palm, then extended it up my forearm in a narrow, uniform flow. It buzzed faintly against my skin, but I held the current steady, keeping it smooth and aligned.
No wild sparks. No flickering. Just structure.
Once the sheath held, I sparked the spear.
Lightning roared into shape with a bit of effort and focus. Thin, solid, stable. This time, it locked into place as if the rail had been waiting for it. The chakra coating held the form steady, letting me compress more lightning chakra into a tighter, longer bolt without losing stability.
I aimed again. Focused. Released.
The spear fired with a clean, snapping screech. The air cracked in its wake as the bolt pierced the tree ahead. It punched through the trunk like a spear, burning a hole straight through before slamming into the tree behind it. A burst of bark and wood exploded outward like a shrapnel bomb, and a second later, the first tree collapsed with a groan.
I lowered my arm and dropped back onto the ground. That adjustment took more out of me than I expected. The coating was chakra-taxing. More control meant more precision, and more precision always came at a cost.
But I was sure I could optimize it with time.
The tremble in my fingers stayed, but it no longer felt like failure. It was effort well spent.
The sheath had worked. It guided the spear. It added force. It gave me consistency.
Not a new jutsu. Just a better way to use one.
Ideas kept flashing through my head. Everything I'd read, practiced, or seen about how weapons moved and struck was finally clicking into place. What if I used an actual spear? Not just as a throwing weapon, but as part of the jutsu itself. At first glance, it sounded like it could work. Lightning chakra flowing across a metal surface, shaped and aimed with precision.
But I knew the limits.
Metal was heavy. Chakra wasn't. That was part of the reason most ninjutsu didn't rely on real weapons unless they were specially prepared. Just throwing a spear, even one coated in chakra, wouldn't be nearly as fast or clean as a pure chakra construct. The weight alone would drag the speed down and throw off the handling. Without something more, the weapon would just get in the way.
That's where my fuinjutsu knowledge came in.
If I could inscribe the spear with the right seals, conductivity channels, chakra flow stabilizers, and maybe even a reaction seal to amplify the output on contact, I could bypass those limitations. I'd need to use a lot more chakra than normal to compensate for the mass and friction, but the end result would be worth it. A physical strike backed by the full force of a lightning jutsu. Fast, heavy-hitting, and devastating.
I could even add a chakra-guiding seal to regulate the flow once the jutsu was active. It could help channel the lightning more cleanly along the weapon's length. That would make activation faster and reduce the risk of backlash. I'd still need to power it myself, but the control it offered would make a big difference in combat.
It wouldn't be something you could find in a scroll. It wouldn't be a clan secret or a copy of another style. This would be mine. A blend of what I'd learned. Lightning release, chakra control, and fuinjutsu, all wrapped into one brutal weapon system.
My eyes lit up at the thought. There was still a long way to go, but the concept felt solid. All I needed now was the right materials, plenty of trial and error, along with something sturdy enough to survive the first test.
I sighed. "I just hope Master Shuzo lets me use some of the village materials… and maybe makes sure I don't blow myself up along the way."