Chapter 38: Acupoint Chakra
The answer—for now—was: it had nothing to do with him.
Spring, Konoha Year 35.
Another year had passed.
Inside Root Base's Lab No.2, within the chakra acupoint corresponding to the Gate of Life, a special chakra emitting fluctuations identical to those of the invisible barrier force within the acupoint slowly merged into it.
Then, a trace of regular chakra flowed out from the acupoint—only to be immediately sensed and captured by the Eight Trigrams Seal and sealed away.
Li Yao didn't care.
Inside his acupoints, chakra was flowing freely.
If he could move his body now, his face would be radiant with joy.
After a year and a half of research, not only had he found a way to extract chakra from the acupoints—but he had succeeded in doing it.
The principle was actually quite simple.
Li Yao discovered that the invisible force binding chakra within the acupoints was of the same type as the invisible force generated by the Eight Trigrams Seal that sealed off chakra flow.
He boldly theorized that chakra-sealing techniques like the Eight Trigrams Seal were probably inspired by the natural chakra-restricting forces in the body's meridians and acupoints.
So, to break the invisible acupoint barrier, he just needed to replicate the method used to bypass the Eight Trigrams Seal.
In other words, he had to generate chakra that emitted the same fluctuation as the acupoint's natural barrier.
These binding forces emitted unique vibrations when restricting chakra.
Likewise, sealing chakra from the Eight Trigrams Seal emitted a specific fluctuation that created an invisible barrier to suppress chakra.
By observing this, Li Yao reverse-engineered a type of chakra that mimicked the acupoint's binding force—thereby bypassing it just like unsealing a technique.
Since no existing chakra template existed, he had to reverse-engineer it entirely on his own, which took a long time.
In truth, he had come up with the idea six months ago.
Only now, today, had he finally succeeded in condensing chakra that could break the acupoint's restriction.
He gave this new chakra a simple name: Acupoint Chakra—a unique chakra with properties that could interact with and unlock the body's natural chakra-restricting barriers.
Though it had taken time to condense—
The results were worth it.
Li Yao could now use the Acupoint Chakra to open the acupoint passage, and release regular chakra—controlling the flow from a mere trickle to a stream as thick as a chopstick. He could even close the passage at will.
Unlike the Eight Gates technique, which explosively flung open the gate and released all chakra at once, Li Yao's method allowed precise control.
The Acupoint Chakra acted like a valve on a floodgate—he could decide how much chakra to release from the acupoint.
This meant he no longer had to fear damaging his body with a sudden burst of chakra.
Even the Gate of Death could be opened in a controlled way—he wouldn't die.
In truth, the reason why the Gate of Death was lethal in the Eight Gates Formation was simply that the chakra it contained was immense, and fully releasing it at once overwhelmed the body.
The body just couldn't withstand that kind of surge.
But Li Yao's method—partially opening the gate and channeling the chakra through his meridians like from the dantian—avoided this issue.
With Acupoint Chakra, every chakra acupoint in his body was now functionally a second dantian.
And since acupoints naturally prevented chakra from leaking—
Each one was essentially a Yin Seal, capable of storing unused chakra.
If Li Yao filled every chakra acupoint in his body, his chakra reserves would reach unprecedented levels.
At least a thousand times more than if he only relied on his dantian.
Such a massive chakra pool would be more than enough for combat.
Apart from a Jinchūriki, his chakra reserves wouldn't lose to anyone's.
Thinking about this, Li Yao was thoroughly satisfied.
With Acupoint Chakra, his chakra shortage problem was completely solved.
He now had a way to store chakra—
And a way to extract it from the acupoints.
The next step was converting that chakra into actual combat power.
According to his plan—
First, he had to gain enough strength to escape this secret facility.
Only then could he think about developing a perfected Transformation Technique to bypass Konoha's chakra-sensing barriers and ninja with sensory skills—and escape the village entirely.
If he couldn't even leave this place—
It wouldn't matter if he perfected his disguise.
Over the past year, due to being completely ignored, Li Yao had regained control of his body once. He saw his surroundings and realized—he was in an underground research facility.
Such facilities were surely covered in various sensing and defensive barriers.
Even if he transformed into a chakra-less bird, there was no way out.
And if a bird or snake suddenly showed up in a place like this—it would immediately raise suspicions.
Li Yao wouldn't underestimate ninja perception again.
Minato's face was still fresh in his memory. He wouldn't repeat that mistake.
So first, he needed power.
But… how to turn his chakra into combat ability?
He pondered.
For him, there were only two paths: ninjutsu and genjutsu.
Taijutsu was out of the question.
He couldn't move his body. Physical techniques requiring movement were not an option.
He could only focus on ninjutsu and genjutsu.
At the moment, the only ninjutsu he knew were the basic three techniques, and Shadow Clone, which he learned from his predecessor's father's notes.
Other than that—even Rasengan was beyond him.
Sure, he could easily condense various chakra natures—
But only if he had existing jutsu seals and chakra templates. Then he could replicate and refine them.
Unfortunately, he had no other jutsu templates. He didn't know their chakra nature or form changes.
Without them, he could only reverse-engineer them as he had with Acupoint Chakra.
But that process took time.
And time was what Li Yao didn't have.
Even if he had been ignored for nearly two years—
He was sure the Third hadn't forgotten about him.
The day might come when Hiruzen suddenly remembered, came back, and simply ended his life.
Li Yao wasn't afraid of death.
He just didn't want to die like this.
So he had to grow stronger—quickly.
Since he couldn't progress in ninjutsu fast enough—
Genjutsu was out of the question, right?
…Wait, maybe not.
Suddenly, Li Yao recalled a certain technique the Third had repeatedly used on him.
He remembered, during one furious outburst, Hiruzen had shouted the name: "Demonic Illusion: Darkness Technique."
His previous-life memories came rushing back.
This was a genjutsu developed by the Second Hokage to counter the Sharingan. It deprived the target of vision, plunging them into darkness.
While it lacked direct offensive power, it was a perfect support technique for Li Yao.
At the very least, in the absence of strong attack ninjutsu, it would be incredibly useful in helping him escape the facility.
"I need to learn that genjutsu first."
Li Yao made the decision immediately.
He remembered: during the last few times Hiruzen cast the Darkness Technique, Li Yao's soul had already merged with his chakra, and he had gained his chakra-perception ability—capable of sensing chakra nature and form transformations.
Although his chakra hadn't physically touched the Third's, the chakra of the genjutsu technique had.
Now, Li Yao racked his brain, trying to recall every detail of the Darkness Technique's chakra signature and form.
As he remembered, he simultaneously manipulated chakra within his acupoints to mimic those nature and form changes.
Given that it had been nearly two years, his recollection wasn't perfect—so he had to reverse-engineer it.
But compared to deriving Acupoint Chakra purely from chakra wave fluctuations—
Recreating the Darkness Technique should be much easier.
Still, even if easier, it would take at least a month or two.
That much time, Li Yao believed, he could afford.
(END CHAPTER)
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