"Have you heard? Kakashi killed his teammate!"At the Nara Clan compound in Konoha, a few clan members training in the courtyard were eagerly spreading the latest gossip.
"It was that kunoichi, Nohara Rin, right?"The scandal obviously stirred everyone's curiosity.
There was no helping it.Hatake Kakashi — the genius prodigy trained under the Yellow Flash — was the classic "child from the other family" in Konoha, the one everyone's parents wished their children could be.Becoming a jonin at just twelve years old, with overwhelming strength to match, he was already the stuff of legends. But what people whispered about most was how he obtained Uchiha Obito's Sharingan after his comrade's death.Rumor had it the Uchiha Clan once tried to reclaim the eye but ultimately gave up.Most believed it was because Obito's teacher — the Yellow Flash himself — personally intervened.
Naturally, someone like Kakashi was always at the heart of every juicy story.And now, with his female teammate, Nohara Rin, dying by his own hand? The buzz was deafening.
"Nohara Rin is really dead, huh?"Sitting off to the side, Nara Kazuki shot a glance at his gossipy clansmen before closing his eyes again.
Unlike the famous Konoha genius Hatake Kakashi, Kazuki was an exceptionally ordinary ninja.Born into the Nara Clan, yes — but talentless by their standards.At fifteen, he was still a genin.
But Kazuki, a transmigrator from another world, didn't feel discouraged.He hadn't won some grand cosmic lottery; he'd simply fallen asleep reading Naruto manga and woken up in Konoha the next morning.
The original Kazuki was a mediocre Nara ninja who'd died transporting supplies during the Third Great Ninja War, killed by enemy forces. That's when Kazuki — the new Kazuki — took over.
"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!"Kazuki's hands flew through a string of hand seals, gathering chakra... but no flames appeared.
[Hand Seals: 988/1000][Fireball Jutsu: 367/500]
A translucent status window only visible to him floated before his eyes.Kazuki drew a long breath.
Twelve more hand seals to perfect.The Fireball Jutsu itself still needed significant work.And twelve hand seals wasn't truly twelve times — each set of ten hand seals only counted as one unit of progress.
This window, this system, was his only cheat — no missions, no shop, just a cold, silent proficiency meter.
"Shadow Imitation Technique!"Kazuki pressed on, channeling chakra into the ground.His shadow writhed for a moment, stretching unnaturally — then snapped back to normal.
[Shadow Imitation Technique: 999/1000]
Seeing the near-complete bar, Kazuki's heart thumped.He had no idea what would happen once it maxed out.But whatever it was, it had to be better than staying a disposable background character.
Without the system, Kazuki figured his limit would've been chūnin at best.Which, in the grand scheme of things, was just another faceless corpse swept away during the Fourth Great Ninja War.
"Ten more times."Kazuki inhaled deeply, summoning chakra again and again, stubbornly performing the Shadow Imitation Technique until his chakra was almost dry.
But he didn't stop refining chakra — he stared intently at the system panel.
[Shadow Imitation Technique: 1000/3000][Upgrade Available]
The maximum bar had jumped to 3000, and a new Upgrade Available tag appeared.So he could upgrade his jutsu?
Without hesitation, Kazuki mentally accepted.
[Please choose one of three upgrade options:][Mysteries of Light and Darkness: You gain an exceptional understanding of light and shadow. Your shadow's area will always remain at its maximum possible spread under current conditions.][Splitting Shadow: Your Shadow Imitation Technique can target one additional enemy simultaneously.][Crawling Sacrificial Dance: Forces the captured target to perform a grotesque dance, offering tribute to twisted deities lurking within the shadows — potentially eliciting a response.]
Kazuki blinked, thrown off by the surreal options.His jutsu... could really evolve?
"Mysteries of Light and Darkness..."He pondered the first choice.Nara clan's shadow techniques were already deadly, but their limitation was the fixed total surface area of their shadows.Mastering battlefield conditions and maximizing that area was practically an art form — Shikamaru had demonstrated that perfectly.
Choosing this upgrade could theoretically let him cheat that limit.
But Kazuki frowned.He could train that naturally over time — it wasn't worth burning an upgrade on.
Splitting Shadow, though... controlling multiple targets?Now that was tempting.
His eyes slid down to the third option.
Crawling Sacrificial Dance.
His expression twisted strangely.He remembered that Naruto canon did mention dark gods — after all, Hidan had worshiped Jashin, who granted him immortality.
Could this grotesque dance be linked to something similar?Twisted shadows... a writhing dance...Kazuki's mind whispered a forbidden name: Nyarlathotep.
If it was truly that Outer God...Well, that would be far more interesting.
He wondered idly — would the Otsutsuki Clan fare well against the Eldritch?
"This upgrade doesn't seem very normal," Kazuki muttered to himself. "Would've been better if I could just make my shadow take physical form. That would've had immediate use."
Still, the good news was that he could upgrade other techniques too — even basic hand seals and chakra control could level up, almost like grinding in a video game.
Ultimately, Kazuki chose Crawling Sacrificial Dance.It had the highest potential ceiling... even if the risks were unknown.
Maybe I'll just get myself killed. Worth it.
The moment he confirmed, a strange dance filled his mind — twisted steps and unnatural contortions that seemed absurd, yet weirdly rhythmic.Watching it unfold in his mind's eye, he didn't feel any innate repulsion.Just an awareness: the dance was... wrong.
"Should I try it out?"Kazuki glanced at his clansmen, temptation flickering.
But he restrained himself.Leveling up mattered more now.He couldn't afford to forget: the day Rin died, a certain madman found his "true path" — setting into motion plans to destroy the entire shinobi world and betray even his own master and master's wife.