Story 10: Chapter 2: Learning (Patreon)

Drawn to Power

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Chapter 2: Learning

______________________________________________________________________

- Tatsuya -

I huffed on my knees from exhaustion from my training.

It had been three months since Kimetsu no Yaiba had become a weekly.

I had already prepared over half the chapters and kept them in reserve so workload was easier. Moreover this training also helped increase my training, concentration, dexterity, strength and stamina.

All this helped me create manga much faster so it was actually a loop.

Suddenly, I got a notification.

Upgrade Quest Completed: I am here

Became a known name in the Manga World

Sell Two hundred Thousand copies of your manga. (200,000/200,000)

Reward: D Rank System Update, Gacha Ticket x 2 

Finally, I was waiting for this for a long time now.

The Gacha Tickets were hard to get. I could only get those through Upgrade Quests. If there were other methods, I didn’t know any for now.

I could have started drawing the second manga six months ago but I had limited slots of the manga I could draw at one time so I chose to wait for the D Rank update which would give me another two Gacha Tickets.

With this, I could roll three mangas and choose the best two among three.

It was not like I could get the second manga slot at Shonen Jump so quickly so I had the time to wait.

I opened my Status window.

Name: Tatsuya Ikuse 

System Rank: D

Body:(F-11)

Mind:(G-86)

Spirit:(G-78)

Magic:(G-20)

Points: 380,598 

Manga: Demon Slayer

Features Unlocked: Training Room, Mentor System

Inventory: Gacha Ticket x3, Nichirin Blade x 1

Shop

Mentor System?

I will check that out later.

First I took out the three tickets from my inventory and activated them.

A wheel spun in front of me.

When it stopped, a name appeared on the counter it was pointing at.

One Piece.

….

….

….

….

Hell yeah!

I got one of the big three.

Encouraged by this, I used the second ticket.

The wheel spun again as the second name appeared.

Love Hina….

No.

No thanks.

I used the last ticket and the wheel spun for the last time.

Please don’t be a bad one.

Please don’t be a bad one.

I prayed with my eyes closed.

When the wheel stopped, I opened my eyes and saw the name and couldn’t help but cheer.

Naruto!

“I am gonna be the king of mangakas… dattebayo.”

I quickly set the two mangas in the second and third slots so that I could start drawing both and unlocking the abilities.

Maybe start with Naruto first and get a Shadow Clone.

Chakra will make things so much easier when mastered.

With joy, I quickly changed the Training Room into a hot spring and cleaned myself off before leaving.

I couldn’t stay here for too long or grandma would worry.

Maybe I can go out for longer periods of time when I learn Shadow Clones?

Yes.

Naruto needs to be started first.

I came back home to see a guest at home. It was a familiar figure.

Sae Toujou was a neighbour and the daughter of a family friend of the Ikuse family.

She was the same age as Tobio and was very good friends with him.

In fact, I think my little brother had a crush on the girl.

It was so much fun to tease them.

They were sitting at the dinner table, eating.

“I’m back.” I shouted before joining them. “Oh, sandwiches, awesome. I’m starving.” I really was.

“Wash your hands first, Tatsu.” Grandma said and I quickly did just that before taking a seat at the dinner table.

“Oh! These are very good.”

“Right. Sai-chan made these.” Grandma said, throwing a smile at the blushing girl.

I caught the signal Grandma had sent my way and a smirk appeared at the corner of my lips.

“Really! That’s awesome, Sae-chan. I wish I could eat your cooking everyday. Alright… it’s decided. You can marry Tobi when you’re older. Then I can eat all the sandwiches I want. How is my idea, Grandma?”

“Oh my! That does sound amazing. After all, I am growing old too. I wouldn’t mind seeing a few great grandkids before I pass away.”

The girl’s blush was atomic while Tobi’s chopsticks fell from his hands and his mouth was still open.

“Wha… what are you both talking about?!”

“What? You don’t want to marry Sae-chan? In that case I wouldn’t mind.”

“I didn’t sa… I mean stop embarrassing her, Nii-san!”

I couldn’t hold it in seeing his flustered look and the slip of tongue and burst out laughing. Grandma chuckled too and the two understood we were pulling their legs.

The atmosphere was very harmonious.

_________________________________x____________________________________

“Here’s the chapter for this week.” I handed the chapter to Koji-san. “Do you have any suggestions?”

“Hmm. Let me check. Everyone was hyped up for this chapter. You left everyone hanging with the Akaza vs Rengoku fight. The ratings for Kimetsu no Yaiba are through the roof….” He spoke as he read the chapter. Suddenly his words stopped. “Tatsuya-kun… this is not what I think it is, right?”

“About Rengoku?” I asked, without turning back and continuing to work on the next chapter.

“Yes… about Rengoku. Did you read the Character Popularity Polls I had given you?”

“Hmm, not really.”

“Well you should. This guy was one of the top ten most liked characters in your manga.”

“Oh… that’s sad, I guess.”

“Maybe you should change it. If you want him out of the plot, there are several ways to do so. Have him be in a comatose state or lose his ability to fight… or….”

“Koji-san.” I interrupted.

“Hmm?”

“People die.”

….

He was going to say something but I didn’t give him a chance.

“Good people too.”

Whatever he was about to say was swallowed back.

I let out a sigh. “Don’t worry. His death will not be in vain. It is necessary for the plot. If there are people complaining, ask them to send questions. I will select a few and answer some of them if I can.” I offered a compromise here.

“Alright. I will.”

“Great. Now I have heard that your grandmother was talking about attending a school with a good art program. Unfortunately there are no Junior High Schools nearby which can do so. There is the Ryoukuu High School nearby which has a good art program and a budding manga club. That said, a little distance away in Ukiyo E town in Tokyo, there is the Sobo Junior High which has a very good art program. You can join it if you want.” He advised.

“I see. I will talk to grandma and inform you. How far is it?”

“It will take you around an hour and half minutes or so each day by bus, although if you want, I could get you a car and a driver.”

“No. I am just an ordinary Middle School student, Koji-san. I don’t want too much attention on me. I will take the train.”

“Alright. As you wish. By the way, we are expecting a reprint of the seventh volume of Kimetsu no Yaiba. Congratulations. At this rate, you will be reaching half a million copies soon. Selling half a million before entering Junior High… seriously, you are something else. I am sure Hiroshi-senpai would have been proud. Knowing him, he would be bragging to everyone he could.”

….

I looked down at the table quietly.

“Don’t be sad, Tatsu-kun. Today is, after all, your birthday. Cheer up.”

Yes. It was my birthday.

A year had passed since Kimetsu no Yaiba became a weekly at Shounen Jump and nine months since I got the One Piece and Naruto Manga.

I had spent a majority of these nine months drawing Naruto and One Piece. As for Demon Slayers, I had over 100 unpublished chapters and only 20 or so chapters before completion.

After Koji-san left, I decided to take a break.

Shuri-san and Akeno had come to our home to celebrate my birthday. They were out to take Grandma to get some check ups done and then do the shopping for tonight’s party.

Tobi had gone with them too and I was left alone because Koji-san was coming to meet me so right now, there was no one else in the house.

All of them will be back by evening.

I had several hours in my hand so I decided to get some training done.

I entered the Training Room.

Status.

Name: Tatsuya Ikuse 

System Rank: D

Body:(F-81)

Mind:(F-56)

Spirit:(F-28)

Magic:(G-28)

Points: 1,280,598 

Manga: Demon Slayer, One Piece, Naruto

Features Unlocked: Training Room, Mentor System

Inventory: Nichirin Blade x 1, 

Shop

The Mentor System was a very amazing feature that I had unlocked in the last upgrade.

It basically allowed me to summon any character from the chapters I had drawn and had read by at least one other person.

They would teach me anything I wanted to learn from them. Although whether I could learn from them or not depends totally on me.

That means I couldn’t learn something like say, the Sharingan Genjutsu if I had no Sharingan. I would need to buy them first.

Also the speed of learning was totally based on my own talent. So I could learn something far more easily than the characters of the manga or I might not be able to learn anything at all.

The price of using the Mentor System for one day was ten thousand points and only one teacher per day.

It was a bit expensive but having a teacher does help a lot. I mean there were many things I couldn’t just buy from the System Shop.

I summoned the teacher I wanted for today.

Ten thousand points were deducted from my System as a figure manifested before my eyes. He had tan-skin and had grey hair, and a small goatee.

Hiruzen Sarutobi.

I had summoned him to teach me the basics of chakra use and control.

He was not the only teacher I learned from. Sometimes I summon Yoriichi Tsugikuni to learn Sun Breathing and swordsmanship.

As for Sarutobi, I could take as many exercises from him as I needed and then master it over time on my own.

I wanted to push myself till I was able to make at least one Shadow Clone first.

Chakra training was actually a bit easier due to my experience with Total Concentration Breathing which involved both meditation and physical strengthening.

I had chakra reserves of a Genin with just three months of training. I wished to train to control my chakra a bit before I bought the Uzumaki Bloodline or maybe Senju Bloodline to bolster my chakra reserves even more.

Sarutobi had tons of basics of fighting and survival tips to teach me.

This guy was without any special bloodline or without any special technique and yet managed to become such a strong Shinobi, it was due to his hard work and talent.

Moreover, he was an extremely great teacher.

He not only taught me about Chakra and Chakra Control, but also Taijutsu and bits of Ninjutsu.

I am planning to get a Sharingan to learn faster from him.

The Naruto world had too many things to get. The only problem I was having right now was points. The D Rank stuff is priced in the hundreds of thousands.

I needed to get one more manga published to get more points.

I guess I would have to ask Koji-san after I complete more chapters of Naruto.

_________________________________x____________________________________

“Happy Birthday!”

Everyone wished me a happy birthday while I cut the cake. There weren’t many people present.

Grandma, Tobi, Shuri-san and Akeno, Sae and her parents and Koji-san.

“A very happy birthday to you, Tatsu-kun.” Shuri-san greeted me and gave me a haori.

“Happy Birthday, Onii-chan.” Behind her Akeno held up what looked like a good luck charm as my birthday gift.

“Did you make it yourself?” I asked and she nodded. “That’s awesome. Thank you.”

Grandma and Tobi got me a bicycle.

When it was Koji-san’s turn, he gave me a new professional manga drawing kit.

“Koji-san.”

“Hmm?”

“Can I ask you for something?” I smiled.

“Eh? Ask me? Sure, go on.”

“Hold here a minute.” I ran to my room and brought out the Naruto One Shot and handed it to him.

“What’s this?” He took it with a raised eyebrow.

“Nii-san, is that?” Tobi began to speak but I signalled him to stop. He was the one who read all my manga so that I could unlock the new items in the System Shop.

Koji-san took the file, unsure and opened it.

“Naruto. You made another manga?”

I nodded and he took a look.

“This is… really good.” He said as he continued reading.

“Right, right?”

 Finally setting the file aside, he crossed his arms. “So you want to have this published.”

I nodded.

“The Chief.”

“I have over one hundred advanced chapters of Kimetsu no Yaiba, which is already near completion and thirty chapters of this one completed. Also, have I ever missed out on the deadline?” Actually I had over fifty of Naruto and One Piece but I was not going to tell him that.

He let out a sigh. “It’s not about that. You are very talented, Tatsu-kun. None of us wants you to overwork yourself. Moreover, don’t you have classes? What if you lag behind in your studies.”

“Nii-san is very smart, you know. He is at the top of his class.” Tobi chimed in from my side. “He even helps me with my studies.”

The man looked at me, surprised. “Seriously?”

“Actually, I am at the top of my entire year.” I smiled.

He just stared at me dumbfoundedly for a minute and then let out a sigh. “I will talk to the chief.”

“Yay!” Tobi cheered and I smiled too.

Finally.

The rest of the party was amazing.

I was mostly happy that I could get another manga for publishing.

________________________________x_____________________________________

I looked at the children bustling around me. Everyone was excited to be in the new school, among new people. Some not too much.

I agreed to come to an arts focused school so that I could improve my drawing skills and this school had good art clubs who participated in several competitions and had great records.

I didn’t exactly need it but Grandma said that I should always try to learn new things and it didn’t exactly hurt trying. Koji-san was also very insistent and both of them pushed me here.

The main reason I agreed was because I could stay at a private dorm here. The journey wasted a lot of time in which I could work so after some consultations, I agreed to stay in the dorms.

Here, they provided food and lodging and separate rooms for each student. Obviously it was very expensive but money was not an issue for me.

Mom and Dad had left me a sizable inheritance, not to mention my own earnings. I never had any shortages of money.

I took this so that I could concentrate more on my training.

Tobi however was quite sad so I promised him to return home on the weekends.

“... that’s because we are going to have a quiz about youkai.”

A sudden comment drew my attention and I looked at the speaker.

Kiyotsugu, the School Council President.

Yeah, a school president in the first year was a surprise but not so much when you know what his family does.

His father is a big businessman and one of the major shareholders of the school as well as a member of the school board. The same goes for his aunt, and uncle. His grandfather was the former mayor. So basically a very influential family.

That said, he was not completely without credit. He could be quite forceful but always persuades people to work as he wants. In short, he got the work done.

If I had to find a flaw, I would say it was his obsession with youkai. The guy was a fanatic. Too bad he hadn’t seen a real youkai or he wouldn’t be. Then again, I am one to talk. Despite being from a clan of onmyoji for a decade, I had never seen a youkai either but the stories I had heard from the people of the clan, even Shizuka, I’d rather not encounter them.

Yes.

Even till now, I hadn’t encountered any nonhuman Supernaturals in this world. Sometimes it made me wonder how they looked but the very next second, my dad’s dead body’s image would flash before my eyes and all my curiosity went down the drain. He was killed by human cultists but… youkai were apparently even worse.

Coming back to Kiyotsugu, the people he was talking with were all his friends from what I know, they had been friends from elementary school.

Kana Ienaga, Jiro Shima, Saori Maki, Natsumi Torii and Rikuo Nura.

It was the last guy who gave me an odd feeling.

I had picked up bits of aura sensing while training under Yoriichi and somehow Rikuo had an aura far above a normal person’s.

His aura was different too, a bit darker than normal people.

He must be someone associated with the Supernatural, maybe an onmyoji or something seeing how enthusiastic he was about all this youkai stuff? But then again, that was mainly Kiyotsugu. Anyways, I wanted nothing to do with them. That's why I kept a distance from them and whatever foolishness they were up to.

I had something more important to look forward to today.

Koji-san had convinced the Chief to let me enter another Treasure competition with Naruto and today was the result.

I brought my manga out from my bag and looked at the polls for last week.

“Oh! Is that the jump from this week?” I suddenly heard a voice from behind me and looked back to see another figure.

Shinohira, another girl from our class.

“Yes.” I nodded.

“Heh! Ikuse, are you an Otaku?” She said teasingly.

“I like manga. I want to be a mangaka someday.” I replied evenly.

I already was one though.

“A mangaka? Yes, you were in the art club, right. Good good.”

This short conversation attracted the attention of many people in the room, even the ones I didn’t want to.

“Really? You want to be a mangaka, Ikuse? Man that’s a surprise. I have heard that you were the top of your year in your last school. I would have thought you would try other jobs. Anyways, what manga do you like?” Jiro Shima, a person from the ‘To Avoid’ group asked me.

“Hmm… I…”

“I like Kimetsu no Yaiba. It’s awesome.”

“Exactly. I like Giyu Tomioka . He’s so cool.”

“I… think Shinobu Kocho looks cute.”

“The best style however has to be Thunder Breathing.”

“Right right. Thunder Breathing First Form: Thunderclap and Flash… zoom.”

And just like that the whole classroom erupted in discussions about manga.

The scene would be quite different if this were a high school. This was still a period where Otaku were looked down upon among people above a certain age. Oh, that didn’t do anything to reduce the numbers of readers. They were still rising but it would take some time for the information age to set in and this industry to truly become a mega giant.

“Still, I didn’t like it when Rengoku died.”

It was a very odd feeling.

I wondered what they would do if they knew I was the one drawing the manga.

“Well, that only means these demons are just that strong. I mean he did fight against one of the strongest ones.”

“But still…”

“I wonder what the author is planning next. I really want someone to bash Akaza's face.” Jiro said with gritted teeth.

“Say Ikuse, would you like to join us for the special youkai quiz? It could help you out when thinking of ideas for a manga.” Kiyotsugu put an arm around my shoulder and asked.

“Ah… I would like to but I have to do homework and I also have some classes and…” I made up some excuses and avoided them.

“Eh, that’s too bad. Join us next time.”

“Hahahaha yeah, sure.”

With that the day passed by somehow.

_________________________________x____________________________________

Inside the training room, today I wanted to buy the bloodlines from the Naruto world. I had finally drawn the Chunin Exam chapter where Hashirama appears for the first time and the Senju Bloodline was finally available after Tobi read it today.

Along with it was the Wood Style Bloodline.

So I had three options.

Uzumaki for Chakra, Senju for Physique and Uchiha for Sharingan.

I noticed that Sharingan can be purchased without having the Uchiha bloodline but it would make me a Kakashi and I wouldn’t be able to use the power of the Sharingan fully.

First one I chose was the Senju Bloodline.

Stronger body would give me assistance with my swordsmanship too… and last but not the least, the Wood Style.

Wood Manipulation was a skill only mastered by the Kushihashi Clan’s Seiryu host.

I wonder how their faces would be if they found out someone else could use Wood Style, even better than them?

A vial containing a red liquid appeared in front of me when I purchased the bloodline.

So, I had to drink it?

I opened the vial’s cork and gulped down the liquid.

As the liquid went down my throat, a warm sensation flowed through my body. It was comfortable enough to make me moan.

Name: Tatsuya Ikuse 

System Rank: D

Body:(F-99)

Mind:(F-56)

Spirit:(F-29)

Magic:(G-28)

Points: 1,089,225 

Manga: Demon Slayer, One Piece, Naruto

Features Unlocked: Training Room, Mentor System

Inventory: Nichirin Blade x 1, 

Shop

I checked my status and saw that my Body Stat had increased by almost 15 points. I clenched and could feel the increased strength as well as vitality in my body. My Chakra had risen by a lot too. It was almost double.

I decided to train for a week first and get used to my new body before buying the other bloodlines and to do so, I had just the teacher in mind.

“Summon Tobirama Senju.”

The guy who taught Hiruzen Sarutobi and probably the best jutsu creator in the whole Naruto world.

_________________________________x____________________________________

A month had passed since the day I got my Senju Bloodline.

During this time, I bought other bloodlines one by one at every week’s interval.

The Uzumaki Bloodline didn’t give me as much gain as the Senju one but still pushed my Body to the E Rank and my Chakra reserves went up by another fold. Yes, it doubled… again.

I now had Special Jonin level chakra all of a sudden.

Seriously, these bloodlines are such utter cheats. I could understand why these three Clans were so much stronger than the other ones.

Last but not the least came the Uchiha Bloodline, which was quite different from the previous two.

It didn’t affect my body but rather my Spirit and gave me a twenty points increase in my spirit. There was also a slight increase in chakra but it felt as if the quality of my chakra was increasing as time went by. It was more potent.

Just these three bloodlines saved me months of training to increase my stats.

I also noticed that my strength increased faster now. The stat gain rate which had slowed down previously had become a bit faster.

It might have been due to the fact that I was growing older now, entering puberty and it was the best time for my body to grow, but the effect of the bloodline was without a doubt undeniable.

Not to mention, fucking Tobirama Senju was a beast. That guy put me through the grinder. I mean it wasn’t as if the others that I summoned were easy but this guy was the most brutal one yet.

Today was the day I was planning to get a Sharingan as I had assimilated the Uchiha Bloodline finally.

I took a deep breath and bought the Sharingan, my points going down as another vial appeared in front of me.

This time however, unlike the previous times, it was a green one. 

I was already familiar with the process by now so I drank the liquid directly.

A warm sensation enveloped my eyes and the scene around me suddenly became more well defined.

I looked at the fan spinning above me and they felt as if they had slowed down as I concentrated. I was able to see the designs in the blades of the fan too.

I quickly manipulated the Training Room to summon a mirror in front of me and looked at my reflection.

Red Eyes with one Tomoe in each eye. Apart from that, I felt a slight increase in Chakra too.

I had bought the One Tomoe Sharingan and I could either train or buy each step to evolve them.

I checked my stats again.

Name: Tatsuya Ikuse 

System Rank: D

Body:(E-05)

Mind:(F-62)

Spirit:(F-58)

Magic:(G-32)

Points: 591,282 

Manga: Demon Slayer, One Piece, Naruto

Features Unlocked: Training Room, Mentor System

Inventory: Nichirin Blade x 1 

Shop

Another increase in Spirit and Chakra. So, Sharingan opening increased Chakra too. Good.

Let’s see what else it can do.

For today’s mentor, I selected a newly unlocked character… Itachi Uchiha.

After all, Madara was hundreds of chapters away and Itachi was second only to Madara in terms of his Sharingan Mastery.

- Tobio -

“Nii-san, are you sure this is good?” He asked.

Tatsu-nii looked at him and corrected his posture. “Yes. Spin and slash.” He said as he demonstrated the move.

Hinokami Kagura or as Tobio knew it, Sun Breathing.

He wondered how he was stuck practising it all of a sudden.

It started when their teacher at the school had told them about a cultural competition where they had to give performances. It could be anything from poems, songs to dances.

Some of his friends had given his name for a dance without telling him and before he could deny anything, even his teacher left the room.

He was thinking about taking his name out but Sae-chan said she was looking forward to his performance and he hesitated to take back his name and now he was stuck with it.

Tobio had no idea what to do.

He didn’t know any dances.

That’s when his Nii-san came back home from his dorms so Tobio decided to ask him for help.

Although very few people knew this, Nii-san was a genius who had made not one but two manga.

He was also always the top of his year and extremely smart.

That’s why Tobio thought he could offer him some advice. But for the life of him, he was not expecting this.

This was a thing from one of his manga so then why did he know how to do this?

Did he create it?

“Nii-san… are you sure this… dance is okay? They won’t make fun of me, right?” he asked, hesitantly.

“Don’t worry. No one is going to make fun of you. I will even get you Tanjiro’s clothes which he wore while doing the dance and you will look super cute.”

“Eh…”

“Tatsu is right, Tobi. The Dance looks wonderful. I didn’t expect Tatsu to be able to create such a beautiful dance too. It reminds me of the dance that my birth family members used to do in rituals to offer their prayers to the Goddess Amaterasu. I think this one is even more beautiful.” Grandma said from the side. “Can you show me the full dance, Tatsu?”

“Yes, Grandma.” With that Nii-san took a cardboard sword and began dancing.

He noticed that there were no hesitations in his movements, and all his cuts were sharp. It was almost as if he was wielding a real sword.

Tobio wasn’t sure but it felt as if waves of flames were emerging around him whenever he spun or slashed the cardboard sword. The whole scene was stunning when he saw it from an outsider’s perspective.

A while later, he finished the dance and bowed.

“See… this is how it's done. Do you think anyone will make fun of it?”

Tobio shook his head dumbly.

“Then what are you waiting for? Take the stance. I will train you for the entire month.”

“Yes.”

They both took the pose and spun around to do the first dance movement.

- Koji Yoshida -

He watched as the chief read the first chapter of ‘Naruto’.

The oneshot had been a massive success, winning Tatsuya his second award.

Then again, with the current popularity of Demon Slayer, anything that Tatsuya wrote would attract a crowd and a Shounen Manga based on shinobi like Naruto were always good ideas among teenagers.

In ordinary cases, the serialisation was a done deal if it had been someone else but… Tatsuya was not just an ordinary someone.

The chief kept down the manga and looked at him. “You want to submit this for serialisation.”

He nodded. “It has too much potential not to.”

“You could always wait for a few years, until he is older to submit this. I am sure it will be well received even after that. Working on two manga would put undue stress on the boy. Kimetsu no Yaiba is one of the top running manga right now. If he picks another one, especially one with such potential, there is a chance that he would ruin both.”

“Umm… about that… he has already finished drawing Kimetsu no Yaiba. That’s why he started working on the new idea.”

….

“Huh?”

“Tatsuya-kun has completed two hundred chapters of Kimetsu no Yaiba. He has already drawn the ending of the story. That was the main reason I am asking for this one to be serialised. By the time Demon Slayer ends, it will pick up speed.”

“Does he want Demon Slayer to end in just two hundred chapters?”

“He said that while he could drag the story more, it would reduce the quality of the work. He will not compromise on that. Naruto would make up for everything.”

“He is twelve, right?” The chief asked.

Koji nodded.

“How does he do all this? What about his own life, his studies. He will likely hamper his life if he gives so much time to manga at this age.”

His face took on a helpless look.

“Tatsuya-kun is at the top of his year at school. He has been the top of his year, every year since he started his schooling. Even the Junior High he goes to has offered him a full scholarship to have him.”

He saw the chief’s mouth open in disbelief. “You are kidding me, right?”

“I could show you all the certificates.”

The man let out a sigh. “Alright, grant him this spot. We will print the first chapter in next week’s Jump.”

Koji quickly bowed. “Thank you, boss.”

He quickly went out and informed Heshi-san about the change.

“Seriously, boss allowed that?” Heishi-san asked, surprised too.

“Yes. For next week’s Jump.” He nodded.

“Eh, which Manga is getting the slot for next week’s Jump?” Yamahisa asked, peeking from his seat.

“Naruto.”

“What! Kishibe-sensei got another slot? But isn’t he doing Demon Slayer too?”

“He will be doing both.” Koji smirked. After all, Koji was the editor of Rohan Kishibe.

- Tatsuya -

“Kai!” I released a burst of chakra, breaking through the Genjutsu and jumped aside right in time to dodge a barrage of kunai… just for a pair of hands to come up from the ground I had landed at and pull me in.

I took my sword and thrust it directly at my feet.

The hand was struck but it exploded instead, throwing me to the side.

“Aghhhhhh!” I shouted as the pain from my injured leg came roaring in and found a kunai in front of my eye.

I looked at the blank face of the guy staring at me with his three tomoe Sharingan and dropped my Kunai and a moment later, he removed his own.

“Where did I go wrong?” I asked.

“Think about it yourself.”

“I broke the genjutsu properly this time, even the second layer.”

“And I had faith that you would. That’s why I won.”

“Huh?”

He sat down while I used the training room to heal my injuries.

“You have habits. One of the most prominent ones is avoiding any attacks that you can.”

I looked at him questioningly and he explained.

“I knew you would be able to escape from the genjutsu. That's why I sent a Shadow Clone under the ground with the Headhunter Jutsu in the time it took you to break through the genjutsu. After you broke, I threw the kunai to make you dodge in the direction I wanted. I took the sword in your hand in consideration and changed my Shadow Clone to a Shadow Clone Explosion Jutsu.”

I thought over his analysis and asked finally. “What should I have done differently?”

“You have to change yourself.”

“What?”

“You have a tendency to avoid confrontation. I understand the wish to do so but when you enter combat, do it with full conviction. You could have parried the kunai with your sword, deflected them and headed straight for me. It would have been easy for you with the Sharingan… but you didn’t. You chose the safest route and while that’s not bad, in fact, being able to choose the safest route in the heat of combat is a talent in itself, it is what makes you predictable. There was also the fact that you didn’t use the aura sensing that you have. Learn to use it while in combat.”

I looked at the waterfall in front of me and he continued.

“Don’t be upset. You have to consider the difference in our current levels. In the time it took you to break the genjutsu, I could have put a hole through your head instead of using the Shadow Clone Explosion jutsu and the Headhunter jutsu. You lost the moment you took that long to break them. If you want to win against me, learn how to not get caught in a genjutsu first.”

….

“So the problem was my strength.”

“Most of it, yes. I know your wish to live a peaceful life. Believe me, I do too. But….in this world or any, only the strong have the option of choosing nonviolence. There is always the way of not resisting but are you the type to just lay over and let others kill you?”

“...I see. Thank you for clearing things out for me.”

“Good. We are going to repeat this training one hundred times more before the day ends.”

“One hundred! We only have eight hours.”

“That’s four hundred and eighty minutes. That’s more than four minutes for every fight. I promise I will keep it shorter than that.”

….bastard.

_________________________________x____________________________________

I lay down on my bed.

Although all fatigue and injuries were removed by the Training Room, training like that took a great toll on the mind.

Itachi’s method of teaching was through live combat.

He would teach me something, let me understand it well enough to be able to do it myself and then he put me through combat, repeatedly to help me hone that skill.

It also made me realise that just knowing something didn’t make you stronger. You have to know how to incorporate it in different situations.

With Itachi’s sense of combat, even if I bought the Flying Thunder God, he would likely predict where I would appear and plant a landmine there in advance….the guy was just that frightening.

But it also meant that my combat experience was rising every moment.

Against him, I was getting one or two stat points, almost everyday in Body, Mind and Spirit.

Body and Mind stats increased due to the constant stress of combat while my Spirit was being tempered by the constant Genjutsu attacks and trying to break it.

He didn’t allow me to replenish my chakra using the Training Room until I was on the verge of fainting from Chakra Exhaustion. The guy even had the balls to tell me to completely exhaust my chakra and experience what dying would feel like so that I could increase the power of my Sharingan in that moment of stress.

It was crazy. A good idea….but crazy.

I might just do it once.

I had tried using Shadow Clones for drawing manga but the thing is, I still didn’t have enough chakra. Oh my Chakra growth was insane. I was already a Jonin level in terms of chakra alone but it wasn’t enough to sustain the long term use of Shadow Clones.

The feedback from the Shadow Clones was insane.

I now understand why only someone like Naruto could do such training.

Normal people would have their brains fried by that.

I had tried using the Shadow Clones for an extended period of time. In fact, I kept only three of those active for eight hours inside the Training Room and drew manga.

I could do so due to constantly replenishing my chakra using the Training Room.

It was hard. Drawing a manga requires a lot of concentration and is a stressful job. Keeping the clones active required even more attention since they did have minds of their own and their thoughts could stray.

But the real problem came when they were dispelled. It was the day, I found a loophole in the Training Room’s healing function.

If the user becomes brain dead….they only get healed at the end of the day when the Training Room’s time is up.

I woke up after 6 hours that day and have never used a Shadow Clone for that kind of thing. The worst part was that all the manga drawn inside the Training Room disappeared as well.

Apparently I couldn’t abuse the Training Room’s regen to work. It should only be for training.

Talk about being petty.

That was one of the reasons why I was putting myself through this training under Itachi. It increases the mind and spirit stat to help me handle more information.

Multi Shadow Clones were rightfully a forbidden jutsu. Even ten minutes from each clone could add up to hours of time and that is an extremely large amount of information for someone.

At this moment, I heard my phone ring and forced myself to pick up.

“Yes Koji-san?”

It was my editor who informed me that Naruto will be coming up in next week’s Jump.

I smiled at this good news.

_________________________________x____________________________________

I entered my class that day and Jiro, who was already in the classroom, came running to me. In his hands was a manga.

“Ikuse, did you see this? Kishibe-sensei released a new manga. It’s about Shinobi.” He opened the first page and showed me.

“Yes. It was published as a oneshot a while ago. It even won the Treasure Award for this year.”

“Really?! I didn't know that. Do you think he will continue Kimetsu no Yaiba?”

“I don't see why not.”

“Man, that's a relief. Still, Naruto is awesome. He had a youkai sealed inside him. A nine tailed fox at that. Aren't they supposed to be the strongest kinds of youkai?”

“Indeed. Nine Tailed foxes are known as living natural disasters. They are among the top youkai out there.” And there he was. Kiyotsugu appeared as soon as the word youkai was uttered. Did he have some kind of sensor?

And with that they jumped into discussion about different youkai.

“That reminds me, Ikuse, we are going to look for youkai in the old school building tonight. According to the information I have found out, it’s a prime hotspot of youkai in this town. You are invited.”

….

I was too tired to even deadpan at them.

“Youkai! Are there really youkai in the old school building?” I asked, pretending to be afraid.

I observed from the corner of my eye that Rikuo was also getting nervous too.

“Obviously. My information is without a doubt. There are youkai in the old school building without a doubt.”

“Ehhhhhhhh! I think I will pass. I am very scared of these kinds of things.”

“What! Don’t be a wus, Ikuse.”

“Don’t wanna.” I denied.

“But why! This is a once in a lifetime chance.”

“For what? Getting killed?”

“Oh, nothing will happen.” He tried to reassure me.

“Alright tell me something.” I tried to reason.

“What? Do you have any questions about youkai? If so, then you have come to the right person.”

No.

I don’t know much about youkai but the information I have come from actual credible sources and they conflict with more than half the things you say. So I doubt that you are the right person.

“Okay, then tell me what you plan to do if you do find a youkai in the old school building?”

“Hmm I will obviously prove that youkai exist.”

“Yes… and what next?”

“I…”

“Well you have thought of nothing about it. Then tell me what if you meet some dangerous youkai? What do you plan to do then?”

With each of my questions the look on his face became bleak.

“Ikuse-kun is right.” Rikuo quickly intervened. “There could be something dangerous in the building.”

“Exactly. Even if there are no youkai, the building has been abandoned for a long time and it might have some parts in disrepair and even be home to snakes or other poisonous insects. You could get injured if you go there, especially at night.”

The guy looked at me open mouthed. “You… have given me a lot to think about. Next time, I shall prepare for all these situations as well.”

….so you are not giving up at all?

As long as you don’t drag me in, I have no problem.

_________________________________x____________________________________

I couldn’t sleep at night.

Constant training and work was taking its toll on my mind so I decided to take a break.

I decided to walk around on the roof of my dorm. It had a great view of the surrounding area and was a nice place where I could sit down and chill.

Sitting on the corner of the roof, I thought of how to increase the sales of manga. If I put forward another manga, they would begin to doubt me.

And Naruto is a very long series. It would take over a decade to be fully published.

I needed to find a way around this problem.

But how….

Hmm.

Maybe if I couldn’t publish One Piece under another identity.

But making the documents and a fake identity was not easy. I didn’t even know how to get those.

That’s something I needed to find out on my own.

Once I could do that, all I needed was Henge and I could easily make another identity.

Now where do I begin?

As I was thinking of this, I saw a group of people, students to be exact, going towards the school.

I had enhanced senses and seeing something like that was easy.

It took me no effort to recognise who they were.

Those idiots.

Were they really going towards that place?

That fool was generally wrong about most things he said about youkai but one thing he was likely not wrong about was the old school building.

At first I didn’t know about it either but as my senses became sharper, especially after I gained my Sharingan, I could feel the wrongness from the building.

It was an instinct of sorts, coming from the training I have had under Yoriichi and others.

Although I didn’t know what, there was something very wrong with that building.

And now these fools wanted to go there….at night.

What should I do?

Dammit….I really didn’t want to get involved in all this mess.

Suddenly, I had an idea.

I didn’t need to get involved….at least not directly.

I quickly created a shadow clone and it used henge before rushing down the building to follow the group.

As for me, I went back to my home and locked myself in.

If there is indeed something and the clone has to bail them out, I had ordered it to break that Kiyotsugu fucker’s legs so that he cannot go to these expeditions again.

If the clone gets killed by someone, I am leaving the school and going back home.

Some might call this cowardice.

I call it the sense of self preservation.

- Shadow Clone -

He jumped on a tree near the building and checked the group from outside.

The sharingan was helpful in such situations but he didn’t have the privilege of using it as it would consume chakra quickly and he might need to fight someone.

The only thing he could do from now was sense auras… and damn, the boss wasn’t wrong about the building.

Up close it was as if a den of demons of some kind.

Boss had even summoned Kokushibo as a mentor once to understand how a demon felt and the feeling was not pleasant at all, and this building was giving him a similar kind of feeling.

Suddenly he saw something strange inside the building.

The guy whom the boss suspected to be related to some supernatural, an onmyoji or something similar encountered one of those dark auras… stared at it for a moment and then turned and diverted his friends in another direction.

Over the next few minutes, he saw the guy trying his best to divert the attention of his friends from any place that might have those auras, which he was becoming more and more sure were youkai.

It was when they headed towards the biggest aura in the place that he decided to take a closer look.

Most of the other auras were not bloodthirsty. Some were even harmless.

That one however…

And sure enough he heard a loud sound of glass shattering and a shriek from Ienaga.

It took him less than a second to reach there and he saw what seemed to be a huge grasshopper about to attack Rikuo and Ienaga.

Almost instantly, his hands moved as he shouted at the top of his lungs.

“GET DOWN!”

The two turned back and instantly jumped to the ground.

Chakra churned inside his body as he put everything in the attack.

Fire Style: Great Fireball Jutsu!

A large ball of fire went towards that grasshopper, completely incinerating it into ashes.

That was the last thing that he saw before his chakra was completely consumed and he was dispelled.

- Tatsuya -

Dammit!

There were actually youkai in that building.

And sure enough Rikuo was someone related to the Supernatural.

He was actually keeping them away from danger but those fools were too excited to have any self preservation.

Too bad my Shadow Clone popped before breaking that fucker’s legs.

But the most important thing was there are youkai near my school.

They hadn’t attacked anyone… before this but still, this was the first time I had seen one.

I knew that I wasn’t strong enough yet.

The pressure I had felt from Nobuhiro Kusihashi that day… was far more than what I had felt from that grasshopper. 

That means, there were stronger beings out there.

I needed to increase my training.

I needed to get stronger.

________________________________x_____________________________________________________________________x_____________________________________

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Author’s Note:

Another chapter of ‘Drawn to Power’ is up.

Tatsuya has weird luck.

The more he avoids trouble, the more he goes towards trouble.

At least he had good teachers.

I wanted to write this from a completely blind to the DxD perspective because having canon knowledge would just make most things a speed run.

This makes things funnier.

Anyways, we will see more of the story in the next chapter.

The next chapters will be SAO and Isekai Restaurant.

Enjoy the new chapter.

Good Day, Peace Out.