Clones Galore

After their short conversation, Chiyo escorted Yukio to the village entrance to personally bid him farewell. Yukio was carrying a large backpack that held all of his belongings and supplies.

The shinobi and more knowledgeable citizens noticed the pair as they headed towards the village entrance. They were confused at the sight of a boy being escorted by the leader of Suna's Puppet Brigade.

Yukio noticed their confusion and pretended to be confused in return. Chiyo was aware of what was happening around her, but she didn't care. She was keeping an eye on Yukio, watching his every action.

When they arrived at the entrance, Chiyo rubbed Yukio's head as if she was his grandmother, "Be careful, Yukio. If you come across any Suna-nin, hand them this," she gave him a wooden badge that had a symbol engraved onto it.

"I'll make sure to show them the badge, thank you," he thanked her and hid the badge away inside his clothing.

After a couple of words of advice, Yukio left Sunagakure. Chiyo watched him as he traveled farther and farther. Once he was akin to a dot, she turned around and mumbled, "Watch him."

"Yes." An unknown voice responded.

=====

Unknown to them, the Yukio that went out to collect wood was none other than a shadow clone that he called Wood Thief. They had switched places the moment they found an opportunity to do so.

He didn't want to stay out of Suna for an entire month or two. He had other things to do inside the sandy village.

When he made sure that Wood Thief and the suspicious group of people following behind him were far gone, Yukio created more shadow clones, three to be precise:

Clone A - Watcher: This clone's sole purpose was to watch over Sasori and figure out how to persuade him into joining the Akatsuki before he succumbed to the dark side. Not only that, Watcher had to study how the puppets were made since Yukio wanted to try out using puppets one day.

Clone B - Lucky: All it needed to do was to win at gambling. Utilizing [Intermediate Persuasion], Lucky needed to persuade others to make the wrong decisions that would make them lose every time. At the same time, it needed to persuade them to continue playing, continue until their lives were practically ruined.

Clone C - Sleep: Like the Wood Thief Clone had decided, Sleep would create the sleep paralysis demon myth.

It should be noted that despite being clones, they all could access the system to a lesser extent. They could view their status pages and missions, but couldn't use the system's shop. Theoretically, a clone could advance and obtain skills.

Of course, Yukio could've created more clones to grow stronger, earn skills, and advance skills at a faster rate, but he was worried about his chakra capacity. It was best to limit himself for now and increase the number of clones as his chakra increased.

As for what Yukio himself would be doing, he was going to research a new jutsu related to sleeping. Since a clone would disperse once the user was unconscious, he needed a technique that would allow him to gain energy without sleeping.

It wouldn't be good if "Yukio" just suddenly poofed under watchful eyes.

=====

"So… sleepy. I want to… go to sleep. Screw it all." Yukio stammered as he entered a personal dungeon, changed the scenery to a bedroom, and instantly fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow.

Only three days passed since the Fake Yukio had left Sunagakure. Three days of tiresome torture for the real Yukio who had been trying to create a jutsu or something that could keep him awake for an entire month.

In the end, he failed. He chose to go to bed at the cost of potentially ruining his friendly relationship with Chiyo.

'Oh well,' he thought, 'The only one that mattered is Sasori.'

Zzzz…

Yukio fell asleep for a whole day. He had a wonderful dream, even without casting the sweet dreams jutsu on himself.

When he woke up, he stayed in bed for half an hour and then got ready for the day. Since he fell asleep, he needed to create more shadow clones.

Yukio stepped out of the alley he had 'slept' in and was immediately greeted by a surprising sight. In front of him was a familiar figure.

"Yo," greeted Sleep.

*blink blink*

Yukio could only blankly stare at the shadow clone in front of him.

"What the-"

"Surprising isn't it. We all thought the same, the moment you fell asleep, we would disappear. Yet here we- I am, still breathing and kicking."

"That's not right."

"Really? Maybe the saying is 'I'm still living and kicking?' Nah, the sounds worse."

"Not that," Yukio shook his head, "I meant the sleeping thing. Watcher, Lucky, and you should have disappeared the moment I fell asleep. I've been away for an entire day, did you guys talk with each other?"

"Yeah, we came up with a theory. We know that the user must focus to maintain the technique otherwise the clones would just poof away."

"Yeah… Is it because of [Shattered Mind]?"

"We came to a similar conclusion. [Shattered Mind]'s description told us that we have more 'brains' since we have a shattered mind. What if each brain can focus on separate things? The biggest example is us, the shadow clones.

Technically, whenever a user and or their clones are performing tasks that require concentration, they're unable to have more than a few active at a time. Haven't you noticed? You haven't felt any stress or fatigue from having us do so many things at once.

Our big theory here is this: [Shattered Mind] has the hidden effect of allowing us to focus on multiple things at once. Even if the user himself is unconscious. There must be fragments of your brain keeping the link between us active."

"That is a big theory, Sleep. We would need to experiment more to determine if it's correct, though it's highly likely. This is a game-changer. I can sleep while you guys do stuff for me. I can grow stronger just by sleeping." A wide grin appeared on Yukio's face as he imagined himself in a few years.

"Don't forget, since a shadow clone is physically real, we would need sleep too. Currently, Watcher, Lucky, and I have a sleeping schedule going on since my task is at night."

"Right, I should recast the shadow clone jutsu. Hopefully, I gain a substantial amount of chakra the moment I received your experiences. Let's go meet with them."

Sleep nodded his head in understanding and the duo disappeared.