Chapter 3 - Completion of the Mechanical Clock

"Alright, channel my chakra to the soles of my feet and walk up."

Standing before a tree, Kagami was focused as he channeled a bit of chakra to his feet. Then under the gaze of his grandfather and his semi-teacher, he took a couple steps on the tree. Only to have the tree crack underneath his foot.

"Three steps. Not bad for a first attempt." Minato said.

Two months flew by for Kagami since first met Minato. For slightly unknown reasons, Minato had taken a liking to him. So when he wasn't rushing around the battlefields, he would teach Kagami basic skills. One of which was how to use his chakra and chakra control. While the other was fuinjutsu.

Did this make him strong, a little bit, but did this make him outpace others his age and the ability to beat up others villages and top powerhouses? No, since clans usually begin similar training for their children around this age.

Kagami adjusted himself once more before trying again. He roughly calculated what he assumed to be the amount of chakra needed and tried once more. Thus, walking up the tree about eight steps before he missed calculation due to happiness and cracked the tree again.

--

While Kagami continued to practice tree walking. Minato walked away with Taiyō since there was no real reason to stay and watch. Pulling out a scroll from his pocket, Minato passed it to Taiyō.

"I am being sent to the front and probably won't be back for a while once again. So can I ask you to look after my house again." Minato said. "I also left training instructions in this scroll for him."

Taking the scroll from Minato's hands, Taiyō nodded as he tucked the scroll away. It wasn't a big deal to watch over Minato house and it could count as payment for tutoring Kagami. Well, even if he didn't tutor, it would still be the same.

"Be careful, Minato. I know you've been studying the Flying Thunder God Technique, but even Tobirama who invented it died despite having it." Taiyō said.

"Err, how did you know?" Minato asked since very few knew about him studying it.

Taiyō just stared at Minato dumbfounded wondering why such a smart guy IQ suddenly went offline. However, he just shook his head since clearly Minato underestimated Kagami. The boy since seeing the notes for the technique has been reverse engineering and recreating it.

While Kagami was slowly succeeding bit by bit. Taiyō, who has been silently watching, guessed in a few years, he will see Kagami using it to some degree. Since, he knew Minato accidentally peaked Kagami interest and once that happens it is just a rabbit hole.

"Well, don't worry about that, just be careful. I'm very optimistic about you." Taiyō stated ending the conversation much to a confused Minato.

--

After a week since Minato returned to action, Kagami had mastered tree walking and much to his grandfather's amusement water walking. It was much more troublesome than the show let on to learn, but in the end he learned it.

However, after completing today's training, Kagami was finishing up his mechanical clock. Yep, the mechanical clock he had started two months ago was now nearing completion. The clock had nearly two thousand moving pieces inside and not only displayed time to a near perfect degree, it was in the shape of a grandfather clock. The cogs and moving parts could be seen through the transparent front.

Naturally, it was far more complex than it needed to be, but it had satisfied his goal. A goal to have fun and if his bright smile was to go by. Then it was safe to say it succeeded.

"If you don't want to be a shinobi, I say you will become a world famous clock maker." Taiyō joked as he sat in his chair.

"I don't want to be a clockmaker, nor a shinobi. Sadly, though I have to become one otherwise I can't study chakra." Kagami sighed. "Chakra can be used for more than just killing each other I believe, but to study chakra, one must become a shinobi."

While this statement wasn't true, it wasn't false either. In order to study chakra in depth, Kagami knew he must become a shinobi. If he starts learning various jutsu, chakra natures, kekkei genkais and many other things. He knew that the Hokage would either forcefully recruit him or silence him just because if his knowledge leaked it could greatly harm the village.

Imagine if he managed to discover a way for non kekkei genkais users to use or at least mimic elemental kekkei genkais to a degree. Now imagine if another village took it and successfully implemented it into their village. Take a Sunagakure for example, what if a puppet user suddenly busted out ice release or boil release. It would spell bad news and now what happens if one learns wood release?

Naturally as a reincarnator, Kagami was interested in wood release and aimed to use it to some degree. He had a few theories for it and naturally set it as one of the goals to achieve in the future. Just he didn't know how far in the future and he had no plans of implanting Hashirama Cells into himself. First it was unreliable, incredibly deadly, and he didn't fancy having another man's face on his body.

Now, would this stop him from actually studying Hashirama Cells? No, they were interesting since they are still kicking despite him dying decades ago. However, that was also in the far future as he neither had them, a laboratory, knowledge nor equipment to fully research them yet. Hence much like kekkei genkai research, this goal was for the future.

For what his current goal was? Kagami decided to just learn the basics skills a shinobi needed as well study chakra control and five basic elements. He wasn't in a huge rush as he knew his goals of researching the limits of chakra and elemental kekkei genkais would take a while to achieve.

Breaking him out of his thoughts, Taiyō suddenly spoke. "In a few days I will take you to meet my friend. His granddaughter is around your age and fairly talented. Maybe she can be your rival in the future."

Kagami sighed as he didn't want to go. Instead he was more interested in going to the junkyard to collect more metal parts to craft something new again.