Chapter 71: Covert Maneuvers

In addition to being unable to use the Kekkei Genkai of the original body, is it also impossible to use the devouring ability granted by the mysterious black bead residing within my soul?

That was the immediate question that came to mind as I, Sato, quickly analyzed the various advantages and inherent limitations of the "Soul Splitting Technique" I had devised.

Creating clones through splitting off portions of one's soul certainly has many intriguing applications compared to more mundane methods like shadow clones or wood clones.

Beyond the baseline spiritualization ability allowing my soul clones to turn ethereal, as long as an enemy lacks specific soul-destroying techniques, even the physical destruction of a possessed clone body will not permanently dispel the split soul - it can simply seek out a new host and continue operating autonomously.

This effective immortality of the split souls is arguably the greatest advantage to this technique, ensuring my soul clones can endure and accomplish tasks that would be suicidal for a normal clone.

Of course, another major benefit is that the soul clone can then extract and accumulate chakra from any body it comes to inhabit.

As I established earlier, the unique sage body this technique granted me is ranked second only to legendary figures like Asura Otsutsuki, Hashirama Senju, and Naruto Uzumaki in terms of sheer life force and baseline chakra capacity.

But that refers specifically to the long-term potential and upper limits of my natural sage body if I can fully develop and maximize its gifts over time. Right now, my sage body is still growing and maturing - I cannot simply start off immediately with power rivaling Asura Otsutsuki in his prime.

Additionally, the various targets I consume through my devouring ability are not directly converted into ready chakra for me to utilize. I must slowly extract and process their life force and energy to integrate it into my own reserves.

This extraction limitation has led to my current usable chakra levels falling well short of what my sage body's full capacity should eventually be. Every extraction I perform feels like opening a dam, yet my needs continue to surpass the rate at which I can refill my coffers.

The exorbitant chakra costs associated with utilizing powerful Wood Style techniques in particular means that even after acquiring this specialized sage body, I still rely heavily on my Devouring ability to sustain myself.

With insufficient chakra reserves for my own needs, it is downright impossible for me to freely share chakra with the collection of souls I have aggregated within my Nirvana dimension space.

Therefore, aside from selectively utilizing my right eye's Nirvana Reincarnation skill, I only intend to tap into my left eye's Nirvana Resurrection of the Dead technique when absolutely necessary for more questionable activities, letting the revived souls take any blame.

But at this stage, I should have no need to resort to exploiting Nirvana Resurrection for the sake of accomplishments I can attribute to myself. That is because these soul clones created via my new Soul Splitting Technique are vastly more convenient to use than wood clones, shadow clones, or even the Second Tsuchikage's advanced splitting techniques.

The only real drawback is that the Kekkei Genkai of my original body and the devouring properties of the black bead cannot be reproduced in the soul clones. However, this is fairly trivial to workaround.

I have already mastered the Flying Thunder God teleportation technique, so it is simple enough for me to instantly jump to any target location where I want to activate my devouring ability, then return.

To facilitate this, I left a Flying Thunder God seal marker directly on my initial soul clone's borrowed body before teleporting back home.

The soul clone then disguised itself as an ordinary traveller using transformation jutsu and began slowly extracting chakra from its host body while embarked on a journey towards the Land of Earth.

In doing so, I have now officially commenced my "Light and Darkness" project within this world.

My original body shall remain safely within the Leaf Village, dedicated to developing my long-term sage body and Mangekyo Sharingan power, working diligently toward my ultimate goals step-by-step.

Meanwhile, this mobile soul clone will serve as my covert dark hand - tasked with helping close the remaining gaps in my sage body's progression, while also obtaining new battle resources like bloodline limits and Six Paths abilities through any means necessary.

By delegating the most dangerous and questionable tasks to this expendable soul fragment, even if it were to somehow draw the attention of the Otsutsuki clan or Sage of Six Paths himself, my true origin body will remain unaffected.

When the time finally comes that my physical body has attained sufficient might to contend with the likes of the Six Paths level entities, I will be ready to openly compete with those mighty aliens and demigods over the fate of this world. But until then I must build up my forces carefully in the shadows.

The first critical stop for this roaming soul clone is to infiltrate the Hidden Stone Village and find a chance to covertly possess the body of the legendary Second Tsuchikage, Muu.

While powerful in its own right, Tobirama's current body lacks any inherited Kekkei Genkai abilities. And my brother Hashirama's iconic Wood Style techniques are simply far too conspicuous and attention-grabbing for keeping a low profile, making both poor candidates for hosting this scheme.

On the other hand, the Second Tsuchikage's signature Particle Style, cutting-edge Splitting Technique, and other unique skills make his form ideal for my purposes.

By taking over Muu's form, this soul clone will be capable of utilizing all of my original body's techniques excluding Kekkei Genkai, on top of the full scope of Second Hokage Tobirama's own sizeable arsenal.

Such a fusion of two legendary undead shinobi would be disgustingly powerful. Even elite Kage-level opponents would find themselves severely challenged and frustrated by the combined immortality, stealth, versatility, and raw technique options possessed by this hybrid copy.

Indeed, if I had to face off against such an adversary in open combat with my current means, it would likely prove extremely troublesome, even for myself. Truly an ideal vessel to advance my hidden agenda from the shadows.

Along the journey toward the Land of Earth, the soul clone took care to covertly ambush and detain various roaming shinobi it encountered, restraining them with sealing techniques borrowed from the Uzumaki clan's deep knowledge.

I would then promptly teleport to the scene upon receiving the clone's summons in order to personally devour the captured victims, not only replenishing my own soul energy but allowing me to directly enhance the clone by splitting off more of the amplified soul essence.

This cycle has enabled the soul clone's usable chakra reserves and overall soul strength to rapidly scale up with each feeding. If it continues at this accelerating pace, achieving Kage tier benchmarks should be imminent.

Of course, raw amounts of chakra and soul energy do not directly equate to substantive gains in combat capability - that requires skillful application. With its current reserves, the soul clone would still struggle to unleash more than a single Particle Style: Atomic Dismantling technique before needing extensive recovery time.

Still, that alone could easily overwhelm and obliterate most non-Kekkei Genkai shinobi who lacked intimate knowledge of particle nature transformations.

After just one week of alternating travel and cunning ambushes across the landscape, the soul clone finally closed in on the boundaries of the Hidden Stone Village itself.

Naturally, I took care to once again manifest at the critical moment, spiriting away Tobirama's body to safety within my Nirvana dimension before reabsorbing the reinforced soul clone directly back into my being, filtration through the black bead's pocket dimension to purge any impurities.

While an admittedly eccentric habit, I have found myself developing a certain penchant for cleanliness when handling clones and foreign chakra sources. Best to tidy them up before returning to my soul wholecloth.

With preparations complete, I then relied on my Wood Transformation and transparency techniques to stealthily infiltrate the very heart of the Hidden Stone Village unseen, beginning my search for the legendary Second Tsuchikage himself. Wherever he may be hiding at present, I will find him soon enough...