While Kenji was massacring samurai in the land of iron the hidden leaf village was receiving their own massacre. The Uchiha clans rising star and prodigy had slaughtered his entire clan in order to test his power.
Hiruzen sat at his desk with a mournful and tired expression. He scanned the many papers on his desk but he was in no mood to address any of them. One did catch his eye though, it was a massage from one of the land of irons high commanders. He talked about how many outposts have been attacked recently and requested the perpetrator be put in the land of fire bingo book.
He fulfilled the request of course. He then sighed as he pondered what kind of man would do such a thing without reason, only a monster, he decided. He almost chuckled, here he was criticizing a man for killing just hours after he sentenced an entire clan to death. It was a good thing his monster had a good reason.
Kenji sat upon a pile of rubble as he ate some well cooked brain right out of a man's skull. He sighed as he looked around the 7th samurai outpost he'd destroyed, his growth was beginning to slow. At first it was great, he grew stronger and more proficient with each raid. Now though, he badly made any progress.
He decided to up the ante a bit, he's only been going after small outposts near the border. Unlike most countries, in the land of iron the strength of their forces grew as you moved deeper into the nation. This was because they had nothing to fear from their neighbors since they were ally's. The harsh weather also made it a bad spot for bandits to set up camp.
Uraume returned from her search of the outpost with a map. It showed all other outpost locations in a large area. One particularly large dot on the map caught his attention. It was the current location of one of the high commanders.
The land of irons army was split into many parts, Its leader is Mifune, the general of the country. Right below him they're were the thirteen high commanders. If Kenji was able to kill one of them he would make a name for himself. If he happened to kill all of them and then cut the head off the snake, then his name would be feared. Kenji, of course, would go for the second option.
Tamura rubbed at his temples as he read through the reports on his desk. He's had a constant headache for what felt like weeks but in reality it was only a few days. Attack have been plaguing the land of irons borders for 4 days, at first Tamura thought it was a new band of bandits moving in. But when one of the survivors of the attacks turned up, he discovered it was much worse than bandits.
As one of the high commanders it was Tamuras duty to protect his country with his life. After the reports he received he was beginning to believe he would have to give his life for his country sooner than he thought. The survivor described the attack force to be only two people. One was a tall man whose skin was stronger than steel and who moved too fast to track.
The other was a white hair woman who seemed subservient to the male, she did not fight so her capability's were unknown. She did, however, say the man's name. This "Sukuna" was trouble, it seemed he was on a war path and was cleaving through Tamuras men like butter. Luckily, or maybe unlucky, his base was next in Sukuna's path. Tamura would put a stop to the man or die trying.
Kenjis first impression of the high commanders base wasn't bad. The samurai were stronger than most of the others. Kenji was just past the front gate when he was confronted by the man of the hour.
"No more need to die here, I challenge you to a duel." He said. He already looked pained at the death of his gate guards and clearly couldn't bear to watch more die if he could do something about it.
Kenji thought it though for a moment before accepting. He wanted to see what the commander could do without interruption. Besides, he could always kill the rest of the samurai after he was done with their commander.
Kenji stepped toward the man, once he was about ten feet from him the soldiers stepped in behind him, forming a circle around the two. Uraume jumped back, landing on the front gate, she pulled out a note book and prepared to take notes on Kenjis fight.
The high commanders wore red samurai armor with a silk vest to show their rank. This one welded a giant spear that was a good bit taller than him. Speaking of, he was about a head taller than Kenji which is saying something, considering Kenji is just short of 7 foot.
One of the high commanders of the army of iron toke up his battle stance while staring him down with a hard gaze. Kenji toke up his own and with no signal needed, they both charged.
Tamura thrust his spear towards the man that made his life hell for the last few days. He aimed right at his chest but before it could make contact the tip was redirected toward the man's feet by his bare forearm, it seemed his resilience was not over exaggerated. After he deflected the spear the man stomped on the head of it, driving it into the ground.
He attempted to run up the spear to close the distance but Tamura push forward and using the grounded spear head for leverage, he shoved Kenji off his spear. Kenji kept up the pressure though and charged head first at the high commander. Tamura met the charge with another thrust of his mighty spear. Kenji redirected it once again instead of down though, he launched it up.
Kenji quickly closed the distance and stabbed forward with an outstretched hand as straight and sharp as a blade. Tamura used the haft of his spear to push the hand up and away, coming out of the exchange with only a nick to his armor. After gaining distance once again Kenji changed at him once more.
Throughout the battle the high commander was like a shield that could fend off any spear attack and the intruder was like a spear that could pierce any shield. After hours of constant battle and many exchanges, the spear came out on top. The aftermath of the duel was decidedly less enjoyable.
Mifune stared at the report in his hands in disbelief. It had been decades since a high commander died in battle. Mifune had heard reports of outposts being attacked near the border but trusted Tamura enough to deal with it. But now that he was die and his base reduced to ash Mifune would have to take this threat much more seriously.
Tamura was able to get some info to Mifune before his base was attacked. He put out an order for Sukuna to be put on the first page of the bingo book and to request the other nations put him in theirs as a A rank at least. Mifune did not know the motives of the man and that troubled him. Surely someone basically going to war with an entire nation by himself would have a good reason, right?
Kenji sat on rock staring at the body of the strongest opponent he's ever faced. Tamura was a very tough nut to crack. Truth be told, Kenji could have ended him much sooner than he did. But he was having too much fun to cut it short. In the many hours Kenji fought him he only used his power for enhancing his physical abilities.
Now that Kenji killed a high commander the land of iron would have to do something about him. They could no longer wait for him to go away or to get killed by one of the outposts he attacked. In short, Kenji had set a fire under their ass.
Now it was Kenjis turn to sit on his ass, If he attacked now only Mifune would give him any real challenge. Kenji would give them time to grow stronger and fortify their defenses. In the mean time it was finally time for Kenji to really figure out how his power worked.
When Kenji first discovered his power he was so focused on weaponizing it, he hadn't actually figured out the specifics. He sent Uraume away, she would keep attacking outposts so Mifune and the other commanders didn't forget about him and the threat he posed to their way of life.
Uraume was pleased by her master's assignment. She would once again get to put some of his teachings to use. But first she would make him a meal. Uraume had found a talent in cooking humans over her time with Sukuna-sama.
After making and delivering her parting meal to her master she left to do his bidding. Uraume has learned much under her master's tutelage and she was disgusted by her previous work. But this time she would make something that would make her master proud.
Uraume was truly glad that her master enjoyed her cooking. She loved traveling with her master, witnessing his art. His way of slaughter was so far beyond hers. Comparing her work to his would be like comparing an anthill to the sky. But Uraume was determined to make that anthill a little taller this night.
Uraume was a failure to herself and, even worse, to her master. She could barely call what she was doing art. It was true that it was an improvement on her previous work but making a pile of shit a little more shiny didn't change the fact that it was a pile of shit. Uraume cleared the area in a fit of rage and embarrassment. She couldn't bear the thought of her master seeing how much of a failure his only student was.
But it was fine, Uraume would just try again. She would keep trying to make her master proud. If she didn't then he would surely get rid of her. While she didn't mind the thought of becoming a piece of her masters art. She thought she would be much more useful to him in life than in death, she would have to save becoming an art piece for later.
Kenji had discovered many things during his training. He already knew that he could shape reality however he wanted. He also knew this power was based off of and fueled by his emotions. What he did not know was that these emotions were not just inside his mind, instead they were in his soul
Kenji found this out when he tried to produce more dopamine in his brain to try to cheat the system. It didn't work as intended, instead it just made him a little loopy for a time.
After some more fucking around he finally deduced it was his soul feeling the emotion and shaping reality. Kenji was happy and disappointed by this discovery. He was disappointed because he couldn't just make more emotions and thus more power and become a god. He was happy about the discovery because it meant the realm of possibility just got a lot larger.
Before this discovery he was cautious about changing the shape of his body, he didn't want to change the shape of his brain by accident and end up killing himself. Another very interesting discovery was what he call trading. Trading was a part of his power that let him trade one thing for another thing of equal value.
For example, he could trade some of his durability and in exchange he would gain a boost in speed. This was a very basic example of trading and was only scraping the surface of the iceberg. One form of trading Kenji found was increasingly the power of his slices in exchange for an increased casting time. This trade came in the form of chanting and hand signs, kinda like what shinobi did. With only one hand sign and a few word he managed to increase the power of his slices ten fold.
Kenji sat in the middle of a grassland and thought of what to improve about his body when he was suddenly set upon. Dozens of samurai came out of the tall grass, blades bare, and ready to attack. Kenji rose calmly and casually, like he was going to get his morning tea.
The samurai didn't give him time to ask questions or to make the first move. Five samurai enclosed on him from different directions, they'd planed their attack it seemed. Kenji sidestepped a thrust before ducking a horizontal slash. He grabbed one of his opponents by the wrists and tossed him at the other. As they tumbled to the ground he was slashed across the back. At least that's what they tried to do, in the end the blade just bounced off his skin like it was a wooden stick.
Kenji formed a hand sign, his index finger, pinky finger, and thumb were bent and touching their counter part on the other hand while his middle and ring fingers were straight and connected at the tips. A second after Kenji made the hand sign the samurai who tried to cut him and two of his friends were split down the middle. Ten more samurai came at him, this time they were a lot more disorganized. Kenji back stepped, this was a good time to test out his new found power.
Kenji was severely outnumbered and he needed something to help with that. Even if he could easily kill each of the on their own when their was many of them all it would take is for number 36 to get a lucky shot and kill him. Kenji could handle them well enough as long as he kept them in his line of sight. But when there were dozens of them that was easier said than done.
Early in Kenjis life he found that the simplest solution was always a good solution even if it wasn't the best. So instead of making some complicated solution like improving his brain so that he could sense chakra better he just gave himself more eyes. In nature animals usually have one of two kinds of eyes. Predators had forward facing eyes, this made it easier to chase prey. Prey had eyes on the sides of the head, making it easier to see incoming predators.
Kenji forced another set of eyes in to being. They were the same size as his other set but slightly below and slightly back. This gave him a much wider field of view and he quickly put it to use.
He ducked a slice coming from a former blind spot. He plunged his hand in to the unlucky samurai. He turned to the samurai that were slowly growing more panicked. He shot them a malicious smile before forming a hand sign.
Kenji sat in the grass land that he'd just turned red. He just got done interrogating one of the samurai. The group was a scouting party that'd been outside of one of the outposts when Kenji destroyed it. Since then they've been following him and looking for an opening to attack. Kenji put his mind from the irrelevant group of weaklings, instead he turned his attention to a more important task.
Ever since Kenji changed his shape he hadn't felt right. It felt like something was missing. Now that he was aware of the feeling of changing his form he found that his old form wasn't complete either. It felt like there was meant to be more to his body than just an extra set of eyes. His pondering was interrupted by the return of Uraume.