Seeing Raihō's conflicted expression, Ryosuke couldn't help but ask:
"You followed all the steps correctly. Still planning to continue?"
Raihō hesitated. Training in the Eight Inner Gates turned out to be much harder than he'd expected. He needed to give it some serious thought.
After a while, he nodded.
"I'll keep going. You succeeded, Ryosuke. I believe I can do it too."
Ryosuke was momentarily stunned. His own success had largely come from his increasingly resilient body, which could endure the pain and recover quickly.
Raihō didn't have that kind of advantage.
Ryosuke looked at him and said,
"Then come back to me once you've mastered the First Gate. I'll teach you the next phase then."
"I'm starting my own training now. If there's nothing else, you can go."
Raihō understood that this was a polite dismissal.
He wasn't upset—after all, Ryosuke had already taught him the Eight Gates Technique.
Just before leaving, he couldn't help but ask,
"So, how many gates have you opened?"
"Four."
Ryosuke didn't hide his progress.
Raihō's face changed.
He wasn't a novice; he understood that unlocking the later gates only got exponentially harder. More difficulty meant more pain.
The thought sent a chill down his spine.
If Ryosuke opened four gates during a fight, and managed to get in close, Raihō knew he'd likely be crushed in an instant.
There was no doubt—Ryosuke Uchiha was a taijutsu genius within the clan.
He needed to report this to Elder Yatsushiro.
As for continuing to train the Eight Gates… maybe some other time.
Not that he was afraid of the pain, of course.
Once Raihō had left, Ryosuke resumed his training. He had just completed 200 push-ups, so next came 200 squats.
After finishing two full rounds of Saitama's "One Punch Man" training regimen, he gained a bonus to his attributes.
Then he returned to his house, took a quick shower to wash off the sweat, and laid back in a chair to rest.
He opened the personal stats panel in his Auto-Cultivation System.
Host: Uchiha Ryosuke
Strength: 135 (turtle-speed training in progress)
Speed: 135 (turtle-speed training in progress)
Endurance: 125 (turtle-speed training in progress)
Mental Energy: 69 (turtle-speed training in progress)
Chakra: 5.4 units (turtle-speed training in progress)
Sharingan: Three Tomoe (turtle-speed training in progress)
Basic Three Techniques: turtle-speed training
Fire Style: Great Fireball Jutsu: turtle-speed training
Eight Inner Gates Technique: Four Gates Unlocked
Overall Evaluation: Half-Kage Level
His strength, speed, and endurance had increased five to six times compared to before.
His overall rating had risen from an ordinary chunin to Half-Kage level.
That likely meant stronger than an elite jonin, but still not quite at the level of a Kage.
Still, Ryosuke felt that rating wasn't entirely accurate. If he used the forbidden Eight Gates, he was confident he could go toe-to-toe with a Kage-level opponent.
Maybe the system hadn't accounted for that.
His spike in mental energy came from his time with Kurenai—and as a result, his chakra had surged too.
Right now, his chakra reserves were more than five times what Kakashi had.
The numbers might not look like much, but that wasn't for lack of trying with Kurenai.
The truth was, Kurenai couldn't handle too much. So after that one intense session, they'd scaled back to once a week.
And those were proper battles each time.
As for the Sharingan—no one dared mock his eyes as weak anymore.
Three Tomoe Sharingan was already considered elite within the Hidden Leaf.
Only those with Mangekyō Sharingan had the right to look down on him.
In just over three months, he had climbed from ordinary chunin to Half-Kage. With the Eight Gates, he could rival a Kage, even if only briefly.
Soon, he could afford to ease up a little.
Give it a few more months, and he might truly become a full-fledged Kage-level shinobi.
At that point, he would no longer fear the Uchiha Clan's fated night of extermination.
He wondered if Itachi had accepted the mental conditioning he'd planted. They hadn't interacted much lately.
But if Itachi still refused to change, still sided with the Hokage—then Ryosuke wouldn't show any mercy.
Meanwhile, that afternoon, Raihō arrived at the Police Force Headquarters and entered Elder Yatsushiro's office.
Pushing open the door, he saw Yatsushiro sitting at his desk, buried in paperwork.
Raihō got straight to the point.
"Elder Yatsushiro, I have something important to report."
Yatsushiro didn't even look up—he recognized Raihō's voice immediately. He continued reading documents, visibly irritated.
The Uchiha Clan oversaw the entire village's security.
They had to settle disputes, arrest criminals, patrol the streets, and maintain law and order.
There was more work than he could handle.
Still, he felt a certain pride—only the Uchiha could run the police force this effectively.
No other faction in any other village, aside from the Hokage's ANBU or Danzo's Root, could do this job.
Raihō, hearing the cold response, spoke urgently.
"This morning, I met with Uchiha Ryosuke."
Before he could say more, Yatsushiro frowned and cut him off.
"Didn't I tell you not to make contact with that guy?"
"He may be strong, but he's dangerous."
The fact that Ryosuke had once proposed wiping out Konoha's leadership—that was more radical than even Uchiha Madara had dared to suggest.
Of course, that was because Madara hadn't had the strength to pull it off.
Even with the entire Uchiha Clan united, they still didn't have the power to do something like that.
A coup to force the Third Hokage to step down? That was doable. After all, the Third wasn't especially strong anymore.
So that option had a decent chance of success.
Raihō quickly responded.
"But Elder, his strength is truly incredible."
Yatsushiro challenged him.
"How strong could he possibly be?"
He'd beaten Raihō—so what? That didn't mean he was stronger than Yatsushiro himself.
Raihō quickly recounted what had happened that morning.
"Elder Yatsushiro, I sparred with him again today. He completely overwhelmed me."
"He didn't even use the Eight Gates, and I had no chance of winning."
"And he told me he's already unlocked four of the Eight Gates."
Yatsushiro froze.
He suddenly had no interest in paperwork. He looked up at Raihō.
If Ryosuke really had that level of power, he wasn't just some elite jonin.
He could be a major combat force in the clan—someone on par with Shisui Uchiha.
Unfortunately, Shisui was clearly in the moderate camp.
And Ryosuke had already unlocked Four Gates?
That didn't add up.
If memory served, Ryosuke had started learning the Eight Gates under Might Guy—and he hadn't even trained for six months yet.
Suspicious, Yatsushiro asked,
"Did you actually see him open four gates?"
Raihō looked confused.
"Elder, I told you—he didn't even use the Eight Gates and still crushed me."
"He taught me the training method, and I tried opening the First Gate… It was already incredibly hard."
"But I don't think Ryosuke would lie about something like that."
Yatsushiro fell silent.
Raihō was right. Ryosuke didn't seem like the type to brag about something like this just for fun.
And he was willing to teach the Eight Gates to fellow clan members—that clearly meant he was still on their side.
"Go back. I'll talk to Ryosuke when I get the chance."
If he could just change Ryosuke's dangerous ideology, the boy would be a major asset.
He decided to finish his paperwork and visit Ryosuke first thing in the morning—to confirm with his own eyes whether Raihō had been telling the truth.
He already knew Ryosuke's habits: every morning, he trained in the grove next to the clan grounds.