Naruto: My Progress in Konoha.

A few days later —

Konohagakure.

ROOT Headquarters.

Inside Danzo's office.

A kneeling ROOT operative reported respectfully,

"Lord Danzo, the report has been confirmed. Two days ago, Uchiha Haruki and Uchiha Shisui successfully reached the front-line camp. The Yuyu Squad has failed their mission."

As he spoke, he handed over a mission report.

Danzo took it, quickly skimmed through the contents, and then flung it to the floor in frustration.

"Useless! A bunch of damn incompetents!"

He had gone to great lengths to ensure this operation's success—deploying a spy who had been deep undercover for years. Half a month prior, he had even deliberately leaked intel about Konoha's support units to Iwagakure, just to gain their trust and cooperation.

And yet—at the critical moment—his men messed it up.

'Those Iwa-nin... useless trash, the lot of them! Such a golden opportunity, and they couldn't even capitalize on it. Pathetic!'

The more he thought about it, the more enraged he became. Finally, he slammed a heavy fist on the desk.

Bang!

The loud noise echoed through the office, but the ROOT ninja maintained his kneeling posture, unmoving.

Once Danzo had calmed slightly, the ninja asked,

"My lord, shall we send another assassination unit?"

Danzo fell into deep thought for a long moment before finally saying,

"No... Let them be for now. Lately, Kumogakure has been mobilizing forces—they're up to something. Your current priority is to keep eyes on them."

"Yes, my lord."

The ninja bowed in acknowledgment.

What Uchiha Haruki didn't know was that he had narrowly escaped another deadly crisis—without even realizing it.

By the time Danzo's attention returned to him again, Haruki would no longer be the type of Chunin who could be taken down by just a few hired blades.

Time passed quickly, and it was now early September.

It had been twenty days since Haruki left the village, and about fifteen days since he arrived at the front lines.

In that time, Haruki had completed a patrol mission and a reinforcement operation, both of which posed little real danger. This meant he'd had plenty of time to continue training.

Thanks to that, several of his abilities had seen substantial improvement.

First and foremost: Body Flicker Technique (Shunshin no Jutsu).

Its level had risen from Lv3 (870/1000) to Lv4 (0/0)—a state of mastery.

Now, he could activate it with just a single hand seal: the "Hitsuji" (Ram) seal.

Moreover, his top speed after activating the technique had increased by about 30% compared to before.

In this state, if he ambushed an average Chunin, unless they were exceptionally alert, they wouldn't even have time to react.

In other words—he now had the ability to one-shot some Chunins.

Secondly, his Genjutsu: Sharingan had also improved.

From Lv2 (420/500), it had now reached Lv3 (120/1000).

As with the previous rank-up, the upgrade boosted both casting speed and illusion power.

This gave Haruki more chances to use it effectively in real combat—a moderate but meaningful boost.

His Konoha-Style Kenjutsu and Uchiha-Style Kenjutsu had also been progressing.

Due to the time spent traveling, training had been slightly delayed, but both styles were nearing a level-up:

Konoha-Style: Lv4 (1910/2000)

Uchiha-Style: Lv4 (1750/2000)

Haruki estimated that within a week, both would level up—and once that happened, he could attempt to merge them.

This fusion could potentially raise his Constitution attribute, which would in turn increase his daily chakra reserves.

That meant more chakra available for practicing the Heart Reflection Technique (映心之术), which would accelerate the evolution of his Sharingan.

Speaking of which, another important skill needed to be mentioned—Chakra Absorption Technique.

With half a month of focused resources, he had leveled it up from Lv1 (1/200) to Lv2 (105/500).

Now, with each use, he could absorb 200 chakra per second from an enemy, converting 60% of it into his own chakra pool.

Over the course of two missions, he had extracted chakra from seven enemies—accumulating roughly 8,000 chakra points.

All of that had been invested into Heart Reflection Technique training, earning him 48 proficiency points, and advancing his Sharingan Evolution by an extra 16 points.

However—it still felt too slow.

Haruki decided that once his sword styles had been upgraded and fused, he would start operating solo when possible, to harvest chakra more freely—and thus accelerate the Sharingan's evolution to its limit.

"Haruki, what are you spacing out for? Let's go!"

A teammate's voice pulled him from his thoughts.

Haruki gave a half-hearted "Nothing," then followed the squad toward the western edge of the main camp.

His next mission: a week-long patrol, primarily to guard against infiltration by Sunagakure squads.

That's right—Suna-nin.

At present, the Land of Rain had effectively been carved into four parts.

Aside from Amegakure still holding the central region, Konoha controlled the entire south, Iwagakure occupied the northeast, and the west belonged to Sunagakure.

Haruki hadn't forgotten his plan to obtain puppet techniques and use them to raise his chakra control. Once back on the battlefield, he'd submitted a request.

After multiple layers of approval, he was finally reassigned to the western front.

From now on, his missions would focus on this region.

This dramatically increased his chances of acquiring the puppet secrets he was after.

But before that, he needed to get familiar with the new enemy.

After all, he had spent the past several months fighting Iwa-nin exclusively.

Now that the opponent had changed, he had to adjust.

Each hidden village had its own unique geography, leadership philosophies, and therefore distinct combat styles and chakra affinities.

Take Iwagakure, for example.

Due to Ōnoki's decision to lower the standards for academy enrollment and graduation, they had an enormous number of shinobi—the largest among the Five Great Nations.

But with quantity came compromise—Iwa-nin had the lowest average combat ability among the five villages.

To compensate, they relied heavily on team-based tactics—their strength was in numbers and cooperation.

On the other hand, Sunagakure sat in a barren desert with scarce resources.

They simply couldn't afford to raise large numbers of ninja.

As a result, Suna had the smallest shinobi population, but the limited resources were highly concentrated—so most of their ninja were elite-level.

Unlike Iwa, Suna-nin excelled at solo combat rather than teamwork.

Fighting enemies like this required completely different strategies.

That was what Haruki meant by "getting to know your enemy."

Time ticked by, and dusk approached.

Finally, Haruki and his team arrived at their designated location.

After completing the handoff with the previous unit stationed there, they officially began their patrol mission.