"What the hell do you mean, 'matchmaking office'…"
Mikami Yuu's mouth twitched, and for a moment he was speechless.
But when he thought about it carefully, it actually did make a weird sort of sense—
Back when Hiruzen laid out a bunch of jutsu and told him to choose, the galgame system had interpreted it as being introduced to potential partners. So now, this place specifically meant for exchanging ninjutsu naturally became Konoha's "matchmaking office," while Mikami Tajima's accumulated merit points became the "membership fee"…
Yeah… following that logic, wouldn't people like Namikaze Minato, the Sannin, and adult Kakashi—those with the richest mission records—basically be the top-tier VIP members here?
No wonder four out of those five were single. So they were all just busy playing galgames with their jutsu…
With that thought, Mikami Yuu didn't answer right away. Instead, he asked the ninja at the "matchmaking office"—ahem, the mission hall—for the current "list" of jutsu he could exchange for.
"Dragon Fire Jutsu: C-rank Fire Release. Hand seals: Snake–Dragon–Rabbit–Tiger. Releases a straight-line flame attack. More effective when used with wire…"
"Flame Bullet: C-rank Fire Release. Converts chakra into a combustible oil-like substance before igniting it…"
"Fired Pottery Technique: C-rank Fire Release…"
"Great Flame Technique: C-rank Fire Release…"
"Blazing Meteor: C-rank Fire Release…"
"Great Dragon Fire Jutsu: B-rank Fire Release…"
It seemed that even though very few Hokage in history were actually famous for Fire Release, Konoha—as the ninja village of the Land of Fire—still had deep reserves of fire-style techniques. But there weren't many truly high-end ones. Forget Dragon Flame Release Song—they didn't even have Fire Dragon Flame Bullet.
Which made sense. This exchange route was mainly meant for civilian genin and low-level chūnin, while the truly top-tier jutsu were mostly passed down through clans and teacher-student lineages.
After weighing things over, Mikami Yuu still ended up exchanging for the same two jutsu he had originally planned on.
Soon enough, he had two brand-new scrolls in hand:
[Ding! Detected high-quality potential romance target: "Dragon Fire Jutsu." Time-limited encounter triggered!]
[Ding! Detected giftable item · limited skin — Great Fireball Jutsu / Dragon Fire Jutsu: Fire Release: Great Dragon Fire Jutsu!]
"Dragon Fire Jutsu" was an old acquaintance.
Back when Hiruzen had first offered him a list of choices, Mikami Yuu had "met" her once already—he had just picked Phoenix Sage Fire instead at the time.
As for Great Dragon Fire…
The moment the system prompt had failed to list it by name, Mikami Yuu had already suspected that it was probably a skin. What he hadn't expected was…
…it was apparently a shared skin for two different jutsu?
Maybe because Great Dragon Fire was basically a hybrid of Great Fireball and Dragon Fire Jutsu, so both of them could use it?
Then again… if it was really a hybrid, shouldn't it count as a daughter or some kind of chimera?
Clearly the galgame system still had some room for improvement in its classification logic…
After muttering a few complaints, Mikami Yuu turned to the more important question:
Since Great Dragon Fire was a shared skin, should he wait until Dragon Fire Jutsu reached 50 affection and unlocked the Gift feature for her? Or should he just give it straight to Great Fireball and unlock the jutsu first?
After a bit of thought, he decided to unlock it first.
After all, getting a jutsu to 50 affection took time. From a practical standpoint, as long as Great Dragon Fire was unlocked, it didn't really matter who unlocked it. Worst case, once he fully understood the theory behind Great Dragon Fire, he could write out another scroll himself and gift it to Dragon Fire Jutsu later.
And if the same skin couldn't be gifted twice, that was fine too. He could make it up to her some other way down the road.
Before long, the galgame text box floated up:
[Great Fireball Jutsu: (Curiously looking over the writing on the scroll) Huh? Is this… a new outfit for me? It looks so pretty! Way prettier than that last "Fire Formation Wall" outfit! It must've cost quite a bit, right?]
"Not really. It wasn't that—"
Mikami Yuu was still mid-reply when Phoenix Sage Fire suddenly popped in:
[Phoenix Sage Fire Jutsu: Wow! It really is a beautiful outfit, and there's even a dragon motif stitched into it… A dragon is the symbol of an emperor!]
[Phoenix Sage Fire Jutsu: Congratulations, Big Sis. You can claim the throne now!]
[Great Fireball Jutsu: Hahahaha! I knew it, I'm the one Mikami-chan loves most! I understand your painstaking devotion now. From now on, any fight Mikami-chan picks, I'll absolutely back him up!]
Mikami Yuu: "…"
He was honestly impressed.
Phoenix Sage Fire having a mischievous personality and saying goofy nonsense was one thing…
But Great Fireball was supposed to be a noble-born heiress, wasn't she? How had she turned into a total gremlin after just a few days? She was even calling herself "this palace" now.
And from past experience, whenever Great Fireball got smug, a certain ill-fated counterpart was sure to show up:
[Great Fireball Jutsu: Clone Technique, how did you know Mikami-chan bought me another new outfit? I've got two now, you know. I can rotate them every day and never repeat~]
[Clone Technique: Tch, don't talk like nobody else has one… Big Sis, I wasn't talking about you.]
[Transformation Technique: …]
Seeing the jutsu start up their bickering again, Mikami Yuu could only cough lightly and calm them down with a few lines like, "You're all my wings," before slipping off to somewhere private and triggering Dragon Fire Jutsu's [Encounter].
He had assumed Dragon Fire Jutsu would be closely related to Great Fireball and Phoenix Sage Fire, but apparently that wasn't the case.
Her personality wasn't as flashy or lively as the other two. She was much more steady and dutiful. A few smooth words from Mikami Yuu were enough to pull her into the romance list, successfully expanding his "harem" to eleven members.
After that, as usual, Mikami Yuu found a moment to test Great Dragon Fire's power.
At the training ground,
he recalled the instructions recorded on the scroll and crossed his hands, fingers flying through the seals:
"Snake—Dragon—Rabbit—Tiger…"
"Fire Release: Great Dragon Fire Jutsu!"
Fwoosh—!
This time, instead of a huge fireball, what burst from his mouth was a twisting dragon-shaped mass of orange-red flames, roaring as it surged forward!
The flaming dragon was five or six meters long, with a fierce head, jagged horns, and rippling claws. Its long tail lashed behind it as it crossed dozens of meters in the blink of an eye and slammed into the cliff face opposite him.
BOOM!!!
Under the impact of the flame dragon, a huge section of rock wall shook violently and exploded apart! Broken stone flew everywhere along with burning sparks, and the searing heat instantly scorched and curled the vegetation within dozens of meters.
A B-rank technique really was terrifying.
Mikami Yuu released the hand seals, closed his eyes, and checked the state of his body.
"The power's decent. It definitely benefited from Heart of Incineration, and it seems to share part of Great Fireball's proficiency too, so it didn't have to be trained from scratch like a brand-new jutsu…
"But there's still room for improvement. That dragon just now wasn't condensed enough. It was too loose, and both speed and accuracy still need work."
"Well, since I'm already here, I might as well practice Phoenix Sage Fire and Dragon Fire too…"
~~~
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