Points—this thing could only be gained by decomposing word tags.
Izayoi had known that ever since he was three years old.
At that time, in order to reasonably appear near the Hyūga clan, he had made friends with a bunch of kids and played ninja games with them.
Because he was too popular, he attracted the jealousy of his peers and had gotten into fights with some kids.
Among those kids, there were a few who had white-colored word tags like "Ninja Aptitude."
After those tags dropped, the system prompt sounded again: Fusion or Decomposition.
Upon decomposing those tags, Izayoi received 25 points. Decomposing each white tag gave a random amount of single-digit points.
Now, decomposing a purple tag had given him a four-digit point reward in one go.
He could even upgrade blue tags now.
"So, how many points does it take to upgrade a blue word tag?"
Izayoi was very curious and couldn't help but tap the plus sign behind his "Chakra Control" tag.
Immediately, his panel changed again:
[Host: Izayoi]
[Innate Tags: Ōtsutsuki Bloodline (Red), Super-Kage Aptitude (Gold), Kekkei Genkai · Byakugan (Purple), All-Attribute Physique (Purple), Chakra Control (Purple), Medical Genius (Blue)]
[Points: 793]
The "Chakra Control" tag had changed from blue to purple.
Meanwhile, the plus sign behind "Medical Genius" had disappeared.
And his points had decreased by 999.
"Word tag levels are divided into: White, Green, Blue, Purple, Gold, Red. Decomposing a white tag gives a random single-digit point reward; decomposing a purple tag gives a four-digit point reward. And upgrading a blue tag requires a high triple-digit number—are these upgrade costs random or fixed?"
Izayoi muttered to himself, "If it's fixed by power of 10 nines, then wouldn't that mean:
White to Green = 9 points;
Green to Blue = 99 points;
Blue to Purple = 999 points;
Purple to Gold = 9999 points;
Gold to Red = 99999 points;
Red to the next unknown level = 999999 points?"
Izayoi didn't know. He didn't even have any lower-grade tags below blue now, nor did he have enough points to test it.
Even if he had extra points, he wouldn't waste them on upgrading low-level tags.
Except for unique ones like Byakugan and Chakra Control, Izayoi had no intention of upgrading anything below red tier.
As long as he awakened the Tenseigan, he would have a slew of dimension-crushing techniques.
If developed to the extreme, it would even grant him powers on the level of the Sage of Six Paths.
Just a pair of eyes would be enough for Izayoi to make it through all the way to the final battle in the Shippuden arc.
Rather than wasting points on trash tags, it was better to save them for upgrading the Ōtsutsuki bloodline.
If that bloodline was upgraded again, its purity would surely match that of the extraterrestrial Ōtsutsuki clan.
By then, it might even lead to the awakening of other colored Rinnegan variants, or powers like Karma and divine arts.
Of course, this was all speculation, and it was still a bit early for Izayoi.
The date changed to September 1st.
The second semester at the Ninja Academy began.
This semester, Izayoi finally started attending in person—but only for the afternoon classes.
The second semester still had cultural studies in the morning, but in the afternoon, along with physical education and shuriken-throwing practice, a new course was added: Taijutsu Duels.
Unfortunately, for these duels, Iruka Umino used random pairing, and Izayoi wasn't matched with Naruto Uzumaki, Sasuke Uchiha, or even Hinata.
"Iruka-sensei, can I request a match against Sasuke?"
When he heard it was random pairings, Izayoi went to Iruka to try and request a fight against Sasuke.
Iruka hesitated for a moment, then shook his head.
"Taijutsu duels don't allow special requests. The whole point is to teach you that the enemies you meet may be evenly matched, stronger, or weaker."
"You need to adapt to fighting on equal ground, to crushing or being crushed… You'll grow from tough battles, feel a sense of accomplishment from victories, and learn bitterness from defeats."
"I understand, Iruka-sensei."
Seeing that Iruka didn't agree, Izayoi didn't push the matter.
He planned to challenge Sasuke after school instead.
But after school, Sasuke's reply made Izayoi twitch at the corners of his mouth.
"Sasuke, want to spar with me?"
"Sorry, I'm not interested. I'm going home to train."
Sasuke—who wasn't yet the avenger—wasn't as cold as in the original story, but still rejected Izayoi's invitation without hesitation and ran off home with anticipation on his face.
After the Nine-Tails' attack, the Uchiha clan had been suspected of being behind it, and had to move their compound from the central streets to near the Naka River.
Without having mastered the Body Flicker Technique yet, Sasuke had quite a walk from the academy to his home.
Right now, all he wanted was to go train with his big brother and had no time to waste on Izayoi.
Before Izayoi even had the chance to provoke the Uchiha clan or bait Sasuke into fighting, the guy was already gone.
Izayoi could only sigh.
He didn't go challenge Naruto either.
Though the ranking test for the top student hadn't happened yet, Naruto's first semester results were already at the bottom of the class.
Even the worst students knew how to read the word "chakra."
Only Naruto could still misread it even after graduating, which spoke volumes about his cultural scores—basically blank or filled in randomly, just like the Chūnin Exams.
With his body also slightly malnourished, his physical scores weren't even average.
As a top student, if Izayoi suddenly challenged someone like Naruto, it would likely attract the attention of the Anbu—or worse, of Hiruzen Sarutobi and Danzo Shimura, who were always keeping an eye on Naruto.
The former was one thing, but the latter might start suspecting that Izayoi knew something, or that he was sent by someone to get close to Naruto.
To avoid unexpected complications, they might even take certain actions.
That would put Izayoi in a very difficult situation.
And that wasn't what he wanted.
So for now, Izayoi's targets were only Hinata and Sasuke.
Having been rejected by Sasuke, Izayoi didn't pester him further.
It was already September of Konoha Year 54, and in just three months, the year would be over.
Next year was the infamous massacre of the Uchiha clan by the filial big brother.
At that point, the newly born avenger Sasuke definitely wouldn't refuse a fight anymore.
So the next day, Izayoi continued to attend afternoon classes in person, but didn't request a match with Sasuke or challenge him after class.
Sure, getting matched with Sasuke or Naruto would've been great.
But the other classmates weren't bad either.
This batch of students included not just the two future saviors of the ninja world, but also the next-gen Ino–Shika–Chō trio and the sensory team.
Every one of them had at least a white tag, the minimum ninja qualification.
Each one could drop tags—white ones, even—and even those could yield a few points upon decomposition.
As for the Nine Rookie stars, they likely had blue, purple, or even gold or red tags.
Any drop from them would be a huge windfall.
Since Izayoi wasn't sure if shadow clones could generate tag drops, there was no way he was going to skip the afternoon classes.