I'm an Uchiha and have Tobirama's talent!

This was a cylindrical underground space, thirty meters tall and a hundred meters in diameter. Aside from the lights on the ceiling and walls, the room was completely empty, it was clearly designed for combat.

"You've been hiding a great spot like this?" Minato exclaimed in delight. "Does this mean I can train here from now on?"

"You wish," Shin replied. "If you want to train here, wait until you've mastered the Flying Thunder God Technique. After that, you can come on your own, bring Kushina along if you like, up to you."

"Alright!" Just imagining being able to train alone with Kushina in such a secluded place made Minato a little excited.

"Let's begin." As Shin's words fell, Minato moved in an instant. With a Body Flicker Technique, he appeared behind Shin and thrust a kunai toward the back of his heart.

"Too slow," Shin shook his head. As he spoke, he had already turned around and caught Minato's arm with a smack of his left hand.

But Minato seemed to have anticipated this. Using the force from Shin's grip, he lunged forward, swinging a punch with his left hand straight at Shin's face.

"Too obvious!" Shin countered by yanking Minato with the same hand and flinging him aside, causing his punch to hit nothing but air.

"You really thought I wouldn't notice you trying to get close using my own arm's force?"

Thrown back, Minato twisted in mid-air and, while retreating, quickly formed a series of hand seals.

"Water Release: Water Severing Wave!"

Upon finishing the seals, a high-pressure jet of water shot from Minato's mouth like a razor-sharp blade, heading straight for Shin.

"Next time, try not shouting your jutsu names." Shin tilted his head and leapt aside, completely dodging the attack.

"Where'd you learn that bad habit?"

But just as he finished speaking, a faint slicing sound came from behind. Another Minato appeared behind Shin, a Rasengan already formed in his right hand, aiming for Shin's back.

"So it was a feint, nice move!"

Shin instantly used the Body Flicker Technique, vanishing from his spot and reappearing to kick Minato in the chest.

But in the next moment, with a poof, Minato turned into a log, it was a substitution. At the same time, the ground beneath Shin collapsed, making him lose his balance and begin to fall.

Almost simultaneously, two more Minato burst out from underground on either side. Each of them had a Rasengan in hand and charged at him, completely blocking all his escape routes.

Both Rasengan struck him from front and back.

Feeling the solid impact of the two Rasengan, Minato was overjoyed, this was the first time he had ever landed a hit on Shin.

As for whether Shin would be hurt, he wasn't worried at all.

Over the past year, his brother had shown an almost monstrous level of durability, he knew he couldn't hurt him.

That was also the level he had been striving to reach. But then, in the next instant, Shin's body exploded, but instead of smoke, it burst into a small, dough-like white lump.

The real Shin reappeared above the two Minato, grabbing each one by the head and slamming them into each other as they crossed paths.

One of them immediately turned into a puff of smoke, while the other fell straight down into the pit below.

Just as he was about to make a snide remark, a loud boom echoed from the pit.

Right above him, a sly-looking little brat had already formed a one-foot-wide Rasengan in his palm, aiming it down at Shin's head.

Shin laughed.

Minato had really grown. Decoys, feints, misdirection, instant jutsu, and traps, he was using them all with precision and finesse.

But… still too green.

Even if Shin wasn't using much of his real power, Minato still wasn't a match for him.

Just as he thought this strike was guaranteed to land, Shin's body, seemingly with no foothold in mid-air, suddenly slid one foot to the side like a ghost.

At the same time, he reached out and tightly grabbed Minato's wrist, stopping the Rasengan dead in its tracks. With his other hand, he tapped Minato's chest with a finger, instantly disrupting his chakra flow.

"You're cheating!" Minato grumbled, dismissing the Rasengan from his hand. "You said you wouldn't use the Flying Thunder God!"

"Who told you that move was the Flying Thunder God? When your control over space reaches a certain level, you can literally step on the void."

As he spoke, he lightly tapped the air with his right foot, and his body shot up over three meters into the air.

The move left Minato stunned, stars practically spinning in his eyes.

"So… doesn't that mean you can fly?"

But Shin shook his head and smiled. "Far from it. You need to condense a large amount of chakra to even get that one step. Right now, I can hover in the air for maybe ten seconds. But I already know the Flying Thunder God, so who needs to fly, right?"

"Exactly! Flying Thunder God is way cooler, you can go wherever you want instantly!" Minato's eyes lit up.

"But you've really been putting in the work these past two months," Shin praised. "Nice progress. Your shadow clones and substitution techniques are getting harder to detect. You're using different chakra nature smoothly, and you're more and more skilled with the Rasengan."

"Hehe..." Minato scratched his head proudly, grinning with a cheerful, innocent look as he said humbly, "It's mostly because you were holding back. You didn't use sensory perception, otherwise, my clones wouldn't have fooled you."

On the surface, he looked like the picture of honest sunshine, but anyone who knew him would tell you he was a sly little schemer, full of tricky tactics.

"What is this place?" Now that the fight was over, he looked around curiously.

"It's beneath my research lab," Shin replied. "I usually use it to test forbidden jutsu."

Then he raised his voice and called into the pitch-black tunnel behind them, "Stop hiding. You've had your fun watching, come on out."

"Huh?"

Hearing that, Minato quickly turned to look down the dark corridor.

"Shin," came Orochimaru's voice as he emerged, "I was just wondering if my improved chakra-concealment technique could slip past your sensing abilities… seems it's still not good enough."

He stepped out of the shadows and walked toward the two.

"If you can bypass his sensory perception," Shin said, pointing at Minato, "that's already impressive."

That meant Orochimaru's latest technique might have been undetectable even to him before his upgrades.

"Hello, Minato. I'm Orochimaru," he greeted warmly. "Shin talks about you often. It's great to finally meet in person."

"Hello, Orochimaru-sama!" Minato replied politely, a little stiff.

"No need to be so formal," Orochimaru said with a smile. "There are no outsiders here."

Shin didn't bother explaining.

Formal?

Yeah right.

That kid was already testing Orochimaru's personality, using formality as a disguise.