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On the other side of the wooden bridge, the three children collapsed to the ground.

The bridge was barely thirty meters long, but it had taken them nearly half an hour to cross. Among them, Konan, being the weakest, would never have made it across if Akio hadn't subtly helped her along with a bit of gravitational manipulation.

"As expected, the rumors were true. Numbweed can affect even jōnin," Akio remarked. Both Nagato and Kushina were barely considered jōnin-level now.

"A direct touch—even I can feel its effects. This stuff needs to be stored properly," he added, carefully plucking the numbweed vines wrapped around the bridge's ropes. Now that he'd adapted to it, further contact no longer affected him.

After personally sealing all the numbweed into a scroll, Akio walked back toward the three children with satisfaction.

"How are you feeling? Recovered a bit?" he asked with a smile. "This was a good learning experience. If someone ever uses numbweed against you in the future, at least you'll know what to expect."

Nagato and Konan quickly nodded, while Kushina sighed helplessly. Seeing Akio seal away the numbweed made her uneasy—she could already sense what was coming in future training.

Akio examined their condition and narrowed his eyes slightly. "Take another ten minutes to rest. After that, we move on."

"Sensei, there should be some live salamanders in the stream here. Shouldn't we catch a few?" Konan asked curiously.

Akio froze. "Live salamanders? Wait… they're really salamanders? I thought that name referred to some herb. What are live salamanders used for?"

"They're an ingredient in soldier pills..."

Akio's face twisted in mild disgust, and he muttered internally, Good thing I've never eaten one... That's kind of gross. The Akimichi clan really can stomach anything.

"If they're alive, we'll come back and catch them later. For now, let's check out this area marked on the map—'Hell Swamp.' What a menacing name."

Konan hesitated but didn't mention that they could just collect dead ones instead. She wasn't exactly a fan of salamanders either.

After resting for about fifteen minutes, the three children had mostly recovered. Though still a bit stiff, they could walk without issue.

Roughly two kilometers later, they arrived at the area labeled "Hell Swamp."

"It's a cave?" Akio frowned and led the group inside.

The cave wasn't too deep—less than a hundred meters in, they reached a shallow depression where a swamp had formed.

"It's said that the mud here is highly effective on blade wounds. Let's collect some," Akio said, but just as he finished speaking, several blue gas jets erupted from the ground ahead.

"What the…" Akio's face filled with surprise. After over a hundred years in the shinobi world, this was his first time seeing something like this—gas.

He immediately stopped Nagato and Konan from stepping forward and frowned deeply.

Gas could be quite toxic. Even Akio wasn't confident he could inhale a few breaths without getting poisoned.

Normally, gas should be colorless and odorless. The fact that it appeared blue meant it was impure, possibly flammable or even explosive.

After a moment's thought, Akio smiled and gave the kids a brief lesson on gas properties—not because he was withholding knowledge, but because he genuinely didn't know much more than that.

"This will be your second training task: find a way to collect that swamp mud. Be careful!"

With that, Akio retreated a few meters and watched as the children put their heads together.

Nagato made the first attempt, using Multi Shadow Clone Jutsu to test the way forward. Although most clones were "lost in action," one finally made it to the edge of the swamp—only to be dissolved by the corrosive mud before it could celebrate.

Akio blinked in surprise. "That stuff is this corrosive? How's it used for healing wounds? Was Hiruzen pulling my leg?"

He later reasoned that it probably required some sort of special preparation before use. For a moment, he was even tempted to put skill points into pharmacology.

"No… better not. Skill points are hard to come by."

Next, the kids figured out the pattern of the gas jets. Again, Nagato sent in shadow clones, and this time one successfully crossed and used a sealing scroll to gather some of the mud. However…

The ground suddenly trembled. A massive creature burst from beneath the swamp and swallowed the shadow clone—and the sealing scroll—whole.

Akio blinked, not surprised by the creature's appearance (he had sensed it earlier), but by what it looked like.

"That's gotta be the ancestor of all salamanders," he muttered, twitching at the corners of his mouth.

"Well, here's your third training task—go capture that salamander ancestor and bring it back to sell to Konoha. It should fetch a good price."

Akio's tone was light, but the creature was nearly the size of Gamabunta. Fighting it in the middle of toxic gas and swampy terrain was far from easy. The kids had to rely on Wind Release techniques just to blow away the gas while dealing with a near-indestructible summon beast.

"This won't do," Akio frowned and stepped forward. "Forget the gas—I'll handle it. Just focus on beating the hell out of that oversized salamander!"

Freed from having to manage the environment, the three kids finally unleashed their full strength.

Compared to when they set out to sea, Nagato and Konan had made considerable progress. And now, with Kushina in the mix, they were able to make the tough-skinned beast bleed under their combined assault.

Sensing things weren't going its way, the "Salamander Ancestor" tried to burrow back underground—but it nearly cried from the effort. Akio had quietly reinforced the ground using Earth Release.

"I'll take you all with me!"

That's the dramatic line Akio imagined it saying… but clearly, the creature didn't have that kind of backbone.

It tried to escape, not daring to prolong the fight. After enduring several jutsu head-on, it turned and bolted for the cave entrance—only to be kicked back inside by Akio.

Ten minutes later, after a very one-sided battle, it finally gave up its life.

Just as the children were catching their breath, Akio called out, "Hurry and collect some more mud! The cave's going to collapse in two minutes!"

The battle had already destabilized the cave—unlike Ryūchi Cave, this one wasn't naturally sturdy. It was only Akio's repulsive force keeping it from collapsing sooner.

They had barely sealed up the swamp mud when the cave started crumbling, from the inside out.

"Run!" Akio shouted—and then vanished.

The three kids froze for half a second before sprinting out of the cave.

It was like a scene from a crime thriller—the moment they cleared each section, it collapsed behind them. Finally, the trio dove out of the cave entrance, which immediately caved in entirely, burying the swamp in a cloud of dust that left them covered head to toe in ash and grime.

Akio strolled up to the still-prone kids, grinning cheerfully, dragging behind him the enormous salamander he had somehow managed to haul out.

"Well done. This training trip was a perfect success."

Kushina's face was smeared with dirt as she gritted her teeth and raised her head. "Great-Grandpa… I just want to know… how did the cave collapse outward, layer by layer, like that?"

Akio chuckled to himself. "Hmm, good question… I'll have to check some geology books when we get back. I'm not entirely sure."

"Eh? Even Sensei doesn't know?"

Thud!

Nagato's voice of surprise was cut off by a solid bonk to the head—from a thoroughly exasperated Kushina.

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