We're Not So Different, You and I

(Well if we learn one body blow together we could literally breeze through that!)

Sakaiza noted the smiling of Ashie as she executed the tenketsu needle successfully. This time she had done so in a complete, full motion. Her chakra had been amplified and her speed complimented it accordingly. It felt like a correctly performed tenketsu needle, not much that Sakaiza could critique on this time. He stood there feeling the sting of the blow and was proud. To be honest at this point the feeling of another tenketsu needle being performed on him was rather satisfying. His sealed tenketsu seemed to be growing on him, as it slightly humbled him. It let Sakaiza know he wasn't as powerful as what he thought, but the fact that he did not feel the pain behind it let him know that he was tougher than what he thought.

Waiting for Ashie's response to his question, Sakaiza already anticipated that she knew the right answer. It seemed as if she took a liking to his modified stance and thus would likely use it in the future. Because of this, Sakaiza speculated that the meaning behind the stance would resonate more with her since she could take comfort in it. And as he speculated, she proved his theories correct. She let out the right answer, responding that reaction was the purpose of his stance. With his high speed and high reaction time, the stance was perfect for countering and defending against any incoming taijutsu and many ninjutsu. Sakaiza just hoped that Ashie could see this style for its true potential.

"I'm glad you remembered. So with all offense comes defense, therefore many jutsu can be used as both. This next jutsu I will teach you is one of them, which is where my reactive stance will come in handy. Are you ready?" he questioned, knowing Ashie's answer would likely be a yes. 

When she would nod her head, Sakaiza would immediately pivot his left foot and rotate his body around his pivoted foot at an extremely high speed. As he did, his chakra was exerted from out of his body creating a large, rotating chakra shield. 

After this quick demonstration was finished, he stopped rotating and once again quizzed Ashie, "Now Ashie, I want you to tell me everything that I did during that technique. I want you to tell me how it could be both offensive and defensive. And I want you to try it on your own. It's called the Palms Revolving Heaven jutsu."


(WC: 408)

(I just want to note that I didn't hit you again Saka o-o and how would it work, If I already had 2000 words already towards the Body Blow, would I have to do another 1000 more since you're helping me learn instead of another 2000???)

She smiled feeling proud of her correct answer, she bounced on the balls of her feet in excitement. He was going to show her another technique?! Wow, he was very helpful. She nodded her head ready to observe. As he took his stance he rotated, slow at first and then quickly picked up speed. It was the first time she saw anything like that, it was beautiful, her eyes were wide like dinner plates and sparkling with the beauty of the technique itself. She didn't know what it was, he spun around and some sort of shield? It was so fast, she assumed it was made out of chakra, but how she wasn't sure. She hadn't read much of her mother's scrolls. She blushed unable to answer his question,

"E-erh, it looked like you spun and created a shield around you made of chakra?" It was the best answer she could give, hopefully he would elaborate further about what he really did. It looked cool, it looked like it would not just protect you but do a fair amount of damage if you touched it. Was it sort of like that other move she was trying to learn yesterday? Was he pushing his chakra out of his tenketsu and rotating it with his body? That was another strong possibility, she waited for his explanation nervously.

(225)

(Well I don't know one body blow at all, so if anything you can say that you had begun learning a technique the other day but you had yet to perfect it. So in this topic you could perfect it by doing the remaining 2000 words and Sakaiza could learn it in the process too, but at a slower rate. So that way we both learn it, but you would likely learn it first unless I'm feeling like randomly cranking out a 4000 word post lol)

As he circled his body in place, he could note the expression upon Ashie's face in the process. She seemed stunned, yet also amused. Such excitement brought a smile to Sakaiza's face but was quickly replaced by a frown. He felt as if she had been denied a part of her heritage by just now seeing this technique for the first time. It was just like how he felt when he had taught himself the technique from some old scrolls that his mother wrote. But he did not expect Ashie to feel this way, perhaps she didn't feel as strongly as he did about not knowing the full extents of the Hyuuga Clan. He also had to take into consideration that she was an Uchiha too, so she would likely see this demonstration as nothing more than an opportunity to learn a new jutsu. But this was fine with Sakaiza. 

Upon the end of his demonstration, he folded his arms and asked his temporary pupil to regurgitate the technique to him verbally. As she began to describe it, she seemed to have the general principle of the jutsu down. She was right, partially. It was a shield made of spinning chakra. But much more than that, it served as a reflective barrier. He smiled and nodded when Ashie answered his question with a lack of confidence. He smiled because he wanted her to know she was right, and so she should answer like she knew she was right. Essentially, he was trying to instill a measure of sureness in Ashie's self.

"You're completely right! It was a spinning shield of chakra." he started with a bright and satisfied tone.

"But it's also much more than that. You see, any attack that comes towards that shield can be blocked if the attack isn't strong enough to pierce it. And if your opponent is really weak," he said while adding inflection in his voice nearing his pause. He then continued in a slightly hushed tone with one hand cupping the side of his mouth as if he were letting Ashie in on a big secret, "you can even deflect away or repel their attacks back at them." 

He paused giving Ashie a moment to reflect on this thought before continuing. He wanted to see how she would react, the body language and facial expression. Such a reaction could be a determining factor on how successful she would be with the jutsu. Excitement was what he was hoping for. 

He then carried on, "The secret behind this jutsu working well, is chakra control. If you can successfully channel and balance your chakra throughout your body in an even distribution, you'll be setting yourself up for the next step; which is exertion. You've gotta force that chakra out each of your 361 tenketsu and maintain a steady flow of it. Then the easy part comes, you just spin as fast as you can in place. But you might get dizzy your first couple times trying it. But enough words, let's see what you got Ash!" Sakaiza might have gotten too comfortable with Ashie, trying out a nickname. But nevertheless, he was quite excited to see her first attempt based off of the moderate amount of guidance he gave her. But still, it was more than what he got when he learned the jutsu so he had plenty of faith in his new friend. 

(WC: 569)

He came out of his spinning the wind that it was pushing past her had come to a stop. He had confirmed that she was indeed correct. She gasped smiling, she felt more sure of herself now, he had explained further about what it was, what it did, and the different ways one could use it for! He leaned forward sharing a deflecting secret with her and she bounce lightly up and down her feet bending back and landing with a little bound. Was he going to teach her how to maintain what she was learning yesterday? She had listened a little further, he explained how exactly to start forming the mass of chakra. She had to force her chakra out the other day to make the water burst out in the oasis.

She decided to try it again, she closed her eyes, took a deep breath and winced as she focused her chakra, from her stomach to her chest and arms and legs. She could feel it, like her pores were alive! While her eyes were closed she spun, but it wasn't perfect, while she spun there were clear areas where she wasn't focusing enough chakra leaving the space open. After a few spins she began wobbling about, the mass of chakra moving with her before she lost her footing. Tripping over her own feet she fell backwards, with a soft, "oooof!" she landed on her bottom. Her torso still trying to recompose it's balance as she was dizzy. Her eyes kept blinking as to her the world was tilting and turning all on its own.

"Whoaaa...whoa Saka, stop moooooviiiiiiiing..." After a few moments of resting she shook her head from side to side her vision fixing itself, but she remained planted on the ground. She looked up hopefully, blushing yet again, "Like that?" a childish question she knew, but she couldn't tell what it felt like, and it's not like she had a mirror to look at either. He was the only thing that could tell her whether she did it correctly or not. So far he proven trustful. He even...called her Ash...just like Zero. Her eyes glazed over as she day dreamed, an illusion of Zero knelt down in front of her hand extended ruffling her hair, she could hear him now... 'Ash, you silly kid.' She missed him. She missed the breeze, the trees. Yeah sure the Hyuuga's didn't like her there...but it didn't matter, she was starting to get used to this world after all. Zero and his...well...now her bear tibbers made things comfortable. Suna wasn't bad, sure it was hot, but people seemed nicer here.

Less judgemental. The illusions began to fade as she saw Saka in front of her, she almost frowned, but to be honest, maybe it was a sign. Maybe this was what Echo was talking about when he said she would find her strength and her purpose. Maybe she was suppose to befriend Saka. She looked back up at Saka again as she realized, she didn't have that many friends in general, many people she could trust, maybe that was something all of her family saw. She was hard to trust people with her life, only Zero had pledged to protect her and stand by her side. Was Saka willing to do the same? Maybe it was the other way around, Ashie wasn't sure...how could she? The only person who tried to give her a boost in her confidence was dead...but now stood a chance to regain a friend who might do that very same thing. So she was trying. Trying to push away the half of her that didn't want to place her life in the hands of other people. It started with Yen, now it's continuing with Saka...she needed to start believing, in both of them.

(647) [647/1500 words to learn Palms Rotating Heavens learning it from Sakaiza to cut the wc in half]

Sakaiza was really feeling like quite the Hyuuga at this point. He was getting Ashie excited solely off an opportunity to try a technique. He couldn't help but wonder if she had seen or heard of this jutsu before though. As she stated, she was half Hyuuga and had family members that were of the Hyuuga clan, so it was definitely possible that one of them had been aware of the advanced jutsu. But still Sakaiza wondered what their abilities included. Naturally, he began to question whether or not he was a suitable trainer for a girl belonging to both Hyuuga and Uchiha. If her relatives were to find out about him training her, would they be okay with this? Sakaiza was just a genin, despite the intensive amount of training that he put himself through. But perhaps they would not think rank mattered, perhaps they would overlook it considering he was an experienced Hyuuga. But perhaps not, for Sakaiza couldn't even overlook his measly rank.

He snapped back into reality, to an excited Ashie breathing deeply. She was focusing her chakra. Her eyes had been closed as she was breathing, which was lightly just to ensure that her breathing was constant. But when she would begin to spin, she kept her eyes closed in the progress. This struck a sour note with Sakaiza as his face crumpled up, which Ashie would not be able to see since her eyes were closed. She would not be able to see the extent of her chakra shield nor the inconsistencies in the shield. Because of a lack of uniform exertion of chakra, the shield would not take on it's intended spherical form. Instead it was more elliptical with a non - constant radius throughout it. Nevertheless, it was what Sakaiza had expected from Ash's first attempt. She was able to exert the chakra, but just not to the degree that the jutsu demanded. To top it all off, the shield wasn't even as large as what it should be. But still, it was progress, which brought a smile to Sakaiza's face as he analyzed all of the areas needed to improve. 

She eventually fell from her feet, perhaps because she was too dizzy. Combined with her discombobulated statement, Sakaiza let out a soft chuckle at the goofiness that Ash had. He walked over to the fallen Ash and knelt down with a friendly expression upon his face. He extended his hand to playfully ruffle her hair and let out an, "Ash, you silly kid." 

To his surprise, when he would say so, Ashie took on a slightly unamused expression. She did not seem to take his friendly scolding of her well, nor did she seem to enjoy the rustling of her hair. Sakaiza overstepped his boundaries. He rose to his feet and took several steps back, creating the distance between the two. Ash was new to him, just as he was knew to her, so he realized that he probably was getting too comfortable with her and she didn't enjoy it. "Sorry about that, Ash" he let out, slightly defeated in tone.

Right after that, he quickly shook off his disappointment and figured he should be slightly more serious now. He immediately let out, "That was good, but there were still some problems. You had your eyes closed the whole time, so you could not see the progress you made and where you would need to improve. So if you were trying this jutsu alone, you'd be unable to realize where the error lied based solely upon sight..."

Continuing, "But I saw. It seems as if you focused your chakra throughout your entire body, but you did not channel it evenly. There needs to be the same amount of chakra in your left foot as there is in your right arm before you expel it all out. Having an even distribution of chakra throughout your body will let you create an even sphere, as the chakra will emit from all of your tenketsu with an equal amount of chakra and distance. This next time you do the technique, I want you to try to take it slower. Try to rotate in place slower to start off with and only pick up your speed when you feel like you're ready. And keep your eyes open too!"

Realizing he sounded a bit stern and lecturey, he sent a smile to Ashie to know he wasn't disappointed in her. The purpose of her taking the jutsu slower would be so that she could build the radius of the sphere in size as her speed picked up. But she should only attempt to build that radius after knowing her body was capable of maintaining the shield she would form while also being ready to expand it. The key to expansion in this jutsu was speed, and that's why Sakaiza emphasized Ashie beginning slow. He did not expect her to be able to get the sphere to its maximum size after this time, but he did expect it to be more uniform in size. He would teach her about maximizing the shield right after this attempt.

(WC: 859; 1,428/3000 to Palms Revolving Heaven Mastery)

When she snapped back to reality she realized that Saka had just done what she imagined. Her eyes almost tearing up as her heart welt up with the feeling of missing a great friend. She shook this off immediately noticing his saddened face and an apology to go with it. For what? He did nothing wrong, in fact, he did something Ashie liked. She liked being treated normally. She stood up right away stumbling a little bit on the way up. She took a deep breath before waiting until he was done speaking fully. He had explained about her keeping her eyes closed, that was her fault, the thought of spinning got the best of her and she closed her eyes out of fear of making mistakes. She made one anyways, so there was really no pro to her con. He had explained that she lacked maintaining her chakra at the right pace and distance. Maybe keeping her eyes closed had something to do with it, her nervousness maybe had her focus too much on certain tenketsu's. He had asked her to take it slower this time, to make sure she felt her chakra evening out through her body before she starts a slower rotation. She nodded to let him know she heard his suggestion and that she would try again,

"Okay, and...I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, you just, reminded me of an old friend from Konoha. I miss him already. To be honest, you remind me of him. You're nice, easy going, helpful. You'd make anyone a great friend." She spoke honestly, she was tired of lying, tired of being wary of people. Time to change that. She kept her eyes open staring straight as she breathed in and out, in and out. Calm and even like her chakra should be. She felt them, her tenketsu's, one by one the were flaring out with her chakra from her head to her toes. She took her stance carefully, slowly making sure to keep her flow balanced all around and not giving more to one side than the other. She extended her left leg out while she kept the right one back and bent. Her left arm joining her left leg and the right joining her right. She pushed with her right foot keeping her right foot going clock wise as she turned, slow at first. She could feel the air around her being pushed, if Saka were standing a few meters away he could definitely feel the shift in the breeze that her rotation was creating. As she got the hang of doing both at the same time, she increased her speed only by a little bit, she was still making sure she would trip over herself as she watched her feet. Once she felt she could go a bit faster she looked up at Saka, making sure she had something to watch to help her eyes stay open. Once she did that, she increased her speed again, she could see it! It was very faint but she could see the range that her chakra was making. She motivated pushed herself harder, faster and faster she spun until she could spin as fast as she could she could see it! It wasn't that much bigger, about a meter in diameter. It was something thought! She pushed her chakra a little harder, that's when Saka and Ashie could tell that she was trying to push it further. There were parts of the spherical shape that started becoming 'bumpy' instead of smooth. She was trying to even them out while increasing the size. Which she was progressing the size, but only by a foot or two nothing too extensive, after all the only reason why her rotation would be smaller that Saka's would be because of their size difference of course! She was vertically challenged and therefor her epicenter was shorter than his!

Once she started feeling herself getting dizzy she started to slow down wobbling forward a little bit before once again dropping onto her bottom, but this time it was on purpose, she had leaned her head back and if Saka had approached again he could tell she was pushing herself, little drops of sweat were starting to form on her forehead as her chest rose and fell with her panting. She was trying her best after all, if she were going to be a jounin someday she needed to improve! She wasn't use to these high temperatures, yeah the clouds were blocking the sun today, but it was still so muggy! How could Saka even stand to be in those pants!? Ashie was wearing a tank top and shorts and she was still not cool enough!

"Saka...h-...how...are you even...able to be....in those pants...?! Aren't...you...h...hot?!" in between her word structures were labored pants, she needed a moment to catch her breath, sure she had trained by herself, but she only ran through the basics. This was challenging, which wasn't a bad thing to her, it was refreshing. It made her felt apart of the shinobi world.

(857) [added onto the 647 from the last post makes 1504/1500 for the Palm Rotating Heavens Jutsu!]

She was sorry. But why was she sorry? Sakaiza had just been the one to apologize so he was confused as to why Ash did the same. Sakaiza’s feelings were far from being hurt, almost the opposite actually. He reminded her of someone she was friends with. That’s a compliment to Sakaiza. The only part that slightly bothered him was that someone was from Konoha, which Ash didn’t seem to take a particular liking to. She seemed to have lots of negative memories from Konoha, which didn’t exactly bode well with Sakaiza. It was quite the shame that she had to deal with the type of people that she did, even though he was sure not all of them were bad. He quickly shook off the thought of being like someone from Konoha. But right after this, Ash began to compliment the person that Sakaiza was. She seemed to highlight the qualities in him that he felt were the ones that stood out the most. He knew he was a nice person, although lately he had found his temper slightly swelling but it was more than likely from his intensive training depriving him of his sleep. He knew he was easygoing, primarily never really getting upset unless he was truly offended by someone or something. He knew that he was helpful, for he had been raised by those who always lessened themselves for the betterment of others. Ash must have been quite the intuitive, young girl if she could notice all of these qualities of Sakaiza. Finally it was the last comment that pushed him over the edge, he’d make a great friend to anyone. That was something he did not know, for he did not see himself in the same light as what other people did. He knew what his flaws were, but Ash did not. Perhaps they would not matter to her.

Nevertheless, he smiled upon hearing the kind words of Ash. His whole face seemed to smile actually. “You know, Ash…” he started while focusing his eyes on her, “You’re a pretty awesome girl yourself. If only all people from Konoha were like you!”

Sakaiza genuinely meant what he said, although Ash was the first and only person he had met from Konoha. The way she spoke of the village seemed to be negatively, so the people could not compare to her. She was quite young and yet she still knew her manners, was pleasant to be around and was respectful. There’s not much more you could expect from someone, let alone a young a shinobi. Now he began to watch her start her technique. Through his Byakugan, he paid a close attention to the details within her chakra network. It seemed as if she had focused more before beginning this attempt, as she had evidently had a clear balance between the tenketsu with all of her chakra now. He smiled, for she had taken the advice he had suggested to heart. Next, Ash would begin to take on her stance. It resembled the modified gentle fist stance that Sakaiza had originally displayed, however it had a degree of her own flair on it. This was fine, and in fact was encouraged by Sakaiza. No two shinobi were the same, despite their similarities, so it would only make sense to him that Ash have even a slightly different style than his own. When she would begin rotating, Sakaiza would watch carefully. He paid close attention to speed she begun at, which was rather slow. Once again he smiled, knowing that she had taken the advice that he offered her. As she seemed to grow more comfortable with her current speed, she would increase it. Sakaiza took several steps back, giving Ash space to allow her shield to grow in size. When she would continue to increase the radius of the sphere, the speed of the rotating chakra accelerated it. It was clear that its speed was increasing due to the amount of wind generated from the sphere. In turn, the sand around the shield was beginning to kick up, circling around the base of the shield.

As the sphere began to increase, it started to create those lumps that Sakaiza suggest Ash be aware of the next time she tried to do the technique. Therefore, he was curious to see how she would react. He was honestly curious to see even if she would react, assuming she would notice these lumps. To his satisfaction, she did. She began to even out the chakra, while still pushing her body to create a larger sphere. However, Sakaiza was not too worried about the size of the sphere to be honest. He was more concerned with the potency of it. There was only one true way to test the density of it. He quickly formed the bird hand seal with his hands and launched four air bullets at the shield. The air bullets seemed to hit the shield and then dissipate, sending the air back to be carried by the wind. The first test was successful, next he threw one of his kunai at the sphere, but not as fast and as hard as he could. As the kunai hit the sphere, it seemed to be carried by the rotational chakra and sent right back at him with the same speed he threw it. Smiling, he caught the kunai which was flying towards him and placed it right back inside of his weapon pouch. The sphere Ash created seemed to be more than good enough to shield her from many incoming attacks, and that’s all that mattered. Once she would be able to increase the radius of that sphere, she would likely be able to protect herself from any shinobi with the intentions of attacking her. This was the true reason Sakaiza had wanted to teach his new friend this jutsu. It was quite the protective jutsu, and thus could increase the likelihood of her surviving harsh attacks. And with the crazy people in the world, it wasn’t unlikely that someone would attack a young girl.

At some point, Ash began to slow down. This could be noted by the speed of the chakra barrier decreasing and the chakra itself slowly but surely retracting back into her body. Sakaiza expected as much, with the massive amount of chakra this jutsu demanded the user to exert, it could easily fatigue an unexperienced user. Working alongside that factor was the concept that Ash was rotating quite quickly, which could easily make her fall down once she stopped spinning. It was, in fact, the same reaction that Sakaiza had when he had done the technique for his first time. As he expected, Ash seemed quite dizzy when she ceased rotating. It was pretty obvious based solely off the fact that she was wobbling and seemed completely disoriented.

A cloud that was originally been cast in front of the sun when Sakaiza first got to the training ground was now finally pass the sun. It allowed the sun to shine its bright and hot rays upon Sunaga, which would essentially cook the training grounds that the pair was on. Sakaiza had been used to this extreme, desert like heat as he had grown up here. It was really all he had known. But it seemed as if it was taking its toll on Ash, since she was sweating extensively and exerting a massive supply of energy and chakra while learning the techniques that Sakaiza had been teaching her. It was then clear to Sakaiza that Ash was really losing it from the combination of the heat and the dizziness she had from spinning. She began to ask him about his pants. “My pants?” he wondered, while looking down at them. They were black, but also made of light material, customary of a Sunaga tailor. The tailor had specialized in making lightweight shinobi gear that could keep its wearer cool from the material it was made from. Still, they were pants though, which seemed to really throw Ash out on a loop.

He laughed and scratched his head slightly nervously, “My pants? They’re not that hot actually, they kind of repel the heat to be honest. They keep me cool!” he said while laughing still. Ash seemed really out of it, so he figured that this was possibly a good place to put a pause on their training. “This desert sun is a home to me, I’m pretty used to it,” he stated, reminding Ash that Sunaga was his home and everything in it was something that he had grown fond of at this point. “But I’m thinking we could both use some food. You should probably get out of the sun for a little bit and go ahead and catch up on some energy. There’s a pretty good noodle shop nearby that we could go to. My treat,” he said with a smile, hoping that Ash would have the common sense to agree. 

To be honest, Sakaiza wanted to get food more than what Ash probably did. He had been starving since the day began, for he had skipped out on breakfast to make it to the training grounds early. This was something he found himself doing rather often lately, and each time he regretted it. He could only hope that Ash also wanted to get food. But she seemed like him, so he was under the impression that she too would be hungry and thus would like to grab a bite to eat with a new friend.

(WC: 1594; 3022/3000 to Palms Revolving Heaven Mastery)

As soon as she mentioned the cloud, it was her own jinxing that moved it out of the way as the rays beat down on her. Her eyes closed as her eyes were a little more sensitive to the light. Of course, her luck was horrible with these kind of things. She huffed, starting to catch her breath again as Saka explained why he wasn't so hot. She knew of course he was use to the heat, and also his pants were special made to repel the heat and keep him cool. Maybe Ashie should get some clothes made for desert heat and not simple summer in Konoha. She smiled like a girl her age should, he was laughing at her goofiness. Just like Zero would, a sign that maybe she would make a lot of friends here in Suna, too bad her father didn't send them here to become shinobi. She heard him mentioning grabbing something to eat and getting away from the heat. She looked towards Saka and nodded, food sounded amazing and not only that ramen. They had a ramen shop here too?!

"Ramen sounds amazing right now. I'll pay since you were so nice to teach me today, you must've been hungry too, I bet you missed lunch training with me today." She dug in her back pouch and pulled out a little coin purse, but it was bulging with ryo. Ashie had done quite a few missions back in Konoha. She tucked it back into her pouch and zipped it shut. She looked back at Saka smiling hoping he'd take the offer, Zero was stubborn and never let her pay for hit ramen, even when Ashie had nothing to spend her money on. She was hoping Saka would, it'd give her someone to spoil.

"Just lead the way, I didn't have much time to scan over a village map, so I get a bit lost here haha!" She would lift her left arm and rub the back of her head awkwardly making light of lack of direction. She knew that wasn't a good thing though, if she were in the forest of death back at home she would need to know where she was going to survive. She'd get there eventually.

(376)

Sakaiza was more than excited to get food, evident from the ominous and loud growl his stomach let out which Ash could probably hear. After Sakaiza had just offered to pay for the meal, Ash told him that he would pay. But he wasn't having it. As much as it hurt him to deny a free meal, he was not the type of person to let someone else pay for him, especially after just meeting them. What hurt him even more was when Ash pulled her coin pouch out and it seemed to be overflowing with money. Reaching in his coin wallet attached to his hip, he could feel the lack of attention he paid to missions in it. He had been so focused on training himself and honing his skills that he hadn't reaped the opportunities to fulfill missions that would generate some income for him. He had about 2000 ryo to his name, which made him feel far inferior to Ash, the young girl that stood before him with a seemingly endless supply of Ryo. However, Sakaiza did not display this despair on his face. 

"No no no, you're a guest to my village. It's customary for me to pay" Sakaiza began to reason, "besides, I'm really tight with the owner so I get it for half off. I've been coming to this ramen shop since I was young." Sakaiza insisted. He was not about to let Ash pay for both of their meals, it was completely against his pride and morals to let her. 

"Yeah I can lead the way, I figured you hadn't seen this ramen shop before. It's kind of low key, but it gets a lot of business still." Sakaiza said while beginning to start for the exit from the training grounds. If Ash would follow, he would then begin to make small talk. "So you're born from both Hyuuga and Uchiha descent, huh? Who are your parents?" Sakaiza inquired. He had wondered about Ash's family lineage since he had met her but didn't have the guts to ask when they first began talking. But after speaking with her, training her and laughing with her he figured that this would not be a problem for her to respond to. 

The pair would have to walk ahead and out of the training grounds for 2 blocks or so, then make the next left. So he figured he had enough time to strike up a brief conversation. 

(WC: 411)

She smiled, he was nice, a gentleman too, but she couldn't concede! Even though yes true, she was a guest, and due to certain traditions that people grew up by, he would pay for the meal. However Ashie couldn't allow that, she thought of a retort, but none could come to her mind. The only thing she could possibly do to pay for the meal now was slam her money as fast as she can on the counter than Saka can. So as she walked on the right side of Saka she snuck her right hand into her pouch where her coin purse would be, grabbing a hand full. This was the plan as soon as they sat down she would put a large sum onto the counter and tell the man to cover their meal no matter what the price was.

Once she grabbed the sum she snuck it into her right pocket in her shorts. That's when he started asking her things about her family, she immediately got nervous, should she tell him? Would he see her differently? Would he shun her? Or worse...would he hunt her down for her family connection? She didn't know how to cover this up, he would know right away that she is lying she didn't even know how to come up with generic names! She took a deep breath before asking him something first,

"You promise nothing will change? Like...you won't hate me...or freak out?" She didn't want to be treated like a outcast or a princess anymore. She wanted to get stronger to protect her brother, to make sure she will never lose another family member again. Two losses were enough for her. Sure her brother was fated to take over the clan, but until then they were cast out into the world to learn how to live. She had to tell him the truth...otherwise she'd be no better than a traitor. She waited her eyes gazing at her feet as they walked, she was scared, but she needed to know.

(344)