Gunbai Yuka and the Pine of Progress (P, Training)

Sat Dec 31, 2016 4:05 pm

Another day and once again it seemed that Gunbai was out and about, off to learn some technique or other for whatever reasons he had. God, it really did feel that way, he thought to himself as he casually finished off an ice cream cone while at the same time not trying to think of the flesh wall that existed not 500 feet away from him. If there was one way to spoil his appetite for the sweet treat, it was that. He could understand that they had been created both as a statement and as a defense, but he was pretty sure that they were going to drive down the value of local restaurants due to their not so pleasant view. Ah well, what did he know. It wasn’t like he was in a position to do anything about it anyway.

Ice cream cone now finished, Gunbai pondered on what sort of technique he would brush up on today. Perhaps he would start up on some light warm ups before moving onwards into the actual techniques. Yes, that would do. It wouldn’t be good if he were to learn so many techniques that he ended up becoming sloppy and forgetting everything that he had already learned. Yup, that was definitely a recipe for him to die if that “path to chunin” or whatever they had called it had been a sign. More like a death trap if anything. Blegh, it was always a headache for him to think about it for long periods of time. Though why, he wondered, did the higher ups decided to test him in such a way? Surely there was a safer, less complicated and likely less expensive way. Figuring he wouldn’t get his answers by taking shots into the dark that was this universe, he instead elected to make his way over to the training grounds to get some work done.

A few minutes later, Gunbai found himself in his usual spot, putting down his bag before scanning his surroundings. Nothing much around him, just the grass, the sky, a couple of rocks, the trees surrounding the area-nope not looking at that one with the dent in it continuing onwards! Doing a few basic stretches, the obvious right over left and down followed by a couple others to limber out all of the joint, Gunbai decided it would be wiser to start with the taijutsu moves first before moving onto his ninjutsu.

Starting out with a few punches and kicks to remind himself of the usual force and weight behind his movements a few seconds later he kicked out into the air, feeling a satisfying whoosh before pivoting and kicking below, above, above, below, balancing himself with his one hand when needed.Huh, it would almost be like break-dancing except it wasn’t for multiple reasons. Now wouldn’t that be funny, a breakdancing ninja. He cracked a smile at that before moving onwards. A single swing with his hand followed with a forwards punch was quickly followed by turning to an invisible enemy, grabbing them by the proverbial face before tossing them up into the air only to be catapulted back by...his fingers. Yeah, he wasn’t sure that one would work but it would certainly be hilarious if it did. Ah well, a man could dream.

Now done with his taijutsu “workout” which read more like a comedy routine than anything else, Gunbai cracked his knuckles to let the gases escape from between the joints before waving through a series of hand seals. A large staff made of rock rose up before him and ten shadowy clones appeared before him, settling into perhaps the laziest fighting stances he had ever seen. Huh, seems that even his self inflicted genjutsu wasn’t feeling up to it at the moment. Ah well, he would do this anyway. With a yell, he charged forward, a long sweep causing five to disperse and a kick causing another to do so as well. Ducking under the combination of fake kicks and punches sent his way he planted a fist into the seventh before smashing through the skull of the eighth, if it even had one in the first place that is. The Ninth met its end with a crotch kick and his genjutsu didn’t even give him the satisfaction of widening its eyes before dissipating as he simply threw the cane into the tenth, watching it dissipate into smoke. He hadn’t left any chakra for the genjutsu so once again he sat alone, panting slightly under his breath from the maneuver. Wow, he was really out of shape. But was he really? Who would expect this sort of performance from a normal person?

Moving onwards once again he drew earth chakra from his core and into his hands before clapping the earth, sinking downwards with the shifting core before what remained below him turned to sand, he sinking into the earth as well with it. Giving himself a moment to catch himself and readjust he did a couple of loop the loops around his moving earth core pit before maneuvering himself to the surface, shaking the sand off of himself as he did so. He wondered if there was some sort of technique he could learn alongside it, it seemed doubtful that people would simply leave a technique as useful as this one as merely a stealth or escape option. Keeping the mental note in mind, he continued onwards with the end of his warm up, concentrating what to him was an obscene amount of energy within his hands before pushing outwards to form the blue blades known as his scalpels. With a yell he pushed forwards before dashing towards what he notied at the last second was the foot tree before slashing in a spinning move, causing two deep diagonal gouges to tear deep into the wood. Turning off the technique to conserve his energy, Gunbai looked around him.

All around him the scenery had been changed, whether it be something subtle at first glance like the damage to the tree or the strange earthen growth sticking out of the ground or something perhaps a bit more noticeable, like the giant pit in the middle of the ground which he had left. Gunbai grimaced at the carnage to the area around him. While he wasn’t guilty about wrecking the place, as fixing it kept jobs open for a lot of people, what he still felt uneasy about was that it was indeed him who had caused all of it. It was almost surreal how far he had come in this amount of time along with how he had changed, physically and mentally admittedly. Already fleshy walls and other such horrors were becoming such a part of his daily life that he didn’t mind anymore. How could he stand to protect such a place? His duty to his family? His hometown?

The answer came to him, and he suddenly realized. It wasn’t for the village, in the sense of the place. Borders had no meaning to him, stakes of land meant nothing. No, it was the people. Waking up everyday to see the downtrodden masses rise up and rebuild themselves bit by bit, piece by piece. The glimmer in a child's eye as they receive the first toy in months due to financial struggle. People rebuilt and grew stronger as a result of tragedy. It could be seen as sad, but at the same time it was something that he wanted to protect. He’d be damned if he let those smiles, those hopes and dreams go to waste. Call him cliche, but part of the whole reason he had decided he wanted to follow in his families footsteps was so that he could see just that thing in his patients. Was it wrong for him to want gratification, to want validation from others? He shook his head. No, for to do anything else would simply mean that he was selfish. Now that he thought about it, he had indeed been quite so the entire time he had been here. Just a boy away from home endlessly complaining in his head about how he didn’t want to be here. Well no longer.

Slowly taking off his jacket, Gunbai revealed the protector tied underneath onto his arm before undoing it’s knot, staring into the shiny metal before retying it again, this time visible against his thigh. It was about time he wore the symbol with pride. The clouds weren’t a symbol of death and hatred, no matter how much of it might still remain around him. It was one of hope, a chance at rebirth and restoration that he refused to squander. But to do that, he had to obtain the strength to back it up.

A newly kindled fire lit up in his body and soul, Gunbai ripped open his bag and took out his book, quickly flicking to a dog eared page which he had saved the night before to be read today. The Mass Shift technique was certainly not something he knew anything about, for he had yet to learn anything about ninjutsu’s application to space and time or whatever it was, he wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth and at the moment that horse came in the form of information. Frankly the whole idea of it was freaking phenomenal in his opinion. The ability to call forth matter, even if only in small amounts, was such an astounding ability which had applications he could take days exploring. That one piece of information is just out of your grasp? Well, now it isn’t. Want to make your opponent overextend and trip themselves? Well, now you’ve done it. It was only a few seconds into re-reading it and already Gunbai had hyped himself up again, so willing and ready to begin he was.

Setting a medium sized rock a few meters away from him Gunbai formed the rat seal before doing something he admitted was a bit childish. Do remember how as a child when you got made sometimes you would stare really hard at something, as though it would move and perhaps crush whatever you were annoyed at? Well at the moment he was doing the same except with chakra added, attempting to create a pulling mechanism towards him. Supposedly this was one way of envisioning space and manipulating it so he would try it despite the fact that it didn’t seem like the most mature of methods, but who was he to judge. After a few more seconds he could feel a slight tremble in the ground, perhaps a sign of him oversaturating the area around him with chakra, before he saw the golden glow of the chakra surrounding the rock which was now heading straight for him. Caught by surprise he barely had time to cancel his seal and catch the rock, which now sat lifelessly in his hand with nothing to propel it. Getting experimental now he threw the rock up in the air and waited for it to reach its peak before descending and applying the technique, noting how it magnified its speed to the point where he had bruised his hand slightly trying to catch it. Well, there was certainly another application of it he supposed. Maybe if he were to apply it to some sort of projectile, through a clone perhaps? He didn’t know that much on it and as such decided to leave the technique at that, content to have at least grasped the basics of such a useful technique. Now came the big boy stuff.

Setting aside his ninja guide he instead pulled out his medical textbook at home, flipping towards one of the offensive techniques it provided. While it might seem odd to most that a technique to harm would be included in a book to heal, in actuality it made logical sense as to diagnose a poison it would make sense for a medical ninja to learn how to apply said poison first to learn it’s ins and outs. Speaking of poison, that was relating to the technique he was trying to finally finish. The Poison Mist technique, though to be quite frank it was more of a Poison Fog due to its density and opaqueness blocking out light when exhumed. An incredibly dangerous technique, it was made as an area of effect attack, mostly so that a medic nin could make attackers back the heck away when they needed time to heal. The problem was that it was non-discriminatory, affecting all but the user so more harm could be done than good if used incorrectly. Now wouldn’t that be embarrassing, having to explain to a superior that you could have saved a life but ended up ending said life by accident when trying to ward away would be aggressors. It was a chilling thought and as such Gunbai had stayed away from the technique when he was younger. Now, however, he could afford no such luxury.

At the moment, Gunbai issue with the technique was the concentration and spread of the technique. Focusing chakra into his lungs was not something Gunbai was used to, as he was not a practitioner of fire chakra, so as such he always felt awkward when channeling through it which caused his technique to come out too think, becoming a thin lavender which bore little to no potency within. However, he currently had a theory on how to change that issue. What if he was to make the chakra denser, instead of simply funneling more? Deciding to test himself and see what sort of response would be entailed, he moved through the motions, kneading chakra in his body and up towards his mouth, this time much denser than before. Pushing outwards, although technically inwards as he produced a sweet smelling batch of chemicals within his mouth before spewing it outwards. Err, maybe not spew, that was an awkward choice of words. Perhaps just exhaling it? Yes, that was much better.

Ignoring Gunbai’s word choices, he was rather pleased with his new results. Now standing in a cloud of poison, which would admittedly be incredibly dangerous in any other situation, he noted that his hypothesis was indeed correct due to the rich purple color of it. Very aware that if it was a technique produced by anybody else he would already be dead he quickly released the technique, refusing to be the cause of somebody’s death because some idiot decided to venture into the odd colored cloud in the middle of nowhere. Waiting over time for the poison to disperse, he noted that the wildlife around him had wilted quite a bit, likely due to their exposure. A shame, but it was in the name of science he supposed. Or something like that really, he wasn’t going to go into specifics like that. Ignoring his demented philosophies in favor of a lunch that he had packed he decided to eat it now instead of later, opting towards reading up on a new technique instead. God, he had really fallen into routine at this pointed hadn’t he?

Skimming through pages he at this point had read through once or twice Gunbai struggled to find a technique that piqued his interest heavily enough until he eventually stumbled upon one that suited his needs at the moment. The storage displacement technique, hmm?

While it seemed to be more of a utility and convenience ability more than anything, Gunbai could see the potential of it when applied in specific situations. While the summoning of objects to oneself seemed to be an issue, in that it relied upon the base power of the jutsu itself for its speed of recovery, the act that items stored within were supposedly taken at the speed of the users reactions was something to take into account of. Being able to quickly shed cumbersome armor and don a more suitable attire would certainly be a boon in more covert missions. But what of its application to others? According to the books summary it's range was limited to the self, which was a bit vague in all honesty as well that would mean that they could only touch things directly against them. How would one summon things such as a jacket, per say? Maybe the “self” in the technique merely meant that it simply meant things close enough to be considered contact, which meant that touching was good enough even if indirect. That brought up all sorts of possibilities. The technique had stated in some fine print that living creatures could not be stored within it, but how about the armor or weapons attached to them? It would certainly be a shocker to swing a prized sword only to have it disappear before their eyes or suddenly become vulnerable due to loss of coverage. Of course, he had yet to even use the technique so he wouldn't really consider himself a valid opinion on how it would work. Ah well, it was a point he would need to investigate at a later time. Perhaps the library would help?

Moving onto the application of his knowledge into the physical plane, Gunbai looked over the technique once more to make sure he hadn’t missed any more important information before finally putting it into practice. Forming the signs of the rat and then the dog, Gunbai focused his chakra into the object he was going to attempt to transport, namely his jacket. Almost in the same was he visualized the mass shift technique when performing it Gunbai did the same this time except instead he saw it as a hole, dragging the object into that other space where it would be kept. It wasn’t exactly what was supposed to happen, but he had a feeling that the chakra price would fill in the gaps where it was required. After all, that was the point of a jutsu, right? Otherwise whenever somebody tried a technique it would just come out in puffs of energy.

Gunbai kept at it for a few minutes before deciding that apparently he was doing it wrong and dropping the technique. Mulling over his approach for a few minutes, he eventually decided to simply do it again, except this time with different visualization. According to the technique the object was supposed to dissipate and explode into the particles, something a lot flashier than his original visualization. It couldn’t hurt to try, could it? Trying again with the new idea in mind Gunbai was rewarded a few seconds later with the touch of air on his skin as with a small whooshing sound his jacket had seemingly vanished into thin air. That was going, now for the reverse. Going through the process again but this time envisioning it happen in reverse, he felt his jacket once again materialize onto his body although at an admittedly slower pace than it had been before. That was probably the difference between dispelling and summoning items that the technique had warned him about, something that he was going to need to be wary of in the near future if he was to use it in combat for whatever reason. Ah well, at least he could say that he had the technique under a novice level of control now. Taking solace in the small victory, Gunbai moved on to his next bit of training for the day, deciding to perhaps try a lower level technique if not simply for less time spent figuring out the technique then he was with these at the moment. It wasn’t so much that he was challenged by the techniques, not that some were not difficult, so much as he didn’t want to spend all day in the fields as he had planned on getting some work done to fulfill his weekly quota of missions. He supposed that might be easier, now that he had his own reasons to do so besides fear of death. Yeah, that definitely sounded nicer.

Figuring that he would end off today’s little session with this next one, Gunbai perused the E-Rank section of his book, thumbing through a few that piqued his interest and mentally setting them aside for research later before finally settling on the one of his choosing, the Mark Seal. While he admittedly was a little bit disconcerted about how it’s original purpose was that of a prison warden’s tool, as that must have been quite a strain on one’s mind when trying to pick out a single person in possibly hundreds of seals, he could definitely see it’s uses in infiltration and protection of others. You had a feeling that your client was going to be ambushed? Leave a mark and ly in wait to counteract it. You suspect that there is a spy in your midst? Drop a seal secretly and have them lead you to their “secret” base. There were many uses for it, many for the more covert side of a ninja career, although Gunbai was honestly more interested in it in the terms of protection of others. If somebody’s blip started heading off in a direction they weren’t supposed to or outright disappeared, you knew something was wrong and could then act accordingly. Oh well, all of this would mean nothing if he could not use the jutsu anyways.

Focusing within him Gunbai drew an admittedly small amount of chakra from within himself, condensing it into a tightly packed wad of chakra as he did so. Walking towards the smashed up tree- hmm, maybe it deserved it’s own name at this point. Maybe….Progress Pine? Ooh yeah, that sounded nice. Progress Pine it was. Although it might get tiring after a while, considering that if he wanted to call it by abbreviation he’d be saying PP. Blegh, stupid childish mind, get back to task. Standing before the newly dubbed Progress Pine Gunbai finished moving the chakra so that it was in his left pointer finger’s tip before tapping it onto the tree, pushing his chakra through in the manner that his book had stated. Removing his finger shortly after he noted a small black dot on it’s bark before it faded away, leaving no sign of anything being done.

Closing his eyes he stretched out with his mind's eye, feeling nothing but his own chakra system and now, a small blip only a few feet away from him. Rotating himself he could feel it’s position change a small smile came to his face, as he had apparently performed the technique correctly. Praising himself mentally at his work, Gunbai collected his things and took one last look at the battered tree before exiting the field with a little bit more pep in his step as he felt the noon sun beam down onto his neck despite the admittedly cold weather. With new purpose and new techniques, it was time to get some work done.

3825 words
+19 stats
+1325 towards Poison Mist (3000/3000)
+1000 towards Mass Shift (1000/1000)
+1000 towards Storage Displacement (1000/1000)

500 towards Mark Seal (500/500)

Sat Dec 31, 2016 8:00 pm

Approved <3

Gunbai Yuka and the Pine of Progress (P, Training)

Gunbai Yuka and the Pine of Progress (P, Training)

Re: Gunbai Yuka and the Pine of Progress (P, Training)