A real ninja, pretty much [Training/Solo]

Mon Jul 24, 2017 6:40 pm

He hadn’t been in the Academy for long, and he hadn’t been in Hoshigakure for long, but Yuuki was beginning to get a feel for it. The young one was sitting patiently in the dirt of the training grounds as he read through the scrolls. There was such wisdom in them, so much knowledge, it was almost unbelievable, and yet he was forced to be reading the ones with the simplest of techniques. Transformation, Clone jutsu, when would he ever need those? He wanted to learn about the more complex techniques, something relating to elemental manipulation, or at least something close to it. When would he get to the cool stuff? he wondered as he scratched the back of his head.

He was wearing his ordinary attire, a plain old white t-shirt and shorts, while his hair was just as big of a mess as it usually was. His legs were almost covered in dirt from the length of time he’d spent on the ground, reading. He preferred reading outside over inside, sure, inside might be quieter and with fewer people, but outside had a beauty to it that inside could never match. It was that simple. He chose what was pretty over what was not, like most children his age would. Although he’d never admit it. He’d admit to choosing the outside because there was more room to practice, but in reality, he didn’t really need the room all that much.

He finally got up, deciding it was enough of that theoretical nonsense, and that he would try out these jutsus he was supposed to learn for his genin exam. He really didn’t understand why he had to be genin in order to learn more complex jutsu, it just made no sense. Why’d he have to have a title only so he could grow stronger? Alas, that was how the world worked, and he would accept it. Unwillingly, but he would accept it. He finally straightened his legs and as he did, he closed his eyes. Yuuki didn’t know why it was, but remembering things with his eyes closed was way easier than with them open.

”Ram..” He said, forming the handseal. He was still pretty new to all that handseal business, and still had to learn what each of them meant and why they were there. He was determined, though, to figure out the meaning behind each handseal in each jutsu he learned. ”Snake..” He said even more quietly as he formed the handseal, remembering the picture of the guy with his fingers intertwined as he followed the instruction. What would a snake mean? Deception, well, he was doing the clone jutsu, so there would definitely be deception. What about ram then? Perhaps ram was a handseal meant for nothing but gathering chakra into his body. Like a ram gathering energy.

Chakra, the mystical energy of the shinobi. He had read a lot about it, but perhaps he still didn’t understand it completely. The history of chakra was clouded in mystery for the young boy, all he knew about it was that someday, sometime long before now, somebody did something which granted him chakra. He did remember, however, that that somebody had two children, one of which was the reason ninjutsu was created. From what he could recall reading, the child tried to spread the knowledge of chakra to others in hopes of achieving peace, but what he achieved was, well, not peace.

Chakra, as he recalled, is comprised of two components. Spiritual energy, which was something he was honestly more interested in, given his weak frame and strong mind. Spiritual energy, as far as Yuuki knew, could be increased through meditation and whatnot, and although that sounded incredibly boring, it was probably better than its counterpart, physical energy. The boy shuddered at the thought of someone who had a lot of physical energy within him. They certainly wouldn’t be weak, he noted. He wanted to not be weak. But physical energy required training of the body, something he wasn’t nearly as competent in as training of the mind.

Anyways, the boy thought, chakra wasn’t what he was doing right now, well, it kind of was, since he was gathering chakra to do a technique, otherwise known as ninjutsu. Ninjutsu, what a curious name. Ninja technique, it meant, he thought at least, then what did taijutsu and genjutsu mean? And fuinjutsu, he had heard of fuinjutsu as well. He knew taijutsu was hand-to-hand combat, but what did the word itself mean, he wondered? He also knew genjutsu was about illusions, but once again, he had no clue what it meant. Fuinjutsu, however, he was less knowledgeable about. It had something to do with sealing, but he never really understood sealing. How was sealing done? Was it magic? No, there was no magic in the world, everything could be explained through chakra and energy.

”Tiger…” He finally said as he pointed his index fingers upwards in a straight line and intertwined his other ones, and something happened. He could feel the chakra within him, he knew he was doing it, he was being a ninja. It both excited and scared him, the concept of producing something out of nothing, but he wanted to do it more. The clone appeared next to him, but alas, he wasn’t satisfied. The clone was perfect, it matched his movements, it looked like him, he could even swear it smelled like him...he needed to bathe soon. But it was just one clone. He wanted more clones than just one, because if he was fighting an enemy with that one clone, the enemy had a fifty percent chance of guessing who was the right one. If there were fifty of them there though, the enemy would only have a two percent chance to guess right, and thus Yuuki would win almost always. In the guessing game at least. He still wasn’t strong enough for actual combat. He was working on it though.

The first step was creating more than one clone, so he simply dispersed the one that was already out. He thought about cheating himself and creating an additional clone after the one was out already, but no, hard work and perspiration were what brought strength, not shortcuts and tricks. ”Ram..” He said again, this time quicker, and not lingering on in the thoughts for so long, perhaps ram represented a technique that was supposed to last? Longevity maybe? Who knew. ”Snake..” He said once more a little bit quicker than before as he formed the handseal. He was now pretty sure it was longevity and deception that the seals represented. ”Tiger..” He finally said, forming the final handseal as he did only to be completely baffled by it. What in the world was a tiger doing there? A tiger… a hunter… strength… stalking the prey… no, none of it made sense to the boy. Why was he forming the tiger handseal? And once more, only one clone came out.

He was getting really good at the theoretical aspects of being a ninja, he noted to himself, but the practical aspects, they were still lacking. Perhaps he should ask a sensei for help? No, he could, and he would do this alone. If he couldn’t do it alone, he was weak, it was that simple. These were the simplest of jutsus, if he couldn’t do them by himself there was no point in trying to become a shinobi. ”Ram snake tiger”, he said in quick succession, forming the handseals as quickly as he possibly could, this time not focusing on gathering chakra but on the image of two clones standing next to each other. And who knew, not overthinking every handseal worked, he created two clones. A celebratory high-five with his clones ensued before he dispersed them too and was ready to move onto the next jutsu. Yuuki simply had no time to waste on these elementary things.

The thought of relaxing came to him, of course it did, to whom wouldn't it come after he succeeded at something, but instead of relaxing, he slapped himself lightly for even thinking about it and formed the handseals once more. Ramsnaketiger, he thought faster, did faster, this time not even saying the words, but alas, only one clone came out. That was why he tried it. He needed to be faster than before, and he needed to be silent when he did the handseals if he was going to accomplish anything in actual combat. Once more, and again, and again, and he finally did it. Two clones stood next to him once more as he held the tiger seal with a childish smile on his face. Who wouldn’t love it when training worked out for the best? This time, however, he tried keeping the clones out for longer. Just to see how long he could go, he attempted not to disperse them immediately. And it worked, they didn’t just puff out as soon as he stopped holding the seal, they were actively mimicking his actions. It was incredible to the boy. Alas, it needed to stop, so he mentally thought of them being destroyed, and so they were. Next up was transformation jutsu, the other one which was required for the genin exam. This one seemed simpler though, also more useful.

He knew that he was only practising the practical aspects of the techniques at the moment, but he also knew what was going to happen at the genin exam. He was going to be asked about the application of the techniques he was demonstrating, so he wanted to be prepared for that. The clone technique was simple, whether in combat or out of it, it was used to confuse an enemy and most likely make him miss whatever jutsu he was trying to use on the user of the clone jutsu. Rather simple, Yuuki thought, but the transformation technique had several uses, and more complex ones at that. Sure, it was easier to pull off than having two clones out, in his opinion at the very least, but it was harder to use properly. The clone technique could be used pretty much at any point in time no matter what was happening and it would serve its purpose, the transformation one, not so much.

One needed a plan when using the transformation technique, that much was obvious, but what kind of plan? Well, during escapes, one could transform into someone, or rather something else and be completely invisible to his pursuers, even if they stared at him, but for that one needed to lose his pursuers first, at least so they were out of his vision range. It could be used as an infiltration tool, disguising oneself as an enemy ninja or citizen and infiltrating their ranks, but for that one needed to be mentally prepared, not just be capable of using the technique. What if they asked questions? What if your disguise target was already there? What if, in case one made sure the previous question wasn’t going to be asked by eliminating the enemy target, the enemies knew their friend was eliminated? There were many variables to the technique, and the boy presumed that was why he liked it so much. He didn’t like one-dimensional plain old boring techniques that served one purpose and one purpose alone, he wanted something more than that.

”Dog..” He said quietly after putting his palm over his closed fist, forming the handseal. What did a dog have to do with the transformation technique? Perhaps it was adaptability? A dog was adaptable, wasn’t it, sure, he could say it was the case. After all, there was nobody around to dispute his case. ”Boar..” He said, even quieter this time, putting his hands together and pointing them down. Alright, a dog he could agree with, but what in the world did a boar have to do with anything? It just made no sense, almost as if someone was messing with him. Did someone really put random handseals one after another when they were creating the jutsu? Yuuki decided, if he was ever to create a jutsu, the handseals would make perfect sense. He completely ignored the fact that for one to create a jutsu, one needed to be very strong, and he was not. He was the opposite of that. ”Ram..” He finally said, putting one hand over the other with his index and middle fingers pointing upwards. At least ram, from what he’d gathered, made some sort of sense. Longevity, right? The technique was supposed to last until cancelled after all, so putting the seal of ram in there wasn’t so bad. He could forgive whoever made the technique for putting boar in there after realising dog and ram made sense.

A puff of smoke appeared as he made the final handseal, and he wasn’t himself anymore. He was one of the kids from the orphanage, Akio was his name, he was round and had a fat face, and was incredibly ugly. Which meant the transformation went pretty well. All he was missing were some pimples and it would be perfect. Cancelling the transformation, he decided he would give it another shot. ”Dog, boar, ram.” He said, this time in quick succession as he formed the handseals faster than before and once more the puff of smoke appeared, this time there were pimples. He didn’t know much about Akio’s body, so he couldn’t tell if it was a perfect transformation or not, but he was pretty convinced he did it perfectly. Or at least somewhat close to perfectly. He cancelled the transformation again, this time forming the handseals even faster, and only thinking of their names, Dogboarram his thoughts raced as he moved his hands unnaturally fast and transformed in a puff of smoke once more. It was the same as last time, perfect, only he did it without saying a word. He was getting better at this ninja business, he thought as he grabbed the scroll from the ground before cancelling the transformation again.

Next up on his list of pointless jutsus was...surprisingly, not a pointless jutsu. It was the genjutsu release technique. He had practised that one before, with a sensei, he just needed to recall how it was done. He attempted recalling what had happened when he trained it: Try it now, the chuunin-level ninja said as he finished his order of handseals, placing a rather strange genjutsu that made the sky look red over the boy. He had figured out it was a genjutsu immediately, without being told so, and thus he made the tiger seal. Once again, however, his thoughts wandered off into the distance, thinking about what the seal meant. Tiger, tigers were strong, it meant strength, strength and endurance, to resist a genjutsu. Easy. The boy smirked as he finished the handseal and immediately got out of the genjutsu. This technique was easy. Try without handseals now. Yuuki remembered the sensei say, and at first he thought the older man was joking. But he wasn’t, it could be done, so he focused solely on the red sky and on the blue sky, thinking about how the sky was blue, not red, and managed to do it. It was probably the only technique he’d managed to master on the first try, and he was happy because of it. Truly happy, like he hadn’t been in a while. He actually couldn’t remember when he was last that happy. There was something about succeeding so easily that made him want to do more, and succeed more, even if it wasn’t on the first try.

In the present, Yuuki formed the tiger seal, and felt the chakra surround him, tickling his skin as if it were a thousand feathers, but since there was no genjutsu, he couldn’t be sure whether it had worked. He assumed it did, but formed the handseal once more, thinking about having the strength and endurance of a tiger, and not falling under a genjutsu. Not falling, not falling, not...falling...he felt a strange sensation on his skin, almost as if there was a dog licking it, it was more than just tickling this time, and he knew he did it. There was, for sure, no genjutsu over him at that time. Unless there was, and he didn’t know there was, then the technique would be useless, he thought. It was kind of too bad that one needed to be aware of a genjutsu to be able to dispell it, but alas, that was the world, unfair. Then again, it would be too easy, since everyone would be walking around with the tiger handseal making sure no genjutsu came over them. Then the point of genjutsus would be lost, and nobody would learn them anymore.

The young Hyuuga thought about learning genjutsu, but decided against it. Genjutsu were simple tricks, illusionism, nothing he wanted to dabble in, he preferred to be truly strong, not just in his own mind. That’s why, he’d determined, he would learn every ninjutsu there was, one by one, without stopping. And then he would move on to taijutsu, and become a master of taijutsu. Maybe not though, taijutsu seemed exhausting, and a lot of physical training would go into it. Perhaps he wouldn’t do that. Thinking of taijutsu, he walked over to one of the training dummies and decided he would punch it. No, he wasn’t angry, he didn’t want to punch it, he’d just been reading about the Hyuuga clan, the clan he was supposedly a part of because of his eyes, and read that they were masters of taijutsu. Perhaps he should give it a try, he thought. What could possibly go wrong, after all, it was just some punching straw.

He hit the dummy repeatedly in quick succession several times with his fist closed, and then realised he wasn’t doing much but peeling off his own skin. Then, he tried hitting it with the palm of his hand, and low and behold, it seemed to move it way more than before, and it hurt his hand way less. Again, and again, taijutsu wasn’t so bad, Yuuki thought as he attempted to put chakra behind his attack, as he’d heard the Hyuuga did. At first, it seemed like he was doing nothing but sticking to the dummy with his hand, but the more times he hit it, the more he realised something. The dummy was beginning to fall apart. And not fall apart as in it was getting punched so hard it couldn’t take it, but literally fall down in pieces, as if someone took a knife and started cutting it out part by part. Of course, it was doing it slowly, in pieces of a centimetre in diameter, but it was doing it, and the boy couldn’t be happier about damaging the Academy’s property.

He knew, essentially, why the Hyuuga put chakra behind their attacks, and it wasn’t all that complicated, he just didn’t expect this kind of result on a straw dummy. He thought he’d have to try it on a person to see if it actually worked, but he was fine with having results on his first try as well. He was more than fine with that, he thought as he smiled and scratched the back of his head before continuing on. The chakra in his hand was meant to strike at the tenketsu points of the chakra circulatory system, and thus close them or open them, giving him control over the enemy’s flow of chakra. And chakra, being what it was, needed by all shinobi to perform techniques, was a very important thing to not have controlled by your opponent. The boy smiled as he hit harder just as the sun began setting down and the chirping of birds got quieter. He was pretty much a real ninja at this point, striking with his chakra straight into the tenketsu of the...straw dummy, well, maybe not a real ninja, but close to it. The boy remembered his earlier childhood, the orphanage, and the bookstore where the old owner, Hayato, would let him sit for hours at a time reading books he had no business reading, and no money to afford. He could remember quite clearly the titles of each book, and the contents, especially of those regarding the shinobi world. He recalled which countries had which villages, which specialities they all had, which elements represented them. Then he realised, Hoshigakure didn’t have any specific element, did it? Light wasn’t an element most ninja could manipulate, was it?

No, but he’d read about a clan that could. Oh, clans, he’d read about all of the clans he could find, there were so many clans, it was impossible. He even continued finding out about new ones after his arrival in Hoshigakure. Akari was the one he was thinking of, he was pretty sure, the clan that could manipulate light. How they did it, or why they were so different than the rest of the shinobi world, he had no idea. He still needed to get clearance on why the different clans had different abilities, especially doujutsus, or special eye techniques. He had one, so he would get to experiment with it first hand, but he lacked the theoretical knowledge about it. Perhaps the extensive library of Hoshi would give him an answer, he thought as he finally fell to his butt, exhausted from hitting the dummy over three hundred times. Or at least he hoped it was over three hundred times. He’d lost count after one-thirty-four. He’d practised enough jutsus as it was, he’d need to get back to his usual method of studying, the theoretical one, soon enough.

[Exit]
WC: 3660
Claims: 18 stats
Jutsus:
Clone [500/500]

Transformation [500/500]

Genjutsu Release [500/500] Mastered [500/500]

Gentle Fist: Palm Bottom [500/500]

Wed Jul 26, 2017 1:05 am

Approved

A real ninja, pretty much [Training/Solo]

A real ninja, pretty much [Training/Solo]

Re: A real ninja, pretty much [Training/Solo]