The first day at the academy (open)

Kouichi's face turned into shock when the teacher called him to answer. All the other students stared at him which made him more uncomfortable. "I... I don't know." Said Kouichi in embarrassment. He felt stupid that he didn't know what the clone jutsu was. Should he already know by this point? He then sat down and once again put his head on the desk.

The teacher was quite obviously experienced as her mouth never once slipped into a frown. In fact, at the boy's answer, the older woman's mouth drew up into a sympathetic smile accompanied by a kind yet curt nod. She hadn't really expected a real answer from the boy, though she would have liked to have seen an attempt. Not that Yui would hold it against the boy. After all, she had a whole class to work with...who to call on next?

"How about you," she cast a long index finger to Kouichi's left and right at Asami. "Tell the class your name and try to explain the clone technique to us as best you can."

All eyes turned to the young genin and for once she did not find herself at a loss for words. No, this time she actually knew the answer to the question being asked. Go figure, a genin knowing about the clone technique; it was a god damn miracle. 

"The clone technique is one that we use to create illusionary clones to confuse our opponents," Asami responded fluidly. "What you wrote on the board are the three hand seals to use the clone technique, Ram, Snake, and Tiger, in that order."

She paused her before remembering the other request.

"Oh, and my name is Asami Miyamoto," she sputtered more quickly than she would have liked. 

The teacher simply nodded before continuing.

"Miss Miyamoto is correct, the clone technique is used to create illusionary clones and these are indeed the hand seals to perform the jutsu, watch carefully," The teacher slowly formed each hand seal after which two clones appeared on either side of her. "Alright, now you guys try getting the hand seals, don't worry about any application of chakra just yet."

At this point, the classroom devolved once more into whispered conversations as students around the room worked with those next to them to make the seals. Asami, for her part, turned to her new friend.

"Why don't you give it a try?"

TWC: 1634

Kouichi looked at Asami, smiled and nodded. His confidence started to kick in. For once he wanted to work as hard as he could to impress not only Asami and the teacher, but show everyone he can do it. He doesn't want to be known as the kid who walked into a desk, but the kid who proved himself. Kouichi took a breath and said, "ok. Let's see...." He took a deep breath, stepped back a bit and started to make the hand signs.
"Ram.....Snake...and Tiger..." He said out loud while doing it. After Kouichi finished he asked Asami "how was that?"

"Perfect," Asami said with a half nod. "Now trying doing it a bit faster, like this."

Furrowing her brow ever so slightly, the young girl whipped through the string of familiar hand seals as fast as she could. She fumbled the last seal ever so slightly, but it probably wasn't something the unpracticed eye would catch. Nonetheless, she, as she was so often prone to, blushed and scolded herself mentally for her mistake. She was better than this, any self-respecting genin could make these seals in their sleep. Yet, here she was still messing up. As her academy instructor would so often tell her, 'it is unacceptable to not master the basics', and so it was, unacceptable.

"There's not a whole lot to it," she continued. "You just need to practice a whole lot. The real hard part is adding chakra to the mix. That might take a while...but don't worry you'll get the hang of it in no time. Now, try again."

At the front of the classroom, the teacher began drawing what Asami recognized as a rudimentary rendering of the human chakra system. She never paid much attention to the mechanics behind jutsu, so the whole system still confused her. However, the branching pathways in the form of a human body were hard to mistake for anything else.

TWC: 1854

Kouichi practiced the hand signs several times, each getting a bit faster. It was getting easier for him each time he did it. It wasn't too difficult for him to learn the first part of the jutsu, but he had a feeling things will become harder. Though challenges we're one of Kouichi's favorite parts of learning, he accepts the challenge with no questions asked.

"Good, just keep—"Asami cut herself short and quickly turned her attention to the front of the classroom as the instructor cleared her throat. It always pays to listen to authority figures. Especially when said authority figures are high ranking Kirigakure shinobi, they can get stabby when not listened to.

"Alright, it looked like a few of you are starting to get the hang of it," the teacher nodded to no one in particular as she continued speaking in her disconcertingly un-feminine voice. "Now, let's talk about chakra. As I hope you all know shinobi perform jutsu by molding the chakra that runs through their body."

The teacher waved vaguely at the diagram of the chakra network on the board.

"This is an approximation of the system that runs in each one of you. For the rest of this class period, we'll work on focusing this chakra before putting it to use. To do that form the ram hand seal," she paused and made the hand seal. "Hold this seal and allow yourself to relax, you'll start to feel the chakra seep from your body. It will be taxing at first, but you'll build endurance as you practice."

Finished speaking, the woman held the ram hand seal for a few seconds longer and those watching carefully would no doubt see an aura of light blue chakra wreathing her form. Oohs and ahhs came from the assembled class; now it was their turn. Once more Asami turned to the spiky haired boy.

"You want to give it a shot?"

TWC: 2112

"definitely!" Kouichi said with excitement. He then placed his hands formed the ram hand signal and then closed his eyes. "Relax" he thought to himself while taking a deep breath. He then started to glow a blue aura. "I... I'm....doing. ..it!!!" Suddenly Kouichi started to feel dizzy. He sighed and stopped creating the chakra aura. "I feel a bit weak. Is that supposed to happen?"
Kouichi sat down for a second, but really wanted to keep going, even though he felt tired.

"Yeah," Asami confirmed with an understanding nod. "That'll happen for a while. Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it eventually."

To prove her point, Asami clapped together the ram seal and allowed an unnatural calm to overcome her. In a few heartbeats, a cool blue aura sprang up around her rippling like the sea on a windy day. Channeling chakra had become second nature to the young genin and she hardly felt the physical drain her inexperienced friend felt. Sure, she might have felt a slight tug on her stamina like the one you feel after a brisk walk, but nothing more than that. Yes, she'd come leaps and bounds from when she first started channeling chakra—she'd almost passed out.

At this point, a distant bell rang; the first class was over. The classroom began to empty as students filed out in a less than orderly mess. Thankfully, Asami only had to attend a single class as per the higher up's instructions.

"It was nice to meet you," she stood up and gave the spiky-haired boy a shallow boy. "I'm sure we'll meet again. Good luck on your genin exam!"

With that, the young girl shuffled out of the room as fast as her feet could take her. Remedial classes hadn't been that bad, go figure.

TWC: 2330

[Exit, 2330 words, claiming +11 speed, 500/500 hand seal mastery of genjutsu release, 1000/1000 for lava release and the remaining 830 goes towards dual element convergence, 830/2000]

Kouichi started to exit the classroom with the other students. He smiled at Asami and said, "thanks for the help!" The first class was over. It wasn't too hard he thought. Kouichi couldn't believe he learned his first jutsu. This made him excited for what's to come. He looked up at the teacher, bowed in respect and exited.

Exits. (796 words, claiming +3 health, 796/796 Cone jutsu hand seal mastery.

Approved