Learning Space/Time Art: Immaterial Sword

Dawn of the First Day

Silence pervaded the village as the moon cloaked it in its light and the stars were wildly visible. Hardly a person was up, unless they were an early bird or worked the late night shift. Having a few hours before the sun would rise, Suzume settled to spend some time outside. She had already been awake, hardly taken a rest in this night. What a better way to make use of these hours than to conjure a new jutsu? It’s wasn’t as if she was tired enough to sleep, anyways. Sleep is for the weak. Grabbing a coat that was pretty thick, she would toss it on, on her way out. Mornings tended to be cold still, and she didn’t want to be distracted by it. She headed into the forest, straying quite a distance from any homes. Maneuvering through the trees was somewhat difficult, having little light to see with. Though, going to an area made for training was a better idea than doing it right there in the village.  It would be rather terrible and tragic if by accident she were to destroy somebody's house from her practice. Not that she could manage such an amount a damage...but it's always better to stay on the safe side. Well, for the most part, in her mind.

Once finding a spot ample for her needs, Suzume begun. A clearing about half a mile from the village, formed by a circle of grass between the abundant plant life. The area provided a group of practice dummies for anyone’s use. It was in her plan to do some typical and easy stuff. Although, this training session would create different results. As usual, she started with a few exercises in focusing her chakra. Similar to her times in the academy, she balanced her chakra from her finger tips to her toes. Thought this was getting old. She already was more than competent in manipulating her chakra. Out of boredom which she couldn’t stand, she tried to do something else with her chakra. However, in this moment she produced a sphere of space time energy. Surprised at the achievement, she lost control of the energy, dispelling the ball. It would dissipate into nothingness, causing her to have to redo it all over again. The sphere brought a pale shimmer, a physical form that she could see. Never before had she seen something like that, being the young and inexperienced genin she was. It baffled her even further that she had done it. Suzume wouldn't have expected someone of her skill to pull off any type of ability like that...she only ever imagined a much more advanced ninja to do such a thing. Only a ninja who had years among years in their lives to managed such a thing, such as some old guy. Yet, she did it. Although, it was still just a sphere of the space time energy. Not much could be done with a simple ball. Then again, where would that old guy have once been to become so powerful? She decided to make use of the discovery, and spent hours to learn its properties.

She formed another sphere, careful to attend to how it affected her stamina. It would be plain unfortunate to have recently discovered that she in fact could do this, only to not have the endurance to keep up with it. Believing she would be fine, her attention was all about this space time ball. She didn’t even bother to finish her old warm up routine she’d start each session with. Before actually doing anything with it, Suzume wanted to make sure she would be able to control it accurately. She made it into different shapes, and changed the density. Eventually she would move the concentrations of space time energy all around the practice area. Playing around with it to feel for how it should be controlled, she would eventually gain the confidence to advance to the next stage in this skill. But, Suzume didn't want to strain herself too much, so she went back to the village as the day broke through darkness – saving the next step for tomorrow.

Dawn of the Second Day

Once again, Suzume was up early and decided to get down with practicing that ability she didn’t quiet have an understanding of just yet. She started where she last left off, molding the space time energy like clay. Having some fun with it, she’d create it into more complex forms – such as a butterfly and then a cat. At some point, she would create a sword from it. It wasn’t the best quality, being too dull to really make any impact on an opponent. Keeping the shape of the sword while moving it proved difficult, too. Suzume slowed her process somewhat, taking it one baby step at a time. Doing it like this would end in no success. She worked on recreating the sword, figuring out the best design for the blade. Something straight and sharp is what she kept in mind. She toyed with designs for a while until settling for something more simple and convenient to make, in case she had to form one quickly in the heat of a battle. Once reaching the point of satisfaction, she would then move it around, attempting to keep its shape. She took it to the right, then the left, next above, and finally behind her. Carefully pushing the sword in all directions around her, she would later try taking it farther from her, and then back close to her. Every now and then, she would lose the weapon’s shape and have to fix it. But, eventually Suzume created a routine to get better with the control of this space time energy blade. Slashing the blade from all kinds of angles, she moved up to attempting an actual attack. What use would an energy sword be if all you could do is move it, but not strike with it? They way Suzume moved with her new creation was more like a dance now, twirling in a flow along with it.

Choosing one of the wooden dummies out of five, she performed a very basic attack, lunging it straight forward. It certainly was a try, but made no impact. Not even a mark. She did it again, with more force. This time the hit made a sound, but only a very tiny one. This would do nothing against an opponent. Out of frustration, she would get rigid with her training. Not paying attention to quality, she only wanted to make a hit that would have some kind of an impact. In a rapid succession, the sword was shoved at the wooden dummy, eventually drawing a streak across the neck from the amount of strikes she carried out. Deflated, she huffed, trying to catch her breath. This wasn’t the most effective way to bring about this skill. She cancelled the sword she worked so hard to form, dissuaded from training.

Upset that this wasn’t working out the way she imagined, she sat and pouted for a while. She might not have been the youngest genin, but most were older than her and it was difficult for Suzume to cope with the fact that they were far more developed in their skills than her due to this fact. But she gave it some rational thought after about ten minutes, thinking, “They didn’t get that far by giving up”. Getting back up, she did the whole thing again to make a space time energy sword. Once one was made, she would dejectedly do some half-hearted attacks. As she did each move, she got better, though. Brightening up at this, she smirked – a little more motivated. The sword was now starting to tip over the practice dummy, satisfying Suzume.

Aiming for the vitals of her wooden opponent, she begun to have fun with this training session. “You will be defeated, my inanimate rival!” she’d goof with herself. If anyone was around to witness her method of training on her own, they would probably think she’s nuts. But this wasn’t to Suzume’s concern, because she was whipping up some powerful attacks. By accident, the energy sword passed through the wooden dummy, and she grew baffled at how it just passed through it. “Huh?” she’d grunt. Repeating all her steps as closely as she could, she would realize that if she lessened the density of the energy sword, it would be able to move through an obstacle. This gave her an idea.

Shoving the sword, without its density, through the dummy’s neck, Suzume would rematerialize it as it was in. The dummy’s head fell of, decapitated. Gleeful with her work, she smiled wide at what she could do with such an ability. Though, she did knock a piece of training equipment into parts. Now the next person to train with it would have an issue of one of the practice dummies not having a head. Not knowing exactly what to do, she simply picked the head up and gently placed back on its rightful body.  Figuring this was a good place to stop for the day, once again Suzume retreated back to the village to carry on with whatever this day would bring her.

Dawn of the Final Day

Today would be the day that Suzume made this skill she came across completely refined. Once at the spot she was at previously, she would yet again make the sword of space time energy. This became easier and easier to her the more she did it, until it didn’t take much thought or effort to recreate an efficient weapon. Knowing that one of the practice dummies wasn’t usable do to slicing its head being cut off from the previous day, Suzume went to a dummy on the other side of the practice area.

Warming up with all the exercises she did previously, she got back on track with where she left off. First, she was at arms reach of the dummy to train this technique. Then she decided to get some distance. Having a distance attack would be necessary for what was ahead for her. She backed away from it, about two feet. Suzume wanted the sword to go flying at the target, but would end up failing. She didn’t keep in mind to hold onto the energy while moving, so having learned from her mistake she gave it a try once more.

Now she was able to effectively utilize this method of attack, at least from this short distance. The time space sword clash against the target, making it wobble. Getting even more distance, she would now be at 10 feet from the wooden dummy. Concentrating more this time, she put her weight in the toss to get it to have as much momentum as she could possible give. The wooden dummy got knocked completely over. “I have defeated you!” she would enthusiastically claim to it, as if it had ears to hear with.

Having the energy to pull off one more attack, Suzume wanted to hit multiple targets in one go. She moved to the side of the training set, to have the best vantage point on the rest of the practice targets. Three remained. At this point, she was fifteen feet from the group. Conjuring another sword, she took a deep breath to have better control over her aim. Smoothly shoving the energy constructed weapon, it launched right at the first dummy, toppling down. The second one received a mighty streak from damage, while the third one was hit but was hardly hurt. Perhaps if this were a real battle, the first opponent would probably have been dead, the second one badly injured, while the third would be hurt but not out. Feeling complete in her technique, she turned back towards the village to get some rest. It took a lot of energy for her to become well with this skill, and for sure now she would be able to use it for real.

[WC: 2010]

Claiming 10 stat points and Space/Time Art: Immaterial Sword

Oh, thanks for telling me!