I Have Goals, Okay? (Open Training)

Lan sighed, brushing black strands from his eyes as he stood in the entrance to the training grounds. He wanted to practice his jutsu, but he needed to learn more high ranked ones... he was conflicted. Sure, he knew 13 jutsu of varying degrees of usefulness. But, they were all weak. Low ranked. Mostly meant for new genin and academy students. He wanted more stuff meant more for people of chuunin rank or above. Yes, that would be good. He wanted to rank up soon, getting stronger was something that would help with that. He did have a pretty strong desire to do something with his life, after all.  

Moving furthur into the training grounds, he pulled out his two senbon. Throwing those was different from throwing Kunai, practicing with them might help him figure out what to do next. He moved about 10 meters away from the first target, his wrist flicking as he threw the first senbon. It hit the outer circle, Lan's disappointment showing on his face as he threw the next one, which wasn't any better. He retrieved the weapons, frowning now. Why couldn't he get it right? Throwing weapons should be easy for any genin! But no, he wasn't very good at those types of things. He vastly preffered jutsu, as dangerous as it was to rely only on one's jutsu to complete tasks. Relying on one's own skills, weapons and hand to hand combat, when you ran out of chakra, was a skill that could save your life, he knew. 

So he kept practicing, despite his obvious growing frustration as he kept doing so. The look on his face made it look like he was ready to spit fire, which made some of the others practicing edge away from him a bit. As if Lan's temper would explode any minute. Which, at this point, was seeming more and more likely. His movements were getting more impatient, tinged with anger that was nearly palpable. Frustration was making him reckless, to the point where he was throwing the senbon so hard that they were going nearly all the way through each target.

WC: 356

The Watchman had been back in the village for a few days. He had spent a good deal of that time with his family, making up for lost time in being gone for an extended period of time. Now that he’d had the chance to catch up with them, it was time to get back into a regular routine. The first thing on that list would be a trip to the training grounds. He needed to improve his swordsmanship, as well as develop some new techniques if he was to be effective in the field. Not only that, but he needed to show that the time spent out of the village was not wasted, and that should current Chuunin be considered for promotion, his name be in that list.

He had woken up early and spent some time meditating. His constant ally, Bossk the cobra, was there with him. The meditation had one primary purpose; to help the Hidemori Chuunin to find his center, to examine emotions from the previous day and determine which would move him forward, and which would hold him back. Once he had completed his meditation, he would finish getting dressed and leave the set of rooms he had in his clan’s compound. The rest of his clan was asleep for the most part, so he did not encounter anyone until he had entered Konoha proper. Even then it was not extremely populated. Tokiatsu didn’t mind that, it meant that his re-introduction back into the hustle and bustle of a population center would not be as abrupt as originally intended. He was used to towns and cities, hopefully the Hidden Leaf village would not be as big a shock to his system as he expected it to be.

It didn’t take him long to reach the training grounds, almost deserted but for one other shinobi. The person in question, a person with black hair tied up in a ponytail was working with what appeared to be senbon about 10 meters away. “An interesting tool to work with, to be sure.” Tokiatsu murmured to Bossk, who was wrapped around his shoulders. Bossk made no comment, simply unwinding and making his way to the ground so that his friend could get to work. Tokiatsu would unclip the two halves of Watchman’s Rebuke from his belt and connect them together by twisting them together at the pommels. He would then channel his chakra into the handles, creating a yellow chakra blade at each end of the weapon. He was already a fairly skilled swordsman, but he wasn’t using the weapon by itself today. The purpose of today’s exercise was to practise using the weapon in conjuction with other techniques. To that end, he needed to master the art of using jutsu with only one hand free. As he could use the dual-bladed weapon one-handed, this would be an excellent opportunity to combine the two forms of training.

Starting off with a simple series of spins and slashes, he would also make hand signs for Lightning Release: Electromagnetic Murder. It was a solid base for another more powerful lightning technique that the Chuunin wanted to learn: Chidori. His first attempt at using hand seals one-handed did not work, which was disappointing, he was hoping there would be at least something to show for it. “Perhapsss you are trying to do too much as onccce.” Bossk said to his friend. Tokiatsu chuckled. “You could very well be correct in that assessment, my friend.”

WC: 582

Today was going to be another well spent day at the training field, Gale could feel it. His only goal at the moment was to hone his strength, becoming stronger so that he could be of some use to the leaf. Still being the newbie that he was, he barely knew any jutsu, just the academy basics and a wind style his father taught him. But before he could go out and start learning an arsenal of jutsu he had to get the basics down pat, in truth he should have had them honed at the academy, but he had wasted a lot of time on pointless stuff and barely made it to genin. His kunai throwing was exceptional by his own standards after his training with the speedy genin Moku, though he might still have some more tricks left to learn in regards to making the kunai go exactly where he wanted It to. His shuriken jutsu, however, was a different story. He didn’t even really know how to make it spin while travelling in a straight line, every time he threw the damn thing it flew off in a completely random direction. Maybe he was missing something, hopefully, there were more people down at the training field today he could watch and learn from.

Gale entered the training fields with a shuriken in hand, spinning it on the tip of his finger as he looked around. He noticed two others already practising, one with senbon and the other with a sword, it almost looked like he was trying to make hand seals with one hand, was that even a thing? “Senbon huh? Never used them before, but I heard from my mother they can be really tricky to throw.” He tucked the shuriken away into his weapon pouch and kept a decorous distance from the two to allow them to train without him rudely imposing on them, though he was close enough so that he was sure they could hear him if they were to talk. “Are you trying to make hand seals with one hand? I had no idea that was possible, that’s pretty cool!” He called out to the older man. Gale smiled and dropped to the ground, beginning some warm up strength training with push ups.

WC: 381

The hum of his blade and the chirping of Chidori was all he had focused on for the duration of his training. The other shinobi had paid him no mind and so he did the same. Eventually one of the others shinobi had said something, and he’d almost missed it. “Are you trying to make hand seals with one hand? I had no idea that was possible, that’s pretty cool!” Tokiatsu would look over at the other shinobi. “Indeed I am. It’s something I learned recently myself, so I felt it would be something worth learning.” Tokiatsu would then look up at the sky, noting what time of day it had become. ‘Was I really here that long?’ He thought to himself. He shrugged and deactivated his weapon before separating the two halves and clipping them to his belt. Bossk would then make his way over and wrap himself around Tokiatsu’s neck as he normally did. “I hope your training goes well.” He would say to the one boy before making his way out of the training grounds.

[EXIT]

WC: 178
TWC: 760

Claims:

760WC towards One-Handed Handseals (760/1500, 25% max stat discount)

Approved