We set out at dawn to begin my training. It was a bit cold, but Kakashi-sensei told me that dealing with all sorts of weather conditions would be a part of my training. Once we approached the small body of water, he turned around to face me.
“We’ll start with a little lesson on chakra control. It’ll help you spend less chakra on ninjutsu and genjutsu.” Casually, he walked across the water. After he was a few feet in, he faced me once again. “Now, you try. Focus chakra to your feet and emit a constant stream of it. The amount of chakra emitted will always be changing, so keep that in mind.” He took a few steps closer and gave me that one-eyed smile of his. “You may want to take off some of you excess clothes, and your sandals. It’ll make things easier. Try to get over to where I am.”
“Gee, you make it sound so easy.” I commented before stripping down to my T-shirt and bottoms.
After dropping my jacket, gloves, headband, and sandals into a small pile next to me, I made the tiger hand seal and focused chakra to my feet. /Here we go. I thought before taking the first step on the water. It felt rather…bizarre, as if there was a thin line of air between my foot and the water. I could feel the repellent force pushing against me. The water rippled and although it felt shaky, but stable enough that I wouldn’t fall. I shifted my weight and took the second step.
Splash.
Well, damn it.
I broke the surface and began to shake my head violently in a half-assed attempt to get myself dry. As I waded back to shore, I removed my mask and wrung it as dry as I could, making sure I kept my faced hidden from him.
“I can already tell this is going to be a blast.” I muttered sarcastically while retying my mask.
“The sooner you get the hang of it, the sooner you’ll be able to dry off.” The jounin said.
“From the looks of it, I’d have mutated into a fish by then.”
Nevertheless, I began to focus the chakra to my feet to give it another try.
It took me until the moon was rising to get the hang of walking on water. By then, I had given up on wringing anything out and Kakashi-sensei simply observed from a nearby tree with his book in hand. It was incredibly frustrating and the more irritated I became, the harder it was to focus on the task at hand, but at least I got it at the end. Kakashi-sensei seemed pretty happy with my success, too.
For the next few days, we started training that focused on building my physical strength. He had me start the day with a rigorous workout that consisted of muscle building. It was just after noon that he started to make things harder for me.
My forearms and hands were wrapped in bandages so they wouldn’t get cut up so easily during my training. Although I tried my best to not show any signs of it, I was getting tired from the tasks he put me up to.
“Come on, Riku. I know you can do better than that.”
With a small glare, I lifted my right foot and placed it against a small ledge in the mountainside. I don’t care if it’s a great view; climbing up a wet cliff without using chakra is hard, what with the wet stones daring to make me slip and fall with every move. It involved quick thinking and the constant use of strength, as well as focus, so I understood why it made for good training. Even so, this must have been the twelfth time I’ve done this and my arms were getting sore.
Eventually, I reached the top and with one last pull, I swung myself up and onto the ledge. With a heavy sigh, I shook out my wrists and stretched myself out while Kakashi-sensei gave me a curt nod. “Looks like you’re getting the hang of it. Tomorrow, you’ll start climbing with a hand tied behind your back.”
“Wonderful.” I answered sarcastically as I followed him more towards the center of the clearing. It was already a bit worn out from previous days of training. Near the end of the cliff, there was a pool of water that was filled by a small stream and ran over the cliff, which is one of the many reasons it was wet in the first place.
“Since you’ve got the hang of walking on water, it’s time to get started on molding your chakra into lightning.” Kakashi-sensei explained as he led me to the pool of water. He held up his hand and after a couple of seconds, it began to spark. “Chakra has vibrations and in order to generate lightning, you need to increase those vibrations. Put your hand in the water when you give it a try. It’ll be easier to see any results that way.”
I nodded and knelt by the water. After concentrating my chakra to my hand with the help of a hand seal, I focused on vibrating my chakra. It was an unusual feeling, to say the least, and much different from creating lightning using genjutsu. Well, that’s a given, since they were just illusions.
There was a faint, buzzing sensation that began to grow stronger in my hand. It almost felt like the pins and needles when a limb falls asleep, but less painful and more ticklish. I furrowed my brows and tried to mold my chakra further. It was much more different than the basic ninjutsu I learned from Sakura. I’m pretty happy with my skill when it comes to chakra control, but I guess it wasn’t as good as I thought it was.
It was a little discouraging, and I felt like taking a break, but I was getting there. I closed my eyes and concentrated more chakra into my hand. As I took in another breath and slowly let it out, there was a sudden cracking sound and I immediately pulled my hand out of the water with a startled cry.
“Did I just--?” I cut myself off as I saw the small remnants of lightning spark in the water before disappearing. I looked up at the jounin with wide eyes before looking back down at my hand. “So that’s elemental ninjutsu.” I murmured, almost entranced by what I had just done.
“Good work.” He commented before slipping off the boulder he had been sitting on. “I’ll go catch our dinner. Keep at it.”
The following day was spent perfecting the simple task of generating lightning. It was tedious and incredibly boring, but at least it really helped. By the end of my fourth day of training, I was already pretty efficient when it came to generating lightning. I felt a little pathetic when I realized that many shinobi were already familiar with elemental ninjutsu by this age, and some were even skilled in two elements, but I reminded myself that I had already come a long way since I first arrived in Konoha. I liked to think that I was doing pretty well for a shinobi who’s never learned any sort of ninjutsu before.
Once again, Kakashi-sensei led me to the top of the cliff with the pool of water and everything. It was almost routine to approach the water and run lightning through it, but he instructed me nevertheless.
“Let’s start with a little warm up. Generate some lightning in the water.” I still needed to use the hand seal to help me concentrate, but I was getting better at it. I placed my hands on the surface of the water. With a small release of chakra, my hands sparked and in a matter of seconds, lighting flashed and sparked violently from my hands and into the water.
Standing up once more, Kakashi-sensei nodded once in approval. Then, out of nowhere, he shoved me towards the water.
“Whoa--!” I gasped and threw my arms out.
Though my feet splashed into the water, I caught myself with a stream of chakra flowing from my hands and pushed myself onto the surface of the water before turning and glaring at the jounin. “What the hell was that for?” I growled while getting back on land.
He responded with a cheerful laugh while rubbing the back of his head. “Your reaction time could use a little work, but at least you can stay on the water once you get on it. You can work on your speed on your own time. For now, we’ll focus on putting your lightning to use.”
“You think I’m ready for that?” I questioned while shaking off my feet. “I don’t really feel like I am.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll start with the basics.” He reassured while guiding me to the center of the field. After gesturing for me to keep my distance, he formed a short series of hand seals. Almost immediately afterwards, his hands and feet began to spark violently. “Let’s call this Lightning Edge.” The jounin said with a smile. “Coating your hands and feet will strengthen your attacks and shock your opponents. It’s a simple technique, but practical, and not an illusion.”
“Ha ha.” I answered flatly.
Kakashi-sensei taught me the appropriate hand seals and after his lightning dissipated, I attempted to generate my own. I made the hand seals and felt my chakra beginning to flow more quickly. Lightning began to spark around my hands rather easily since that as something I had already gotten the hang of, but generating lightning around my feet at the same time was hard.
I managed to get a few traces of lightning to form but as I did, the lightning around my hands faded away until I completely lost focus and stopped the technique all together. Without a word, I gave it another shot, but yielded the same results.
With a small sigh, I looked up at Kakashi-sensei sheepishly.
“This is gonna be a long day.”
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Chapter notes: Training continues and it's kinda boring actually, so let's do some speed posts to get this over with.
Chapter end notes: Thanks for reading!