Naruto: The Outsider's Resolve

[Fiction]

Takuma didn't rush in, nor did he pause to relax. Almost getting a hit in was nothing special when Mikoto was playing around with him. Unlike Maruboshi, who purposefully left openings to see if Takuma would notice and correctly exploit them to test his techniques, Mikoto was a typical sparring opponent, and thus, a constant source of threat and pressure.

As he thought about his next move, Mikoto looked down at her sword and scabbard before looking up at Takuma.

"You almost got one in there, Takuma," she said.

"Not at all."

"Hmm, I've gotten rusty." She gazed at him for a moment. "Do you always fight like this? It didn't seem like you were trying to trade damage."

"No, this is not how I usually fight. I was trying to mimic—no, take inspiration—from how Maruboshi-sensei fights," said Takuma, pointing his chin in his old teacher's direction. Seeing that they were conversing, he slightly relaxed and lowered his head with a sigh. "I'm too wrapped in my way of fighting; I can't see how to get out of it... so I thought, what if I tried to try to copy other fighters that I know? Maybe that will expand my mind, and something will stick."

Bishop's style of layering pressure until the opponent broke; Masaaki's opportunistic, quality-over-quantity way of fighting; Maruboshi's stable footwork that he was forced to develop after losing his leg; Nenro's set-up approach with ninjutsu. Because he had built his entire style by observing others in the Ring, he knew every fighter had something they could offer him.

But Takuma had trapped himself in a bubble; perhaps it was because he had learned in the Ring, where everyone fought similarly because they learned from other Ring fighters; he had trapped himself in the bubble. He wanted to see what he could take from shinobi who weren't from the Ring, and break out of his bubble.

"Learning from others, is it?" she said to herself with a smile. "This isn't suitable then..." Mikoto sheathed her sword and threw it behind her; it spun in the air before stabbing the ground with the tip almost perpendicular to the surface.

She raised her arms in a defensive block and opened her legs to form a wide stance. "Come at me, Takuma. Try out what you want to take from others, and let's check if you're any good at taking," she said as she rotated her wrists.

Takuma thought she was switching to something like his spars with Maruboshi.

Mikoto took out a kunai but stayed still at her spot, so Takuma carefully shuffled toward her with four tentacles holding a kunai each. When he entered her personal space, he jolted at her with a quick sweep kick while all four tentacles moved simultaneously.

The sweep was supposed to lock her legs so she couldn't move to dodge the four kunai. Mikoto's wide stance ensured that her back leg was already out of Takuma's reach and the moment his leg left the ground for the sweep, she moved by pulling her front leg back.

But while the sweep missed its mark, the four tentacles stabbed simultaneously at different parts of her body.

While she was pulling back her leg, she bent her knees to lower her height to gain half a second worth of additional travel time before the kunai reached her—which was enough for her to swing her own kunai to parry two tentacles. Mikoto twisted her torso to evade the third while her empty hand smashed into the final tentacle, cutting is in half; the final kunai lost all momentum and bounced harmlessly off her shoulder.

Takuma was dumbfounded by Mikoto's movements and immediately jumped away. Despite her awkward body position, Mikoto was faster and slammed a palm into his lower abdomen, sending him flying. He crashed on his back but immediately rolled up to his feet to get ready for a counter, only to see her walking toward him.

He took a breath and focused on his footwork as she came in closer—his goal was not to get hit. He made the first move and flowed into a quick chain of rolling punches for her face, but she effortlessly dodged all of them with fluid head movement. Before Takuma could reset his hand, Mikoto moved and laid a heavy blow into his kidney. He felt a pain take root in his body as his feet left the ground for a split second. His eyes remained on Mikoto, so his breathing hitched when he saw a spinning heel kick coming for his face.

His reflexes were stretched to the limit as he pulled his body down to duck under the kick the moment his feet touched the ground.

This isn't working. Takuma rolled to the side to evade a punch coming down at his face. The roll made him lose sight of Mikoto, and at that exact moment, she crouched down and took out his legs with a sweep.

I need to do something different, he thought as he used the tentacles and all his limbs to push himself away from her a second before she threw down an axe kick, cratering the ground and spraying him with dirt.

Mikoto's movements were fast and fluid, and there was minimal time for him to retaliate. The window to act was small, and any careless attempts had seen him punished. He needed to slow her down, but how was he going to accomplish that?

Takuma's writhing tentacles came into his view as he hastily got up, and a thought light-bulbed in his mind. Tentacles and snakes were the same shape and Anko often used a variation of the summoning jutsu to summon snakes from her person to bind her opponent, serve as a distraction, or straight-up attack them with venom.

He took a breath and split the four tentacles into eight; now that she was no longer using her sword, he didn't need them to be as strong. They just needed to be strong enough to partially hinder her movement, and he would take care of the rest.

He ran toward her before snapping a kick at her stomach. Mikoto took a step back and received the kick into her downward-facing palms. Half of the tentacles attacked and wrapped themselves around her arms while the other half held down her torso—essentially locking in her pace. She could force herself free from the tentacles because they weren't strong enough to immobilise her completely, but it would take a second more if she were just backing off.

I got her this time. Takuma cocked his arm as chakra flowed to his hand—but just before he could heave his punch, she headbutted him in the forehead. The augmentation fizzled away as he staggered back, his thoughts in turmoil.

Mikoto spun around once like a top, tearing away the tentacles holding him down. Takuma put his arms together to block a back fist aimed at his chest; he felt a sharp pain stab his bones as he blocked the strike but he ignored it and focused on the next attack.

The Anko snake-tentacle experiment wasn't a failure and the headbutt was proof of its potential.

As she threw her right hand to his head, three tentacles moved at the highest speed possible and struck her arm one after another, slowing the punch slightly. Takuma ducked under it but she whipped another punch with her free arm, forcing Takuma to merge four tentacles into two before wrapping and pulling on it.

He blocked the hit, maintaining focus thanks to the tentacles softening the blow slightly.

It's working. He whipped a punch for her throat only for Mikoto to twist her body out of the way. Takuma followed up with a biting kick, but she ducked below it and struck him in the liver. Frustrated, he tried to back away to formulate a new plan, but Mikoto stepped forward, keeping the distance between them.

"You're doing good, Takuma," said Mikoto before prying open his guard with two jabs and laying a chain of half a dozen strikes right into his chest.

The strikes were light because they were sparring, but he would've been in real trouble if they were full strength—even while she was restrained to his level. A thought flashed past his mind as he stumbled back. He could touch her with his tentacles; now, he just had to make it hurt. Not only did he know how to do that, Nenro also had a similar idea, validating Takuma's ad-hoc creation.

D-rank ninjutsu had fewer hand seals, which made it perfect for a lightning-fast spar like this. As Takuma completed the hand seals, a tentacle wrapped around his right arm. Lightning Release: Shock. The jutsu converted his chakra into lightning-nature chakra that flooded the water tentacles.

Eight Tentacles: Shock Mode

A fascinated smile appeared on Mikoto's face as Takuma rushed towards her. She didn't stay her ground like she had till then and moved in sync with him, keeping herself just barely within range of the electrified tentacles as though she wanted him to succeed.

"This is an excellent combination," she said, her eyes tracking the charged tentacles.

The tentacles swung and swiped at Mikoto, trying just to get one touch that would shock her,but she moved around effortlessly while looking at the sparking water with amusement. The joy in her eyes only made him want to get in a hit even more—and he had a tactic that he could use to take her by surprise.

Kameko's Taketori kenjutsu had the ability to extend her sword's reach, surprising her opponents and actively making them think about her sword's true length. Takuma knew no kenjutsu, but he could play with the length of his tentacles just fine.

A tentacle jabbed at Mikoto, and she moved back to evade it as she had done until then. At that exact moment, another tentacle shrunk to half its original length and transferred its water to the others, causing the tentacle jabbing at Mikoto to grow in length, which it hadn't done since the start of the fight.

Despite the failures, he was confident enough in his previous attempts that he would hit her this time—so it stung the most when Mikoto dodged the attack like she knew it was coming.

The charge in the tentacles ran out immediately after the failed attack, and Mikoto dashed in before he could recharge it, hitting him so fast it felt like all four strikes landed simultaneously.

Okay, screw this! Gritting his teeth, he reverted back to his original style and opted to stay close to get at least one solid hit in, even if he had to trade damage to do it.

He backed a punch to her face with an augmentation. Mikoto bobbed her head away before punishing him with a body shot that he absorbed and immediately went for another augmented punch for her liver, but before he could even pull his arm back to set up the punch, she hit his shoulder, stopping the punch before he could even throw it.

Takuma forced on and decided to stomp on her foot to lock it down and stab with an elbow. He went for her foot, but Mikoto shifted it to the side before stomping down on his foot in turn. Takuma knew what was coming and raised his guard, but Mikoto was faster and slipped a punch through the guard.

She then finished with an uppercut to the chin that shocked his entire body.

Despite his doubled vision, Takuma had his tentacles attack her face with water to disrupt her flow but she spun him by the shoulder, switching places with him. He had no idea why she did that and thought it was to confuse him, but then he felt a punch dig into his back; it didn't hurt badly—but it destroyed the tentacle water mass.

How did she know he was going to use the tentacles? Takuma was utterly shocked. It was as though... she knew it was... coming...

At that moment, the entire fight flashed through his mind. Not once had she taken the initiative and had simply attacked him by picking apart the weakness of his moves. She had solely fought through the counterattack. He had thought she could do that because she had made herself slightly faster to challenge him—but as the fight ran through his mind, he realised she wasn't faster than him... she simply moved before him.

She was able to punish all of his moves because she knew what he was going to do before he did it—and thus set up counters for everything he did.

Takuma looked up at her, expecting to see red eyes only to see they were still onyx.

"...Then how?"

"In our first lesson, you said you wanted to be a jonin... so, broaden your horizons; this is the surface of what it means to be one," said Mikoto before promptly knocking him out with a spinning heel kick.





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[Fiction]

Beautiful. That was what Maruboshi thought when he saw his student's efforts being thwarted over and over again.

The skill shown by Uchiha Mikoto was exquisite; every move looked elegant and effortless, but all of it was planned down to the very minute details. He expected a jonin, especially an Uchiha, to possess such skill, but that didn't take away from the fact that it was a delight to watch.

However, Mikoto wasn't the only one who deserved praise.

Maruboshi was well aware of Takuma's style, so he was proud to see him step out of his comfort zone and try different tactics. His choices were generally terrible. They opened him up to attacks, turned his fighting style into a disjointed mess, actively made him worse, and even frustrated him enough that he switched back at the end—and yet trying out all those changes was the right choice.

Maruboshi could almost see a glimpse into the future, where Takuma's combat style had evolved. Currently, he was in messy flux, but once the pieces fell into place, he would have something strong, stable, and sustainable that he could safely rely upon out in the field.

As he watched the fight, he felt two gazes from separate directions. He pulled his eyes off the fight to look at the peeping but couldn't find anyone in the trees; they had hidden themselves well. He didn't find it strange because the field was public property; neither was it isolated—and the Hidden Leaf was a village filled to the brim with shinobi who had learned to hide themselves for no apparent reason.

The gazes disappeared the moment he swept his own across the field, but he wondered if the hidden onlookers were ANBU operatives observing Takuma before his test. He had no way to confirm that other than catching them, which would be embarrassing and rude if he was wrong and would do nothing if they were indeed ANBU.

———
.

Uchiha Fugaku swiftly hid himself when he saw Maruboshi Kosuke look right in his direction. The Eternal Genin was already a senior citizen, but it seemed like he still had the senses of a prime hunter. It had been such a long time since Fugaku had seen his wife fight that he didn't want to miss it—but he didn't want to interrupt or intrude, so he watched from the shadows.

The spar was more or less what he expected. Mikoto's offence was ran through counterattacks, which made sense because when it came to the Uchiha's Interceptor Fist—not only was she better at it than him and arguably the best in the clan, but taijutsu was a bigger part of her combat style than his.

The Uchiha Interceptor Fist was the taijutsu developed and used by the Uchiha clan. The core of it was to make corresponding responses or counterattacks that struck at incoming attacks. The style was also heavily based on not letting the opponent get into a flow by disrupting their moves and intensively punishing their openings and bad habits.

To be effective, the user had to be proficient at reading the opponent, and with the Sharingan, which had the power of insight to mimic and understand other's moves, that was an easy feat.

Even though Takuma wasn't even close to being a challenge, he could tell that Mikoto was feeling comfortable. She had effortlessly used the clan's taijutsu to perfectly dismantle her opponent without breaking a sweat while also restricting herself to his level.

Retirement had undoubtedly had its effects, but it felt like she had retained most of her skill—her experience as a jonin was still there, buried under the surface—and she would only need to bring her body up to speed to once again hone her combat instincts.

As Mikoto finished the fight by knockout, Fugaku turned around to leave. Seeing her fight made him consider inviting her to regular spars so they could spend time together like they did before they had their children.

He turned back with the three tomoe spinning in his red pupils as he locked in on the person hidden in the trees. They were well hidden, with only small parts of their body visible, which would have been a problem if not for the Sharingan that saw chakra in colour that outed the person. Fugaku blinked, the traces of chakra disappeared, and he could no longer spot them.

Chakra masking, he guessed. That's no ordinary miscreant…

Fugaku glanced at Mikoto and company once before leaving. Whoever it was, with his wife and Maruobshi Kosuke present, there wasn't much they could do.

———
.

"What do you think?" Maruboshi asked Mikoto after she knocked Takuma out.

"I'll give him a point for effort," said Mikoto as she dusted the dirt and grass off her outfit before kneeling down to straighten Takuma so he wasn't lying in an off-position. "I could tell he was trying things, but it made him disjointed at best."

"It'll take some time to integrate new things smoothly."

"If he's trying to avoid trading damage, then genjutsu will work wonders."

"How is he at genjutsu?" he asked.

"He has the fundamentals down, but if he really wants to take full advantage of genjutsu, he needs to open his mind to the possibilities," said Mikoto as she stared down at Takuma. "Most shinobi mistake ninjutsu and genjutsu to be similar when they're not. Unlike ninjutsu, technical skill is only part of the puzzle; application is the half where the true potential lies. The mind is a complex system, both a hindrance and an advantage for genjutsu users. It takes a lot to create believable illusions, but there is no limit to what the mind will accept. He needs to realise that genjutsu is more than a string of hand seals that perform a certain function—the day that understanding clicks in his mind will be the day he'll start using genjutsu in his special way."

It was good that Takuma had Mikoto as his genjutsu teacher because Maruboshi didn't have the talent for using genjutsu—as Mikoto said, it took a lot to deceive the mind—and he didn't have it in him to create believable illusions beyond the most basic genjutsu. He recalled the genjutsu Takuma had used on him in their spar earlier that week. It was much more potent than expected and had tightly gripped his mind.

There was no doubt that Takuma had the ability to create very believable genjutsu.

"I will work with him on a genjutsu application when we resume our lessons," she said.

Takuma noisily heaved as he abruptly sat up with his eyes wide open. His body tensed, and he looked ready to jump at the sight of danger as he scanned his surroundings before calming down when he saw both his teachers standing around him.

"That was a shit show," Takuma groaned.

"You did great," said Mikoto, tossing him a water bottle.

"I didn't manage to hit you once."

"That wasn't going to happen either way. As long as I didn't want you to hit me, you wouldn't have touched the clothes on my back."

Takuma looked at Maruboshi, who shrugged. If he didn't want Takuma to hit him, he could guarantee that didn't happen, but that was never the purpose of their spars.

"How did you do that?" Takuma asked Mikoto, staring into her eyes. "Are you wearing coloured contacts?"

Mikoto tried to stop herself, but she burst into laughter, which turned Takuma red with embarrassment.

"You don't need the Sharingan to do what I did today, Takuma," Mikoto chuckled as she wiped a tear from her eyes. "With enough combat experience, the willingness to improve your taijutsu, and the right approach to learning, you too could predict your enemy's moves one day... But you're not wrong; my eyes played a major role in how I fought today."

"How so?" asked Takuma.

"Your water tentacle jutsu. I have fought someone who used it, so I knew that you could change the tentacle's length, so I was ready for you to use that tactic," said Mikoto.

Takuma stared at her for a moment before looking down at the ground. Mikoto wanted to continue, but she saw a signal from Maruboshi to wait. After a few seconds of silence, Takuma spoke up again,

"...You have the Sharingan that allows you to copy your opponent's moves. That must mean you have tons of fights from many types of fighters recorded in your mind. I must have fought like one of those fighters—or a combination of certain aspects from various fighters—so even though you didn't use your eyes against me, you had the knowledge to predict my moves."

"Correct," Mikoto smiled.

Takuma sighed. "The Sharingan sure is impressive."

"It is impressive," said Mikoto with a hint of pride, "but it's not that simple. Our eyes give us the gift of insight, allowing us to parse visual information at a high rate, which is how we can copy whatever we see—and as it may sound, many of my clan folk who have unlocked the eye never go beyond simple monkey copy when there's so much more to it..."

Maruboshi gazed at the woman before him and was surprised to see her talking negatively about her clan members in front of outsiders. It was natural to have such thoughts, but from what he knew, clan shinobi didn't reveal those thoughts to outsiders as they were representative of their clan. The matter of reputation was taken very seriously.

Moreover, the person doing it was Lady Uchiha, who was always expected to defend her clan. He glanced at Takuma; the relationship between Mikoto and his student seemed closer than he thought.

"...When I was still active, I used to look back at my fights and rather than just monkey copy, I used to take my time to understand why my opponent moved the way they did. I was often wrong in my understanding because the Sharingan doesn't give answers, but by investing time and effort, I was rewarded with knowledge about combat beyond even my clan folk, who had been shinobi far longer than me…"

The Uchiha were infamous for their Sharingan—but when people talked about them, it was only about copying ninjutsu hand seals and taijutsu movements to mimic their opponents. He had been alive long enough to know that the Sharingan was capable of more than copying, but what he just heard was frightening, to say the least.

"I was so thrilled by what I had found that I fought every clan member willing to fight me. I made them imitate every opponent they had fought so I could copy them and then take my time to understand and break down their opponents until I had the correct answers to problems I might face in the future."

Maruboshi felt a chill go down his spine as he looked at Mikoto. There was a terrifying intelligence in her eyes that made his instincts scream danger. Mikoto, by herself, would have faced a decent set of enemies she would've copied from. But she had just claimed that she made her clan members imitate their opponents. If he were conservative and guessed ten unique opponents per clan member and fought ten members, she would have copied an additional one hundred opponents.

Even if there were significant overlap, she would still have gained rich experience beyond what most shinobi would ever experience in their entire careers. He knew she was a jonin, but he now felt a monster was standing before him. And she had claimed that all Sharingan-bearing Uchiha could do the same—they didn't do it, but they all had the potential to— was again reminded why the Uchiha clan was one of the founder clans with a deep and dominant history in the Warring States Periods.

It also made him think that Takuma would benefit more if he learned taijutsu from Mikoto instead of genjutsu.

"But knowing the answers isn't enough; you need to be able to use them quickly and correctly. The Uchiha Interceptor Fist is based on the tenets that focus on reading the opponent, finding their weakness, targeting their openings, and disrupting their flow... I applied my knowledge through my taijutsu and became proficient to the point where I no longer needed my eyes to see through my opponents—the eyes elevated everything I did—but even without them, I felt as though scales had fallen from my eyes. I had unlocked a new state of being... I was free, and I was in control."

Takuma looked gripped and utterly immersed. He hung on her every word as though it was a mantra for eternal prosperity with Mikoto's every word were resonating with him.

"You don't need my eyes, Takuma," Mikoto asserted confidently. "Yes, they helped tremendously, but I—not my eyes—am the reason behind my understanding and skill. If you look at your opponent and apply your mind to it, you will see things that most people miss—and that's where you will find what separates ordinary from extraordinary. It will take a lot, and it will not be easy, but I think you can do it... because you were doing it today, weren't you?"

"...Yes," said Takuma.

Maruboshi looked at him, and he seemed lost in his thoughts.

It was the right decision to bring in Mikoto for the spar.

Maruboshi could tell that something was about to change. He could tell that Takuma's mind had finally opened and felt he was going to go through a change much bigger than fixing his sacrificial tendency.

He wondered what Takuma would be like after those changes.





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[Fiction]

As the week drew to a close, the weekend arrived, and Kameko found herself standing outside an izakaya nestled deep within the Entertainment District, away from the bustling main streets. The front door had a notice taped to it that said the place was reserved for the day for Inuzuka Hana's rank promotion celebration.

Her academy class always booked a small establishment for the evening so that they could enjoy the class gatherings by themselves. She entered through the door and was immediately greeted by the staff. The establishment was an open space lined with tatami mats, with low tables and floor cushions for seating. It was perfect for a large group, allowing people to move around and socialise easily.

"Kameko, you're late!"

She had just confirmed with the staff that she was there for the gathering when she heard her name called. Aimi latched onto her and pulled her towards the table where many classmates were already present and enjoying themselves. She looked around and roughly counted over twenty people present, a high number even for a class that always had a strong attendance for their gatherings.

A few people had not maintained contact with the rest of the class, while others were stationed outside or transferred out of the village. It made sense that everyone who possibly could have come was there because it was a special occasion. Kameko swept her eyes across the gathering to find a certain someone but couldn't see him, which was natural as he had never attended any of their class gatherings.

"Hana, congratulations." Kameko walked over to Hana's table, where she was the centre of attention as the host and subject of celebration and sat beside her. As a congratulatory gift, she presented her with a set of durable, high-quality sashes for her forehead protector.

"Thank you, Kameko," Hana smiled brightly. She used to wear her hair at chin length, but in the year Kameko was away, she had grown her hair past her shoulder. Kameko even noticed how the Inuzuka clan's traditional fang tattoos on her cheeks were now darker; she had heard that the tattoos were inked darker when an Inuzuka was promoted as a higher status symbol within the clan.

With the greeting done, Kameko wanted to leave the table and move to a quieter spot. She was excited to catch up with her friends, but she wanted to take it slow and build up from there, and the popular table wasn't the spot to do so.

It had been three and half years since their batch had graduated, and they had started participating in the Chunin Exams last year, having gone through two of them as they were conducted bi-annually—and managed to produce three chunin within the batch.

The first Chunin Exam resulted in two promotions.

Kameko looked across the table at a brunette with cinnamon-brown hair and sharp amber eyes. The first promotion was bagged by their batch's Rookie of the Year, Okubo Momoe, the civilian prodigy who had won the entire exam.

She had always been first at the academy and even maintained her top spot among the batch long after.

Sitting a few seats away from Momoe was Uchiha Izumi, with her long, straight, dark brown hair and a beauty mark under her right eye. She was the second promotion of their batch from the first Chunin Exams and had placed second, only barely losing to Momoe. And then there was Inuzuka Hana, the only one from their batch to be promoted in the second and latest Chunin Exam.

All three chunin at the gathering and their teams were sitting at the same table, and Kameko could tell that her classmates wanted to talk to them, especially the boys, who were all trying to impress them. She wanted no part of that and was about to leave when Hana grasped her arm to make her stay.

"Tell us what it was like out there in the war?" asked Hana.

Momoe, who had been chatting to someone else, turned towards Kameko. "I would also like to hear about it," she said.

Kameko suddenly felt everyone's eyes on her.

She realised she was the only one in their group who had participated in the war. Out of their academy, three people had been deployed to the Land of Hot Waters. One was deployed only a few months ago and was still out there. As for Takuma, he hadn't kept any connection with the class except for two people. She glanced at Fuma Arisu sitting beside Izumi and found her gazing at her with a neutral expression.

They worked together at the Police Force, and even though Takuma's relationship with the Military Police had soured before he left, it didn't extend to Arisu. She wondered if Takuma had told her about his experience; she got the sense he would not talk about it to anyone.

Kameko herself didn't want to talk about a lot of it.

"... The base I was stationed at ran a recapture mission," Kameko said, opting to share the parts she was comfortable with. "There was this gold mine that the enemy had taken over, using the captured workers to mine as usual. The gold which should have gone to the Land of Hot Waters was now going to the enemy... and our mission was to rescue the workers and run the enemy out of the mine. It was going to be a difficult mission because our base only had two jonin while the enemy had three on their side."

The tension in the room rose at the mention of the jonin disparity.

Kameko roughly went through the preparation that went into planning such a big operation. Perhaps it was boring to listen, but having gone through it, she had come to learn the importance of preparation and planning.

"...as the stealth team was pulling the workers out, the enemy rang its sirens... the battle had already begun by the time we got down into the pit. In a few short minutes, the entire pit was covered with more than a hundred shinobi from both sides fighting against each other."

Kameko could recall the mine vividly. The earthy smell, the faint tremor in the wet ground, the cacophony of metal mixed in with all the yelling, and the brush of ambient chakra against her skin—even thinking about it made her heart pump faster.

"That sounds awesome," said one of her classmates. "So you fought beside jonin. What was that like?"

"... Terrifying," Kameko answered honestly. "Everyone kept clear of them, fearing they would be caught in one of their jutsu. That wasn't enough, though, because they affected too broad of an area with their ninjutsu. A Fire Release ninjutsu exploded and caused several substantial landslides, disrupting the battlefield."

The questions came pouring in from how many people died and how many she killed to what were the enemy jonin like. She tried her best to answer the question and ignored the unsavoury, insensitive ones.

Momoe, sitting across the table, caught her eye. She had an inquisitive look as she absentmindedly played with a thin braid in her hair. As though noticing Kameko's gaze, Momoe looked up with a sharp look and said,

"Interesting. What did you think about that combat experience? How did you manage everything that was happening around you?"

"What do you mean?" asked Kameko, not understanding the question.

"As in, when I spar, I don't have to focus on anything but my opponent before me. That changes when you add numbers on both sides; I have to keep track of my teammates and the enemy as I fight my opponent," said Momoe in a pondering tone. "I've never been in a battle with hundreds of people, but I assume that it would be difficult to keep track of your surroundings when there are so many people actively fighting around you—are you being mindful of them... are they being mindful of you? I believe having jonin there further complicates the situation as well."

Kameko had to pause because the questions until now were along the lines of "What was it like?" where she didn't have to think much. So suddenly, facing a more profound question warranted her thinking about the answer before she could reply properly.

"It's too much to keep track of, and I was scared because I hadn't been part of such a battle. Strangely, I wasn't as stressed as I should've been in that situation... and that was because I had a teammate covering my back, and I was doing the same for her." Kameko thought about how she and Rikku were protecting each other in the dangerous pit where lives were cut down every minute. "Instead of putting it all on myself and inevitably getting overwhelmed, I trusted my teammate, and we shared responsibilities."

Momoe looked at Aimi, sitting beside Kameko and Hideaki at the corner of the table, stuffing his face with food.

"I guess that makes sense," she smiled while gazing at her teammates.

"How did the battle end?" Izumi asked.

"It ended when two enemy jonin died, and the remaining one chose to flee. Everything started to collapse as some managed to flee, but most of them were killed," Kameko answered, but as she was looking back to her memories, she realised there was another just as significant turning point. "However, I think the first heavy blow to the enemy was when my team targeted the iryo-nin. Takuma found the mine the iryo-nin were hidden—"

"I did hear that Takuma was on your team. How's that wimp doing these days?"

Kameko was rudely interrupted. Sitting behind her at another table was Inuzuka Hiji, Hana's cousin and their batch's jackass. His annoying voice seemed more grating to her ears than it ever did when they were in the academy.

"No one's going to think you're a mute if you stay quiet, Hiji," Arisu said in a fed-up voice with disgust in her eyes.

"Oh, come on. I'm just asking how an old friend is doing," said Hiji, smirking.

Everyone in the gathering knew that the relationship between Takuma and Hiji was the farthest from friends. Hiji and his group had constantly bullied Takuma in the later years of the academy. In the final year, Takuma stopped following their orders and ceased showing any reaction to their words, which made Hiji and his group lose interest in him.

"Why do you have to be so childish, Hiji? Your attitude is the reason you were passed on for promotions after the exams," Hana sighed disappointedly at her cousin.

Hiji's smirk collapsed into a glare. The two cousins were the same age and often compared to one another. Hana had always been ahead and was used as an example for Hiji to do better. It had only gotten worse now that she had made chunin while he was still a genin.

"You should make amends with him the next time you see him," said Hana.

Hiji scoffed at the idea, which pissed off Kameko. She wouldn't have cared before, but after spending months on the same team with Takuma and having gone through their time in Yu, she felt more than irritation at Hiji's attitude.

"If you can't make amends, then you should at least act civil," Izumi added on the topic. She and Hiji were on the same jonin team, and in many ways, he was compared to Izumi more than Hana because they were on the same team, and she was yet another person ahead of him. "He's not the same person he was before. Takuma was made a senior officer in the Police Force while he was a genin and trusted to lead a new team. That's something to be respected."

"And Takuma has experienced a war, which none of us can claim to have done," said Arisu.

Hiji looked taken aback because he wasn't expecting so much pushback. He noticed people staring at him and how the merry vibe of the gathering had come down, and everyone was treating it like it was his fault.

He scoffed and rolled his eyes, "Whatever, I will respect that wimp when I see what's so impressive about him. We can fight if he wants, and we'ill definitely beat that weakling, won't we, Kuragari!"

Hiji's black ninken, Kuragiri, playing with Hana's Haimaru triplets in the side, stood up and barked excitedly while showing his sharp teeth. Just like the triplets, Kuragiri had grown as well, was bigger and bulkier, and looked more menacing than them.

Kameko wasn't intending to, but she scoffed and did it loud enough that Hiji glared at her.

"What? You don't think he would beat us, do you?"

She had seen and fought both of them and compared the two boys. They were similar in that their combat style was crude and brutal; she instantly felt the difference between them.

Hiji and his ninken were a pain to fight with their trained coordination and the Inuzuka clan's taijutsu and ninjutsu; he was also feral in his approach and went at his opponents with full force because he didn't have another gear, which often made him difficult to handle but it was quite one-dimensional.

Takuma, on the other hand, tried to overwhelm them by causing as much damage as possible to end fights quickly. However, Takuma could and did observe his opponent and adjusted his approach, which made it difficult for him to fight. Then there was his skill with all three disciplines of ninjutsu, taijutsu, and genjutsu—which not only made him defend to plan against; it also made him much more flexible in how he could go about causing damage. She had also seen him fight in the manor house against the ROOT agents. She could be wrong, but she didn't think Hiji had the combat sense and control Takuma had shown that day.

And that was all on top of the solid proof that Takuma had defeated an experienced chunin with a strong command over a B-rank jutsu.

"If you spar, he'll defeat you," Kameko said calmly to Hiji as everyone listened, "but if you fight, he will kill you..." She didn't know how to put it any other way— Takuma was a fighter in a spar, but he was a killer in a real fight.

Those two were very different shinobi, and the latter was ten times more terrifying than the former.

Hiji laughed so loud that it hurt their ears. He tumbled to the floor while holding his side, and his ninken mimicked his partner by barking joyously. "Takuma? Beating me? He hasn't touched me in our spars once—and you say that he could kill me!" he laughed.

Usually, she would only think of such behaviour as childish and beneath her, but perhaps because she had spent nearly a year with Takuma as her teammate, she felt bothered because they had gone through so much together. She wanted to wipe the smirk off Hiji's face and scare him, so she said something she wouldn't have said otherwise because of how it had affected Takuma.

"... Killing you won't be much of a challenge, seeing that he's already killed a jonin," she said.

Hiji didn't hear her, and on top of his own laughter, he asked, "What did you say?"

However, people sitting near her on the table did hear her. Sitting across from her, Momoe heard her but felt as though she had misheard.

"I'm sorry, Kameko, did you just say that... he killed a jonin."

Kameko turned to her and said, "Yes, he killed a jonin. And in fact, he—"

"Kameko..."

Kameko froze when she heard a familiar voice. She turned around and saw Takuma, along with Taro, standing a few steps away from their table. He had a grave expression on his face, and he only said one word.

"Enough."






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[MrRobot]

Kameko is being a bro but yeah that would be too much.