Naruto: The Outsider's Resolve

[Fiction]

Takuma dumped his backpack onto the ground beside his foot as he looked at the large board tied up on the metallic chain-link fence with barbed wire weaved not only the top but also through the chain-link that made up the fence's body.

—> Training Ground: No. 42 <—

The board also had warnings about the area being a restricted property... only for shinobi use... stay out... danger... and many other notices all pointing to turn away, all written in bright red— not the feel-good Coca-Cola red, but the kind that screamed hazard.

Seeing the trees with trunks as thick as houses stretched over multiple stories tall with canopies so dense with green that not a single ray of light trickled down to the ground, Takuma was completely fine obeying the warnings and returning home. Alas, orders were orders and needed to be obeyed.

"Takuma!"

Hearing his name, Takuma turned away from the grim-looking forest to look at the trio of Nenro, Ai, and Masaaki walking towards him with Masaaki waving his hand above his head like an excited child.

"Mornin'," he said. Even though it was still dark, with sunrise a couple hours away.

"You sure packed light," Ai said, looking at Takuma's backpack.

Takuma glanced at the trio's backpacks on their shoulders and saw that their packs were larger than his and packed to the stitches. To him, it looked like they had overpacked.

"I travel light," said Takuma. He had been taught to pack light, carry only essentials, and be resourceful for anything else needed at the moment.

"So, this is it, huh," Nenro gazed at Training Ground No. 42. "What can you tell us about it?"

Takuma stared at the roots of the trees to see if he could spot some mushrooms. He had researched the area when packing his supplies as he was taught. But then Takuma noticed that the trio was looking at him.

"Huh, who me?"

"Who else... none of us are from here."

Takuma blinked. It was true. To everyone else, 'Takuma' had always been a Leaf village resident and even he had been living in the Leaf village for over a year.

"I... don't know much," said Takuma. "Never got to explore the restricted parts of the village, wasn't allowed, you know," he glanced at the looming forest, "but from the looks of it, the training ground is a forest-type terrain to maybe emulate deep forest to practice. From what I read, some risky flora and fauna roam there, creating a somewhat dangerous ecosystem for outsiders. So, not your average forest. An abundance of poisonous fruits and mushrooms, a special species of blood-sucking leeches, spiders that can blend in the environment— invisible to predators but attractive to prey... so yeah, there's a lot of interesting—"

Takuma looked back. Ai looked pale and blue.

"O-Oh, should I have not said something?" he asked.

"She hates leeches," Nenro wrapped his arm around Ai and rubbed her shoulder. "We once slept at a dairy farm, and in the morning, she woke up to find six leeches stuck to her, sucking blood."

Takuma wrinkled his nose. That sounded horrifying to wake up to. And it looked like it left behind a trauma on Ai.

"Well, there's something we can do to keep them away," he said to Ai.

"Really?" Ai removed her face from Nenro's shoulder and looked hopefully at Takuma, who nodded.

There were herbs that could be mulched into a paste that worked like repellents to keep the leeches away.

"Crying first thing in the morning, you guys sure are lively," said Taro upon arrival and lazily waved his hand to them with a light bag on his back. "Why's she crying?" he asked.

"Ai doesn't like leeches," said Masaaki.

"Then this is going to be terrible for her," Taro chortled shortly.

Nenro glared at him as he pulled Ai closer.

Takuma shook his head. The reason why they all had gathered away from their usual training grounds was that three days ago, Yoshio had announced that they would be doing an outdoor expedition to make the genin experience how to camp outside when they were outside the village for missions and couldn't find a town to lodge before sundown.

It was quite a basic skill to have, which was why Maruboshi had Takuma go through outdoor camping training. Which was why he was excited to hear they would camp outside. He felt an affinity for the great outdoors— the scenery was beautiful, the air was clean, and despite his not-so-stellar experience with his first trip, Takuma had some great times on the subsequent trips— something about camping under the trees, away from the city noise and light felt great.

But as he looked at Training Ground No. 42, the dark forest, which he had read about in the archives, didn't look too appealing. But he was hopeful nevertheless.

One by one, more and more of Yoshio's group began to arrive at the training ground, all with bags on their bags, looking worriedly at the forest.

"Isn't that the instructor?" Masaaki said, pointing towards the forest.

Takuma turned towards the forest and saw Yoshio appearing out of the woods, accompanied by several shinobi. He walked through the gate in the fence and faced them.

"Looks like everyone is here," Yoshio said after peering at them. "Welcome to Training Ground No. 42. As you can see, it's a forest, and you all will spend the next few days exploring it. Do some fun activities. Have a great time together in the great outdoors."

"I don't like this. He's going to screw us over. I can feel it," Taro muttered loud enough for the team to hear.

Takuma couldn't agree more. There was nothing fun or great about how Yoshio had said those words. What did he mean by fun activities?

"The objective of this excursion is for all of you to get used to operating outdoors during missions or simple traveling. It was for that reason Training Ground No. 42 was chosen— but that's only the part reason why we are doing this," Yoshio continued as a smile appeared on his chiseled face. "I previously said that you'll be traveling with your teams... I lied. Everyone will start separately from each other, so if you prepare your supplies jointly... too bad."

Takuma saw that the trio looked aghast. It seemed they had done precisely what Yoshio mentioned. Team-5 hadn't planned for joint preparation, but it seemed the trio had done so themselves.

"Every one of you will get one of these five tokens," Yoshio raised his hand to show five tokens, each in a different shape. "All of you will start separately at different points of the fence, with the control tower somewhere in the forest as the goal. Five tokens, each of a unique shape, are needed to enter the tower. The first two sets of five tokens will be granted entry and rewarded, while the remaining fifteen will be declared failures and have to shovel shit in a stable for a week."

They were made to queue and given a token each.

"What did all of you get?" Masaaki asked as he returned from the line. "I got the circle token."

"Square," Nenro raised his triangular wooden chip.

"Triangle," said Ai.

"Diamond," Taro showed his rhombus-shaped tile.

Takuma walked to the group and saw his teammate's tokens before showing them his pentagon token. "We need to make a plan to converge somewhere in the forest so we can then travel together to the tower," he said.

"Probably the right thing to do, but we don't know anything about the forest. How should we decide the meeting point?" Nenro said.

Takuma slung his backpack off his shoulder and took out a scroll. He unfurled it to show a map. "So, as you can see, a river—"

"You bought a map with you?" Taro stared between the map and Takuma.

"Huh, yeah. The day after he told us where we were going, I searched to see if I could find something. I asked the archive manager, and she straight up handed me a map," Takuma said— libraries were awesome. "So, as I was saying. You see this river..."

Spoiler: Img: Training Ground No. 42

The fences around Training Ground No. 42 made a circular perimeter around the forest. A river entered from the north and then split soon after entering the forest. The stream that headed southwest exited the forest in one piece, but the second stream that headed southeast branched one more time at two places. The tower that Yoshio mentioned was situated right in the middle of the forest.

"We don't know where we will enter, so I say we head toward the water," Takuma ran his finger over the river on the map placed on the ground. "We meet at this split and then head to the tower together," he pointed at the first split in the southeast stream, which was right next to the central tower. "So, wherever you enter the forest, head towards the water, follow the steam and make your way to this split— don't try to tread the woods, it's dangerous. Yoshio told us we are going to be in here for two days. You need water for those two days, which is really easy to get if you're near a bunch of it. I will repeat, try to get to the water as soon as possible and then use it as a guide."

Rivers were overpowered. They provided water and food, and as such, they were a great place to camp. And in the real world, civilization settled near water, which was why if you followed water, people could eventually get to towns or villages.

"It will be difficult if we enter from the wrong position," Taro pointed out how the river streams were far from some places than others.

"Cover as much ground as you can during the mornings," said Takuma. "Wake up at first light and utilize most of your time to cover as much distance. I hope all of you have brought some food?" All of them nodded. "Good, ration it out, so you don't have to waste time hunting for food— but don't let yourself get dehydrated. When you make camp, drink as much water as possible and boil enough for the journey. Don't drink standing water. Don't eat anything you don't absolutely know you can eat..."

He rattled off everything he learned from his excursions and made sure they made it to the point well and in one piece.

"You sure know a lot about camping."

Takuma slung his backpack over his shoulder as one of the shinobi that came along with Yoshio called his name. "I do. I was trained for it. Alright, see you guys soon," he said before jogging to the shinobi.

Ai turned to Taro. She asked, "Do they teach this in the academy here?"

"The basics, sure. We even went out a couple times, camped near a forest... but what all he said, they didn't teach any of that," Taro shook his head. "... where did he learn it?"

Takuma ran to the shinobi, who handed him a red flare rod.

"If you're unable to continue for any reason, shoot this towards the sky and stay there, we will come and get you," said the shinobi and then asked if Takuma understood, who nodded.

The same shinobi then led Takuma and four other genin, and they traveled for one and a half hours before they stopped. He walked to a gate locked with multiple locks, and after unlocking every one of them, he turned to Takuma.

"You enter from here," he said.

Takuma walked inside, and the shinobi then locked the gate behind him before taking the rest of the group with him. Takuma watched them until they were out of view, after which he turned towards the forest.

He looked at the sky; the sun was about to come up— meaning it was time to start covering ground.




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[Fiction]

The forest in Training Ground No. 42 was unlike any forest Takuma had trekked in. The trees were giants compared to anything he had seen, with canopies so thick that they only let soft glimmering rays of light through the gaps. Every tree trunk was colonized by a shroud of parasitic vines that covered the base of the dark brown trunks in green, making everything above look burnt— though he could sense a bottomless vitality residing in them— he was going to die first before these trees perished.

The ground was bizarrely uneven, with grass and moss covering it, making it look flat even though it was not. He saw finger-sized worms burrowing into the ground and bugs that would bloody his entire palm if he squashed them.

He had yet to encounter animals other than the occasional chirping of birds, which he couldn't identify, for he had yet to study bird calls.

Takuma looked up at the trickling light piercing through the canopy and re-affirmed his direction. For once, he considered himself lucky as he had entered the forest from the southeast direction. According to the map, he had two river streams closest to him— one that flowed to the south and one that was more in the general east direction.

He didn't know exactly at what point the shinobi had dropped him, so he couldn't identify which river stream was closer to him. Takuma flipped a coin and decided to head northwest towards the stream that flowed south. Not only did it flow close to the central tower, but it was also a straight path to the meeting point.

He wondered where his teammates had entered the forest and hoped that none of them got a northeastern entry, as that was the most challenging region. The nearest river stream was only accessible through a deep trek through the forest, which wasn't ideal— the longer you stayed in the woods, the higher the chance of encountering potential dangers.

He himself had been trekking a couple of hours and felt that it was only time before he encountered something problematic. Though he kept his fingers crossed and wished for another bout of luck to reach the river without any hiccups along the way.

*Crunch*

Takuma immediately turned towards the sound. Was it a wild animal? He preferred not to encounter any predators, for he had yet to fight one and had no idea if he could win— or win without injuring himself to a point he couldn't continue.

Cursing himself for jinxing a perfectly good situation, Takuma tried to pinpoint the source of the sound. He heard it again and, this time closer, turned himself back to find that the source wasn't an animal but a groupmate of his.

"Kaede..."

Takuma glanced at her hands, which held a gleaming kunai in each hand. She peered at him cautiously while darting her gaze at the surroundings.

"It's Umeda for you," said the tall girl with long limbs that granted an advantage in close combat. Something Takuma was envious of. He had long legs, but his wingspan was only slightly above average, making his reach sometimes somewhat lacking.

"Umeda, it is... then...." Takuma trailed off when he noticed that Kaede didn't have her backpack on her. He knew she had it on before; he remembered seeing her carry one. She didn't look scruffed up or injured in some manner, which probably meant she hadn't lost it—

The realization struck him suddenly. He could be wrong, but Takuma said it anyways.

"I don't want to fight you."

Kaede's eyes sharpened as she and Takuma moved around in a circle. Observing each other

"And yet you take out your kunai," she said.

Takuma gripped the kunai he had just taken out. "You can't blame me for protecting myself," he said as he threw his backpack behind him on the ground. "Let's just part ways peacefully. There's no need for us to fight. There's no shortage of those tokens. Every team has the right combination to get into the tower. You don't want mine. I'm assuming that's what you want," he finished.

"Not really," Kaede said, smirking. "I don't need your token. I just need to separate it away from you. As you said, all teams have the tokens to make it into the tower without fighting the other teams. But only two teams can win. That's tough odds. However, if I'm to get rid of even a single token from another team, an entire team is suddenly out of contention. The odds have suddenly improved. There's now a fifty percent chance of us winning. The returns are too great for the little effort needed."

Takuma gripped his kunai harder. He hadn't thought about that. In his goal to reach the water as quickly as possible to secure a safer situation, he had ignored the fact that, unlike his usual outings, he wasn't operating in a vacuum. This time, he had other people in the forest alongside him— who were competing for a prize and had the motivation to obstruct him.

"... I will leave you here," Takuma said.

"What?" Kaede sounded confused.

"If we fight and I win—"

"You think you'll win?" she scoffed.

"Our sparring record is split evenly," Takuma said, he kept his tone and expression flat and calm, "so yes, I do think I can win here. And if I win and you get injured enough to not continue, I'll find your emergency flare and take it away, making sure you can't call for help."

Kaede froze and stopped in her tracks. Takuma knew he had hit something. He stopped and continued.

"I'll leave you here all alone in this dark and dangerous forest with no way to contact outside. You will definitely be bleeding, attracting the animals in the woods to you. You see where I'm going with this?"

"... You wouldn't," Kaede said, disbelief in her voice.

Takuma couldn't see the horror in her eyes, so he continued. "I don't like to fight, really. I'm not good at it, so I derive no pleasure from it. Especially not in here, the woods. So, if you force me to fight and I win— and if I know myself well, which I do— I'll take revenge because you forced me to fight and put my life in danger here in the forest. I wouldn't care if you were my groupmate who suffered daily beatings together... I will leave you alone here."

Now Takuma could see it. There was the realization in Kaede's eyes that he wanted to see. He really didn't want to fight, and if it took horrifying the girl with lies about what limits he was willing to go, he was ready to do it. He wasn't going to leave her alone without help if they did fight, of course not— but fear was an effective motivator, he knew that firsthand.

"What's your decision? Do you want to risk it just because Yoshio said that only the first two teams will win? Do you like Yoshio so much? Are you so desperate to not shovel shit that you're willing to risk your life? If you do go ahead, I will accompany you."

Takuma assumed a combat stance with his kunai pointed forward. Looking ready to fight Kaede.

Kaede stared at Takuma in a moment of long stretched silence before she started to step back until she disappeared between the trees.

"We can always travel together, you know!" Takuma tried to call out to her— but got silence in return.

He sighed. That was close. He almost got into a fight after only a couple hours.

"I'm going to use this every single time."

He was relieved that the wild encounter with Kaede went well, but it did give way to a worry. Kaede's approach of stealing a single token to eliminate an entire team was valid. If one person had thought of it, others would think of it as well.

Which meant that there was a chance his teammates might get targeted as well.

'Please let them reach the meeting point in place,' he thought.

For now, all he could do was move onwards and reach the meeting point, hoping that others would as well.


———
.


"Should I be worried about something?" Taro looked at the sword-wielding girl staring at him, which looked more like a glare, but he was sure it was just her natural expression, so he didn't judge her.

Kameko stared at Taro with her hand on her sword hilt for a long moment before she turned his back to him and started walking ahead.

Taro followed after her. When she turned back to him to glare at him, Taro just raised his hand and shrugged. "We're going the same way, don't worry, I'm not going to disturb you. And we both know what's going to happen if I attack you," he said.

Kameko scoffed with her chin raised before turning away to start walking again.

Taro had no opposition to her behavior. As long as he could pass the annoyingly tiring walking through the forest with ease and uneventfully, he was fine tagging along some prideful display from the princess.

There was a shuffle in the bushes, and Kameko's hand was again on her hilt as she held the scabbard. Taro also pulled out his kunai as he placed himself a little bit behind Kameko.

A person appeared from within the bushes, and his eyes widened when he noticed them. "Geh, Kameko!" he croaked before pushing back into the bushes and running away.

Kameko clicked her tongue before she started walking again.

Behind her, a smirk appeared on Taro's face. He couldn't have found a better bug repellant than the girl in front of him. As long as he kept following her, getting to Takuma's meeting point was going to be as easy as taking a walk.

Life was good.


———
.


Masaaki ducked underneath the huge claw strike and drove his large knuckle duster into the large inky jaguar's gut, sending the lithe big cat's body into the tree trunk behind her.

"Is that all you got, big kitty," Masaaki laughed as he slapped his thigh. "Come on, let's play some more."

The jaguar, however, didn't seem to want to play and skipped away into the woods with her tail between her legs.

Masaaki pouted as he deposited his knuckle duster into the packs.

"Now... where am I?"

Masaaki looked around the dark forest and groaned as he had no idea where he was. He looked around until his eyes fell in the direction the jaguar had run in.

He decided that it was the direction to go in.

And he did it while humming a song to pass the time.


———
.


Nenro looked down at the ground while perched up on a thick branch of a tree. He watched as a guy walked out of the bushes while looking around as if trying to look for something.

He had spotted that he had a tail half an hour ago. He tried to lose the tail, but whoever it was, kept glued to him, no matter how much he tried. Seeing that he couldn't lose the tail, he decided to 'lose the tail.' Nenro waited until the guy was directly below him until he jumped down. Nenro had already landed on the ground, crouching, when the guy noticed him— but it was already too late by then.

Nenro shot forward, wrapped his arm around his groupmate's neck, and started choking him out.

"It's nothing personal," he grunted as he kept the struggling guy in control. "And while I don't mind you tailing me, I would prefer it if you didn't."

The guy flapped his legs and arms, trying to claw at Nenro's arms, trying to hit him from the back and everything to escape until he couldn't do it any longer and just dropped unconscious.

Nenro dropped the guy to the ground and then knelt beside him to find the token, which he pocketed. He then took out the emergency flare from the guy's backpack and aimed it at the sky.

"Sorry about this," he muttered before pulling the tab.

The flare tore through the canopy and rose to the sky before bursting up in a bright red light.

And after making sure the guy was safe until he was found, Nenro left, continuing on with his journey to Takuma's meeting point.


———
.


Ai looked up at the bright red flare lighting up in the distant sky.

'Already?' she thought, surprised at how quickly the first flare had been fired. Ai wondered who it was for a moment before continuing onwards.

Ai's time in the forest had been an uneventful one. She had seen a couple baby foxes along the way, but she avoided in the fear of facing the ire of their parents, who she was sure were nearby. Other than that, her journey had been smooth sailing.

"Oh?"

Ai heard a trickling sound. She started running forward, and with each step, the sound grew louder until she was standing on a gravel rock facing a wide and deep river with clear water flowing under bright sunlight. She squinted her eyes; it had been a couple hours since she had seen so much sunlight.

"Well, that was easy," she said.

Looking at the sun, she affirmed the direction before heading towards it, knowing that as long as she followed the water, she would reach Takuma's meeting point.

Forest treks were easy.




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[The Radiance]

Takuma traumatizing children is the funniest shit ever. Rip Kaede Umeda.

 

[Zippogun]

Thanks for the chapters

 

[Fiction]

The forest that grew in the confines of Training Ground No. 42 was a significantly large area but not big enough that a trek from the boundary to the center would take more than a day.

Takuma gazed at the central tower. He could just see the tip of the building with antennas fixed on the top as he walked along the river. The sky only had an hour to ninety minutes of sunlight left, after which it would be unwise to travel any further. He would cut through the short forest distance to reach the tower if he didn't have to wait for his team.

His journey had been mostly smooth, and he considered himself early to the meeting point, and didn't think that anyone would be there before, given that his river route was one of the shortest.

As he continued his march over the riverside gravel, he heard the sound of water grow louder. After fifteen to twenty minutes, he found himself at a bend where the river stream cut into two sub-streams— one which he followed and the other that split again later down the route.

He had reached the meeting point.

"Yo."

Unexpectedly, he wasn't the first one to get there.

Taro was already there. "You got here quick," he said.

"Not faster than you, though," Takuma dropped his backpack beside the large rock on which Taro sat.

"I just followed her," Taro pointed his thumb over his shoulder. Beyond the gravel, under the tree line, sat Kameko with her eyes closed and her sword laid in her lap. "It looks like others had the same idea as you."

"It's basic to follow the water for direction," Takuma shrugged.

Taro pulled a face as his shoulders dropped. "She didn't follow the water," he said. "I had to follow her through the forest until we reached here... it was horrible— so horrible." He sighed before asking in a more serious tone, "Did you meet someone along the way?"

"Twice," said Takuma. "I negotiated with one to part ways peacefully and hid from the other. Pacifist strat. What about you?"

"Pacifist... strat, what? Whatever, I don't wanna know.... We met four people, and she scared three of them and beat the crap of the fourth one— he pulled the flare. I didn't have to do anything other than just mind my step and maintain a constant distance from her," Taro pointed to Kameko.

Takuma could see that happening. With her personality and combat prowess, Kameko had a reputation for being someone not to be messed with. That sword of hers made long and deep cuts, and no one wanted to be spurting blood in the middle of the forest, waiting to see who would get there first— the shinobi or the forest residents, desperately hoping it would be the former.

"I see no one else's here yet," he said.

Taro shook his head. "I just hope they're here soon. I would prefer to get to the tower before dark and go straight home. Leave the rest of them to struggle for another day."

Takuma decided to treat some river water for drinking. It had already been a few hours since he had his last drink, and after the all-day activity, it was high time he got some more. By the time he had the fire setup ready and the water boiling, more people had arrived at what turned out to be a common meeting point for multiple teams.

"Aww, I wasn't first," Ai was one of them, "that sucks."

"How does it feel to lose to Turtle Taro?" Takuma smirked at Ai.

Ai groaned as she received the water canteen from Takuma.

"Hey, I take offense to that. And it's not like you can say anything, I arrived before you as well," said Taro.

"That's only because you had the killer rabbit Kameko's help," Takuma bantered as he kept an eye on the other who had arrived.

There were a total of three teams at the meeting point. Takuma, Taro, and Ai from Team-5. Kameko was joined by one of her teammates. And finally, there were two more members of another team. None of them had their complete teams, which meant no one could move forward to the final step of entering the tower. They were in a deadlock until every member of the team arrived at the place.

'Or maybe we're wasting time here, and the other two teams are already in the tower.'

The three teams remained in their area. Kameko and her teammate sat beneath the trees. Takuma and Ai make their place around the big rock that Taro was sitting on. While the other group stayed stationed near the river, cautiously looking at the others.

The silence between the groups was broken by a sudden loud sound.

"Ah! I found it!"

Masaaki came running out from the woods on the other side of the river with small branches and dead leaves sticking out of his clothes and hair. His face was all muddy, and he looked like he had come out of a mining cave. He stretched his arms above his head and looked up at the sky before gazing at the river. A grin appeared on his face. Masaaki dropped his backpack on the ground and ran towards the rivers before jumping into the water with a loud cheer.

"That idiot," Ai sighed.

"It is pretty hot here," Taro said, eyeing the river.

When Masaaki came out, Takuma passed him the water canteen that Masaaki chugged down empty in a second.

"Did I not tell you to head towards the river? Why did you come running out of the woods?" asked Takuma.

"Oh, that was good," Masaaki said after emptying the canteen. "I tried to find the water, but no matter where I walked or how much I walked, I couldn't find water." He pointed at the river behind him, "I did find this river, though, and I found you guys, so I guess it's all okay."

Ai saw that there was a tear on Masaaki's clothes. Worried, she asked, "Did you find others on the way?"

"Huh, no, I didn't find anyone. I did meet a couple of cats, though," said Masaaki, grinning. "Played with them a bit. They scratched me up a little bit," he lifted his backpack to show a large rip in the fabric.

Takuma stared at the rip in the bag, and even without his experience in fabric stitching, leather work, and equipment repair, he could tell that rip didn't come from the claws of a wee bit cat. But Masaaki looked fine, so he decided not to pursue the line of questioning.

"Now, we just need Nenro, and we can go to the tower," said Ai as she handed a dry towel to Masaaki.

Taro looked up at the sky. The sun had already pulled halfway down, and blue had already begun to blanket the sky. "Let's hope he can make it soon, or else we might have to camp here for the night," he said.

Takuma nodded with pursed lips. He would've been perfectly fine and happy camping by the river for a night, admiring the starry sky with his teammates, if not for the fact that they would have to shovel shit for a week.

Just as the riverside had begun to settle down again after Masaaki's loud entrance, the peace was once again disturbed by a red emergency flare ripping into the sky, leaving behind a smoke trail as it climbed up— brighter than the flares were earlier in the day against the bright sun. The location of the flare was relatively nearby to their position.

"How many does this make?" Ai asked as everyone watched the smoke trail.

She got nothing in response. No one knew the exact number. While the flares made it to the sky with the canopies blocking the view, the people inside the forest couldn't tell all the time when the flare was launched.

But they all hoped no one from their team had been eliminated.

"What are they doing?" said Taro suddenly.

They all looked and saw that the two near the river had gotten up and walked to Kameko and her teammate. Kameko was up on her feet before they could even reach her with her sword in hand. The two guys raised their hands and showed their palms, signifying peace— and then began whispering something to Kameko, who frowned for a moment before her eyes widened.

"Get ready. They might strike," said Takuma.

"Huh, why?" Masaaki asked.

"No fucking idea, but we need to be ready."

They didn't stand up and assumed combat stance, but all four of them did keep an eye on the others. There was silent tension between the two parties that grew louder with each passing moment.

"Does anyone know how to read lips?" Masaaki asked.

"If you shut up for a second, we might be able to hear something," Taro whispered at Masaaki.

Takuma tried to strain his ears to listen to what they were and even tried to look at their lips to see if he could make it out words, regretting that he didn't have friends in his life who didn't play the lipreading challenge with loud music pumping through headphones.

Eventually, one of the guys from the other team walked toward them.

"Be cool, be cool," Ai whispered to them as she crushed Takuma's arm in her grip. But it was also she who suddenly shouted, "What do you want, Rei?!"

"Hey, I have a proposal for you guys," said Rei with a smile.

"I have a bad feeling about this," Taro said out loud.

Rei shook his head. "No, no, this is beneficial, definitely," and seeing that they were listening, he continued.

"The four of us," he pointed back near the trees, "are ready to go to the tower and need one more member to come along with us, and we will get inside and get the number one—"

"What are you talking about?" Ai interjected, frowning. "You can't just gather five random people and enter the tower. You need to do it with your team."

Takuma nodded. The first two out of five teams entered the tower to not get punished— and hopefully, got some reward.

Taro suddenly whispered, "Oh no," he closed his eyes and sighed deeply, "oh no, he said it... Yoshio said it. How did I miss that? It was there in front of me..."

Takuma frowned. What was Taro talking about? The instructions from Yoshio were clear...

'—Every one of you will get one of these five tokens—'

'—All of you will start separately at different points of the fence, with the control tower somewhere in the forest as the goal. Five tokens, each of a unique shape, are needed to enter the tower. The first two sets of five tokens will be granted entry, while the remaining fifteen will be declared failures and have to shovel shit in a stable for a week—'

Takuma's heart leaped up his throat as he recalled Yoshio's instruction.

"The first two sets of five tokens...." he looked up at Rei. "Nothing in the instruction said anything about the team."

"What?" Ai frowned, confused. "I don't understand."

Takuma looked behind Rei at Komeko and company. He could see why they had joined hands. His team already had four members assembled, with only Nenro remaining. Expecting three members to arrive faster than one single person from another person was a tough wish— especially not knowing who was eliminated. So when Rie and his teammate approached Komeko and her teammate, he could see why she so readily agreed.

"Which token do you need?" Taro said to Rei.

Four people meant four tokens. The Rei-Kameko coalition needed one more token— meaning they needed only one more person.

"The pentagon."

Taro... Ai... Masaaki— all their heads turned as their eyes fell on Takuma.

Takuma, on the other hand, could feel the token with negligible weight grow heavy in his gear pouch.




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[Fiction]

Takuma could feel everyone's eyes on him as he stared at Rei.

"I'm assuming you have the pentagon token," said Rei, smiling. "Come with us, and we will sleep under a proper roof tonight. Who knows, maybe we may very well be back at our homes by the end of the day. What do you say, let's go?"

Takuma didn't remove his eyes from Rei as he asked Taro, "How sure are you about the rules?"

"You're considering it?!" Ai exclaimed in disbelief as she stood up.

Takuma didn't respond to her. Instead, he turned to Taro. Kameko, Rei, and their two teammates believed the rules to be two sets of five tokens, not the first two teams. In the moment, he didn't know what to think— and Taro seemed to be the best person to ask for an opinion.

"H-Hey, Takuma. They possibly couldn't mean any five people. The instructor must've meant teams. He must've misspoken," said Masaaki, but even he sounded doubtful.

Ai nodded in agreement, "Yeah, let's not overthink it!"

Takuma kept his gaze fixed on Taro.

"... A shinobi must look underneath the underneath," Taro repeated the quote that Takuma remembered seeing on the academy walls— one of the shinobi rules.

"Taro!" Ai shouted at him. She knew as well as Takuma knew what Taro meant to say. A shinobi was supposed to discern the truth of any situation— and in this case, the truth was dangling right in front of them, without hiding.

Takuma squinted his eyes shut as he rubbed his face.

"Uhm, if you're worried about Yoshio's words, you don't have to, you know," Rei took out the triangle token from his person and held it in front of them in his palm. "The tokens are not customized in any way to distinguish between the teams. I compared mine against the other four, and there are no special signs on any of them, which clearly tells us that Yoshio really meant any set of five— not teams."

"Ai, your token," Takuma turned to Ai, who had the triangle token in their team.

Ai snorted and turned away from the group, clearly unwilling to participate in whatever was happening. Takuma asked again, but she refused.

"Ai, please," Taro also asked.

"You, too— why?!"

"We need to confirm if he's telling the truth. If we can confirm there's a difference between the token, then we can put this behind us and wait till Nenro arrives."

Ai gritted her teeth in frustration before throwing her token at Taro and walking away from the group but not before giving Takuma the stink eye. Takuma felt bad, knowing where she was coming from— but he quickly turned to Taro, who was comparing the tokens.

"They are... identical," said Taro. He looked at Takuma, "What're you going to do now?"

"I don't know," Takuma sighed.

"You tell him to turn the hell away and not disturb us!" Ai yelled from a distance.

"We should hurry, you know," said Rei, not sparing Ai one look. "It'll be getting dark soon... and who knows, someone might come along and take away the chance."

The meaning was clear. This was a transactional operation. They needed five people to get to the tower, and he only happened to have the token they needed. The moment someone else with the pentagon token came along, they would offer them the same deal.

Takuma thought about it. There was a reward on the line. Knowing Yoshio, it would be mission points, which Takuma desperately needed. Raiton: Shokku (Lightning Release: Shock) wasn't coming along as he expected— it was now functional but nowhere near usable in real fights. If he couldn't get into the final tournament to win the C-rank jutsu, he better start his mission points savings early to buy one on his own.

More powerful jutsu meant a boost in combat ability... which he desperately needed. Even if he didn't know the future, the world of shinobi was chaotic and thus dangerous. He needed to get stronger to secure himself by getting stronger, or else the chances of him finding himself lying in some ditch leaking blood remained rather high.

He had to make a decision. He looked at Taro, who stared at him impassively, giving out nothing. Masaaki, the person who could shine in the darkest of woods, looked worried as he gazed at Takuma, but he didn't say a word to dissuade Takuma. On the other hand, Ai didn't even look at him, her frowning gaze fixed on the river water with her arms crossed, showing her closed body posture. And even though Nenro wasn't here, Takuma could picture the prince-guy saying that he would support any decision Takuma made— because that was the kind of guy he was.

"No, can't do it," he said with a long groan.

"What?" Rei uttered in surprise.

Takuma stood up, pressed his hands into his face, and sighed in resignation. "Thank you for the offer, but you'll have to find someone else to complete the five. I'll not be joining you four," he said.

Ai turned her face to Takuma with her eyes glittering, her anger draining away as if washed away by the river beside her. Masaaki's imaginary dog ears perked up as his entire person glowed. Even Taro sighed a breath of relief.

"Are you serious?" Rei said as if he couldn't believe it.

"I am… can't believe it either."

He recalled his days when he was in the academy. How he felt from the moment he entered the classroom in the mornings, watching everyone spend time in their social and friend group— how it felt to train alone in the evening— how it felt to return to the empty home and do the chores in silence. It was the same every day as he operated his way through the same 'day' over and over again on his own. He didn't like anything about the rest of his days except for the early morning training.

He remembered how it felt when Taro questioned his ground-walking exercise and how the other three had left. That moment made him feel that he had returned to the most miserable year of his life, but worse— it felt worse when something was taken away than when it was never there in the first place.

Takuma didn't want to experience that ever again.

It was okay. He would grind Raiton: Shokku harder until it was usable. He would take more missions in the future to save more mission points. Until he got a stronger jutsu, whenever that was, he would try to improve his plateaued taijutsu. He would work harder to make up for the missed opportunity.

... He just didn't want to be isolated again.

"You heard him; go away, shoo," Ai stood between Rei and Takuma and badgered him until he walked away.

Takuma sat down again with a heavy sigh. He turned to Taro and asked, "What would you have done?"

The lazy teammate shrugged. "I don't know. I wouldn't know until I was offered the same opportunity."

Takuma could appreciate the answer. It felt more real than a simple negative or positive.

"Why did you refuse?" asked Taro.

"... A shinobi must see underneath the underneath," Takuma said as he leaned back, rested his weight on his hands, and stared up at the faint shadows of the stars that could finally appear with the sun's overwhelming shine fading away. "I just followed your advice..."

"Huh?"

Takuma shook his head. He had simply decided to believe. Only time would tell if the gambit would pay off... He wished it would pay off— he would be fine even if he didn't win anything for it.

He smirked and jutted his chin to Ai. "I can't live without her constant yapping in my ear. I fear that I have dug myself into a relationship that I can't see myself escaping— really toxic, actually."

"I don't yap. Why don't you admit that you're too shy to say it," Ai playfully kicked his thigh.

"I'm happy that you stayed, Takuma!" Masaaki said with a bright and loud smile.

"Me too, buddy, me too," said Takuma before sighing.

"It's not all over, you know," said Ai. "Nenro can still come here before they get their fifth member. We can still win, I believe we can!"

It was true. Both parties had four members— the fifth member could arrive for any of them. Takuma really hoped Nenro would arrive first. In fact, Takuma was surprised Nenro hadn't come earlier.

But then another person did arrive, and it wasn't Nenro. Rei immediately approached the girl and entered communication.

"She could have the wrong token," Ai said nervously. Takuma gulped and nodded.

But then Rie turned towards Kameko and shot them a thumbs up with a smile. Upon seeing that, the group began to pack up, getting ready to move.

"Should... Should we fight them?" Masaaki asked, looking between the team and the group about to leave.

"It'll be four against five, and with Kameko there, I can see mutual destruction as the only outcome. Not worth it," Taro said.

"I don't know about that. Mutual destruction seems pretty good right now," said Takuma, dipping a hand into his pouch that held his three explosion tags. He lipped one of them, ready to stick one on a kunai and chuck it toward the group.

"We should wait for Nenro and try our chances here rather than bleeding here so close to the tower," said Taro.

"Are we going or not?!" asked Masaaki.

The team remained tense and still as they watched their competition until they disappeared into the forest.

"... Shit, we just watched," Taro muttered.

"Well, Nenro usually makes the final decision," Ai sighed and kicked the gravel.

Takuma let himself lie down on the gravel and sighed. Now that Kameko and Rei had left with another person, who very well could've been him, Takuma wondered if his decision was the correct one. Team-5 was a temporary assignment for basic training. They weren't like the genin led by a jonin who stuck together for years. As far as he knew, genins part of the Genin Corps didn't stay together after basic training. In fact, he had zero ideas what his life would be like after the basic training.

He didn't regret his decision, but he did entertain the possibility in his mind.

"Oh, everyone's here," they heard the voice they had been waiting for.

The entire group turned over to look across the stream to see a battered Nenro waving at them. He was caked in mud, there was a bandage covering his upper arm, and a cut had almost split his headband. Upon seeing him, Ai immediately jumped over the river to fuss over Nenro, checking his injuries. While Nenro didn't seem too injured, he did look like he had been in a nasty fight.

"What happened to you?" asked Takuma after Nenro came to their side.

"Somehow, three team members ended up finding each other... and I ended up finding them," Nenro cracked a kink in his neck. "It turned out they didn't like me very much, and we ended up getting into a scuffle. I lost them somewhere, good for me because I was on the verge of pulling the flare."

Takuma could see that happening. Everyone liked Nenro— but did they? A completely positive reaction was impossible on any topic. There will always be people who will hold opposing reactions. It wasn't a bad thing to have opposing views, but in cases like this, it could cause more harm than good.

People could be cruel, Takuma knew that very well.

"Let's go to the tower," Masaaki directly got up and swung his backpack over his shoulder.

"Can you stand in there for a few more minutes?" Takuma asked.

"I can go on all day long," said Nenro with his usual smile, which looked as good as it would if he was squeaky clean out of a bath.

"The day is about to end," said Masaaki.

"Read the vibe," Takuma chuckled as he slapped Masaaki on his back. Inside, Takuma was thrumming with urgency.

They needed to hurry and get to the tower as soon as possible before it was too late.


———
.


"Too late," said Yoshio.

Was what they got when they reached the tower.




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[Ha2kon]

Thanks for the chapter, wonder if the MC should have bought a water art instead of the lightning art. After all they did say that he had water affinity

 

[always_confused]

I probably should've seen that coming. On the other hand, hopefully this builds team spirit among the 5.

 

[Fiction]

Thanks for the chapter, wonder if the MC should have bought a water art instead of the lightning art. After all they did say that he had water affinity

Click to shrink...

Okay, I got worried I somewhere said that Takuma has Suiton(Water Release) affinity, but then I went back to check and phew— no, I haven't revealed Takuma's elemental affinity yet. You maybe confusing it with another Naruto fic.

 

[Sono]

There are a few ways to look at the situation. To be potentially won: a single, low-rank technique. To potentially lose: trust of your team, ranking (entire team finishing 3rd, vs 1 guy finishing 1st/2nd and the others probably not finishing at all), a bit of self-respect, potentially esteem from Konoha ninja(they're big on teamwork).

Not saying he made the right choice, but there's definitely more than one argument in favor of the choice he made.

 

[Fiction]

Two days after the Training Ground No. 42 excursion, Takuma walked into his group's usual training area like he routinely would, but today he had switched his usual back waist pouch with a slightly larger one to accommodate the raincoat and boot covers he had carried to protect his clothes from the smell when they went to shovel shit in a stable.

He wasn't looking forward to that at all.

"Mornin'," he greeted his team after a day's break.

Nenro and Ai reflected his energy. While Taro responded with his usual nod that didn't show if he was feeling his normal self or if he was down at the prospect of the one-week worth of punishment.

"Good morning!" Masaaki greeted back as vigorously as always.

"So loud..." Taro sighed.

Takuma wanted to make a hungover comment but held back, knowing it wasn't the right time. He looked around the field and saw that the entire group had a low fee to them today. As he observed his groupmates, he noticed something strange. For a moment, he couldn't put a finger on it, but then it struck him.

"They had a fight, didn't they."

While everyone knew everyone in the group, most of the time, people usually only hung out with their teammates. But today, Takuma saw that the other teams were broken up— not talking to each other.

"It's obvious that those who didn't win weren't onboard with their teammates 'betraying' them," Taro, sitting with legs crossed down on the ground, muttered his comment as he peered at the group with his head laying on his palm.

As it turned out, neither of the winners were from the same team. Like Kameko and Rei, the other winner was also made up of people from multiple teams. And as Taro said, those who won saw no fault in their view, but those who were left behind didn't see the winner's choices the same way.

"It must've been really awkward in their rooms afterward," Ai said with a slight grimace on her face.

After entering the central tower in the forest, everyone was healed by Shady Guy and then sent to their rooms that they shared with their teams for the night. Team-5 had gone to sleep really quickly after washing up, but it was easy to imagine what had happened in the other rooms.

"To have slept in the same room after all that, that's tough," Nenro said. The rooms were barely large enough for five people to sleep semi-comfortably. "Thank god we didn't have to go through that."

"Preach," said Takuma.

"Instead, we had to listen to his snoring all night long," Taro half-glared at Masaaki, who flushed.

"I can't help it!"

Nenro consoled Masaaki by telling him he was too tired to notice any snoring.

"Gather up!" Yoshio had arrived.

The group did, and they did it with perfection. After more than a month and a half of training and beatings, they had a level of discipline ingrained into their bones that they kept even with the tension that strained the air between the teams.

"I'm severely disappointed by this group's performance in the forest excursion. Even though I had booked the training ground for two days, I was expecting us to leave the forest early on the second morning. But the fact that I had to delay our exit by a few hours because all of you weren't able to make it to the tower in time embarrassed me a ton. I couldn't believe that the genin, who I had trained for so long, were so pathetic. If I'm not coming across properly, I will say it outright— I'm disappointed in you lot."

Takuma, who was standing near the back, saw a few people bowing their heads.

"Despite that, I promised those who completed the challenge the fastest a reward. I'm tempted to withdraw the reward, but as everyone knows, I'm a man of my word. Those who won, step forward," said Yoshio.

Takuma held back a snort.

Ten people stepped forward and naturally made a line. Takuma noticed that the other five had three members from Cho's team. And he knew the rest of Cho's official team hadn't been out of commission— which meant her team would have entered the tower together... but they didn't.

"All of you completed the objective assigned to you as fast as possible. For that, I commend you and reward each one of you with mission points," said Yoshio.

Takuma sighed. It seemed his gambit was a failure. He had made a 'wrong' choice.

"Cherish these mission points earned through the betrayal of your teammates," Yoshio continued.

'What?' Takuma looked at Yoshio, surprise covering his face.

"I'm sorry," the usually taciturn Kameko narrowed her eyes. "The rules didn't say we have to complete the challenge with our teammates. We didn't betray anyone."

Yoshio marched in front of Kameko, and his large muscular frame towered over Kameko as he stared down at her. "Tell me I misheard you not saying sir as you addressed me. Did I mishear, Taketori Kameko?"

Kameko stared up at Yoshio for a moment before gritting out: "...Sir."

Yoshio grinned broadly before he said, "Indeed, there was no role in completing the challenge with your time. But answer me this, did you discuss the challenge with your team before you entered the forest?"

"... I did... sir," said Kameko.

"Did your team plan to complete the challenge together?"

"... They did, sir."

"Did you at that time tell them about the possibility of you going off on your own without them?" When Kameko stayed silent, Yoshio pressed her, "Did you tell them or not, Taketori Kameko?!"

Kameko's face twisted as she spat out the answer, "No, I didn't, sir."

"So you planned to complete the challenge with your team but left that plan to complete it with other people. That sounds like a betrayal to me, Taketori Kameko," said Yoshio as he leaned toward her before pulling away and looking at the other nine people. "All of you betrayed a part of your team for an unknown reward. I hope you understand what this says about yourself. What would it look like to your peers who will be part of the same mission as you in the future. Think about it— you treat others how you want them to treat you."

Taro, who was standing in front of Takuma, leaned back a little and whispered, "Is that what you meant when you said— seeing underneath the underneath?"

"Yeah, something like that," Takuma whispered back. In truth, he was hoping Yoshio would deem them as victors because they completed the challenge as a team and they would get a mission point reward, but he accepted looking at the humiliated ten winners was an incentive.

Yoshio continued, "I'm someone who appreciates loyalty, and in this group, only one team showcased it," he turned towards Team-5, and Takuma felt everyone's eyes on them, and he unconsciously perked up, "which is why this week, I declare Team-5 as number one on the weekly rankings."

Takuma's mind, upon hearing Yoshio's words, did some mental operations, and he came to a simple conclusion. Number one on weekly rankings equaled mission points. They were going to get mission points— he couldn't be happier. His gambit had paid off. It also meant Team-5 had their second win on the weekly rankings.

"We will continue today as usual, but the fifteen who lost the challenge will follow me to the ranch after training to serve their penalty. Now get ready—"

Ai cut off Yoshio and exclaimed, "Huh, but sir, you said that we were loyal, shouldn't we be excluded from the punishment, sir!"

Yoshio, who had turned away, turned back towards them and gazed at Ai, and there was a pause before he said, "Shinobi Rule No. 04: A shinobi must always put the mission first." He looked at everyone as he continued, "This world isn't fair, children. Loyalty in the field is paramount because who else can trust with your back but your teammates, yet there will be times you'll be asked to put the mission first, even if it means putting the same teammates in danger if it means mission success. We are shinobi. We are men-for-hire. We put our lives at risk for our village and country... and we put our lives at risk for people who're willing to pay an appropriate price."

He looked at Team-5, "You valued your team loyalty higher than the reward. I praise you for that, but at the same time, it is the truth that you lost the challenge. Your life as a shinobi will test you from time to time, and you'll have to make choices whether you like it or not. That is the truth of this life of ours."

"B-But, sir, how can we..."

Yoshio shook his head. "I don't have the answer to that. Only you can answer that for yourself.... I'll suggest this: Form your Nindo and follow those beliefs so you don't regret your choices. "

Takuma clenched his hand into a fist. He didn't recall a lot of Naruto's story, but he did remember Hatake Kakashi's belief in putting loyalty before everything else, even rules. It wasn't the belief itself that jumped at Takuma, but the history of how he had arrived at the belief. Kakashi's father (whose name Takuma couldn't remember) had chosen to commit suicide after he put his teammates' safety over a mission— he had been disgraced by his peers, which had driven him to take his life.

Yoshio's words about life not being fair and making difficult choices made Takuma think about that. Two days back, he had made a choice that didn't have life-altering consequences— but the trade he was in would throw choices his way, which would have much more serious consequences.

Life was not fair.

Takuma knew that fact very well.

His existence here in this world was proof of that fact.



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[Artemis]

Very nice resolution to that mission! Thanks for writing.

 

[Zippogun]

Thank you for the chapter

 

[The Radiance]

Damn... only one team was loyal. kudos to Takuma.

 

[Fiction]

The effects of Yoshio's forest 'lesson' could be seen entrenched in the group as they approached the last days of the basic training. Team-5 operated the same as before the forest challenge, but the same couldn't be said for others. The two winning coalitions had members of the four teams, meaning that at least one member in each team had chosen to give up completing the challenge with their teams to win the reward.

"The teams are broken," Takuma commented while watching Ai spar against her opponent. "If we're careful and play our cards right, we can get into the final tournament."

Yoshio's group consisted of five teams of five competing against each other on the weekly rankings leaderboard. No one could claim they knew exactly how the rankings worked as the criteria for grading was absent, and Yoshio only disclosed the rankings at the end of the week. But through some clever observations, the group members had deduced that the sparring record for every week held significant weight in the criteria.

But that didn't mean that sparring was all that mattered.

As it stood now, out of the five teams, three were in the lead with two No.1 rankings in the weekly— Team-5, Kameko's Team-3, and Cho's Team-1.

Team-5 got their second No.1 in Week Six from the forest challenge and were the latest to do so.

Unexpectedly, it was Team-2, a team that hadn't been No.1 before, to ace in Week Seven due to them preventing the abduction of a wealthy civilian merchant's wife and daughter while patrolling their route— a single incident that had rocketed them to win the week. Proving that sparring wasn't the end-all criteria.

Week Eight, however, didn't have any outlier events that could sway the rankings, neither did it have any challenges that had helped Team-5 win their two No.1 rankings.

Looking at the history, the chances didn't look good for Team-5 as they had never won a No.1 ranking based on sparring alone. They could even be considered in the same category as Team-2.

But things were different for Yoshio's group in Week Eight. Teams of strangers had learned to operate as cohesive units in their time together, but the forest challenge had thrown a wrench into the smoothly running teams. The number of mistakes during team exercises made up of a lot of training schedule, were as high as they were in the early weeks when the teams weren't used to each other.

Which presented Team-5 with an interesting situation.

Takuma pumped his fist and cheered as Ai sliced a gash into her opponent's arm. He grinned, "We have been the best team this week by far. Luck has been with us this week. Nenro and Masaaki haven't lost a single fight. Ai is going to win this one. I have been doing decently," even when he was holding back his brand new trump card for the final tournament, "and surprisingly your record isn't in the red."

"Stuff it," Taro grumbled. Taro's record was always more losses than wins. Takuma didn't say it out loud, but it felt great to have a higher win record than Taro— when just last year, Taro would've pounded him into the ground.

"If nothing crazy happens and we keep winning, we can ace this week," Takuma ripped the grass beside him.

"If we keep winning, that is," Taro replied.

In front of them, Ai threw her kunai, which embedded itself into her opponent's thigh, bringing them to their knees. Yoshio called the fight.

Taro continued, "As you said, we have been lucky with our pairings. But there are only so many people. It's only time before we get matched against someone powerful," he glanced at Kameko, the strongest in their group, "that might drag us down."

Takuma had considered that option, but he still thought they had every chance at winning as long as they continued to perform well outside of sparring.

Ai returned from lugging her opponent to the Shady Guy's tent. "Did you see that? I totally tricked him into committing when he shouldn't have," she had a healthy sheen of sweat on her.

"I saw. It was amazing," Nenro smiled as he handed a towel to Ai. He continued and added to the ongoing discussion, "I agree with Takuma. If we keep doing whatever we are and others don't suddenly get back into tune, I think we have a good chance."

Yoshio called for the next pair, and Masaaki stood excitedly as his name was called. He pushed his hand into his back pouch to pull out a knuckleduster around his fingers.

Takuma gazed at the shining metal adorning Masaaki's hand. He didn't use jutsu, but with those things around Masaaki, he didn't need to. Masaaki had broken bones with simple punches. Takuma glanced at Kameko. In his opinion, if Masaaki had an accompanying bukijutsu, he could rival Kameko's kenjutsu.

'We can do this,' he thought.


———
.


It seemed the luck was true with Team-5, as it was already Thursday, and things had gone as Takuma had expected. They had kept a favorable win rate, and the other teams struggled with their synergies.

But not all things were up and up.

'She looks pissed,' Takuma thought as he looked at Cho in front of him. The girl's charred brown twintails looked particularly evil right now, matched by her eyes that were viciously staring at him. She still held a grudge against Team-5 for winning the tree-walking challenge before Team-1.

Takuma and Cho stared at each other as Yoshio walked away. There was no official starting point. Technically, they could attack the moment Yoshio called their names.

Takuma usually didn't make the first move, preferring to react and counter. But today, he made the first move. He pulled away from Cho, but at the same time, he threw three shurikens at her.

Cho's problem, Takuma thought, was that she tried to get through fights without taking a single hit. It made her too defensive, which gave him the opportunity to press him.

The moment the shuriken left his hand, Takuma canceled his backward motion and charged toward Cho. In the small window, as she dodged the shuriken, Takuma laid a low kick into her shin. Cho cried as she was forced to kneel. Takuma pressed ahead aggressively, but Cho grabbed his arm and threw him over her as she rolled.

Takuma skidded on his landing and immediately ran back towards her. Cho, with shame and anger on her face, pounced into attacking. Takuma should have backed down, let Cho's aggression break on a wall of defense, but in the heat of the moment, he opted to match aggression with aggression.

They crossed blades, broke apart, and swung almost like drunks, each missing twice until Cho clapped Takuma on the side of the head with the hilt of her kunai. Takuma wavered, and Cho hit him again, hard. He dropped to a knee, and Cho brought her kunai down, going for a 'killing blow.' Takuma got his kunai up in time to block, then rolled away before lurching to his feet.

Cho tried to give him no space, but she wasn't aggressive enough, and Takuma successfully traded blows to get into a position to defend himself. He decided to immediately gamble his newfound breathing space and went in for an elbow drill into Cho's shoulder, and then, as she hopped back in pain, he cracked her in the neck. Cho made a strange high-pitched sound as she went down.

Takuma dipped into his pouches, and senbon were the first weapons he found, so he threw them. Cho, despite clutching her throat, rolled away and the thin senbon embedded into the yellow ground.

Takuma clicked his tongue and moved towards Cho, but as he whipped his head, a wave of dizziness struck from when he was hit in the head. He gritted his teeth and hid his stumble within a step and looked toward Cho with a glare that shouted punishment— but his eyes widened when he saw the two hands facing him making a bird hand seal. Still lying on the ground, Cho raised her head to face him and smiled viciously through the grimace.

Air rapidly distilled around her accompanied by the sound of flowing gales before a burst of winds assaulted Takuma with the force of a truck. He felt his body flatten against what felt like a solid wall of wind. All of the air was knocked out of him, and when he hit the ground, did he find a rushed breath return to him. His world turned into a poorly drawn water painting dripping in water as colors swam in his vision.

Cho unsteadily got up to her foot and ran towards Takuma, who had been tossed several feet away by the wind blast from Fuuton: Boufuu Kyouzuu no Jutsu (Wind Release: Gale Surge.) As she arrived near Takuma, he suddenly swung a kick and swept her legs, and the already unsteady Cho sacked to the ground.

Takuma couldn't hear anything but a sharp ringing as he pulled himself up. His vision was trying to make him puke his guts out. He straddled Cho and smashed her in the head, and luckily it hit despite his swarming vision.

It would've been fine if Takuma had grabbed Cho's head and pounded it against the ground. But in the state of nausea and anger, he made the hand seals of Raiton: Shokku(Lightning Release: Shock) that he had practiced so much he could do it in his sleep— it just wasn't his fault the jutsu didn't work well for him. He pressed his hand against Cho's chest as the arcs of lightning snaked around his hand, and then— Zap! Cho's body spasmed as if she was having a stroke. While the jutsu couldn't travel far or cause the amount of damage it was supposed to— at point-blank range, it was as effective as a heavy-duty taser.

Cho raised her quaking hand towards Takuma's face, but it fell back to the ground halfway up.

Takuma removed his smoking palm and didn't care anymore. He got off Cho and collapsed on the ground beside her. He looked to his side and saw that she was curled up and jittering. Face hot and heart drumming, but victorious, Takuma put his hands up, and he didn't care if it would make him feel miserable, but he yelled.

He had won.


———
.


Takuma hadn't felt worse in his entire life. One would think that a day would be enough to recover from a fight with minor cuts, but Cho's wind release jutsu had left a deep stinging pain in his body. It was so bad that he loathed the idea of standing.

"Will you stop groaning?" Ai shot him a glare.

Takuma groaned as he stretched his back and felt the pain in his bones. "I can't... I can't do it today. If he makes me fight today, I'll throw hard. Fuck the final tournament. I don't need the C-rank jutsu, I'll figure it out," he whined. He had skipped his early morning training because of the pain.

Takuma ignored Ai and continued to groan and did it louder when she hit. He only stopped when Yoshio arrived, and they had to file into the grid. He met eyes with Cho and glared at her when she had the gall to glare at him when she was the one who had made his life miserable!

"The final tournament is going to be held tomorrow and the day after that," were the first words that came out of Yoshio's mouth.

For a moment, Takuma forgot about the pain.

"I'm going to announce the weekly ranking for this week early," Yoshio continued. "The team with the highest number of wins will participate in the final tournament as my representatives. One of you guys better win. I don't appreciate getting embarrassed in front of my co-workers."

Takuma felt more restless than ever. Why couldn't he just get to the point?!

"... No.1 for this week's ranking is... Team-5," Yoshio turned to Team-5. "That makes you a three-time No.1— which means you're going to the final tournament."

Takuma blinked as he stared at Yoshio's face.

It felt so... anticlimactic.

"I disagree!"

Takuma turned towards the sword-wielding girl who had spoken up.

Now, that felt more climactic.




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[Zippogun]

F*** yeah. Go thunder punch, or make shift tazer. Thanks for the chapter

 

[oakgem217]

Awesome story. A truly grounded take on the naruto world, a rarity to be sure.

 

[The Radiance]

Jutsus are Op as they should be. The Human body even augmented with chakra can't deal with flame ball, wind walls and thunder.
Looks like Takuma and Team 5 have to defend their claim or not depending on the instructor reaction.

 

[Fiction]

---

Author's Note:
CHAPTER 50!
Yeah, let's fucking go!!!​

---

"I disagree!"

Takuma didn't have the time to rejoice or even completely take in the announcement. He turned his head toward Kameko, who had dared to raise an objection. While it did surprise him that the objection came, it coming from Kameko didn't surprise him one bit.

The group didn't make a single peep. Even Ai, who Takuma was expecting to break into a celebratory dance, stood unmoving. Everyone waited for their instructor... to react.

The hulking Yoshio arrived in front of Kameko with silent steps. The difference in stature couldn't be more pronounced as they faced each other. One looking down, the other frowning up.

"Insubordination will cost you among shinobi, Taketori," said Yoshio, his thick voice heavier than usual. Takuma hid a wince— Yoshio's use of the family name was sparse, but everyone knew why and when he chose it, and that's what made it more impactful. Yoshio continued, "This is my group. I'm your instructor. My word is the divine law. You don't get to disagree with my decisions, genin."

The taciturn Kameko seemingly found her voice as he talked back at Yoshio. "I'm by far the strongest in this group. I deserve to be in the final tournament. I can understand why Ando and Seno were chosen— but I can't see any merit in Oishi participating in the tournament... sir."

Ando Masaaki and Seno Nenro wrinkled their brows but schooled their expressions for the most part. Oishi Taro, though, pulled a fed-up face with no attempt to hide the emotion he was feeling.

"You speak less, so I didn't notice it. You don't use the word, sir, enough in your vocabulary."

Takuma stood on the opposite end of the grid to Kameko, but he could very clearly feel a pressure seeping out of Yoshio that made his already looming frame look more menacing than ever. Takuma felt as if the atmosphere was bearing down on him, compressing his chest and shoulders. It wasn't just him; everyone else in the group looked a varying level of very uncomfortable.

Was it chakra? It had to be chakra, Takuma thought as he glanced at Yoshio from the corner of his eye. He was scared that the feeling would enhance if Yoshio turned his attention to him.

"Did you not understand when I said that the team on the top would represent me in the final tournament? I'm feeling frustrated right now. How can someone not understand words as simple as that?" Yoshio's words drummed in their ears.

"I'm strong—"

"I don't give a rat's ass if you're stronger, genin. It's my choice, and I will make it any way I want to!" said Yoshio, thundering. Takuma held back a flinch even though he was steps away from them.

Yoshio raised his hand and pointed in the distance toward Shady Guy's medical tent. "I can break his bones a hundred different ways, and he would fail to stop me ninety-nine times if given a chance. I could give him the key to my home for assassination when I'm at my most vulnerable— and I'll still survive even if he jumped me in my bed while I sleep." Shady Guy, noticing they were looking at him, looked up from his book and gave them a wave. "And yet, because he practices the rare iryojutsu(medical jutsu), he's considered more valuable than me in most situations. Strength is not everything, get that through your head."

Takuma stared at the Shady Guy. Princess Tsunade, one of the Three Legendary Sannin, the to-be Fifth Hokage, had pushed for any mission team to have an Iryo-nin, a healer, on the squad. The practice was accepted as having an Iryo-nin shot up the team's survival rate to the moon. It was a great enough difference that every single shinobi village adopted the practice. She was lauded for her contribution to the shinobi organization.

And yet, most teams didn't have an Iryo-nin on them. Iryojutsu was a complex field of ninjutsu and required time and effort from a qualified shinobi to be effective. Most shinobi didn't even have the prerequisite of fine chakra control to step into the field. As such, there just weren't enough Iryo-nin to go around, which made them a sought-after commodity.

It was no wonder Shady Guy could spend a good part of the day idling under a tent doing seemingly nothing important. He could do it because he had the leeway to do so.

Takuma had to give it to Kameko for her persistence because she didn't back down. "But it's a combat tournament. I am more valuable," she said.

The pressure bearing down on the group disappeared with Yoshio's sigh. He spoke, "You're very... very lucky that I don't want to get into annoying trouble with your clan," Kameko's eyes sharpened. "Let me put this straight. It's a fighting tournament of genin who haven't even completed a single mission, not seen the real threat of a blade thirsty for their life— none of you are real shinobi. To me, it's a fun little bet with my co-workers, so," his volume suddenly shot up, "I don't care if you're more valuable! It might be a big thing for you, but for me, it's about the same as cockfighting! Get it straight in your head if you think that you somehow hold some importance in my eyes, because you don't!"

Takuma felt offended. He graduated from the academy, he wore the forehead protector of the Leaf, no one couldn't deny he was a shinobi. Did he express his displeasure? No. He wasn't very very lucky like Kameko, and there wasn't anything holding Yoshio from skinning him alive.

Somehow, he no longer felt the joy of getting to the final tournament. Yoshio didn't care if he was sending the strongest within his group— it was, as the man had put it, a fun bet with his co-workers. For Takuma, however, obtaining a C-rank jutsu was a key mark even in his life.

He felt small.

The difference between someone like him and Yoshio was too great... and Yoshio was only a chunin. Takuma couldn't even imagine what he would look like in the eyes of a jonin. What was he worth in the eyes of the top brass— was he just a dispensable pawn? He didn't think he wanted to know that answer.

The thought alone made his stomach sink.


———
.

"Cheers!"

Celebrating the win did bring Takuma's feeling of joy back.

He took a sip of his honey banana shake and looked around the restaurant. Taro didn't eat out much, so he didn't have a recommendation; the trio was from outside, so they had no idea either. The responsibility fell on Takuma, who was equally as clueless— but he ended up recommending the same restaurant that Maruboshi had taken him to. And here they were. He did tell them it was a little on the expensive side, but they didn't seem to mind.

It was his first time eating out after Maruboshi had taken him out on convocation day and the second time overall since he had found himself in the world. The first time around, the celebration had turned from happy to sad real quick when he heard of his assignment to Genin Corps. Takuma looked at his team, and he had to say... Genin Corps wasn't that bad.

"Yoshio sure dug into Kameko," said Masaaki. "I felt bad for her."

"I didn't," Ai said as she flipped through the menu.

Nenro asked, "Did you all feel the pressure coming from Yoshio when he was talking to her?"

Takuma nodded. "It was really heavy. It felt like I had a weighted vest on me. Some kind of chakra manipulation, for sure," he looked at Taro.

"Why are you looking at me? I don't know," Taro said with a half-confused half-frustrated face. "Why do you guys, you in particular," he pointed at Takuma, "think I know the answer to everything? I don't know!"

Takuma did think Taro would know.

"Maybe he was exerting his chakra outwards," said Nenro with an inquisitive look on his face.

Takuma shook his head. "It has to be more than that. I exert chakra outwards when I walk up a wall, but it doesn't happen then. And if he is exerting his chakra outwards— is he pushing it out of all the tenketsu all at once? Isn't that like really difficult? Also, how does it flow out so evenly," he didn't remember seeing anything like that when he read the manga.

"Order first," Ai pushed the menu into Nenro's face as he tried to reply, "then you can talk all you want." She looked at Takuma and then pointed at the menu on the table.

The food was great. Last time around, he was stressed about the Genin Corps, so the experience didn't stick.

"How are you feeling about the tournament tomorrow?" Masaaki asked with a broad grin on his face. "I'm feeling excited. Who would we get to fight against? Hey, do you know?" he addressed the last part to Taro.

"Again, why are you asking me? I was with you the entire time," replied Taro, sighing.

The ninety-seven genins in their batch were divided into four groups. Three groups of twenty-five and one with twenty-two people. The groups trained in the same zone were allocated to the basic genin training, but they didn't share the same training field.

Takuma didn't know about the others in his group, but he didn't meet the genin from other groups other than sometime in passing. If they met eyes, he would nod to them, but other than that, he didn't have much interaction outside his group.

"Twenty people," he said. "Four groups, five people each. If it's single elimination... it'll be four or five rounds, depending on if we get a first-round bye."

"Or we could get eliminated in the first round."

Everyone looked at Taro, who shrugged. Takuma could see Taro tapping out in the first round if the fight got tough. Takuma... didn't want to see that happen. Taro was an easier opponent to fight than most other people. If Taro went far and somehow met him in battle, it would be easier for him to win a fight.

"I won't go easy on anyone if you fight me," Masaaki announced with his arms crossed.

"Neither would I," said Nenro.

"Try me," Ai smiled.

They naturally looked at Takuma, so he thought for a moment before saying, "I'm going to do whatever it takes to get that C-rank jutsu, even if it means beating all of you and whoever fights me into a bloody pulp."

He had a faint smile on his face, but he was serious in what he said. He had invested too much to convert the chance of obtaining the C-rank jutsu. For the next two days, Team-5 would no longer be a team. Every man for themselves, no holds barred.

"Ah," uttered Ai before looking sullen. When Nenro asked, she answered. "Team-5 is over, isn't it... The teams were only supposed to hold until the end of basic training."

'Ah,' Takuma had forgotten about that for a moment.

For Genin Corps, missions were assigned by the Leaf Genin Resource Command— everything from mission objectives to the teammates was pre-described for them.

Today indeed, was the last day for Team-5.

There was a silence between the group for a moment. For the last two months, they had fought each other, they had laughed with each other, they had eaten together, they had trained together. They had spent a majority portion of the waking day with each other.

It was a short time, but they had become a team…

"Doesn't matter. We will still be a team, even if it's not official, and we will still be friends," Nenro raised his glass of water and said, "To Team-5."

" "To Team-5." "




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[Fiction]

Takuma furrowed his brow as he twirled the shuriken in his hand as he tried to locate the target. The thick white mist obstructed his vision, hiding the painted wooden stump from him. It was so thick he wouldn't walk outside with the visibility he was left with in the fear that a car would run him over.

The quiet of the morning helped him focus as he tried to recall the position of the stump. But his mind had other plans as it let the thoughts of the tournament creep in. Less than two hours remained before he had to head to the training field for the tournament and fight like a prize fighter for the C-rank jutsu that was on the line. He was going to fight people who he had never seen fight before— even his academy classmates in other groups were an unknown as he had only ever seen them use taijutsu, rest of their combat style was a mystery to him.

He needed to face five(or four if he was lucky) people and win. He was worried… he had never won four fights in a row. His record was dotted with losses. Now he was going to face the best from each group and the chances of him winning five straight against the elevated opposition didn't look great.

But, he had to win.

Takuma threw the shuriken into the white mist and a moment later the sound brought back the thud of the shuriken hitting the wooden stump. He walked through the mist and reached the tall wooden stump with the red and white target that had no shuriken on it. He had missed the target by an inch. He sighed, the nerves were getting to him.


———
.


"See, I told you there was money on this!" suddenly Takuma was not feeling the nerves from before.

The training field which was usually full with only the genin in basic training was host to a small crowd of shinobi who were definitely not in basic training. All of them shinobi and from the color of their flak jackets, all of them were chunin.

"They're not even trying to hide it!" Takuma could see someone going from person to person with a laminated paper, collecting money.

"Do you think we can participate?" said Taro, a look of calculation flashing in his eyes. "Because I think if we work together, we can make some serious change."

"Are you talking about match fixing?" asked Nenro.

"I didn't say that, but if you want to put it that way, sure."

Takuma glanced across the field at the team from another group with their chunin instructor. Some distance from them stood another team with their instructor. All the teams had their chunin instructors with them which prompted him to ask the question, "Where's Yoshio?"

Masaaki pointed to a group of chunin and among them stood Yoshio's towering figure laughing with them.

"I… I think it's the first time I have seen him laugh," Ai said with a weirded out face. It was indeed a strange sight to see Yoshio laugh.

Takuma caught Yoshio's eyes, who then walked towards them. "I hope all of you're ready to show your best today," he said. "All of these people are here to see you perform. It'd do you good to put a good impression, and who knows, they might look at you favorably in the future."

What did that mean? In Takuma's eyes it was obvious all of those people were here only for fun. He couldn't think more about it as a shinobi walked to the middle of the field that had been left empty— clearly to be used as the fighting stage.

"Don't disappoint me," Yoshio said to them before walking away to rejoin the people he was previously talking to.

"Welcome all to another iteration of the rookie genin tournament," the shinobi announced with a charming host smile on his face. "Today, we will see twenty of best rookies fight for the tantalizing prize of a C-rank jutsu. Until yesterday, they were teammates, but today, they're going to clash against each other to prove that they're the strongest! Are you excited to see who rises to the top and who gets crushed behind."

There hoots and cheers across the crowd.

'God, it's like a gladiator colosseum,' thought Takuma. It also told him that this tournament was in no way official.

The announcer continued, "As there are twenty contestants, we will have to weed some people out to make a proper bracket. That's why the first round will be a preliminary consisting of four matchups."

The announcer then named the people part of the preliminary round. Two people from each team were chosen. From Team-5, Ai and Taro were called up.

"People with the worst records?" noted Masaaki, bluntly.

"At least, you're not fighting each other," said Nenro, "meaning both of you have the chance to move to the next round."

Both lost their fights.

"I did say that it was a clear possibility," Taro shrugged, unbothered about his loss as he rolled his shoulder that had been cleanly dislocated in the fight.

Ai did look genuinely down as Nenro consoled her.

Betting money exchanged hands in the audience before the announcer took the stage again.

"The genins fought valiantly and while some lost, they're winners are heart," the announcers said some nice words and then got boo-ed at from the crowd. He ignored the crowd like a deaf person and continued, "Now that we have a proper bracket in hand, we can get started at the real fun," he said and money once again begin to exchange hands.

"Let's begin with the round of sixteen," the announcer read from the slip in his hand. "The first game matchup is going to be Yoshio against Chinatsu, represented by Takuma and Ohta."

Takuma got slapped on his back by Masaaki as he stepped out, as did the Ohta from Chinatsu's team. There were hoots and cheers as they took the stage. Ohta was taller than Takuma, almost as tall as Masaaki, but was wider than him— Takuma could see Ohta growing into Yoshio's build if he hit the gym twice a day.

They faced each other as the announcer addressed them. "You know the rules," he said. "Don't kill each other or lop something off that can't be fixed. Stop the fight the moment I say so. As long as you follow that, you're good. Do you both understand?"

Takuma nodded while Ohta replied with a 'yes'.

"Good, then take it away, young fellas. Make the fight as entertaining as possible."

The moment the announcer moved away, Ohta started to speak.

"I heard you're a big loser."

Takuma was surprised by the sudden trash talk, but he indulged after a moment's thought. "Oh, yeah? Do you know what I heard? I heard you choke big time, so this fight is going to be really easy for me," he said. Ohta's team had two of his academy classmates, so he knew who must've said that about him.

"Oh, who said that?"

"Your mom did," Takuma grinned, "when I visited her last night… and you know what, she was doing the same thing as you," he then mouthed: 'choke'.

Takuma hadn't heard that since he had come to this world. But boy did it work like a charm. At first, Ohta was surprised, but anger soon overtook him and he rushed like a raging bull. Takuma quick-stepped out of reach, avoiding a kunai slash to the face, and countered with a front kick to the gut. Ohta folded in half as he flung backward, but he was as strong as he looked as he regained his balance before he hit the floor and landed with his feet dragging tracks on the ground.

Ohta snarled and rushed forward without skipping a breath. Takuma threw himself backward and Ohta's swinging kick sliced air, a handspan from hitting.

Following up, Takuma closed the distance, and Ohta, having being enraged by Takuma's comment, attacked with unadulterated aggression. Takuma blocked every swing and hit, and though he was ratcheting up the pace, he did it slowly. If he was to take advantage of Ohta's rage, he was going to do it thoroughly. He used no true attacks but blocked and countered with precision, while pushing the pedal on the pace.

Ohta's heavier build matched his fighting style, he wasn't a nimble fighter, and his heavy swings showed that he was power hit. The fighting style suited Takuma because he could actually keep up and control the momentum. Which was why even though he lost regularly to Masaaki, he found Ai more challenging.

The needle on the pace had moved to a point where Takuma felt rushed, and he knew that Ohta was slower than him. The rage and free space to attack was the only reason why Ohta hadn't noticed how unfavorable pace had become.

Takuma made his move. Ohta swung his arm wide, Takuma ducked under it before taking advantage of the Ohta's bodies moving momentum to step in and stamp a fist into the face. Ohta's aggression suddenly came to a panicked halt. Takuma danced on his feet, bringing himself to the side. He kicked behind Ohta's knee.

Ohta, forced to kneel, hurriedly turned his torso back to bring his hands in a better position to block. He caught the late glimpse of a kunai coming down until and then it was the pain that told him there was a kunai embedded behind his shoulder. The screams ripped through the gallery's cheers as blood spluttered out in the air.

Takuma didn't let his feet rest for a moment. He glided from Ohta's left to right and slipped two senbon into the base of Ohta's neck, pushing them deep into the resisting flesh, avoiding anything vital as to not kill. He had spun a full circle around Ohta and for the 'finishing blow' he grabbed Ohta's head and made him kiss his rising knee, caving Ohta's face in.

Takuma grabbed another kunai out to continue but he saw Ohta dropped to the ground on his back, falling on the kunai left in his back, digging it deeper. Ohta passed out before he hit the ground.

"And, that's it!" the announcer called the fight.

Takuma let the breath go he didn't know he was holding and took a couple unsteady steps back. He could hear his heartbeat as he watched the two young Iryo-nin in charge of injuries rushed in to take Ohta away. Takuma stared at Ohta's broken face and he stared at the pool of blood he had left behind as the announcer grabbed his hand to raise it as the victor.

"You did great, Takuma!" Nenro greeted him with excited slaps on the shoulder.

"The knee to the face? A great touch," Masaaki nodded in appreciation.

"How're you feeling?" asked Ai.

Takuma stared at his friend's face. What was he supposed to say? That it didn't feel real. Everything had gone by so quickly and smoothly. That he was expecting his plan to fail or at least face some hiccups along the way. That he had seen the fight go an entirely different way in his mind.

"I'm feeling…"

He thought about the last two months. He had worked hard. He had contributed to the team that had won in the group. He had been the first to complete the tree-walking challenge. He had won some tough fights which he didn't think he would've been able to win two months back.

The stunned disbelief gave way to something else as he thought about it.

"… confident."




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[Deathbybunnies]

"The genins fought valiantly and while some lost, they're winners are heart,"

Click to shrink...

I think this should be "winners at heart".

I'm enjoying this story a lot. I've seen complaints about the slow pace as I read through, but while it's not exactly going at breakneck speed, it didn't feel too slow to me. I think perhaps it's the difference to being drip-fed updates over time and reading it fresh - your current pace is fine for the latter, and so long as you aren't deliberately pacing it for the former, I wouldn't worry about it.

 

[Zippogun]

Thanks for the chapters. Always a pleasure

 

[Darkcore41]

Just caught up and have a few questions:

Why hasn't he focused on genjutsu? It just seems obvious he has a knack for it. The clone jutsu was fast to learn and he was able to see through the proctors genjutsu easily.

Also why did he choose an elemental jutsu without knowing his nature or waiting until he's a chunin?

 

[K.St0ne]

He is normie who goes to school and does his homework then work 9 to 5 work. Not some NEET knows birthday of Oroshimaru and remembers all 52 sign of Water Dragon Bullet.

 

[The Radiance]

I'm enjoying this story a lot. I've seen complaints about the slow pace as I read through, but while it's not exactly going at breakneck speed, it didn't feel too slow to me. I think perhaps it's the difference to being drip-fed updates over time and reading it fresh - your current pace is fine for the latter, and so long as you aren't deliberately pacing it for the former, I wouldn't worry about it.

Click to shrink...

Completely agree with you, people are too used to overpowered characters stopping everyone with impunity that they forgot how great delayed gratification is. Seeing Takuma go from Zero skill to somewhat adequate ninja is a rush.