Hello again my dear readers, here is a chapter up to the usual length again. Also I am a little nervous about the bulk of this chapter and what you all will think of it as a bit of a proto-web swinging and an idea of how Izuku will be doing his particular version of web swinging as opposed to Miles's or Peter's
Izuku started to slowly wake up some with a groan as the dull throbbing on his head slowly died off, opening his eyes to the shelter he had been living in for the past month now? He had grown accustomed to his daily routine of getting up, training his Seikuken in some new way before sitting around the fire with Sensei and talking before they both turned in for the night. Sitting up before letting out a loud yawn, Izuku scratched his head a bit as he got up and moved over to the embers of the fire to warm up his body a bit before heading down to the river.
As his feet took their place in the water, Izuku smiled as he let the familiar calm flow through his mind as he set up his Seikuken to catch a few of the fish in the river, over his days fishing in this way Izuku had found himself drawn to certain types of them depending on the time of day. Breakfast was time for salmon, letting a few of the carp and trout swim by his Seikuken harmlessly Izuku spotted one out of the corner of his eye headed his way. The distinctive red stripe up the thing's body denoting it as a nice and healthy Cherry Salmon, as soon as the fish entered his radius Izuku's body reacted by knocking the thing out of the water and onto the shore before another came around, this time a bit bigger and that was caught as well with the reaction of his arm.
Getting out of the water, Izuku returned to the camp with his breakfast in hand just as his sensei was getting up himself. Who emerged from his shelter to the sight of Izuku gutting and scaling the fish before stuffing the fish with some herbs and spearing them over the embers of their fire, which had just enough heat for a slow roast of the fish.
"Good morning Sensei. I got breakfast already so we don't have to worry about that. Is today going to be the same as the rest of our time here? Refining my Seikuken more with some stationary exercise or you throwing stones at me?" At the mention of those words, Izuku's head throbbed some from the stone that had hit him dead on the day he had first developed the technique fully.
Sitting down next to his student, Fumai let out a loud yawn as he pondered what he would do next with his student. His mind still a little groggy before he shrugged some. They probably should do so after all, Izuku needed all the refinement he could get in that department.
"Maybe, hey Izuku remind me how long we have been out here? The days have sort of blended together now and I am a little mixed up in the morning." Fumai then leaned back on the ground for a bit of peaceful cloud gazing as he thought upon what his little disciple had accomplished this trip and smiled. He was so proud of the boy for everything he had done so far, seeing him grow from the timid pre-teen his daughter had brought home from school into the confident young man he saw today was just astounding.
"Oh, I think we have been out here for about a month. Which means we have a week or so left of training I think. If it takes us the same amount of time to get back home as it took getting out here anyway." The young man's words caused Fumai's eyes to widen. Had they really been out here that long? Well, then his training plans had changed completely!
Sitting up just as the fish was done roasting Fumai took the smaller fish and brought it up to his mouth to start eating it, his student did have an aptitude for this sort of survival cooking he supposed.
"Well then, I should probably give you some different training starting this week shouldn't I?" Taking a gulp of his food to finish it off, Fumai went off to his own shelter and collected the web shooters from within and before Izuku could even open his mouth to ask what they would be doing, Fumai leapt from his sitting position and went into a flying roundhouse, just slow enough for his student to dodge in time with a roll before he went back into his stance.
"Battle training, incorporating and using your Seikuken in a real fight. Not just the training we have done until now." With a flick of his wrists, the master tossed his student his weapons and as soon as the things were on flew into a series of quick jabs coming at Izuku from every angle.
Izuku, for his part, tried to calm his mind as much as possible to put up his Seikuken, eyes tracking the movements of his sensei's fists and either coming up to deflect them or doing a dodge backward to avoid another jab coming his way. Mind racing with ways to get himself away as he did so before he jumped back while firing off a few webshots onto the ground, creating sticky traps that would hopefully last the full hour as he took a breath.
"Good! Use those weapons of yours best you can! For the next seven days, you are tasked with surviving my attacks and assault in any way you can! With the exception of dawn and dusk where I will stop to eat! All other times you need to be on the lookout for me to come right around the corner! If you get lost, head towards the river and follow it to our fishing point!" With those final words Fumai couched down before leaping at his student, keeping a neutral stance until he was within a few meters whence he threw his arm forward in a mean left hook that Izuku thankfully ducked under, deflecting the arm as it entered his radius before Izuku went into a roll underneath his master's body, coming up he dashed off northeast to avoid his own traps while occasionally laying down web fluid traps for his master. Heading by his shelter once to grab his bag full of additional fluid canisters and was off into the mountaintop forest.
"Ok, ok Izuku, calm down some and think this through. Sensei only wants to do this to test your skills so far right? See if I can avoid him and attack occasionally right? You just need to show him in this that you are going to be ready come spring!" Shaking his head clear of the doubts it had been holding before, the young man heard what sounded like the loud crunching of his master running through the forest after him at a pace he could never hope to escape from at this rate. Looking upwards to the strong pine trees above him, their thick branches like an interconnected web Izuku stopped some.
"At least, I can't hope to fight or escape from a fair position on the ground." The crunching of his master's approach made his nervous mind go into overdrive, he couldn't web sling out here, he wasn't strong enough yet and he didn't have Fumai's express permission to yet. Though that didn't mean he couldn't use his webs to travel at all right? Aiming his two arms upwards, Izuku shot two web lines at some nearby trees and started to back up some, feeling the webs stretch some as he pulled back walking backward until his arms felt like they were about to fly off his arms Izuku let out a sigh. Was he really going to try this right now? As he asked himself that question, a voice echoed throughout the nearby forest.
"Ooh Izuku, just so you know if you are caught it is a week's worth of spear training. I may or may not have Hane join in, and make you wear some weights!" With that threat in his mind, Izuku let out one low gulp before jumping and letting himself fly forward on the web-slingshot shooting himself upwards into the branches, wind whipping at his face as he did so and whipping out an arm to grasp onto one of the higher branches, his body swinging around it some to let his momentum die then pulled himself into the vast web of wood, stepping back on the thick branch he found himself standing on to lean back against the thing panting. His body felt like it was in hyperdrive as he looked towards his shaking arms, using his left to grasp his right to calm himself down while breathing in deeply and smoothly. The web zip went smoothly as possible in his mind, which meant he could perform it more often without worry of injuring himself too badly.
Hearing the crunching once again get insanely close, Izuku froze some before pulling his entire body into a ball to hide out from the man hunting after him. He took intentionally low and shallow breaths as he heard his Sensei pass underneath the tree he was in, staying completely still to not cause any noise and only relaxing some as the man passed on towards the next three entering Izuku's sight line and letting the student watch his master as he moved to try to get a sense of the man's direction to Izuku himself could move away for now and formulate a real plan for fighting his teacher. From the way Sensei moved, it looked like he was following the trail of footprints he had been leaving in the muddy forest floor thus far. Though now that Izuku had left no more trail, he was looking for any other clues that his movement might have left behind when one of the strands of Izuku's web fluid. Now released of all its tension drifted into the man's peripheral vision making Izuku curse silently before he stood up slowly as possible to not disturb the tree and started to walk along the branches. Well not really walk but more crawled along the branches like a chimp, using his hands to cling to the wood underneath him until he was at the end of his branch, the piece of wood bending under his weight, threatening to snap off and send the boy hurtling around twenty feet down to the ground.
Knowing he needed to move on soon the boy was forced to stand up and grab onto a piece of wood in front of him to swing over to another branch for him to walk on. Causing the wood to shake quite a bit and cause various bugs and leaves to fall out and down to where Fumai was looking around, clearly, the man would notice the disturbance and know where his student had escaped to in order to run away from his possible beatings.
Knowing that stealth was likely out now Izuku started to walk across the interconnected web of tees best he could, clinging to overhead branches best he would while walking along the thicker ones on the ground, trying to keep himself calm the entire time so that he wouldn't panic and brag an unreliable anchor and fall to the ground. The process was somewhat slow but effective nonetheless as the young man traversed through the treetops that he hoped his teacher wouldn't be able to reach as easily as he did. As Izuku did go through the trees like this he thought upon the purpose of the training, it was to help let him use the Seikuken in a real battle or dangerous situation right? Then he should try to use it as he goes through the treetops, stepping on one more pine tree's branch, Izuku looked down on his foothold and onward to the other branches of oak and birch, his arms tensing a bit as he thought of what he could be doing.
Calming down fully Izuku slowly started to construct his mental image of the Seikuken as he lowered himself down on his foothold until he was dangling from just his arms on it, the strong muscles tensing as he started to kick his legs back and forth a bit to build up momentum. The image of him falling to the ground clear in his mind but he tried to ignore that. This was a time to train and push himself after all, and if...If he wanted to be like Spider-Man in traversal then he would have to get used to this kind of thing eventually right? With that idea in mind, Izuku swung himself a few more times before finally letting go with his right arm and letting his body rock forward with his momentum. The mental image of his arm's full range of movement helping as he noted the next branch he could grasp onto and as soon as it was within reach he did so. Holding onto the tree limb for a few moments there, suspended between two giant trees as Izuku mentally prepared himself for the next swing before letting go with his right hand and letting himself swing forward, his right hand sliding along like a hook right when he was on the upswing he let go of the branch to fly forward a bit. His left arm already out to catch on the next available branch.
As this process repeated itself, Izuku kept up his visual image of the Seikuken the whole time, letting himself flow from one branch to the other naturally as he brachiated along the treetops, slowly and intentionally speeding up along the way as he did so. Letting his mind get caught up a bit in the rush of swinging from tree to tree like a gibbon, it was much faster going than walking or climbing along the treetops for that matter, as time went on Izuku was having more fun with the action than he supposed he should have, but the motion of his body's swing as the muscles in his arms tensed to support them each time, the sensation of freedom achieved from each time he flew through the air and onto the next branch was incomparable to anything else he had felt before and Izuku was loving it! Though as the young man got more caught up in the fun of the swing his Seikuken deteriorated when the calm was broken, leading him to grasp onto a faulty branch and start a plummet to the ground.
Mentally panicking as he feel down Izuku flailed a bit in the air, the ground ever approaching to cause serious injury the young man forced himself to calm down and focus a bit on a solution, only thinking of one the young man rolled in the air so that he was facing belly up to the trees and shot out two web lines to the highest, strongest trunks his webs could reach and as they stuck, Izuku closed his eyes and prayed this would work, he could feel the lines stretch out to their maximum, taking energy from his fall and slowing it down somewhat, stopping the would be disaster when Izuku's head was a few inches from the ground before springing him back, at a higher speed than he had ever been swinging from the branches from before. With another gulp, the young man formed his Seikuken once again, suppressing the high amount of adrenaline pumping through his system and nervousness of falling before he grasped onto a strong branch and started to swing from limb to limb again. His body flying forward with each swing upwards of his arms.
Letting his body fall into the flow of brachiating from branch to branch again while keeping up his calm mind best he could, focusing solely on his task while he did so occasionally feeling like he needed a change of direction to throw his Sensei off the trail the young man, while flying during a release, shot a web line northwest and pulled on it, letting the elasticity work with him there and pull his body in the appropriate direction before resuming his previous swinging. Until he noticed the sun was starting to set already, letting his momentum die on the next grab and pulling himself up onto the thick branch Izuku realized that he had been doing that action for at least twelve hours and now that he had given his arms a chance to rest and for the fatigue to set in he felt his arms start to throb painfully and decided to rest here for the night at least. Hoping that his master was staying true and resting himself for a while back at camp.
Feeling his stomach growl, Izuku looked around the trees and spied a few Peach trees and Mikans ripe enough to eat and so he sent out a couple of web lines at the fruit before pulling them back for his own dinner. Nearly groaning a bit from the sweet tastes of the fruits in his mouth after a month of fish and herbs he ate his small meal before deciding to turn in for the night. Knowing that he would need every bit of sleep he could if he wanted to survive the next day with Sensei hunting him down.
As the sun rose the next day, Izuku let out a groan at the painful throbbing in his arms, a clear sign that he had overdone it a bit yesterday with his web swinging though hopefully, he would be able to move them without too much of a bother today. Sitting up from his lazy position on the tree, Izuku yawned a bit before he stood, leaning against the tree for some support before he started to walk through it. Going in a slow and methodical method today to rest his arms a bit, the young man's attention turned towards the ground where he assumed his sensei was searching for him. Though it currently seemed like he would be safe for a while to come it wouldn't do him any harm to be on the cautious side now would it.
While he walked, Izuku found himself naturally straying towards a leftward path, one that would eventually make him loop around towards camp which was good he supposed it wouldn't do to get lost on the mountain after all. As he walked through the treetops, the young man took it to himself to speak his thoughts about fighting Fumai aloud, wanting to process the plan better and visualize it through words.
"Well, I don't think I can stand up to him in a straight-up fight clearly I barely managed to get away the last time so keeping it on an uneven ground would be the best." As he looked to the ground for his teacher, Izuku saw how the branches constantly crisscrossed and let out a contemplative hum.
"I think I should keep it up here, the uneven ground and gaps between branches will force him to take it slower, especially with Sensei being a lot heavier than I, he would need to be more choosy about what branches could support his weight. Then I guess I could make it into a hit and run battle using the trees to my advantage, putting web traps on the branches Sensei could stand on to further control his movement."
"Hmm yes that sounds like an excellent plan, then what are you going to do next?" Hearing a deeper voice behind him, Izuku turned around in fear to see Fumai sitting on a branch in a squatting stance with a contemplative smile on his face.