After a night of discussions, preparations, warnings, and more warnings, Hikaru and his parents eventually ate and went to sleep.
Waking up, Hikaru felt a strange tingle in his eyes; the sensation lasted for several minutes, and then it slowly faded away. ๐๐ฉ๐ข๐ตโฆ It could only have been a result of his probing and prodding the day before.
๐๐ฉ๐ช๐ด ๐ฅ๐ฆ๐ง๐ช๐ฏ๐ช๐ต๐ฆ๐ญ๐บ ๐ธ๐ข๐ณ๐ณ๐ข๐ฏ๐ต๐ด ๐ง๐ถ๐ณ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ณ ๐ช๐ฏ๐ท๐ฆ๐ด๐ต๐ช๐จ๐ข๐ต๐ช๐ฐ๐ฏ, ๐ฃ๐ถ๐ต ๐ฏ๐ฐ๐ต ๐ณ๐ช๐จ๐ฉ๐ต ๐ฏ๐ฐ๐ธ. ๐๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ค๐ข๐ฏ ๐ธ๐ข๐ช๐ต ๐ถ๐ฏ๐ต๐ช๐ญ ๐ข๐ง๐ต๐ฆ๐ณ ๐ ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ต๐ถ๐ณ๐ฏ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ท๐ช๐ญ๐ญ๐ข๐จ๐ฆ.
Getting dressed, the young Uchiha checked and double-checked his equipment and supplies before heading downstairs to share the morning meal with his parents. It was a quick and quiet affair as Hikaru scoffed down his food, shooting up from his chair as soon as it was all gone. Before the boy could move another step, he was enveloped, first by his mother and then by his father, as they squeezed him tight.
"Come back safely, Karu," Ahma whispered in his ear.
"Make sure to listen to your jonin supervisor," Sora ordered sternly.
Like this, the three stood in the kitchen for several minutes until finally, Ahma stepped away, prompting the same from Sora. With a smile, she stroked his hair before shooing him away, warning him not to be late.
๐๐ฉ๐ฐ๐ด๐ฆ ๐ง๐ข๐ถ๐ญ๐ต ๐ช๐ด ๐ช๐ต ๐ช๐ง ๐'๐ฎ ๐ญ๐ข๐ต๐ฆ? Sighing, Hikaru dashed through the door and made a beeline straight towards the main gate.
As he neared the village entrance, he was overcome with a sense of warmth, a smile uncontrollably twitching on his face.
He would finally taste that rush again. He would finally feel alive once more.
Spotting two figures standing by the gate, he slowed his approach.
๐๐ฉ, ๐ญ๐ฐ๐ฐ๐ฌ๐ด ๐ญ๐ช๐ฌ๐ฆ ๐'๐ฎ ๐ฏ๐ฐ๐ต ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ญ๐ข๐ด๐ต ๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ฆ, good.
"Hey there, Hikaru!" Waved Anzu, who stood beside a nonchalant Ren with his arms folded.
"Hey, guys. Where is instructor Kazuya? Is he not here yet?"
Anzu shook her head, pigtails flying side to side as she did so.
"He's late. Even later than you." Ren stated coldly.
Hikaru opened his mouth to respond, but he was interrupted by the timely arrival of their teacher.
"Sorry guys! I just had some last-minute business to attend to." Kazuya said, panting as he bowed his head to the three.
"It's okay, sir! I'm sure you had something really important to do, to leave us waiting at the gate for you," saying so with a cheery voice and grin, it was difficult to determine whether she was needling him or being genuine.
"Can we just go, already?"
"R-right. Glad to see you're eager, Ren." Embarrassed and unable to handle the combined pressure from his cheerily passive-aggressive and coldly disrespectful students, he could only do his best not to lower his image any further. He was only thankful that his third student hadn't also joined in on the attacks.
Kazuya's embarrassment vanished, replaced by the calm confidence of a veteran. "Before we all head out, make sure you are prepared. Double-check all of your equipment. Once we start moving, we cannot return here until the mission is complete." Giving such an order, he also began re-checking his own equipment.
The three genin could only do as instructed, no matter if they had already done so prior to his arrival.
Once everyone finished re-checking their equipment for the umpteenth time, Kazuya stepped past the gate's boundary, waving to the gate guards as he did so, and led his genin out of the village for the first time.
Jogging forward, they maintained a fair pace as the distance between them and the village widened and widened, and the scenery shifted.
"At our current pace, it will take us about two days to make it to the village." The jonin said from in front of the three.
"I can't wait! Our first mission is so exciting, and it was given to us by the Hokage himself!"
"Hmph. Well, it only speaks to the expectations Lord Hokage holds for us."
"Exactly! So, we can't afford to let him down. Isn't that right, Hikaru?"
"Hmm? Oh, yes. Let's strive to complete the mission without any mistakes. Say, are we going to be doing some team training before we reach the village, sir?"
"Always asking the good questions, aren't you, Hikaru?" Kazuya said as he glanced back at him with a smile. "Of course. I had hoped to have built up our teamwork for some time beforehandโฆ." A flicker of frustration passed over his eyes. "But. It seems we have no choice but to put some training in and fast."
Gesturing over to the horizon ahead of them, he spoke again, "As soon as we reach that hill, we'll rest for a moment and then begin our training."
Anzu placed a hand over her eyes as if trying to expand her vision. "I can't see any hill!"
Surprisingly, Ren was also unable to spot the aforementioned hill.
"That's exactly the pointโฆ." Hikaru murmured, not even bothering to see if he could spot the hill.
Both of them raised an eyebrow, considering his words before realization dawned on them. It was going to be a long journey before they were able to trainโฆ
Several hours later. Team 5 had long since been forced to pick up their pace, running ever since Kazuya announced their goal. While the team's instructor was utterly unperturbed and seemingly even more refreshed than he had been at the start, the same could not be said for the genin he was responsible for.
"Hahโฆ hahโฆ How are you stillโฆ." Anzu was currently outraged as she lay spread out on the ground, staring up at the sky with blurry eyes.
In a similar but much less exhausted state, Ren Hyuga sat up against a tree, taking deep breaths and intently focused on the third member of their team. While he was incredibly proud of his own physical prowess, even he had suffered greatly from the run.
"What?" Hikaru asked as he glanced between the two. He was currently swinging his tanto back and forth, swishing through the air amidst a small storm of leaves.
With every swing he made, another brown leaf clung to his blade, forming a second skin over its metallic surface. The aim was to not let a single leaf fall to the ground but to completely coat your blade in them using chakra.
It was a training technique Sakumo had devised for him. With this technique, he not only perfected his already exceptional control, but he also had to have incredible reaction speeds and depth perception. Piercing through the hundreds of fluttering leaves that floated down to the ground and touching only the one most at risk of reaching the ground while also keeping the other leaves afloat with his movements that purposefully created small gusts of air was no easy feat.
Catching her breath, Anzu finally managed to form a complete sentence, "How do you have so much energy left?!"
"Oh, this? Hmm, just lots of training, I guess." The Uchiha lightly shrugged his shoulders as he continued to cut down the storm of leaves, turning his once small metal blade into a club composed of plants.
Truthfully, he was also quite affected by the run but was able to refresh himself by invigorating all of his muscles with chakra. Perhaps even more effective than said muscle rejuvenation, he had also used a breathing technique he had built up over the years in conjunction with internal chakra manipulation that spread oxygen around his body at a greater level than it normally would. This method largely counteracted the build-up of lactic acids, meaning running for long periods did not impact him as severely as it did others. It was something that had taken months of experimentation, initially born from a memory of someone from Earth whose body naturally did not build up lactic acids and could run for miles with ease.
๐๐ต ๐ด๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ฎ๐ด ๐ต๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ต๐ฉ๐ช๐ด ๐ฆ๐น๐ฆ๐ณ๐ค๐ช๐ด๐ฆ ๐ช๐ด ๐จ๐ฆ๐ต๐ต๐ช๐ฏ๐จ ๐ข ๐ฃ๐ช๐ต ๐ต๐ฐ๐ฐ ๐ฆ๐ข๐ด๐บ ๐ง๐ฐ๐ณ ๐ฎ๐ฆโฆ ๐๐ฐ๐ธ ๐ด๐ฉ๐ฐ๐ถ๐ญ๐ฅ ๐ ๐ฎ๐ข๐ฌ๐ฆ ๐ช๐ต ๐ฎ๐ฐ๐ณ๐ฆ ๐ฅ๐ช๐ง๐ง๐ช๐ค๐ถ๐ญ๐ต? ๐๐ข๐บ๐ฃ๐ฆ ๐ ๐ฏ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ฅ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ถ๐ด๐ฆ ๐ด๐ฐ๐ฎ๐ฆ๐ต๐ฉ๐ช๐ฏ๐จ ๐ด๐ฎ๐ข๐ญ๐ญ๐ฆ๐ณ, ๐ถ๐ด๐ฆ ๐ฎ๐ฐ๐ณ๐ฆ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ช๐ฏ๐จ๐ด, ๐ข๐ฏ๐ฅ ๐ด๐ฆ๐ต ๐ฎ๐ฐ๐ณ๐ฆ ๐ญ๐ช๐ฎ๐ช๐ต๐ช๐ฏ๐จ ๐ณ๐ถ๐ญ๐ฆ๐ด ๐ต๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ง๐ฐ๐ณ๐ค๐ฆ ๐ฎ๐ฆ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ฆ๐ฎ๐ฑ๐ญ๐ฐ๐บ ๐จ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ข๐ต๐ฆ๐ณ ๐ฆ๐ง๐ง๐ฐ๐ณ๐ต.
"Ah! You're a monster! Even Ren is too tired to keep training!"
The Hyuga in question could only grimace as this harsh reality was so casually pointed out by Anzu. He really was inferior to the Uchiha in terms of physical endurance.
Watching over this scene with interest, Kazuya finally spoke up, "Are you sure it's a good idea to train after such a run, Hikaru? We will begin team training soon."
Turning his head to the side, Hikaru's arm flew forward, swinging his blade several more times, catching the last of the floating leaves.
"It's okay, sir. This is just a light exercise. My arms were feeling a bit left out from the run, is all." Saying this, Hikaru swiped his blade from his left shoulder until it was fully extended forward. In doing so, the accumulated leaves all flew off the blade, following the sword's movement as they did so before flying away with the wind.
With his exercise done, Hikaru performed a few stretches before sitting down and meditating to recuperate his chakra and energy and in order to strengthen his spirit.
"Geez, that guyโฆ." Anzu muttered sourly, ashamed of her physical prowess by comparison.
Closing his own eyes, Ren's head leaned back against the tree trunk as he opened his mouth. "Rather than feel down on account of your inferiority, work instead to overcome it."
"I know, I knowโฆ." The girl said as she pulled some onigiri out of her bag, snacking down on them to replenish her lost energy.
It felt like but a moment had passed before Kazuya loudly clapped his hands, snapping everyone's focus back onto him, and declared, "Well, you should have rested enough by now. Let us begin our team training!"
Anzu groaned but still stood up as fast as the other two did.
Hikaru's eyes hovered over his instructor, curious as to what the training would be, as he stretched his different limbs, waking them up. He could have circulated a small amount of chakra throughout his body to achieve a similar effect, but he found it lacking when compared to actually stretching his muscles.
"Now, I'm sure you're all curious as to what I have planned, is that right?"
All three genin silently nodded, awaiting his following words.
"Wellโฆ" Kazuya found himself chuckling slightly, which seemed like the devil's laugh to his three students.
"You will have toโฆ." Again, he stopped himself short,
As he expected would happen, all three of his students' heads inched closer toward him subconsciously as they sought out the rest of his words.
"Retrieve this scroll!" Shouting, he pulled a blue scroll out of his pouch and held it up in the air.
This time he smiled as he quickly followed up on his previous words, "While keeping me from stopping you!"
"You mean for one of us to retrieve it while the other two keep you too busy to stop them?" Ren asked after a second of contemplation.
"Nope! However, you retrieve the scroll is entirely up to you! That is one method. You could also group together to defeat me and take it afterwardโฆ." He offered good-naturedly.
'๐ ๐ฆ๐ข๐ฉ, ๐ณ๐ช๐จ๐ฉ๐ต!' All three though, in unison.
Holding a finger to her mouth, Anzu then asked the question that had been on Hikaru's mind, "What if we fail to retrieve it?"
"Oh ho! Very good question, Anzu!" In response to her supervisor's praise, the girl blushed slightly.
Casually chucking the scroll into the air before catching it again and repeating the former movement, Kazuya's smile only deepened. "Nothing!"
"N-nothing?" She asked, unsure if she had heard him right.
"Yup! Absolutely nothing!"
"Thatโฆ"
"You three will stay here, training together until I have subjugated the bandits all by myself and completed our mission!"
Coming to a realization, Hikaru's eyes sparkled. "You mean that if we fail to overcome our own deficiencies with teamwork, we will have to sit the mission out and work to improve our compatibility over the following days as you complete the mission for us?"
"Precisely!" Chuckling some more, Kazuya's expression quickly lost all of its warmth, "Of course, that will also mean that we will not be undertaking any more C-rank missions until I personally deem you ready."
๐๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ณ๐ฆ ๐ช๐ต ๐ช๐ดโฆ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ค๐ข๐ต๐ค๐ฉ.
"That isโฆ" Ren grimaced at the thought of essentially failing their first mission, one given by the Hokage on account of his high regard for their ability, nonetheless! "...Reasonable," he finished. Although he detested the idea, he could find no fault in his supervisor's logic.
"I assume there is a time limit, sir?" Hikaru asked, curious as to how much time they were given to achieve this feat.
"Another excellent question!" Their teacher declared, with a finger pointing upward. "Hmm, how long should I give you?" He asked, rubbing his chin as he turned towards the horizon.
"I think giving you until sunset should be long enough."
Hikaru and his teammates instinctively looked up at the sun that hung overhead. They left the village first thing in the morning; they ran for around three to four hours and took another hour to rest. With the current season, the sun did set sooner than it usually would, but all things considered, they still had about six hours of sun left.
"Nowโฆ if you have no other questions, I'll go hide this scroll somewhere close by and the test will begin!"
Seeing that no one had any further questions for him, Kazuya's body flickered away.
The hill they currently stood on was about as large as a football stadium, covered in dense foliage, and blessed with many trees.
๐๐ฉ๐ช๐ด ๐ช๐ด ๐จ๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ฏ๐ข ๐ฃ๐ฆ ๐ข ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ข๐ญ ๐ฉ๐ข๐ด๐ด๐ญ๐ฆโฆ Hikaru thought as he gestured toward his two fellow genin.
Huddling together, they began to exchange information and plan.
"Okay, so we know that sir Kazuya is a taijutsu specialist who also happens to be talented in genjutsu and has an array of lightning jutsu at his disposal." Anzu said straight away so that they were all clear of what they had to contend with.
"Hmm, that's troublesome. Even if he holds back, he has years of experience on us and our puny taijutsu skills." Ren said as he stared at Hikaru. It was clear to both boys that it would fall to them to hold back their supervisor while Anzu would search for the scroll.
"That's troublesome, sure. But what I'm most worried about is his genjutsu prowess. Even if we manage to hold him off, I'm sure the scroll will be well hidden, and since we don't know exactly how he uses genjutsu, we should assume that he's used it to help hide the scroll." After finishing his words, Hikaru's eyes turned thoughtful before speaking again.
"Ren, check our bodies, to see if we've already had genjutsu cast on us."
Immediately understanding, Ren's eyes instantly transformed into the famous byakugan as he examined not only the other two genin nearby but also his own body.
"There is already a foreign chakra inside each of our bodies. What it does, I cannot say." Saying this, the Hyuga placed his hand first at the spot where the foreign chakra was strongest on his own body, dispelling it, and then repeated this action on both of his teammates.
"Soโฆ that's the first trap, eh?" Hikaru mumbled.
"First trap?" Anzu cocked her head at his mumbling.
"When it comes to shinobi nothing is ever as simple as it seems, what we assume to be the trap, is just a means of concealing the second, third, or even fourth trap. It's just a ruse that makes us let our guard down, while the true trap lurks beneath, ready to strike."
"Hmm." Ren himself hadn't even considered this fact, thinking that their teacher wouldn't go to such lengths to test them.
"It's as I thoughtโฆ." The orange-haired girl sighed, "Teacher really doesn't want us to participate in this mission."
"Ah, so you got that feeling, too?"
"Yeah. It's pretty obvious to all of us that he wasn't at all pleased by Lord Hokage giving us a C-rank mission. I thinkโฆ I think he intends for us to fail, so that he can deny us the chance to undertake the mission and at the same time have us spend the next few days training together."
"Well thenโฆ I guess we'll just have to sorely disappoint him. By passing the test!" As contradictory as it sounded, it made perfect sense to Hikaru's two teammates. Such enthusiasm from their usually aloof teammate was quite surprising, though.
However, Hikaru's enthusiasm was easily comprehended if one knew of his peculiar tastes. ๐ ๐ฉ๐ข๐ท๐ฆ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ง๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ญ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ข๐จ๐ข๐ช๐ฏโฆ ๐๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ณ๐ถ๐ด๐ฉ. ๐๐ต'๐ด ๐ฃ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ฏ ๐ด๐ฐ ๐ญ๐ฐ๐ฏ๐จ, ๐ฃ๐ถ๐ต ๐ ๐ด๐ต๐ช๐ญ๐ญ ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ฎ๐ฆ๐ฎ๐ฃ๐ฆ๐ณ ๐ช๐ต ๐ข๐ด ๐ค๐ญ๐ฆ๐ข๐ณ ๐ข๐ด ๐ฅ๐ข๐บ. ๐๐ฆ ๐ข๐ฃ๐ด๐ฐ๐ญ๐ถ๐ต๐ฆ๐ญ๐บ ๐ค๐ข๐ฏ๐ฏ๐ฐ๐ต ๐ง๐ข๐ช๐ญ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ช๐ด ๐ต๐ฆ๐ด๐ต!
"Yes. We should at least be able to do that much." Ren replied with a fire in his belly.
"Yes! Let's do it!"
Just like that, the three of them came to a common understanding, opting to give it their all to pass this seemingly impossible test. An hour passed by as all three made dozens of different plans, rejecting just as many and sharing all of the abilities each of them possessed.
Hikaru's body had long since cooled, losing all hints of its previous excitement as he became more analytical. "Ultimately, we cannot know when or what the second, third and fourth traps are going to be. All we can do is adapt to them as they happen. We can rest assured that none of us are currently under any genjutsu, but that will not remain so, I am sure."
"Agreed. While I am unable to be taken by a genjutsu, unless it is many times more powerful than I can handle, with my byakugan activated, I cannot bear the cost of them being activated for such a long time. You two are in even worse positions, but at least you both have fine enough chakra control that while on guard you should be able to detect any such genjutsu attacking you."
"Soโฆ do we go with plan 47?" The girl asked as she bit her lip. It wasn't her preferred plan, but since both of the boys had settled on it, she couldn't say anything more than she already had.
Hikaru's eyes met Ren's as they came to a silent understanding. "Plan 47 it is," he said decisively, not wanting to waste any more time deliberating. Either they decided now, or they would be there until sundown coming up with and dismissing plans of similar levels of possible success.
"Let's do it, you guys. Either we give it all we have, or we might as well just give up now." Saying this, he held a hand out in the middle of the three, quickly gripped by a dainty hand, which in turn was then grabbed by a sturdy hand.
With that last act of agreement, all three genin dispersed into the woods, ready to enact their plan, ready to pass the test.