Notice: I do not own Naruto, and make no claims of copyright on the
characters who are not my property. Original characters, however, are mine.
Author's Notes: This a short chapter, focused almost entirely on one thing, Neji's first dragon ninja technique. This chapter, and likely several that will follow, has instances where the viewpoint shift's from Neji to Xi. I've tried to make that as clear as possible, since it can be confusing, but is hard to avoid in this sort of dual protagonist setup.
Oh, if people are actually reading this, I would ask that you take the time to write at least a short review, its always very encouraging.
Exhaustion Shift
The sun beat down hard, but Neji didn't feel it anymore. Every muscle in his body ached, but he didn't feel that anymore. His eyes burned and wrenched from the torture he was putting them through, but he didn't feel that anymore. Hands curled into a half-bent position, bearing nekode, unable to change posture, but he didn't feel that anymore either. There was only one thing Neji was focusing on, the battered and scourged piece of wood in front of him, and only one word going through his head. "Rend!"
He screamed the word as he brought his hands down, and then across, and then back up. Chakra flowed out from those hands, forming instantly into blades sharper than the mind could see. Those blades made contact with wood, and the chakra started to disperse, cutting, but also breaking up. More chakra flowed from Neji's hands, keeping the blades steady, sharpening the ever-dulling point at a constant level. His eyes flickered, unable to maintain focus for a moment. No, must focus, mustn't lose it now, so close. Yet his eyes drifted out, losing focus on those blades of chakra, and they took in the wood. It seemed as if they tracked something moving through the wood for a moment, strange channels of chakra that were spreading and moving. W-what? Neji thought, and then forced it away. Must focus, he could feel his concentration slipping. No use, my eyes can't do it anymore. They're deceiving me. In desperation, Neji acted by reflex alone, and forced his pained eyelids to move, to snap down and close, taking his vision away.
Eyes closed, but the image of the blades remained. Neji saw it burned into his mind, those blades of chakra, seeing them behind his eyes. He saw the chakra flow inside his head, how the blades formed, dissipated, and then re-sharpened, always matching the nekode blades they were modeled on. The image was there, graven into him from the hundreds of times he had performed rend. Seeing that image, uncluttered by what his eyes were telling him, without their distractions, Neji could feel the chakra completely. He suddenly knew how to complete the last step, to pass those chakra claws through the wood completely, how movement of his hands would change them, he could see in his mind a moment ahead in time, and determine what he had not been able to with vision alone.
His arms came down, crossed, dropped to the bottom of their arcs, and then came straight back up. When he finished, Neji's eyes snapped back open.
The beaten log, one of many marked by failed attempt after failed attempt, bore the styled three gouges, each with the visible perfect cuts of the rend. He had ripped the wood with the dragon's claws.
Emotion drained out of Neji completely, and he felt the strength of will that had been keeping him going collapse. He knew it was coming, so he simply let strength leave his knees, and fell to the ground. Finally done, was all he thought in that moment.
Draci Xi heard Neji fall to the ground. Huh? He wondered. Has he collapsed from exhaustion again? Its too early for that isn't it? He paused in his own practice some distance away and looked. No, he's fallen. I suppose I'd better go see why. Xi was annoyed today, and had been for some time. Neji was the source of his annoyance. One week left, Xi reminded himself. One week left on the 5th's deadline. If he doesn't master rend I'll have to give him up, and it looks more and more like that will happen. That wasn't so infuriating by itself, if Neji had shown no talent at all for learning the dragon ninja move Xi would have accepted that, and while he would have considered it a failure on his part, the current situation was far more aggravating. One step from completion! It was ridiculous. Three weeks stuck just learning the very last part of rend!
Neji had mastered the earlier portions of the jutsu with great speed, learning how to form and maintain chakra blades, even how to cut things with them. Xi had been astonished at the ninja's progression, almost four times the speed of his own when he was learning. Then, when all that remained was to bring the rend through a resisting object, Neji had faltered. He can do everything perfectly, except maintain the technique through its full motion. He can't even get any significant way into an object; everything just breaks down. As it is now, he'd cut an inch into someone and all the charka would vanish into the air. The most infuriating part was that Xi had no real idea what the problem was. He had been able to intuit this trick out almost instantly, the one piece of rend that had not been a long and terrible struggle. It must be the byakugan, Xi knew, that was the only explanation for why he couldn't offer Neji any help. He'd tried to compensate for it, had tried any number of things, even blindfolding Neji and telling him to do the technique that way. That might have worked, if Neji hadn't needed his eyes to actually begin the technique at all. A habit to break him of, Xi had decided, but had acknowledged that wouldn't work now.
Xi turned and approached Neji, lying spread out on the ground, staring at the sky. Look's fine to me, why's he lying there? He scowled, and then the corner of his eye caught a glimpse of the log Neji had been practicing at.
Xi spun about in shock. Those gouges! He actually did it! Xi deliberately steeled his face to not show any emotion, and made sure to keep his voice steady when he decided to speak. "So." He said slowly, weighing every word, for Xi had been extremely cautious with praise so far, and was uncertain how much he ought to complement Neji. "You managed to use rend fully. That's good. I'm aware of how tried you are, since I'm getting ridiculously burnt out trying to work in this sun, but you need to get up and do it again. Successfully rend twice more, and then we'll try on last thing and call this day finished."
"Ah." Neji managed from the ground. Even collapsed as he was, he was not idle. Instead, he had considered the difference between doing rend the last time, and how he had done it before. By doing so he had caught something. When I try to watch all the chakra flowing, I put myself a step behind. I was trying to correct as I go, but I needed to be thinking ahead to maintain the blades. He immediately reasoned one step beyond that. I should be able to see what I must do by watching the blades, I just have to consider what its showing me indicates what needs to happen ahead of my hands, and correct that way. It should be much easier this way. Neji could already sort out the indications he had seen in the chakra flow that guiding him to what he needed to do. He could use those indicators to assess his mental image, and keep it whole constantly, instead of trying to reshape the blades as they fell apart as he had done before.
Painfully putting his hands on the ground, Neji levered himself upright.
My, he's way more beat up than I expected. Xi thought, looking at him. That he can even stand in that condition is impressive. Has he been practicing until he collapses?
Neji jerkily stepped over to another log, this one likewise marked and marred by all his failed attempts at rend. I have enough chakra. He decided. And, my eyes work still. He summoned the byakugan and raised his arms.
"Rend!" He snapped both arms down, automatically falling into the crossing pattern. Now, looking at the log in front of him, judging the flow of chakra was automatic, he felt no resistance at all as his hands slid through the wood. Indeed, his eyes were more steady, he did not have to focus nearly so hard. Because of this Neji noticed something strange. Chakra is leaking all through the log? He had only an instant to see it, but with the Byakugan he was able to see tiny channels of chakra leaking away from the blades and moving all through the log. So that's where the chakra dissipates to, he decided, as the move finished.
If anything, this one's better than before. Xi decided, looking at the deep marks Neji had placed into the wood. He would certainly kill his opponent. That was probably enough to let it go, Xi could see that Neji was suffering from a lack of chakra, and from shear exhaustion. He might not even be able to extract enough chakra to do the move again. Dragon ninja jutsus, since they provided killing force, used up a lot of chakra. Much less than the lethal jutsus of most other styles because of the reliance on perfect control, but still a tremendous amount of chakra. Considering how much Neji's been practicing, his stamina is tremendous. His chakra reserves approach that of many jounins.
"Do it once more." Xi told him. "Then we're done."
Neji turned to a third log, and gathered his chakra again. Huh, not very much left. I don't know if I'll be able to cut al the way through. He steeled himself. No, I'm finishing this today. He gathered himself and readied his hands, which ached and burned. His eyes, however, felt much better, since he had returned his Byakugan vision to a much wider field, instead of forcing it down and confined.
"Rend!" Neji struck for the third time. It was much the same, but again, he noticed those strange channels of chakra. Why does it leak out that way? He wondered. Shouldn't the chakra disperse uniformly? Unless these channels represent some sort of way to release chakra that would otherwise get stuck in the log. Neji had an idea suddenly, as he had when the idea to spin and release chakra at once had shown him the possibility of Kaiten. He wasn't sure how it would work, but he expected something would happen if he flooded those channels with chakra.
It was an impulsive thing to do, for he simply channeled every bit of chakra he had into the blades on his hands, tapping reserves he didn't knew were there. Once he began, Neji couldn't really stop, and he found that chakra was simply flowing out of him into the blades. Have to channel it! Have to force it through the blades and into the wood! There seemed a moment when everything held in place, and Neji focused chakra flow as long as he could will it to happen, forcing it through blades and out into the wood, as long as he could hold on and see it. It seemed to take forever, time froze and his hands inched at a tremendously slow pace. Then he couldn't hold on anymore. His body spasmed, and his eyes snapped shut defensively.
Neji felt himself fall, and then everything went blank.
The middle of the log, where his hands had rested, exploded.
"What!" Xi shouted, as shards of wood flew everywhere, some of them with enough force to embed in his clothes and skin. "What happened? Neji?"
The boy lay on the ground, twitching. Wood shards had splintered all over his hands and arms. Xi knelt down to examine him. Phew, the wounds aren't serious. But what's wrong with him? Xi squinted. It's his chakra! Damn, that's bad, he used up too much chakra, and his body doesn't really have enough now. He gave a much more thorough examination of Neji, trying to determine how serious the problem was, all the while berating himself. I shouldn't have had him do this a third time, he'd already mastered rend, there was no need to try and prove it. A long tense moment passed, and Xi was able to confirm that Neji wasn't dying. Well, it seems he'll be all right, more or less. His chakra reserves are great; he just probably won't be able to move well for a few days, or mold any chakra. Still, he shouldn't have used up as much as he did. Trying to rend with the amount of chakra he put out, that should have destroyed the move. Instead, he made the log practically burst apart. How?
Xi thought about it for a while. I really don't know, he decided. It must have something to do with all that extra chakra he released. It's as if he put additional blades all through the log, and then ripped them out all at once, but how could you do that? With chagrin Xi realized, I'm going to have to ask him to explain. Who would have thought that? You really are a genius boy. Though it appears geniuses have to prevail upon Konoha's hospital rather often.
As gently as he could, Xi picked up Neji's now stable form and began the long walk back into Konoha. He was disappointed in himself for pushing Neji so far, but also pleased. He didn't know what had caused it, but his pupil had finally mastered the dragon rend. The witch's deadline is beaten, and you have a scroll to sign, Draci Neji.
Author's Notes: This a short chapter, focused almost entirely on one thing, Neji's first dragon ninja technique. This chapter, and likely several that will follow, has instances where the viewpoint shift's from Neji to Xi. I've tried to make that as clear as possible, since it can be confusing, but is hard to avoid in this sort of dual protagonist setup.
Oh, if people are actually reading this, I would ask that you take the time to write at least a short review, its always very encouraging.
Exhaustion Shift
The sun beat down hard, but Neji didn't feel it anymore. Every muscle in his body ached, but he didn't feel that anymore. His eyes burned and wrenched from the torture he was putting them through, but he didn't feel that anymore. Hands curled into a half-bent position, bearing nekode, unable to change posture, but he didn't feel that anymore either. There was only one thing Neji was focusing on, the battered and scourged piece of wood in front of him, and only one word going through his head. "Rend!"
He screamed the word as he brought his hands down, and then across, and then back up. Chakra flowed out from those hands, forming instantly into blades sharper than the mind could see. Those blades made contact with wood, and the chakra started to disperse, cutting, but also breaking up. More chakra flowed from Neji's hands, keeping the blades steady, sharpening the ever-dulling point at a constant level. His eyes flickered, unable to maintain focus for a moment. No, must focus, mustn't lose it now, so close. Yet his eyes drifted out, losing focus on those blades of chakra, and they took in the wood. It seemed as if they tracked something moving through the wood for a moment, strange channels of chakra that were spreading and moving. W-what? Neji thought, and then forced it away. Must focus, he could feel his concentration slipping. No use, my eyes can't do it anymore. They're deceiving me. In desperation, Neji acted by reflex alone, and forced his pained eyelids to move, to snap down and close, taking his vision away.
Eyes closed, but the image of the blades remained. Neji saw it burned into his mind, those blades of chakra, seeing them behind his eyes. He saw the chakra flow inside his head, how the blades formed, dissipated, and then re-sharpened, always matching the nekode blades they were modeled on. The image was there, graven into him from the hundreds of times he had performed rend. Seeing that image, uncluttered by what his eyes were telling him, without their distractions, Neji could feel the chakra completely. He suddenly knew how to complete the last step, to pass those chakra claws through the wood completely, how movement of his hands would change them, he could see in his mind a moment ahead in time, and determine what he had not been able to with vision alone.
His arms came down, crossed, dropped to the bottom of their arcs, and then came straight back up. When he finished, Neji's eyes snapped back open.
The beaten log, one of many marked by failed attempt after failed attempt, bore the styled three gouges, each with the visible perfect cuts of the rend. He had ripped the wood with the dragon's claws.
Emotion drained out of Neji completely, and he felt the strength of will that had been keeping him going collapse. He knew it was coming, so he simply let strength leave his knees, and fell to the ground. Finally done, was all he thought in that moment.
Draci Xi heard Neji fall to the ground. Huh? He wondered. Has he collapsed from exhaustion again? Its too early for that isn't it? He paused in his own practice some distance away and looked. No, he's fallen. I suppose I'd better go see why. Xi was annoyed today, and had been for some time. Neji was the source of his annoyance. One week left, Xi reminded himself. One week left on the 5th's deadline. If he doesn't master rend I'll have to give him up, and it looks more and more like that will happen. That wasn't so infuriating by itself, if Neji had shown no talent at all for learning the dragon ninja move Xi would have accepted that, and while he would have considered it a failure on his part, the current situation was far more aggravating. One step from completion! It was ridiculous. Three weeks stuck just learning the very last part of rend!
Neji had mastered the earlier portions of the jutsu with great speed, learning how to form and maintain chakra blades, even how to cut things with them. Xi had been astonished at the ninja's progression, almost four times the speed of his own when he was learning. Then, when all that remained was to bring the rend through a resisting object, Neji had faltered. He can do everything perfectly, except maintain the technique through its full motion. He can't even get any significant way into an object; everything just breaks down. As it is now, he'd cut an inch into someone and all the charka would vanish into the air. The most infuriating part was that Xi had no real idea what the problem was. He had been able to intuit this trick out almost instantly, the one piece of rend that had not been a long and terrible struggle. It must be the byakugan, Xi knew, that was the only explanation for why he couldn't offer Neji any help. He'd tried to compensate for it, had tried any number of things, even blindfolding Neji and telling him to do the technique that way. That might have worked, if Neji hadn't needed his eyes to actually begin the technique at all. A habit to break him of, Xi had decided, but had acknowledged that wouldn't work now.
Xi turned and approached Neji, lying spread out on the ground, staring at the sky. Look's fine to me, why's he lying there? He scowled, and then the corner of his eye caught a glimpse of the log Neji had been practicing at.
Xi spun about in shock. Those gouges! He actually did it! Xi deliberately steeled his face to not show any emotion, and made sure to keep his voice steady when he decided to speak. "So." He said slowly, weighing every word, for Xi had been extremely cautious with praise so far, and was uncertain how much he ought to complement Neji. "You managed to use rend fully. That's good. I'm aware of how tried you are, since I'm getting ridiculously burnt out trying to work in this sun, but you need to get up and do it again. Successfully rend twice more, and then we'll try on last thing and call this day finished."
"Ah." Neji managed from the ground. Even collapsed as he was, he was not idle. Instead, he had considered the difference between doing rend the last time, and how he had done it before. By doing so he had caught something. When I try to watch all the chakra flowing, I put myself a step behind. I was trying to correct as I go, but I needed to be thinking ahead to maintain the blades. He immediately reasoned one step beyond that. I should be able to see what I must do by watching the blades, I just have to consider what its showing me indicates what needs to happen ahead of my hands, and correct that way. It should be much easier this way. Neji could already sort out the indications he had seen in the chakra flow that guiding him to what he needed to do. He could use those indicators to assess his mental image, and keep it whole constantly, instead of trying to reshape the blades as they fell apart as he had done before.
Painfully putting his hands on the ground, Neji levered himself upright.
My, he's way more beat up than I expected. Xi thought, looking at him. That he can even stand in that condition is impressive. Has he been practicing until he collapses?
Neji jerkily stepped over to another log, this one likewise marked and marred by all his failed attempts at rend. I have enough chakra. He decided. And, my eyes work still. He summoned the byakugan and raised his arms.
"Rend!" He snapped both arms down, automatically falling into the crossing pattern. Now, looking at the log in front of him, judging the flow of chakra was automatic, he felt no resistance at all as his hands slid through the wood. Indeed, his eyes were more steady, he did not have to focus nearly so hard. Because of this Neji noticed something strange. Chakra is leaking all through the log? He had only an instant to see it, but with the Byakugan he was able to see tiny channels of chakra leaking away from the blades and moving all through the log. So that's where the chakra dissipates to, he decided, as the move finished.
If anything, this one's better than before. Xi decided, looking at the deep marks Neji had placed into the wood. He would certainly kill his opponent. That was probably enough to let it go, Xi could see that Neji was suffering from a lack of chakra, and from shear exhaustion. He might not even be able to extract enough chakra to do the move again. Dragon ninja jutsus, since they provided killing force, used up a lot of chakra. Much less than the lethal jutsus of most other styles because of the reliance on perfect control, but still a tremendous amount of chakra. Considering how much Neji's been practicing, his stamina is tremendous. His chakra reserves approach that of many jounins.
"Do it once more." Xi told him. "Then we're done."
Neji turned to a third log, and gathered his chakra again. Huh, not very much left. I don't know if I'll be able to cut al the way through. He steeled himself. No, I'm finishing this today. He gathered himself and readied his hands, which ached and burned. His eyes, however, felt much better, since he had returned his Byakugan vision to a much wider field, instead of forcing it down and confined.
"Rend!" Neji struck for the third time. It was much the same, but again, he noticed those strange channels of chakra. Why does it leak out that way? He wondered. Shouldn't the chakra disperse uniformly? Unless these channels represent some sort of way to release chakra that would otherwise get stuck in the log. Neji had an idea suddenly, as he had when the idea to spin and release chakra at once had shown him the possibility of Kaiten. He wasn't sure how it would work, but he expected something would happen if he flooded those channels with chakra.
It was an impulsive thing to do, for he simply channeled every bit of chakra he had into the blades on his hands, tapping reserves he didn't knew were there. Once he began, Neji couldn't really stop, and he found that chakra was simply flowing out of him into the blades. Have to channel it! Have to force it through the blades and into the wood! There seemed a moment when everything held in place, and Neji focused chakra flow as long as he could will it to happen, forcing it through blades and out into the wood, as long as he could hold on and see it. It seemed to take forever, time froze and his hands inched at a tremendously slow pace. Then he couldn't hold on anymore. His body spasmed, and his eyes snapped shut defensively.
Neji felt himself fall, and then everything went blank.
The middle of the log, where his hands had rested, exploded.
"What!" Xi shouted, as shards of wood flew everywhere, some of them with enough force to embed in his clothes and skin. "What happened? Neji?"
The boy lay on the ground, twitching. Wood shards had splintered all over his hands and arms. Xi knelt down to examine him. Phew, the wounds aren't serious. But what's wrong with him? Xi squinted. It's his chakra! Damn, that's bad, he used up too much chakra, and his body doesn't really have enough now. He gave a much more thorough examination of Neji, trying to determine how serious the problem was, all the while berating himself. I shouldn't have had him do this a third time, he'd already mastered rend, there was no need to try and prove it. A long tense moment passed, and Xi was able to confirm that Neji wasn't dying. Well, it seems he'll be all right, more or less. His chakra reserves are great; he just probably won't be able to move well for a few days, or mold any chakra. Still, he shouldn't have used up as much as he did. Trying to rend with the amount of chakra he put out, that should have destroyed the move. Instead, he made the log practically burst apart. How?
Xi thought about it for a while. I really don't know, he decided. It must have something to do with all that extra chakra he released. It's as if he put additional blades all through the log, and then ripped them out all at once, but how could you do that? With chagrin Xi realized, I'm going to have to ask him to explain. Who would have thought that? You really are a genius boy. Though it appears geniuses have to prevail upon Konoha's hospital rather often.
As gently as he could, Xi picked up Neji's now stable form and began the long walk back into Konoha. He was disappointed in himself for pushing Neji so far, but also pleased. He didn't know what had caused it, but his pupil had finally mastered the dragon rend. The witch's deadline is beaten, and you have a scroll to sign, Draci Neji.