Sorry it's been quite hectic for me recently, weddings, school, finals, conferences can really take it out on a guy. Well here's the 5th chapter. Enjoy.
-Chapter 5-
My mind reeled with the possibilities. I knew the name of the Mother and Father now. I was overjoyed, I wanted to leap into the air and yell out my new found happiness. Climb to the highest mountains and scream to the heavens that I have a heritage. That I am not an parentless child, that I have a heritage!
"I can't believe it, you are the sole heir to the greatest water clan to ever exist," my sensei breathed. He sat there as both of us slowly digested the information. It was far too much, one day I was simply a rogue monk. The next day I was a prince to a prestige clan. Slowly my sensei got up, walked over to me, and took me by the collar. "Boy, now that I know who you really are. I'm going to work you like a dog," He said it so nicely, and smirked at me that I couldn't help but shudder at the pure torture I was going to endure.
"First, I want you to climb that mountain," He told me gently, pointing up to a mountain about 1500 feet up, with a slope of a virtually vertical surface. "Gotcha," I confirmed for him and started towards the mountain. "No, you're not ready yet," taking hold of me he bind my arms and one leg together, blind folded me, and a put a freaking heavy weight around my neck.
"Ok, now you're ready. Oh and by the way, no water manipulation is allowed," He chuckled slightly, as I groaned at my predicament. Hopping on my single leg, I smacked my head against the wall as I couldn't see the beginning slope. "HOW THE HELL DO YOU EXPECT ME TO DO THIS!" I cursed at him, "I did it, you can do it too. Especially with your heritage, if you can't do this then I guess you can't live up to your parent's name."
I froze, he brought family into the discussion. How I was so jealous of my monk mates parents. Their family, the love and bond they shared with their blood. I wanted to run, to hide, anything to make the pangs of pain leave. The cursed memories of my younger childhood, of other children mocking me for my lost parents. "Shut up," I whispered so dearly to my heart that I felt him stiffen under my glare, even if it was behind cloth he could feel it.
"Then go, prove to me that Kiba didn't make a disgraceful son," passion to prove to my Father that I was powerful welled within me. Taking the weight around my neck I swung it until a swing arc around my neck. Then charged forward and smashed it into the rock. Making a firm leverage, I did a reverse kick and jumped up. Only to feel the chain around my neck tighten as I tried to maneuver up.
Sitting on top of the weight, and leaning forward so that I had air to breathe I thought about how to get up this blasted mountain. Running the rules in my head, I thought about what he said. I was blind, disabled with both my arms and one of my legs, I had weights around my neck, and I wasn't allowed to use my water techniques… wait.
The weight around my neck was… circular and cold. Far too cold to be metal… so therefore it had to be ice! "Ice manipulation?" I inquired. "You got it faster than I did, little runt," he sounded a bit disgruntled but happy none the less. "Yes, I said you couldn't use water skills in general, I didn't say anything about the subsections of water."
"So uh… how do you bend ice to your will?" I swore I saw my teacher sweat dropped. "Well, to avoid having set rules… You have to find out on your own." He laughed and walked away into the homely cave, "I'll come back in 2 days before you die of thirst. Don't die now!"
"Oh, you're a monster!" I yelled back to him, there was mirth in the statement. But also truth, he was so screwed. 'Ice bending can't be that much harder than water bending… right?' Wrong. Oh so very wrong as I found out in the next 2 days. Water is a liquid substance, ice is a solid. I don't know how Clay did it but making solid objects manifest itself with just your will was extremely hard. So hard in fact that I simply stared at nothing for hours on end trying to figure out how to do it.
My stomach growled loudly in protest from lack of food. I patted it, "Do not despair my friend, once we defeat this stupid challenge we shall eat that old man out of house and home," my stomach growled again this time in joy of making my sensei totally broke. 'Got to prove that old man wrong' I thought viciously. Concentrating I bent the ice into blocks that extended outwards of the mountain.
Feeling my way around I grasped the first protruding ice block with my teeth, only to realize I hadn't made it far enough. Concentrating my chi through my teeth I was able to force it to move out more, slightly choking me, but none the less ok. I kicked into the wall beneath me unhinging my weight and flipping upwards.
Jamming that into the wall I repeated it, slowly moving my ways up. Once or twice I slipped and I had gone down what took me 50 minutes going up, took me a split second to go down. At 1 Day, 23 Hours, 59 Minutes, 59 seconds I heard footsteps. Then a voice. "Boy, you're slow!" I felt my nostrils flair, I was here for 2 days climbing this god forsaken mountain, and he had to nerve to call me slow.
"I was at the top by this time, you don't have much determination do you?" He commented briefly, showing no malice but of a bit disappointment. "Get down here," he yelled towards me. I relaxed my muscles and fell into a trance of sleep.
-Jiraiya-
My student fell from the skies into my arms as I brought him into my cave. It wasn't a cave really, an opening of a cave but on the inside. It was the ultimate home for a warrior such as me. Eventually, a warrior for him too. While he was climbing the mountain I had called a friend of mine. I recalled the good days we used to have before the war struck out between the Sky and Water clan.
He was a Shen Gong Wu Smith. Probably the only one within thousands of miles, for they are powerful artist. Unlike most weapons that are made with only metal, leather, wood, and other things. The items are imbued, with spiritual powers. But not without a cost, depending on what you sacrifice it will bring power to the Shen Gong Wu. People have sacrificed their dreams, emotions, feelings, limbs, mind, sanity, soul, the lives of others, and even their own lives to master and prefect the art of this craft.
That is why there are so few, many of them unwilling to use another life to craft a powerful Shen Gong Wu, will more than likely sacrifice their own life. At one time, there were many smiths. As time grew on, and generations started disappearing, so did the smiths. He was fortunate enough to meet this smith, smiling at the ring on his right ring finger.
On it was a simple tattoo of a dragon. But when activated made him seem dragon like. Yelling out the Seal would cause it to activate. Used against his newest student only days ago. Known as the Hurricane Dragon Seal, it allowed the user of either the Water or Sky clan to revert into the half-dragons they are. Glancing down onto the boy he was going to bring this boy to hell and back in the next 2 years.
Setting the boy down in one of the many I had in my abode I let him rest until the morning.
-Omi-
"Ugh, my head hurts." I whined as I awoke from my slumber unaware of my current state. Next to my teacher was a man I've never seen before. He wore leather gloves and had was very well built with his upper body. He had a air of confidence and wisdom around him. The man's gray eyes shown with the intensity of wars and battles.
"Ah, Omi I see you woke up," Jiraiya said to me. Advancing towards me I got up from my bed and rubbed my tired eyes. "You're not going to be training with me today, instead…" he pointed to the new person in the room, "He will be your other teacher from now on." Jiraiya smiled at me when he uttered the words out his mouth.
"Hello," I greeted the man as cheerfully as I could. He didn't say a thing except, "follow," in which I did as gracefully as possible. We finally reached the mouth of the cave, pulling out something from his chest pocket. I just felt his hand reach my shoulder as we surged across the brink of existence only for my sense of reality to be justified again when I was inserted into this realm.
He continued to trek making sure that my intuition was being used. We entered a cave that was in the middle of a canyon instead of the beach. As we trotted down the many corridors and passageways I began to lose track of time. Also I was become very hot, "water," I whispered as icy cool water spurted from my finger tips onto my face. I breathed a sigh of relief until the water that was coming towards me turned into steam.
It was getting extremely hot now, but the man seemed unfazed. Determined to not disappoint my new teacher I continued to go on. But now it was unbearable, I was sweating excessively and my vision started to become hazy. There was an opening that shown light and I saw it. Inside was a road of rock barely 3 feet wide with railings.
It ran towards a huge mass of land that was suspended in the air. All around it was lava. Huge burning lava. Magma flares that busted up around it occasionally but it was there. Then the heat came back with a vengeance. They were very close to the earth because it wasn't a volcano it was hundreds of meters underneath the Earth's crust and near the Earth's core.
"I am Kakashi," he told me simply. "I am a Shen Gong Wu Smith, I craft Shen Gong Wu to use," he told me plainly. "Shen Gong Wu, simply don't 'exist' they have to be created and that's who I am. I create the Shen Gong Wu that you use." He told me without missing a beat. "Unlike normal things such as swords, shields, and other assortments of weapons. Shen Gong Wu are imbued with power, but at a cost. That cost can be your dreams all the way to your life."
Pulling out the object again from his shirt pocket he showed it to me, it was a beautiful dove made of bronze. "This is the Dove of Recollection, It's a return to home Shen Gong Wu. If we find a place we wish to remember. We simply utter the words "Remember!" and the Dove will remember this place. But if we choose another place to remember then the last one shall be forgotten and the new one remembered. This was hand made by myself, and I crafted this with a man's happiness."
I was aghast, he had used someone's emotions to do this! "You took a man's happiness!" He looked at me with those gray eyes again. "Yes, he insisted that I did. Do you know why? Because he was evil, happiness was the only side of him that he hated, the only way to get rid of emotion was to place it into a Shen Gong Wu. That man you know today is Chase Young. He may seem to have happiness but it's most likely mockery and sarcasm that give it a false sense of happiness."
I was just staring at him. Now that I thought about it Chase Young never seemed to have a happy side. He laughed when there was someone in pain or when he was benefiting from something scandalous. "But first, you're here to learn how to craft Shen Gong Wu. Before I can do that, you need to learn how to craft normal equipment." He gestured to a pillar that reached far up into the ceiling and through a hole that was gigantic.
"Pathway," he stated to the pillar. Instantly the glass sheen it had melted away and huge black lasers like projections busted out and formed exact steps that circled the pillar all the way through the top. "Follow me if you please," he gestured up and then started towards the sky. I was ecstatic, this was amazing. If he crafted these beautiful creations then who knows what I would be able to create with my young nature and time to spare. As we continued up I realized that the temperature was declining extremely quick. The trip down was a slow agonizing heat. This was a quick breeze up.
When we reached the top I held my breathe, because it was caught in my mouth. This was just… beautiful. "Welcome to Paradise, kid." He simply smiled. At the top there were grassy valleys extending as far as the eye could see. Forests to the south and mountains towards the north. Vast seas grew on and lakes and rivers dotted this entire world. "What is this!" I exclaimed my eyes filled with wonder.
"This was created by Shen Gong Wu, Heylin Magic, and Xiaolin Magic. The Shen Gong Wu provided the structure needed to constantly give the power and maintain this environment. Heylin Magic is needed to imbue the Shen Gong Wu to make the inside large as it bends the time and space laws itself to make this. Xiaolin Magic is required in order to give life and growth to occur here."
I was amazed at the wonder. Then stopped. Exchange was needed for this to be so powerful. "What was needed." I asked simply. "The life of a precious person, the love of a Heylin Warrior, and the hate of a Xiaolin Monk." My brain was going hay wired. He killed a precious person just to create this? This was remarkable, but to give up a life of a loved one…
"How could you?" I asked so delicately that it barely went past the lips of my mouth. "She was dying, and she wanted to do something remarkable before she died. She never loved me until the end, but by then it was too late to salvage our love because she was going to fall into the abyss." This is what I created for her life to be given to. He was being extremely vague, talking about a past loved one. I wanted to pry, but I choose to bite my tongue.
I tracked my eyes at his legs as he motioned towards a figure. There was the most amazing creation to ever grace my eyes. It was a tree of magnificent proportions. The grass around it was lush and dew misted. The trunk of the tree was solid with a sheen that could rival diamonds as it trailed up it's creations started to change. From wood to metals and gems. Above ruby, emerald, and sapphire branches grew out. Gold and silver leaves were growing everywhere. The fruits where trinkets made from diamond, opal, garnet, pearls. The finest craftsmen ship on every detail.
"What is it?" my eyes grew amazed at the creation that stood before me. "This is the Tree of Eternity," he started , "It is what powers this entire landscape to be what it is. My grandfather, father, and myself worked on this tirelessly from when I was a child, until I was 35. My grandfather died before it was finished, my father died before it was finished, I was the one to finish it by placing the last piece here." He pointed to a part of the tree with a glass dome sticking out of it.
Inside I could see gold dust circulating and moving at high speeds until it was all just a blur. "That inside is pure gold dust that is being used to stabilize the Heylin and Xiaolin magic from utterly destroying each other. It took me many sleepless months to create, but I had done it." He smiled fondly at the thought but turned to me. "Come this way," he stated simply and moved towards the forest grove.
When we reached there I saw a mill factory outside and multiple chopped down trees. "You'll start with the very basics, which is carpentry. I'll give you a task with a deadline, you have to match it or else I'll force you to redo it a hundred times." There was no hint of playfulness in his voice, or joy, or any emotion at all. He was just telling me, and commanding me to do as I was told.
"Your first task is to create a staff exactly 5 feet and 6 inches, with a pointed end on one side, and a gnarled knob on the other. Perfectly smooth and creamy texture. You have 4 days to complete this. Dismissed." He left me alone, with no clue, hints or any other form of help. Then he dropped something in front of me, it was a manual and below it was a leather belt with multiple tools in them.
"Good luck." he told me and trotted off.
Staring at him I saw him get smaller as he went back into his abode. It was my turn to do this, and I turned around to face the forest grove, my confidence abounding.
-End Chapter 5-
Whew, so sorry for the long wait. But as I said before, I had a lot to do. And for the Naruto references, well I don't care if you like them or not. I use them, they're not the actual characters from Naruto. Just their names. Oh, and if you're on Gaia. Donate some gold to CloudedMemories:P I'm questing.