Put away the porn! It's time for more of…
The Shinobi's Guide to Training
Part Three: Use the Force!
By Kaori
Bright and early the next morning Team 7 was back at their new training spot. Kakashi, was on time for once. "How suspicious", thought the genin. Yesterday's training was aggravating, what will today bring? Why do they get the feeling it will be similar? (1)
"All right students, today you will be learning how to use the power of your mind to connect with the world around you and sense the changes." Said Kakashi. At any rate, this training builds on the principles of yesterday's exercise. You must keep a clear mind throughout."
"What happens if we don't?" asked Sakura, Kakashi threw a rock at her head. "OW!"
"That happens." Eye-smiled Kakashi. "I have several bags of rocks of various sizes here which I will be throwing at you. You must dodge them all…."
"Heh, this will be easy." Snorted Sasuke.
"…blindfolded." Finished Kakashi. "If you get hit even once I will make you pick up the rocks I've already thrown."
"EEEEHHH?" exclaimed Sakura and Naruto.
"I feel ridiculous." Muttered Sasuke. "And this blindfold itches."
"Yes, but think how ridiculous you'd feel if you had to do this naked." Said Kakashi.
"Naked!" yelled Sakura.
"Well, the manual does recommend the trainees to be naked but it's not mandatory." There was an awkward moment of silence and then…. "Think fast!"
Rocks flew all around. Kakashi didn't bother throwing them one at a time pelting them with handful upon handful of rocks. He didn't even stop after he hit them, merely instructing them to pick up the rocks (still blindfolded) as he kept throwing. Two and a half hours of this and the genin were too sore to move.
"Are you trying to kill us?" wailed Sakura. The last volley had been a ridiculous amount of fist, sized rocks. She was almost certain Kakashi was using some kind of throwing device.
"If I were an enemy and these rocks were kunai, you would have been dead a long time ago." Kakashi replied.
"So the point of this exercise is to teach us how to dodge objects without seeing them?"
"Exactly. You should be able to sense the rock before it reaches you."
Unbeknownst to Team 7, they were being observed and not by the wild animals; they cleared the area the minute Kakashi's throwing started to get a bit too enthusiastic. No, it was the ever-exuberant Maito Gai who had stopped by with the intention of challenging his rival to a game of badminton (2).
At first, he was going to rebuke his rival for child abuse, but then he noticed that (before being pummeled by more rocks than anyone but a jounin would be able to dodge) they were starting to get the hang of it. Inspiration struck…
"We're going to do what now?" Neji scowled.
"As I said," Gai enthused. "my eternal rival has currently engaged his students in some extreme, modern training! I will not fall behind! But, I will not simply copy his method. No, I shell go one step further! But first, you must don the blindfolds of youth! And no using your byakugan Neji, that would defeat the purpose of this training."
"You still haven't told us what the purpose is." Muttered TenTen, who put on her blindfold simply to avoid arguing with Gai. After all, you don't get into fights with pigs; you both get dirty but the pig enjoys it.
"Gai-sensei is so cool!" grinned Lee, who could barely contain himself as he put on his blindfold. Neji, figuring whatever was in store for them couldn't possibly be any worse than having to look at Gai pouting in his spandex suit, put on his blindfold.
"Good students!" nodded Gai, pleased with himself. "Now …prepare!" he hefted a boulder and threw it.
Now there are two things about observing training methods every martial arts master should remember: first of all, make sure you understand the purpose of the exercise and secondly, make doubly sure that you've seen the entire regimen before even contemplating on improving on it.
That said, let's go with Team 7 as they visit Gai's team in the hospital…
Sasuke was enjoying himself as he tormented Neji (who was in a body cast up to his neck and in traction) by tickling his nose with a feather.
"How did you end up like this in the first place?" Sakura asked. "Did Gai finally go crazy and decide to kill you all?"
"Gai-sensei would never do something so un-youthful as try to murder us!" Lee insisted. Somehow he only got both his legs broken while poor Neji and TenTen had both been completely crushed. "It's just that his new training was too much for us right now!"
"New training?" Naruto parroted. "Kakashi-sensei has us doing new training too."
"He got the idea from your sensei (Uchiha, knock it off) to begin with." Neji twitched, which was rather painful as his bones hadn't even begun to knit back together yet. He so desperately wanted to jyuuken Sasuke into next week for this. Said Uchiha had a very mischievous smirk on his face.
"Got it from Kakashi-sensei?" blinked Sakura.
Neji, between pleas to Sasuke to stop tickling his nose, recounted the entire incident. "The next thing I know something heavy landed on us."
"Okay," said Sasuke. "that guy, nucking futs. (3)" Sakura, Neji, and Naruto nodded in agreement.
This training was actually inspired by the trailer for the movie Dodgeball (I didn't see the actual movie but I thought the trailer was kind of funny). Anyway, what kind of training shall we witness next? Only one way to find out, you've gotta wait for the next chapter!
1) Stole this line from The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimly (the actual line is "I wonder what tomorrow will bring? Why do I think it will be similar?"). I miss that show, I must say! It was totally decent! My favorite episode is the one where Ed witnesses a robbery and has to testify against the guy in court.
2) I don't understand why we have badminton. Isn't tennis boring enough? (Please note tennis is only fun if you're actually playing, unless we're talking about Beer Tennis then watching is definitely more fun.)
3) Woo! Desert Punk line!