Hello everyone, thank you for reading this far.
I'd first like to thank coolblast for the really great review you did. It encouraged me to continue.
I'm also going to be a little bit slower at updating this story since I'm kind of caught in this storm called mid-terms... haha...
I'll do my best to keep updating!
I'm also surprised to see how my other story Anbu's life is so popular. I really didn't expect to see such a popularity with that story!
As always, I don't own Naruto or anything related to it.
Shikamaru was walking down a road. He had just crossed his sensei while walking with Choji. Asuma had told them to meet at the training ground number 42. The boy offered to go tell Sora while his sensei would go see Ino. Choji, on the other hand, decided that he would go get some food first.
When he arrived at the girl's house, he knocked on the door. He waited for a while, but nobody answered. He tried the door knob; it was locked.
"She's not there," he told himself.
He looked down at the ground. The soil seemed like the kind to keep footprints. He could see his own but nothing more.
She didn't even sleep here, he thought. Maybe she's in town…
He turned to walk back. Konoha was huge. It would take a while for him to find the girl.
At that thought, the boy let out a sigh while putting his hands in his pockets. "What a drag."
When Sora woke up, she could smell pancakes. She got up quickly and went to the kitchen to see Reena making breakfast.
"Need help?" she asked.
Reena turned her head.
"Oh no no! I'm fine. I'm almost finished, so if you want to take a shower now, we'll be ready to eat afterward."
"Okay! Second door on the left?" Sora made sure.
"Exactly," her friend answered.
Sora took a quick shower. When she came out, as promised, breakfast was ready. She ate quickly with her friend and helped her clean the dishes as a thanks for the meal. Finally, before leaving, Reena gave her friend a blue scroll.
"There's a special technique inside. The hand signs are a bit long but with the necklace I gave you, you should be able to do it easily after performing it once," she explained.
Nodding her head, Sora opened the scroll. The list was indeed very long. At the top, she could read: Water release: water dragon blast technique.
"Awesome! I'm excited to try it!" said the black hair girl in excitement.
"Just be careful with it, it's very powerful," warned her friend. "If you want, we could practice it later?"
"Sure! But now I need to leave. I want to go see my sensei since he said that we might meet up today."
"Oh wait! I'll walk with you! Sakura wanted to see me," remembered Reena.
The white hair girl ran around her house to gather her things. When she was done, she met her friend at the front door.
"I'm ready, let's go!"
They both walked out, and Hikari locked the door behind them. The girls then headed to town. On the way, they heard a merchant, who seemed new around, advertising his merchandise.
"Out of techniques? Come and get new ones here!"
They went to see closer. The shop was surrounded by little kids studying in the academy. Reena took a scroll with the symbol lightning on it. They both looked inside. On the top it said: Lightning release: Dragon's lightning rage. Right under it, there was a bunch of random handsigns written under.
"Those are not the right hand signs," murmured quietly Reena, knowing the hand signs of this technique by heart.
"We should report it then," told her Sora.
"We can go together at the end of the day," offered the white hair girl.
"Sure, if he's still here."
"Oh trust me. He won't go anywhere with the money he's making," pointed out Reena.
"Yeah, you're right," agreed Sora.
As she agreed, they heard someone shout:
"There you are Sora!"
Sora turned around to see who called out her name. Shikamaru was walking toward where the two girls were standing.
"Hey Shika, what are you doing here?"
"Searching for you. Asuma-sensei wants to see us at the training ground number 42," he answered.
"Then I'll have to leave you Reena," the black hair girl said to her friend.
"Meet you in front of the Hokage office at four then?"
"Okay!" agreed the girl.
She then headed off with Shikamaru toward the training ground. However, something was off. Their usual comfortable silence didn't feel as nice for either of them.
Getting closer to the training ground, the boy stopped. This atmosphere was, for some reason, really getting to him. Sora turned around to look at him.
"Shikamaru, why are you stopping?"
"Where were you last night?"
"Um, well at Reena's place," Sora answered, not quite understanding why it mattered to the boy.
"What was wrong yesterday then?"
The girl bit her bottom lip. She wasn't ready to cover that kind of topic with Shikamaru. Heck, probably she would never be. Not knowing what to answer and feeling trapped, she naturally started feeling mad. At the boy's surprise, she turned around and said harshly while walking away:
"Why am I suddenly being interrogated? If I wanted to share my personal life with you, then I would."
"Gee… I was just worried," mumbled Shikamaru dumbfounded.
"Then why don't you bother Ino instead?" she spat out, which she immediately regretted for various reasons.
She was angry in general but couldn't really pinpoint to whom it was directed now. Thoughtful, she spent the rest of the walk staring at the ground quietly.
When they arrived at the training ground, the others were already there. Ino was sitting down on the ground, choji was eating chips and Asuma was holding four colored scarf in one hand and smoking with the other one.
"You're finally here," said Ino as she got up.
"Yeah, sorry if we're late," said Sora while giving a mean look at Shikamaru, which didn't go unnoticed to the blonde girl.
"Doesn't matter, as long as you're here," said the sensei.
"So why did you want to see us, Asuma-sensei?" asked Choji.
"For a little test."
"A test? Why?" asked Sora worried.
"To see where you are at. You are all Chuunins now," answered Asuma.
"So what kind of test is it?" asked the black hair boy.
"You will all have a scarf attached around your waist. Your goal is to get the more scarf you can in the next four hours. I will be here just to make sure that no one gets killed," he explained.
"If we get ours stolen, can we try to get it back?" asked curiously Ino.
"Yes, now choose the scarf you want," Asuma said as he holded out the scarf in front of him.
Sora took a sky blue one, Choji took a grass green one, Ino took a dark purple one, and Shikamaru took a black one.
"At the count of three you can start. 1… 2…" counted the sensei.
Everyone got ready to jump. They were all waiting for the magic number.
"3" finally said the man after a drastic wait.
The whole team hid. The training ground was perfect. It had a lot of trees and bushes, and to top it all, a huge river running through it.
Sora was hiding high in a tree. From there, she had a good view of the ground while being well hidden. She was also listening carefully for any sounds while trying to calm down the storm of thoughts raging in her head. Everything seemed peaceful for now...
This is it for now. It's a bit shorter so I can set up the next chapter properly!
As always, share the love, please review/fav. Comments would be highly appreciated!