When Itachi awoke, any doubt that he may still have been in the elemental nations vanished from his mind. This was because the first thing he saw when he woke up was a giant lumbering humanoid creature standing below his tree, staring up at him. It was unlike anything he had ever seen before, it looked human, but Itachi knew it wasn't. First of all it was taller than any human he had ever seen, probably around 5 meters. It was also completely naked, and as such, Itachi was able to see its lack of genitals. And lastly the face, it had big beady eyes, as well as a huge unnerving smile. Itachi was able to keep his cool, but such a creature unnerved him. The thing that surprised him the most actually, was how it was able to get so close before he finally woke up.
Itachi used a system of chakra detection in his sleep to always be aware of his surroundings. He would send out a pulse of chakra every 30 seconds or so, and if that pulse made contact with another chakra network, he would be made aware of it, and if he wanted to, he could choose to wake up. Because of this, he could only always be partially asleep, but it was a necessity. But the creature below him had no chakra. It surprised him, one of the first things you are taught as a shinobi is how every being has some sort of chakra, you couldn't live without it. But this thing broke that rule, it was also scarily quiet, so much so that if he wasn't staring at it right now, he would have no idea of its presence.
After pondering about the creature's weird appearance, and lack of chakra network, Itachi realized that it still may be able to communicate. It may just follow different social norms, and staring at someone for hours on end was just a form of polite greeting…definitely.
"Hello there, you have been staring at me for quite some time it seems." Itachi said to the creature in a monotone voice.
It didn't respond, Itachi expected that. He was just hoping that there was maybe a small chance that it was intelligent, but it seems as though that is not the case. He figured he may as well learn more about this creature, so he began to jump from tree branch to tree branch to see how it would respond. His Akatsuki cloak billowed behind him as he soared through the air. He saw the creature's eyes following him as he began to circle the clearing where he first woke up. He stopped jumping when he was directly across from where he started. As soon as he stopped the creature ran forward at a decent speed until he was close to right under him again. Unexpectedly the creature tried to use all its momentum to jump up and grab Itachi by the legs, however, he was much too far up the tree for it to even come close.
"So, it wants to get me, that's for sure, and it has at least some hunting knowledge; it knows how to use its speed from running to jump higher, interesting."Itachi thought to himself.
It was at this moment where he realized that all the animals from yesterday were still in the clearing, happily laying in the grass or nestled within the bushes.
"So it only wants me? I should probably go down there with it so see how it reacts when I am on level ground with it."
With that said, Itachi jumped through the air, and landed on the ground about 20 meters away from the humanoid creature.
"What will you do now" Itachi though
As soon as the creature noticed Itachi was now on the ground, it began to run towards him at an impressive speed, much faster than earlier. As soon as he was in reaching distance, the creature shot out its arms to try and grab him, but he simply sidestepped the attempt. It continued to try to grab and swipe at him, however, Itachi was able to easily just move out of the way, making sure to stay clear of the creature's now open and drooling mouth. He didn't even need his sharingan. After about 5 minutes of this cat and mouse game, he decided that he had learned enough about the weird creature's style of hunting, and so, he shoved his hands into the ground to form two hardened earth kunai. He then moved his way in between the creature's legs, all the while dodging its attacks, and sliced at the giant's two achilles, but the blades just bounced off. He had to jump out of the way as the giant tried to smash him under its foot.
"Interesting" Itachi thought "It seems to have incredibly hard skin, no matter, I can still get through"
After maneuvering his way back under the giant's body, Itachi used his limited skill in wind style jutsu to coat the earth kunai in a thin layer of wind chakra, increasing their cutting power. This time when he slashed at the being achilles, it went through like a hot knife in butter, and its effect was immediate. The large creature fell forwards onto its hands and knees, unable to support itself with its legs. However, Itachi noticed a large amount of steam coming from the creature's ankles, and after observing it for a few minutes, Itachi was astonished to see the wound was completely healed.
"Its healing factor rivals that of a jinchuriki, this makes things more interesting."
By now the giant was standing once more, and continued its assault. But Itachi was no longer in the mood to fight, he had not eaten since he got here, and the excitement of seeing a new creature had worn off, so after weaving a few hand signs and saying the words, "Fire Release: Fireball Jutsu" Itachi completely obliterated the creatures head from the jaw up, it once again fell forwards, and this time, Itachi though it was done for good, and stored his kunai away for later. He began to walk away, in search of some berries and plants he could use to sustain himself.
However, as he was walking away, he noticed in the corner of his eye, a huge plume of steam coming from the creature's body. Itachi turned around and watched as the giant reformed nearly its entire head. He watched as tendons, muscles, brain matter and bone seemingly formed out of nowhere to come together and create the giant's head into a perfect replica of what it was before.
"You have peaked my interest creature, But I am still in need of food, you will wait for me until I am done"
With that said, Itachi once again started a series of hand signs, this time saying "Earth Release: Earth Binding Tendrils" and slammed his hands against the ground. As soon as they made contact, three massive pieces of earth spouted out from the ground and began to wrap around the giant. One wrapped around its torso, binding its arms to its side, and the other two wrapped around each of its legs. Once completely immobile, the tendrils trapped the giant against the ground, and hardened up, not allowing it to move an inch.
After watching the creature for a few minutes to insure it wouldn't escape, Itachi made his way into the forest to look for something to eat. It didn't take long to find some plants that looked edible, he didn't recognize any of them, but he noticed they still kept in line from what he knew about the plants in the elemental nation. He recognized the patterns and colors of plants that were and weren't safe to eat, and gathered accordingly, he did that same with different types of berries. He also was able to catch a few squirrels. After he had gathered enough to make a good meal, he made his way back to the clearing and began to get to work, ignoring the giant for now.
He was able to make a pot by using earth jutsu to extract clay from the ground, and used his fire jutsu's to harden it into something usable. He got some water from the pond and set it over a fire to boil. He gutted and skinned the squirrel so only the meat was left, and began to make a stew. He threw in the meat along with many of the herbs and plants he gathered from the forest and let it simmer for about 30 minutes until he was left with a heavenly smelling meal that had attracted quite a number of animals. It wasn't the best thing he had ever made, but for how hungry he currently was, it tasted divine. He ate the berries on the side, and gave the leftovers he had to a fox that had been staring at him the whole time. It yipped happily at the gift, and ran off back into the forest once it had finished.
Finally having his hunger satiated, Itachi decided it was time to experiment on the confined giant that was silently staring at him. He got up, gently took off his cloak and shirt, cleaned and stored the pot he had made, and walked over to the trapped creature. As he got closer it began to struggle against its restraints, but it was of no use. He first started seeing if the creature was at all susceptible to his sharingan, but after looking into its eyes with his sharingan active, he decided that the giant was too mindless for any sort of genjutsu to work on it. Itachi then pulled out his kunai that he had stored earlier, and decided that he needed to know if there was a way to kill this beast. He punctured the giant's body where there should be vital organs, but no matter where he stabbed, it didn't seem to affect the creature. He also learned that there was no need to take off his clothes; as soon as the blood left the giant's body, it too turned into harmless steam, a bit hot, but nothing damaging. He would have felt bad doing this, he had never liked torture, but the creature wasn't making a single sound. It made things much easier. He then decided to target the major veins, arteries and nerves to see if they did anything, but nothing came of it. He spent what seemed like hours injuring and dissecting the beast. It was hard because of its amazing healing factor, but he was able to figure out that it had many similarities to normal human anatomy, except that it was missing all of its digestive organs except a stomach.
"Why was it trying to eat me if it could even digest me?" Itachi wondered "how can it even survive if it can't properly eat?"
Itachi had these questions in mind as he continued to investigate the creature. He eventually made his way to the creature's spine, and began experimenting on that. He started at the base, severing it and seeing what happened. But just like the rest of its body, it simply regenerated back to what it was before. He continued like this, moving his way up the spine until he reached the base of the head. Not expecting anything different, he cut through its nape with his kunai. For the first time in the hour of experimenting, the creature finally made a noise, a small groan, and began to rapidly disintegrate. Itachi quickly jumped off the body, as he had begun to sink into the extraordinarily hot innards of the giant as it began to decompose. He watched as in a matter of minutes the giant was reduced to just a skeleton, and how a few minutes after that, there was nothing left that would hint that it was ever even there.
"So there is a way to kill it." Itachi said to himself. "It's nape seems to be the only part of its body that won't regenerate. Good to know"
With the giant finally killed, Itachi dispelled the earth tendrils which were holding the beast down. It had been a long day, but when he looked up into the sky, Itachi could see that it would still be a few hours until the sun set. He decided that he should probably continue to train his taijutsu until he was back to where he used to be. With the introduction of this new formidable creature, Itachi didn't want to be caught off guard if one appeared which was more versed and skilled in combat, he doubted there would be a giant which could stand up to him, but he wanted to be sure. Plus he didn't really have anything else to do with his time anyways.
This time he summoned three water clones to fight against. He dodged and weaved in between their volley of punches and kicks, waiting for the perfect time to strike. One thing that he wouldn't be able to get back to his previous level until quite later would be his physical strength. He was missing about 8 inches of height, and 60 pounds of muscle, so he decided to focus on more precise, well thought out strikes, biding his time until he saw an opening. He could still punch harder than any 12 year old should be able to, he was confident he was stronger than most full grown adults, especially when reinforcing his body with chakra, but he knew he could be stronger.
After about three hours of grueling training, the sun finally began to go down. He was covered in sweat, and grime, but was proud of what he had accomplished. In the matter of just two days, he had gone from stumbling around like a toddler just learning how to walk, to a taijutsu master that was nearly on par with what he used to be able to do. He was sure that after just a couple more days of this training, he would be able to tie his previous self. After a quick snack of some berries he had set aside earlier, and a quick dip in the pound to clean himself of all the filth he had accumulated, he grabbed his shirt and cloak before retiring to the tree he had slept on the previous night. After redressing, he once again lied down on the log and fell into a deep sleep after his long and eventful day.