AN: see bottom

Chap 21 PE sucks

Kinme tip #46: Never insult someone the first time you see them as first impressions are tantamount to building a respectful, working relationship. That said, if someone insults you the first time you meet, plot revenge swiftly and silently and give them cause for regret. Or get to know them better and make a lifelong friend.

~Kinme ambassador to Uzushio

I returned to the bar battered and bruised and somewhat broken-hearted. The adorable little Uzumaki (who was actually older than me) had tried to comfort me via lots of smiling and other Uzumaki Sunshine traits, but I still left class discouraged.

Kunai-throwing went better as expected, with an accuracy of getting the target roughly three quarters of the time, but senbon throwing netted me a chubby zero. At that point the teacher looked ready to give up on me and just punt my education to someone else that's not him. I'm quite sure Oro would pick up shuriken throwing pretty quickly, what with

Then it got a bit better, with some other physical aspect testing such as sprinting, long-ish distance running, grip strength, rock-wall climbing capabilities, and finally combat. The teacher and several of his clones watched us all with a keen eye, not-so quietly judging and writing everything down in a few notepads that he had brought out.

If combat came first, I would've been fine. But as it were, I was tired, Dōsukēru wasn't allowed to fight with me, and weapons were prohibited. Add in the advantage my classmates had in weight, height, mass and otherwise all other age factors, out of the five spars that the teacher put me through I only won the easiest two against the unlucky civilians and just barely tied the third.

That was on account that the rest of the class was doing the physical testing as well. They didn't get a chance last week because every inch of the gym was booked, and so we ended up doing the test all together.

At least I was third-place in sprinting.

(And nowhere near the top half in any other aspect)

And to think that he was going easier on us early on during the shuriken/kunai/senbon practice because we were about to do the test… Whelp. I'm screwed tomorrow.

Uzumaki breezed through pretty much every aspect of the physical testing with marks placing her up in the top five consistently, her energy a never-ending river that I could almost drown in. The other consistent top places was hogged by the Hatake kid and some Uchiha, the Inuzuka being a bit too busy goofing off. For some reason, we didn't have any Hyuuga in our class, but that's none of my business.

By the time we were gathering our bags to go home, the only thing I needed to collect was my bento box and shattered pride. Dōsukēru nudged me in condolence but I think she was also fuming.

Rarely did our clan produce actual front-line fighters, our body type and combat style overall more fit for ambushes and assassinations. Bounty-hunting went under those two pretty well so that was quite a large source of our clan's income aside from patents, trademarks and otherwise new tech. The problem was that the academy churned our front-line fighters at best, meat shields at worst, and our style would suck for any of them. But even then, falling so short of expectations was maddening to say the least.

I miss our clan and our tailored training regimes.

Uzumaki Ta– Ta– something came up behind me and patted me on the shoulder, probably to try to comfort me a bit more before suddenly Dōsukēru popped out of my collar.

"I'm sorry about how I said what I earlier, but I'm not taking it back," she said. Uzumaki looked quite a bit confused, probably not expecting the snake to apologize.

Then she hesitantly gave us smile that was small in size but big in heart, "I'm sorry too, I didn't mean to yell at you. Friends?" she asked, and that was that, friend number one acquired, and we parted our ways at the academy gates where she was picked up by a lady wearing the Senju crest on a shoulder.

The sun was setting by the time we pushed our way into the rambunctious bar, the Uchiha matron manning the bar and her husband throwing out drinks like they were shuriken. Judging by the way each drink landed precariously close to the edge but never fell, he's probably been at this for a while.

There might've been a drunkard who was kicked out before we came in, what with a heavy scent of booze leading out of the door along with a stench of cleaned up puke, but whatever.

Uchiha-san's eyes sparkled when she spotted me, "Suijami-chan! You're back!" It's probably improper to use my name like this already, but she must-ve judged from our behavior or something that we need someone that acknowledges us as the children we are, as the adults they are.

Or maybe she's just improper like that. As a matter of fact, thank the Sage she's dropped the formalities. It was easier dealing with the formal forms of communication earlier when I had no clue what she was like, but right now there's no shit in me that cares.

"Hi Uchiha-san, I'm back," I said.

"So am I!" Dōsukēru chirped, happier to see the lady than I was. Just what did she tell my partner yesterday?

There might've been the sound of coins changing hands somewhere near the walls of the bar, but surely no one betted on me actually not coming over for my second day of work? Like, Oro and Sugiryuu was still here, I can't just abandon them, right?

"Now that the two of you are back, I'll set up an area where you can place your… piano? Was it?" Dōsukēru nodded, and with a wave of her hand, the customers seated at a table beside the wall scurried away to gather at the opposite side of the room, where they squished in with some other ninjas at a larger table.

Her husband, Uchiha Ka-something, took the bento box that I had no idea where to put, removed the table, grabbed an adjustable bar stool, and picked up a drunk patron on the floor before depositing him non-too gently on the side.

The person, whoever they were, kept snoring.

Then there was a flurry of activity where once I had set up the piano, Oro and Sugiryuu zipped out of the worker's lounge and pounced on us, blasting question after question until we were up to our ears in question marks. The little midget actually ended up sniffling, but it turned out to just be a sneeze when a patron accidentally knocked some condiments over in the area we were standing around.

He was mighty curious regarding the testing parts of the day, so maybe implanting stamina training among his other routines of the day wouldn't be too hard. Both of my little brothers were properly incandescent when they found out that Dōsukēru wasn't counted as a person, and yet still not allowed to help me with anything.

When our conversation strayed to the people of our class, the two of them were quite amused, if four year olds could seem amused, at the prospect of scaring the shit out of all the classmates just by existing.

Uchiha-san allowed us the time to chat and warm back up after the trek from the academy, collecting the bento box like this was an everyday thing, and once she deemed that we had enough of a break, off to the piano bench I went.

The quality of the piano playing today wasn't as good as yesterday, but judging from Uchiha-san's chakra whenever I made a mistake, she wasn't too surprised. I've no idea how much she talks with the Yamanaka lady, but hearing the chatter from the customers probably gave her some sort of idea what goes on in the academy these days.

If my fingers were as noodle-like as my partner, well, she wasn't blaming me.

I cycled through some of my less complicated repertoire, and couldn't help but think that perhaps, perhaps, there would be sheet music in the murder pond. If there was, then I can bid farewell to transcribing every damn piece that I can just barely remember from my memory, which could save me a hell lot of time. On the the other hand, I have yet to see evidence that the piecemeal papers at the bottom of the pond contained any complete pieces of music or books. If the only thing that the pond can supply me is defunct currency for the actually dead, ho boy would I be pissed.

Considering the page that was fished up was page frickin' 96 and it looked nowhere like the end of the plot, or even the end of the chapter for that matter, then there would be at least 48 pieces of paper I would need o fish up for it to become a complete book.

Thank gods the book page was double-sided though.

Annnd my fingers slipped again.

No more sidetracking, only piano-playing.

A routine was developed pretty quickly. In the morning, I would get punted out of bed by someone that's most definitely not me, we would acquire breakfast at the bar where the regulars were slowly getting used to us (they really shouldn't drink that early in the morning), and then Dōsukēru and I would go off to the academy in search of physical hell.

Of course, she led the way by nose and the mythical creature called a Sense of Direction. Surely it must exist on the same plane as a unicorn, no other reason that I wouldn't have caught a glimpse of it otherwise.

Like what I first presumed, we found a staunch ally (friend) in the Uzumaki, the civies staying the hell away from the three of us. Why the kids stayed away from Dōsukēru and I was perfectly reasonable, but what caused them to not even try to approach the Uzumaki? Hopefully we'll find out soon and not leave it as a mystery that'll bite us in the ass later on.

She was temporarily upset that we wouldn't be able to eat out at the Tea for the Weary every day, but we promised her that we'll go at least once a month.

Otherwise, my wallet really would die.

Physical training did wonders for muscle mass, and nearly nada for my accuracy. The unfortunate sensei has given up on me being able to throw a senbon or even shuriken, and just ended up drilling me repeatedly in the use of kunai. At this rate, I will soon be able to nail a flying bird without looking with eyes. Hopefully. Or maybe not, birds are awesome and the thought of just randomly hitting one out of the sky actually made something in me feel a bit queasy.

A week after I started attending classes, the other children that had somehow gathered up the courage to talk to me also stopped because the only response they get is from Dōsukēru, who was such a constant presence on this side of the fabric of reality that it confused some of the clan kids. They thought she was a summon, what with her talking and all, but nope, neither of us has been back to the summons realm since four years ago when Oro was born.

The Inuzuka kid looked a bit jealous, or maybe just thinks it unfair that his partner can't talk with his friends like he can. Yet.

By the time week three rolled around, I wouldn't be surprised if most of my class was semi-convinced that I was mute. The only time I communicate with the Uzumaki in class was with notes scribbled on scrap paper, and outside of class I was too focused on eating and hiding away from most of my classmates.

Hopefully if this continues on, rumours of my supposed "muteness" would spread and the other classes wouldn't try to talk to me as well. And if it then continues like so, perhaps I could desensitize them to talking to Dōsukēru, and accept that talking to a meter-long, blue, incredibly venomous snake was a perfectly normal of communication. These kids are eventually going to make up the majority of the next generation, and if they can accept communication with summons as being the same as talking to a fellow human, then mission accomplished.

If this can make Oro's early year(s) in the academy easier, then I would get to breath easier as a genin.

After the academy's final bell, we would then walk to the bar if the weather was nice, or sprint if it was shit. On occasions when it hailed, Uchiha-san would put out braziers along the wall and the drinks would be ominous dungeon-themed. Somehow, she also got ahold of music from a variety of other instruments like the koto or ––––––– and would give it to Oro who then gives it to me with a grin. Thankfully there was enough brain cells left in my head to put together a transcribed version of the piece after a few days of mulling and caterwauling experimentation.

Judging by the smug look on her face, Uchiha-san was quite happy with the results when I added the piece into the repertoire a week later. There may have been more money changing hands from one of he customers to her husband.

Then she presented me with a stack of music from multiple different instruments with such an innocent looking expression that I knew that I've made my bed and it was time to sleep in it.

Oro was steadily getting better at the flute, and now that Uchiha-san has given us some native pieces, I could even help him with the notes and judging if they sounded like the same pitch if played on the piano. Soon enough and we'll be able to do duets!

I… didn't do many duets Before, most of them with my piano teacher as practice and shits and giggles, but there was at least one piece that I ended up playing together with my sister. Gods, I hope she's doing ok.

…

Ahem.

By the time we eat a decent supper at the bar and set off home, the sun would be way down below the horizon and the stars could be seen sprinkling the skies like diamonds embedded in a sheet of obsidian. The constellations weren't all that familiar to us yet, since when the clan was around they didn't let us out at night/at all when it was too cold. No matter where though, the stars were pretty, and we could even faintly discern the milky way, which frankly, is amazing.

Even if we arrive home under a sky full of stars, the time would actually only be around six.

All four of us would spend the last few waking hours doing whatever catches our fancy in the living room that was– for some randomass stupid reason– situated in the basement with a fire crackling in the hearth. Thank Sage Hashirama remembered that mortals needed heat to survive and gave the house a functioning chimney/vent thing. And thank the Uchiha couple for reminding us to buy lots of wood and coal and firestarters for the fireplace.

Since Oro and Sugiryuu were only four, they always ends up going to sleep two hours before me, and generally just slumping over randomly in from the the fireplace. Once the little fella dozed off way too close to the fire and his hair nearly caught fire, like, it wasn't even that long yet!

Since we had the fireplace on anyways, I would just shove enough fuel to burn for a few hours and carry the two of them to a blanket fortress built the day we discovered the majestic power of the hearth. A few hours of doing whatever the shit the two of us older beings would be doing (excavating more basement space for our bunker seals/transcribing music/messing with chakra/etc.), then we'd check the fireplace, add in more fuel if necessary, and go wash up.

After cleaning and sleeping, the cycle would rinse and repeat. Unless it was the weekend, then we would screw around, play some piano, and the lot of us would go exploring.

The librarian already knows our names, which is hilarious.

A while back, after the attack on Takumi village, we hird a genin team to deliver a message to the leader of the artisan village. First, to express our condolences, then to inquire as to the state of the Shiro-Sakura hotel because it was essentially the Kinme embassy in the village, and then finally asked about the still living smiths.

The Shiro-Sakura hotel was still standing albeit quite a bit scorched. The attackers had a few proficient in katon-jutsu and tried to burn down what they couldn't loot. The hotel, having been reinforced by a few generations of Kinme, was rather impervious to fire and was one of the buildings that the citizens had evacuated to. Thankfully the attackers hadn't stuck around to watch anything burn, but from the tone of the letter that came back, they very nearly didn't need to.

Susumu-nii had survived, his father didn't.

He was on a apprentice-exchange trip with the village of Katabami, because according to some ramblings that I heard from the ninjas in the bar, some smiths think it beneficial to see where the minerals and metals they work with come from. Like, the environment that "births" them and whatnot.

The apprentice goldsmith that was swapped with Susumu-nii didn't survive.

Which sucks, because he was the eldest son of Katabami's leader, and in his grief he cut off all trades to the nearby villages.

Looks like the price of gold will be going up shortly.

Anyways, with confirmation of Susumu's survival, we could schedule a visit to Takumi village to commision Oro's blade. He had decided on a katana for a while already, but we didn't get the chance to have it made.

Since the school term was ongoing, we evidently couldn't go during the weekdays, and dragging along two rare clan brats like us meant that we'd probably need a chunin team instead of one composed of genin. But even with the speed of a chunin team, just the trip to-and-from would take over two days, not to mention the actual forging of the weapon.

Ugh.

With the next round of academy exams starting in May, approximately three months from now, we could potentially set the time for the break between the exams and the next term's start. That would give us exactly one week to work with, unless all of my exams can be fit into the same day because apparently the teacher's that do the tests don't come to school on every day of the exam week, so the only chance to do all of it as soon as possible would need me to do the lot of them on the same day. Which would suck.

Double Ugh.

At least that's a problem for future me. Present me is just frazzled trying to fit everything into everyday life, because Oro and Sugiryuu both need to be taught at least the minimum required amount to ace the academy exams the first year they do it, otherwise they wouldn't get on the same team as Tsunade and Jiraiya.

Textbooks were buyable in a lot of the bookshops around the village, but only certain ones actually sell them for a reasonable price. As of yet, a corner store that we accidentally stumbled upon (and would probably never find again with my sense of direction) had the best prices and largest assortment of books.

For shits and giggles and contributions to the Kinme/Ryūchi library, we bought a copy of half of the stores stock. The front desk lady was in turns both incredibly happy, and very much frazzled, what wit the literal mound of books that was dumped onto her desk.

The cobra that I spent nearly a quarter of my total chakra reserves had given a look at the pile, and told me to summon reinforcements to carry the lot of it back. Non-black box storage seals were not approved to go through the dimension folding aspect of summoning, it seemed. Thankfully it was the weekend, otherwise my chakra running on red-tank amounts would've netted me a lot of bad scores.

Oro helped as well, the little fella was getting better at hand signs every single day, his memory brain and muscle wise, and finger flexibility were quite a boon to practicing the summoning jutsu. We weren't as careless to actually let him perform the jutsu though, just having him lend some of his chakra to me worked well enough. Sending the books over to the cave ate up his reserves as well though, so the snakes ended being the one doing all the chores that day.

And ho boy did they let us know it.

At the rate that we were using and replenishing chakra for training and summoning, our chakra reserves were actually growing quite obviously, if at a price of risking damage to our chakra channels. But hopefully soon enough we'll be able to summon Manda again with our combined chakra reserves, if only for a few brief seconds. We miss the grumpy old snake, his habit of threatening to eat us included.

Winter soon passed to the wet slushy weather of spring, and the slowly rising temperature peeled away the layers that we wore like a particularly wooly onion. There may have been a few festivals that we missed, cooped up inside even from the spring cold, but each one was celebrated in the bar with various decorations and themed drinks.

The academy couldn't care less, we had school those days and the physical training aspect didn't give us any mercy.

On one of the brighter side of things, I have started to place nearly consistently within the top fifteen when sparring. If the sparring came before all the activities and my muscles and chakra were fresh and active, sometimes even near the top five when the matchups were favourable. If after those activities and everything that made me up was one step sideways away from being a cooked noodle, then around tenth or eleventh place. Considering we weren't allowed weaponry, I think that's pretty impressive.

I finally learned the name of one of my classmates, or rather, I heard it and couldn't forget it.

The Hatake kid's full name was Hatake Sakumo, future White Fang, dad to Kakashi the copy-nin, and apparently the person that triggered the Third Shinobi War and killed himself to regain his honour over it. Or he killed himself to take some of the blame off of little Kakashi. Figures. The second we come to Konoha, a wild Plot Point appears.

Either way, it was surreal sitting in a classroom and knowing how one of your classmates would eventually die.

Eh, none of my business. Probably.

Fuck. If the third war happens, hell, when the second war happens, it will be my business because we'll be fighting in it.

Fuuuuck.

Hopefully Oro would either be able to defend himself properly in a fight by then, or just not be sent onto the battlefield. At all.

But honestly speaking, this time period is actually relatively ok. If I live a normal ninja lifespan, or even a bit longer than hat, then I won' need to witness the stupid ass ninja vs alien fight that nearly turns the entire planet into goddamn fertilizer for a tree. If my soul decided to pop in earlier to this world, it'll be quite likely that either it was during the clan warring period (which'll suck), or during the calm right before the first ninja war.

If my soul decided to pop in later, then Plot happens. Plot sucks.

Oro could also do some of the simpler chakra exercises now, like the leaf exercise, and he was having quite a bit of fun attaching scrap paper to himself. It seemed to help him study as well, the habit of writing notes ingrained in our blood, he would just slap the small pieces of paper onto the nearest available clear patch of skin like it was a sticky note.

Note to self: Invent sticky notes.

Second note to self: find Oro a practice katana so that while we wait on getting him an actual weapon, he can still train and adjust to using a blade that might be as long as he was tall. It would also be relevant to have him somehow build up arm muscles so that he'll actually be able to control the blade when swinging it around.

After the Bear Incident, my little family has gotten it into their heads that I was hopeless at climbing stuff with chakra. They weren't wrong per say, but there was a lot of factors influencing whatever the shit happened that day. The lot of them still conspired against me though, getting me to practice sticking to the wall by throwing live spiders in front of me. Needless to say, our basement wall quickly gained a few foot-shaped craters.

Perhaps one day we'll remodel the craters by deepening it into the surrounding foundation like an alcove to store stuff, but that's not today. Today, my beloved little family would rather see me shriek and hop five foot straight up whenever a spider appears within sight.

One day, I will taunt them with their phobia on Halloween, and we'll see then who gets the last laugh. After all, it was quite startling when we had discovered Oro's vicious hatred for slugs, which was quite...interesting

Hint: still probably not me because the three of them teaming up to get revenge on me would be even worse.

That's what family is for, right?

Sparring got a lot more interesting once the rising temperature let us beat each other up outside.

For one thing, there was a lot more variety to the terrain and the teachers actually let us use it to our advantage. For another, it gave us a larger "stage" to play around with, so to speak.

And that's how I ended up here, punching the lights out of one of the few civies in our class. For those kids, honestly, any match up that isn't with each other isn't fair considering the clan-taught practicing the rest of us lot has.

The kid was maybe a year older than me, but that didn't mean it would save him from falling once my fist impacted his stomach. The spar wasn't even that long (not like I could do spars for long), just two minutes of high speed dodging with occasional jabs thrown in to test for my opponents defense. Dodging was a lot harder than I thought when I didn't know my opponent. The only reason that I won in the end was because he didn't think I could do any attacks other than flimsy jabs.

The kid will need to use his brain more if he was to get any further in his ninja career, especially as most people in the class already know my style of combat.

Ie: stay the frick away from any possible blows, or absorb them as best as possible because the flimsy meatsack that I currently inhabit can't tank for shit. Then hit back as hard as possible when they have their guard down.

Downsides to how I fight was that now that people know, those that fight after investigating their opponents weaknesses would try pretty much just wait me out, baiting with faints and other more energy-efficient strikes.

With my shitty endurance, I could never last past the five minute mark, even four was sometimes iffy.

Most spars though, finish around the three minute mark because fighting is goddamn tiring.

"Suijami-chan, Sora-kun, make the seal of reconciliation and leave the ring please, we'll have the next set up." The teacher that watches over our spars was a Sarutobi, first name forgotten. She was considerably nicer that our homeroom sensei, but was quite a bit more ruthless. It also seems that she actively chose to become a teacher, instead of our homeroom asshole who was punted to a teaching post after receiving an injury to the leg. If it was severe enough to take him of of the active roster only temporarily, it brings to mind what sort of injuries would allow a ninja to permanently retire without dying.

Whatever it was, I want no part of it.

The other kid was a bit wary when I pulled him up and the two of us did the finger seal thingy, and we both skedaddled the hell out of the ring

"Nice job!" Dōsukēru said, winding her way back up my arm and into my jacket through the collar. It wasn't hard to suppress a shiver, Uzumaki had helped keep Dōsukēru warm while they were in the sidelines by holding her like she was a cat. It worked? I suppose?

"Will Tamiko-chan and Ryoma-kun go to ring four? You'll be up as soon as those two are finished."

Since our classmates all just milled around the six rings while the teacher yelled out names and recorded the victories/losses on a oddly excel-like spreadsheet, it wasn't hard to whisper a "good luck" to Uzumaki without other kids hearing.

She tossed back a grin and a thumbs up while bounding over to obliterate some poor child in a match.

Yeah, I've got a lot to learn, and a lot of muscle mass to build up.

Then just as I was about to trek over to watch my only human friend in this class, the dreaded call rang out from the teacher's corner. "Can Suijami-chan and Reo-kun go to ring two when it's free?"

Frick. Can't she see that my laboured breathing is one inhale away from coughing up blood?

Third note to self: somehow train up Oro's endurance, because these kids are all powerhouses and just smarts won't be able to cut it.

This is going to suck.

Reo-kun was not a civilian. He was also not my age, and he was built like a mountain. And last of all, he was an Akimichi, and I was screwed.

We bowed to each other, as per the laws of the land, and there were little hissing sounds of encouragement from my corner of the ring. The human sounding cheering all originated from the Akimichi kid's side, Dōsukēru probably having scared them off. Even though Dōsukēru wasn't allowed to participate, she was allowed to watch from right outside the ring.

So, without much preamble, we advanced.

The fight began with a lunging punch from his left side, the punch thrown with quite a bit of weight behind it. The strike a jab if I recall his prefered side correctly, and quickly followed up with a cross from his right. I did my best to parry the jab, but had to entirely slip past the second punch lest getting an instant knockout.

There were a few more blows that were exchanged before I finally managed to slip under a hook to get behind him. By then, he had landed a blow to my side that nearly winded me and would've broken a rib if it was a direct hit (it's just a spar kid, calm down), but I also got in a kick to his side that did… absolutely nothing. The tanky lil midget.

Positioned at his back, I tried for an elbow to the side of his neck before he could turn around as the layers of muscle the kid already has potentially shields any blow to the trunk region.

Trying to hit his limbs would also be futile as well, what with my bones probably being a few notches weaker on the Mohs hardness scale, not like that's what it was called here. Hence risky strike to neck from stupidly close range.

Predictibly, the kid ducked and tried to gut punch me, which I flipped over because awesome ninja jumping skills. I tried to aim for a blow coming back down, but his guard was already in place so the only thing that would hurt would've been me.

I wish I had my blades right now, would make life a lot easier. And bloodier.

Twisting mid air, I flipped again off of the cross guard he made and –whoops nearly fell out of the ring.

Even though we weren't allowed anything other than taijutsu, it was implied between the lines that we were allowed to reinforce a bit of our blows with chakra. Not much, just enough to make each hit count.

That was something I haven't risked doing yet, what with my hay-wire balance and generally saving it up for the physical conditioning part of the day. Today was different though, what with the home-room sensei out on some mission, and now I had plenty of chakra to spare.

I chose to rush the Akimichi this time, and he responded remarkably quickly, fists at his hips and dropping into a sturdy horse-stance.

Fainting with a fist to the elbow nearest me, he raised the arm in a block. Then I dropped to the ground, momentum carrying me under the block and behind his guard. Then it was a matter of reinforcing an elbow with chakra once I twisted around, and pushing against the ground to shoot back towards him.

Actually landing the blow to the back of his knee surprised me, but all it took was a quick scramble to get away when the leg buckled from underneath him.

By then, it was only a matter of popping up and snaking behind him again to fix his neck in a sleeper hold.

From previous experience, the kid knew that the match was over and tapped out.

The teacher had us do the seal and with a bounce in my steps, I retreated from where I finally won against someone with considerably more muscle than I did.

Took long enough.

Crouching down so Dōsukēru could slither back up my arm, she scolded me, "why did you do so many flips?" That was a rhetorical question and she knows it. "If you watched his change in stance when you were in the air, then you would have noticed a hole in his defence!"

I tilted my head at her, and my partner sighed. "He stumbled because there was a rock. You weren't facing him then."

So… if I had not jumped so high and came for a strike immediately, or even continued on to attack his guard, then the match could've been shortened and I wouldn't have used my chakra for that strike to the knees.

Dōsukēru must've read my expression, because she nodded and said sagely "never turn your back on an enemy."

Just as she was about to spout out some other advice that would only embarrass me for not following, Uzumaki popped back, a new bruise slowly blooming along the underside of her jaw, but a smile already on her face.

"Guess who won all sparring matches three days in a row?" She crowed, eyebrows wiggling like a red puppy's tail. I wonder what muscles are being used for such a motion.

Dōsukēru rolled her eyes and ducked back into my clothing because it was "warmer than outside". I pretended to shrug, and pointed innocently at Hatake Sakumo, who was currently baiting a kid nearly twice his size with a flurry of strikes into a corner, then using the tree in the ring as leverage to fling himself clear of a particularly nasty uppercut.

Annnd K.O. The two of us watched side-by-side when he landed on the other kid before his opponent could see where the Hatake went and basically sat on the kid till he tapped out.

Uzumaki scowled, "We had a tie, a tie, and I already did two matches before then and he only did one!"

My partner peered out of my collar briefly, offering up a "he still won though," before escaping to where the Uzumaki's ire won't affect. I hummed in agreement to Dōsukēru's statement, which might've just been a bit petty.

Uzumaki did not approve of my humming, and tried to jab me in the ribs with an elbow, which failed due to an odd backarching on my part. It was amazing what having to not accidentally squish Dōsukēru has installed in my brain, anything that comes towards my chest or even upper back region can only be dodged by a large margin, not even blocking is acceptable.

That match with the Akimichi having been my third one, I was done for the day. Uzumaki still had one more to win before her three are over also, and we'll be allowed to head on back home. Sparring was the last class on Tuesdays, so that's when we have the least to do during the conditioning part of class. No "conditioning" kids until they are too tired to fight, only enough to make sure they go home at least mostly bruised, uh-huh.

But instead of walking home as per normal these days, Yamanaka-san showed up. We haven't seen her since the first day of the academy, and it's been nearly two months since then.

Uzumaki gave us a worried glance, but left when Dōsukēru gave her a little nod from where the Yamanaka couldn't see.

There wasn't even a greeting or anything, just a "come here" motion with her head and we were following behind her like an odd humanoid duckling. Here's to hoping that whatever it was that she'll be taking us to would be quick, or that someone told my brothers and Uchiha Asuka-san that I'll be late. After spending so much time at her bar, I wouldn't be surprised if she hired a genin team to put up embarrassing posters looking for a lost snake child.

Dōsukēru whispered in my ear, "where do you think we're going?" I shrugged, then blinked because–

"Therapy? maybe?"

"Probably." She answered.

With the direction we were walking in as well, it probably would be the counselling sessions that the Hokage told us about what seemed like ages ago. At least, it might be in this direction.

"Ma'am?" I called out, hoping to get at least some sort of acknowledgement back.

She hummed, and gave us a slit-eyed smile. "You'll know when we get there~"

Indeed. The building that she led us on a trek to was near the center of the village, but on the opposite side from the academy. Since her chakra was the same as the Yamanaka that took us everywhere ages ago and the ANBU trailing after us didn't really seem all that excited, she couldn't have been an imposter. But if she wasn't an imposter, then why was she behaving so differently?

The building that we were taken to looked like a an imposing chunk of tofu slapped onto the ground. Very white, and large, and supposedly soft. Or maybe that was what the genjutsu cast around the entire thing made us want to think, because upon stepping over a threshold on the ground Yamanaka's chakra had twitched in a very abnormal way, and when we stepped over it, there was a thread of something foreign that tried to mist through my chakra system. It spread quite quickly, and almost seemed like it wanted to take root in my head.

Out of curiosity I let it. Probably not a good idea, but curiosity killed the cat.

After all, Yamanaka-san wouldn't let any real danger come to us purposely, right?

Immediately, the entire complex semed to loom out of the shadows like a sinister being out of a second-rate horror movie (not like I ever watched any). That was quite a change from the innocuous block of tofu it resembled not two seconds ago.

Infact, with every step closer, the more terror I could feel course through my veins, a snap in Dōsukēru's chakra informing me that she decided that she's seen enough of the genjutsu and would very much like to leave.

Yeah, that was a wise choice.

Following her lead, I also snapped my chakra in the manner she did, and the wave of illogical terror immediately decided to dissipate.

So curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction of knowing brought it back. Or maybe it was just being able to live nine times that brought it back, whatever.

The Yamanaka scribbled something onto the notebook that she seemed to always carry around, probably a note along the lines of "Human Kinme could not detect genjutsu, had to follow the summon's lead."

At least the little mindtrip brought upon from the illusion meant that we were probably at the T&I. Not the best place to be after school, but if we were going through the front doors, then we should be allowed to treat it like a learning trip, right?

The lobby of the building once we stepped in and got a good look around could only be described as pristine, a potted plant every dozen meters or so lining the walls. Amazingly enough, they used fluorescent lighting here, which was quite a hop up from the incandescent light bulbs decorating every other structure in Konoha.

Hopefully they'll realize that the old fashioned incandescent lights are relatively safer, because in a ninja village where anything can be weaponized, well.

The front desk lady looked up, saw Yamanaka lady, and scrambled to put away the book she was reading. Snapping up a hasty salute, she nearly began to speak, but the mind-reader just flapped her hand at the front desk lady. She must've also winked or something, because front-desk lady's eyes widened a bit and seemed like the perfect image of someone startled into saying "oh" in a very theatrical way.

And that's how we got into T&I, and how our guides led us, hip swaying, to a room that was vaguely familiar.

Oh, it was the room that we first woke up in when we got to Konoha, except it got refurbished with a much improved selection of furniture. Instead of the two beds, mobile curtain and snake-trapping cabinet/drawer thing that used to be there, there was a nice, pudgy looking couch and a few fluffy chairs. The table was round, of some dark brown hardwood, and the lighting was drastically chippier than whatever the hell we got last time.

Like last time, the moment I was in the room, the only part of the world available to my sensing skills was whatever occupied the room with me. For all that I could "see", the outside world could cease to exist and I would never know.

It wasn't just the room that was similar, the situation was as well. Our therapist was still the Yamanaka, aka mind walk lady that mind walked my mind without my consent.

Eh, could be worse.

AN: AHHHHHHH

Since the end of this term approaches swiftly with promises of god-awful exams, updates will slow down, and no longer be over 7000 words per chapter (wtf how did they get so long). I also won't have any more time for NaNo, not to mention my muse having kneeled over a few thousand words ago, lol

On one hand, yay! First actual fight scene! On the other hand, omfg first actual fight scene. Please give me advice on it because I have no bloody clue how it went. Any advice would be tremendously helpful!

Thank you all for the follows, favs, and reviews, I luv ya'll!

Please leave a review on the way out!

~Cadriona Morningwing

Uploaded: November 21, 2018