Chapter 10
Shinji was weightless, that's how he felt anyway. Surrounded by darkness, his recollection of the battle was fuzzy, not knowing whether his sensei lived or died, or what even happened to his teammates.
All he remembered was the explosion, and the sounds of crumbling stone all around them.
In an instant, a light pierced through the darkness, and he was met with moving ground, and immense pain to his…everywhere.
"Captain, it seems he's awake." A somewhat familiar female voice said from behind Shinji.
Their movement came to a stop and Shinji was placed on the ground to look at his kidnappers, or his rescuers. To his relief and surprise it was Oni and his personal squad of ANBU.
"Holy hell runt, gave me a scare you know that?" Oni asked in a quiet tone as he crouched in front of Shinji.
"Wh-What happened to them? M-My team, what happened?" As Shinji looked with pain on his face, he saw the now downed heads of the ANBU in front of them.
"We didn't make it in time." Oni was hurt and he made it known through his voice. He may have been a cold ANBU when needed, but he still cared about his fellow shinobi. "I'm sorry Shinji." he apologized.
The boy's eyes widened as much as they could, "No you have to be wrong." he denied.
"It's true, kid. The ravine, it came crashing down, everything was buried in tons of rock. It's a miracle you even survived." Another ANBU, this one with the mask of a tengu, said in a neutral demeanor.
"Th-That can't be, everyone could-" Shinji tried, only to be silenced with a hand on his shoulder from Oni.
"It's okay Shinji. It hurts, believe me I know, but they're gone."
'It can't be true…please tell me I didn't just get them all killed.' The boy was quiet, yet the unconscious tears still flowed. After silently crying, it evolved into angry wails of denial and hatred for Konohagakure.
Shinji Sato may be a 70 year old re-born witcher, yet he doesn't have the emotion numbing mutagens that made witchers so efficient at their job. Beyond that, he is still an eight year old child, barely experienced in the true ways of this world.
Shinji cried himself into exhaustion and fell asleep once more, causing Oni to place the boy on his back and continue moving back to Iwagakure.
It wouldn't be long before Shinji awoke in the hospital of Iwa. He was groggy, his lips were dry and while numbed, the pain was still there. He sighed to himself as he looked at all of the monitors hooked up to him in the darkened room, beeping in the night.
He sat up in his bed and placed his back against the wall. 'I guess they're really gone. Dammit!' Shinji slammed his fist into his bed and once again began to silently cry at the acceptance of his team's demise.
His crying ceased and he was left in a daze staring at the bed. It seemed the shadow in the corner of the room went unnoticed.
"You've been sleeping for two days now. Multiple fractures all over your body, bruised tissue and some new scars, notably the one on your right eyebrow." Shinji had heard the voice so much he already knew who it was, but was in an uncaring state at the moment.
Shinji ran a hand gently over his eyebrow and felt a bandage covering it. Upon noticing it, he puts his hand down and returns to his desperate state. 'If he says it, I'm gonna freak.'
The shadow in the corner stood up and approached the side of Shinji's bed. "It's not your fault-" he said while trying to comfort Shinji, however the boy snapped his head to look at the man whose face was still shadowed by darkness.
"Not my fault? Not my fault!? I was the one who weakened the structure of the ravine, if I didn't do that, it wouldn't have fucking exploded as easily as it did and kill everyone!" Shinji took a large and deep breath after the angry rant, and soon continued, "Not only that but we failed the mission! I failed the mission, what does that say about me? I killed my teammates and failed the mission, that's all anyone has to hear to treat me as a pariah now." Shinji finished in a quiet tone but kept his gaze on the shadow.
"Then forget what they think, they don't matter." The man contemplated his next words and actions very carefully. "Trust me, I was a social pariah as well." before Shinji could retort, something changed with the form beside him, something about its hair.
Bright red hair shone in the moonlight as Shinji's eyes widened at the realization of who Oni truly was. "Uzumaki." Shinji said, astounded at the near extinct clan he was able to witness.
"Now, you are the second person to know my identity." the Uzumaki said as he faded back into the shadows.
"So, what's your actual name then?" Shinji asked with a neutral gaze. Oni hesitated, already revealing such a major detail about himself however, at this point it was inevitable. He thought it was only fair though that he asked a question of his own.
"You're no normal kid Shinji, let's not get it twisted. You've had training, lots of it, and I don't know how or from who, or for how long, but it shows." Oni inched closer, bathing his face in the light of the moon, revealing his pale skin and narrow eyes.
"Just who are you, Shinji Sato?"
'D-Does he know? He has suspicions of something at the very least but, can I really trust him with the truth?' Moments of silence and contemplation turned to seconds, and those seconds to a minute before something happened.
Oni stood up, and began to walk to the door after a disappointed sigh. He reached for the doorknob-
"Gaston of Faroe." Shinji said while looking at the bed.
"Is that who trained you?" Oni asked, removing his hand from the knob and looking at this mysterious boy.
"No, he's long dead by now. He left me scrolls and techniques and I studied them." Shinji sighed. "He instructed me to burn the copies upon my mastery of them." Shinji had decided to not tell the truth, or at least the whole truth.
"Was he a Shinobi? Where was he from? I don't think I've heard of a place called Faroe." Oni questioned.
"No he wasn't a shinobi, called himself a witcher. His notes barely talked about his personal life or the surrounding lands." Shinji informed his ANBU comrade.
"You talk about his notes in the past tense, is it reasonable to assume you have mastered his knowledge then?" Oni questioned upon his picking up of the particular use of vocabulary.
Shinji rested his head against the wall and looked up to the ceiling, "I mastered his teachings a while ago." Shinji sighed.
The two sat in a tenuous silence.
Oni was no fool. He knew the boy was keeping something from him. However the name Gaston, that may hold some truth to it. Whether it was his mentor or not, it's worth noting.
"I appreciate you telling me all of this Shinji." Oni moved to the door, this time satisfied with Shinji's words. "Make sure to get plenty of rest, I expect to see you at training ground fourteen in a week." Oni left once his words were finished.
'Wait what did he say?' He thought to himself as he remembered Oni's last statement. 'Is he? There's no way. Training ground 14, one week, I'll go there myself and find out. But right now, I need to get out of here.'
Shinji slowly got up from the bed, taking it easy as to make sure he was actually healed enough to make the journey. He gave a preliminary stretch and realized all he was at the moment was sore. He looked around the hospital room one more time and saw that his clothes he had been wearing on mission were on a nearby chair as well as his headband.
Approaching the now cleaned and folded pile of clothes, he took his time getting changed which left him with the final piece, his headband. He sighed when he looked at it. Where did his loyalties lie was a question always somewhere in Shinji's mind.
He observed the headband. The ever present symbol of Iwagakure on stamped steel stood out like a beacon among the litter of small dents.
'For you guys, for Oni, I'll do my best.' Shinji tied the dented piece of metal around his forehead, opened the window, and disappeared into the moonlit village.
Waking in his bed the next day, still garbed from the night prior, Shinji made his way to his research desk, aka his dining room table.
It had gotten far messier over the years, the once neat stacks of paper turned into a mess of writings that Shinji had no idea what was mixed up in there. His stack of books off to the side had tumbled over long ago leaving yet another pile on the floor.
'How did I let it get this bad?' Shinji asked himself while observing the mess that not only consumed his dining room but also the living room. Using a single hand seal, two poofs were heard outside, before two more Shinjis walked through the door.
"Mornin boss!" the two said in unison with beaming smiles.
Shinji rubbed his forehead at the cheeriness of his clones. "You two just get started in the living room, leave the notes and whatnot to me."
"You got it!" Without another word, the two cheery clones went about their work mere feet away from Shinji as he looked over everything.
A rough thirty minutes later, Shinji had finally finished his reorganization of his research notes and stored them away in their own storage scrolls. Multiple scrolls for machinery, equations and mathematics, and others for scientific notes like botany, chemical formulas and structures and his collection of textbooks.
It wasn't long before his clones finished as well which left Shinji proud and satisfied with the cleaning of his home. Shinji had placed more recent and finished research notes on the table and decided to look them over.
He went over the chamber that was designed for the Trial of Stone and observed the refined design of the machine. In theory, all of this was supposed to work the way as intended, but unless it was built and he was able to see with his own eyes, he would always be guessing.
"Wait." he said to himself in the silence of his home. He remembered every ryo he had saved over the years and even earned on some missions in the field. It wasn't a small amount, but it wasn't substantial either but it would go far enough to get started properly.
Having rough estimates of the amount of materials such as iron, glass and copper helped, but he would need in depth amounts of each material in order for the building plans to go well. After a few short minutes of number crunching, Shinji had exact amounts of the materials he would need for the trial chamber.
He would soon leave his home and make his way to the industrial district of the village. Here lay certain shops and stores that took the better part of a day to find everywhere Shinji needed to go in order to get all of the materials.
'That was a lot more expensive than I initially estimated.' As Shinji handed another thousand ryo to the iron worker for the parts needed, he internally cried at the depleting funds in his account. Knowing what all of the materials were going toward certainly helped though.
Each respective shop offered to have it delivered, But Shinji was impatient as he wanted to start working, so he negotiated to just have him seal his purchased goods in a scroll and call it a day.
Taking his purchased goods back to his home, he decided some minor renovations had to be done. First and foremost, he moved everything from his room, to what used to be Akumas room. 'I really don't know why I didn't do this sooner.' Everything that resided in Akuma's former room was either placed within a big bonfire outside, or reused in some way that suited Shinji's needs.
With his old room being completely empty now, he decided that it would be his workshop from then on. He replaced all of his notes and research materials in this room and made a workbench from the wood he purchased.
When all was said and done, Shinji now had a proper work area with a usable dining room. Then deciding he wanted to actually use his new work place, he unsealed all of his materials, gathered his multitude of diagrams, and gathered his tools.
It quickly became evident to Shinji that his designs were harder to fulfill than he thought. He spent the first night alone on the base of the machine and working through the wiring. He sighed to himself, slightly numb fingertips at the amount of electrical shocks he received and grease stains on his shirt, he stood back and looked at the start of the chamber.
It was seven feet long and raised about nine inches off the ground and was a convex shape like an oval. Internal wiring, stray metal plates and random diodes and resistors were lying about with unfound homes.
He looked proud of his achievement. Looking again at his diagram, he made sure everything was in place for the base of the trial machine.
"Oh yea, it's all coming together." Shinji said with a smirk on his face.
Four days later
"Son of a bitch!" Shinji screamed as his clone dropped the solid steel frame they were lifting into place and it landed on his finger.
He pulled his fingers free of the heavy frame and dispelled his clones. "I've Had enough of you dimwits for today." the boy growled out. He grabbed a can of cola from the fridge, and walked outside to reveal the middle of the day.
There was a pleasant breeze along with cool weather to match the midday sun. He jumped on the roof of the house and planted his butt down to relax, overlooking the village as sipped his drink.
'Almost done. Just a little more and the chamber will be finished.' Enjoying the view of the village, Shinji continued to think about his almost finished machine and other plans that had yet to get past the concept phase.
A crushed soda can later, and a new plan in mind, Shinji walked back into his home. Heading directly into his workshop, he grabbed a spare piece of paper and titled it, Theory on Jinchuriki: Kill the host, or steal the beast? Sliding that particular piece of paper within a hidden part of his workbench, he resumed his work on the trial chamber.
Two days later
'He's late.' Oni idly checked his watch, 'Very late.' the revealed Uzumaki sighed to himself. He told Shinji to meet him here, however the day was half over and the boy was nowhere to be found. Deciding to figure out this mystery, he went straight for the Sato house.
Approaching the house, Oni heard the sounds of clanging, like a metal hammer striking more metal. He wrapped his knuckles on the handle once before realizing it was a useless gesture. Deciding to let himself in through the back window and realized the banging got louder.
Approaching what was supposed to be Shinji's bedroom, he peered inside to see the child working away on a large machine. 'That has to be the chamber he was designing. He really built it.' He continued to watch Shinji work on the machine, silently waiting all the while.
Shinji grabbed the welder for what he believed to be the last time. After a messy weld was completed, the boy stepped back to view his work. It was a large cylindrical structure that laid perpendicular on the floor, resting on its stand. It had a glass lid with a hatch on the side to lock it in place. Inside the chamber, there was a simple looking pad to lay on, with leather straps for the arms and legs and multiple, ominous looking holes all throughout the hardware.
"You're late."
"AHH!" Shinji jumped at being startled by Oni. "Oni what the hell? We don't train until-"
"You're late. Five hours late actually." The man said in an annoyed tone. Shinji was confused and denied his statement.
"What're you talking about? We train tomorrow, the 14th." Shinji explained.
"No, today the 14th." Oni pointed to the calendar on the wall.
"Oh. Shit." Shinji looked at oni who wore the face of anger and doom.
"Get ready. You have five minutes." Oni explained as he walked out of the house and waited outside.
Shinji scrambled back to his new bedroom, changed into a new set of clothing, and ran outside all within a one minute time span. He noticed Oni waiting on the path, and rushed to catch up with him.
They reached the training field in record time. Shinji sat down on the rough earth while Oni stood and began to explain the current situation. "Following your mission to the southern front, I reported to the Tsuchikage of what happened. How are you holding up?"
Shinji shrugged, "eh, could be better honestly." He answered in a lackadaisical manner.
"Good, because I'm going to make your day that much better." Oni grabbed a scroll and handed it to Shinji. Grabbing the scroll and unfurling it in a single move, Shinji read the words that lay on the sheet. 'There's no way…' Shinji thought to himself as he read through the report.
"Well what does it say?" Oni said with a less than smug grin.
"It says I'm a chunin." Shinji was confused and a little angered. "Why does it say I'm a chunin?" He looked at Oni with an angry questioning appearance.
Oni looked down at the boy, he honestly thought this would've been good news for him. "That's not all you dolt, why do you think I'm the one training you?"
Shinji thought hard about the reasoning but ultimately came up blank. Oni sighed and finally relented the answer to him.
"How can you be so smart and stupid all at once? I volunteered you to be my one and only apprentice." Oni stated with a faux joy that was not lost on Shinji. 'But if he's training me, does that mean this is my shot at ANBU?' The look of realization on Shinji's face must have shown to make Oni smile the way he did. No, that was no smile Shinji had ever seen, that face was that of a masochist through and through.
"I'm putting you through the wringer today brat." Oni pulled a scroll out from behind him, unrolled it and placed it on the ground, only to finish by placing his hand on top of what Shinji recognized to be a storage seal.
A poof of smoke appeared then soon faded away to reveal…a kiddie pool. "What the fuck is that?" Shinji asked while pointing at the pool filled with water in the shape of a horse.
"It's a pool you moron. Could you wager a guess as to its purpose?" The raised eyebrow of the irate Oni almost punctured his adorable pool with how sharp it was.
Shinji gave a contemplative gaze and brought his finger to his chin. "Not like you're gonna teach me the water bullet jutsu…" after thinking on it for a little longer, "My only real guess is the water walking technique."
"Right you are. Now, pay attention because I'm only explaining once." Oni explained the process in which the technique was performed. It was a single hand seal, used to initially control one's chakra, and the method was to build up chakra at the soles of your feet to stick to any surface.
Using this built up chakra, you would step onto water and adjust the chakra levels constantly as the constantly changing depth, form and speed of the water so as to keep yourself on the surface..
This was easier said than done however as an explosion resounded within the training field. One thing Oni 'forgot' to mention was that if he put too much chakra into it…
"Son of a biiiitch!" Shinji shouted as he flew into the distance from the explosion of chakra stemming from his heels.
'I'm gonna enjoy this.' Oni smirked at the sight of his student soaring like a bird.