Mika smiled as Iruka announced his name, the last of the genin. "Mika, there are not enough teams for you to be on. However, since you're on the top tier of the academics and have the third greatest test results over all, you have been placed in the reserves. Essentially, you will be on whichever team needs a replacement member. Usually this includes the teams with clan kids in them."

Standing, Mika bowed. "I understand. May I leave?"

"Yes, but remember this, you are expected to go to the Missions office every other day at the least to get a D rank mission. This starts on Wednesday."

Bowing once more, Mika smiled. "I will do so." And so, ignoring the snickering of the other students, mocking him for being in the reserves, he hurried out of the Academy room and ran toward his training ground. His favorite place, his training ground, was two miles away from his apartment and in the same direction so he stopped there first. Run down and dirty on the outside he had never been able to afford a nice one, but inside it was well put together and warm.

His apartment was a studio, all one room, and the walls by his bed had pinboards with ideas and schematics. A purple knitted blanket covered the walls around it to kill the echo. Several book shelves had hundreds of books he bought from discount stores since he was eight. On a table opposite his bed, was a pile of books and scrolls from the Library. It was his home, he loved it.

His bathroom, the only other room in his apartment, had a small mirror and he walked there first to look at the mirror. He could not help but sigh at the bags under his eyes, the soft exhaustion of his overall self. He was pale, almost sickly, and doll like. He looked not that different than he had at eight, only more muscular. He was dressed like a chunin, only with a gray vest and a sword on his back. His headband was around his left arm, a passive sign of his lack of loyalty.

'Not that anyone knows the truth, at best they think I am aiming to be the next Sanin... they have no idea that Sanin is Orochimaru. Powerful, important and away from this place.' Sighing, he stood straight. "Time to train."

He grabbed the more physical scrolls, placing them in his pouches and hurried out to the training ground he found at nine years old. It took about four minutes to reach, when he did he leapt onto the pond it had at it's center. He would perform his basic workout of kicks and punches, sits ups and crunches, sprints and a job and so many stretches. Then without hesitation, he pulled out his blade and started to move through his katas. Learning the Water walking and tree climbing techniques took about an hour total over the long weekend, and he figured out that practicing his katas over the water helped with control and chakra levels. It was something the books he grabbed mentioned in passing.

This went on for over an hour, before he slipped into shadow sparring, but only after setting a long timer that he always carried with him for training. Tai and ken, rolling and dodging, he moved with the grace of what he hoped was a chunin. This lasted an hour as well. Then, when that was done, he moved into circuit training. He set up ten logs and either replaced himself with them, over and over in a cycle, or he used the body flicker.

He did this for many reasons, partially to master the techniques like the Second and Fourth Hokages, but also as they were some of the safest techniques to master unlike genjutsu which had so, so many risks without a partner. He could integrate it into his tai and kenjutsu, and that would give him the means to actually be a threat.

After the next hour passed and he was dead on his feet, he sat against a tree and mediated for a solid thirty minutes, a tool for focus and control and power. It also got rid of the terrible migraine that came with using too much chakra, as he found out the hard way.

From there, he would spend another hour studying genjutsu, so that one day he could used it safely. He would move into sealing training for another hour, though only reading it and making notes.

When that was done, he would spend one last hour just swimming, to cool off and give himself one last boost of physical development... it also helped him clean off.

Pleased, he slowly trotted back to the village. 'I really need to figure out what I am going to eat tonight... dango sounds good.'

Never did he notice the eyes on him... eyes that watched with deep intrigue and curious.

Chapter end, tell me what you think in the reviews.

This was a blast.

Love, your Ninja Overlord,

Mika.