A month before the Uchiha Incident Dix understood he lacked something that was required of him if he was caught while stealing the eyes. He needed actual combat experience. Even though he knew this, he only had the chance to practice in Squad D, the combat training squad, as he was still quite young to be sent out on missions and such. So he had to seek out combat on his own.
He decided he would roam the main roads of the Fire Nation, while he made sure to stay relatively close to Konoha, to look for possible fights, such as capturing bandits, rouge ninjas or other criminals, and maybe even foreign ninjas that are violating the borders of the nation. He actually wanted to take up bounty hunting, which would've been a good way to get some extra income while getting actual hands-on combat experience, but he had to identify himself to become an actual bounty hunter, and this was something he couldn't do.
The first time he fought was when he ambushed a small camp of bandits. There were around 10 of them and they were in a pretty bad shape. They had low quality equipment and none of them knew how to use chakra. They were mostly just simple highwayman or petty criminals that banded together as a necessity for survival. Even their sentries were sleeping when Dix swooped in and slit their throats one by one. It wasn't much of a fight, more like a massacre. He wanted to test his stealth, and it worked so well, that these lowly mob had no way to detect him whatsoever.
He didn't have any remorse over taking the life of these scums. They were the bottom of society, and they had this coming a mile away. Its just happened to be Dix's hands that delivered the blow. And this didn't concern him whatsoever. His conscience was clean and the death of these criminal didn't weigh on him at all. Even though this was the first time he killed someone, he couldn't care less.
He attacked the next camp right before the sun touched the horizon. This meant they were already tired, but mostly none of them were asleep yet. He stood right at the entrance, and was covered by a dark cloak that hid all of his features, meaning even if he missed someone or he had to escape for whatever reason his identity would still be safe. Just to be absolutely safe, he bought a mask from a street vendor that was quite similar to what the Konoha ANBU uses. He noticed he really looked like an actual ANBU unit from the village, with the exception of his height, which only amounted to around 135 centimeters, which didn't prove much of an overbearing sight. The scary part of him was his strength and speed. He tried to restrict himself as much as possible, so normal people were able to contend with him for a few seconds, but that didn't gave him much combat experience.
So he was standing plainly at the entrance of the bandit camp, which had around 20 people in it this time. Everyone was alerted by the sentries shouts when they noticed the approaching Dix, so by the time he arrived to the gate, it was already open and all the warriors started pouring out, with their leader at the front.
"Who are you and what is your purpose here? How dare you enter the Golden Hounds' territory without invitation?! If you can give me a reasonable explanation I will let you go with your life, but you will have to pay the price of your impudence with either blood or gold! Now show your face!"
*The 'Golden Hounds', huh? That sounds pretty lowly. I already know you are just some shitty bandits. You chose the wrong person to try and intimidate.* Dix thought, but didn't say anything. He didn't bother altering his voice, but he didn't want to be identifiable by it either, so he just didn't talk. He wasn't there to negotiate anyway, so he just pulled out his katana he bought from a blacksmith in the village. He was actually interested in kenjutsu, the way of the swords, and he wanted to learn about it later on, but for this one he really wasn't enough by himself, and no amount of book reading would suffice. He needed an actual master to teach him.
Back to the events, he just pulled out his sword and pointed it at the leader. He just started laughing and cursing the 'kid' and boasted about his exploits. Dix didn't say anything, just point at one of the other bandits, which he understood was the weakest of the bunch, and he rushed at him with max speed without the Eight Gates. He almost disappeared from sight for the normal people, but the leader was able to react. Dix shot out from his original position, and in the next second he was already behind the target, with his sword piercing trough their heart, then he jumped back a bit, to create distance between him and the other enemies. The leader barely managed to pull out his own sword by the time the first bandit died. Everyone looked at the shrouded figure with horror and even some awe. He was too strong, and nobody wanted to fight him. Except the leader.
"Argghh DAMN YOU! ALL YOU MAGGOTS GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER AND MOVE! SURROUND THE KID AND ATTACK AT ONCE! HE CAN'T DEAL WITH US ALL!" The bandit leader didn't lose his head, and managed to pull his comrades back from the clutches of fear. Dix broke out a smile under his mask, as he was happy he didn't have to take it easy again, and the bandits will put up a fight instead of just waiting to be massacred. He also understood the leader was probably a trained fighter, so he had a good opportunity on his hand.
The bandits regained their senses and started following their orders. Dix just patiently waited for them to close a circle around him. Then at the leader's signal they all started swinging their weapons at him. Some swords, a few maces and a lot of simple wooden spears. Dix parried all of them from every direction. They were extremely slow. He was already used to fighting at his max speed with his clones. If he activated the Eight Gates he would be a ten times faster, but the clones are not capable of using that technique, so he didn't have any fighting experience with that. This mob don't deserve to see that power thought.
Parrying the attacks was easy, but sensing every single one coming was a bit harder. Dix used all of his senses to try and predict his enemies movements, and he felt like he found something he was lacking. If he had the sharingan or the byakugan, both of which can track enemies easily, he would have a really easy time fighting these bandits. But now he wanted to develop another technique of his own to have some sort of detection 360 degrees all around him.
With this in mind he quickly finished the simple bandits, but met some resistance with the leader. His fighting style was similar to a ninja's but it was quite unrefined.
"You bastard! You can't defeat me, I was a chuunin level ninja before, you should kowtow (traditional way of japanese act of submission/asking for forgiveness, get on all fours and the forehead touches the ground) ten times, then kill yourself, or I'll make sure you get something way worse then death!"
Dix had a hard time suppressing the emerging laughter, and he just barely managed to do it, as a few muted noises reached the man's ears. He must've thought Dix was mocking him or something, so his head turned red and he charged at him with a war cry. Dix easily parried his attack, and after a few exchanges he decided to counterattack. The man had no way to defend against it, his form was bad and undisciplined, so he just had to endure a cut trough his upper body. It wasn't too bad, but he was losing blood fast. He tried to use every ounce of his hidden reserves to fight Dix, but that one simply countered it all. Some tricks were used, but nothing seemed to work, almost like his opponent could see the future.
Dix was getting bored, so he quickly beheaded the rouge ninja and went to loot both the corpses and the camp. While he was doing that he noted there were a few prisoners of unknown origin in some cages, so after he searched trough the entire camp he set them free, and without saying anything he rushed off into the woods.
He liked this setting, an unknown powerful figure attacks random criminal camps to serve 'justice'. So he decided to continue. He summoned a lot of clones and spread them across the countryside to cover more ground and fight many places at once. If one found a camp he deemed too risky, he would wait up reinforcements and handle the enemy in groups. Also Dix summoned a training squad to start working on the idea he had. He had to work fast, as the night of the incident was getting closer and closer.