Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto nor The Gamer. I own nothing, really.
Chapter 18
[Intermediate Chakra Control Exercises has gone up a level.]
[Chakra Control has gone up a level.]
'Yes!' I thought, inwardly cheering. I had gotten really good at not showing when something happened with the system.
"I think I hate you, Eiji," Someone grumbled behind me and I chuckled.
"At least the leaf isn't falling off every few seconds anymore, Naruto," I countered good-naturedly.
It wasn't like I didn't understand where he was coming from. Everyone in the class could already steadily hold their leaves, the clan members even being able to have their eyes open and even chat a bit. The blonde boy, instead, barely could keep the thing stuck to his forehead for more than 20 seconds before it fell down or flew off. Meanwhile, there I was, practicing katas while my feet were stuck to the wall.
However, I no longer felt bad about it. Ever since his talent for calligraphy and later fuinjutsu had been found, the Jinchuriki had been much more relaxed even if he still liked to complain every so often.
'That aside…'
[Eiji Satou
Title: Aspiring Prodigy
Energy Points: 500/500
Chakra Points: 250/250
Strength: 25
Dexterity: 27
Constitution: 25
Chakra: 25
Chakra control: D+]
'I really have to look for a way to increase my stats faster, they barely go up anymore… Weights, maybe,' I thought to myself. Although, I would have to see what I could do. When I had gone into a ninja shop to get some light weights to start with, I had been told that I needed at the very least permission from a teacher.
Apparently, too many dumb kids had stunted their own development by using weights when they weren't ready for it.
Annoying, but understandable.
However, Iruka-sensei was reluctant to allow me more benefits. I had half a mind to ask for my mystery benefactor to give me some as a reward… although they should already know about that wish of mine. Maybe they also didn't want to give them to me? I just couldn't find a reason as for why Danzo (or whoever else it was, I still thought it was him though) wouldn't want me to progress faster. I was sure I was ready. Even so, all that meant that I would have to put a pin on that idea… for now.
Once I graduated though, all bets were off.
I needed more power. A lot more.
[}-o-{]
"And that's that," I said as I finished signing for Medical Training. It felt nice to finally have that out of the way, I had been strangely anxious about the whole thing. Not overly so, but enough to bother me. Half my free time had been spent worrying over my choices and if they were the correct ones. Kinda reminded me of what my friends had gone through in my last life while choosing their careers.
I had been nice and also sad to remember.
"Genjutsu?" Shino asked, not at me but at Sasuke, with a raised eyebrow. I had to get behind that too, since the Uchiha, despite his future eyes disposition towards the art, didn't really seem the type for the illusionary techniques.
"Same reason as Eiji," Was all the explanation that he gave, but everyone still nodded. Especially me, since it immediately made sense. The guy wanted to kill his brother, not much we could really do to change his mind sadly, and for that he needed to be able to deal with the Sharingan's Genjutsu bullshit.
"Anyway, it'll be nice to be at Medical Training with you, Hinata," I said with a wide smile that the girl returned immediately, albeit smaller. I was just happy that she wasn't shy about it.
[}-o-{]
I couldn't help but look giddily at the paper in my hands. This was it, the moment I had been waiting for. Such an innocent little thing was so very important for me and everyone else in the room. Sasuke was glaring at his with such intensity that if it were a person it would have shrunk out of fear.
"Your turn, Satou-san," Said Yachi-sense, the teacher of the Ninjutsu course. I took an excited breath in before channeling my chakra towards the paper in my hands. For the shortest of moments, it felt as if time stopped completely.
And then the paper in my hands wrinkled all over.
I resisted the urge to cheer out loud. Lightning. My affinity was freaking lightning. A grin threatened to split my face in two. What? That was my favorite element, sue me.
"Ok then," The teacher took note of it on the notepad she held and motioned for the next student to do the same thing. I moved aside still giddily holding the wrinkled paper.
I didn't quite remember any Raiton jutsu aside from the Chidori but that didn't matter. I would create some myself if I had to. I would probably make one or two anyway. Ideas were forming in my head already. Stolen ideas from stories that I had read or watched back in my old life, but ideas nonetheless. I would have to check my notebooks once I got back home, there were bound to be some that I had already forgotten about.
I watched with interest as Sasuke did the test and got a lightning affinity too. That wasn't much of a surprise for me, since I knew he was quite proficient with the Chidori even though he had grown learning fire jutsu. Still, I couldn't help but wonder, would the story have gone differently even if I hadn't changed anything? The answer I could manage was that, yes, it would. There were several evident differences between the world that I lived in and the one I had read about.
It was a reassuring realization, actually. I didn't have to worry about turning the plot worse than it was in canon if canon didn't exist anyway. There was no way for me to know if I was making things worse or better, and that was a relief more than it was concerning.
"Looks like we'll be training together," I commented lightly as I stood next to the Uchiha, the teacher having divided the class according to their affinities.
"Hn," he grunted and I stopped myself from chuckling. That habit of his annoyed everyone in our group, even Ino. I just found it hilarious, honestly.
My efforts proved useless when Yachi-sensei walked around leaving scrolls for everyone to study the theory behind their affinities and have a peek into what they would be able to do in the future… the distant future, since we would only be learning D-rank jutsus, which weren't 'badass' in my classmates' words. And thus, everyone groaned, except Sasuke and I. We just looked at each other and rolled our eyes.
He probably thought all this beneath him since he probably could already fling fireballs around and I quite honestly didn't much care that the jutsus were simple. Any jutsu sounded awesome in my ears, if I was being completely honest. So, we both took our books and started reading in silence.
'Still… I can't wait to throw a lightning dragon at someone,' I thought to myself. Maybe it was childish of me, but I blamed that on the fact that I was on the body of a child. That was my story and I was sticking to it.
[}-o-{]
"You ok, Hinata?" I asked concerned. "You look a little green over there," I added, although I couldn't quite say it as a joke. She really looked sick.
Not that I could blame here, really. The opening speech Shimizu-sensei gave for the Medical Training course was… something. She'd basically told us that we would spend the first few months learning the theory behind the most common poisons, venoms and all type of injuries that we could encounter and how to stabilize them. We wouldn't be learning how to actually treat much though. We were learning what was basically first aid, but ninja style.
After that first phase, we would then start practical stuff, which didn't mean that we would work on anybody, as some might guess. No, since we couldn't go on missions to get field experience, because we weren't even genin after all, we would instead practice on a puppet. When the teacher showed it to us, I couldn't help but be reminded of Kankuro's puppet, although this one didn't have any combat capabilities and instead was made to be as human-like as possible.
The problem with this? Shimizu-sensei was… detailed about what she explained. Extremely so. And considering the subject at hand, it had a lot of gory details. Things that made even me feel queasy, and I was a guy that was twice the age I appeared to be and had spent a good deal of my past life trapped inside a hospital with only nurses and doctors for conversation most of the time. Thus, I had thought I was at least a bit prepared for what the Medical Training course had to throw at me.
I was wrong.
"Y-Yeah, I'm alright," Hinata replied in a tone that belied how false that answer was.
"Take a deep breath in," I advised with a wry smile. "Once we leave here, we can go home and I'll prepare a tea for the both of us to take and calm down," She nodded with a small, grateful smile and we turned towards Shimizu-sensei once more.
In other circumstances, I would have thought that the teacher was exceedingly harsh with the students. After all, they wouldn't come across any situation nearly as horrible as she had described until they were at least Chunin… But considering how Naruto's first C-rank mission went in canon? I don't think I will be arguing anytime soon.
And thus, I took the book she offered and started reading without saying anything. Every now and then though, I would sneak a peek at Hinata, just to make sure she wasn't going to puke or faint.
[}-o-{]
"I'm telling you, Ebana-sensei is awesome, believe it!" Naruto announced enthusiastically, much to our amusement. We had been watching him squirming giddily ever since classes finished. Eventually though, someone (read, Hinata) had taken pity on him and asked how his first Elective classes went. "We are so few in the Fuinjutsu class that the teacher said he'll adjust the classes to our levels, and said that since I have calligraphy down I can start learning seals and testing much earlier."
"Sounds great," I nodded with a smile. "and how about Trapping?"
"The teacher said he'll teach me some of his tricks but that I already know most of the stuff! Hazakura-sensei even said that I can help teach the others and that'll add to my final score!" I hummed at that.
Did he not take Trapping in this world's version of canon? Because that sounded like something that could get him to pass despite his trouble with the Clone Jutsu. Granted, that was if that was still a thing here. Now that the differences were so glaringly obvious, I was starting to question if all my foreknowledge was useless. At least regarding to the plot.
"Naruto with new tricks for traps…" Chouji muttered and a chill ran down everyone's spines, even mine. I just hopped I wouldn't have to deal with the aftermath of the bloodshed. "Anyway," the Akimichi continued, clearly wanting to get everyone's minds away from that nightmare. "Survival was fun, we'll even start going on little field trips on the training grounds after the first half of the year and then a couple of them outside the walls at the end."
"Aw man, I have a feeling that I'll wish I could take all the electives by the end of this conversation," I grumbled. Was this what Hermione felt before Third Year? Because then I could relate.
"Training maniac," Shikamaru grumbled back.
"How was Tracking, by the way?"
"A nightmare," The Nara answered instantly in a distinct contrast to his usually slow replies. "Kiba was there, as we guessed… and he wouldn't shut up. I think I might quit. Maybe change to a different course so my mother won't get angry."
"I mean, you could always go the Eiji Route," Ino suggested and I blinked.
"The Eiji Route?" I asked confusedly. This was the first time I heard about that.
"But it's so much trouble," Shika almost whined.
"What the hell is the Eiji Route?" I tried again.
"But it's an effective method, and once would be enough," Shino nodded seriously and I slumped as I realized that they weren't going to tell me.
"You guys suck," I muttered under my breath.
[}-o-{]
"I mean, a bunch of E and D rank genjutsus sound like a lot more annoying to deal with than one C or B rank, to be honest," I said thoughtfully.
Sasuke grunted, although his narrowed eyes told me that it was a negative one.
"Don't get me wrong, B ranks are awesome and all, but if they aren't done right… well, you know."
It was a month after we started our electives, and the Genjutsu teacher had given us a little test to check what we had learned. Said test was to be done in pairs and, naturally, Sasuke and I were in the middle of ours.
The art of illusions was surprisingly interesting. Although, being quite honest, it was also very complex to apply in battle. Someone like Shikamaru or Naruto would have been much better suited for it, I reasoned.
After all, applying Genjutsu effectively needed lots of misdirection, mind games and tricks. It wasn't nearly as impressive as the series made them out to be, although, considering that most of what was shown was done by Elite Jounin and Sharingan users… maybe I had been misinformed from the beginning.
Why was I making it sound so underwhelming? Well, using illusions wasn't very effective if you had to give it away with hand signs. So, unless you mastered the jutsu to a level where you wouldn't need those, then Genjutsu wouldn't do much unless the opponent wasn't looking at you.
Still, there was a real danger of coming across people that had mastered the art to such a level. And I knew there were some that I most probably would encounter.
"So, better than a C rank but worse than a well done B rank?" Sasuke offered and I nodded before writing our answer.
[}-o-{]
"You can eat that?" Hinata and I asked Chouji with wide eyes. We had been comparing notes from the Medical and Survival courses, since the second dealt a little bit with first aid. It was very little, and basically how to slow down the worst problems so that someone that actually knew what to do reached the patient.
The Hyuuga heiress and I, however, hadn't expected one of the plants that we knew was positively deadly, to be edible if prepared right. Made me wonder what else the courses skimmed over to deal with the short time they had to teach. Maybe I would have to study things more in depth after graduation.
"Eiji," I turned towards Ino with an inquisitive expression. Half a year ago, I would have been shocked to see the Yamanaka actually chatting with Naruto. Now though, it was a common occurrence. After Naruto calmed down and Ino stopped being so bitchy, they got along very well.
"Need something?" I asked distractedly, one ear listening to Chouji and Hinata.
"Can we talk for a moment?" The blonde asked and my full attention turned to her.
"Sure," And with that, I stood up and we both moved away from the others.
"Are you ok?" She asked, a hint of concern in her voice and I blinked at her with a baffled expression.
"What?" I asked dumbly after a moment. "Yeah, I'm fine," I replied with a grin. "Why though?" I added confused.
"Eiji, I'm a Yamanaka… we notice lots of things about people, especially if we are around them often," She explained and I raised an eyebrow at her, making her frown. What was she getting at? "You space out a lot when you are training, or studying, or even out of nowhere sometimes," I blinked in surprise. I did that? "I think it was more evident last year, but you still do it even if only for a few seconds."
I honestly didn't know what she was… No… Actually, I knew. She had noticed when I started to think about stuff from the story… This was bad.
"And you downright force yourself to train until you can barely stand," She continued. "For as much as you tell Sasuke that he trains too much you aren't much better."
"Ino, I always have to force myself to train, you know how it is. No pain, no gain," I grinned at her. "I'm not actually a training maniac, you know?"
"And you get this worried look sometimes…" She said this time, apparently ignoring what I said. I blinked at her. "Like something really bad is gonna happen."
"Ino… I am worried."
"Don't you deny i- What?" Now it was the Yamanaka's turn to blink in confusion.
"I am worried, Ino," I repeated calmly. "You guys seem to forget, but once we graduate, there's a real chance of us going on a mission outside the walls. Eventually, we'll be involved in a dangerous one too. So, I'm worried. I'm worried that we'll be in over our heads. I'm worried one of my friends will die. So, I want to be as good as I can to prevent that."
Silence followed my speech as I gave her a sad smile.
"Can you blame me for training and being a bit distracted?" I asked then. I hated myself, I hated that I had to hide things from my friends. But I had to.
"I… I'm sorry," She replied eventually with a grimace. "It's just… we worry too, Eiji," It was her turn to give me a sad smile and I suddenly felt like an asshole for the gesture. It really hurt to have it directed at me and I was an adult in mind.
"I'm sorry too," I apologized. "I'll try to tone the training down a bit," I half-assured half-asked. She nodded and her smile turned just a tiny bit to the happy side.
"See that you do," And with that, she walked back to Naruto and a napping Shikamaru,
Meanwhile, I stood there alone for a minute. I was justified, that was true. They just didn't know what was coming our way. I had to get strong enough to protect not only myself but also the second life I had been given. And that meant protecting my friends too. And that meant being much stronger.
But… it was true that I was maybe overexerting myself a bit. With the academy, the extra elective, my own demanding personal training… all that while trying to balance a somewhat normal social life might be a little much.
No wonder I was forgetting stuff and doing dumb shit. I was trying to bite too much.
But I also wouldn't stop.
I couldn't.
There was too much at risk. I could rest after Madara and Kaguya were dealt with.
With that said… maybe I could relax a bit.
'Live life to the fullest,' I chanted in my head before taking a deep breath in. 'Not just survive, live' I chastised then before putting a smile on my face and walking back to Hinata and Chouji, who seemed to have changed topics from the electives to normal cooking.
[}-o-{]
Third Person PoV
"So…"
"He said he's worried about what'll happen when we graduate, about what'll happen to us," Ino replied after hesitating for a moment.
"Hmm, he told me something similar last year," Shikamaru said, still laying on the floor with his eyes closed. "Didn't think it would get so bad though."
"I think…" Naruto started, his face the very example of sadness. "That he is more scared for us than you guys realize," That both of his friends stare intensely at him.
"Why do you think that?" Shikamaru prodded with narrowed eyes.
"Well… when we started hanging out… he once fell asleep in my apartment," Naruto glanced nervously towards his brother. He felt bad, extremely so, for revealing something so private. But he was too worried to care. "And he had a nightmare… when he woke up he said something like… being alone was scary… yeah, something like that. I remember because…"
"You could relate," Shikamaru offered, a rare sympathetic expression on his face. Ino, meanwhile, put a hand on the blond boy's arm to offer her support.
"Yeah," Naruto nodded before looking down. "When we started living together… I found out that he always has nightmares like that," He frowned for a second before sighing. "I think that's why he always stays up until after I went to bed…" He added as an afterthought.
Both the others frowned too.
The Nara took Naruto's words and added them to the massive puzzle that he was shaping in his head regarding the Satou.
"I don't want it to be my fault if someone I know is killed or worse."
Shikamaru thought over those words his friend had used so long ago. It seemed that it haunted Eiji much more than he had realized. The genius felt like slapping himself. There he was, finding amusing the fact that his talented friend forgot he could choose an extra elective or had overlooked the fact that he could try walking before running on walls.
And what about himself? He hadn't noticed that one of his closest friends had been training himself to the ground and more for their safety. That Eiji was utterly terrified of losing them that the thought haunted him every night and most days. Even after been told so himself.
Some friend he was.
Beside him, the Yamanaka heiress had similar thoughts of her own.
"I had friends, before Naruto and the rest, you know?" Eiji had said. Had he lost them? Had he been so alone and for so long that he ended like this?
"That's what friends are for," As the words rang in her mind like they had sometimes since then, she clenched her eyes shut.
"What do we do, Shikamaru?" Both clan heirs turned towards Naruto before their eyes widened. The blond boy was looking at the Nara with a completely new expression.
That was an expression they had never seen or even imagined on the knucklehead. They had seen him determined, focused, even serious. There was steel in those blue eyes. They demanded an answer. It reminded them of their parents waiting for a report from another shinobi.
Shikamaru frowned and silence reigned for a long moment.
"We train," The Nara spoke finally. "We become strong enough for Eiji to stop being afraid."
"Never thought I would hear those words from you, Shika," Ino said, although there was no mirth in her voice. She couldn't find it in her to laugh in the situation. It did, however, lighten the mood the smallest bit, which was exactly what she wanted.
"I have to, anyway," Naruto replied, her expression morphing into his usual grin. "I'll be Hokage, after all."
Both heirs rolled their eyes.
Somehow though, they weren't as skeptical anymore.
[} Chapter End {]