Chapter 7: More Training
"Well, I was also thinking of doing the same. But since I will not get any privacy in my room to meditate, I will also come to your room to do my meditation practice."
"Okay," Kaida replied, understanding the need for it, as this was one of the reasons he asked for a separate room for himself.
…
Both Kaida and Yomi went to Kaida's room after eating and, without discussing anything, sat in the lotus position to begin their respective training.
Yomi just had to meditate since she had not unlocked her chakra, but it was by no means easy since her full concentration had to be on her breathing all the time. Maintaining a constant rate of breathing in a fixed sequence was not easy. Even a little distraction would interrupt and reset the whole progress.
At first, Yomi could only maintain her concentration for 5 minutes at max, and that was when she was in a quiet environment where there was no one to disturb her, but the duration steadily increased as time passed. On the other hand, Kaida was having much more difficulty doing his training.
The exercise he was doing was known as leaf concentration, the all-time famous exercise which everyone with a little knowledge of Naruto knew about, in which you have to stick a leaf on your forehead with the help of chakra while sitting in a lotus position.
When Kaida started to practice the exercise, he thought, 'Hmm, Uncle said that chakra has both physical and spiritual nature. So, if I want to move my chakra, I just have to will it to move in that direction with full concentration. Let's try doing that.' And the process really worked, though he had to try it for half an hour, but it still worked.
'Wow, my whole chakra started to move in the direction I wanted it to move, and as Uncle said, I have to get a stream-like flow from my solar plexus to my forehead for the leaf to stick on my forehead. Okay, let's try to imagine it as a river or a stream and see if it helps,' he thought.
When he started imagining it as a river, the chakra did start to move in the form of a stream, but it was by no means a small amount. If we calculate the rate at which his chakra was flowing out of his chakra reserve, it would be around 20% of his whole chakra reserve per minute. So, at most, he could maintain this for 4 to 4 and a half minutes since he couldn't fully exhaust his chakra, as it is harmful for anyone to empty their chakra.
Kaida still decided to continue with the exercise while trying to limit the amount coming out of his chakra reserve. It was by no means an easy task as whenever he tried to slow down or reduce the amount, the chakra flow stopped immediately.
He continued to try, and after 5 minutes, his chakra became dangerously low. That's when he decided to meditate, as the old man had advised. Since it would take nearly 7-8 hours to completely refill his chakra, he decided to continue meditating as well.
They both kept practicing and only came out of their room to eat, but for different reasons. Kaida wanted to become strong and felt too old to play with some 5 to 8-year-old children. Though the age gap wasn't that big - he was nearly 13 in his previous life - but that doesn't mean he would play with them, especially since now he could train and become strong. It was an exhilarating feeling which kept him focused on training.
As for Yomi, she wanted to catch up with Kaida's progress as soon as she could. With Kaida practicing for all the time, she thought if she took more breaks, the gap would only increase, so she also stuck with her training.
In the evening, when his chakra reserve was full, Kaida once again started leaf concentration with nearly the same result. Though there was a little improvement - the leaf fell a lot less from his forehead as he was able to maintain a steady flow of chakra for a little longer, only by 10 seconds, but it was still some improvement.
After that, he again started meditating until it was time for dinner. After that, both of them went to their respective rooms to sleep as they had to go for training tomorrow at 5:00 A.M.
**(Next morning...)**
Kaida and Yomi met at the orphanage door and went to their training area 15 minutes early. The old man was already there and said, "Great to know that my lesson did not fall on deaf ears. Now I hope both of you have done the exercise I suggested. Come forward one by one so I can examine if there were any problems."
Even though the chances of anything going wrong were low in these beginner exercises, Hiroshi still decided to take no risks with the children at all.
First, Yomi went forward. The old man again covered his hand with chakra and placed it at her back near the solar plexus. After 2 minutes, he removed his hand, stood back, and said, "Yomi, I can easily see that you have been diligent in your exercise, so if you keep doing it like this, I am sure you will unlock your chakra in a week or less." With a full day of exercise, the rewards were great. Normally it would have taken months with the training time a child would invest in such exercise, but since she had done it for so long, her improvements were faster.
After hearing that, Yomi's face bloomed like a flower. She thanked Hiroshi and went back to her position, knowing that she was close to bridging the gap. Obviously, she was happy. Then Kaida came forward.
Hiroshi once again followed the same procedure. And he was surprised by the result - there was little, very little, but increase in Kaida's chakra reserve and that was in just one day. He asked Kaida what he had done yesterday. A look of understanding came over his face when Kaida told him about his complete routine of yesterday, which was mostly training. Hiroshi nodded and said, "Kaida, it is already great that you were able to stick the leaf on your head on your first try. Don't worry, you will get better at it as you keep practicing the same exercise. So keep up the hard work."
Kaida also thanked Hiroshi and went back to his position.
Hiroshi nodded his head after changing few things in his plans he had made for his two new students and said, "I can see both of you are serious about your training, so I am just going to give both of you your training plans. You can come to me if you face any problems during your exercise. This damn office work doesn't give me much free time."
After that, he passed both of them a paper with full instructions about which exercises to do, specified for each day of the week, with running, stretching, and meditation being common for all days and one day of rest per week. Reading his training plan, Kaida asked, "Uncle, why is there one day empty, without any training to do?"
"Kaida, giving rest to your body is as important as doing exercise. In fact, it is even more important to do so if you are exercising daily, so don't do any exercise on that day. Just enjoy and play, you guys are still young," Hiroshi said with a smile.
Seeing that neither of them had any more doubts, the old man went back to his office, and Kaida and Yomi started their exercises.
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Next Chapter: Improvements
A.N.: Add to the library so you'll be notified as soon as I update the next chapter! I will update a chapter daily for 5 days a week and an extra chapter on Saturday and Sunday if your support is good. Also, please share your reviews about the chapter in the comments. Both positive and negative ones are appreciated. 😊