A few more days passed, and although he'd felt the physical fatigue had dissipated, the lingering effects hadn't completely vanished. He estimated that this period of recovery roughly corresponded to the interval he had in mind for training thanks to the strong spiritual energy he had.
During these few days, nothing special had happened at school. Iruka continued to train the class and started teaching about chakra. For Natsuro, these lessons were a bit of a waste of time since he had already learned this material on his own, and the training intensity couldn't match the regimen he had set for himself.
However, since it was still early in the school year, the teachers were mainly focusing on teaching basic training techniques. He figured that later on, they'd probably allow for more independent training.
Now that he had self-studied all the material in the book, it was time to attempt chakra extraction. Since it was his first time, he waited until his mother, Shinai, was home to supervise him.
Although extracting chakra was generally considered safe, he didn't want to take any chances, just in case something unexpected happened.
"Mom, I'm going to start now," he stated, sitting cross-legged on his bed. Although there was no specific posture required for extracting chakra, he felt it was more appropriate to assume a proper position with someone watching.
"Alright, don't worry. From what I remember, there's nothing dangerous about extracting chakra," she reassured him, cheering him on.
"I know,". He was just being cautious—what if he passed out?
With that, he began to follow the instructions from the book, starting to sense the energy within his body. He had already tried sensing it before, and it was quite easy for him. This time, it was even more natural.
However, while he had sensed the energy before, he hadn't tried to extract it until now. With his mother watching over him, he felt more confident and began combining his spiritual and physical energy to extract chakra.
There were no unexpected incidents; he had successfully extracted chakra on his first try. He then focused the chakra into his hand, forming a familiar blue energy that made him momentarily dazed.
"You actually succeeded on your first try! Little Natsuro, you're really amazing!" she was a bit surprised. Although extracting chakra wasn't particularly dangerous, it wasn't common to succeed on the first attempt. Could this mean Natsuro had a strong natural talent? she thought, feeling quite pleased.
She made up her mind—to celebrate Natsuro's talent, she'd ask her teacher to help her get a Shadow Clone technique as a surprise for Natsuro after work tomorrow.
"Well, I guess I did alright," he replied, surprised at how smoothly it had gone. It was probably due to his strong spiritual energy. Regardless, his talent seemed decent; the next step was to see how he performed with ninjutsu.
But he wondered about the amount of chakra he had. He felt it was probably decent, but without a comparison, he had no idea what level he was at.
As he was lost in thought, he suddenly felt a pair of hands on his face. Shinai was tugging at his cheeks and said, "You've successfully extracted chakra, Natsuro. You should be happier and smile!"
In the end, under his mother's playful insistence, Natsuro managed to force a smile. Although it was a bit fake, she was satisfied. "That's better. You're so young, why are you always so serious?"
He felt a bit helpless; he wasn't emotionless, just deep in thought.
Finally, after escaping his mother's playful teasing, he returned to his room to continue extracting chakra. Even though he didn't have much use for it yet, he wanted to familiarize himself with the process.
He needed to get to the point where he could extract chakra without consciously trying, so it would be ready whenever he needed it. But what to do with the chakra he had extracted?
He didn't know any ninjutsu yet, and it felt like a waste just to let it dissipate. Maybe he could use it to practice control, like tree climbing or wall walking?
But then he remembered his mother was likely resting next door. Falling off the wall and making noise wasn't a good idea, so he dismissed that plan.
Aside from that, what about practicing chakra's shape and nature transformations?
As for nature transformation, he didn't even know his chakra affinity yet, so he could only practice shape transformation for now. But rather than focusing on shape transformation, he decided to practice controlling chakra to form shapes he imagined, starting with the simplest—forming a ball.
Natsuro began trying to release the chakra he had extracted through his hands, but he noticed that as soon as the chakra left his body, it quickly dissipated into the air, becoming uncontrollable.
Frowning, he didn't give up.
He continued extracting and practicing, over and over again. Soon, he noticed that his chakra reserves were almost depleted. He realized that if he extracted all the chakra at once, he might be able to completely drain his reserves. Since chakra extraction is related to spiritual energy, and his spiritual energy was particularly strong, it seemed that his chakra reserves weren't proportionate to his spiritual strength.
However, this also indirectly confirmed that his chakra reserves were not yet on par with his spiritual strength.
On the other hand, his practice with shape transformation had yielded some progress. At least now, when chakra left his body, he could still sense a faint connection to it, although controlling it with this weak link was extremely difficult.
But just having that connection and being able to sense it was a positive sign. Strengthening this connection would be the first step toward mastering shape transformation.
With his chakra depleted, he decided to call it a day and rest.
Tomorrow would be an important day. He planned to approach Iruka to ask about the amount of chakra he had, hoping to get a benchmark. He also wanted to see if he could start learning the basic techniques—Transformation, Clone, and Substitution Jutsu. He believed his current chakra level was enough to start practicing them, so if he demonstrated his abilities, there was a good chance Iruka would agree to teach him.
If that didn't work, he could ask his mother for the hand signs for the techniques and then seek Iruka's guidance on how to perform them.
As he planned out the next day, Natsuro quietly drifted off to sleep.
The next day, after school, he approached Iruka.
"Is there something you need, Natsuro?" Iruka asked, a bit puzzled.
"Iruka-sensei, I've already learned how to extract chakra from the textbook and wanted to ask you to evaluate my current chakra level," Natsuro replied.
"Hmm? You've already taught yourself?" Iruka was a bit surprised. To be a good teacher, he made sure to understand his students' backgrounds, and this included Natsuro. Although Natsuro's mother had once been a genin, she probably wasn't capable of teaching him. This meant that he had likely learned everything on his own within just a few days and had already extracted chakra.
Although Iruka didn't know why Natsuro was so interested in knowing his chakra level, as a teacher, he naturally liked diligent and talented students. So he nodded and agreed.
"Of course, I'd be happy to help."