Chapter 12: Reading is tough for Naruto.
"Whoa! One hundred?" Sasuke exclaimed, slightly taken aback as he watched the sea of Naruto clones spread across the training ground. "Are you sure that's necessary?"
Naruto grinned, full of confidence. "Of course it's necessary! Shadow clones speed up everything! It's like having a hundred Narutos reading at the same time!" He puffed out his chest, proud of his ingenious plan. "I'll be done with studying in no time!"
Sasuke narrowed his eyes, a smirk forming on his face. "Yeah, but…" He paused, his eyes gleaming with amusement. "Where exactly are you going to get study materials for 100 clones?"
Naruto's grin froze. "Huh?"
Sasuke's smirk widened. "You don't have 100 textbooks, do you? Or 100 sets of notes? What are they supposed to read? Each other?"
The words hit Naruto like a brick. His face fell as he looked around at his army of clones, all standing there, waiting for their orders. Suddenly, the brilliance of his plan began to unravel.
He hadn't thought about the fact that his clones would need the same resources he did—textbooks, notes, even pencils! And worse, he barely had enough for himself, let alone a hundred of him.
The realization sank in fast, and Naruto's heart dropped. His once-bright expression turned dark as disappointment flooded through him. "I… I didn't think about that," he mumbled, scratching the back of his head.
Sasuke crossed his arms, clearly enjoying this. "I figured as much. You really think things through, don't you, Naruto?"
Naruto felt a pang of embarrassment as his shoulders slumped. "I just… thought if I used more clones, I could get ahead faster. But now… without enough books… it's pointless." His voice trailed off, the excitement he'd felt just moments ago completely evaporating. He tried to force a smile, but it felt hollow.
In one swift motion, Naruto dispelled most of his clones, leaving only 10 behind, as that was the limit for the study materials that Sasuke and he had. A soft puff of smoke filled the air as the clones vanished, the empty space around him feeling oddly heavy. Naruto stared at the ground, his face shadowed with disappointment. "There's no point if I don't have the right stuff…"
Sasuke, still smirking, couldn't resist twisting the knife a little further. "What's wrong, Naruto? Depressed because you realized you can't even keep up with your own ideas?"
Naruto didn't answer, his mood sinking deeper. His grand plan to speed up his studies had backfired in the worst way possible, and now he just felt like a failure. The gap between his ambitions and reality was becoming painfully clear, and it hurt more than any jutsu could.
Sasuke's laugh echoed through the training ground. "You really thought you'd outsmart everything by brute-forcing it with clones? Sometimes, Naruto, you've got to use your brain."
Naruto clenched his fists, frustration bubbling up inside him. But he didn't snap back. He couldn't. Sasuke was right, and that made it sting even more. He had messed up. Again.
"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up," Naruto muttered under his breath, avoiding Sasuke's gaze. "I'll figure something out…"
Sasuke walked over, still chuckling, but there was a hint of something less sharp in his eyes. "Look, you've still got 10 clones. That's more than enough for now. Focus on what you can do, not what you can't."
Naruto glanced up, surprised to hear something that almost sounded like encouragement from Sasuke. It didn't make him feel much better, but at least it wasn't another jab.
"Whatever," Naruto grumbled, though his voice lacked its usual fire. He gave a small sigh, dispelling his frustration. "Guess we'll just study like normal for now."
Sasuke's smirk faded, replaced by a more serious expression. "Come on, let's get to it. We've still got a lot of ground to cover."
Naruto nodded, still feeling the weight of his earlier mistake, but determined to study hard. He wasn't about to let this stop him completely, not when his academy's first exams were at stake.
As the day wore on, Naruto and his remaining clones sat cross-legged in the clearing, textbooks open in front of them, their eyes focused—at least, for now. Sasuke and his single shadow clone were also quietly flipping through their own books, effortlessly absorbing the basics of Japanese language and writing.
Naruto furrowed his brow, staring hard at the characters on the page. "This isn't so bad," he muttered under his breath, trying to stay positive. "If I can learn jutsu, I can learn this, right?"
Sasuke, sitting nearby with his clone, glanced at Naruto with mild skepticism. "You'd better hope so. Otherwise, you're going to fall even more behind."
Naruto grumbled but kept reading, determined to prove Sasuke wrong. For the first few hours, everything seemed to be going smoothly. His clones worked in sync, each focusing on a different chapter of the textbook. It felt like he was making real progress, the knowledge slowly trickling into his brain.
But as more time passed, the effort began to take its toll. Naruto's clones, each dealing with a different aspect of the language—grammar, vocabulary, sentence structure—started to show signs of strain. One by one, they began to fidget, their focus breaking. The strain of processing so much information at once was overwhelming, even for shadow clones.
"Hey… why is this getting harder?" one of the clones murmured, rubbing his temple.
Another one groaned, dropping his book. "This is too much… I can't focus anymore."
Before Naruto could react, a puff of smoke filled the air as one of the clones dispelled itself, its memories and experiences flooding back into the original Naruto's mind. A sharp pain stabbed through Naruto's head, causing him to flinch as details of many Japanese characters suddenly appeared in his mind.
"Ugh!" Naruto groaned, clutching his forehead. "What the—!"
More clones began to vanish, one after another, each time delivering a fresh wave of overwhelming information to Naruto's mind. His vision blurred, and his head felt like it was about to explode. Within moments, all but one of his clones had dispelled themselves, leaving Naruto reeling from the flood of memories.
Sasuke watched with a sigh, shaking his head as the last clone disappeared in a puff of smoke, leaving Naruto alone, panting and massaging his aching temples. "I warned you," Sasuke said coolly, not even looking up from his book. "You can't just brute force your way through everything, Naruto. Studying's not like fighting."
Naruto groaned again, his head still pounding. "Yeah, yeah… I get it. But come on! I thought they could handle it!"
"They're you, remember?" Sasuke smirked, closing his book. "If you can't handle something, neither can your clones."
Naruto scowled, frustrated with both himself and his clones. "Ugh, you guys suck!" he shouted, scolding his now-gone clones as if they could hear him.
Sasuke's clone, standing beside him, gave a small shrug and looked to Sasuke, who sighed once more. "Alright, fine," Sasuke muttered, standing up. "Let's try this again. I'll help you. Maybe if you focus on one section at a time, you won't get overwhelmed."
Naruto looked up, surprised but grateful. "You… you'd do that?"
Sasuke rolled his eyes. "It's not like I want you to fail and drag me down with you."
With that, Sasuke and his clone began to guide Naruto through the basics again, starting with simple characters and slowly building up. Naruto struggled at first—his brain still throbbing from the earlier memory dump—but he gritted his teeth and forced himself to concentrate.
"Just focus," Sasuke instructed, his voice patient but firm. "You're trying too hard to take everything in at once. Start small."
Naruto nodded, clenching his fists as he forced his mind to slow down and process each lesson, bit by bit. It was agonizingly slow at first, and every so often, his head felt like it was going to burst from the sheer effort. But little by little, he began to make progress, with Sasuke and his clone patiently guiding him through each step.
Hours passed like this, the sun moving steadily across the sky as they worked. What was supposed to be a simple study session stretched on, consuming the entire day. Both boys lost track of time, caught up in the monotony of reading, writing, and correcting mistakes.
By the time the sun had dipped below the horizon, both Naruto and Sasuke were utterly exhausted, their eyes glazed over from hours of staring at textbooks.
Naruto leaned back, groaning. "I can't believe we spent the whole day reading. My brain's fried…"
Sasuke's clone disappeared in a puff of smoke, and Sasuke rubbed his eyes, feeling the same fatigue. "You wanted to catch up, didn't you?"
"Yeah, but not like this…" Naruto muttered, rubbing his aching head.
End of the chapter.__________________________________________________________________________