Turns out, that girl might not be as useless as I thought she'd be. Her healing power is surprisingly powerful, though it is nowhere near what I could do once I master my clans Recovery Jutsu. The legends say that one can heal from anything short of getting cut in half, as long as they have chakra. And taking into account her complete and utter incompetence in any ninja field, though I didn't expect more from a woman, this will make her a massive burden on me, once I reach that level.
Although I guess she was brought in this team for Baki more than for me, considering how quickly I could escape most encounters. Though should a war come, instant healing for a whole front would be indispensable, to any nation, and especially Kusagabure. If she manages to more efficiently use her powers, maybe by trying to cooperate instead of squirming around and trying to get away. I don't understand why that bitch acted that way, I even tried asking nicely.
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"Wench, heal me." I said, with my friendliest smile on.
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I really can't understand them. I addressed her just as the memories of this body told me was socially acceptable. Maybe Kusagakure is more egalitarian than previously believed? Though I doubt that is a big possibility, considering how the Uzumaki's were used. Using resources efficiently seems much more important than human rights to them anyway, I mean, Baki had his head cracked open like an egg by his assigned clone of our sensei, and that was because he started asking questions instead of fighting back. He had to fight with a broken head against an opponent more experienced than him, as our jonin had his clones retrain their strength to a similar level to ours. He got healed by Karin but still.
The bitch, however, seemed to have went through no fight, as she was incapable of even doing that. She came back drenched in sweat, carrying a bag of scrolls. The redhead was given taijutsu training because she was lacking in even that! How did she even get in this team? I am walking in circles with this train of thought.
Just as I realised that, I came across the same battle-scarred clearing I had visited yesterday. In the middle of it, stood Karin and Baki, with Deiki observing them from the sides. There was a circle drawn in the ground. I stopped in my tracks and observed them from a distance. I expected Baki to clear the floor with the redhead, until the jonin clapped his hands and the two sprung into action.
Baki moved excruciatingly slow, his arms and legs weighed down. As I inspected his person closer I saw some bands of weights on all of his limbs, and a vest as well, hidden underneath his shirt, to top it all off.
As he met Karin in the middle, I was surprised at how well she was moving. Well, more at how badly Baki was moving with his weights. The redhead was quite clumsy, not reacting in time to any of the openings created by Baki's lack of adjustment to his new weights. Though one thing I could appreciate was that her taijutsu itself, was not half bad. Not anywhere close to my clans techniques, but not bad compared to the other Kusagakure shinobi I saw training on my way here.
I continued to watch their exchange, as Karin finally reacted to one of Baki's mistakes, and tried to take advantage of it, only for the green-eyed genin to headbutt her, as soon as she dropped her guard ever so slightly, to go on the offensive. I scoffed as I started approaching again, our sensei stopping the fight and taking Karin aside to talk to her.
As I approached, Baki quickly went to retrieve a set of weights for me from a bag, and threw them at me. I quickly caught them and put them on, underneath my loose robes. They were identical with Bakis, a dark grey colour, four bands, for my arms and legs, and one vest, for my upper body. As I got done with that, our sensei made a signal for us to come to him.
Once we were both in the circle, he simply clapped once then went to instruct Karin on taijutsu. Seeing I was distracted, Baki took advantage and tried to sucker-punched me. Unfortunately for him, my reaction time is superb because of training to effectively use Projection, and so, I ducked under his punch and sent and elbow to his stomach.
To my surprise, as I hit him, he also hit me with the elbow of the arm with which he just threw the punch. I jumped back, scratching the back of my head where I was hit. Baki stood in his stance as he waited for me to come to him.
Smart, considering my taijutsu is based off of counter attacks and surprise attacks using projection. I decided to go on the offensive, even though I felt sluggish because of the weights. I quickly closed the distance between the two of us, and threw a punch at Bakis guard. The green eyed genin quickly shifted his stance to better defend my attack, and, as he did that, I used my other arm to hit him as hard as I could in the spot which he left open. Although I could barely put any power behind that punch, it left him disoriented, that, together with the pain of blocking my actual punch, gave me another opening, I made use of it, hitting him in the side.
To my surprise, he ignored my kick and socked me as hard as he could in the face. I promptly grabbed his clothes and headbutted him. He grabbed my neck and started chocking me, as he tried to take me to the ground. I happily obliged, taking him with me, then I broke his grip on my neck while we were falling and tried to get behind him. With neither of us being able to get the advantage on the ground, I kicked Baki away then rose to my feet. I felt surprisingly tired, the weights doing their job a little too well.
Something else that bothered me was the fact that I couldn't best Baki in pure taijutsu, though I guess if I were to train my taijutsu as intensely as he has been I'd overtake him...
As I was lost in my thoughts, Baki had taken action once more, and threw a right hook at my head. I jumped back, and threw a kick at him, he caught my leg, and threw me towards the other side of the arena. I adjusted myself in the air and landed on my feet.
Without delay, I shot towards him and and engaged him in hand to hand again. After being in a deadlock for a full minute, Baki took a risk. He grabbed my hand, and threw me again, this time however, we were near the edge of the ring, a.k.a. the circle drawn on the ground, with me flying out of it.As I got up, I realised that I was dripping with sweat and that my breathing was heavy. These weights are really good. If just a simple spar can exhaust me this much with them on, wearing them for extended periods of time will increase both my strength and my stamina by a lot. Considering my Reinforcement techniques strengthening is exponential, it is very important to train my body to its absolute limits, although the technique does eventually fall off, once the muscle becomes too strong, even the chackra wont be able to push it further.
I went towards our jonin commander only to see him still busy with Karin. As such, I started stretching while waiting for them to finish. After a little bit, Baki joined me in my stretches, we continued exercising in silence. Well, I did, Baki kept saying things I chose to ignore to focus on my stretches better.
After a while, Dekiru, got around to coming to us. He simply made two clones and left. One clone signaled Baki to follow him, while the other kept staring at me. And he stared, and continued to do so. Up until I got up, when the clone spoke;
"You have this bad habit of getting lost in your thoughts, and getting surprised, or reacting at a slight delay. I will follow you around, punishing you whenever you fall into your bad habit, until you adapt."
To say the least, I was quite unhappy about this, but, in the end, this is for my own goo-
I was interrupted by a sucker punch to my stomach. The clone moved faster then I could react, even if I were to concentrate on it. The punch sent me flying into a tree, which promptly collapsed on me.
'Maybe I hit him too hard?' the clone must have thought to itself, as my consciousness faded.
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I woke up after an hour, the tree still collapsed on me. As I got up and looked for my teammates or my teacher, I found that they had already left. With a heavy sigh, I started to head to the villa, which looked like any Japanese building, only bigger, by a lot. This building has become the so-called 'clan compounds' of the Zenin. I went to the room I had assigned as an office. This so-called office, was a room on the second floor of the villa, being decorated with empty bookshelves, and a desk with a chair. Behind the desk, was a large window, angled so that the sunlight would light up the desk.
I went through what things I could sponsor with the money from my late clan, to hopefully gain more influence, both in pure resources, and in politics.If I, for example, manage to create or help to get off the ground, lets say, a good coal extraction industry, that would assure that my children would have some sort of assurance, am I to fail in some of my goals. And it would also be more resources in the short term, the only problem was, this sort of stuff is risky.
I sighed as I looked over the options I had found in my time here. None of them seemed to be good. The only tempting option was to wait for some farmers to have a bad harvest season, buy their land, and have them work for me. Though for that, I would have to find someone who would acce-
Once again, I was punched in my stomach, getting thrown out of the window. This time, I was prepared. I had been maintaining a Projection in my office, to better my chackra control. I reappeared in my office, with the intention of ignoring the hole in my window, and concentrated on making another projection. Only for me to get sent flying again. This is quite irritating, to say the least. I am surprised I am able to keep my emotions in check so well, despite both my originals personality, and the kids personality, being quite quick to anger. Unfortunately for me, the next few days seemed like they were going to be hell, as I got hit again, WHILE IN THE AIR.
I hit the ground with a heavy thud. I got up. Made a Projection as fast as I could. And climbed back up through what was left of the wall of my office. I sat down. And tried to relax. Now, I would have succeeded. WOULD HAVE BEING THE KEY WORDS. Because, I was sent flying AGAIN.
I decided that it was time for me to go on a walk, and ponder the mysteries of life. I got sent into a river. I tried to read a book. Another wall of my compound was broken by my skull. I tried to go to sleep. The floorboards were broken by my mattress.
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After a few days of constant harassment, I was deemed vigilant enough 'for now'. Now, I would be calmer had I not have been forced to to participate in 'teamwork training sessions' which is a very fancy way of saying unpaid child labour. Which would be fine, its just a very good way to use resources. But I had to paint some fences, while being attacked constantly. Its not that hard to stay vigilant on all of your surroundings while doing tasks which require fine motor skills, or at least, that is what Dekiru claims it isn't.
I can tell you, it is VERY hard to do so. Although, as much as I hate to admit it, this training has greatly improved the speed at which I create Projections, mostly because I am more aware of environmental factors. And my reaction speed has improved, for example, now. A punch passed through what now became my right, instead of what it was, a.k.a. my stomach.
And with that, to my absolute delight the clone actually dispelled, instead of trying to sound ominous, and failing. Who would even takes the phrase 'I will be watching' seriously anymore? Not me. That's for sure.
As I focused back on my sensei, I noticed he was talking about a mission out of the village, how exciting.