The early morning cool against Asasu's skin, as he stood in the backyard, staring at the training book like it, had personally insulted him.
The words on the page were simple, but what was the meaning behind them? Pure torture.
"If you don't start your morning by feeling like a stampede of bulls has hit you, you're not training hard enough." - Osamu Shozen
Asasu sighed.
Rentaro, sitting on the porch, sipped his tea way too casually.
"You gonna start or just glare at the book all day?"
Asasu scoffed but pulled off his long-sleeve shirt, tossing it aside. His physique wasn't bad he wasn't scrawny but he wasn't strong. His arms were lean but lacked real muscle, his torso was flat, and the only real definition he had came from running around chasing his siblings or carrying trays at the restaurant.
That was about to change.
He flipped through the book, scanning the exercises Osamu had written.
"Start with running. A shinobi with slow legs is a dead shinobi. 5 Miles is a minimum."
5 Miles?!
He glanced at Rentaro, who was still watching him like this was entertainment.
"You expect me to run that far?" Asasu asked.
"No," Rentaro said. "I expect you to try."
Asasu sighed but he couldn't back out now.
He took off running.
Five minutes in, Asasu felt fine.
Fifteen minutes in, his breathing started getting heavy.
Twenty minutes in, his legs felt like lead.
By the time he reached the halfway point, sweat dripped down his body, his breath was ragged, and his bare feet ached from slamming against the dirt road.
This is insane, he thought, wiping his forehead.
He wasn't even halfway done, and he already felt like his body was breaking apart.
Still, he pushed forward.
By the time he returned home, he collapsed onto the ground, his chest rising and falling rapidly.
Rentaro, still sitting there, didn't even blink.
"Good start," he said.
Asasu lifted his shaking arms. "You call… that… a start?"
"Yup," Rentaro said. "Now, push-ups."
Asasu groaned.
The push-ups were worse.
His arms were weak. He had never trained them properly, so every push-up felt like lifting an entire boulder. By the fiftieth rep, his arms burned like they were on fire, and his body trembled under the strain.
His form was shaky. His breathing was uneven.
But he kept going.
"If this is what I have to do to keep up…"
"Then fine. I'll do it."
After finishing the bare minimum of Osamu's hellish morning routine, Asasu collapsed onto his back, staring at the sky.
He felt like he had been beaten with a bat.
His chest ached, his legs refused to move, and his arms felt like noodles.
"That's the weakest workout I've ever seen," Rentaro commented.
Asasu turned his head, glaring. "I… hate you."
Rentaro smirked. "Good. That means you're learning."
Later that day, Asasu sat with the book open, flipping through more pages to see what exactly he had signed up for.
A particular section caught his eye.
"Ungentle Fist-Taijutsu Technique."
His eyebrow went up in curiosity.
He had heard of the Gentle Fist, the Hyuga Clan's signature fighting style that targeted chakra points with precise strikes.
But Ungentle Fist?
There was a small, hand-written note next to the title:
"Named after I beat the hell out of a Hyuga in a fight. HAHAHAHAHAHA!"
Asasu blinked.
Then turned the page, morbidly curious.
The technique was simple in theory but brutal in practice.
"Unlike the Gentle Fist, which strikes chakra points to disable an opponent, the Ungentle Fist focuses on striking the human body in the most painful and effective ways possible. Instead of stopping chakra flow, it stops your enemy from wanting to fight at all."
Below that was a list of 'high damage' areas to strike.
Solar plexus (knocks the wind out of them)
Ribs (break one, and their whole defense collapses)
Knees (kick here, and they'll never stand properly again)
Jawline (disrupts the brain, causing momentary blackout)
Throat (self-explanatory, don't be a wimp)
Asasu stared at the page.
This was… vicious.
The notes scrawled in the margins were even worse.
"The best way to fight is to make sure your opponent doesn't want to fight anymore. If you hit them hard enough, fast enough, and in the right spots, it doesn't matter how much chakra they have. A shinobi with broken ribs and no air left in his lungs is just another guy waiting to get knocked out."
This wasn't some elegant technique.
It was a street fight in taijutsu form.
And the worst part?
It made sense.
He flipped to the next page, where Osamu had drawn a simple sequence of movements. The key points were:
Fast footwork. Heavy strikes. Relentless aggression.
It wasn't about trading blows. It was about hitting first, hitting hard, and making sure they stayed down.
Osamu had written a final note at the bottom of the page.
"If you ever fight a Hyuga make sure to yell 'UNGENTLE FIST' really loud when you hit them."
Asasu sighed.
His grandfather was an idiot.
But…
He closed the book and stretched his sore limbs.
He was going to learn this.
If he was going to dedicate himself to this path, he couldn't hold back.
No excuses. No shortcuts.
Just hard work, pain, and growth.
He got up and stepped into the backyard, ready to start again tomorrow.