Red Riot - Chapter 7 - Tentative steps forward (Patreon)

Water lapped across my temples as I floated in the grotto pool. I’d lost count of how many times I’d come here. Of late, it was only when I felt certain that I had lost any tails, both from the clan children and from my own group.

Shoto was still very good at sneaking up on people, but I’d been able to shift a little of my time towards sensory training. I would never consider dropping training my mystical palm completely. I still had so much further to go. There were too many different organs or methods of wielding it. It had too much potential for me to ever feel comfortable saying it was ‘good enough’. That was the path of hubris.

It was like any skill, you needed to practise it to maintain it. If you want to improve it? You needed to push yourself.

I was getting enough practise from all the sparring from the kids, but I still practised on the rats and the fish on more complex organs than the muscles, blood vessels, and bones. Now I was working on the bowels, the lungs, and finally the heart. All parts of the body that I had a basic knowledge of thanks to my past life. But they were complex. The brain? That would be something I felt I needed more than a lifetime to understand.

I remember a quote about the brain. Something a physicist said about the brain: If it were a simple organ, we would be so simple we couldn’t understand it. A wonderful truth, if a little circular for my taste.

It would be years, decades even before I felt confident that I could work on someone’s brain. I still had organs such as the liver and kidneys that would be stepping stones to completing my understanding of the human body.

For now, I circled my chakra through my coils. I’d cleaned out almost all of my chakra coils now, and the results were truly staggering.

When I pushed my chakra now with the water bullet jutsu I no longer shot bullets the size of my head but rather the size of a man. I could do it a dozen times without becoming breathless or low on chakra, something others noticed. Kizan had become envious of my chakra pool, he’d tried playing it off by saying something about my chakra pool being so large making it easier for someone to detect me and for me to lose more stealth games.

Shoto had laughed and pointed out that I continued to be the best in our group for chakra control exercises. That had made Kizan grimace like he’d smelt something foul.

I'd comforted him by pointing out that no one in our group was better at the sword than him. It made him puff his chest out and go back to practising. I had to stop Shoto from spoiling Kizan’s mood with the smaller boy pointing out that Kizan was one of the only people that could afford a good sword.

The only other kid to have one had ended up being Sharkbait. For a given value of ‘good’.

I pushed my thoughts to the side and focused. I had found some tiny imperfections in my chakra system and was going to clean those out today. It was that or start working on my brain, which I was extremely hesitant about.

That said, the current buildup I’d found wasn’t much better. I’d been nervous about them before due to their location on the chakra node near my heart, but I was feeling safe enough.

I’d cleaned out most of the other chakra pathways well enough.

I turned my attention inward and swirled my chakra; like the ends of ropes, I had tendrils of chakra spiral down my network towards the blockage in the heart node. Something about that niggled at my mind, but I couldn’t for the life of me put my finger on why that was.

I used the tendrils to scrape at the flakes of imperfections. And with each tiny scrape, I felt myself lighten, and my chakra flow improved. I felt like it flowed smoother, like it wasn’t as turbulent.

Then, before I knew it, I had only one oddly resistant ridge of muck within my node that resisted the cleaning.

In some ways, this really reminded me of cultivatio—

May tendrils tugged at the ridge, and all of it flaked off, revealing something different.

Something strange.

It felt like the chakra node had a small sphincter that held itself closed. I considered poking it before stopping. I had the same feeling once again. The heart node—why was that important?

I withdrew my chakra. An instinct for preservation I had felt a few times at the academy was rearing up and warning me off. Somehow I just knew it would be a bad idea

I had wanted to cleanse my heart node, and I had done as much; the tiny flakes of gunk had broken up and no I perhaps had an entire percentage increase in chakra capacity which was far more than such results in the past.

I scoured the rest of my body, working from my toes upwards, finding and documenting the last few spots that had gunk on them. I cleansed the node in my groin and felt myself feel an odd rush of blood when I was done which had me pausing and looking out of the water.

Nope, still a kid, no early puberty for me yet.

I lay back and tried to settle myself at the odd feeling of chakra swirlign a little freeer in my groin. I almost missed it once more but this node also had a small opening.

Two points in the body. The heart and the groin…

I sat up and put my face in my hands.

They were the Gates!

The Eight Gates that one of the most powerful shinobi in the series was renowned for!

Might Gai’s various taijutsu utilised these points in the body. And I, like a damn idiot had been cleaning my chakra nodes having forgotten them!

I ran a hand down my face and scowled, not repressing the expression. I was slipping if I wasn’t remembering something as big as that. Sure, in the Naruto story, the only users were Might Gai, Rock Lee, and… Kakashi from what I could remember, but they were huge power-up tools.

Tools… that I might have just stumbled upon…

I licked my lips and considered the nodes. I had a node already ‘cleaned’ that I might be able to use.

But… The heart node. Was that the first or the last chakra node to be opened? Was there a difference in how you opened the gates? Did your chakra rotation change anything? For all they were cool moves that had been briefly explained, the mechanics had never truly been discussed.

I’d never thought I would want to go back and demand the creators make Might Gai monologue before this moment. I chewed my lip in thought and considered what I could gained if I just teased one ope—

I threw myself back into the water. Then I rapped at my head with my knuckles.

“Urgh! And tell everyone that is charka sensitive enough where you are?! Idiot!” I groaned.

I wouldn’t be able to use the gates or train them. Not here. Not where my use of the gates could reveal a resource that I was very much not willing to share. I had no doubt what would happen to me if a shinobi decided they wanted this and I was in their way. After all, I didn't go to the academy for the sake of appearances!

“Urgh! I need to train my wisdom stat!” I joked aloud.

I chuckled before feeling a pang as I realised no one in my current life would get that reference. “Wisdom is so my dump stat!” I chuckled and ignored the way my face got wetter for a little while.

Then I frowned.

“Fuck!” I was teaching and training my group to be stronger, smarter, faster, but not wiser… I sat up. “Fuck!” It wasn’t so funny when I’d stumbled upon a glaring weakness in our group. I ran through a few conversations in my head. We’d been getting confident lately. Our glowing success with the last expedition to the Shark Coast almost had some of us swaggering around.

I remembered another phrase from my life that had been hubris. Arrogance deserved. I snorted looking back at it, more like ignorance self-applauded.

We were getting too big for our britches, and we needed to temper ourselves. I considered that and came up with a few plans, a few tricks. And even a way to wake up the group. I actually had a very easy option available to me. Himeto could deliver a swift reminder of our true position. Then I would need to switch focus for a little while, and train up my group's wisdom.

I knew how to make games like checkers, chess, and chinese checkers, but perhaps I could also play with my past life’s nerd past times and create a cribbed-together roleplaying situation that people could work through. They did stuff like that in the army and police force with planning operations didn’t they? … I honestly had no idea, but it sounded feasible to me.

I nodded, feeling better. I wiped my eyes and lay back down feeling more stable, more sure of my path forward. I was making progress.

I turned my attention to the other chakra nodes and grinned. And I might even get myself an ace up my sleeve if I played it carefully.

I moved to the chakra node in my stomach. Then into my abdomen, the thoracic-lumbar spinal joint, and then the cervical-thoracic spinal joint. Then I paused and slowed down.

There were two gates in the brain. The brain that I had been extremely careful to avoid rushing on. I could feel temptation calling but I decided to sit up. I didn’t need my power up right now, and I’d made some serious strides. Also, I had lost track of time and now… now I needed to get back home to the Okiya.

I exited the cave and found that the high tide had come in, obscuring and submerging the cave entrance. Not that swimming in the darkness was a fear of mine anymore. I swam with the faintest traces of chakra throughout my body. This saw me surging through the water better than any star athlete of my past life.

I swam past an eel and on a whim, broke its neck. The ladies at the Okiya enjoyed unadon and an eel would be a nice treat for those not working tonight. A shark swam past and eyed my catch. It was weird to merely be aware of it and not hyperfocus on it like I would have in the past.

It was no longer a threat to me.

I’d grown used to hunting them during the shark coast expedition. I knew what to keep an eye out for. I could tell that this shark was used to seeing shinobi as it wisely swam away instead of attempting to eat me.

Wise shark.

I exited the surf and hopped up onto the beach with the eel over my shoulders. The civilian side of town seemed a little brighter than usual. A number of people were out and about happily sharing drinks and eating food. I walked through and nodded to a few people I would walk past almost daily.

They stopped and eyed me for a second before shrugging it off and returning to their drinks. I paused, suppressing a frown at their reaction to me. That had been unusual. An unusual reaction specifically that pertained to me and my walking past.

The drinking was a second indicator that something was off. A few houses were celebrating something I could pass off as simply a very good day of fishing with a great payoff. Instead, almost the entire population was out. It wasn’t a festival and with us being at war…

I faded from sight. Not moving into the shadowy corners, as that was a cliche where people checked. I went up and moved onto rooftops and places where people didn’t look without reason to. I didn't give them a reason as I darted from position to position before settling down on a sizable crowd of drunk men. They raised their small glasses of cheap beer and made a toast.

“To the defeat of Uzushio!”

“To riches trickling down!” called another

“To happy shinobi spending big!” laughed another. This man got punched, with a few people sobering up and glancing around. Only one of the group looked up, but he didn’t look at where I was positioned. Not that it would have mattered.

“Idiot! We’re happy for them, but don’t make them sound like idiots!” said the watchful man before he gave up his vigil. He reached out and grabbed the beer. “If you’re going to be like that then get out of here. You know it’s important to smile when things are going great and not raise our heads when things are bad!”

“Not like the shinobi are dropping coins on us! We’re just coin counters!” slurred the man. He waved his hand towards the red light district. “It’s them whores that get the silver and gold coins!” He chuckled. “And they get railed!”

The men snorted while others rolled their eyes. The more vigilant man sighed. “I’ve told you those girls aren’t so bad. They spend big and spread it around. They’re not stupid.” He then punched the man without warning. “Also, one of those whores is my niece, so keep your mouth shut.”

The man got a surly look before he had what must have seemed like a clever idea. The other man’s face darkened and he must have known what was about to be said as he raised his fist.

The drunk man stood. “I’ll be sure to pay her a visit then!”

“Bastard!” And just like that, a fight started. The other men didn’t stop drinking and instead decided it made for good entertainment. The more watchful man turned out to not be a very good fighter. I hummed and considered my options before leaping down. I caught the drunk’s fist as it sailed in. It was so slow…

Instantly, the group all stopped drinking and hooting like monkeys, calling out for their fighter to beat the other up. “Sir they—” They started to say, only to notice a lack of a headband on my forehead. “Ah hell, it’s a kid.”

“Let go you little shit!” snarled the drunken man. I flexed my arm and twisted him into a kneeling position. “I think you’ve proven yourself enough. Go home,” I said. “Or don’t…” I twisted his arm a little more and then relaxed it causing a sharp spike of pain that had him gasping. Then he threw himself away from me.

The others watched me like a snake, realising that I might be a kid, but I was still a threat. More than a few eyed my vibrant red hair. I chewed my lip and turned to the other man who was down on his back with blood pouring from his nose and a pair of black eyes already forming.

“You, come with me. I want to talk with you,” I said, making him stiffen up. I offered a smile. “Your niece is Tifa, right?” I said eyeing his features. The thick eyebrows rather gave it away. She’d had a very hard time plucking them until I’d numbed her skin and allowed her to do it easily.

I’d won a lot of favour with the women of the Okiya when I proved I could do that.

“Uhhhh sure kid… sure,” said the man I’d saved. “You’re Matsu right?”

I nodded and gestured to an alleyway he stiffened, and I rolled my eyes. “I’m not mugging you; I just want to talk.”

“Cause that’s so much better,” muttered the man, not aware I could hear him. Heck, I could hear what was being said between the group of muttering men, with them trying to be quiet.

“Come on,” I said, moving to the alleyway and out of sight of the main road. The man followed and grunted. “Fado,” he said introducing himself. I hummed.

“Matsu,” I said back, being polite. I leaned against the wall. I nodded toward the street. “When did news come out about the victory?”

“Couple hours ago.”

“When did the fight supposedly take place?” I asked quickly.

“Less than a week,” he said back.

“What are people saying?”

“The Swordsmen and another group of shinobi, one of the clans—no one is sure— caught a large group of Uzumaki on open waters. They killed them all and there were a lot of riches found that the Mizukage supposedly allowed the fighters to keep. There are word going around that there is going to be more fights with the Uzumaki.” He eyeballed my hair. “Kid, you might want to shave your head…”

I nodded. “That’s… not bad advice old man.” I ran a hand through my rather long, vibrant, and pointedly red hair. I hadn’t considered the implications of having the telltale Uzumaki red hair, but I should have. Anti-Uzumaki sentiment would be riding high. I sighed and pulled a kunai out making the man stiffen up only to pause when I started shaving my head then and there in the alley.

“What… what are you doing?”

“You and your group of friends,” I said, flicking my eyes to the group in front of the alleyway, “have been saying there are a bunch of hyped-up shinobi running around the place. There is going to be a large anti-Uzumaki-sentiment, and here I am with red hair.” I raised an eyebrow at him. “Do that math.”

“Ah,” he said as the last of my red hair fell to the ground. I sighed. The madam was not going to like this. But needs must.

I hummed and asked a few more questions of him but didn’t get much. Not that i expected to. He had no idea what riches the fighters had secured, nor how many casualties had been taken. Only there was a lot more bloodlust in the air with people sensing weakness with the Uzumaki. People I more than likely had blood ties with, albeit only half-blood ties.

Before I left, I gestured at his nose. “Want me to fix that with some… ninja magic?” I said instead of explaining my technique.

He considered me before shaking his head. “Nah, if I come out all fixed up the guys will be way too suspicious. They’ll already be asking if I sold them out to a little shinobi in training.

I nodded. “Point… should I rough you up a bit?”

He shook his head and I left him to it.

On the way back to the Okiya, I noted more signs of revelry, but now that I knew to look I noticed how forced it looked. Like the people were happy because they knew it was expected of them and not because they were actually happy.

When I reached the red light district, I immediately noted that it was packed. Shinobi were sauntering into the various buildings and happily receiving greetings. I could see my home… and that was a strange thought, that I had grown used to living in an Okiya.

It had women out the front calling out and greeting the honourable sirs and mistresses that swaggered around like peacocks. There were girls on that should have been on their downtime, which told me that a much larger group had been called up.

I played that out. That meant that if they were entertaining the various patrons, they’d need more rooms which would mean the rooms that usually were for the girls to rest in might see clients in them. My room was safe as was my stuff as it was always packed away and not even the lowest of clients would be ‘entertained’ in the rooms I shared with a few of the younger girls for sleep.

But still.

It stood to reason that trying to sneak into my room to fall asleep was not a wise move. Sneaking up on hyped up shinobi? Bad idea. Ones that would be drunk and probably not amused at having to investigate a rookie sneaking around.

Bad idea. Very, very bad idea.

I almost wanted to pat myself on the back. But then I realsied I was being arrogant. It wasn't that hard to follow the chain of logic. I slunk off to find Shoto’s crib. I woke him up and waved the eel I’d caught in his face. “Late-night snack?” I said.

He grunted and sat up from his bed roll while I inspected the rather run-down rooms he’d claimed as his own. “Doing well here.”

“Well enough.” He shook his head. “This doesn’t count as you sneaking up on my by the way. I sensed you coming.”

“Wasn’t trying,” I said before huffing. “Mind if I crash here tonight?”

He tilted his head and moved to the window. “Sure but why? Also why are you bald? You look creepy.”

I snorted and told him why over dinner.

The next day at the academy, I got some thoughtful looks, and Instructor Tenpora paused, looked my bald head over and nodded approvingly. It didn’t stop him from starting the lesson by trying to sneak a genjutsu onto everyone while throwing a barrage of kunai at us.

During a break, I tapped Himeko Kaguya on the elbow and jerked my head somewhere out of earshot from others. She followed curiously but gave a flat “What?” when we stopped.

“I need you to beat the snot out of everyone that turns up to today’s training session.”

She snorted and bit into her rice. “I already do that!” she said grouchily.

"Yeah, well I need you to do it fast, hard and like they owed you and hadn’t paid up.”

She eyed me and frowned. “Why? I’m not your dog to do as you order,” she said warily.

“We’re getting too confident,” I said. “We need a wake up call.”

She considered me thoughtfully. Her white hair swished lightly in the wind. “Won’t work,” she said after a moment.

“Why?”

“They’re used to me beating them up. They need someone else to measure up against and fall short.”

“That… makes a lot of sense…” I reconsidered my approach. “Hmmm yeah… you’re right, there are better ways to go about this. The shock value would make the lesson stick but there are other ways…”

She grunted at that before narrowing her eyes. “That girl is back again.”

“Yeah, I know.” I said, pointedly not looking towards were Hanahime Terumi was. The girl was clinging to a wall and she must have felt rather good about getting this close. She and others of her clan and their allies, when she was not fending off fights from the Hozuki, had started trailing my group. More specifically I now had a few people I always needed to shake at the end of the day.

I really wasn’t sure what I was going to do about her. I sort of wished she had better things to do. I sighed and nodded to Himeto, “Right well I’ll see you later this afternoon.”

With my Plan a having holes poked into it I decided to try Plan B. that afternoon I sat everyone down in our training group.

“We’ve gotten stronger, faster, smarter.” the kids liked this and perked up. I smiled sadly. “We’ve also gotten more arrogant lately. We’ve had more close calls with the clan kids detecting us when we sneak up on them. We’ve had to start shaking off people trailing after us and some of the results of that...” I shook my head.

Kizan frowned. “We’ll get better! Don’t be so doom and gloom!” The other kids nodded at that and I sighed.

“I need to be. I need to be realistic.” I slammed my hand. “How many of us can fight Himeto evenly?” None of us raised our hands. “Himeto are you even the strongest fighter in your age group?”

Himeto who’d been leaning and watching this discussion without a care, leveled a very annoyed look at me. “... No,” she said.

I nodded. I’d thought as much with the signs that she often had bruises and scraps on her body. If it wasn’t adults it had to be others in her age group. The Kaguya, sadistic as they were wouldn’t just keep beating on a kid… but then again I could be wrong and they did that along with her being beaten up by other kids in her clan.

The announcement of Himeto not being the strongest kid in our age group took the wind out of the others sails. “Eh?” Sharkbait said.

Rei fidgeted, but Kizan sniffed. “We beat those Kaguya kids on the expedition!”

“We outnumbered them." I waved a hand around at our group. “Are we always going to outnumber them? There are more of them in our age group than there are of us!”

Kizan grimaced but didn’t say anything else. I chopped my hand their the air. “I’ve been thinking of this and other things that we’re getting sloppy on. We’ve gotten stronger, faster, smarter, but we’re not using what we have better.” I tapped the side of my head. “We’re not thinking things through. We’re not getting wiser.”

I pointed back at myself. “I’m the same. I’ve not been applying myself and pushing myself.” I slap the back of my hand on my palm. “We cannot become lazy! We can’t become arrogant! We don’t have the safety nets, the special jutsu, the training. We need to start having sessions where we're not just fighting and getting stronger but training our minds as well.”

“How do we do that?” said Rei, worrying at her thumb.

“We make up games and talk through scenarios, like they would in planning ops for chunin yeah?”

This got some interest, and I grinned as I revealed a board I’d hastily gouged an eight-by-eight grind into, along with another that was set up for tic-tac-toe. I had other boards for Othello and checkers, and finally, after rummaging through my mind for another, I came across something that other kids had already played: Go.

“Kid games?” Shoto asked, leaning forward with a gleam in his eyes.

“Games that require us to think and weigh up our options,” I replied. I offered them up. “Who’s in? Or should I just have Himeto beat us up to show we’re not that good?”

The kids snapped their hands towards the games, much more enthusiastic to play games rather than fight Himeto.

I grinned and distributed the games, only to have Himeto claim the spot across from me. “Explain the rules,” she grunted out. I tried to stop myself from smiling, that would only earn my another broken nose. Hmmm perhaps this was a better idea than I thought.

This time I let myself get away with patting myself on the back.

I swaggered home that night feeling happy with how the day had gone, only for the Madam to take one look at me when I walked in and shriek.

“Your hair!!! Your beautiful hair! What did you do to it!?” she screamed, causing a number of women to poke their heads out. They also gasped in shock.

“Ah,” I said, caught out as I put a hand to my now bald head. “Calm down, I can explain!” I said. Sadly that didn’t help.

I really wish I hadn’t forgotten about this…

[hr][/hr]

Nothing too crazy occurred for the next semester. The cold war between the Terumi and the Hozuki continued to play out, with tensions building. The kids and their allies clashed in ‘schoolyard scuffles’ that only ever got to the point of knives and swords being drawn before the instructors came down on it.

Each and every time the kids caught fighting were told to keep it for the expeditions.

We learned how to move and fight in  groups, and the instructors had us fighting in ‘randomised’ groups. Occasionally groups were set up with a Terumi or a Hozuki on a group with another group and we all got to watch as kids tried to sabotage each other with trips and forcing them into unfavourable positions.

I considered it highly educational for awareness training as the Terumi or Hozuki could flip-flop on whether they were going to help or hinder you.  Sometimes the threats weren’t just the people you were supposed to be fighting but also your ‘allies’.

Each training exercise became a slog of being aware of everything around you and how you or others could act. Or perhaps I was taking it to an extreme? Either way, I tried to find the positive from the hellish training that made me want to beat up children.

My group learnt games.

We learnt when to push, and when to pull back with coordinated operations. We broke into a derelict building to run practise operations, and ran more stealth games against other groups while catching out and sometimes toying with the clan kids.

Something they did not appreciate with a few more kids trying to find us. We then made the call to let them catch us out and observe a training session where we were simply sparring. We made sure to use some of the same moves the next day before we altered where we were training forcing them to try again for subsequent weeks. The success the clan kids had ended up making them laxer in their vigilance of us as they instead tried to catch a weakness from their main threat with the other main clans.

I personally continued to hone my medical jutsu. Another trip to the medical wing thanks to a fight with A Hozuki kid with a katana getting into my guard during a bukijutsu match cutting me up. Tenpora had ended up dragging me there, growling all the way. I was thankful at the chance to as a few pointed questions and learn how they worked the mystical palm jutsu for things such as the intestines and heart. I also got some notes on the diagnostic jutsu that helped. It turned out I’d already been doing what I was supposed to.

The Diagnosis jutsu itself was in fact a chakra ultrasound that allowed you to feel the internals of the body and map a network. You did so by sending your chakra into the person at extremely small quantities over an arc that could be narrowed or widened depending on how much clarity you wanted. I’d never had to narrow the beam of my diagnosis jutsu yet but that might have also had to do with my much large chakra pool allowing me to brute force it with more chakra being used than another medic.

I’d also cleansed my nodes fully of the muck that had been within them. The brain nodes I had been excruciatingly careful with. When I had finished cleaning them out my chakra had surged and I’d almost fouled the water I’d been in as I gained more than the extra percentage of chakra I’d been expecting. If anything, it felt more like a ten percent boost at the final stage of cleansing.

I now had much greater ease in wielding my chakra, and my sensory skills had grown in range. Shoto now had to truly work to even get close to me.

I hadn’t opened a gate yet.

I had the choice of opening one of three gates. The two in the brain seemed linked together; both of them could be the first gate. That, or it started in the heart…

That didn’t seem right to me, however, as the heart opening up would lead to the groin first rather than the spine like the brain. I felt slightly more confident in the brain being the gate I had to open first. If only for the finer control that it would have with nerves being the first to open rather than the heart and groin.

I still wasn’t sure which was the right answer honestly. But I did know I didn’t want to open the gates while I was within the Village. I wanted to hold onto that ability. My very first ace in the hole as it were.

When we got intel that we were going into a cave system with the next expedition months in advance I smelt a rat and said as much. We still prepared for going into the cave system but my instincts were proven correct when they led us on a long run to a port in the shinobi district where we were sailed to an island that may as well have been a jungle. There were no beaches on this island. It went straight into mangroves that led into denser forests.

A web way of water flowed through it with large patches and clearing of land just visible through the trees. A lush verdant smell came with wind that stirred the leaves.

Unlike the Shark coast, the jungle was vibrant with life shown by the bird calls, the growls and the movement in the water beneath us. Instead of being released in singles we were all kicked off the ships in a large group.

There was an instructor we’d never met before who opened a scroll.

“Students are to form groups of four! Throughout the forest, there are a number of markers. Complete the set, solve the puzzle and survive for a week and you will pass. Fail this and you will be punished!” He then rolled up his scroll, and with a horrid grin, he began counting out numbers. He pushed a few people toward other groups, and soon there was a wide spread of different students.

I scowled when I realised they were going to make things very, very difficult for us.

I wanted to exhale in relief when I wasn’t put on a group with Terumi and Hozuki kids together. Himeto, however, ended up with me. It was cruel and unusual, but... Ah, they hadn’t said that our teams had to be the initial five we were put with. I kept an ear out and realised that they pointedly were working around that issue.

I held my tongue until the ships pushed off. There was an air of tension once more building up. I whistled and pointed to my kids.

“Rei! Shoto on me!” I then grabbed Himeto. If I didn’t she’d vanish on me. “We’re grouping up!”

One of the shinobi-born kids opened their mouth to argue with me only to pause when one of the Terumi to perk up. “He’s right!”

Instantly battle lines formed with the Terumi and the Hozuki reformed into their cliques. More than a little jostling occurred but no knives were drawn until only a few stragglers were there.

Things might have ended with just an uneasy hostage exchange, only for the Kaguya kids to grin widely. “FIGHT!” one screamed, and then suddenly it was a melee, with everyone breaking away from each other for space across the mangrove beach.

Amusingly, the Kaguya clan faced the brunt of attacks, and only a few other kids took hits. It didn’t stop them from screaming and adding to the din. A few kids fell into the water only to surge just as quickly out. “Alligators! There are alligators!”

A short thick snout shot up and snapped after their legs as they attached themselves to a tree.

Shoto hopped up onto the branch next to me. “Those idiots don’t realise that those are crocodiles!”

I snorted and shook my head. “I don’t think they particularly care. They have other things to focus on.” I watched as a few jutsu were thrown back and forth and for battlelines to form up. “That was scrappy…” I muttered aloud. “That was strange… the set of orders may as well have been to cause disruption. You can almost guarantee that the Kaguya would start a fight…”

Shoto shifted to a branch nearby. “I don’t think they expected you to brazenly call it out in front of everyone.”

“I didn’t like where they’d forced you and Rei,” I said causing Shoto to remember that he’d been one of the kids shoved deep into Hozuki hands. “Instead, I got you out and was able to reform our group with Himeto.” I shot the girl in question a glance. She seemed a bit unsure of herself now that she was standing with us while the Kaguya were pushed back.

“What’re you going to do Himeto?” I asked.

She grunted. “I’ll stick with you.” She rubbed her chest and smiled as one Kaguya took a water bullet to the head. I hummed and kept watching the brawl, stretching my chakra sense as far as it would go.

I felt some flickers that didn’t seem to have anyone attached to them. “Heads up,” I said sweeping my eyes about. “Somethings up… There are chakra signatures that don’t match anyone that…” I stopped when I felt a puzzle piece slot into place highlighting more than just tiself but also potential pieces around it.

“Hmmm forget it,” I said to Shoto and the other kids acting as casually as they could while shifting and checking different angles.

I clicked my tongue as a large gap formed up with the Kaguya, Hozuki, and Terumi groups gaining room from each other. There were lots of small cuts and scraps with only a few wounds that looked worse then they were. I grunted. “Let’s see if we can find those markers or if this entire expedition was just a bullshit excuse to pit us against each other.”

“Need a lay of the land first,” Shoto said before whistling to Rei to join him.

My group faded away, and we formed into four groups of four. With Tenpora no longer pretending to be a kid and Himeto in our group we had exactly sixteen which worked in our favour today. We could therefore claim we were sticking to some of the orders.

The jungle itself turned out to be rife with wildlife. Strong wildlife at that. We encountered gibbons that were highly territorial and more than happy to fight us with their loud shrieks alerting anyone with ears that someone or something had approached them. When Kizan skewered a leaping male we’d had to back him up and blast a number of monkeys with water bullets.

Their bodies had fallen onto the ground only for a large cat to leap one and snap its neck. That had the monkeys backing off and screaming at us.

When we reformed our lines, I laughed and jerked my head to the big money boss. “Hey Kizan? I think that monkey boss is swearing a blood debt against you!”

Across from us, the monkey in question bared its fangs and glared at Kizan.

“Pfft, please! I’m not afraid of a monkey!” he said while the other kids laughed.

Shoto then sidled up. “That monkey boss has a necklace with a kiri symbol on it. I think that might be one of the markers.”

I blew out some air. “Right, of course it is… looks like we’re taking them out as targets of opportunity. Kizan, Himeto, lead a charge after the next barrage.”

I formed three quick handseals and fired off a water bullet that broke apart a tree, forcing the monkeys to leap to a different tree while three other kids fired off bullets and plucked a few from the air.

Himeto and Kizan leapt into action. Both of them aiming for the head of the boss monkey. He screamed and threw himself against Kizan to kill him in a rage only for Himeto to score the kill with her bones spearing into him.

The necklace ended up having a cryptic phrase attached to it.

“I lurk not in the trees…” I read later around a small fire. This time we had been able to bring our storage scrolls and camp supplies had been on the list of items with a small fire tray being among the supplies.

A number of birds and fish were on the fire as I rubbed my chin. “It might be a hint for where to look for another marker?” I said while rubbing the necklace with the kiri symbol.

Rei bounced where she sat. “Still! This is pretty good no? We have a marker! We’re a quarter of the way there!”

“Depends how they score it,” said Kizan. “They might say that each group of four needs their own markers.”

“We don’t know enough… we need to scout out the terrain and learn what we can. I think if there are native groups like the monkeys, we will have contenders, but the instructors might just be spiteful enough to have tossed the necklaces in hard-to-reach places.”

The kids considered this before nodding together as one. The instructors were petty after all.

I considered what had happened, and I felt myself coming back to how the instructions had allowed for me to twist them. “There was something important back on the beach there… we were able to reinterpret the orders.”

“Were we though?” Kizan said. “The instructors might just decide to punish us for doing that.”

The others seemed on the fence.

Shoto, ever loyal shook his head. “Nah, I think Matsu has the right of it. We were being pushed into a trap. It's sort of like if the orders got intercepted and reworded only a bit. They couldn’t be too different, but they needed reinterpretation.”

“I think they’re going to keep doing that from now on,” I said, striking while the iron was hot. “We need to be able to be not caught out. Who knows the orders might become more intense and seemingly locked in. That doesn’t mean there’s not a way around them,” I said while thinking of what they might tell us on the day of graduation.

The kids nodded at that, and I felt content to leave it there. Before I went to sleep I sidled up to Shoto.

He nodded in greeting but I merely looked out into the darkness before whispering, “I’m picking up two chakra signatures that don’t belong to our class sneaking around. They’re very faint and I’ve been watching the position but nothing seems to be there… I’m not sure if its just they’re very good or if a jutsu is involved, but I had a thought that—”

“Careful those are deadly,” he said quickly, interrupting me with a cheeky grin.

I chuckled and nodded. “You’re not wrong.’ then I got serious. “I think I know who they are.”

He merely raised an eyebrow, asking me to elaborate.

“I think they’re Kiri infiltrator and stealth operatives. Think about it: there’s no way they’d let the little heirs and heiresses wander around with the risk of encountering older shinobi. If the Hozuki and the Terumi are feuding like this, wouldn’t it mean there’s a risk the adults would be called in? I think the village knows this, and so they instead force ‘neutral parties to keep watch.”

“As neutral as they can get anyway…” Shoto said while rubbing his chin. “What do we do about them?”

“Nothing.” I made a sign to stop him talking over me. “I think they're also there to evaluate our skills. No point letting them know we caught on.” I smirked. “Let’s train ourselves against them.”

I felt a plan tease at my mind with those words but the solid points evaded me. Something about training ourselves against our watchers…

I chewed my lip in thought as Shoto smirked. “Gotcha, same rules otherwise. Watch for any fights and see if we can pick up more jutsu?”

I nodded. “Yeah, Sharkbait reckons he saw the handseals for a fireball jutsu, and Rei says she picked up what might have been a substitution.” I rubbed the back of my head. “I couldn’t detect them though as things got a bit too chaotic for me there.”

Shoto merely chuckled and waved it off. For how terrible it was to watch kids fight so desperately, it really did help us.

Over the next few days, we worked our way through the jungle, sticking to the trees where we could. Eventually, we had to investigate the ground and the waterways that wound themselves throughout the island.

We found a number of other markers and slowly came to the conclusion that the cypher had to do with opposites. You could find a marker in the water, and it would talk about the trees. Then another in the dug-up earth mounds mentioned the sky. So we searched the canopy and found a single tree with a sea eagle’s nest in it. Sharkbait had been the one to investigate and had ended up needing to be saved by Rei when the mother eagle came home and tried to swipe at him with her claws.

We didn't find enough to cover our entire group, but we were confident in our response. Enough so that we decided to shift our focus; instead of just happening upon any fights that were breaking out, we sought them out, slipping as carefully as possible and tracking the various patrols and skirmishes.

"Hiding in the Mist!" exclaimed a Hozuki, exhaling a massive wall of mist against a trio of Kaguya. The Kaguya snorted. As Kiri nin the mist jutsu really wasn’t as dangerous as it might be for others. I marked it mentally as an ox, a snake, and a ram, with chakra surging up out of the shoulders rather than the mouth, as the Hozuki kid had made it look with his little breath trick.

The Hozuki then ghosted away on the Kaguya, who roared a challenge after them impotently.

When I gathered the group back up, I learned that Rei and Bait, as we were calling him now, had been able to witness a shinobi-born kid use an earth or mud bullet jutsu that they had the seals for.

And just like that, it felt like we were getting ahead, gradually closing the gap between jutsu and skills.

We ate well that night only to happen upon a Terumi girl —the same one from the last expedition, as my memory recalled—once more caught out. This time, she was attacked by a group of Kaguya kids. The largest had a demented grin on his face when he launched a bone spear through her guts, pinning her to the tree.

“Ha! That’s more like it! The clan will celebrate my name now!” he crowed. The Terumi girl did perhaps the smartest thing she could by kicking herself off the tree and running. The Kaguya boy merely watched, raising a hand to his group.

“Let her run; she’s dead anyway,” he said before turning away disinterestedly.

I signaled for us to follow after the girl. She led us on a bit of a run but soon collapsed onto the roots of a giant tree. Her breath came in short, raspy bursts, and her body was coated in sweat.

Her mouth dripped, faint trickles of blood spilling forth making it clear she was dying to even a casual observer.

A leopard stalked forth, and she raised a kunai only to fumble it as she lost control of her hands.

I clinically watched her. The leopard prepared to leap.

I flicked a kunai into it, nailing it in the skull. It dropped flat, almost like it had decided to have a nap.

The Terumi girl blinked blearily around, only to pause when I hopped down from the canopy. Kizan and Shoto came with me.

“Matsu! What the hell are you doing!?” Kizan hissed as I moved up to the girl. I put two fingers on her carotid artery and felt her heart weakly flicker.

“I think…” I licked my lips, “I think I’m buying us some leverage,” I said. Internally, I knew it was simply a case of my not wanting to sit and watch a young girl bleed out like this. I had a good chance of saving her, so why not?

Kizan accepted my reasoning, but I could see Shoto watching me for a while longer. His eyes flicked around the treeline, and I grimaced. “Yeah, they’re there,” I said, referring to the watchers I’d started to lock onto more and more over the week.

There were at least two now watching us and how we acted. I looked into the girl’s eyes and offered her a smile. “Relax, this won’t hurt.”

The girl’s eyes watered as she heaved in a great sob, only to shudder as my chakra swept through her and forced her heart rate to slow. My hand glowed green as I worked on her puncture. The Kaguya had punched a hole right through her intestines, and she’d lost a lot of blood.

Thankfully, it hadn’t ruptured anything like the kidneys or the liver. Just the intestines… If she survived this operation, she was still going to be in a tough situation.

I knit her flesh back together and slowly eased her back to some level of health. Her heart was weak, like the tiny fluttering beat of a little bird.

“Make a stretcher; we’ll gift her back to the Terumi.” I considered what to say next. “Get ourselves something in return.”

“Hmmm, sounds good,” said Kizan as he swept his sword through a few tree branches and vines to make a stretcher. Shoto vanished to give us overwatch while Kizan and I carried the wounded Terumi girl towards her camp.

When we got close, I called a halt. “Stop! A Terumi patrol is coming in,” I said. We deposited the stretcher and moved back a ways. It didn’t take long for the patrol to spot us and zero in. They bristled and were about to challenge us when one of them spied the girl.

“Shit! Chichi’s there! Get Hanahime!”

One of the kids in the patrol group burst off back towards their camp and soon ten more kids were rushing towards us while another ten were moving to encircle us. I felt our own group moving in behind us shoring up our escape.

Hanahime appeared in a burst of speed, and her eyes swept from me down to the stretcher. “What did you do to her?” she snarled, her expression turning stormy.

“Brought her back to you.” My simple answer caused the kids to pause in working themselves up. “She ran into a group of Kaguya, in particular the big one.” I tilted my head. “Jinba I believe his name is.”

“Tch! Chichi, why do you do it?” Hanahime shook her head, her long black hair shaking back and forth, before she locked eyes with me. “Thank you.” She swallowed. “Do you want our markers?”

I waved her off. “Nah, those aren’t worth bringing her back to you alive… for now.”

“What do you mean?”

“She took a bone through the guts. She’s going to most likely get an infection. She needs drugs for that, along with more specialised care than we can give her. I imagine you might have the drugs. But do you have anyone that can give her the specialised care?”

Hanahime moved up, confident that we weren’t going to attack her now. “But you were able to heal her?” Hanahime fingered the hole in Chichi’s dress.

I merely shrugged. “It’s not much.”

She searched my face. “One of your group can heal? And you think that’s not much? Where did you… No, who—”

I raised a hand. “No, I’m not giving that to you.” They’d most likely find out if Chichi regained consciousness after all. “When this expedition is done, I expect to be given certain items, whether she lives or dies.”

Hanahime clicked her teeth. “Very well…” Her eyes flicked down to my hands to inspect them. I knew what she was doing she was seeing if there was blood on them. A good medic didn’t get much on their hands though thanks to the mystical palm you didn’t need to outright touch the patient. I had some blood on my pants but I’d cleaned them out easily enough with a weak water bullet.

“Be seeing you,” I said before signalling for our group to withdraw. The Terumi kids didn’t follow us. When we regrouped Kizan clapped me on the back.

“Nice one Matsu! What’re we going to ask for? A new sword! A super strong jutsu maybe?”

I glanced at the group. “We need more utility. Things that can get us out of dangerous situations or set us up into advantageous positions Simple things such as the replacement jutsu, the rope binding escape jutsu and the Henge.”

“Huh?” Kizan said, as others murmured in confusion.

I shrugged. “I want enough that we get something good out of them, but not too much. I want them to still be favourable to us. Maybe leave us alone. As it is this action will technically align us with them unless we double deal and heal a Hozuki kid but they’re a bit too likely to double cross us.”

“Won’t that make us have to deal with the Hozuki?” Rei shifted back and forth, furtively looking around. “They’ll attack us as well!”

“We will have to, but I’m thinking a bit longer term. Our group? We’re outliers and that will only become more obvious after we… graduate.” I didn’t say if we graduate. Instead, I focused on putting us in as good a position as possible. I had half a hope of getting us through the graduation scenario. I just needed to get us as strong as possible. 

I had perhaps half a plan as it stood right now. Which was better than a year ago. Sadly it was very impossible and ballsy. I'd need to betray Tenpora, and find a way to make the clans put their infighting aside... And with the Kaguya... that was an impossible dream. But I wanted to dream for more... this next year...

I blinked as I realised what else next year meant. “Huh, we’re going to be second years after this…”

“Hah! We’re going to be above someone else for once!” crowed one boy.

“Hmmmm there’s some more opportunity there,” I said thoughtfully.

The others discussed other jutsu they might have wanted to get. With a fire, earth, water jutsu for us. There was a long discussion of getting a lightning and wind jutsu to go with it. I considered it and made adjustments while arguing for the replacement jutsu and the Henge. Both were perhaps crucially important. The longer we could practise them, the better.

Two days later, the boats arrived.

We met the instructor, who now had a smirk on his face. “Oh? What’s this? You decided not to listen to my groupings, did you? That’s not right, I’m a superior officer! That’ll mean punishment detail for the lot of you!” He then snapped his gaze onto the Terumi group, who were carrying an extremely pale looking Chichi.

“Tch! Suppose I can’t just cut her throat if your willing to drag her along with you,” he said. He waved us all onto the boats and we claimed separate spaces. Chichi’s head lolled to the side and she searched around with dull eyes until her gaze stopped on me.

I could see the recognition in her eyes as she whispered something, and Hanahime was next to her instantly. Hanahime looked up at me and a silent exchange of understanding passed between us. We both knew that I’d shown a bit of my hand.

When we reached Kirigakure, two older Terumi swept in and snatched up Chichi to cart her off. I was sadly unable to witness what they did with her. Instead, we had to go through the academy and clean it from the rooftop to basement levels I hadn’t even known were there. We sadly were barred from cleaning the instructors’ areas. It would have been quite the feat to slip in and steal intelligence, but then again, our instructors knew what we were like.

After all, they'd taught us.

Hanahime had approached while Tenpora had been supervising us while we scrubbed toilets. Her nose turned up as she was forced to take up a brush, but she claimed the stall next to mine by glaring at Rei.

“Hmmmm Chichi lives I see,” I said after a few minutes of quietly working. I could almost hear every ear nearby twitch and listen in. Thankfully it was just Tenpora and my group close enough to listen in.

Hanahime shifted. “Yes… thank you for that. She’s an idiot but she’s important to me.”

“Hmmmm so, you want my price now?” I asked.

“... yes, what do you want?”

“I want the replacement jutsu, a d-rank lightning and wind jutsu, and the Henge.”

“... that’s all?” She asked after a moment of silence. I could feel the others holding their breath as they tried to not make a noise.

“I also don’t want you to harass our group anymore during the expeditions. It's already dangerous enough out there. I don’t think it’s going to get less dangerous.”

“Want us to stop sneaking around and watching you train?”

“No,” I said simply.

“No?” she said incredulously.

“No,” I repeated. I didn’t want to lose the chance to safely train my group against hers.

“Why those jutsu?” she asked instead.

“For reasons,” I said.

“Which are?” she said pointedly.

“Entirely my own. Can you do it?”

“... yes… I might have some trouble getting a low ranked wind Jutsu.” She continued to scrub. “What would it cost to get you to join us properly?”

“Hmmm that’s not on the table,” I said back.

“You’re a medic Matsu. Skills like that… you healed her gut; that’s not a simple thing to do.”

“It wasn’t,” I said back. “I’ve been working at it for a long time.”

“How did you even learn such jutsu?” she said unable to leave it alone.

“Effort, lots and lots of effort.”

“... If we have any injuries during a future expedition… would you heal our wounded?”

“That would rely on you being able to make contact with me. I don’t want to be blamed for not being easily locked down. It’s not my fault if people get into fights and hurt, nor if I’m not around to heal them, understand?”

There was a sullen silence at that as she scrubbed. “Understood,” she said after a moment.

“It’ll cost you each time I have to do it by the way,” I added on when we were done. She nodded tightly and moved back to her own group. Kizan and Rei looked excited by that.

Rei vibrated in place. “Oh! That means if we find someone injured and heal them we can get more! Nice work Matsu!”

Kizan rubbed his chin. “If we wanted… we could even cause a few fights to play out…”

I sniffed. “I don’t think we need to borrow trouble,” I said quickly, hoping to shut down that line of thought.

Kizan shrugged. “It has potential.” I didn’t reply to that. I merely shook my head and made to move off.

“Matsu,” Tenpora said from his spot leaning on the wall. ”Stay behind. The rest of you, clear the room.” The others did so with worried looks back at me.

I locked eyes with him, and he searched my face. “That was cleverly done, but speak honestly. Why did you want the Henge, Rope escape technique, and replacement jutsu first and foremost?”

I shrugged. “Aren’t they the basic three? The three jutsu we’ll need to have a shot at graduating? I’d heard a rumour,” I said honestly. I had heard the rumour, and I knew it to be a lie.

Tenpora hummed. “We don’t really have a basic three you know? That’s not how your prove you should graduate. Only Konoha do that.”

“How do you prove it?” I said quickly, jumping on the chance for information I could share without raising suspicions. I also wanted to distance myself from the misstep I’d made. I had just referenced the basic three with graduation. Something linking me to Konoha. Something I hadn’t been supposed to know before now. Shit that looked… wait… It wasnt the rope escape, Henge and replacement for Konoha’s basic three was it?

It was… the clone jutsu. A jutsu I didn’t see the importance of, as I was more interested in the Shadow clone jutsu.

Tenpora shook his head, unaware of my internal thoughts. “That’s a secret you will have to learn and keep to yourself. Keep making your team strong.” He tapped the side of his head. “And keep shaving your head.”

I grunted in annoyance only to pause when he tossed me a scroll. He moved off the wall and sauntered away, not saying a thing as I unrolled it and saw that it was the rope escape jutsu and a basic genjutsu.

Huh, sweet.

I pocketed it and returned to my group with a smile and a wink causing them to relax. One year down now, and I’d learnt a lot. That didn’t mean there weren’t going to be a lot of hurdles to jump through but I knew we were doing well.

I had two years at the moment. I knew things were going to go down soon with Uzushio. There was nothing I could do about it beyond hopefully profiting from it without being collateral.

I rubbed my neck. It felt like the possible noose was loosening these days, but I didn’t want to grow lax.

I didn’t have that much time left before I’d be out of the frying pan and into the fire.

Two years until graduation. It felt a long way away but I knew it’d come very quickly. I somewhat had the Terumi thinking favourably of me. now I just needed to deal with ever-slippery Hozuki and the battle junky Kaguya.

Did other people have plans that would most likely see them gored or stabbed in the back?