Ready or Not, Here We Come

Kenji stood close to the tree that was not but about five meters away from him. It seemed that he had been a little slacking in recent weeks and needed a bit of down time to get his priorities straight and what better way to spend your down time than with some good ol’ fashioned training to help get your juices flowing in the right sports? Before starting off though, Kenji decided to warm up a bit, doing a little jogging in place, keeping his fingers loose by doing some quick handsigns and a few air punches to really get him loose enough to start.

Once he was ready, Kenji quickly performed some handsigns in order perform his signature jutsu. “Shadow Clone Jutsu.” A puff of smoke appeared and there were now two clones that appeared next to him, immediately ready to give what they had. Kenji took a quick breath. “Ok, this isn’t about power, it’s about control.” Kenji held his right hand out and one of the closes started circling his around Kenji’s while the other placed his hands on top of theirs. Before long there was a spiral of chakra appearing in Kenji’s hand, growing quicker and more solid by the second.

After a few minutes of that, a few sparks started making themselves well known as the ball of chakra started to turn golden. Kenji held onto this for a few more seconds before finally charging into the massive tree in front of him. Once he made contact to it, the tree instantly started to denigrate and once he was finished, there was nothing left but a stump. Kenji breathed in a lot once it was over and then sat down on the stump and lowering his head in exhaustion. “Ok… better.”

Seconds later, Kenji heard a young voice yell out. “Wow that was so cool!” Kenji quickly looked ahead of him to see an 8 year old Ayame looking over at him with admiration in her eyes and her jumpy body language telling him that she was excited. “What was that, dad? That was soo awesome. First, you made some real, real copies of yourself and then you just made a ball of energy then you wooshed into that tree and destroyed it. Can I learn that too, dad? Huh? Can I?” Kenji looked at his daughter a little bit confused for a second but then started laughing. ‘Yep, she’s my daughter all right.’

“Well, Ayame, those kinds of techniques are really hard to do and require a lot of discipline. I’m afraid you’re just not ready for them.” After seeing Ayame’s face fall, Kenji quickly added on. “But tell you what, when you graduate from the Academy, I’ll give you something so you can learn to make your own clones on your own.” Ayame’s face instantly little up, already not being able to wait to graduate so she just ran up, sat on her father’s lap gave him a big hug.

Now, 13 years old and ready to go, Ayame was sitting on top of a stump similar to the one her father made, sitting in a similar fashion as he did as well with an added twist of having her arms crossed. After a while, she whispered to herself “I’m ready now.” Once she opened her arms, a medium sized scroll was revealed to be in her hands in her hands and she soon popped open the scroll and looked inside. “Kage Bunshin no Jutsu, I’m ready for you.”

“Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!” The sound of a girl yelling out the commands and then a puff of smoke indicating the jutsu was in its operating phase filled the forest area of the training grounds, causing a few birds and owls to leave their former night time hang out spot in the woods to escape from the noise and the smoke, a little bit of the cursing too probably. This was probably the 9th time that this same exact sequence of events had its turnabout. But, hopefully, this wasn’t going to be the 9th failure in a row and yet another waste of chakra.

To Ayame’s severe disappointment, this actually was the 9th failure she had accomplished in a row once she looked around her to see no clones or anything. Making a deep sigh, Ayame went back to the tree stump that she was sitting on prior to her training. She then took out the scroll that she had kept in her blue skirt pocket and took yet another look at what she was working with. While reading, Ayame started moving her mouth to the words on the scroll, making sure she had everything right thought out to make sure that she would be able to complete this jutsu a bit better.

Once she thought she had it down packed, Ayame closed the scroll and returned it to her blue skirt pocket, ready to set this one loose. Ayame did a little bit of stretching out first though to get herself prepared a little better and to loosen herself up as well. She started out by walking to the middle of the field and placing her hands on her sides, leaning back all the way until her hands would eventually touch the ground, giving her back and spine a good workout. Once she was finished, Ayame continued to lean back until she basically performed a slow back handspring and landed on her feet.

Now that Ayame was a bit more prepared this time, she took a deep breath and concentrated. ‘C’mon Ayame, you can do this. All you have to do is distribute your chakra evenly. Just distribute your chakra…. evenly…’ Ayame closed her eyes slowly and waited for a while, keeping her head clear of anything distracting for the first time in her life so she could concentrate better. She took a deep breath, this time she was going to get it done right. The young girl performed the required handsign and the puff of smoke appeared again.