Loser or genius
Chakra is mysterious energy that can create literal miracles. That’s why most children want to attend Academy, the only place, which can teach you how to use it. The older you get the more difficult it is to access your chakra. If you are not guided properly from the start, you will simply be unable to do anything.
If you grab some random middle-aged woman from the street and make her perform hand seals, the chakra in her body probably wouldn’t even stir, because it was unused way too long. If you do the same to a young child, it may result even in injury to chakra pathways, because he doesn’t know what he is doing.
One needs to complete many steps before attempting to perform any Jutsu- mediating to get attuned to the correct flow of chakra inside your body; having refine enough control over it; having sufficient information of what exactly is happening inside your body when you make hand seals; to know inner workings of the Jutsu itself, its purpose and effect.
For example, Henge requires you to clock yourself in your own chakra, while clone technique needs to be done by expelling it outside of your body. Another issue is that you can quite literally die from chakra exhaustion, so no one can just smash fingers together and perform incredible feats.
The Academy Three: Clone jutsu, Transformation Jutsu or Henge and Substitution Jutsu.
That is the only ninjutsu we will be learning, they are relatively easy techniques, which have no offensive properties. They are mostly used to diverge attention of your enemy. There is certain percentage of dropouts every year, these jutsus were taught with that in mind. Ex-students won’t be able to bring any real harm with those techniques.
At least I heard it was like that during peace. War times required every possible able-bodied person they could get their hands on. That’s why quality of fresh graduates was worse than usual, but harsh missions beat them up to necessarily level fast enough.
Currently we are learning Clone Jutsu, there are only four hand seals. Surprisingly, it is the easiest among them. You just need to expel chakra from tenketsu points and create an illusion of yourself. With enough practice we will be able to make them move as we wish, because there wouldn’t be much use of this technique otherwise. For that you have to actively think how you want that illusion to look. I don’t think that I have ever stared at my own appearance in the mirror as much as I did while learning it. How my clothes move, when I run or sit, how much my mouth bends when I smile. You can’t exactly see yourself in a way that you see other people. In a way it is funny how we live inside our bodies and still don’t know enough about ourselves. If nothing else, it helped me stop having flashbacks of what happened every time I looked at my face.
Sensei gave us only a week to practice and today we will be performing them in classes. The new thing, that I found out about myself is that I am not very good with small details. Well, I won’t be genjutsu master any time soon. Maybe it is because people always commented on my appearance, my face and body are always without mistakes, but clothes seem cloudy. Little details like on what side the button is always come wrong.
As far as I noticed most students have the same problem, they either slightly mess up their own features or clothes. Is it correlated to what we pay more attention- how other people view us or how we view ourselves?
I was a bit nervous when everyone stared like that, but successfully passed nonetheless.
Laughter resonated throughout the room, I couldn’t help myself, but also smile. Obito’s clone looked like rather comical. He nervously stared at Rin, when he was doing hand seals, that’s probably the reason why it had dress and ribbon on him.
“Oi, Uchiha. You didn’t have to tell everyone about your weird hobbies like that.” Someone shouted in the crowd. Obito clenched his fists and blushed so hard even his ears were red. He plopped on his seat face down on table and hid himself from everyone with his arms. Poor Obito.
I personally don’t think there is anything wrong with boys wearing something like that, it clearly wasn’t Obito’s intention though. When I was young, I was given skirt to wear, I don’t know if caretakers just mistook my gender or we had shortage of clothing back then, but I didn’t even know that I am not supposed to wear it as a guy. But all of it concerns only some traditional clans or civilian man, because they are just weird like that, and I have never bothered to found out the reason for that.
“Next. Hatake Kakashi.” Sensei read from the list.
Hmm?
He didn’t stand up from his place and just made correct hand seals from his seat. Suddenly more than 20 clones popped around the room. The one near sensei raised his head and looked at sensei. He moved? What the…
Dead silence. No one even breathed. Everyone stupidly stared at clones around them. Every single one of them was perfect copy of Kakashi. He dispelled them after a minute, probably because of chakra consumption.
He made the clone move; I couldn’t even get all details right on one stationary illusion. We were only taught this Jutsu a week ago and he wouldn’t be able to practice it before that, because his chakra coils would still be forming like everyone else’s. So he mastered it only in a week? I could feel my whole body trembling and my pupils contracting. I heard people constantly praising him for being a genius, I admitted that he was talented, but thought that he just trained more and received guidance from his father, who is incredibly skilled. Him being better than us was just inevitable.
But that… that was just crazy. He is a monster. I didn’t know someone like him could possibly exist.
And we are the best class among our grade. I secretly checked students from other classes and they weren’t even half as good as us. I couldn’t tear my eyes off Kakashi, he just looked bored and slightly confused, seemingly not understanding why everyone freaked out so much. Crazy bastard.
He suddenly turned his head into my direction and he seemed to have scanned my whole existence with his eyes. I admit that I got caught staring, but do you have to be so intense?? Take your laser beams somewhere else. It is not like I was the only one. I was practically sweating and finally breathed out in relief when I stopped feeling his gaze drilling into my side profile.
Noise returned back in a previously quiet room, and everyone started loudly praising him including sensei.
“As expected of a son of such a legendary figure.” He glanced at Asuma Sarutobi after saying that. Sensei might be good at explaining stuff, but his psychological manipulation brings more harm than good in my opinion. With one sentence he made Kakashi’s achievement to be that of his father, it will make him work harder so he won’t sully his name. He also subtly slighted Asuma. “Like look, as the son of Hokage shouldn’t you be as good as Kakashi.” Which will probably make him pull more effort. In theory it sounds good, but he didn’t acknowledge Kakashi’s talent and in the future if he won’t produce the same incredible results, he will just break down. Also, Asuma now probably has inferiority complex and animosity towards Kakashi, with whom he could have bonded because of their similarities.
I glanced at Kakashi and he looked as unbothered as ever. Yep, just wasted my worry in vain. He probably cares about opinion of chunin sensei as much as that of a piece of a gum on a road.
One look at Asuma showed that he was slightly affected by that display. I haven’t interacted with him at all, because honestly I was not that curious about him and there were always those, who wanted to get close to him because of his dad, so he kept his distance from everyone else except his close friends. To be honest, he is rather talented guy, but not really that impressive. I didn’t know if he purposefully placed in upper 15% of a class and didn’t want to be higher placed in a ranking. Or maybe I overthink and he is as good as little scruffy orphan like me.
At the table where Obito and Rin sat, Uchiha looked downright shell shocked. He has been constantly declaring how is going to beat Bakashi despite the fact that one is top student and another is dead last. I think he finally understood the gap between them. He just wanted to show Rin that he is better than him. But how can you possibly outperform that monster? The heat in Rin’s gaze began shining even more brightly, she kept stealing glances at Kakashi with her burning cheeks. She is not the only one. They looked at him almost worshiping. How creepy.
Bang
Sensei loudly hit his book on the desk “Silence!”
“We now will continue with demonstrations. The only one left. Might Guy.” Shit. I winced inside. Did Sensei put one after another on purpose? I don’t think he is all that happy with Guy being in our class, sometimes it feels like he is trying to push him away from the path of shinobi. He always sighs when he sees him, even though Guy is actually diligent student with good marks and attitude.
I sat next to him and could visibly see blood draining from his face. Isn’t he alternate? I thought that he will pass some special exam only based on his taijutsu. It is known to everyone that he can’t do ninjutsu. Maybe he can? It is only little E-rank Jutsu after all, you don’t need that much chakra. But to go after monstrosity that Hatake showed. Poor Guy. I don’t envy him.
He finally started moving, he looked almost like he was facing his death. Kind of weird to see always cheerful Guy like that. He clasped his hands together, looked up at the ceiling and muttered something under his breath. I only heard “Help…angel.” Is he praying right now? Didn’t peg him for religious guy.
“Hahaha, he looks like he is going to piss his pants.” I think it was said by the same dude, who mocked Obito. Is he a bully or something? How tacky. Some cronies around him started laughing and everyone else in classroom soon chimed in.
Guy audibly gulped and started making hand seals. There was suddenly so much smoke near him. It wasn’t supposed to be like that, the amount should be minimal from conjecturing and expelling. Seems like something is wrong.
There were only clothes with no body or face at all, like there was an invisible man inside of them. Soon they just fell to the ground. So, he really can’t do any ninjutsu.
Sigh
Sensei pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. That group of bullies continued to throw mocking words at him as he returned to his seat with shaky legs and dropped shoulders. Not every single person laughed at him, because it really isn’t laughing matter. But he was pegged as hopeless case. It is in our culture to recover the strong.
This is the path he has chosen for himself, so there is no place for pity. He will have to bear all of this and even more for quite some time, because he will be weaker than us at the beginning. Would your physical strength matter in a battle, when your opponent will throw long distance Jutsu at you and you won’t be able to get even close enough for hand to hand combat.
You must have an incredible will not to give up halfway, when all your peers around you are getting progressively stronger, while your own progress will feel like slow crawl of a turtle in comparison. But if he actually reached the apex of his specialisation through all this hardship, he really will be a monster on his own right no worse than natural geniuses like Hatake. I wonder what is pushing him further that desperately? Is it that weird concept of Youth that he has always prattled on? Will of fire perhaps? Proving everyone wrong about his father?
Ring
The class is finally over. Everyone was gathering their things and running out of room like their lives depended on it.
Guy was still sitting at the desk seemingly lost in his own thoughts.
“Hey, Guy. What did you do before the Jutsu?” I curiously asked him. He flinched when he heard the word Jutsu and looked up at me.
“I mean I think you started praying. Are you interested in some religion?” The land of Fire doesn’t have unified religion or anything like that. Most people pray to the things that give them hope, because sometimes it is the only thing that you can do while in despair. It all depends on person himself. Some pray to Sage of Six Paths, some to Amaterasu, some even to spirit of deceased Hokage, hoping they would protect them even after death, some to their summons and their holy lands. The Land of Fire has many bizarre things, secluded sects and places, so everyone is free to believe in whatever they want.
I am atheist myself like most shinobi, so I was curious about religious beliefs. To be honest, after taking someone’s life it is difficult to think, that you will end up in a good place after your death. That’s why I refuse to believe in anything at all. It is better to believe in myself and my own effort, to placate my restless mind, when things get hard, I also don’t need anyone else.
I wouldn’t say that I am particularly close to Guy, but we are sitting next to each other, so it is hard not to talk at all. It is not like he is stupid or anything, just extremely energetic. So conversing with him in moderation is rather pleasant experience, he also inadvertently gives others motivation to do better. But there are not that many people who talk to him in a class, I think they just decided that he would sooner or later quit and there is no point in making contact with him. It may be a bit cold hearted of me, but I also have veiled interest in seeing whether he will make it or break it.
Guy suddenly jumped from his seat and clasped our hands together. His face was extremely close to mine, and I could see literal stars in his eyes. Personal space, you nut job. “Dear kind-hearted Kaito.” I think he has some misconception about me. Just because I wasn’t outright rude to him doesn’t really mean much.
The only kindhearted person in a class is probably Rin and she is gunning to become a medic nin, they are supposed to give a shit about well-being of others at least a little. In her own way she is abnormal as fuck, I have seen her trying to help some kid find his lost ball for an hour straight. Tutoring Obito for god knows how long on topics she already knows herself. Who would honestly do that? She is just so nice and helpful to everyone to the point that for cynical ass like me it seems abnormal. Maybe she is some closet pervert and wants to feel good about herself by doing good deeds, while secretly thinking that these ants should indeed feel grateful to her. Or she is purposefully gaining such reputation, so when she will do human experiments in the future no one will think it was her all along?
I am being way too paranoid. She seems like a genuine nice girl, but I really don’t trust my judgment of character after Daiki. Always expecting to find secret layer and looking underneath the underneath. It is good quality to have, but it shouldn’t be directed at my future comrades, someone whom I will have to entrust my back to.
I came back to my senses when Guy started shaking my hands left and right. “I was praying to Goddess of Eternal Youth.” He exclaimed loudly. “When I was challenging myself to run 500 laps, I am embarrassed to say it , but to the end of this marathon my faith in Youth has started shaking.” The tears were streaming down his face. The stupid fuck still didn’t let go of my hand. I really shouldn’t have asked, he got in one of those moods.
“But then I heard a voice of Goddess, that sounded like heavenly chimes, that pierced my very soul. “Don’t listen to them. You can do it. Just a little bit more” he said. What absolutely wonderful words.” My smile got stiffer, my whole face cracked like porcelain bowl. Isn’t it me? I thought with despair.
“After that I successfully got into Academy. From now on I will never doubt the power of Youth, its flames are burning brightly inside of me.” I was glad at that moment that my face was hidden, because the expression I was making at that moment was bound to be wonderful.
Suddenly I heard someone coughing and almost overturning the table. I looked at the maker of that ruckus. Hatake was suffocating himself in that mask and he glanced at me with really weird eyes. His shoulders were trembling, he was making wheezing sound and trying to suppress it.
He doesn’t know, does he? But why would he react so weirdly?
Guy looked slightly offended by Kakashi. “That’s really won... wonderful, Guy.” I said practically in tears.
“I wish they would show me their majestic form one day, but I know they are always with me.” You are looking at him right now. I can never tell him it was me. Hatake started coughing again, but he finally left.
I have never imagined that my little cheering would be interpreted like that.
I am Shimizu Kaito, Academy student and Goddess of Eternal Youth. Why not God, when I am male? I am also curious about that.
I really hope he won’t burn incense to me or something like that.
Well, whatever.
“I really don’t feel like doing anything today.” I loudly yawned and looked outside. It was getting progressively colder day by day, but right now the weather was surprisingly nice. Warm and gentle breeze, birds still flying around, fluffy clouds and bright sun. I grabbed some food and blanket and went outside.
Smash
The sound of broken plates resonated throughout the whole building. “You good for nothing imbecile!!Did you gamble all of your money again?!With what are we supposed to pay the rent this month? Huh? You tell me!” The couple that lived not that far away from me were going at it again.
What a beautiful day.
“Awuah.” The guy who lives above me started loudly crying. “What do I do, Haru?!” He is senior from Academy, who came from the same Orphanage as me.
“I have already failed graduation exam two times. Sensei had started hinting to me about carrier change and civilian school. That Substitution Jutsu is so damn hard, I just can’t get it right. Even if I graduate I will be just sacked into Genin Corps and rot away there.”
I continued on my way. The sun peeked slightly throw the clouds. How nice.
I saw bunch of grannies loudly discussing something on a bench. “Hah! That Ayame is slut like I told you.” One of them puffed her chest proudly. “I could see that her eyes were shifty.”
All others joined in gossip and slander. “Tried to become rich lover of her married boss. What a joke! But now look at her, pregnant and fired.” They kept muttering and nodding their heads. “It is karma. Tried to saw a wedge between couple.”
Wind carried the smell of apple pie towards me. Seems like Akane-san is cooking already. No one can ruin my mood.
“No! Don’t hit me. I don’t have money!” The act of bullying was happening in alley behind the building, where I live.
I could feel my eyebrow twitching. Can’t they all just chill?! Such a pleasant day. Why are all so dramatic all of the sudden? No one can ruin my mood.
Meow
Shiro came to me and started pressing himself against my legs. “Do you want to go with me, little one?” All anger left my body. I picked him up and headed towards secluded place near the river.
I saw someone bullying a child again on the streets. How annoying. I have already decided to avoid the commotion, when I noticed familiar shade of green and orange. Only Guy would wear such disastrous combination. One shinobi held his head with one hand and another was saying something to him with disgusting smile on his face. You don’t have to be a genius to know that he said nothing good. I didn’t know their situation, so I decided to come closer and eavesdrop on them.
Guy was swinging his hands trying to punch one of them, but the difference in their strength was so great, that he only looked like some child play fighting the other.
“Your father is a joke. Always chasing Youth at his age. He can’t do any ninjutsu or genjutsu and even his taijutsu is subpar at best.”
“He is more a comedian than a genin.” The one holding him loudly laughed.
“Aaaaa! It is ten more punches for disrespecting my Papa.” He loudly shouted, but all his efforts were in vain.
Should I help him? I am not sure. Guy wants to redeem the honour of his dad and get them to apologise. Let’s just pretend, that I didn’t see anything. I have heard so much gossip and slander about his dad, both of them are constantly dealing with stuff like that.
But it is shameful, those two are probably genin themselves. I can’t imagine chunin and jonin having enough time to pick up on Academy student. They seems to be around 20 or so. Aren’t they just jealous? Or maybe ashamed? Usually the age when one is promoted to chunin is 14-17, at war times that limit is even lower somewhere around 10. And most of them are field promotions without any exams.
Might Dai is still trying to raise in ranks and he is proud to be genin of Konoha. While they have already given up and are ashamed of the fact that they have no real accomplishments.
Most of the kids join the forces with expectation of becoming something great. Because surely they will be the ones to etch their names in history, that one percent of shinobi, about whom stories are told and songs are sung.
But reality is cruel.
Maybe Jiraya no Sannin is partially to blame? He is inspiration to a lot of people. He was dead last at Academy and still became a legendary figure. But being a genius doesn’t necessarily mean having good grades. I heard from Matron about some of his feats during his childhood, all his pranks were so unique and unconventional. It almost feels like the way he sees the world is vastly different from everyone else. He was definitely genius in his own right, otherwise he wouldn’t be chosen as a student to Lord Third.
I honestly think that the best option is being genin or chunin with desk job: steady income, enough access to information, not much danger to their lives or mental health. Doesn’t it sound like a dream?
I turned around with Shiro in my arms as I listened to the sound of their punches landing on Guy. He won’t die from something like that. To begin with they are seasoned genin and we are Academy students. Even if I run to run to help, it will only increase the number of beaten-up people from one to two.
Suddenly someone ran past me in a blur. Kakashi sneak attacked them, while they were preoccupied with Guy. The first one went down after Hatake hit the pressure point on his neck with his foot. The other one was still crouching on the floor and holding Guy by his shirt. Both of them didn’t except to be be attacked like that inside of Village. They were still shinobi with considerable experience, so the second one reacted and tried to counter Kakashi’s punches, he was gradually moving backwards in Guy’s direction, who was still Lying on the patch of grass and clutching his stomach. Hatake only targeted his upper torso and a head, not even once hitting his lower body. Usually when someone with such small stature like Kakashi fights an opponent, who is way taller and bigger than them, they would focus on hitting their legs. With precise quick jabs and superior speed due to their smaller body they will try to make them lose their centre of gravity and fall down. Like toppling a tree by making cut after cut on his trunk. That was written in the books given by Academy and advised by our Sensei. So Kakashi’s actions didn’t make much sense to me. Did he get flustered and panicked during the fight? So, he just kept thoughtlessly hitting wherever he could?
No. The expression on his face was as bored as when Sensei was explaining mathematical equations on the board, and he already knew the answer before teacher could even finish writing down the question.
Suddenly shinobi stumbled on Guy’s body and lost his balance for a split second. Hatake didn’t miss that opening and made him pass out with chakra filled uppercut. To be honest he had his back turned on Guy and even then, we are still only 5 years old and quite small, plus his outfit made him blend with grass and ground rather well. I have never noticed that soil in the Village has somewhat orange- reddish tint to it, so his colourful leg warmers didn’t stand out as much as I thought they would.
I stared at them in shock, my whole body was trembling from sheer ridiculousness of what I just witnessed. I felt like hysterically laughing.
Did he… did he just defeat two genin… with absolutely no harm to himself. Even if they were civilians, they were two grown ass man at the peak of their Youth and physical strength. Academy student after a year of studying should be able to defeat civilian man with no difficulty. But it has only been two months and we didn’t even start to spar yet.
I have specifically spied on senior classes and most of them weren’t really using their heads that much during the fights, only flailing their arms and legs trying to land as much hits as possible and overwhelm their opponent with physical strength. But this fight, it seemed like Kakashi had already calculated how to defeat them in a quickest way possible without wasting a single move before the fight even started. I can’t believe he purposefully goaded him towards Guy and then used his own classmate as some terrain obstacle. I don’t know if it can be cold smart or cold hearted. We were taught to use everything possible to win- to throw sand in the eyes, to wear clothes and behave in a way that will either intimidate or make them underestimate us. So, what he did wasn’t wrong, but not exactly morally correct.
The fight itself didn’t last even a minute. I mean considering the fact that they were still just genin at their age and were bullying an Academy kid just to vent their anger, you can make a conclusion that they are trash. Still, they survived through one war and were in shinobi forces for approximately a decade, they are not inexperienced. Kakashi is only four…
“I can’t believe you couldn’t return a single punch after what they said about your father.” Kakashi said and looked down at him scornfully.
Wait… wasn’t he running from behind me? And he heard what they said and saw what they did, that means he was really close. I was standing right at the corner some distance away from them, so I would not get noticed and had to channel chakra to my ears, because you can’t hear otherwise. That means all this time Hatake was standing near me, he might have been right behind my back or even by my side.
And I didn’t notice at all.
Cold sweat started running down my back. I practiced sensory detection so much and this is the outcome. I felt bitter. He could have killed me and I wouldn’t know how it happened till the moment of my death.
He ran past me only sparing one judging glance in my direction.
Why do I feel so shitty? It is almost like I don’t deserve even a word from him.
Is it my guilty conscious?
Was I wrong not to help Guy?
I looked back at him. He was crying on the ground clutching his stomach. He just seemed so utterly defeated. I wouldn’t want anyone to see me in such state.
Should I console him? Or it would be better to let him preserve his dignity and not to embarrass himself in front of one more classmate?
Oh shit. It seems like there is problem with his ribs. I thought they would only here and there a little.
To be honest, I think I did the right thing. And what Kakashi did hurt him a lot. He doesn’t realise how much his opinion matters to others, the genius everyone looks up to. He is embodiment of natural talent, while Guy would represent the hard work.
I heard Guy say something about rivalry with him. This whole situation sucked to begin with, but then being shown and chastised by someone he wants to stand side by side with, made it even worse.
Haaaah. Let’s get him to the hospital.
The whole way towards hospital he was in a daze. I don’t think he realised that I was the one who was carrying him. My plan to enjoy my day with Shiro fell through. He is smart cat so he ran into our neighbourhood direction.
No one will ruin my mood my ass.
It was my first time not getting admitted myself to Hospital but bringing someone else. We had to sit in a waiting room, because his injuries weren’t that serious. They are as usual under-stuffed.
I decided to get us some water from dispenser. When I returned back, Might Dai was hugging him and crying on Guy’s shoulder.
I really hate myself for that trace of jealousy and bitterness that I felt at that moment.
Well, no reason for me to come back. I blended into the crowd and went home.
I wonder how it feels to wake up at the hospital and greet more people than just your doctor.
Will I ever know?