Honing one's skills (Training)

The gods had generously cleared the sky above of all clouds to permit the soft rays of the large burning mass of the sun to pierce through the maleficent scene of the scape and shed light over its tranquillizing detail. A pair of fairly tall and lusciously-green forests grew a few inches away from either sides of the rock-littered sandy shore, the glistening water reminding the moment of its insisting presents in the centre of the scene with its unpredictable trickles and soothing swooshes, as it calmly raced above the surface of the riverbed. Birds whistled their chords to the background noises of the rushing wind and the victimized leaves. The atmosphere was heavily saturated with organic smells of all tones and strengths, most of which were at the very least tolerable, if not undeniably admirable. Today he’d beg its tranquil nature to groom the mood of his training session. After his training session with Xan, he had promised his newly found Sensei that he would practice Kenjutsu more often to hone his skills and refine his technique, which at first seemed impossible to do due to his lack of interest in kenjutsu but after practicing for awhile it became as natural as breathing for the young boy which may be due to the fact that he was a denkou, whether or not he was able to use chakra.

“Finally here.” Hiro said as breathing heavily before tossing the weapons Xander had given him. Taking a deep breath he would let the fresh air of the mountain side circulate through his lungs before exhaling. It had been ages he had come to this place, the place where his parents were buried. As rogues from the Allied Shinobi Nation, they had travelled into Pandorian territory to live life a new or that’s what the thought. Hiro wasn’t one to hold grudges against people, as the hunter that had come for them was just doing his job, but oh how he had wished things would’ve been different. “No need to dwell on the past.” Hiro said as he shook his head in an attempt to clear his mind. Today wasn’t the time for a trip down memory lane, he had training to do. Making his way to the giant rock that was olddly situated in the mind of the small river, he would climb the massive rock with his katana in his hand and sat on the peak with his legs folded and his weapon placed before him.  The first thing on his list to do were a couple of breathing exercises.  Keeping his mouth closed, Hiro would begin inhaling and exhaling rapidly in equal durations but as short as possible. He had done this trying regularly with his father when he was a child and he had once said that this exercise was suppose to produce quick movement of the diaphragm which would help his breathing when the time comes, which he never understood why. At first he was unable to do it for more than 15 seconds on his first try but gradually he was able to perfectly execute the exercise and now he is able inhale and exhale in 2 min spans.  With the first breathing exercise over with he would move on to the second one. Opening his mouth this time he would exhaling loudly from his mouth making a loud whoosh sound. He would then close his mouth and begin inhaling quietly through his nose to a mental count of four. After counting to four in his mind he would then hold his breath to a count of seven and after counting to seven he would exhale through his mouth once more, making that very same whoosh sound from his mouth once more but this time he had held it for eight seconds. In the same breath how ever he would inhale again and repeated the very same process once more several more times before finishing up with the second exercise. The third and finally exercise was pretty simpler than the rest.  The moment he began exhaled he would count to one, and the second time he would count to two. This exercise was to help the air circulate properly through his lungs and though his father had told him to never go about the count of five, he would not only do so but go to ten. “Yosha, time to practice my swings.” Hiro muttered as he picked up himself and the katana from the rock.

Jumping down from the rock and into the shallow waters, Hiro would first stretch his limbs. After a quick stretch he would place the katana on the opposite side of his right arm, gripping the hilt as tightly he could but not as tight that he would become uncomfortable, ensuring the blade was completely secured and wouldn’t fly out on him like the last time he was training with Xan. After being pleased with the security of the blade, Hiro would twist the handle of the blade and unsheathed the sword quickly.  A sharp ring would echo throughout the mountain as the sword was cleanly drawn from its scabbard. “Nice.” Hiro said with a smile on his face as he examined the blade which he held on out, the weapon glowing in all its magnificence.  It felt a bit strange that he felt such a feeling looking at a weapon he had once detested, was it because he had begun to appreciate the art of the sword, or was it because it was given to him by someone how had believed in him? Even though he probably would’ve forcibly taught him the art of the sword anyways. Twirling the blade around in a full 360 degree angle he would sheathe the weapon and took his stance once more. Gripping the hilt and pulling the sword from the scabbard, the sweet sound of the sword being unsheathed would echo through the mountain once more and he would nod in satisfaction. “Unsheathing and sheathing a sword seems natural now. Well at least I’m not fumbling the blade now.”  He said with a smile on his face before tossing the scabbard to shore. Gripping the sword tightly once more he would begin swinging the blade from left to right, building up the muscles in his arms but would abruptly stop after feeling a pain in his forearm. “Ouch… This is tougher than I thought.” Hiro muttered as he rubbed his shoulders. But he couldn’t give up here as he had promised Xan-sensei that he would do 100 swings each day, it was either that or Xan would do terrible things to him... Letting out a soft sight he would grip the blade once more and began practicing his swings. At first he it had felt the pain would be unbearable for the young lad, after a couple of swings the pain would seem to diminish and soon after he was done, by some miracle of Carmen.

With the swings out the way it was now time to practice his moves, with the first being the Twin Moon Dance. It wasn’t until doing some research on Denkou style Kenjustu was when he realized that the Twin Moon Dance was intended for Female All True Taijutsu Denkou and men who had learned the style were laughed at in the clan. “Damn you Xan….” Hiro muttered as he took the stance of the Twin Moon. Ever since learning the move he had felt something so completely off with this technique and now he knew why… Unfortunately. The only good thing about learning the Twin Moon Stance would be because it would help him in training his speed. Letting out a soft sigh Hiro would begin doing a dance routine, he would the grip the katana and made his towards the giant rock in the middle of the river. Somehow he was actually moving faster than he would normally be when running regularly which was strange but he didn’t question it. After getting the hang of the Routine he would need to learn the rest because well…why not?

With that out of the way Hiro would begin practicing his Shunpo. Out of all the techniques that Xan had taught him, he had a fondness for Shunpo and he believed that with Shunpo the possibilities were endless.  He had gotten so used to using the shunpo, there was no need for him to actually force himself to fall as it all came to him naturally now. Using the technique he would Shunpo over towards the shore and flicked up the scabbard. He would then toss the scabbard with all his strength over the other side of the river and he would then Shunpo over to catch it. Catching the scabbard with relative ease he would throw it once more and would Shunpo over to the other side. Though the technique was a rather useful one he had come to find out that it had taken a terrible toll on his body if used too often so he would have to find some way to actually maximize the use of the technique or limit his usage of it, which completely sucks but there must be a way, but for now he was testing his limits with the technique. Making his way into the forest he would climb a nearby tree and set himself a target destination.  Pushing himself of the limb he would shunpo to the nearest tree at swift release speeds, the next would be a bit further than the previous so he would shunpo at bullet release speeds picking up the pace he would Shunpo to the next at bullet release speeds, feeling a bit weary, Hiro would up the ante and Shunpo to the next tree at crashing ground speeds but the tree would be a bit futher than he had anticipated, when he had attempted to land on the branch he would loss his footing instantly and would begin falling. While he was falling however he would grab unto a nearby limb and  before he used the shunpo technique once more would use the tree to propel him forward. The final shunpo he had left in him would carry him at speeds he would never have dreamt of, which was at Blinding Light. Unable to control himself, he would land rather awkwardly on the floor and caused him to tumble through out the forest at blinding light speeds luckily for him he had landed back in the small river he was at before. “Damn that hurt…” He said as he pulling himself up from off the ground. By some miracle of Carmen he didn’t receive any serious injuries and that was quite reassuring. Though he was pretty surprised he was actually able to move so fast using Shunpo, but though the reward was great, so was the risk. His body would begin aching all over ash he not only used shunpo more than eight times today, he also went and done the maximum speeds. “At least now I know my limits.” Hiro stated as he leaned against a rock breathing heavily. “Well I suppose that’s enough for the day.” The young boy said as he slowly but surely made his way towards the katana and the scabbard he had dropped and as well as the sack off weapons he had taken with him. He had done a lot today so it was high time he had gotten some rest, maybe grabbing a snack. Throwing the sack of weapons over his shoulders he would make his way to the small hut his parents had in the nearby mountains. “Will I be as good as Xan one day?” Hiro questioned as he trudged up the rocky path ways. In reality he had found himself lacking in many departments when he compared himself to Xan, ruthlessness being one of them, was it something he was born with? Or something he had gained over time? Hiro didn’t think it would be possible for him to take a life but what would happen if he was placed in that situation? “Well when the time comes, it comes.” He said as he opened the door to the hut, tossed the bag on the floor and collapsed on the bed falling asleep instantly.

Hiro’s eyes slowly crept open as he woke from his slumber and the first thing that would greet his eyes was the wooden roof. Letting out a soft yawn he would set up and scratched his bum. Feeling well rested he would get up from the bed and made his way to the kitchen, which be a couple feet away. Pulling out the green leaves he would place them in a cup and turned the stove on then placed the kettle on the burner. He had many fond memories of the place, the times he had spent with his family felt like such a long time ago but he remembered them like yesterday. “Hm?” While he was lost in thought the water in the kettle had boiled up. Turning the stove off he would pour the water inside the cup. Inhaling the sweet aroma he would grab the two biscuits he had carried with him. “Thanks for the food I’m about to eat.” He said out loud before pushing the entire biscuit in his mouth before taking a sip of the tea. While he was busy enjoying his tea there was some sort of commotion happening nearby. Putting the tea down he would unconsciously pick up the katana that laid on the bed and headed outside.

What had greeted him outside was a bit unexpected to say the least. Surrounded by a group of five men was a little girl laying flat on her bum with tears in her eyes. Immediately his mind would go back to the day he had witnessed the slaughtering of his parents, his mother had the same exact look on her face before she was cut down which not only saddened him but angered him as well. “What’s going on here.” He called out to the group gripping the hilt of his katana. Upon closer expectation would notice that the group of men were in fact members of his village the girl however showed no headband or any indication that she was from a village, maybe she was a missing nin? “Mind your own business kid, she’s ours.” The youngest looking boy spoke as he grabbed the girl by her leg. “We’ve been hunting her for so long and now what we’ll do to her…. Well let not say.” The eldest one said as with a crude smile on his face as the others laughed. Flailing the girl would let out desperate pleas for help as she struggled to keep them away from her. “Why are you after such a person? She doesn’t even look as if she could hurt a fly.” Hiro stated as he tried not to lose his cool at the fact they just seemed like a bunch of bullies. “Didn’t I say to mind your business chump?” The man bellowed as the others began undressing the young woman. “As if I’ll stand and watch this!” Unsheathing his sword he would shunpo in the midst of the men and swung his scabbard hitting those who were crowding the girl in the face knocking them back. “Tsk, piece of shit. Get em boys.” The men had quickly gotten up enclosed them both. “Stick to me as close as possible.” Hiro ordered the young girl as he prepared himself for the assault. Three things were working against Hiro currently, his mindset not to kill anyone, the fact they were from his village and the safety of the young woman, what would Pops-sensi do? “Probably kill everyone….” He said chuckling as he held his blade out to his opponents. As the ran towards him he place his hand on the girl’s head pushed her down on the floor before swing the sword in a full 360 degrees. The one that had advanced the furthest would receive minor cuts and bruises while the others would leap back.  Using shunpo Hiro would swing his scabbard down on his temple knocking him out cold. “Look out!” A soft voice rung out from him, spinning on his heels he would raise both scabbard and sword and block the on coming attacks that were launched towards him. “Close…” He muttered before pushing off the attack and using shunpo to appear behind him before pile driving him into the ground. The remaining three would begin running towards him. “Jeez.” Hitting the sword on a hard surface he would feel the pain of the vibration through his body, a bit more than before, but with this he knew it was more than enough. Taking his stance he would shunpo over before delivering a vertical slash towards the three men however instead of one slash there would be seven. He had purposely insured that none of the attacks were fatal but they had received the several slashes none the less. “Beaten by a kid…” the eldest muttered before passing out. “Are you okay?” Hiro asked turning to the young woman he had protected. “Y-yeah..thanks mister.” She said softly before attempting to stand but due to the injuries she had received she would just fall back down grimacing. “You’re hurt huh? Come on lemme help ya.” Hiro would quickly sheath his sword and picked up the young girl in his arms. “Hold on tight okay?” Hiro said as he would wait for her to cling to him before using shunpo to head back home.

“Here we are.” Hiro said as he opened the door with his foot and placed the young girl on the bed. “Sorry if the place is a dump, I hardly ever come up here.” He stated before grabbing some bandages and wrapping her injured leg. “T-Thanks mister….” The young woman stated with a weak smile. After finish wrapping her leg he would grab the biscuit he had saved for latter and presented her with it and the tea. “So what’s your name kid?” Hiro asked before tossing the katana to the ground and sitting on the edge of the bed. “S-Sakura…” She muttered softly before drinking the tea. Hiro had a lot of questions for the young woman but seeing how shaken up she currently was he decided to let it be for another time. “Well you are free to leave after you have healed but you are welcomed to stay, after all no one knows or stays here.” He offered with a smile. A long pause would be between the two but she would eventually speak. “I think I’ll stay…” She said with a weak smile.

WC: 3,128

Trained:

Ash

It couldn't be helped. Wailing away at these practice dummies in an environment like this meant ash was going to get everywhere. Even now as he had just started, Hiro was practically a ash magnet; his hair matted with it, his eyes irritated by it, his pants filled with the stuff. Even his shinobi sandals felt as though they were filled more with ash than with feet. This cheap bokken that the training grounds provided; Cracks filled with ash which flew all over as Hiro came at the dummy with a silent fury that he could only be attributed to the ash. That is, until the clouds receded. Unfortunately for him had chosen a day to train where ash was spewing from a nearby volcano eruption, of course no one got injured as this was pretty much normal in Jigokugakure but he was still pretty annoyed that it chose to happen when he decided to train. “Jesus Christ…” He muttered as he spat out the ash that happened to make its way in his mouth.

Heat

Even for Jigokugakure, this seemed like an unusually hot day. Perhaps that was the reason this training field was built here. Hiro was forced to squint his eyes due to the brightness of the sun as well as the grating sand in his eyes. Before long, his neck and arms would begin to burn, even as accustomed as they were to life in Jigokugakure. As Hiro continued to make basic attacks at the dummy, he couldn't help but grunt in frustration as his arms began to tire and his hair became matted with sweat and ash. Finally, as his shoulders became red from both strain and sun, Hiro relented, falling to sit on the ground. He began to breathe heavily; the stress of the training was finally catching up with him, and he could feel the beat of his heart complaining in his chest. As his heart rate lowered and he regained his composure, Hiro removed a water skin from his pack, taking a long, slow sip of relief before dumping the remainder over his head and wiping his face.

Hiro looked down at the bokken in his now blistered hand, unable to keep a slight tinge of disappointment come across his face. All he had been doing was train. He had yet to use his skills in a real battle and although he wasn’t confident in his abilities when in came to kenjutsu, beating up a practice dummy all day everyday was quite boring, it was time he used what he had learned against real opponents, not counting those hooligans who were after Sakura-chan of course... they just sucked. Letting out a soft sigh, Hiro would use the Stumbling Edge-Fall technique on the training dummy causing it and the bokken to fall apart completely, thus ending his training session for the day. Though he would’ve preferred to use his swords, he decided that it would be best not to use them so often as the blades may dull but perhaps it’s time he invested in a training sword, after all using a wooden sword is pretty lame. Tossing the broken sword on the floor, Hiro would shake the ash out of his hair and headed over to the young girl that had been sitting and watching him for the past hour or so. Ever since he had rescued her from those troublesome men, he had been watching over Sakura-chan and even though she had been in a shell for the longest time, it had appeared that she had been warming up to him, which was good after all he hated the awkwardness between them. “Done with training Hiro-san?” The young girl asked him the moment he had walked up to where she was staying. “Mhm… Was pretty dull, but then again training with a dummy is never interesting.” The young Denkou stated as he pulled up a chair and sat under canopy which protected Sakura from the falling ash. Giggling Sakura would pull out sweets she had made for the two and handed Hiro his share. “This village is pretty amazing; I’ve never seen anything like this before.” Sakura stated with awe as she looked around watching ash fall from the sky. Hiro however wasn’t impressed though he never had anything against the ash falling from the sky he found it a bit annoying at times like now when he wanted to do some training but he had to admit, you can only witness something like this in this village, maybe that’s why she liked it so much. Stuffing the sweet cake in his mouth Hiro would wash it down with some tea before turning to Sakura. “I’m pretty sure each village has their own appeal but the fact that we live amongst active volcanoes is pretty cool. ” He added with a shrug of his shoulders. “It is way better than that dark hole I used to live in…” She muttered as looked in her reflection in the cup of tea. She still hadn’t told Hiro why exactly she was chased by those group of men and every time he brought the subject up she would go back into her shell, which is why he had stopped asking completely but she had always stated something about her past every now again and it was never pleasant. Patting her on her head he would give her reassuring smile “Well now you’re with me and now you’re safe.”

Sun had set and the two had headed back to the little cabin the woods. Sakura had made it her duty to make dinner for the two as a means of repaying her debt to Hiro and whenever dinner was finished she would fall asleep almost instantly. It was nice having someone around to spend time with him, as Xan only showed up when he felt Hiro was slacking off and he hardly ever spoke to him about anything but training, well it wasn’t like he tried to anyways. Maybe they should have a heart filled conversion one day. Well it’s a bit hard to imagine Xan having a heart filled conversation with anyone. Letting out sight he would cover Sakura in a blanket and grabbed his Katana and went outside.

Like clock work, around this time he would practice his swings under the moonlight under the roof. Ensuring that he had ample footing, Hiro would quickly unsheathe his blade and began swinging the katana from left to right, horizontally and diagonally. He had started getting used to the feeling of using a sword and wonder when it would be time to put his training to test, though he wasn’t the one to walk around town to look for trouble, maybe he could take a dangerous mission one day, hopefully he wouldn’t die.

While he was busy thinking about sword practice something else had hit him. He still hadn’t practiced throwing his senbons! A few days ago after returning from shopping with groceries with Sakura-chan, he had noticed a pack of senbons that were left on his doorstep and he even though there was no note attached or any signs of the person who had actually left them there he had instantly known who they were from after all he was the only person who though giving a weapons to a young child was a cool thing to do. He had been putting off practicing with senbons as of course he had sucked at throwing them until that is he saw Sakura-chan do some tricks with them, it was then he had realized she had a knack for tossing those things around and even though she had ended up teaching him a trick or two he pretty much still sucked with them. “I suppose I could give em a try.” Hiro said before dipping into his back pocket pulling out a had full off senbon. “Sakura-chan said that in order to throw these effectively I must envision the target in my mind” Which was easier said than done Hiro thought as he awkwardly twirled two senbon between his fingers. Hiro would draw one senbon and threw it at a nearby tree, and off course it would miss completely as his aim was way off the mark. “This would probably be easy if I had my clan’s dojutsu….” He muttered to himself as he listened to the senbon whistling through the night air and finally sticking itself into a tree. Recalling how Sakura had looked completely at easy hitting multiple bulls eyes with the senbons he wondered if he would ever get so good with the needles, though she did state that it did take plenty of practice. Though he hadn’t been practicing a lot he had found himself not making the same mistakes he had previously done before, maybe that was the perks of being someone who trained their bodies solely for the use of physical based moves. Looking up towards an orange tree that was near his cabin a sole ripe orange caught his eye. “Hm…” Looking up towards the orange and down towards the senbon he had gotten an idea. “Let’s see what I can do.” He muttered as he took his throwing stance and took a quick look before taking deep breath and closing his eyes. “Picture the orange in my mind.” Hiro would quickly toss a senbon towards the orange and of course it had missed its target, he had tossed a second one but even though it had missed he could see that it was getting closer to the target. After about wasting twenty senbon he was left with only one. And though he had managed to trim the tree down abit he still hadn’t got his target. Frustrated Hiro would toss the senbon angrily towards the sky not really caring where it would land and to his surprise it would hit the orange, it hadn’t cut it down but it had managed to pierce it, which was a bloody achievement.

After finishing two thousand swings in less than three minutes and practicing throwing his senbons, he would wipe the sweat from his brow. “I wonder if I’ll turn out how old man Xan wants me to?” Hiro muttered to himself as he looked down on the katana he held in his left hand, before Xan’s training he felt as useful as a sack of peanuts but Xan had given him a new lease on life, which made him eager to know what will happen next in his short life and for the first time he was actually excited about life if only his parents could see him now. “What am I thinking? Their always watching me… Aint that right?” He said out loud as he looked up at the full moon before him. Sheathing his sword he would jump down from the roof and headed inside to finish what was left of the food Sakura made for him. “I wonder what lies ahead for me in the near future.”

Trained:

WC:1844

Approved.

“Hiro-chan… Hiro-chan….Hiro-chan!!!”
The sound of his name being uttered in a repetitive, unrelenting way was the first breach through his wall of unconsciousness, rudely awakening him from his slumber. Hiro was never much of a dreamer, his sleep undisturbed by random fantasies conjured by the mind. A studier of the mind may make some inference about this personality because of this - he was, after all, generally very down to earth with little time spent daydreaming. Due to his meeting and subsequent training with Xan Ibwa he had found himself becoming a goal driven person, a person who started setting goals in his life which was rather dull before all this, after all he did was eat and sleep but now he was finding himself doing things he never thought would happen in his wildest dreams, taking on missions with other shinobi in Pandora, training Kenjutsu and of course becoming the apprentice of the Bloody Ruler and the right hand to the God Queen herself, Xan Ibwa. Oh how life was an unexpected ride at times. So now he had been living life by moving step by step towards his goals avoid any and every distractions after all anything unrelated to his goals were distractions. Like that flaming ball of pink hair heading towards him right now.

“Sakura don’t you dar-” Whatever threat that he was saying was cut off as the young pink haired girl leaped onto the bed, landing heavily on Hiro. Ever since he had saved and sheltered the young girl she had become more accustomed to being and living around Hiro and thus she had started warming up to the young Denkou and now they shared a relationship similar to a brother and sister, although she tends to make crude remarks which disturbs Hiro from time to time. . Hiro took a moment to regain his breath before rolling the girl he now considered his little sister off the bed and onto the floor, struggling to get himself out of his comforter to sit up on the bed. His muscles protested rather soundly, sore from his practice the day before and from the unwelcome wake up call.  “Tsk, why can’t you be a good little girl and make niichan get some sleep.” Hiro muttered groggily before letting out a soft yawn too tired to cover his mouth. “Baka you promised that you’d take me to Minari Castle so I could do some studying or are all those beatings old man Xan has been giving you in training softened your brain?” The young girl stated quite rudely as she got up off the floor and brushed herself off. On closer inspection Hiro noticed that the young girl who had always had a bang over her right eye was dressed in a pretty blue dress with a big blue ribbon at the back. Ever since he had left her at Minari Castle when he was heading out to do a mission, Sakura had been a regular visitor of the creepy castle reading the ancient texts that resided in the library and watching the Apprentice and Bronze Knights fight each other. What was quite strange however she always came home with gifts, xel and clothing whenever he would pick her up. Though it was a known fact that the God Queen had a soft spot for kids wasn’t it a bit creepy to just give kids random gifts? And why wasn’t he getting anything? And why was he taking her there? She should know the way!!

“Oh…right that I did promise.” locking his fingers together and stretching his arms over his head, he stifled a groan as the muscles in his shoulder, arms, and neck protested. Never again will he go to bed right after practicing with Xan without a good stretch and a hot shower. Part of him wanted to go right back into bed, but he had training to do. Goals to be met. The missions he had taken on lately were simple, D rank missions, but time-consuming. He was yearning to do something that would test his skills but he had to be patient, after all e was still getting paid and in no time he’ll be recognized, for the right reasons of course . But that meant he had less time for training, and getting out of shape was out of the question. “Rightio lets go!”

It took him approximately 10 minutes to have a quick shower and get dressed, slipping a couple seals under his sleeve and keeping the rest in the small bag he carried with him, as well as a handful in his jacket pocket. Sauntering into the kitchen, he reached over Sakura who was sitting at the kitchen table and grabbed the half eaten muffin off his “sister's” plate, grinning through the mouthful of blueberry muffin at  sakura’s protest, but not stopping to look back. He knew just where he wanted to go - the small forest south of the village, where the low-hanging branches and soft ground would be ideal for what he had planned for himself. That was of course after he dropped off the little demon at Minari Castle. “Don’t push yourself too hard Hiro-chan…” Sakura said with a low voice after catching up with him. It had been approximately a month since his last meeting with Xan and every since he was trying to replicate lightning release via the curse mark he was granted to no avail, in truth Hiro had been doing more harm than good to his body with this training and it was showing. In fact today was the only day he had a full five hours sleep. “No need to worry I’m fine.” He said with a smile before patting the young girl on her head. Though he knew what he was going was dangerous he was determined to master the art of recreating lightning even if it meant that he would end up destroying his body, such was his resolve.

Soft breaths escaped him as he finally jogged through the line of trees that marked the beginning of the forest. He wasn't out of breath, but satisfyingly warmed up after jogging the entire way. Not breaking his pace, he suddenly jumped up, both hands solidly grabbing at a tree branch. The running start gave him a swinging momentum that pushed him forward and he let go of the first branch, somersaulting once in the air before landing rather nimbly on the thicker branch of another tree, crouched down.  The branch shook under his weight, once, twice, before stilling again, and a grin splits his face, proud for a moment. Flips and somersaults didn't do much in battle, but it thrilled him nonetheless, revealing in the complex movements that he could push his body to do.
Moving into a standing position, he eyed another branch, hand slipping into his small one strapped bag and hooking his finger into the single kunai in his possession. He had to admit - his weapons arsenal was pathetically small and ordinary, but these weapons were given to him by Xan, who probably just picked them up at some random shop so Hiro could actually learn to use a blade, maybe there was a weapon with a cool special ability out there for him? He'd just have to work harder if he wanted to get more for himself. Another goal he loved forward to achieve. Instead of jumping off the branch, Hiro casually stepped off, free-falling vertically, feet first, towards the ground. The only additional movement was his hands, one raising up above him to drop a paper seal, the other flicking his wrist and releasing the kunai just as the seal began floating towards the ground. The kunai would travel in a diagonally upwards direction, piercing through the seal and pinning it against the targeted branch - which was now above his falling form. Besides using the sword, throwing senbon and kunai became a whole lot easier to him, and that was mainly due to the fact that Sakura had been helping him out.

As he neared the ground, Hiro would tuck his body into a ball, forcing his body to move forwards. The contact with the ground was bumpy but otherwise docile as he rolled forwards and eventually to a stop. Hopping back on his feet, Hiro hastily glanced up to see the result. The kunai had hit the targeted branch as he wanted it to, but just barely, lodged at the very bottom edge of the branch. Not good enough. Catching the corner of his bottom lip with his teeth, he chewed it lightly as he replayed his action in his mind, analyzing it to see where he went wrong. He didn't fail, but it wasn't perfect. And perfection was what he strived for.

Looking up the tree, Hiro would use shunpo to make his way up the tree as of course he was unable to mold chakra so he was unable to use the Supernatural Walking Technique. Running up the tree, he would make his way over to where the kunai was lodge and pulled out the kunai and stuffed the tag in his back pocket. After all he was in no position to waste training supplies as he was probably the poorest Bronze Knight inside of the village, which was no achievement of course.

As he made it up to where his kunai was, Hiro reached over and gave it a yank, pulling it free. The force of the pull, however, made him momentarily lose concentration - he never really was one for Ninjutsu, as he couldn’t use it anyways- and he was free-falling once more. Except this time, he was going head first. Shit. Options ... what were his options? He didn't intend for this training session to result in a concussion, or something even worse. And if he expected to get out of this unscathed, then he had to clear his head and figure out what his possible options were.

Noting that he was falling relatively close to the trunk of the tree, he quickly formulated a solution. Bending both knees back, Hiro was relieved to see that the bottom of his feet landed solidly against the trunk of the tree. This was good, he just needed to ensure now that he didn't flip over and smash his face against another tree. Taking a deep breath, he pushed off the tree, launching his lower body forward and providing him with enough momentum to flip himself back up right, where he would land rather unceremoniously on the ground. The bottoms of his feet had initially managed to land on solid ground, but his body wasn't done moving yet, forcing him to tumble back and land on his behind.

At least he remembered to bend his knees when he landed. If he wasn't able to absorb the shock, it would definitely leave him a little more than just winded. But he had to admit - the whole thing was exhilarating. Once the adrenaline began to fade, Hiro stood back up, letting out a breath. Two falls in five minutes, that was quite the accomplishment. One expected one ... not so expected. But now that he was out of immediate danger, his grin was back, mentally applauding himself for creating an ideal situation to test his reaction skills. Not that he was going to try again anytime soon. Time to move on to Lightning Magic.

This is where Hiro had been having issues with. Ever since his last training with Xan he was instructed to learn how to utilize his Curse Mark to recreate lightning. Problem was he had no idea how to and Xan himself had told him that he was on his own in regards to learning Lightning Magic. He had tried previously before to do this but each attempt left him physically, mentally and emotionally drained. No matter how many books, Sakura had given him to read or how many scholars he had spoken to, recreating lightning seemed like an uphill task, but this was an order from his sensei and this was something he also needed to become a better knight and a better denkou.  Planting his feet firmly in the ground Hiro would begin to inhale slowly. “Don’t push yourself…” The words of Sakura kept resurfacing, the hurt look on her face when she spoke.  The last time he had attempted this Sakura had found him passed out in the living room in a small pool of blood, why was there blood? He had hit his head on the small table not only breaking it but had caused some head injuries, something he kept from Xan, even if he had told him that, he probably would’ve scolded him for not trying hard enough. Still he had promised Sakura that he wouldn’t push himself so hard again but.. “I can’t afford to hold back...Sakura-chan.” Closing his eyes, Hiro would concentrate on drawing the energy from his Magician Curse Seal. He would feel a burning sensation coursing through his body, a familiar sensation this was as this had happened the twelfth time he had attempting to draw power from his curse mark which meant that he had made a step in the right direction. With the natural energy flowing through his body it was time to attempt to recreate lightning. With the many books he had read, documentaries and demonstrations he had some what of an idea of what lighting looks like. Keeping his eyes tightly shut he would imagine the electricity flowing through his veins   and when that image came to his mind he would attempt to release those thoughts into the open to create lightning magic….Or something like that. And of course it had failed instantaneously. Clicking his tongue he would try once more. “This needs to work….” He desperately said to himself. Forcing all this energies into the seal Hiro would started to feel a sharp pain crawling up his spine into his brain “Ack..” Grabbing the curse seal with his left hand, Hiro would fall to his knees as the world as he knew it started spinning. Panting heavily Hiro struggled to get to his feet and before he knew it he was no face first on the floor, struggling to regain his conciseness.

“Hahaha, what a useless Denkou.” Hiro was used to this. He was used to be called names such as useless, waste of space, nothing. Ever since he had been born he was unable to use lightning and even though his mother had always said it would happen sooner or later it never did. Hiro and his family were poor. The bread winner of their family, his brother had been killed one day in an attempt to protect his younger brother from a group of missing nin. Ryu was someone Hiro had looked up to. He was strong, athletic and an all around nice person and above all he was a feared swordsman. Hiro had always attempted to mimic his brother’s graceful swordsman skills but always failed and at times would hurt himself, which in turn made him both hate and love kenjutsu. “You may not be able to use lightning Hiro-kun, but you can be a great swordsman just like me and pop.” Ryu would always say to young Hiro whenever he was brooding.  But even kenjustu Hiro had failed to grasp and he would begin to wonder why? Why was he born in such an illustrious clan, yet…yet he was unable to use a sword or use lightning release. Why was he going through such torture? The young boy had gone through dark depressing times, and if it wasn’t for his friend Saku, he didn’t know what would’ve happened to him. “Brooding doesn’t help your situation Hiro, you can achieve anything you want as long as you put your mind to it. ” Saku had a knack for saying wise words, despite him being the same age as Hiro. “Tsk shut up and lets go.” Hiro said with a smile on his face as they watched the cart filled with food making its way through the lone road. Hiro and Saku both came from the same backgrounds and from time to time when food was short they would go find some. “Try to keep up with me this time. Hiro-chan.” Saku said with a smirk before running down hill at full speed. “H-Hey not so fast!” Hiro called out to him before running chasing out to him. This week’s target was a fruit merchant traveling from Samui with all sorts of exotic fruits and vegetables, which of course would fetch a high price when they sell the stuff they wouldn’t eat. “This is it Hiro get ready!” Saku shoute before activating his stage one Raidengan and throwing two kunai  with explosive tags at the wheels of the carriage. The carriage would of course spin out of control and crashed in a nearby tree casing its contents to spill out. “What the fuck??” A voice could be heard screaming at the top of its lungs. The man would manage to pull himself out of the carnage with a projectile accelerator. Leaping into the air Saku would land before him and pulled out his denki kunai. “Sorry old man, this is ours.” The young man said with a smirk. “You little shit….” The man yelled in anger before firing several projectiles at C rank speeds. Unfortunately for him however due to Saku’s stage one Raidengan he was able to react fast enough to dodge and tackle the man to the ground, he was surprisingly strong. Somehow the grown man had managed to allow Saku to subdue him and it was now time for them to claim the spoils of war. “You okay Hiro?” Saku asked his young partner in crime as he was currently struggling to catch his breath. “I’m fine….” Panting heavily Hiro would fall to his knees before falling completely over, which was strange as it felt he was suffering from a asthma attack. “Hiro? Hiro!” Dropping everything he had gathered Saku would rush over to Hiro’s side with a frantic expression. “Hiro! Hiro, wake up! Damn it!” Saku’s voice began to fade as Hiro started losing consciousness. “Hiro! Hiro!”

“Hiro! Hiro are you okay?” The sound of his name being uttered repetitively by that high pitched voice… felt like a recap of what had happened earlier this morning. His eyes slowly crept open revealing the young girl sitting on top of him, her eyes wet. “Ugh… My head hurts.” Hiro groaned before sitting up and rubbing his temple. “Idiot you promised that you would pick me up at two…” Hiro would take a quick glance at the watch that as on her arm, god knows where she got it from in the first place, and noticed that it was now 5 o’clock was out for that long? “Sorry Sakura-chan…. I guess I went a bit overboard.” He bow his head apologetically. “Hpmh.” Sakura would get up from off Hiro and pulled out a scroll with he kanji for lightning on it. “Though I’m probably gonna regret asking this, what’s  that?” Hiro asked with caution in his voice. “This is a scroll filled with lightning release charka.” Sakura stated before unraveling the scroll revealing the hidden seal. “I’ve been researching means on how to have you create lightning and since you basically suck at doing it yourself we can try this.” “How is that gonna help me?” Hiro asked again regretting to do so. “Simple Hiro-chan, think of your body as an old circuit, unable to create lightning on its own, then think of this scroll as a power source.” Wait….Hold up. “You can possibly mean you’re hit me with the raw lightning release chakra in that scroll!” In reality he wasn’t too surprised that she came up with such a ridiculous idea after all he had a gut feeling she was going to do or say something crazy. “I mean in theory that makes some sense but I’m a human being not a machine!” “Human, Machine same thing.” Sakura said calmly brushing aside his worries as if they were nothing. “You were willing to push yourself to the edge possibly killing yourself in the process and you won’t try this?” Her words were cold and precise and hit Hiro right where she had intended. Was this the same girl that had been crying for him a short while ago? Letting out a soft sigh, Hiro would stand up straight. “Fine let’s do this.” With a smirk Sakura would nod and released the seal that held the lightning element.  In the blink of an eye the lightning would collide with Hiro’s body knocking him backwards into a nearby tree. “Channel the energy from the curse mark.” Sakura basically ordered as she watched Hiro wreath around in pain from being electrocuted. Ignoring the pain coursing through his body Hiro would close his eyes and channeled all his might into the curse mark on his neck. After a few moments of concentrating the pain he was feeling due to being hit by the raw lightning element subsided and his body would give off a natural aura. “Whoa…. Did that actually work??” Hiro said in surprise. “Hahaha! Of course it did! It was my idea after all!” Sakura said with a big grin on her face. “Now put it to the test Hiro-chan!” With the lightning dissipating Hiro stood there wondering what move to try and then it dawned on him. Recalling a conversation he had with Xan the last time they had trained together he wanted him to learn a specific move and that was the chidori, he had already known all the handseals so this should be easy…hopefully. Taking a deep breath he would began reciting and forming the hand seals “Umm… lets see. Monkey…Dragon…Rat…Bird….Ox…Snake…Dog….Tiger…Monkey..” Without him even realizing it, the lightning would begin manifesting in the palm of his hand producing a sound reminiscent of birds chirping. “I did it…” Hiro muttered in disbelief as he looked down on the raw natural energy in his hands. With all this raw energy built up in the palm of his hands he had to release it and he had just the target for such an action. Setting his sights on the giant boulder that was situated in the middle of woods, Hiro would run at full speeds towards the boulder but he then had a crazy idea. Why run when he could just shunpo and get a quick and decisive hit? With a smirk he would shunpo over to boulder and slammed his hand at the base causing the boulder to explode violently causing rubble to rain from the heavens. “Whoa….” Sakura couldn’t hide her amazement at what had happened before her very eyes, she had expected her research to yield results but this wasn’t what she had expected. Hiro himself was quite surprised at the outcome but he was truly happy that he was now a full-fledged denkou, lightning magic or lightning release it didn’t matter as now he was able to use lightning and he could probably reinvent the clan techniques he held in scrolls to fit his own fighting style, it does seem that the real work begun now. “Hiro look out!” Sakura’s warning would cause Hiro to look up and noticed the giant chunk of rock coming towards him at Crashing Ground Speeds, the funny thing was however to Hiro it was as if it as moving in slow motion…how odd. Either way he would simple take a step back and avoided the rock entirely with little to no effort whatsoever. “So this is what I’ve been missing out on all these years.” Hiro said to himself as he looked into a reflection of his self, more notably his eyes which were now electric blue with a jagged pattern. It would be interesting to see what Xan would say to him when he saw this.
Three hours later, chakra depleted and physically exhausted, the eighteen year old finally acknowledged his stomach - which had been growling for the past little while. He ached everywhere, the result of more tumbles and tricks he had decided on doing in between his Fūinjutsu practice. His red hair was damp with sweat, sticking up in odd angles as a result of Hiro's constant habit of running his hand through his hair. His jacket had been shed, hanging off a branch somewhere, rubble lying everywhere due to the explosion of the giant boulder and sword marks etched in the trees nearby. “Hopefully I don’t get in trouble for this.” Hiro said to himself looking around the once lush forest.  “Baka, you’re Xan’s apprentice, you really think they’ll give you for the stick for this.” Sakura stated coldly as she brushed the dirt off her dress. Well she was probably right, though he had often tried to stop her she would pull the He’s Xan’s apprentice card to get them out of trouble…well get herself out of trouble. “Well I’m beat! Let’s go home.” Hiro said as he picked himself up off the floor and grabbed his jacket. “Yeah I’m hungry lets stop on by the ramen shop to celebrate my brilliance!” Sakura said with a straight face, which was quite surprising. “Yeah let’s go celebrate.” Hiro said before patting her on the head. Today he had felt as if he had made strides in the right direction and was on the top of the world.

Techs Trained:

WC: 4266
WC needed: 4100

Approved

Well well well, this was certainly different. The mountain and forest had been pretty dry so far; nothing compared to the desert's harshness, but still no lush rain forest. This however, this was rather idyllic. A quaint little waterfall, no more than 3 meters high feeding into a little pond. Hell, the pond itself couldn't be more than 5 or 6 meters across, and unless that water was playing tricks on his eyes, it was maybe 2 meters deep at worst. Likely a tad deeper right under the falls, or would have been if the cascade wasn't falling directly onto a flat rock. It looked like it had been laying there under the falls for a very long time, the surface was glassy smooth and slightly concave in nature, allowing for a tiny puddle of water to form before spilling over the edge and into the pool. Even that wasn't much distance, only a few inches or so; nothing overtly special. Didn't mean it wasn't pretty. He could see a plethora of animal tracks and trails all around this little oasis; it was obviously a popular watering hole for the local wildlife. Excellent. Maybe he would run into some hostile animals where he could take up, gather some hide and probably sell to some old dude that is fond of leather or make something out of it for Xan-sensei, like some battle armor or a new flak Jacket, the one he had on looked like he had it for god knows how long.

For now though, the water looked rather wonderful. it was crystal clear and looked supremely pure; likely snow runoff from higher up the peak. His clothing was still dirty and ashy from his time training while an active volcano went off, and while he normally didn't really care about things like hygiene and all that, the mud and abrasive nature of the dirt would quickly ruin his clothing, and make any attempt to have Sakura make any more clothing for him out the window as she would probably nag him about the importance of keeping up appearances if he wanted to become The Blue Humming Bird. Yes, becoming the Blue Humming Bird had become something of a dream of his lately ever since Xan-sensei had challenged him to become a God and change the world. Of course Xan himself probably had a different meaning for Hiro to become a God, but Hiro knew exactly why he wanted this, he didn’t want anyone to suffer and even though people believed Pandora was filled with evil doers, Hiro would seek to change that as well, even if he had to stand before the God Queen herself…. Well not really.

Well now about his clothing. Nothing more than a kunai was needed for this; cut some strong branches off a nearby tree, strip the bark off, fashion a sort of rack that he could use to dry and repair his current gear. The find of a small soap tree, stunted by the cold climate but still fruiting and alive, was a bit of a blessing; he could use the small berries to wash his furs safely; they worked like a natural laundry detergent, but are super gentle and wouldn't ruin the water source. Plus, he could use the sap and the leaves as dyes if he felt like it; so collecting and storing what he could from the little tree was worth it

It didn't take but an instant to confirm the water was snow run off; it was icy cold and brutal on naked flesh. Not that he minded, after the initial moment of shock he was busy working the dirt and ash out of his clothing as quickly as he could. After a good hour of work, his gear was cleaned and hanging on the rack, checked for damage and repaired to working order. Enough to satisfy him, anyway. Now, a thought appeared in his broken mind. If he was going to go up the mountain, he'd need to get used to cold again. For a very long time he'd been in the heat of the volcano, and while the nights sometimes came extremely hot, he would warm up to it eventually, after that was where he resided whether he had liked it or not. The top of this peak was snowbound and frozen, no amount of sun could warm it. This water would make for some good acclimatizing; he could work his system into cold climate mode using it so that he wouldn't be as totally screwed once he got into the cold zones further up.

The smooth rock at the base of the falls would do nicely. Before, he'd only been up to his waist in the water, and just for a few minutes it took to wash the debris and such from his clothing. His torso and upper body had been exposed to the far warmer air, and remained dry; so while it wasn't comfortable (as his 'boys' would attest to), it wasn't really much of a hassle nor could it really do him any good. He needed to be properly submerged; and the thought of playing 'hold your breath' for hours on end didn't really appeal to him. No, he'd go another direction; sit under the running waterfall until it stopped being cold. More so, until it stopped being anything but perfectly comfortable and pleasantly warm. Easier said than done, of course; but he'd been through far worse. The many wounds he had received while training with Sakura and Xan scars swirling around his exposed flesh stood as testament to what he'd endured before, and what he could endure now.

His first attempt was... pathetic. The short version, he'd ducked his head under the water, it touched his back, and he shot across the pond so fast you could almost imagine the gunshot noises. Sensitive areas didn't like the stark contrast between his normally high body temperature and the nearly freezing cold water.

The second? Slightly better, he managed a full five seconds before pulling out and almost rolling himself in a fire that he managed to somehow get started dripping wet and using green wood on barely enough kindling. A spot close enough to the fire to nearly burn his skin was adopted for a bit; although this particular failure gave him a chance to get said fire burning hot, high, and happy; he'd need it for later to stave off hypothermia as he had planned to spend a couple of days up in these mountains not only because he wanted to get away from the village, Xan-sensei and Sakura for awhile, he wanted to know how it felt to train in a different environment he had always been training in heat and ash, it was time he had started training in the cold and snow. Why? Because it would allow his adapt to any conditions as he was a True all Taijutsu user so his Past Confrontations was his greatest ally and weapon.

Once his motivation had returned, he moved back to the falls; managing to sit down this time and let the water actually finish soaking him. It was... uncomfortable, to say the least. The rock was hard and supremely cold, and the icy water sloshing down his back and chest caused his muscles to dance and spasm in turn; alternating between attempting to avoid the cold liquid and reacting to over stimulated nerves freaking the hell out. This attempt lasted a good 10 minutes before chattering teeth and shaking body had he basically turned into a shivering Popsicle. Not fun, and not helpful at all.

By now, the sun was starting to set; so he had to give up for the day. Gathering enough wood for the night, as well as setting up some sort of shelter, was far more important than sitting under cold water for however long he could manage; so after a moment of warming his hands and feet by the fire; he got to hunting underbrush and any dead and dried wood he could find.

The moment the sun was up enough to be noticed in the clearing, Hiro was up and moving about. If he planned on staying any longer, he needed to get some traps and snares set; he was out of food and the pond had no fish in it; at least none big enough to bother catching as anything but trap bait. It was close to noon before he was done with this task; a dozen snares and nearly as many hang traps set all around the animal trails; baited with the last of his jerky and the tiny minnows that lived in the pond. A decent little stack of wood was set aside for later, and he'd managed to find a poor turtle that made for a nice roasted breakfast. That, and he could use the shell to store the soap nuts he was drying for later; as well as a surface to crush them into powder when they were ready.

He approached the waterfall with the wariness of someone that really didn't want to do what he had to do; but it was worth it in the end. With an almost dejected sigh, he crawled back under the water and settled in; cringing hard when the night chilled water hit his flesh. It was actually thick, almost to the consistency of a watered down slushie thanks to the chill of the night that hadn't fully dispersed yet. That was pure pain to his nerves, which where right back to the dance of spasms and chattering teeth; small goose bumps erupting quickly and haggard breathing marking how much the cold was affecting him. This attempt lasted a solid half an hour before he couldn't take it anymore; all but falling into the pond itself and half-assedly dog paddling his stiff limbs in an attempt to not drown and make it to shore and therefore to the fire. He took a half hour break to shiver and steel himself for the next attempt for before moved back toward the waterfall for his next try.

This time actually went fairly decently; for a while anyway. The teeth chattering wasn't as bad; and while it was stupidly uncomfortable, he was managing to handle it pretty well for this first hour or so. Then a rather large fish of the trout variety flopped over the edge of the falls and onto his head, and he decided to call it lunch.

An hour later, he was back under the waterfall; teeth barely chattering and only mildly shivering. This was the best attempt so far, and if he could hold it; it would get him where he wanted to be. Course, things never worked out that well; and a second fish decided to commit suicide via landing on his head. That broke his concentration, and that made the water feel like razor sharp daggers ripping into his skin. Now, while this gave him one hell of a raging hard on, it was still uncomfortable as all fuck, so he call it a day and climbed down to his little camp; warming up before doing an early check of his traps. Too soon for anything to reasonably be caught, but it never hurt to look.

The next morning started before sun-up; right back into the water and under the falls. This was setting up to be a good try; the water was slushie again, but it didn't feel anywhere near as cold, nor did it hurt anywhere near as bad. This he could handle. It wasn't perfect, but it was tolerable; he could handle this for a while. A long while. Not forever, but it was better than it had been the day before; triply so his first dip days before. Hell, he made it clear through noon before he had to quit; and that was only because he heard one of his snares trip nearby. A rush to check the trap produced a rather large rabbit, perfect for replacing the lining of his shoes or making new gloves for his trip up the mountain. It wouldn't take him long to skin and clean the carcass; setting the meat to roast slowly in a bed of embers while his scraped the hide and pulled it tight on his make shift rack to dry out.

One that was done, he was right back under the water. Now, now it was rather nice, actually. Not warm, not particularly pleasant; but nothing he couldn't handle easily. Hell, he could sit under this for days and not care. In fact, the longer he sat, the better it felt. He met the sunset underneath the water, and watched the stars rise in the sky. The sunrise found him still under the water, quietly sleeping and happily settled in for the long run. In the end, it was his stomach, as well as the sounds of snares tripping and traps springing that brought him out of his little revere. When he realized how long he'd been sitting, he called it a day and ended his attempt to torment himself into being a cold loving being. It was successful enough, and it would go a long way toward helping him handle pain in a fight to boot; as his nervous system was desensitized over his entire form fairly evenly. Fewer weak points, more sustainability.
After his endurance training, it was time he had practiced his bread and butter, Kenjutsu. As usual he would start out with a couple hundred swings of the blade his sensei had given him. Smoothly and seamlessly sheathing his katana, he would raise it to the heavens allow the little sunlight that was being shone from between the nimbostratus clouds that were producing light snow fall, to reflect on the blade. Finding a firm foothold in the snow, he would spread his legs and held the sword with both his hands tightly gripped on the hilt on his sword. He would raise the weapon above his head and swung it down horizontally and would then follow up with a vertical swing from left to right. Shifting to the left he would turn 180 degrees and swung the weapon in the reverse order, from left to right vertically then he would raise the sword above his head and held it for a few seconds then swung it down again. He would then take a 360 turn while swing the katana which. Why? Because why not!

With swinging practice out of the way it was time for him to practice his movement. At first he had relied on the full moon style for movement, but that was completely and utterly embarrassing. That was for girls! Why would he use that? Then Xan had taught him the way of the Shunpo, Shunpo was a more cooler means of getting around but it had drained the very essence of his life force which meant it would be something he couldn’t overly rely on and then along came Hoho. Hoho was a completely faster a means of traveling as it allowed him to move at Samurai speeds but of course it had drained his life force. But there was means of beating that drain and that was Shadow less Fight. At this point however he was only able to use Shadow less Flight at Bullet release speeds, which was acceptable! He needed to be faster and stronger than his opponent so he could take them down. Sheathing his weapon he would first do a couple of stretches, first from left to right and then from back to front before taking his stance. Taking a running stance he would find himself traveling at Bullet Release samurai speeds towards the edge of the of area. “Faster damn it!” He muttered to himself as he began picking up the pace, at this point he had felt his body moving faster, but he didn’t feel himself getting drained. Was that because he had gone through that endurance training before? With a smirk he would jump over rocks and branches in his way as he found himself traveling at Crashing Ground Samurai Speeds. “Whoa!” He woul draw himself to a halt after almost colliding with Gendrome.
Well, Well, Well, this was quite the predicament young Hiro had found himself in. Why was a Gendrome even in this area? Hiro thought as his eyes and the Gendrome’s made four. The monster had seemed to had finished devour some smaller animal as the blood of the said animal was dripping from its mouth and the carcass was lying a couple meters from it. The monsters eyes examined the boy’s body from head to toe as it had seemed to come to a decision that he would be its new meal.  “As if!” Hiro exclaimed as he grew his katana and took his stance. Hiro would rush towards the monster at B rank speeds attempting to slash at its mid section, but the monster had easily avoided his attack as it jumped back. “It has reaction tiers?” Hiro muttered to himself as the monster began its charge towards him. Activating his stage two Raidengan he would avoid the charge coming towards him at Crashing Ground speeds. It would seem as if he would have to play the waiting game, he was very much capable of bypassing those reaction tiers with his Denkou style Kenjutsu but he had to gauge the monsters move correctly, which seemed impossible for him at this time. “This is gonna be a pain in the ass.” He muttered to himself as he pulled out the senbon that kept his hair intact. He would then through them at Vacuum Release speeds, which he would notice that the monster would take it head on but still charged towards him. His heart would begin pounding in his chest as he watched the monster charging towards him. He had to wait. A bead of sweat would drop down from his forehead to his chin as he steeled himself. The monster was getting closer. The moment it had arrived within, ten feet of him he would rush at it at Vacuum Release Speeds looking to slit the animal’s throat. His Katana went clean through the monsters neck, severing its head from its body. Though he was successful in severing the head of the beast it was also successful in wounding the young lad. “Son of a…” Hiro muttered as he tore off his shirt sleeve and wrapped it around the wound. Stumbling to his feet, Hiro would watch as the snow would be colored crimson due to his blood. “Well might as well go patch myself up…” He muttered to himself as slowly trudged back to base.

Nightfall had come down rather quickly but Hiro had made his way back to base safely, albeit leaving a trail of blood, hopefully any more animals would take that as an invitation to come visit him for a late night snack. Hiro had been sitting inside the cave he had called base with his back against the wall. Before him was a small camp fire, the flames from the fire danced around somewhat elegantly, reminding him of the twin moon dances. To the left of him was a bowl of water mixed with his blood and numerous senbon inside the waters. In order to stop the bleeding Hiro was forced to patching himself up and by patching himself he was sewing himself up with a senbon and some loose thread from his clothing. This as you could imagine was extremely and utterly painful and occasionally a cry of anguish would escape his lips, echoing throughout the cave and the mountains on a whole. Panting heavily Hiro would drop the needle in the bowl of water before wiping the sweat off his brow with his good arm. “Well that wasn’t such a bad job if I don’t say so myself.” Hiro said with a weak smile as he looked at the terrible job he had done with attempting to patch up his wound. At this rate he would probably get an infection so he might had inadvertently made things worse, much worse. A soft yawn escaped his lips as he felt his eyelids closing on their own, even though he had known falling asleep in this condition was complete madness, he couldn’t help it he was too drained. Like a dead body, his head would slump over and he went into a deep sleep silently hoping he would wake back up from this.

His eyelids slowly crept open revealing the stalagmite which was around him. Hiro would find himself covered in a thick blanket and a warm fire. Sitting up he would also notice that his arm was completely stitched up neatly. “Baka, don’t go around killing yourself off.” A voice said from the other  side of the room. It was a familiar voice and one that was equally welcoming. “Thanks Sakura-chan.” Hiro said as he turned his head to left looking at the girl would stood in the corner dressed in full white, the Pandora headband and a katana. “You’re welcome Hiro-nii” She said with her usual disinterested tone. “Xan-senpai told me to come get you knowing that you’d probably get yourself killed off and looky here he was right.” She said as her amber eyes looked down on the young boy. “Glad to see he was worried about me.” Hiro said bitterly as he stood up. His arm still felt a bit useless but thankfully it was his right arm.  “I’m assuming that you’re not done here yet, right Hiro-nii?” Sakura stated as she pushed her help off the wall she was leaning against and stood beside him. “If not I’ll be more than happy to beat you to a pulp.”

Well it was time to train once more and this time he was training with Sakura. He had known that she was good with senbon but he had never seen her fight with a Katana before, and didn’t she call Xan her sensei? “Prepare yourself Hiro-nii.” She cautioned as she grew her katana and pointed it towards Hiro. “Hehe, let’s see what you can do Sakura-chan.” They both would star at each other for a few seconds until that is she took a step forward and seemingly tripping an falling before disappearing from sight. “Shunpo??” Hiro muttered in surprise but he would quickly activate his Raidengan and avoiding her attack by a hare’s breath. But she didn’t give him time to rest as she quickly made her way towars him once more at Crashing Ground Speeds swing around wildly, at first glance this seemed to be nothing but her flailing around but without his Raidengan there would’ve been no where for Hiro to read her movements. Planting his feet firmly into the ground he would run towards her at Crashing Ground speeds to intercept her moves. The two blades intercepted each other immediately, the first clash caused Hiro’s sword to sword to release a high pitched sound and giving off a vibration. With a smirk on his face he would endure the pain and looked to intercept her move once more but Sakura would pull her sword away at the last moment. “As if Hiro-nii.” She said as she somersaulted backwards before tossing several square shuriken his way in quick succession. Gritting his teeth Hiro would toss the katana in the air would quickly pull out several of his shuriken and tossed them to intercept Sakura’s. Seeing this bold move, Sakura would began tossing more shuriken his wayfaster than before forcing him to either continue with clashing with her or dodging, but Hiro wouldn’t waver and continued intercept her shuriken with his own. But after a few minutes he would notice that he was running low on shurken and decided to Shunpo out of the way but that was exactly what Sakura wanted him to do and used Ia slicing to mow him down. “Whoa!” Hiro would intercept the attack with Vacuum release speeds. “What are you trying to do kill me?!?!” Hiro yelled after sliding to safely. “Yes.” She answered simply as she activated her displacement aura. Groaning Hiro would he already fully examined her fighting style and was ready. Hiro would create two shadow clones and both clones would rush on towards  bearing their weapons but due to her Aura being activating she would use Ia slicing to interrupt the clones but that was the plan. The real Hiro would launch himself in the air and looked deliver the final blow. The clones would easily avoid the move and seeked to close in on her but with her reaction tiers she would avoid the attacks and looked to escape to the left but immediately after landing Hiro would use Stumbling Edge- strife to close close the gap between them. “Shit..” She muttered as Hiro would deliver a horizontal slash to her mid section…with his scabbard and it was a very powerful hit either as he didn’t want to hurt her. “Seems like I won this round” He said with a smile while extended his hand help the young girl. “You got me that’s for sure.” She admitted with a smile as she took his hand and pulled herself up. “You are getting better and you’ll become the Blue Humming Bird in no time.” Sakura would cling to his arm. Hiro couldn’t help but chuckle at how easy it was for her to change her mood. It was quite scary.

It had been approximately two and a half weeks they had spent in the mountains training and it was about they headed back to Jikogakure to report back into Xan-sensei. Hiro had collected all the tan and hide they had collected as during their spare time they had hunted and skinned animals for fun, well Sakura thought it was fun, and of course she made him carry the entire hide, but he didn’t mind he could build his muscles this way. “All ready to go Sakura-chan?” Hiro asked as he was all ready to leave this place, hoping to come back again one day. “Yeah lets go back home, it’s too cold here.” She complained yet again about the climate. Chuckling he would take her by the hand and made his way out of the area with his friend.

WC: 4,404

Spoiler:

Approved, but your going to have to change Lightning Magic: Shadow Clone and replace it with another B, due to it being an A-rank technique.

If there was something that was always upon the Bronze Knight’s mind was to get better. There was no better feeling than noticing your progress throughout your life. The feeling that Hiro would get upon getting stronger and more agile in the battle field was unremarkable. Today the young Bronze Knight would be training on his movement, senjutsu and kenjutsu. There was a point where his training required less effort to get better, but now achieving the rank of Silver Knight the young man’s work ethic had gotten better. This should not be a problem at all, as his motivation was built around Xan-sensei’s belief that he could be even better than him and of course his own desire to be the best.
Every time he turned to the side to look, there would be someone getting ahead of him this could no longer happen. There was that one kid he had once seen around the village, they were both the same age and the same rank and now he was Gold Knight. Even though he was considered a prodigy Hiro had still felt that was slacking off in regards to his training as even Sakura was now a Silver Knight, the same spoiled brat he had saved from those bandits so many months ago had made it a rank higher than him, though he wasn’t too disappointed in that as he was glad that she was fitting in with everyone in the village and was feeling at home, but he wasn’t about to lose to her! No way.

”If I want to become better, I need to train harder than before.” Hiro said as a tear of sweat dripped down his chin as he continued to run uphill on one of the mountains. His legs were mostly tightened, and almost ready to give out. For hours every day the young man would climb the mountain, not really slowing down on the process the young Bronze Knight was ready to increase the strength of his legs to be able to run faster. Though shaking the young man would not stop, every day and every hour he would be giving his all and training until he could no longer move his legs until the next day. For some reason his body would quickly adapt to strenuous activities more quickly than others, was it due to his Past Confrontations he did know but whatever it was he was grateful for it and hoped it would prove handy in his battles as well.

”Just how far do I still need?” A last quick breath was taken as the young man’s legs slowly began to feel numb though did not trouble him to keep running and was actually in fact relieving, as the young man’s speed had been changing for the best in the past few days. And if he had to guess just how much progress he has made over these days of training to get faster he would say he has gotten at least twice faster than the normal person would be.”My movements are getting lighter by the day. I can already tell I can move faster.” Hiro said as he looked at a small timer he had set before starting. It allowed him to record his time every time and every day.

”My time has improved as well, 10 seconds faster than yesterday around this place.” Hiro said with a grin on his face as he quickly began to speed up his ace even more after seeing his own personal best record upon running these mountains. The terrain just made it even harder for him to run, so that would actually improve his movements a lot better than before.

Hiro believed that being the fastest in battle is the one thing that most shinobi should work on. If you got the speed than you got half the battle won. It makes sense to Hiro and if someone would listen to his voice when it comes to speed and a shinobi they would think about it the same way. If your opponent could not catch you, he could not hit you. And if your opponent cannot hit you, then he cannot hurt you. Of course speed would not win a fight, there is also smarts and the way people use their surroundings. Speed will always help but the smartest man will always win the fight.

This exactly how the young man thought. He wasn’t the most intelligent person in Pandora but he was always working hard to get better. He was always a committed person, one that used his motivation to perfect himself. To become the best among his rank and the soon to be his ranks was his willpower he used to get better. There wasn’t a single person that witnessed his method of training and the greatness and concentration he managed to acquire upon trying to get better.

Aside from running uphill for long periods of time to strengthen his legs he had also used the start of his run to improve his explosive starts. An explosive start was something that he also needed to improve as a first reaction of movement could save a person from an attack. And even someone from having a slight advantage. This explosiveness was soon acquired upon time, his start became faster and his legs began to move as if they moved on their own by time.

It was about time I reached the top.” Hiro said while his breath remained a little off point. His legs began to shake intensively after running for hours uphill a mountain. This training actually lasted a whole week. A week of long fast runs to improve his speed and leg movements. Now he was at the top of the mountain as his body dropped to the knees as the sweat cascaded around his face and whole body.”This is probably the most intense workout I have had in a long while.” Hiro said with a giant smile on his face as he tried to catch his breath normally. If there was something that he was most proud off was the fact that he is a person that worked hard for what he desired the most. The young man got up from the floor as he looked at the timer in which he stopped as soon as he hit the peak of the mountain hoping to see a much improved time than the first day when he started.

”Eh, 15 seconds faster than before…I still got work to do. But for now this workout has paid off.” The Bronze Knight said as he picked a bottle of water from a bucket that was previously put so when he reached the top the day before. This was something that he kept in case he needed it at the top and to refresh his body just a bit. “It’s time I work on my kenjutsu skills.” He said after enjoy the refreshments.  Grabbing his favorite katana he would do like he always would practice his swings after the first four reps he would feel his muscles tighten up on him which was expected as he wasn’t doing much training over the course of a month, thankfully Xan didn’t find out or he’d be screwed. After the first set however he would feel slightly more comfortable and would finish the rest of reps with relative ease.

After that was done it was time for a little meditation. Putting his sword to his left he would sit on the floor and began  couple of breathing exercises. Keeping his mouth closed, Hiro would begin inhaling and exhaling rapidly in equal durations but as short as possible. He had done this trying regularly with his father when he was a child and he had once said that this exercise was suppose to produce quick movement of the diaphragm which would help his breathing when the time comes, which he never understood why. At first he was unable to do it for more than 15 seconds on his first try but gradually he was able to perfectly execute the exercise and now he is able inhale and exhale in 2 min spans.  With the first breathing exercise over with he would move on to the second one. Opening his mouth this time he would exhaling loudly from his mouth making a loud whoosh sound. He would then close his mouth and begin inhaling quietly through his nose to a mental count of four. After counting to four in his mind he would then hold his breath to a count of seven and after counting to seven he would exhale through his mouth once more, making that very same whoosh sound from his mouth once more but this time he had held it for eight seconds. In the same breath however he would inhale again and repeated the very same process once more several more times before finishing up with the second exercise. The third and finally exercise was pretty simpler than the rest.  The moment he began exhaled he would count to one, and the second time he would count to two.

Ending his breathing session of the day by opening his eyes and taking a final deep breath, he figured that today would be the day. Getting up from his seated position, he set off against the rock and dove into the ice cold mountain water. It was so cold that the average person would numben up in mere seconds, though Hiro had gained enough resistance when he had trained in mountains so his endurance was pretty high. Swimming through the river while the current sent him on his way, he made it to the shore where he had put his clothes. Hiro lacked those fancy techniques that would quickly dry his clothes, so he had chosen not to take his clothes with him into the water, taking them all of and folding them up on the shore. Swimming naked felt nice, making him feel even closer to nature when he had no clothes to cover him up. Despite that, the privilege of wearing clothes was what separated him from the animals, probably being the only thing that did so. “I can feel you staring Sakura-chan.” Hiro said as he looked out in the forest. A figure would emerge from behind the trees and it was indeed his partner, Sakura. She had a bad habit of following Hiro around whenever he was training and at first it was a bit annoying but he had gotten used to it.

Slowly, he put his clothes on after drying his body, the time had come to try something he had not done in a very long time, for it was something that eventually took it’s toll on both himself and his training partner. The last time they had seriously been fighting one another, they had almost ended up killing one another in their own urge to beat their opponent. It was only natural, for they were both under the bloody rule. He knew that by fighting the Sakura, he was inviting deep wounds and bruised bones, though that was just what made fighting Sakura so enticing.
“You are sure about this, you really want to do this thing again, even though last time... well, I don’t need to remind you of last time. We both know I would have killed you if you had not tapped out when you did, otherwise we would not be having this conversation. Still, it is your decision, I won’t try to stop you if you really want to lose to me and prove my superiority again...” She said with a smile as she gripped her katana waiting for him to give her the signal.

Hiro detested that smirk she had on her face and was determined to wipe it off her face once and for all, but one thing was for sure he could tell that she had felt confident she was able to beat him.
In truth, the fight had ended in a draw, the two of them wrapped around one another with their arms tangled and bodies in tatters, One being able to slit the others throat while the other had the chance to ensure that their would be no children in the near future. It seemed that the little girl had forgotten her place in the peaking order as he was superior even though she was now a rank above him and seemed to let what happened the last time they fought get in her head, something that would surely change if she wanted to try going up against Hiro again. Last time, he had been holding back a bit, though that would not be happening again any time soon. Cracking his neck before he cracked his knuckles, it seemed high time to learn Sakura a lesson in respect he figured she would already have learned by now. It was true that the two of them had been equals for a long time, though Hiro knew for a fact that he had surpassed her not too long ago.

“It’s stunning how bad your memories are when it comes to this kind of thing. The way I remember it, I had you in a stranglehold and could slit your throat. All you could do was try to cut my manly hoodaway, if you would still have been alive by the time you would have actually reached it. Seeing as you've forgot, allow me to refresh your memories.”
Taunting the girl by returning the same level of petty provocations, a momentary silence fell over the grassy knoll they stood upon. The only thing heard were the bones cracking and churning inside of Hiro’s body, letting Sakura know that his body had readied itself for battle already. Hiro had been training long and hard for this, being more then ready to show Sakura just how much he had improved his overall battle prowess. The main thing he had been focusing on was his speed, though he had also been giving some extra attention to his physical training. Watching the girl as it narrowed her eyes, Hiro bent through his knees, ready to use his sublime new skills against the girl who at this point still had no idea of how hard Hiro had been training in the last month. That was when it happened, the girl quickly used Shunpo to disappear from his sight but this was something that was expected and he quickly activated his Raidengan to counter her movement speed and her incoming slash to his torso. “Hmph your reaction has gotten better. No matter.” Sakura said as she looked Hiro dead in the eye as both attempted to over power the other to no avail. Hiro would take a quick leap backwards and pulled out a hand full of senbon and threw in all manners of directions towards hoping to confuse the girl but she seamlessly and effortlessly avoided them all and began charging Hiro at Crashing Ground speeds. “She’s fast…” He muttered as he attempted to meet her speeds and clashed with her once more with the vibrations of his sword hitting hers four times in rapid succession at the cost of dealing himself harm. Sakura would grab on to Hiro’s arm and delivered a quick punch to his face but before he could react she would create a feint and kicked him in the rib sending him flying ten meters to the left. Drawing his Wakashi he would stab it  into the ground forcing his knock back to halt. As Sakura looked to rush on to him he would channel his chakra causing wild lightning to race towards her to intercept her charge, but as a cipher she would easily react, launch herself in the air and looked to decapitate Hiro using Temtsu style death. Hiro simply stood there awaiting the attack and before it could even hit her blade would immediately disintegrate leaving nothing but the hilt in her hand. “W-What…” Sakura said with a look of surprise on her face and this was where she messed up. Taking her opportunity of surprise Hiro would shine light in her eyes using his katana to blind her and when she was blinded he would launch towards her at Samurai Vacuum release speeds towards her. His first course of action would be to slam the hilt of his weapon in her stomach causing her to flinch due to the pain. He would then grab her by both hands and forced her down into the ground, luckily it was in a soft spot where there was grass so she wouldn’t be hurt that much by the fall. After a few moments, Sakura was able to open her eyes and the first thing she seen s Hiro’s face extremely close to hers. She would attempt to struggle to get out of the man’s grasp but failed to do so he was much stronger than her and of course her sword had disintegrated into nothingness so she was unable to counter the boy. “Struggling won’t do you much good Sakura-chan” He taunted as he held her down as hard as he could, which wasn’t that hard to do as she wasn’t that strong in the first place. “I win hehe.”

“You’re a bit too close to me…” She said with her face completely red as his chest rested against her and he was between her legs. Hiro was completely oblivious to what she was speaking about until she had pointed it out he would quickly get up off her with his face flushed as well. “Sorry…” He muttered before standing on his own two feet before extending his arm out towards her. With an embarrassed look on her face she would take his hand and pulled herself up. “I’ll give you that win…Pervert.” She said before walking away from him. “Oye what?!? That was purely an accident!” He called out to before running behind her to explain.

Spoiler:

WC- 3007
Tech WC- 3000

Approved.

“I try too hard.”

Those had been the first words out of the young man's mouth when he woke up this morning to the feeling of a hard rocky ground beneath his back just as the sun had been peeking over the horizon. And now, those words came back to haunt him as he felt his fingers beginning to slip against the feeble hand hold he had found on the cliff face he was climbing. How long had he been scaling this massive wall? He had lost track of the time, but his whole body ached and his arms and legs felt like jelly. His hands were numb, fingernails cracked and splintered, blood staining the ends of his digits as he clung for dear life with his left hand while the right dangled lazily at his side. He'd grunt lightly to himself as he tightened the grasp of his left hand in an attempt to to keep himself from slipping and falling down what looked to be close to a fifty foot drop.
Sweat stained the front of his shirt, serving as a testament to the effort he was exerting at the moment. His right arm shot up, searching for a place along the surprisingly featureless wall, looking for some sort of life line in order to take the stress off his left arm. His feet were planted firmly against the wall, doing their best to compensate for the sudden shift in weight but the wall was smooth. Even the portions of the wall that protruded from the near vertical plane were somehow smoothed down as though sanded down or eroded away through years of being subjugated to a harsh flow of running water. If Hiro hadn't been hanging there, steadily slipping in grip, he would have definitely taken the time to contemplate how this could be.

For now though his right hand slid along the wall, fingers groping against the solid surface until they finally managed to find what felt like a firm hold. Once again Hiro's weight shifted from his left arm to the right, putting the strain on his opposite limb, giving his left side a chance to rest for a second before his muscles in his legs began to tense, pushing his entire body upward while his core contracted in order to help stabilize his body. The fatigue made the act a difficult one, in fact, in Hiro's mind he had given up at least four times on this climb. The only thing that had kept him going was the fear of slipping and falling to his death, or at least falling and snapping his spine or something like that. He wasn't a fan of the idea of having his spine snapped. He was quite fond of being able to use his legs. He had no desire to be a paraplegic or worse.

He'd begin to scale again, moving upward along the wall, feeling the incline of the cliff face change. Of course the change in angle wasn't to his favor, the young man eventually reaching an outcropping of the wall that would make climbing very difficult. Already his hands were numb, blistered, and bleeding from all the climbing he had been doing for the last couple of days. This wasn't the first time he had climbed cliff faces like this. For the last couple of days Hiro had taken a leave of absence from the village and his duties, a self given vacation that he thought he had earned given how much he had been working lately. Predictably, a "vacation" really couldn't amount to much relaxation. Hiro, while always enjoying a good rest, hadn't had much time as of late to polish his skills. While he was in no way rusty, he couldn't help but feel as though he needed to take advantage of this time up to push himself in order to come back from this "vacation" just a bit stronger and a little more capable to serve in the field.

His left hand slid along the wall, fingers gliding over the stone face above him that served as a slanted ceiling from his current position. It would have been easy to use natural energy here, to allow himself to scale the wall without worrying about hand holds and foot holds, but that would be counter productive to what he was trying to achieve at the moment. His fingers continued to search, eventually coming to a jutting piece of stone. Reflexively his hand wrapped around it, pulling on it lightly to test it. It seemed sturdy enough. His right hand now pushed down on its current hold while his legs did the same, pushing his body up and leaning backwards a bit due to the angle of approach. Immediately his right hand shot up, grabbing another hold that was a bit too smooth for Hiro's liking, but he didn't have the luxury of being able to spend time searching for another hold. He needed to be quick here or his exhausted body wouldn't be able to hold on much longer. His legs scrambled to keep up, feet digging into whatever hold they could find. More grunts came as his hands moved one over the other, reaching, grabbing, pulling, bleeding, smarting, and trembling. It was all one giant Hell, his body screaming silently in pain with each move he made. His fingernails were almost completely gone by this point, driven all the way back to the cuticle almost so that each sensation against them caused a stinging and tingling pain to run up his fingers and into his hand and wrist. That was more than unpleasant. He was glad he was wearing shoes this time. He couldn't imagine putting his feet through another climbing session like he had yesterday. They were still sore from that strenuous session.

Hiro's eyes moved upward, staring ahead of his position. He was close to the top. Once there he could eat the apple he was carrying in his pocket. Breakfast would taste good after a morning workout like this. He began to climb again, the thought of food pushing him forward. His right hand moved up, grabbing for another hold, finding something immediately and yanking down on it in order to bring his left side up so that he could potentially advance. As he did so, though, he heard the familiar sickening cracking noise that caused him to grimace as he braced his entire body for the immediate drop then stop as his left hand clutched for dear life. Once again he found himself hanging, this time without the benefit of his feet to support him as they lost their position along the cliff face due to the sudden shift in weight. He'd let out a small yell of pain as he felt his shoulder strain to keep the joint from slipping out of place. He'd quickly reach up with his right arm again, looking desperately for something to grab hold of.

"D-d-damn it.."

He'd croak as his right hand grasped at no particular hold but rather just seemed to create its own somehow by sinking his fingers against the rock, barely finding a small portion to help take some stress off off his left arm as he swung his legs back toward the wall. His right hand moved again once his feet found a good spot to dig themselves into. His right hand would find the hold it was looking for, pulling him further upward as his left arm relaxed a bit before reaching up for the next hold. Another fifteen minutes would pass as he made his way steadily up the cliff, eventually reaching the top. He'd pull himself up over the ledge and roll onto his back, staring up at the blue sky, breathing heavily and groaning. He was more than thankful for the break, but in the back of his mind lingered the thought that it wasn't even mid-morning left. There was still more to do.

Why was he doing such an intense training? It was quite simple. Every since he had lost his spar with that filthy succubus, he had been disappointed with himself and not only that he had basically shown Xan that his training was for naught. Xan’s words the day had hurt him so much had seriously contemplated putting down his swords for good and went back into obscurity. Of course it was quite possible for Xan to find someone who was more talented than Hiro, after all he was nothing but a broken Denkou and there were many out there in the world. In truth he had already made up his mind to just give up after that humiliation but of course Kagura wouldn’t have allowed him to do so. “Baka, you lost to me many times and you didn’t want to quit, you trained and came back stronger so what’s the difference now?” She had said with her usual stern voice but this time she wore a softer expression, maybe she was simply looking to motivate the young boy to pick himself up and it had done exactly that. So now here was doing series of intense trainings to bring not only his body up to speed but also his mind. “Maybe I should go get some rest for the next day.” Hiro muttered to himself after raising his aching body off the ground and went to the make shift camp he had Kagura prepare for him.

The feeling of the wind whipping through your hair as you sailed across vast distances in a matter of seconds. The feeling of being nearly weightless, allowing your body to move on its own volition, uninhibited and free. The feeling of being one with the wind, rushing forth at great speeds. These were only some of the sensations that Hiro felt when he allowed himself to run, to let himself truly run as fast as his legs could manage to carry him. Of course, these feelings were not what the boy was experiencing right now as he sprinted as fast as he could with the traditional, yet heavy, training weights that were often implemented by practitioners of kenjutsu. Both arms and legs felt as heavy as lead, each step requiring a tremendous amount of effort from the young man as he ran up the long inclined road before him, running up a low lying mountain. This training, this strained running had been his mid-morning training for the last couple of days, done after his morning rock climb. With his body still exhausted Hiro would strap on the weights and run up this same road every day. Sweat poured from the Bronze Knight's body, his shirt completely drenched. The sweat rolled from his forehead, down into his eyes, a small pool forming on his brow that he desperately wanted to wipe away, yet knowing that even a simple action such as that would require far too much effort on his part due to his arms feeling like lead blocks. It was all he could really do to keep his arms in a swinging motion as he ran, his muscles straining against the weight with each move. He was half way up the incline.

He had no timer, no real way to keep track of his time, which was something he lamented when he reached his camping spot a few days ago. It was something so basic yet he had forgotten to bring something like a watch to help track the time. Still, he continued, undeterred by his inability to track his own progress. He just had to keep pushing himself. In the end he hoped it would be enough. His breathing now came in strained and heavy spurts, his voice accompanying each exhalation of air as he forced the air out of his own lungs all in order to take in the next gulp of oxygen as quickly as he could. What he'd do for some water at this point.
As he ran he could hear his own footsteps despite the pounding in his ears from his own heart racing. They were heavy, almost thunderous, much too loud for his own liking. It was a side effect of the weights, he knew that, but he still disliked how heavy each step felt, how his feet crashed down to the earth after the split second of air time. He made extra effort to raise his knees a bit higher than usual, to extend his stride as much as he could, knowing that the weight made him subconsciously skimp on these two details with each step. He needed to try and run as he would normally, it was the best way to gain results from training like this. His shoulders tensed as he swung his arms a bit more, resisting the urge to let them hand and trail behind him. Not only did not defeat the purpose of weights on his arms but also caused more stress on his shoulders. He needed the rotators cuff to hold and remain absolute in their strength. More sweat poured from his forehead, onto his brow, getting into his eyes, making them sting from the enzyme containing saline liquid. He was really exhausted at this point and he still had about one third of the way left to go.

Hiro tried to pick up the pace, unsure if he was really moving faster yet at the same time mentally feeling as though he were putting in more and more effort. If he had to be honest with himself, he was quite annoyed by now, the weights being the target of his disdain. He hated how they felt. He hated how he felt with them on. He hated how loud they made his steps and how they made even the simple task of wiping the sweat off one's own brow a monumental task. He honestly hated this method of training, but he had seen the fruit of the labor in the swiftness of other kenjutsu users' movements. Almost all of them contributed their speed and strength to the use of weights like these at least at one point in their training. He pressed on, trying not to think too much about his own annoyance and frustration. He was almost there. Just one fourth the way to go.

The running was becoming monotonous now. No longer able to keep sprinting or even to push himself to a run, he felt he was jogging now, small intervals of sprinting thrown in when his stamina allowed. The sprint barely lasted ten seconds before he fell back to the half run half jog, trying to force himself to move faster yet finding no energy to do so. His body felt spent at this point. The pattern persisted and he felt that frustration welling up in his chest once more. Damn these weights. He was glad that this was the last day of his "vacation". He knew though, that even if it was that he'd probably need to keep coming back to this method of training every so often lest he lose his edge. The thought wasn't comforting in the least.

Hiro would exhale heavily as let his body drop, falling on his behind with a small grunt before moving his left arm onto his lap, unstrapping the weight from the left arm then his right. He'd move his arms a bit, uninhibited by the weight. They felt like jelly but weightless at the same time. He supposed that if there was any pleasure in this method of training, it was the feeling of taking the weights off and feeling that feather like lightness that came in the minutes after. He moved to undo the weights from his legs. He was glad it was over. Once he had removed the overbearing weight from his body he stood up, stretching. He really did feel a bit unsteady on his feet, but again, like his arms, his legs felt so light. He'd give a small grunt before turning toward the road he had just run up. He supposed it couldn't hurt to test his speed now that he had completed his final day of his physical training regimen. He'd slide his right foot back as his left lead, leaning over slightly as though he were about to start a race, opting to not take the full sprinter's start position, settling for the half ready position. He'd mentally count down from three. As soon as he hit zero he was off, sprinting down the hill, his body moving in a blur of motion, hard to follow completely. The feeling of wind through your hair. The feeling of being free and uninhibited. The feeling of being one with the wind as one sailed across the earth as fast as they could, traversing vast distances in a matter of seconds. He felt these feelings now and it brought a smile to the young man's face. How wonderful he felt, being free from that weight that had clung so desperately to his body, slowing all his movements. The weights were gone and he was swift, just like the wind.

Chakra, the term given to the essential energy required for almost any of the ninja arts that were taught to those who learned the way of the shinobi. It flows through all living things and is said to be composed of two parts, the spiritual energy that comes from experience and the strength of the spirit and physical energy produced by every living cell of the body. The two combine in even parts to create a potent energy that is said to fuel the shinobi's power, giving him the ability to perform rather miraculous feats that most were unable to pull off. At least that's what Hiro had been taught during his days in the academy.

In reality though, Hiro had no real clue what chakra was, as he was never able to mold the thing from birth but thanks to the Magician Curse Seal he was able to use something as equally as great which was Natural Energy. So now instead of Lightning and Magnet Release, he was able to use Lightning and Magnet Magic, which was equally cool and all he needed to focus on was perfecting his own skills and fulfilling his duties utilizing the means that Carmen-sama had provided for him.

The boy did his best to keep his mind clear of all distractions as he focused on the task at hand, meditation, reaching in and drawing out his inner self, unlocking the energies within. It sounded cheesy, but even if that didn't work, the fact that it seemed to help clear the young man's overactive mind was more than a good enough reason to partake in the practice of meditation. It made him more clear headed, it calmed his nerves, and it helped settle him after a strenuous morning of intense and body breaking training. His body still ached, but he removed himself from the physical pain, focusing inward, drifting in and out of the physical consciousness of his own mind. At least that's what he wanted to do.
“Don’t you think you’ve been away from home a bit too long?”
A voice said coming from behind about five feet away from where he was currently standing. The voice was none other than Kagura. The young woman had the annoying habit of showing up whenever he was away training for a certain length of time and he didn’t know why. Was it because Xan had been wondering what was going on? Or was it because she got lonely without Hiro around? The latter seemed like the most likely reason.

“Well the last time I checked I’m free to do what I pleased so snot nosed brats shouldn’t be telling me what I should do!”

He said with his eyes still closed as he was still trying to meditate, unfortunately the main point of meditation was having a peace of mind and with Kagura here that would be impossible.

“Fine you win.”

Hiro said before letting out a small sigh. In truth he was currently tired so maybe heading home to a home cooked meal would be a good idea. Assuming she cooked anyways.

Techs Trained:

WC- 3357
WC Needed- 3300

Approved

Hiro could barely move an inch, covered in sweat from head to toe. His lungs danced up and down in his body and he could probably be heard for miles and miles, almost unable to stand and seeing spots. This had been the method he had been using for training to bring up his stamina and the speed of his movement. Sure he was currently beyond fit for what was considered of a normal young man at his age and rank but he needed to go faster train harder so he could at least be a semblance closer to Xan well more like a tiny droplet in a giant crater.  For a few seconds he didn't even dare to try to move, he was worried that the pain might cause him to pass out, he could still hear his own legs screaming desperately.

Again.

These ruidmentary training weights trapped on his shins, these heavy metal things made things unnecessary. Hiro couldn't help but recall the loss he had suffered by the hands of the Apprentice Knight and the shame it had brought him. Every time he had thought about it his blood would boil and it felt as if he was about to explode. Hiro was never one to hold a grudge against someone, in fact he was one that always took a lose as a learning experience but when she had used him to get to someone she knew she had no chance on earth, heaven or hell to initiate her sick and twisted plans, it became personal and he was going to settle this with her soon and from what he had learnt from Klaus and Ivanna he should be ready for any genjutsu she was going to throw at him and of course what she had used against him won’t affect him that strongly thanks to his past confrontations so that was an added plus to his fight for his pride.

After strapping the weight to his legs, he had been tasked with racing around the jungle until the Silver Templar Klaus  had sent to aid him in training sent instructed him to stop. He had gone from an open terrian, through trees, through sands, through rocky moutains, all for the sake of training. Was Klaus trying to train him on navigating through the elements? Hiro could do this without worry, as he already had a great amount of endurance ever since he had made a trip to the waterfall near Samuigakure for training purposes and a bit of sightseeing. Those couples of days hunting for his food and living through harsh weather conditions had increased his Endurance tenfold so this was nothing, well that was wwhat he kept telling himself anyways.

But speed wasn't the issue for him, sure he had to be fast, but this training would also give him the one thing he could combine with his other teachings in the jungle. Longetivity, the ability to continuously run without stopping or getting tired. Ninja who underestimated the ability to run for days on end, as he had back home.

Hiro focused on his speed training, continuously running through rivers to test his control since he couldnt walk on water yet, racing through a forest thicker than the ones he'd previously danced to and continuing to train into the night. To his surprise he had discovered taking off the weights made him faster, but not just for the lack of weight, his raw agility was better. Testing his speed out without the weights proved a considerable jump in speed, something that Hiro would intend to grow on. With his accuracy training being the most easiest, and speed training being done, he was now ready to move on to the hard part. Strength. Klaus wanted to focus on his muscles since he was using weapons and hand to hand combat. Before long, Hiro was going to be a beast.

Later on that day, Hiro fell into a heap of frustration, sweat, blood and tears. While his lungs burned under the fire of no oxygen, he raised both of his arms in the air looking at them through pulsating eyes. They were ragged and covered with dirt, hours of training drawing to an end. After taking a rest and dropping the speed weights, Hiro began his next task: trying to garden in a forest. Instead of bringing tools with him to help him create his new garden, Hiro was tasked with the impossible, pull up the biggest roots and create a small clearing inside of the forest where Klaus and Ivanna could have some kind of drink and smokes of course.

Pulling the roots from the ground was nigh impossible, but Hiro succeeded, after crying and his hands start bleeding and his body was wondering what the hell he was doing. The roots were like melded together, years, no decades of time spent growing deep into the ground made it like trying to pull up hair from the root. Nigh impossible. But once he learned how loosen the dirt up with a couple of punches pulling them was still hard but not almost impossible. A few times he had managed to pull up more than one root, but these were always the difficult ones. Once there were too many piled up in a single area, Hiro had to move them, which meant finding a spot and tossing massive logs, bigger than himself of course into the abyss of the forest around him. After a while, the only thing left was a forest full of holes and fresh tree roots ripped from the ground.

Hiro however, ran into a particular tree that Ivanna requested be moved. This tree, after feeling it, Hiro was sure that he could not move it. Putting a hand against it told the person that there was water running through here, not slowly like most other trees, but enough to cut it and watch the tree bleed water. And he wanted one of the thickets roots removed so he'd have a nice shade spot. Hiro hoped that Ivanna didnt think he was dumb... Then again she was pretty sick and twisted so this wasn’t something that was connected to his training, this was more of lets see how much suffering she could put him through.

After finally getting a good grip on the legs, Hiro moved on the last branch. His entire body strained, his face turned red if he had no melanin and his veins all over his body bulged like they were going to pop. With each leg quivering like the string of a bow after a shot, it seemed for a moment as this last tree was going to be too much for him. Hiro had other plans, and of course he overcame the struggle. Tearing a massive tree root from the ground, Hiro pulled the fresh root from the dirt, sending it all everywhere, including his face.

Once the tree root was out of the way, Hiro pulled it out from the tree until he could feel it about to pop, pulling harder and harder until he tree root began to tear now that it wasn't attached to the ground. He had almost walked all the way around the tree, but now he'd come to the point where the popping and snapping of soft wood was about to end. With the tree root completely separated from the tree, he hoisted the massive thing over his head and chucked it with his strength, leaving the clearing full of nothing but holes and grass, with deformed trees sprawled over the area now they could have their little TLAH Order party.

It had been weeks since he had done his training with Ivanna and Klaus but the pain still lingered throughout his entire body most notably his arms and legs. But even though he was currently in more pain than he could possibly bear he was still up for more training.  After all his body will remember this and his past confrontations will allow him to go throw such a training once more without him even breaking a sweat which was pretty useful quite frankly. “Where are you going Hiro?” Kagura said as she exited the bathroom and entered the living room with nothing but a towel on. “First off all…Put some clothes on… Secondly I’m going to go train.” Hiro said unable to look at the young girl who was now gaining womanly curls and a nice sized chest, oh god what was he thinking! “Baka, you’re still in crappy state why are you so hell bent on pushing your body over the limit just because of what happened with that Sucubitch?” Kagura said while glaring at the back of Hiro. “For my pride I guess.” Hiro answered honestly before turning and smiling at Kagura. “I’m pretty sure you will be following me anyways so if I do pass out you’ll be nearby right?” He said before running out the house heading to the mountains.

By following the mountain down below the elevation of Jikogakure  one comes across the tree line rather quickly. It doesn't take long before you find yourself in a dense forest filled with trees of various sizes and a mass assortment of plants. The one in particular that Hiro was looking for were bamboo groves. The clustered stalks filled a small area in densely packed poles roughly an inch thick. Some stalks lay on their sides or lean against others after being damaged by things passing through the area. Most would see the area as an annoyance to walk through, but an abundance of bamboo if they had a use for it. Hiro saw it as a training device.

The early morning sun barely fell through the thick forest coverage. It was about 5:00am and he was pretty sure that no one would bother him up here, except Kagura of course. His hand instinctively went for his left thigh causing a pained expression to creep upon his face. He had to force himself to push the thought aside as he worked toward his goal of bettering himself. After that landscaping and marathon running he had done his body was still recovering but this was no time for him to wimp out!

He stood at the edge of the grove silently soaking up the atmosphere. The light blue rays of light filtered into the area leaving many dark shadows hanging in the air. His eyes had long ago adjusted to the dim light making seeing easy enough. His mind attempted to formulate a plan to make it through the grove without delay. However, he furrowed his brow in frustration as his mind couldn't process that many movements ahead of time. He decided it would be time to test his instinct rather than his wit.

Hiro charged at the grove only having a few meters of clear area before bursting into the stalks. He managed to slip between two stalks to make it inward. A quick sidestep got him around another. One of the injured bamboo stalks forced him to duck. It seemed that getting through here would be easier than he could have expected. He straightened before sidestepping once more. A stalk rubbed his shoulder. Nothing serious. He continued to move through, but found himself being hindered more and more. His eyes couldn't keep up with all of obstacles before him. He slowed...and slowed...and finally came to a halt.

There the black haired boy stood in the center of the bamboo grove contemplating what his next course of action would be. He certainly could not clear the area without either moving incredibly slow or damaging all of the stalks. His breathing returned to normal while his mind became more and more hazy. With his fists clenched and his teeth gritted, Hiro charged forward once again. This time his eyes were open, but this time he had activated his Raidengan.

All he could see were the immediate stalks around him. He leaned to the side while lowering himself. It was a fluid movement that required some flexibility, but he pulled it off. A quick sidestep with a half body spin got him around another group. His thoughts had slowed to a minimum as he focused only on making it through the grove. To an outside viewer it would almost appear as if Hiro were now dancing in the grove. The stalks surrounded him, but did not hinder him. A small smile spread across his lips as his eyes were dark from focus but a spark of excitement existed in that darkness.

Hiro flung himself from the edge of the grove. His breath was ragged and sweat rolled off his forehead down his face. It wasn't that warm out this morning, though his jacket wasn't helping at all, as a cool breeze blew through. The feeling of moving through that grove. The feeling of relying on ones instinct rather than reason. The sensation was burned into his memory. He would not forget the feeling. A flame burned within him. A blaze of triumph. Without another moment's delay Hiro faced the grove again. A confident smile showed he had nothing to fear as he rushed again to conquer the bamboo field.

Trained:

WC- 2,209
Required- 2,200

Approved

Hiro awoke in a rather energetic mood this day. The sun was seeping through the moderately clean windows to give off a warm kiss to greet him while the clouds tried to hide the sun from its duties. It was all planned that he would have the day to himself with a training session in forest terrain of Jikogakure. The forest in questions stretches out as far as the eye could see covering the many mountains which hides Jikogakure. A small river also runs through the forest which many dangerous herbs and wildlife species call this place home, and pose a threat for anyone who may wonder into it, yet it seemed to be a the perfect place for young Shinobi like himself to test his might. The young Denkou then made his way into the restroom, there he washed his face and brushed his teeth afterwards before heading into the mildly warm shower and embraced what it had to offer. After his soak, he then made his way back into his room and headed straight for the closet to pick out his outfit.

After finishing his bath and getting dressed, Hiro would make his way downstairs.  He made his way over to the fridge and took out some bread and other ingredients such as meat, cheese, large quantities of fruit and juice and placed them all in concealing bags to keep them fresh and tidy. With the wide variety of foods, he then placed all of these in a basket along with napkins and a blanket which would be soon accompanying him to the forest.

He then made breakfast to help start his day with some nutrition and energy which could also make his body feel more prepared and full so he would have time to embrace the surroundings that he would observing later on this evening. He pulled out a box of wheat flakes with some raspberries to compliment them and milk to pour over. Once prepared for himself, apple juice was also poured into a half pint glass and set beside the bowl of cereal. The spoon took larger portions than needed which indicated that Hiro was in a rush to get to the destination he had set for himself. He rarely went out to the dense forest. In fact, he had only been there on missions, helping to find a cat, and helping to secure a scroll from the hands of a small gang. This all happened when he was only an Apprentice Knight of course and had came a long way in terms of skill and intellect since then.

He had noticed his katana in the hallway, the katana had no special properties, no special abilities, no special designs, it was just a regular katana. But he had loved the blade nonetheless. Why you ask? Because it was a symbol of his rebirth as a shinobi, a symbol of the bond that he now shared with his sensei, Xan Ibwa and that was why he was so attached to 30 xel katana. He lifted the weapon and befitted it upon his lower back for further protection in the unknown forest. Locking the door behind him, Hiro scanned the street up and down to find a lot of people out doing their own personal errands with shopping while children were running, playing and laughing. The street was too crowded for the young Bronze Knight's taste and so hastily made his way to the Village gates with his supplies in his hand.

As he approached the gates he had noticed that the two guards were not the same the ones he was accustomed to. The fact that he picked an odd day might have been the reason along with the others hours of work they are required to be posted here. He nodded and raised his weapons to show the two fellow shinobi as a gesture that he was going for a meal outside of  the village for training and probably a picnic , in which they happily complied with a small smile and a nod towards him maybe because they had known he was Xan’s. He smiled back once he was given permission and made his way down the road towards his destination of the dense forest which was not as far as he anticipated. Before long, Hiro had arrived to the dense forest. The sunlight seeped through the trees and their leaves touching only a few areas of the surroundings. He clutched his picnic basket tighter as he became more alert of his surroundings, wondering which was poisonous plants and wondering about the whereabouts of the defensive animals in their home.

With luck, Hiro did not run into any danger, in fact it was quite peaceful, just the way he liked it. He made his way to a secluded area near a stream that the water could be heard crashing ever so slightly among the banks that kept it detained within the trench. The flowers glowed with various colours depending on which area he looked, the majority being a reddish pink hue with the reflective ray of the sun's light. The breeze was not too strong but enough to keep cool from the smothering wildlife that was around him. He sat the basket down and looked at the contents. He began with a blanket, laying it across a firm and even patch of grass. Second of all, he placed out the food that surrounded he would eat and thee plates and napkins to go along with them. With the food before him he gave thanks and began tucking into the various ingredients and combining them to make a rather delicious sandwich. “Started without me I see.” A familiar voice rung out from behind. “Nah I brought enough for you too!” He said with a smile as his Onyx hues laid upon his partner in crime Kagura who was not only covered in what seemed like sweat and blood from head to toe but her clothes were also in tatters. One of his many reasons for coming here today was due to the fact that he had known Kagura was within the forest completing an exclusive mission from Pandora. “So how did it go?” Hiro asked before handing a sandwich to  Kagura who was now seated beside him. “We racked up about fifteen bodies, most were in pieces due to my recklessness. We just turned them over to Gensogakure however, they seemed pleased enough and I get a nice reward as well.” She stated before sinking her teeth hungrily into the sandwich. It had been about 3 weeks since they had seen each other, which was due to the fact that she had been traveling with a squad around the entire Pandora Territory searching for targets. “So when will you and Xan-sama be going out?” She asked when she was finished devouring the sandwich. “Tomorrow, unlike you guys however it’ll just be me and him which in all honesty seems a bit dangerous but the old man knows best.” He stated sarcastically before taking a bit out of his sandwich. Xan for some strange reason had complete fate in Hiro, even though he had just started learning Kenjutsu and even though he had lost to her. “So you think you’re ready for that rematch?” She asked looking him directly in his eyes. “I’m getting there…” Hiro muttered. He had been training hard enough however he felt he hadn’t been ready as yet, mainly due to the fact that he was still unable to create a genjutsu dispelling technique. “Well you can take me along and we’ll  kill the bitc-” Before she would finish her sentence however she would quickly jump on top of Hiro forcing him down to the ground. Unsure of what was happening, Hiro found his left hand on her hip, and his right on her breast which was pretty damn embarrassing. “We have visitors…”  

Hiro hadn’t noticed it before but they were surrounded. It seemed that Kagura had gained a great number of enemies during her mission and somehow they had managed to track her back here, luckily they weren’t lead to the village as they both would’ve gotten in some deep shit for revealing the location of the village. “Seems like you got a group of admirers” Hiro jokingly said before gently pushing Kagura to the side. Activating his Raidengan he could see that the amount of enemies were far beyond what he probably would’ve expected. “This is bad…” He said to his partner who was now standing beside him. Hiro was currently in tip top shape, however the same couldn’t be said for Kagura, but knowing her she would still look to fight so there was no use in telling her to run. Instead he would take the command. “Follow me Kagura.” He said as he formulated a plan.

“This was your big idea? I understand that you’re trying to lure them away from the village but when exactly are we going to stop running and start fighting?”  She complained as she followed Hiro who was currently running east. In truth they been running for quite some time and it was obvious that she was laboring as she wasn’t in the best of conditions so it was probably best for them to stop. “Right lets go!” Hiro said with a smile before breaking away from Kagura, drawing his blade. The person closest to him would be in for a surprise as the sudden turn coupled with Lack of Intent would mean that his death would be unexpected and swift. Kagura would use that as a cover to throw a drilling boomerang shuriken which would take out three enemies at once, so that was four down, six more to go. Watching them with his dojutsu activate Hiro would easily deduce that the remaining were quite strong but dying wasn’t on his list of things to do today so they had to win. Hiro would bolt towards them at Blinding Light speeds before stumbling, that stumble would allow Kagura to run upon Hiro’s back and launched herself into the crowd. Kagura would then utilize her batto stance to take out two of the mercenaries instantly while Hiro would use strafe to cover the distance and decapitated another.
Not before long all of them would be laying face first in a pile of dirt, covered in shuriken like practice dummies and/or have deep wounds.  Hiro was currently surveying the area to see if there were more hiding while Kgura was busy trying to catch her breath as she was completely and utterly exhausted, which was understandable as she had been fighting for weeks. “Come on lets go.” Hiro said as he extended his arm towards her and when she did take his hand he would pull her up. “We should contact a few templar knights so they can come and collect the bodies and have them shipped to Genso.” Kagura slowly before passing out due to exhaustion. With a nod Hiro would pick her and exited the area and made it towards home for a well deserved rest.

WC 1,854

Techs trained:

Approved

It had been a cold dark day in Jikogakure, which was a bit strange due to it being the surrounded by numerous active volcanoes, but it was a change that Hiro had welcomed. It had been approximately a month and three weeks since he had last done any form of training and luckily Xan was out of town or else he probably would’ve been killed for lack of training, but today was the day he decided that he would finally do some training and not a normal training regime but one that would make up for the month he had missed, or something like that.

Removing the sheet that had provided warmth to his body, Hiro would slowly but surely roll out of bed and stood on his two feet. “Guess I should just tidy up before leaving” Hiro muttered to himself as he looked at his bed which had been a mess. In the same breath Hiro would quickly remove the cover sheets that had been on his bed for quite some time and replaced them with a new grey sheet that Kagura had purchased recently for him. He would then take a top sheet with the initials TLAH over it, why the TLAH order had bed spreads he had no reason why, and neatly stacked the pillows towards the head of the bed. Now that was over he would make his way towards the bathroom and took a quick glance in the mirror. Ever since he had started training with Xan he was no longer the same person, which was a good thing of course as now he was filled with determination, ambition and strength, which was better the little coward Denkou he once was. After his self examination he would grab his toothbrush and evenly distributed the toothpaste on the bristles and when he was through with brushing his teeth, he would take a quick show and headed to the kitchen.

“Hmm what to eat...” Hiro said as he stood before the refrigerator. It was like he was spoilt for choice, in fact it was the the exact opposite! However he was having one of those moments where you had a few decisions yet you were unable to decide on what to take. A conundrum? Probably not. In the end he decided it would be best to have a large breakfast as he would be out all day so he would have an assortment of fruits with toast and cereal. After eating to his heart’s content, or in this case his stomach, he would get dressed as he was still naked, grabbed his training material which was piled up in the corner of the living room and headed to his usual training spot.

The cool breeze would caress his cheeks the moment he had arrived in his favoured training area. Hiro would place his training weaponry under a nearby tree and would begin his warm up. Finding a place that was dry he would sit with his legs crossed and closed his eyes. His first task for the day would be to breathing exercises. He would begin with inhaling and exhaling rapidly throughout his nose while keeping his mouth closed and ensuring that his in and out breaths were exactly the same duration. He would keep this exercise going for about half an hour before  moving on to the next exercise. Shifting his body, he would ensure that he was sitting with his spine straight and with his head inclined slightly forward before closing his eyes and allowing his breath to take its natural pace. He would initiate the exercise by counting to one and then exhaling  he would counting this counting cycle without surpassing five counts for ten minutes before stopping the final exercise.

With a calm and clear mind, Hiro would stand on his feet and picked up his katana. Now he would practice his swings, unsheathing the weapon, Hiro would begin by swinging the horizontally, from left to right. This time however instead of a hundred reps like he normally would he would do a thousand reps, which on paper sounded utterly ridiculous but he did say he was looking to make up for the training he had missed so a thousand reps it was! “998….999….1000! Whew!” Hiro exclaimed after finishing the reps within a record seven minutes without the use of an speed tiers which was quite impressive, he wasn’t finished however as now he had to do a thousand more reps, this time they would be from left to right vertically. This would be done within seven minutes as well and with his reps finished he would sheathe his weapon once more.

“Magic Clone!” After forming the clone seal, Hiro would create a clone of himself with the help of Magician Seal that the God Queen Carmen had granted him. The reason for creating a clone was quite simple. He needed a sparring partner, and since Xan wasn’t around which was probably more of a good than a bad thing, he had to settle for himself. “I guess it’s time to teach myself a  lesson!” The clone said with a sly grin on his face before picking up the spar katana. “As if!” He said before taking his stance.

The clashing of the two swords would echo throughout the empty forest, as Hiro and his clone fought vigorously. He had lost count the amount of times they had actually cancelled out each others techniques but he had known that they were going at it for over an hour. Pushing each other off, the would land within ten meters of each other panting heavily while staring each other down. “How will you beat her at your current level? I mean you’re pretty weak.” The clone said with a smirk, taunting the original. Hiro couldn’t help but fall for his taunting though as whenever anyone mentioned her. “What did you just say...” He snarled gripping his katana tightly. Normally Hiro wasn't one that was easily provoked, but whenever someone had made the mistake of mentioning that girl to him, it had got his blood boiling. “Whoa man calm down I was joking.” The clone said laughing nervously. While it was busy worrying about how to calm down it’s original, Hiro would walk past him at Blinding Light speeds. The clone would jump back due to be surprised but it had knew that it was all but over now. “Hehe, my apologizes Hiro.” The clone said with a smirk as he watched as Hiro sheathed the weapon, and when the blade had made its way into the sheathe the clone would disappear. “Would that be enough though?” Hiro muttered to himself as he was now alone on the training ground. He had been training for hours now but was he ready for a rematch with that girl? Only time would tell. Letting out a soft sigh, Hiro would pick up his training gear and made his way home.

“I’m home...” Hiro declared after opening the door. His home had become quite occupied recently with him taking in Kagura after rescuing her from those missing nin and now he had provided accommodation to the civilian he had captured on his mission with Xan. “I wonder how she’s doing...” Hiro muttered to himself as he placed his gear down. When she had regained consciousness she went on a rampage, screaming, crying and attacking Hiro calling him a monster for what he had done to her friends and thus when Kagura got home she had roughed her up and chained her in the room opposite to his. Which didn’t do much good as every night Hiro would hear her sobbing uncontrollably and praying to her god for absolution. “Xan-senpai was right, you should’ve placed slave marks on her. What use to you is she like this?” Kagura stated while they were having a conversation when the woman had finally passed out due to exhaustion. Hiro had made it his personal duty to feed her and provide her with water whenever he was around as he knew that Kagura didn’t give two shits about her. At first she wouldn’t eat anything for weeks, but she would soon start eating some food, maybe she was warming up to him? Or maybe she didn’t want to die afterall. “Jeez this is such a pain...” Hiro muttered to himself as picked out some fresh fruit and water to take up to the woman. “Good evening, just gonna leave these here, if you’re hungry you can have these, they're fresh and tasty.” Hiro said nervously as he put both the bowls with water and fruit a few feet infront of her and turned on his heels to leave. “Why….why did you do this to me..” The young woman muttered as her sharp eyes glared at Hiro. “D-Do what exactly?” He said nervously as words made him stop in his tracks. “You killed my friends, took me from my home and have me here as a slave...what do you plan on doing with me? Rape me? Torture me? Keeping me as your play thing? What...What do you want from me??” She screamed on top of her lungs with hatred in her eyes. “You know...You’re pretty ungrateful.” Hiro found himself saying before turning to face her. “I could’ve allowed Xan-sensei to kill you all and ship your bodies to Gensogakure so that they could do whatever the hell they pleased. But I decided to save you. In truth it was probably on a whim why I decided to chose you but you were chosen nonetheless. Now I don’t want you here chained up and wilting away, but you gave me no choice.” He said sternly with a frown on his face. “Tsk, you don’t know what it’s like being away from those you love! I begged them not let him take me on that stupid mission and now, I won’t see them again!” Mary said with her anger turning into sadness. “And that’s where you’re wrong. I was never born in Pandora, I was originally a part of the Allied Shinobi Nations. But my parents were hunted down and murdered by the Shogunate and the ASN refused to avenge my family so my brother chose to get revenge by his own means and was killed by hunter nin from our own village.” Silence had grown between the two for a few moments before Hiro started speaking once more. “Look, I’m sorry that this had happened but you’re alive and like how Xan-sensei had given me a chance to have purpose in my life, I’m extending the same courtesy towards you Mary-san. I know you must miss your family, and I promise you that I’ll have you reunited with them one day but for now you must help me with you skills so that we can make Pandora a great nation.” He ended his speech by extending his hand towards the woman. Mary hesitated at first but realised that he was in fact sincere. “Okay… Hiro...” She said taking his hand and weakly shaking it. “Yosh, let’s get you out of them chains.” Hiro would quickly unlock the chains that binded the woman to the her makeshift cell and gave her a helping hand so she could stand on her own two feet. “Thank you Hiro...” Mary said with a weak smile as gripped on his shoulder for support. “Y-Yeah no problem.”

The had spent majority of the evening sorting out clothes for Mary to wear seeing as her clothing were tattered and tore apart. Regrettably Hiro had to go into his savings and purchased clothes for the young woman to wear as she was much older than Kagura and as such none of the clothing Kagura had lying around could fit the adolescent woman. “I wouldn’t have thought that clothes in Pandora would be similar to ones back home.” Mary said sounding quite surprised when Hiro had brought the clothes for her. He didn’t understand why people had the idea that Pandora was filled with monsters and demons, I mean technically it was true but they were nomal people at some stage in their many lives and they were normal people residing in Pandora, like Tumu, Xan and himself. Well if you would consider a drunk wielding a sword/gun or a zombie murder normal, but he at least he was normal. “Umm...I wasn’t sure what to get for your ummm underwear so I had someone help me out.” And by someone he meant the store clerk and boy was that awkward. “It’s fine, once I start working again I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to buy my own clothes.” She said with a smile. Now that Mary was the oldest person in this household, Hiro thought it would be best to give her full control of the house funds as sign of trust, that and Mary did say she worked as a maid for that old guy Xan had killed so she was probably the better of the three to make those kinds of decisions. “Hiro-sama… Can I ask you a favour?” Mary said looking away. Hiro had told her numerous times just to call him Hiro but it seems that she was the submissive type and so he just allowed her to do what she pleased. “Sure.” He said before taking a sip of the tea that Mary had made him. Any normal person would be weary of whatever Mary made for them to eat or drink, due to the fact that it may contain poison, but he had trusted her. Why? Who knew. “I want to start my own ranch. I want to be a famous tamer! I wish to explore all of the Pandora Empire, no I want to explore the world! I wanna tame all sorts of creatures and breed entirely new ones! I wanna be the best I can be! Do you think you could help me?” She said with a warm smile looking at Hiro with pleading eyes. Hiro couldn’t help but smile at the girl’s words. Little did she know however, that they share similar traits, the both wanted to be free. “Sure. Once I get strong enough I’ll show you the world! We’ll be the best at what we do and everyone will admire our skills.” He said with a smile. The day would end with Mary falling asleep in her new room that Hiro had made and Hiro himself had dozed off, for tomorrow he would start training once more.

A new day brought forth new opportunities; a fresh start to a goal that always seemed just out of reach. To attain the kind of power he wanted would likely always be without end, a race without a finish line, yet one he would run with everything he had despite it being a proverbial möbius strip. He found himself at the same location as last time, admiring the scenery of the otherwise desolate Ash Country. There were worse places to spend a day, he thought to himself. His regime hadn't changed since yesterday. The day prior had been spent on muscular strength and endurance, and he definitely hadn't gone easy on himself. The soreness in his arms were a clear indication of his dedication. On this day, the training had shifted in style, but not in intensity.

Hiro brought his hands together and formed a sequence of five hand seals with impressive accuracy and speed. Despite his inability to mold chakra once upon a time, he was now proficent at forming seals due to the Magician seal giving him the power. After all, he had techniques that required their usage, such as the one he'd just used. He split chakra from his core and shaped it into a humanoid shape, which took on the appearance of himself. It was far from being the ideal technique for this type of training, but he wasn't planning on dishing out the damage. His intentions were to perceive and receive where possible.

As the clone took shape, they shared a wordless glance. The real Hiro rolled his sleeves up just below his elbows and assumed a defensive stance with his Raidengan activated. His right hand was clenched into a loose fist and lowered slightly while his left remained open and at his side. His feet were positioned apart and knees were slightly bent, giving the stance an airy feeling that would facilitate the usage of quick movements and speedy reactions. His ball of his rear foot was raised slightly, and the weight of his body continuously shifted back and forth from his rear to leading foot. Both the stance and the martial art in question were perfect for Hiro's style of combat. Observe and adapt. Take only what was useful, and discard the rest. The clone assumed a more offensive stance, a mixture of what was the Denkou clan’s fighting style and one’s he had observed from his fight with ASN shinobi. The two exchanged a slight nod of their heads to signal that they were both ready to begin, and the offensive stanced clone began a slow but cautious advance. The experience that the clone garnered would be discarded entirely, but such was the nature of a more primitive clone technique. Until he bothered with learning a more suitable alternative, he was stuck with making what he had work.

The clone began its offensive. Its right arm shot rocketed forward with speed and strength to rival Hiro's own, unsurprisingly. Hiro responded by raising his right forearm and pushing the strike aside. It was his attention to throw his clone off balance by catching it by the wrist and pulling it's weight down. However, things rarely went perfectly to plan, and the clone reacted accordingly by pivoting on its left foot and quickly raising its right leg. By whipping its hips around, the leg snapped forward with impressive momentum.

He shifted his weight and quickly dropped into a crouched stance after releasing the clone's wrist. The roundhouse swung overhead while the real Hiro stretched his right leg out and swept for the clone's only point of contact; his left leg. The sweep connected and the clone was indeed swept off balance. While falling, it twisted its torso and outstretched its hands to the ground. It caught itself before it fell and quickly twirled its legs around like a whirlwind, then dropped its hand stand to its elbows.

It was quick to recover, and so was Hiro. Before a second had passed, they were back at it. He mused that his ability to receive and react vastly outweighed his ability to deal out damage, but such a difference was precisely the point of this training. Attacking was always a risk, it opened one's defenses to counters, which was precisely why leading the battle with his advances was paramount. If he could control the flow of the battle, anticipate exactly how his opponent would react to how he moved and as a result maneuver accordingly, then the result would be decided from the beginning.

However, to do so was also a risk. Putting his faith into his expectations and his self assumed ability to predict how an opponent would react was a terribly unreliable tactic. He had to take into account the unexpected-- predict the unpredictable. Combat was not unlike a game of chess, where the victor was all too often the one who thought the most moves ahead.

The clone struck out at him again. This time it unleashed fast, accurate, and well guarded jabs and strikes in lightning fast combinations of three. Right jab, right jab, left cross. Just by watching his own clone's footwork, he could tell that the expected one two combination was in fact a one one two, performed either to test the waters of his own defense or even throw him off with the unexpected right cross.

Hiro evaded the first jab, then swung his right arm around and caught the second jab on its return with his forearm. He knocked it aside, thus breaking the stance and forfeiting his clone the opportunity to perform the expected left cross. As a result, the clone had suddenly lost balance-- or had seemed to, at least. In reality, it shifted its weight with its right hand and thrown itself toward the ground. As a result, a sudden kick that lacked weight and power behind it swiped across his face. Despite its usage of speed in favour of power, it still stung, and send him rolling into the ground.

A sly grin appeared on both the face of the clone and his own as he rose back up. "Not too bad, me." The spoken words were quiet, and it wasn't long before the clone was making another advance. A flurry of combinations of typical boxing variety found their way in Hiro's direction. Some were blocked, some were evaded outright, and others managed to connect, yet none inflicted any lasting damage. Bare knuckle boxing was rather dangerous, after all, even if it was just with himself. Every so often, the clone would change its tactics and strike with other techniques and styles, namely powerful but slow muay thai maneuvers that Hiro opted to evade entirely instead of meeting with redirection tactics. As per usual, his perception of time during combat was lacking in accuracy. It had only been fifteen minutes of constant combat, and he hadn't been feeling particularly winded or fatigued, yet the battle seemed to have been going on for much longer. A minuscule amount of strikes actually found their target, whereas the majority were nullified. A large grin was plastered on both his own and his clone's faces as their intense spar dragged on with no clear victory in sight.

Finally, an opening presented itself to Hiro, and he was happy to oblige it. The clone swung high, aiming for his head, but their distance was just a bit further than expected. As a result, Hiro's left leg shouldered the weight of his body as his right leg shot outward and caught the clone square in the chest. Causing the clone to disperse. “Hehe, looks like I won.” He said as he wiped the sweat of his brow. “Hiro-sama! I made lunch!” A voice called out in the distance. Upon turning into the direction that the voice came from, Hiro would see that it was Mary. “Okay I’m coming!” He said quite enthusiastically. He had loved Mary’s cooking, more so than Kagura’s and since she was well versed in many exotic dishes, he couldn’t wait to see what she had in store for him today.

WC: 3778

Techs Trained:

Damn bro, why you gotta be such a boss. Approved though.

It was a peaceful night for Hiro, having not had any nightmares and in fact today seemed to be going quite well, he had even woken up early enough to prepare himself a large breakfast. Who didn't need something to eat in the morning? Well for Hiro that something just had to be some bacon and eggs with a side of two slices of toast spread with some butter. Enjoying the treat for himself he decided to walk around the house and look over his parent's pictures, remembering his father and mother fondly before he'd finish most of the food, only left with a single piece of toast.
Popping the slice of toast into his mouth, he paid his respects to the small mantel picture he made for his father and then headed to the door, opening it up and setting his course for the training grounds just half a mile from her house in the eastern part of Jikogakure, even having enough time to wave to greet some of the people that he had considered his neighbors, even though he had lived on the outskirts of village. Even though they had always been kind to him, he had noticed a difference in their behavior towards him. They always looked as if they were proud of him and at times they would wish him luck even if he was just heading out to buy groceries with Mary. Was it because he had risen through the ranks so quickly and was now a Silver Knight? Or was it due to the fact that he was the apprentice to the Bloody Ruler? Most likely it was later as it was due to Xan’s influence why he was no longer a child unable to defend himself, but a boy edging closure to manhood.

Regardless, Hiro couldn't afford anymore distractions and instead made his way quickly to the training grounds while eating the toast, making sure not to drop any of it on his way. He had some thoughts that he needed to sort out and some training that had to be done but he kind of wanted to push that aside if he had the chance to or failed to get any inspiration which for Hiro wasn't too uncommon.

Entering now passed the grounds gate, Hiro stepped over to the middle of the area and sat down in the middle of it that overlooked the passing river, his eyes began to lower until they closed as he lowered his hands to rest inside of his lap and began thinking to himself about what he had learned a few days prior. His last training session had been with Karliah and even though he hadn’t been using his most dangerous techniques or any lightning magic, she was able to push him back quite easily. Not that he was disappointed in what had happened, but he was more grateful that she had shown him a few weaknesses in his character and that he was hoping to work on today. One thing he knew he would have trouble with was his passive nature. Hiro was never one to be easily angered or provoked and as such he would rather look for alternative means to end disputes, like talking them out instead of fighting, but regrettably not everyone had the same mindset as Hiro especially in Pandora, which is why he was glad he meet Karliah and would work to get her stronger so she could be free. He hadn’t understood how the Tenshi had clan had operated but he was determined that he would free her from her captives, even if it meant fighting everyone in the clan.

Snapping out of his train of thought, he opened his eyes and yawned into his palm, there was so much to think about and so little time to calculate it all into just a hypothesis. He needed to try it out and really see if he was right or else it'd only pull at her mind even more and he definitely wouldn't be able to sleep without knowing he gave some effort into it. So that's just what he'd do, he'd try it out and see for himself if he was right and even if he wasn't then at least she got some practice in, what was he talking about? The usage of his lightning magic. He had hardly used his lightning magic for anything but imbuing it in his katana, wakizashi and/or his senbons, but he had always watched his brother do spectacular things with his lightning release and had wished he would be able to be capable of the same and what he would be doing now was practice using his lightning magic so he could feel comfortable with using it in battle. Hiro stood up and began looking up at the sky and watching the clouds begin to form together from the predicted rain this evening would bring. If there was ever a time to train his abilities, now was that time and so without delay he closed her eyes and stood straight with fists clenched at his hips. The sunlight that once kissed the ground where he was now had vanished and the first droplets of rain fell, one of which hit his forehead. As soon as he felt the rain drop onto him, he gathered her natural energy inside of his body and focused it into a concentrated form to produce sparks of lightning from forcing its way through out his entire body. The amount of lightning magic that he had gathered inside his body had grown at an alarming rate and sooner or later it needed to escape and since he didn’t give it much of an option, it would escape through out every inch of his young body. “Raiton Mahō: Chidori Nagashi”

Just as the jutsu had been named, he had pulsed an electric current throughout himself. The lightning was wild and unrestrained as it exited his body covering over twenty feet. This had been the second time he had actually used this technique since learning the basics of it a few months ago. The first time was when he had battled Karliah, which proved to be a great defense against her straight forwardness and the second time was literally a while ago. This technique in itself was highly useful as it could be used for defensive and offensive maneuvers. “I could combine this with eclipse whirlwind..” Hiro muttered to himself as ideas of how to combining Chidori current with his kenjutsu. The rain would began pouring down harder but that wouldn’t deter the young man from continuing his training. “Shadow Clone!” He shouted before forming the clone seal. A clone would appear after a cloud of smoke and instantly started sneezing. “You’re gonna catch a cold if you keep this up out in this weather.” The clone said before turning to face the original. “It’s perfect weather for brawling only using taijutsu and lightning techniques.” He said with a smile before cracking his neck and his knuckles before taking a rather aggressive weaponless stance. “You’re the boss mate.” The clone said as it assumed relatively the same position. Coursing the innate lightning magic through his body, Hiro would make a mad dash towards the clone and attempted to deliver a quick jab to the right side of the clone, but due the clone being able to read his movements with a combination of the Raidengan and Muscle Tension and moved in an instant to block the oncoming strike. “Hehe, as if you’re gonna get with such a straight forward attack” The clone said as the both exchanged a play glance as they looked into each other’s eyes. Shifting its weight, the clone would grab Hiro’s extended arm and would toss him over his shoulder and attempted to deliver a swift kick to his stomach, but though he had allowed himself to get thrown, he would use his Hoho: Bound to maneuver in midair to in mid air, however instead of launching another attack, he would use the Lightning Magic: Flashing Lights technique to blind the clone. “Arggh, shit!” The clone cried out taking a few steps back while holding its eyes. Landing on his feet, Hiro would kick off the ground and made a dash towards the clone utilizing silent killing so that he couldn’t be heard. Before the clone knew it, a sharp electrical pain ran through its body as a fist plunged into its gut. As he stumbled backwards, Hiro would continue to rain down the punches on the clone. Left hook, then right hook, then a kick to the gut, Hiro unleashed unholy fury upon the clone. Staggering the clone would fall on the ground causing a large splash. “Tsk Chidori Nagashi!” The clone yelled as his body began releasing a torrent of electricity in an attempt to stop the assault since he was unable to see anything. Hiro would jump back a few feet away from the attack since it know had more reach due to the water.


“You okay?” Hiro said mockingly to the clone who was now struggling to get to. “Tsk that was a dick move.” He said slowly opening his eyes, now able to see, well kinda anyways. Hiro’s onyx eyes would scan the clone from head to toe and a smile appeared on his lips. Each physical attack was juiced with lightning based magic thanks to Shinken Gai: Rai Touch. The clone looked not only exhausted due to the assault but also as if his sanity was slowly melting away due to the repeated shocks he had received. This fighting style would be useful if he was ever forced into a hand to hand fight, which hopefully would never happen, but you just got to be prepared. “Tsk, bastard I’ll get you for this.” The clone would make a mad dash towards Hiro, with Hiro meeting him half way they would began trading punches once more, however the clone’s attacks seemed to lack the same bite it did at the beginning of the battle. “Feeling a bit drained? I can read your moves with using Raidengan or Muscle tension” Hiro said with a smirk as he found himself easily blocking and evading the clone’s tired attacks. Gritting his teeth the clone would start throwing punches in fury at max speeds hoping his wild and unpredictable attacks would hit the original, however it had the quite opposite. His attacks were wild, that was a fact, but unpredictable? Not in the slightest. All he had managed to do was further exhaust himself causing his attacks to drop speed and lack any conviction. Hiro would would evade his attacks by leaving an after image in his place. While the clone was busy pummeling away at the after image, Hiro who was a safe distance away, would stoop down and began forming a series of seals. Monkey → Dragon → Rat → Bird → Ox → Snake → Dog → Tiger → Monkey. After performing these sets of seals, Hiro would bolt towards the clone at Blinding Light speeds before slamming his chakra coated arm into the chest of the clone. “Chidori!” Mid way through his wild swings the clone had realized that he was in fact attacking an after image it was already too late. “Ugh… I guess that’s it for me…” The clone said with a pained expression on its face. “Thanks for the fight. I’ve learnt a lot.” Hiro said with a smile before pulling out his left arm out of the chest of the clone. The clone would disappear immediately after the arm was removed, thus leaving Hiro alone in the rain. “Well I guess its time to head home.” He muttered to himself before running his hand through his wet hair. It was high time he went home and got a change of clothes before he caught a cold, which wouldn’t be idle as medical care in Pandora was expensive as hell. With a sigh Hiro would bolt of at Echoing Flash speeds towards home.


“A-A-Achoo!” A loud sneeze echoed throughout entire Pandora, well maybe not Pandora more like the small house that was situated on the outskirts of Pandora. Turns out that Hiro hand actually managed to catch a cold after his brawl in the rain. Luckily for him however, Mary was around to provide him with cold remedies she had known so he didn’t have to go to the clinic to get extorted, I mean treated. “Baka, you could’ve at least waited until it had stopped raining.” Kagura stated in her usual high and mighty tone before sitting around the table along side Hiro. Today they were taking a day off from the glamorous life of a shinobi and were having a little family celebration, if you could consider a Denkou orphan, a small child that used to be a missing ninja from the Shogunate and a tamer that was captured during a raid on the Allied Shinobi nations a family anyways. “You should be more careful Hiro-kun, as a shinobi you should know keeping your body fit is the most important thing.” Mary said in her usual motherly tone before placing down a stack of pancakes before the two children. “I know, I know, I’ll be more careful.” Hiro stated pretty flattered that they both tht they were worried about his health, well he thought Kagura was anyways. Grabbing his fork, he would stab the large pile of pancakes and when he pulled up an amount he was pleased with he would drop them off in the empty plate that was before him. He would then grab the maple syrup and applied it to his pancakes before he started wolfing them down like a man that hadn’t eaten in days. Kagura’s grey hues would be glaring at the sight of Hiro destroying the pancakes and couldn’t help but shake her head. “Boys are so gross.” She muttered before stuffing a piece of toast in her mouth. “By the way Hiro, have you thought about what order you’re going to join since you became a Silver Knight?” She asked before continuing to nibble on her toast. It was true that he was now a Silver Knight so he is now eligible to join an Order, the problem was which one? Due previous conversations with Xan, joining the TLAH Order wasn’t an option due to Hiro being as stealth as an elephant trying to entire a building in broad day light that and he was told that if he wanted to achieve what he had dreamt of he had to follow his own path and step out of Xan’s shadow, which was in fact true. So that had left INCO, ICHT, CUAN and HUIT orders, for the Five Suns of Pandora and the CIHU, PILT, XOLO and the HUEH orders from the Mictlan, the Nine Domains. In truth his style of fighting doesn’t suit any of the Mictlan so he could cross them all off his list. Which had left the four orders. He could cross INCO off his list as that order dealt strictly with support and he wasn’t exactly the supportive type. He could also strike CUAN off his list as well as he wasn’t built for espionage, the only one person he could think of being qualified would be the succubus chick, if she trained enough for it anyways. So he was now left with ICHT and HUIT. In truth these two orders summed him up perfectly, assault and counter assault. He was a pretty skilled fighter so he could do well in the frontline of battle and he could also be used to intercept enemies and push them back. “Hmmm, either ICHT or HUIT.” He said with his mouth full of pancakes. “Hiro-kun…don’t talk with your mouth full…” Mary stated looking a bit disturbed after seeing all that chewed up food and all the residue flying all over the table. She herself had no idea what they were talking about so all she was able to do was listen and eat her breakfast. “Great choices since you wouldn’t fit in at any other order, and you aren’t smart enough to create your own order” Kagura stated before taking a sip of the freshly squeezed orange juice. “Wow… Mary is pretty good at making anything.” She said sounding a bit jealous. Hiro couldn’t help but scoff at her, he was more than capable of creating his own order, he was just a tad bit lazy is all… “Either way, I’ll be visiting ICHT and HUIT orders to see what they’ll be able to offer and then I’ll run it by the old man and see what he thinks.” “So these orders have specific themes to them?” Mary found herself asking as she was quite curious to what they were speaking out. “That’s right Mary.” Kagura said before Hiro had gotten the chance to say a word. “Each order has a specific theme, if you will, to them. There are five gods that specialize in stealth, support, counter-assault, espionage and assault. The tall dark guy that was with Hiro when you guys were ambushed was the Bloody Ruler, the leader of the TLAH order and the right hand to the God Queen herself, Xan Ibwa. Oh and he’s Hiro’s sensei of course. ” Hiro would give Kagura a nasty look when she had brought up what had happened a few months ago but Mary’s reaction wasn’t what he had expected. “Oh I see. So Hiro-kun’s going to be a God of Pandora then?” She asked looking at Hiro. In truth he didn’t think so far ahead as to become a God of Pandora but Xan did say once that he would need to be a god to create the world he had wished for. “I wish to create a world where there wouldn’t be any need for fighting amongst one another due to petty difference, but the only way someone like me can even think of creating such a world, I would need to be someone of authority, a God.” He said with a serious expression on his face. His dreams of finding out why they Kagura was being hunted and reuniting Mary with her family and help her become a Master Tamer had also encompassed that dream so he wasn’t working towards this for his personal gain, but for these two as well, and Karliah.


After breakfast was over with, Kagura had went into town to meet her squad as she was heading out for a mission while Mary and Hiro was left to clean up the mess, not that he didn’t mind anyways. While Mary was finishing up her breakfast, Hiro would begin clearing the table and started washing the dishes. He had enjoyed this feeling, the feeling of sharing a space with people. For too long he had been alone and now he had something that resembles a family, and now he had that. “Do you have anything planned for later Hiro-kun?” Mary asked as she placed her dish into the kitchen sink. What exactly does she do when neither of us were around? Hiro asked himself while her continued to scrub away at the plates. “I was planning on training now that I was feeling better, but if you wanna go do something we can go do so.” He said knowing she must be pretty lonely being cooped up inside and even though it was probably best that she was in here than out in the streets of Pandora, Hiro thought it was best that she familiarize herself with the Pandora and he knew just the place. “Mary-chan, let’s go for a walk.” He stated after finishing up the last dish. Mary would have a look of confusion on her face, as she didn’t understand what had gotten into him all of a sudden, but she agreed to go along with him anyways, as it was better than being home alone reading old magazines. After a quick shower, they both were ready to get the show on the road. Hiro had adorned the armor and weaponry he was provided with by Jake, while Mary wore a beautiful pink sundress that she had bought. “Yosha! Let’s go!” Hiro said with a bright smile on his face before he started walking. They had been walking for about ten minutes, until they had reach their intended destination. “Tlah headquarters?” Mary said as her green hues read the plaque that was on the building. In reality this wasn’t the actual TLAH headquarters as they were situated in Samuigakure, but they had erected a building within Jikogakure as Xan and a few of his elite guard had frequent the village. He was the right hand man of the God Queen after all. “Yeah we’re gonna stop here for awhile.” He said before nudging her forward. Opening the door, they would enter the vast hall and would instantly be greeted by piercing stares which would immediately die down after the people within the building noticed who it was. “Oh it’s Hiro-kun. Good Morning.” A voice said greeting the two. Hiro would bow slightly to the red haired man. “I’m going to see someone at the back, she’s with me is that okay?” He said knowing well that he could’ve just waltz past the lot without a care in the world but he wasn’t that type of person after all. “Sure, sure go ahead, you’re Xan-taichou’s kid so this is basically your home.”The man said with a smile before bowing to the two kids. “Alright let's go Mary.” Hiro stated as he made his way to the back. The room they were heading for had been empty for quite sometime, however ever since a certain mission that he had accompanied Xan on hd made the room turn from empty to always occupied. Opening the door, the two would be greeted by the sight of a man hitting hot steel with a large hammer. “Jared…-kun?” Mary said sounding surprised to see the man. Upon hearing his name, Jared would put the hammer and turned to greet the two at the door. “Hello, Hiro-dono and Mary-chan. You seem well.” He said quite surprised himself to see that she was in such an excellent condition physically and mentally and after examining her body he would also note that she wouldn’t have any slave marks on her either. It seems that the kid really did keep his word. “Hello Jared-kun. Mary-chan was home bored so I thought that it would’ve been best that she was able to spend time with someone she knew for a long while. I’ve already gotten Xan-sensei’s permission to have her spend as much time here with as possible, as long as it doesn’t affect your work of course.” Hiro said with a smile before nudging the young woman forward. He knew it wasn’t much considering she was away from her family and the rest of her friends were probably getting raped as we speak, but he did promise that he would make her more at home in Pandora as he aimed to become the foundation on which she’ll become a Master Tamer. “Thank...you...Hiro-kun….” The young woman said holding back her tears. She had know that the young boy was a good person but doing this for her was a bit much, but she was grateful to him. “You’re welcome Mary-chan, now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll allow you two to catch up, I’ll go do some training.” Hiro said with a smile before leaving the room. Though he hadn’t planned on doing training today, but with Kagura and Mary occupied might as well he got some shit done. With a smile he would make his way out of the TLAH building and headed to his usual training grounds. It was high time he started practicing his Senjutsu based techniques so that he can familiarize himself with using them in battle.


Heavy panting could be heard from a mile away as Hiro struggled to catch his breath. He had done total of one thousand push ups, a thousand sit ups and jogged 6.7 kilometers before arriving at the peak of Mount Jurassic. He had decided to relocate to Mount Jurassic due to the fact that it was perfect for what he had in mind. “Yosha.” Forming a flurry of seals, Hiro would gather a large amount of lighting magic in the palm of his hand. The sound of thousand birds chirping would echo throughout the mountain range as Hiro looked to stabilize the wild lightning. “He. This is pretty neat.” Hiro thought to himself as his red hues stared directly into the mass of lightning he had in his hand. The chidori was suppose to be an assassination technique, which he had always found hard to believe since it was so damn loud, but apparently it's the sound of birds that is suppose to throw people off, which again didn’t make much sense but hey, what merit did he have to his name to question the name of such a legendary technique. Shifting his gaze from the mass of lightning, he would turn his attention to the giant boulder that was a few feet away. Bolting off at Blinding Light Samurai speeds he would thrust his left arm he held the mass of lightning in into the giant rock. “Chidori!!” He yelled slamming his hand into the giant rock causing it to explode and making rubble fall from the sky. He wasn’t done there however, he would immediately activate his Raidengan to track the falling rubble. “Amazing...” He muttered to himself. Even though it had been over six months since he had gained the ability to use his Raidengan, the way the world looked in slow motion had always amazed him. Anyways back to the task at hand. Gathering lightning magic in both his hands, Hiro would throw approximately 20 senbon at the largest pieces of rubble that were falling. Launching himself into the air he would, he would draw his sword and coated in lightning and began hacking away at the remaining rubble. Drawing his wakizashi he would start spinning in mid air to shred the remaining rubble to dust. When there were no remaining rubble left he would sheathe both his weapons in mid air before doing a somersault, landing on his two feet perfectly. “Whew that was pretty neat.” He said to himself. His grey hues would look to the sky and even though it was getting late he decided that he was going to do another training exercise before heading back to the TLAH order to go get Mary. Taking a deep breathe he would draw his katana once more, shifting his left hand to the extreme top of the hilt as the blade didn’t have a hilt and placed his right hand on the base of said hilt. He would then left the blade above his head before bringing it down at a great force. “One.” He said out load before repeating the same action again, “Two.” He said after bringing the sword down the second time. He would continue this exercise for about 10 minutes completing approximately 4,000 reps, a record number in a record time. It was amazing that he had usually struggled to do 100 and now he was able to do 4,000 without even breaking a sweat. Sheathing his sword, he would look to the sky and saw that the sun was setting. “Crap I should be heading back now!” He said before bolting at Blinding light speeds.


It hadn’t taken him long, five minutes to be exact, for him to arrive at the TLAH headquarters. He would greet the people that were currently inside, noting that he hadn’t seen Xan, Ivanna or Klaus but they always seemed to be busy so this was expected. Arriving at the blacksmith’s door he would knock four times before entering the room. “Hey, I’m back.” He said announcing his arrival. Mary and Jared would be sitting rather close together. Jared had been making what seems to be a necklace from an ore that was probably collected for him to do his work and Mary was watching him with her head on his shoulder and her arm locked with his. “Eh? Hiro-kun?” She said sounding quite surprised. Her eyes would follow his and after noticing he was looking at their interlocking arms, she would remove her hand from his and shifted over on the bench putting some distance between them. “Oh! Welcome back Hiro-kun, I was just making a gift for Mary here.” He said with a nervous smile on his face. “S-Sorry for interrupting I’ll wait outside!” Hiro himself was feeling embarrassed about walking into such situation and as such he would do what any other normal human being would do, leave the room and wait outside.

“Well that was awkward.” He said out loud before parking his rump on the steps of the building. He was pleased to see that they were enjoying each other’s company as they both are foreigners and to a lesser extent, prisoners in Pandora. Hiro had known it probably would’ve been best to let her go, but if she had went back to the Allied Shinobi Nations with information that their caravan had been attacked and that she had known the location of Jikogakure, it would’ve sparked a war, so it was for the best that she had resided here in Pandora. I mean it could’ve been worse, she could’ve been killed like that dude that was sitting in the caravan or being constantly raped like the two women that were thrown in the incubus den….Did she even know about that? Maybe she thought that they were dead? It would best that she had that thought anyways, because if she had known that they were alive she would’ve wished to see them and if she had seen that terrible sight which was the incubus den, she would have nightmares for days, he knew he did when Xan had threatened to throw him inside that place. But was this what was best for her mental health? She was away from the people she had loved and even though she had seemed content with living with Kagura and himself, he knew that she was depressed and ever since he had gotten home and heard her crying in her room he knew that she would feel better knowing she had someone who she was familiar with. “Jeez I’m too young to be filled with some much inner conflict.” He said to himself as he watched the people going through their daily commute. Living in Pandora was like getting a daily dose of harsh realities everyday and he often wondered what it would like living in other factions. Even though he knew that the Allied Shinobi Nations had followed the traditional roots of shinobi, he wondered what it was like in the Shogunate or the Epilson. “A world that was filled with civilians, I wonder if they really are any different?” He thought out loud. “Sorry it took so long Hiro-kun.” A voice called out from behind him. “No problem, whenever you’re feeling bored or lonely you can always come here, Jared is generally in from time to time and you can always go with them when they're gonna go collect materials to familiarize yourself with the area so that when we go taming we’ll know the route.” He said with a smile before standing on his feet. Turning on his heels, his grey hues would come across the blue necklace that was around her neck. “That’s beautiful.” He said admiring the stone which seemed to be a sapphire. “Thanks. Jared-kun made it especially for me. He also told me that you had fought to keep me alive and for that I thank you. Jared has settled well in Pandora, he said that even when Xan-san had brought him here, everyone had treated him kindly.” She said with a warm smile, recalling the time she had spent with the blacksmith. “Though he seems scary, he does have a soft spot especially for people that follow him and small animals. ” He said recalling Xan freeing the octopus that was trapped. “Well it’s getting late and Kagura must be wondering where we are, so we should head home before she starves to death.” He said before sticking his hands in his pockets , turning on his heels and leaving the area, expecting the young woman to follow him. He had enjoyed the peace that was in Pandora and wished that it would last forever but he knew that such a wish wouldn’t be granted as they were in the world of the shinobi and anything could happen at any given moment and he had a feeling that he would be trapped within a situation which would either make or break him as a person, but for now he would enjoy the peace. “Hiro-kun...Are Pandorians the true evil in this world?” Mary asked the young boy. How ironic that question was. He had remembered asking Xan that question the first day he had met him and even though his answer was satisfactory at the time, he still had thoughts about this in the back of his head. “I once asked someone that very same question and their response was this. If you ask anyone in Pandora there answer would be no. Even though you have some sick and sadistic people living here, majority would their reasons as to why they believe their good. Others would agree that they were betrayed by either the Allied Shinobi Nations or the Shogunate and wish to seek revenge. Others were forced to retreat to Pandora so that they could live, like myself. But of course if you ask anyone inside of the Allied Shinobi Nations, The shogunate or even the Epilson republic they would either say yes or they wouldn’t know what to say. The thing is if you were to judge any faction based on the crimes they had committed in the past, present or future, there truly wouldn’t be any good or evil in this world. Just indifference. But I must admit that we’ve done something that may have the world see us as evil but in truth who hasn’t?” Hiro said looking up to the sky. Sure enough Pandora was a pretty shitty place to be in due to the larger populace being mentally unstable and would snap and kill at any given time, but that didn’t mean the others were in the right all the time. “I mean you have people like me in Pandora. I was originally from the Allied Shinobi Nations and my family got killed by the Shogunate Mishura. Naturally I had expected that the Allied Shinobi Nation shinobi to avenge my parents and bring me closure, but they refused as they were so close to sealing a treaty with the Shogunate, so they had just brushed it aside as if it was nothing. As if the life of my parents didn’t matter to them.” Not a day goes by where he doesn’t think about his parents and how different things would’ve been if they were alive, perhaps he wouldn't have met Cleo, Kagura and Mary and wouldn't have trained under one of the strongest people in Pandora but he probably would’ve been content. A long silence would ensue as the two made their way through the streets of Pandora. The streets were busier than usual, he hadn’t known why though, but it was nice to people actually trying to live their lives normally for once and not preying on the weaker ones in Pandora. “Have you ever thought about revenge Hiro-kun?” Mary had said finally breaking the silence. “I had once upon a time. There was a time where I had dreamt of finding the two responsible for murdering my parents. But at that time I was weak, unable to mold any chakra and was basically equal in strength to a civilian….that held no profession. It was after the death of my brother that I had realised that it made no sense for me to continue living amongst the Shinobi in the Allied Shinobi Nations so I had left the Hakaguakre. No one came after me of course because I held no secret information about the clan or village and I was a weak and frail boy. I personally don’t remember how I ended up in Jikogakure, but I had managed to squat in a nearby house and just went by what I could find to eat. Luckily I knew how to farm so I was able to grow some vegetables. It wasn’t long that someone had informed the authorities that I was squatting and I was given a choice to either join the village or get killed and well I didn’t want to die so I took up their offer. To think I would be at the point right now.” He had indeed come a far way. Before he was a little boy without much future, living life day by day wondering where his meal would come from to a Silver Knight whose sword skills were quite impressive, he had owed a lot to Xan and he’ll have to repay him in some way, shape or form. “Though our ideals may clash in the near future, I still respect Xan-sensei and what’s done for me, so i’ll be his soldier for as long as he needs me to be. But once the time comes I’ll create a world where the people I care for won’t have to worry about if or when they’ll get killed.” He stated looking up towards the sky. “That’s pretty admirable Hiro-kun. I hope you get to fulfill your dreams. You have the capabilities of being a great shinobi and an even greater person. I believe in you and I’m pretty sure Kagura does too.” Mary said with a bright smile on her face. Though they hadn’t been together for long, Mary knew that Hiro was different from the average shinobi in Pandora and she had solely believed that he would achieve all he wanted and more.

“We’re home!” Hiro said quite tired after opening the door. The moment they had entered the house they would be greeted by the sight of Kagura sleeping on the couch. “I guess she’s had quite the eventful day as well.” Mary said with a sweet smile as she brushed the hair out the face of the sleeping Kagura. Well she’s got the right idea, Hiro thought as he removed his weaponry and placed them on the rack that Kagura had created to hold their stuff. Today had been quite a busy day for them, with Mary and Jared finally reuniting and Hiro getting some training done. In truth his training was more of him occupying himself with something to do while the two had spent some time with each other, as his presence wouldn’t make their reunion natural and it seems that they were quite cozy with each other when he had seen them together in the room and it was quite obvious that she was in better spirits knowing that one of her friends were alive and well. “Are you hungry Hiro-kun?” Mary said softly trying not to awake the sleeping Kagura. “No not really.” He answered after removing his last piece from his body. Though his training was quite a difficult one, his mind was occupied with other things and the need to fill his body with nutrients wasn’t one of them. “It’s been a rather long day so let’s just hit the hay, I’m pretty sure that you’re tired Mary-san.” He said as he moved over to the sleeping girl on the couch. He would then bend his knees before wrapping his arms under her body and would proceed to lift her up. He wasn’t sure if he was actually getting stronger why he was able to take her up so easily or if it was due to the fact that she was a lightweight, it was most likely the former as Kagura had a tendency to devour anything in the kitchen and she had been having trouble with getting into some of clothes, her excuse was that she was a growing a girl but we all knew that was lie. “I guess you’re right. Good night Hiro-kun.” Mary said with smile before retreating to her bedroom. “Goodnight and sweet dreams Mary-san.” Hiro said as he watched her figure disappeared into the room. “Now, time to put you to bed sleepy head.” He stated with a warm smile as he looked down on the younger girl in his arms. Turning on his heels, he would make his way to her room. Luckily it wasn’t locked so he would use his left foot to gently push the door open before making his way to her bed and placing her down as gently as possible. He would then pull the covers over her body and ensured that she was tucked in properly. “Sweet dreams Kagura-chan...” He whispered before turning on his heels and headed out the door. “Hiro-kun….” Kagura’s voice mumbled as she started tossing and turning her sleep most likely to find a position she was comfortable with. A smile would make his way on his lips before he flipped the light switch off and closed the door behind him.

“Today was fun..” Hiro said to himself before throwing his body on to his bed. He had gotten lot accomplished in the past few days, both physically and mentally. Now that he was Silver it was about time he joined an order and after a lot of thinking he had decided that he would join the CUIT order. Why? He didn’t know, but it seemed to had fit his persona and his fighting style more than any others. Sure he would’ve preferred to be with Xan in the TLAH order, but it was time for him to leave to the nest and experience things on his own. After all how was he going to beat Xan if he was constantly in his shadow? “I’ll go pay them a visit tomorrow so I can get inducted in the order. I wonder what kind of person the leader is.” He thought to himself before yawning. He had yet to meet any other of the gods of Pandora and was interested to see what personalities they held and kind of fighting styles they each had. Joining the CUIT was also going to milestone for the young boy as he was now inching closer to achieving his dream.

WC Needed- 28,500
WC Reduced by 1/4 thanks to tournement prize
WC Needed- 7,125

WC Done- 7, 134

Trained:

Approved

Hiroshima had been back home for approximately a few weeks now. It had taken him a few days for him to treat his wounds and have his body rest from the strain it had undergone due to himself constantly pushing it against Takahiro but it had been worth it. He was able to claim the legendary Raijin no Ken for himself and more importantly he was able to come back home to his family. Now that he was at one hundred percent, it was time for him to figure out what exactly the sword could do since he was planning on making it his main weapon as his favorite katana was destroyed by that bastard Takahiro. With that said, while Karilah and Mary were out shopping with the baby, Hiroshima would grab the sword he had placed on a mantle above his bed and went outside to the back. The sword at its current state was nothing but a hilt with no blade or button to press so he assumed that he would need to put some power in it. Pouring some natural energy inside the hilt, the hilt would start to crackle with electricity before as blade of pure electrical energy would be formed. “Huh, neat.” Hiroshima muttered as he examined the blade. With a further in-depth look at the weapon, he would notice that it was completely possible to alter the size of the blade as well, which was pretty cool. He would then try something else and instead of using lightning magic to power it, he would use magnet magic instead which would also reap the same result. Last but not least he would pour Raiden magic inside the hilt which of course worked just as well. As he toyed with the sword like a kid that had gotten a new Christmas present, the faint sound of a feminine voice calling his name. Odd. He thought to himself as he had never heard that voice before and there wasn’t anyone else around. The moment he had focused on the hilt a screen of sorts would pop up displaying a video of him and Takahiro fighting then the words Hello Master. A bit startled at the sudden revelation he would calm down as he noticed that this was just the sword communicating with him. “Hello Raijin, I’m glad that we were able to team up, let’s hope that we get to be together for a long time.” Hiroshima said with a smile before heading inside while Raijin showed him videos of the things she had witnessed throughout the years.

Training the Raijin no Ken from Base->Legendary

Note:

Word Count needed 250
Word Count within topic- 431

Approved

And just like that it was over. In truth, he didn’t feel any different from before so he had questioned if it actually had worked. He wouldn’t have said this out loud of course since he didn’t want to offend the two in the room but since he couldn’t tell the difference he would just have to try out his new seal himself. “I’m grateful for your time, the both of you. May the God-Queen bless you in your future endeavors.” He said with a smile before slightly bowing and leaving the room with the slaves he had brought along with him. As he parted ways with the slaves that he had borrowed from Xan, he would immediately run into a familiar face sitting on the wall with her legs crossed.

“Yo, been awhile, Kagura-chan.” He said with a smile the moment he had noticed the girl, well young lady now. It had actually been years since he had seen her since their schedules had been quite different. Kagura had been in the HUIT order longer than he had been and thus was one of the few selected to roam the lands and protect it from those who meant the village any harm. While he was just stationed at the village awaiting orders from the higher ups.

“Yeah, it has been awhile hasn’t it? Heard a lot about some Denkou reject making waves not only in the order but in the entire Pandora Empire. I had to see if it was my Denkou reject.” She said before hopping off the wall and hugging Hiroshima. He would embrace the woman of course and after a brief moment they would part ways. “So what are you doing at the castle? Had some business to attend to?” She asked as she was curious as to why someone like him was hanging around the castle and not back at headquarters. “It’s a pretty long story, maybe we should go somewhere else and talk.” He said waiting for her to agree and once she did they would go to their favorite spot that the frequently visited when they used to hang out.

Once they arrived at the lake at the edge of the town, they would sit down under the Sakura tree and thus Hiroshima would begin to recall the adventures he had been in since their last encounter. Fortunately she had known that the Bloody Ruler had taken him under his wing before she had left so he didn’t have to start from the beginning. He would however, begin telling her about all the brutal and inhumane training sessions he had put him through and that one time they had ambushed a number of civilians. Things would only get interesting from there on out as he would begin to tell her the story of how he had met the love of his life Karliah and that they had a beautiful baby boy together. “So I’m a god mother? How lovely!” Kagura said bubbling with excitement over the news. He knew she would’ve been happy at the news since she had always adored babies. “I’m glad to see one of us found happiness. It’s been nothing but doom and gloom since I left. Comrades dying left and right sometimes I wonder what’s the point to all of this. There seems to be no need in sight to the fighting.” Kagura said with her voice filled with nothing be disgust. Hiroshima understood her frustration, they shared the same sentiments about how the world had been in the past few years. Ironically, the both were made orphans due to needless violence. Shogunate shinobi had killed his parents while shinobi from the allied shinobi nations had murdered hers. They never did let it consume them and turn into monsters like majority of Pandora, but instead made it their duty to try and end the nonsense. “I see. It’s obvious that at the level we’re at we would be unable to change much in the village much less the world. But I decided.” Hiroshima said as he looked to the sky. “I decided that to become a God of Pandora and which God would be better to bring peace than the Blue Hummingbird.” He would recall the moment he and Xan had finished training and he had asked him were they truly the bad guys of this world and his response was if he wanted to change the image of Pandora he needed to become a God and that was his main goal from here on out.

“The Blue Humming Bird huh? That’s pretty interesting and bold Hiro-kun.” Kagura said having heard of his ambitions. The truth was she had dreams of being the Blue Humming Bird or at least work closely with the one whom was the Blue Humming Bird so this revelation was music to her ears as if he did become the Humming bird, she would ensure she was there to work alongside him to make the world a better place and vice versa. It did seem as if their fates were truly intertwined. “Well lets see how good you are Hiro-kun. I mean if you are looking to become a God of Pandora then you must at least be strong enough?” She said with a smile on her face before pushing the last bit of cake in her mouth and getting up from under the tree. Chuckling he would take a final sip of the green tea they had bought before getting up as well. He should’ve known that it would’ve ended up like this as Kagura was one who liked to test her abilities against others and back then it was always against him. “Well, take it easy on me, I’m still a Silver Knight.” Hiroshima said with a smile as he slipped into his stance. “Aspiring to be the God of our order and yet you’ve been Silver Knight for over four years. Interesting.” Kagura said with a hint of disappointment in her voice. She was Gold Knight looking to go up to Platinum so she might end up over powering her friend but she was never one to underestimate her opponents, especially one trained by the leader of the Pandora Empire.

Both stood a considerable distance away from other as they wanted for one to make a move. Hiroshima’s grey hues would shift towards the weapon Kagura had on both her hips. One was blade she had held all her life, Archemeny, while the other seemed to be just an ordinary blade. “Hmph, I’ll go first then!” Kagura exclaimed before drawing the katana and bursting forward towards Hiroshima. He had half expected her to draw Archemeny but she was probably going to test him out before doing so, which was understandable. Drawing his katana, he would swung the blade diagonally to block the incoming attack. “That’s a nice looking sword there Hiro-kun.” Kagura said as her eyes scanned the nameless blade. “Why thank you I really lov-” Before he could finish his sentence, Kagura would deliver a swift kick to the gut causing him to gasp for air before head butting him a few feet away. “That was rather dirty.” Hiroshima said having managed to stop himself from falling back any further while rubbing his forehead. “Keep getting distracted and this will be your last fight.” Kagura stated with the tone of her voice shifting to one of seriousness. Letting out a sigh, Hiroshima would take his stance again and prepared for her incoming attack again. Seeing that he wouldn’t do anything but stand his ground, Kagura would kick off the ground once more and bolted towards him and this time looked to deliver a vertical slash. Hiroshima would of course stand his ground and deflected the weapon to the side before following up with a vertical slash with his wakizashi which he would draw immediately after parrying the attack. Kagura would see the oncoming attack and would dodge the follow up before looking to capitalize of the opening he had created. Tch, shit. Hiroshima thought to himself as he was now or was he? Digging in on his heels, he would begin to spin like a top creating something like a whirlwind made of blades in an attempt to force her backwards. This indeed work as she was forced to jump back. “Tch. If you don’t intend to get serious then I will.” Kagura stated before unsheathing Archemeny.

As she drew the weapon, a torrent of flame black flame would erupt as it the weapon left the sheathe. Hiroshima had only seen the weapon on action once and it was when they had fought a group of defectors together and now that destructive blade was being pointed at him. Knowing that using his katana and wakizashi against such a weapon would be suicide he would sheathe both his weapons and prepared to throw in the towel. That was of course until a screen pop up before him with the words, you’ve forgotten about me? It’s been awhile. Hiroshima had actually forgotten that he had Raijin on him today and if he could he would kick himself. Tapping the seal on his left wrist, he would grab the hilt of the weapon and would pour S rank worth of lightning magic into the hilt. The lightning would crackle as wildly as the flames on her sword would as they both stood there looking at each other. What is that? Kagura would think to herself as she scanned the weapon that he now held. It was strange looking sword but she was certain that Archenemy would be able to overpower it. As she kicked off the ground, Hiroshima would match her stride and both swords that we now comprised of pure chakra and natural energy would clash sending bolts of lightning crashing into the ground as well as small balls of flames into the ground. “Chidori Nagashi” Kagura had expected the stream of lightning to come from his body but was shocked when the attack came from the blade and shocked her. “The hell?” She muttered as she felt her body starting to spasm. Hiroshima would take this as an opportunity to end the find and thus came in at full speed to slash her but in an instant Kagura would shake off the paralysis and thrusted her blade forward into Hiroshima’s stomach. “Looks like my win, Hiro-kun.” Kagura said to as she made sure to miss any vital organs and ensured that she hit a spot where it would be easily healed. “You wish.” Hiroshima said with a smile as blade actual made its way right through him but he hadn’t been injured at all, in fact he seemed just alright. “So this is the power of the new curse mark, interesting.” Hiroshima muttered to himself as he was now completely composed of lightning. “This is my win.” Hiroshima said before hitting her with enough electrical energy paralyze her and knock her out.

Kagura would awake with not only a headache but also small muscle spasms. She would turn to the left and saw Hiroshima drinking a cup of green tea and he would smile upon seeing her awake. “Yo, sleepy head.” He said before making his way over to her and helping her up. “That was pretty good Hiro-kun and it even seemed like you weren’t trying that hard.” She said as she scanned his body for any wounds and realized there were none. “What can I say? I’m pretty good.” He said with a smirk. The rest of the day would be relatively smooth as they spent it catching up and sharing more stories of what they had been up to and once the sun had gone down it was time for the old friends to part ways. “It’s been nice seeing you again, Hiro-kun. Say hi to the family for me.” She said before embracing him once more. He wasn’t sure when he would see her again but he knew that they were destined to bring peace to this Carmen forsaken world and he would do everything in his power to become The Blue Hummingbird.

WC: 2026
WC needed: 2000

Trained :

Approved