Kapitel 141: Ch141. Training 2

Both Konan and Rei watched Mei and Ringo in silence, Rei leisurely enjoying their sword fight, in which Mei was grossly outmatched, while Konan observed only Ringo and her movements. She was not interested in the farce of a fight whatsoever.

Slowly, Konan's discerning eyes started widening as she spotted what she previously didn't even bother noticing.

'Her style changed?' Konan pursed her lips in concentration. 'Indeed... it did change!' She frowned, 'Ringo became slower? No... she stopped dodging. Why would she...' Konan narrowed her eyes. Someone who didn't intimately know Ringo's fighting style would not catch up on it but Konan had trained the redhead! If anyone knew how Ringo fought, it would be her. 'She no longer dodges everything. She fights as if she was heavily armored and most of her opponent's attacks didn't even matter.'

Rei smirked as he saw the focused look on Konan's face with the corner of his eye. He quickly understood that Konan noticed. Ringo's style simply became more reckless. Blows that she would previously in no way let even graze her, the weakest but dangerous ones, now ever-so-slightly scraped her. She still tried to evade but...

'The new technique of Ringo is a game-changer for her and I made sure the girl understood it.' Rei thought while merrily shaking his head. 'I really look forward to when she is finally comfortable testing it in a real fight.'

Just then groggy Yugito walked out of the house, rubbing her eyes and stretching like a cat.

"Good morning." She mumbled, just loud enough to be heard.

"O~, Yugi-chan, finally awake?" Rei teased while gesturing towards the spot next to him, causing the girl to happily nod and sit where he told her to.

"As if you didn't know I woke up..." Yugito cheekily puffed out her cheeks. The month she spent with Rei and his girls really improved her overly serious nature and she became more playful, truer to her feelings. She was no longer wary whenever Rei was around.

A second later, Rei's clone stepped outside with a tray of scrambled eggs, toasts, and two fishes for the resident cat. Naturally, it started to prepare breakfast the second she woke up since Rei had the entire place covered in various seals, among which, various detection seals were quite common.

Yugito's expression brightened like the sun when she saw the tray with breakfast, and especially the fishes. Rei proudly chuckled when he heard her audibly gulp her saliva down. The girl was getting quite used to his cooking.

Without even waiting, Yugito started chomping on the fish first. "Yes, yes... eat up, kitty. Mei wanted to start your training today. You will need all the energy you could muster." Rei shrewdly grinned. He knew what Mei prepared and honestly, Nibi Jinchuuriki or not, he was pitying the girl.

'Maybe I should teach Mei some common sense when it comes to instructing others? ... Nah, practice is better than a thousand words. Sorry, Yugito, your sacrifice will not be in vain!' His lips slightly twitched which was noticed only by Konan who hid her silent snickers behind the sleeve of her purplish-black kimono.

Yugito started choking on her food, clearly wanting to say something in return if her narrowed glare was an indication but Konan spoke first. "Well, I think you should stretch before Mei is able to get you in her care. Anyway, Rei, you promised me a sparring match yesterday. Still up for it?" She leaned closer towards him and kissed his cheeks with an expectant expression, making Rei's eyebrow twitch.

In the end, he sighed and relented. He knew there was no avoiding it. 'She clearly knows I hate fighting her because it is so hard to hit her. Why the heck did she have to come to enjoy sparring against me? It is pure torture chasing her all over the field! Damned Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, I clearly remember she got this bad habit of enjoying making her opponents irritated when she started sparring against them with her clones while she hid in the treetops, snacking on sweets as they made fools of themselves.'

Rei stood up, resigned to his fate, and followed excitedly skipping Konan to the nearby empty training field while leaving Yugito to her much needed breakfast.

Unfortunately for him, there was no member of the Seven Swordsmen present so it was him who had to suffer. Needless to say, his desire for Ringo's new Jutsu to be showcased and Tsunade's power-up was not entirely without any ulterior motives. He desperately needed a new 'play-mate' for Konan!

'Maybe I should fetch Kisame later on?'

...

"This is pure bullshit." Yugito subconsciously muttered as she watched the fight between Rei and Konan. Yes... fight. It was not a sparring match. Not when both threw around assuredly lethal moves! "What kind of madmen did I agree to join?" She dryly laughed.

Most of the time, the only thing Yugito could see was blue lightning flashes and a flurry of paper slices. She couldn't even hear the sound of fighting as the sound of static deafened her and more often than not, she had to cover her eyes from the ferocious winds generated from the exchange. She got only glimpses. Glimpses of severed limbs and… Well, she now really didn't look forward to the training Mei prepared for her if this was any indication.

'This... isn't that similar to the Raikage's speed!?' Yugito mentally screamed.

In the field, Rei, holding his chokuto, zapped from one place to another, cutting Konan's limbs, piercing her heart, decapitating her... only for the blood to sprout the second he slashed through her flesh. Then a second later, the blood burst into uncountable red paper slices as her body changed to variously colored paper slices.

By that time, however, Rei was already exchanging blows with yet another Konan who attacked him a split second after he scored a hit on the previous one.

'Hagoromo, have mercy on my soul!' Rei whined.

'IT,' He cut of Konan's hand, 'JUST,' He turned around and pierced the head of the Konan that appeared behind him right through her eyeball, 'NEVER,' He kicked the body away, getting his sword free out of her head and fluidly slashing towards the right, slitting the throat of the next Konan, 'ENDS!' He kicked behind himself, hitting the knee of the next Konan, unbalancing her while he heaved the sword up and brought it down on her in a downward slash, bisecting her.

The entire surrounding was now just a flurry of paper, forcing Rei to saturate his body with lighting chakra and bolt away from there in order to avoid being caught in them.

This repeated again and again and again... for the next hour.

'7150, 7151, 7152, 7153...' Rei counted.

"How many freaking times do I have to almost kill you until you are satisfied, Konan? It's been an hour already!" He stopped, lowering his sword and Konan appeared in a flurry of paper four meters in front of him, totally fine in pristine condition.

"I take it, you like my newest masterpiece." She said with a very rare full-blown content smile on her face, making Rei scowl.

"Only you could create such a complicated yet perverted thing from a foundation made on most basic Jutsu. It's damn annoying!" Rei huffed, glaring at the woman who giggled, making him involuntarily smile.

'Why is it only during these moments when I am completely irritated that she forgets her facade? Not cute at all...' Rei hummed, also slightly smiling without even realizing it.

"So? Did you see through my newest Origami Technique?" Konan proudly asked.

"Are you really going to call it Origami Technique?" Rei asked in disbelief but Konan just playfully shrugged.

"That is a very big part of it, after all." She innocently blinked at Rei's fed-up yet piercing and accusing stare.

In the end, Rei had to admit his defeat and sighed. "Fine. Whatever." He grumbled.

"So~, my technique?" Konan tilted her head with a small coy smile, causing Rei to stop his grumbling and snort in derision.

"What technique?" He asked with thick sarcasm covering his tone, "All you do is Kawarimi right before you are hit with a singular slip of paper while activating the storage seal on that paper which pops in a paper clone mid-Kawarimi. There is that henge sustained by the clone itself that makes it seem as if my attack really hit you and blood actually spurted out before the clone dissolves back into paper slices a second later. All you do is use Clone Technique, Kawarimi, and Henge." Rei wanted to scream. "So why the fuck is it so hard to freaking hit you! What is this bullshit! You didn't even try to dodge! You didn't take even one step during the entire fight! Kawarimi, Kawarimi, Kawarimi! The fuck is that shit!?" He raged.

Konan just heartily laughed at his outburst with a teasing look. "Cool, isn't it?"

"Cool my ass..." Rei whispered under his nose. He was moving at solid Raikage-level speed when the guy was using his Lighting Armor and yet... despite his senses being enhanced, even he couldn't spot the moment when she substituted herself with the paper.

'To think her Origami would reach such a level. She is a monster, no doubt. At this rate, there is no way to win against her without a large massively destructive area of effect Jutsu. The way she used Henge to actually simulate blood and gore while she transfers herself to her opponent's blind spot and attacks while he is distracted due to scoring the hit. That's outright nasty. I can see how most shinobi could fall for that. Everyone stops for a millisecond if their enemy doesn't dodge an obvious attack they are certainly capable of evading. Whether they want or not, their brain starts to think about whys and... that momentary pause is when she strikes from behind. It would take some serious battle and danger instincts or high sensory ability to react to that.'

Rei's eyes gleamed with happiness despite his sullen appearance. He was naturally glad Konan was getting even stronger.

Rei sighed to calm himself down and decided to indulge Konan who had this 'praise me' shine in her eyes. "I must admit," He shook his head in disbelief, "the way you fluidly connected the three basic aspects of shinobi arts into a singular technique and made it into something like this..."

There was a reason why the basic three Jutsu were... well, basic. The Henge was an introduction to the lowest level Genjutsu. The Basic Clones were also supposed to be Genjutsu aimed technique but their purpose was to make sure the students have at least basic chakra control. And Kawarimi was a preparation for ninjutsu. One just stretched his chakra, connecting it with a thing they wanted to swap with and well, then swapped. This meant it was not teleportation. Just chakra manipulation.

As Konan demonstrated, she could swap with any of her uncountable paper slips since they all contained some of her chakra. It was basically a teleportation technique in her hands since she didn't need to reach with her chakra. The entire thing barely cost her anything and she could probably do it with her eyes closed for an entire week without a single break.

'How broken Jutsu...' Rei inwardly chuckled and walked towards Konan and with a gentle smile, he lovingly rubbed her head while tenderly hugging her. "Good job, honey."

Kommentar Kommentar von 80

Abstimmen

Kapitel 142: Ch142. Mei's idea of training

Konan and Rei finished with their sparring match and alongside still flabbergasted Yugito, they went towards the training ground where Mei prepared something special for her kitty charge.

The second Yugito showed her face, excited Mei dragged her towards the middle of an... obstacle course if it still could be called that. Rei could somewhat see parts of the obstacle course used to train ANBU ramped up to insanity levels. Lethal traps, maiming traps, and worse yet...

'So this is why Mei wanted those area-effective chakra constricting seals, gravity-heightening seals, and water-like environment simulating seals.' Rei thought with a sweatdrop as his throat went dry.

'And they say my training methods are brutal.' Konan mentally deadpanned at the clueless Mei. She couldn't help but feel proud.

'Does she want to kill me?' Yugito did the clever thing and fearfully took a step back.

"This," Mei proudly gestured towards the huge death trap she prepared, "is my masterpiece! As the Jinchuuriki of the Nibi, you are naturally nimble and agile so training those aspects is a must!" She exclaimed with twinkling eyes, making everyone's face twitch. "So I asked myself, 'Hey, Mei, how could we help Yugi-chan?' and the answer was obvious! Obstacle course!"

"Uh... M-Mei...s-sensei?" Yugito asked unsurely, looking at the obstacle course. "A-And the corpses around?" She pointed towards the bodies or parts of bodies still strewn all over the course.

"Ah, that?" Mei dismissively waved her hand around, "Don't worry. I just borrowed them for testing purposes!"

Rei facepalmed.

Konan approvingly snickered.

Yugito gulped.

Only now that she took a closer look did she notice... 'They are all B and A-ranked rogue ninjas from the Bingo Book. All of them are jonin level!' She mentally freaked out.

Not paying attention to the fidgeting blond Jinchuuriki next to her, Mei tilted her head in a pondering manner. "Though, I am not really sure why they all decided to take a permanent vacation from this realm after starting the obstacle course. The best of them didn't even get half-way through..." Mei shook her head in disappointment. "Yare, yare."

'Permanent... vacation?' Yugito took another step back. She didn't need a permanent vacation from her living state. 'Maybe I should have stayed in Kumo...'

"Mei," Rei butted in. "Maybe it would be prudent to shroud Yugito in your Steam Armor to ensure she is not fatally injured." Jinchuuriki or not, he didn't see a twelve-year-old finishing even ten percent of the insane death sentence of an obstacle course Mei prepared. Not when experienced jonins apparently died, not getting past one-fourth of it.

Mei looked a bit conflicted at making it easier for Yugito. She clearly had great expectations of the younger blonde but...

"Mei," Konan gave the girl a meaningful but amused look, making her flinch and quickly nod in acceptance. "Good girl." Konan smiled at Mei while inwardly she was facepalming. 'No matter how you look at it, with all those restrictive seals affecting the entire area of the obstacle course... even chunins would be reduced to civilians. Just the water-simulating seal would make this almost impossible ordeal unless one had incredible body strength but...'

Rei walked towards the two girls, wrapping his right arm around Mei's shoulder to cheer her up while wrapping his left around Yugito's to make her feel better. He felt there were things that just had to be said. After all, this was also training for Mei on how to train someone.

"Mei you are expecting too much of Yugito. She is barely high genin to low chunin level right now. You can't compare her to yourself when you were twelve. You were already training for years with us at such an age. Yugito didn't have personal trainers. If you want to help her train, you gotta start slowly and be mindful of her needs. Not..." His voice turned awkward, "try to kill her with the first exercise."

It took some persuasion but in the end, Mei relented to go easier... much easier on Yugito. Needless to say, the resident kitty-holder was elated at hearing her life was spared from having any restricting seals placed on her during the course and the fact her life was safeguarded by Mei's Jutsu, Rei's seals, and to give her a bit more comfort, even Konan created full body underwear from her earth-chakra-hardened paper slices for the girl. Much to Yugito's dismay, they didn't have the heart to outright cancel it since Mei put her heart into preparing it.

Half-hour later, Yugito stood in front of the entry point of the course, nervous as all hell while she felt up the invisible Steam Armor shrouding her. Seeing she needed encouragement, Mei walked closer to her and gave her a brief hug.

"Yugi-chan..." She firmly addressed her. When she was sure she had Yugito's full attention, her voice softened, "I know you had a very hard and sad upbringing. I had too. I remember every rock, punch, or kick thrown at me. The only advice I can give you is to not try to forget but remember and steel your resolve. Train so it can't happen to you again. Train so nobody can treat you like trash again. I can give you training. I can teach you. But... it is you who needs to repeatedly break your limits. It will be painful and at times you will cry in hopelessness but trust me, it is worth it." Mei said with a gentle encouraging smile.

'A bit flimsy speech at cheering her up but it would do.' Rei chuckled, shaking his head.

'How cringy.' Konan who sat in Rei's lap slightly smiled and leaned her back into his chest. 'Then again... that might be exactly how she felt training under me and Rei.'

They watched as Yugito gained a determined look and turned towards the obstacle course.

And then, it started.

Yugito ran inside, masterfully running through the first corridor which was riddled to the brim with projectile trap seals that spewed kunais when somebody was near them. She almost made it look easy.

"Eh... She is actually using Surface Walking to run on the wall where the amount of trap seals is the lowest. At least we can be sure she can use her brain well." Konan pointedly commented, causing Mei to be a bit depressed when she remembered the numerous hours of Konan telling her she was doing cool-looking but moronic things.

Yugito reached the second obstacle. Vertically laid poles in a sea of swirling fog that kept close to the ground. The half-melted slowly sizzling bodies in the fog gave Yugito a clear image of what would happen should she fall.

With a gulp, she used all the nimbleness and dexterity of a cat she could muster in order to jump from pole to pole, trying to get through the obstacle as fast as possible. She stepped on the third pole... and discovered the room was not as simple as it first appeared.

"Ah, gravity enhancing seals with an area of effect around the pole, isn't it?" Konan asked, observing the panicky blonde as she almost fell into the melting fog.

"Yup, some poles have none, others have seals with different gravity-scaling. This entire exercise is built to make her control her balance at will and become accustomed to gravity or pressure shifts in the environment." Mei said, proud of herself to come up with it.

"Look! She managed to land on the fourth pole!" Rei said, changing the topic.

He was not about to discuss how asinine this entire exercise was. One misstep and you are in a melting mist. Yugito had to step on very small poles of various sizes. The smallest could fit only one tiptoe while the largest barely had place for one and half of her small foot. Needless to say, the ones on the smaller side were more common. She also needed to be capable of adjusting her gravity center in a split second to adjust to sudden gravity pressure change due to the seals. The only thing that was missing would be something to force Yugito to go quickly instead of her own pace. Now that would make the creator into one right asshole.

Yugito was doing well, she noticed she had time to adjust so she jumped from pole to pole, taking at least five minutes to get used to the sudden gravity shift on each pole. Even those that didn't have gravity seals were quite challenging since she was expecting the gravity shift and when it didn't come, she got unbalanced. Many times did Rei think she would finally fall as she flailed her hands, only her natural cat-like balance saving her.

Konan could see Mei getting excited as Yugito was about to jump from the tenth pole to the eleventh. She only managed one 'Uh-oh.' before...

Rei deadpanned, seeing the pole under Yugito fall down a second after she landed on it, causing her to fall into the melting fog. Only the Steam Armor around her prevented the girl from being made into a mushy goo by the fog. Rei slowly turned his gaze towards Mei and gave her a dry look.

"Really?" Now he understood why so many jonins died without even completing one-fourth of the course. It was the work of a completely sadistic bastard! The whole thing was made to be impossible to pass.

"Yup. It wouldn't be an obstacle course without proper traps to give her a bit of a push!" Mei brightly smiled before frowning. "But to think she would fail at the second obstacle out of twenty... You were right, Rei, Yugi-chan needs a more refined approach!"

'I am not gonna ask what exactly refined means. Clearly, Mei got her inspiration and training ideas from somewhere,' He glanced at amused Konan, 'Sorry, Yugito. It's for your own benefit. This concerned observer is unable to ease your suffering!'

Kommentar Kommentar von 45

Abstimmen