Chapitre 179: CH_6.8 (179)
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The link is also in the synopsis
———
.
"He has got a foul mouth on him," said Toridasu.
Shirakumo frowned. "There shouldn't be a need to insult her and her clan… It's unsightly."
"I like it," Anko smiled. "A shinobi needs to maintain calm during battle. He riled her up, and she is clearly falling for it… But I don't know if it was wise to do it to Kameko."
Toridasu glanced at Anko and then at Kameko. "A Taketori, is she?"
"Yes."
———
.
Takuma took a step back when he saw Kameko's sword hum dangerously. He didn't need to be told that he needed to avoid getting cut from that. It was bad that he was no longer scared of bladed weapons like swords from his time Ring—he needed to feel the fear to keep himself safe. Fear kept him on his toes.
Kameko charged at him with her sword. Takuma equipped six of his eight with kunai and left two free for other uses.
He could immediately tell the difference in her. She was clearly more aggressive than before, and her sword became sharper. Not the blade, but the movements; her strikes were becoming tighter, faster, flowing through the air, cutting through it as though no resistance existed for the sword.
Takuma might have insulted her sword, but it was mesmerizing.
Kameko gave Takuma a chase. Her footwork worked in conjunction with her arms as she slashed and stabbed at Takuma, who jumped around her, using his entire body and his tentacles to keep her sword away from her. With every sword strike, she chipped away at the tentacles. Not even the kunai worked as the chakra around the sword disturbed the integrity of the tentacle, taking little sips of water from the tentacles.
This was just like his spar against Okubo Momoe. Eight Tentacles was a bad fit against kenjutsu users.
Her sword was like his augmentations, but unlike him, who expunged his chakra outwards to create an outward-going force, her chakra stuck to the sword, vibrating at high speeds to create a razor edge, and from observations, it increased the sword's range by an amount.
With her non-stop aggressiveness, raging offense, it was difficult to judge that invisible range.
Perhaps he was wrong to anger her.
She was skilled.
But, that wasn't enough.
———
.
"The Taketori sword. Even in the hands of a youngster like her, it's deadly as ever," said Toridasu, fanning himself with a folding hand fan.
"She is apparently the most talented in her generation," Anko commented.
"Oh? Did she say that herself? Isn't that touting one's own horn?"
Anko shook her head. "Her father wrote me a letter."
"That would've been embarrassing for Genin Kameko."
"It would be if I told her," Anko smiled.
The Taketori clan was one of the premier clans who had developed a style of deadly kenjutsu. The Taketori sword was a sword of swiftness and efficiency. They had existed since the pre-Hidden Villages Warring Eras and had developed their sword on the battlefield.
The Taketori ideal was pure offense—discarding everything that hindered the sword's destructive capabilities and refining the remaining till the sword achieved its most deadly form.
Takuma's offense was fast-paced, but Kameko's was on the next level. Her sword sliced through the air, every strike with the sole intention to draw blood. Takuma used force to push Kameko back, but she used sheer speed and finesse to leave him on choice to retreat as anything else would have him come in the blade's trajectory.
Kameko raised her sword high up and swung it down for a sharp cutter of wind to fly out towards Takuma, who hadn't stopped moving on his legs since he had insulted her. He hadn't been given a moment's rest. And as the wind cutter flew towards him, he slid under it on his knees, bending his torso backward as though the wind cutter was a limbo pole.
"A wind affinity. Excellent for kenjutsu," said Shirakumo. "It seems Taketori's future is going to be stable."
Possessing an affinity towards the wind or lightning nature transformation was highly desirable for shinobi pursuing the kenjutsu as they had the best compatibility with blade weapons.
"That said, these two are from the same batch?" asked Shirakumo.
"Yes, why do you ask?" Anko said.
"Just a thought about how people from the same batch can differ in just a few years. They have been shinobi for the same duration… but the difference in experience is plenty clear."
———
.
'Why can't I hit him!?'
Kameko gritted her teeth as she sheathed her sword, built chakra into the blade, and unleashed a strong and wide wind cutter as she unsheathed the blade with a wide swing.
She ran towards Takuma after unleashing the wind cutter. And as she expected, Takuma ducked under the cutter, and other than small cuts on his arms that he used to protect his face, he left uninjured. Knowing this would happen, Kameko unleashed a vertical wind cutter, but Takuma rolled away without even looking at the wind cutter.
She had been bombarding him with attacks, but not a single one had hit him.
It was getting frustrating.
She released two more wind cutters, disregarding pacing her chakra consumption.
Takuma weaved hand seals and disappeared into the ground.
Her senses were set on fire as she looked around everywhere in search of where Takuma would appear from the ground. She heard the ground crack, and she immediately dashed to the spot. Kameko switched from her wind cutter to the vibrating edge as she got into close range.
As she was about to slash her sword down, a figure appeared in her peripheral vision. There was no sound or any other indication that someone was behind her until she saw them. The self-preservation kicked in, and Kameko changed her target; she turned to slash at the new target, which turned out to be Takuma.
"Huh?"
Her sword went through Takuma clean without any resistance because there was nothing corporeal to cut. Takuma disappeared like he never existed.
'Clone Jutsu!?'
Kameko's heart leaped in her chest as she turned back only to be slammed with pain. She looked down to see a gash in her side. It was a mistake to give her wound attention as she felt a powerful punch assault her face. One moment, she was standing; the next moment, she was on the ground. The air was knocked out of her lungs, leaving her breathless. Once again, she was reminded that Takuma knew how to use chakra augmentations.
Her vision was blurry, her ears rang, and she felt the strong urge to empty her stomach. The pain in her sides was actually the one thing that held her together as she got up. She didn't expect to get up; especially not being allowed to grab her sword.
Something was wrong.
Ding!
Her swimming vision settled, but as she regained focus, her sight was filled with dozens upon dozens of Takuma surrounding her.
She drew on her sword but found her body to be bound by paralysis. The more she struggled, the more her body felt like stone.
Then, from out of nowhere, she felt herself locked in a rear naked choke hold. And her paralysis didn't allow her to get out of it. Within seconds, she felt herself go faint, and before she went unconscious, a few words hit her ears as the dozens of Takuma disappeared as though they never existed and she felt control return back to her, but it was already too late.
"I will work with you, Taketori Kameko. I will give you at least that…"
———
.
Takuma let Kameko go after she went limp in his grasp. She fell down to the ground, and he stepped back. Immediately, two people came up with a stretcher to carry her off to presumably the medical house for the treatment.
"Good fight, come on, let's get you treated," said one of the people helping Kameko on the stretcher.
He had only left a gash in her side, and with iryo-nin, that was but a light scratch. He was injured too, but they were essentially inconsequential that even he could treat on his own. It felt good not to come out with a fight with critical injuries.
"Thanks, you guys go ahead; I will be right there," he said.
The man glanced at Anko and the two jonin walking towards them before nodding. He made sure Takuma knew the location of the medical house and then took an unconscious Kameko away.
"You're on the team, that's for sure," said Anko.
"I'm glad you liked the performance," said Takuma.
He looked at Toridasu and Shirakumo and introduced himself to the latter.
"I followed the Narcotics Taskforce's work in the Police Force. It was quite impressive," said Shirakumo.
"It was a team effort, sir," Takuma replied.
"You created such a hubbub upon your arrival, Genin Takuma. I hope this won't become a regular thing around here," said Toridasu, fanning himself. "Though some excitement here and there is always welcome," he laughed 'hohoho' like Santa.
"I came here to do my duty, sir. I will do that; anything other than that is just a bonus," said Takuma. "Now, if you will excuse me. I shall get myself treated."
As Takuma left, the two jonin and Anko followed him with their eyes.
"What do you think he will do now?" asked Toridasu.
Shirakumo replied, "If he's smart, he will take care of the situation as soon as possible," he turned to Anko, "and if he doesn't, you will have a problem."
Anko shrugged with a grin on her face.
"If they don't get along, I will make it so they won't have a choice but to get along or their lives would be miserable the entire time they are here," she said.
.
———
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The link is in the synopsis!
Chapitre 180: CH_6.9 (180)
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The link is also in the synopsis
———
.
When Kameko opened her eyes on a bed in the medical house, she found Takuma sitting at her bedside, reading a scroll. He looked up from his scroll at her.
"You're awake and fairly quickly at that. How are you feeling?" he asked.
She narrowed her eyes, showing her displeasure. "What are you doing here?"
"Waiting for you to wake up so we can have a chat."
"I don't have anything to say to you."
"Well, I do, and you will listen because I will only say this here," said Takuma; something in his demeanor told her that she should listen. "I won, so according to the bet, we will be working on the same team…"
Kameko bit the inside of her cheek and clenched her fists. She sat up on her bed to be on the same level as Takuma.
"So, what? You're here to gloat about it?" she spat.
"… but I don't want there to be bad blood between us, so I'm here to dispel the animosity between us for the sake of the team. I don't want to spend my time here locking horns with you. Therefore, I suggest we make peace. And as a token of my intention, I will forgo the two months of my tasks we decided for your punishment."
Kameko stayed silent. It was clear from the look in her eyes that she was suspicious of Takuma.
Takuma stood up and bowed to Kameko. "I apologize for bad mouthing you and your clan during the fight. I didn't mean any of that; it was simply a tactic to throw you off your calm. Your sword was dangerous enough that I had to resort to other tactics."
"So, we are just supposed to become friends now?" asked Kameko, scoffing.
"Not really," Takuma shrugged. "Honestly speaking, I'm not interested in becoming friends with you. All I'm proposing is that we treat each other as professionally as we can. We don't need to be friends to functionally operate as teammates. I simply don't wish for unnecessary hostility."
Takuma stood up and rolled up his scroll.
"I have said my piece. It's up to you if you wish to be civil with me; my peace offering will hold even either way. Rest well, I will see you tomorrow," he said before taking his leave.
Kameko dropped back to the bed and sighed as she stared at the ceiling, thinking.
———
.
"Huh, I thought she would give me a reply," Takuma muttered as he exited the building.
Barely an hour had passed since the fight. It was a strange feeling—the fight was akin to a Ring fight, and he usually had those in the late evening, but today, the day had barely started.
"I should go talk to Anko," he muttered.
"I'm here."
Takuma flinched and looked to the side to see Anko leaning against the wall. She waved to him as she walked to him. "Yo, that was a good fight. Chakra Augmentation, Taijutsu, Genjutsu, Water Release, Earth Release—that's a good amount of stuff in your repertoire. I must say I'm liking you more and more as a member of my team."
Takuma smiled. "So, what do you think? How did I do?"
"Well, if you are asking," Anko hummed. "You wasted too much time at the start. If you had planned it better, you could've ended the fight without using the genjutsu. You only hit her with a couple of augmented strikes, and those hurt her enough to make her not risk being close to you, even with a sword in hand. You heavily underutilized those and let her get in the cuts and knicks she did."
Takuma lifted his hand and looked at his fist.
"It's more like I can't utilize the chakra augmentation," he said.
"What do you mean?"
"I made this chakra augmentation on my own—"
"You created it on your own!?"
Takuma laughed and waved Anko's surprise down. "It's not that impressive." He explained the base concept of how he used to overload the chakra adhesion (used for wall-sticking) to create power by expunging the chakra outwards. "Because I don't have any experience in jutsu creation, and I was told once by someone that the base concept itself was flawed from an augmentation perspective, the use-case is quite restrictive.
"My augmentation has multiple variables I have to consider with every strike. Whenever I hit someone with an augmented strike, I experience a knockback recoil. I have long gotten used to it, but each recoil makes me slow down just a bit, but it's enough that I have to be mindful, or I can put myself at a disadvantage. I have to consider if I'm using a punch, a palm strike, a kick, what kind of kick, or if I'm using my elbow or knee; then I have to consider my opponent, where am I hitting them, how much force can they shrug off, and because of the recoil I have to think about the follow-up—if I want a quick successive attack then I need a lower recoil to make the transition seamless, but if I can afford a moment of pause, I can go for a heavy hit.
"Moreover, the techniques' demand of control itself is a problem. In the start, I used to break the bones in my arms whenever I used the augmentation recklessly." He looked at his hand. "I have fractured my knuckles, wrist, and fingers more times than I can remember. I have gotten better through experience, but the flaws in the technique that caused the injuries in the first place still remain. I can't go above a certain power limit, or I would injure myself."
He looked at Anko.
"Every augmentation is a risk. I have to mentally and instinctually calculate all of it to land a proper punch. If I didn't need to, every attack of mine would've been augmented—I have the chakra for it. I know that if I tried, I could've shattered Kameko's jaw in one shot or caused heavy internal injuries in her abdomen, or killed her if I placed my hits properly on a vital—in return, however, I would've lost my arm. From a certain standpoint, a kill for a broken arm doesn't sound bad, but that trade-off is immensely risky."
Iryo-jutsu was miraculous, but it couldn't solve everything. A broken arm not treated quickly could get complicated enough that amputation was the only choice.
"Sounds dangerous," Anko said as they walked through the camp. "If it's so dangerous, why do you still use it?"
Takuma had only one answer to the question. "Because it makes me dangerous. When they realize that I can hit that hard, they become hyper-conscious of it. There's fear in their eyes, caution in their movement, hesitation in their intentions." Takuma didn't realize that there was a grin on his face. "And flawed doesn't mean useless; I figured a couple of things that work around it."
He removed two kunai from his pouch and pointed at a nearby tree.
"Watch," he said.
Takuma threw the two kunai one-at-a-time at the kunai.
"The second one was faster?" Anko commented.
"Let's see, shall we?"
They walked to the tree and saw that the first kunai was barely a quarter of its length into the thick tree bark, but the second kunai was more than halfway into the tree.
"It's brutish, but everything has its uses," he said.
Takuma had figured out that he could propel the kunai faster and stronger by expunging chakra behind the kunai a moment before it left his hand. Force was a product of mass and acceleration; Takuma increased the acceleration with his augmentation technique and created a sharp jump in force. In return, he sacrificed accuracy, so he could only use it at close range or when he had extra time to aim.
"You used it against Kameko, didn't you," asked Anko, unsure if her guess was correct.
Takuma nodded.
"I don't think it's particularly impressive, but I can see it having its uses," she said. "Would improving chakra control improve your augmentations?"
"Improving chakra control improves everything, ma'am," Takuma chuckled.
"Anko," she reminded him.
"Yes, my apologies," he replied. "But it's not like I haven't worked on chakra control." He trained chakra control on a regular basis. But it was also true that he hadn't seen improvement in his control recently.
"I don't know what method you used, but you haven't used mine," she said.
"Your methods?"
Takuma didn't know why, but seeing the glint in Anko's eyes as she coyly smiled sent alarm bells in his mind. Something in him told him otherwise, but he still asked, "Will they help improve my chakra control?" If his improved his chakra control, his abilities all-round would improve.
"Of course, but it might be tough; if you agree now, I won't accept complaints later."
Takuma's fingers twitched. He was wondering what kind of training Anko was talking about. Her behavior was tingling his instincts; the last time he had felt like this was with Maruboshi, who had put him through his 'basic training' during the academy. He had hated every second of the training because of how tough it was.
Takuma trained every day, but he didn't particularly enjoy it. Training was a way to grow stronger; as such, he did it every day.
'Maybe I should decline...'
"My methods are actually my teacher's special methods," she said.
Anko's eyes gained a particular look as though she was testing him, observing his every expression.
Usually, Takuma would notice the change, but the moment he heard that Anko's methods were her teacher's methods, his answer was decided, and he replied as enthusiastically as possible.
"I will take your offer, thank you!"
Takuma, of course, knew who her teacher was. Even if he hadn't read the source material, after living in the Hidden Leaf for as long as he had, he knew Mitarashi Anko and her teacher, Orochimaru of the Snake, one of the Legendary Sannin. One of Hidden Leaf's most wanted, currently rogue missing-nin, one of the shinobi with the highest bounty on their heads.
The man was terrible— terrible, but great. Anko was a chunin, so he figured she would have some more advanced training methods, but Orochimaru simply gave her more credibility.
Anko looked stunned for a moment before she laughed and slapped Takuma on his shoulder a couple of times.
"You're an interesting guy!" she said. "I will teach you, and I will teach you good!"
Takuma felt good. He had showcased his ability to the entire camp and had managed to build a good rapport with his chunin lead. It was not bad for a day's work.
.
———
Chat with me and the rest of the community on our DISCORD server.
The link is in the synopsis!
État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
200+ Classement
Power Stone 
109 Power
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