Book 1: Magic
Chapter 6: Much Needed Training
A bright ball of gas burning millions of miles away peaked its light through the window curtains, focusing onto the closed eyes of one human saiyan hybrid, Gohan. He covered face with his hand in a futile attempt to block out the sun.
“Sun.. You're so cruel in the morning.” Gohan groaned as he begrudgingly got up, arms and tail stretching to the ceiling before falling limp.
The Z-fighter stood from the bed, forcing his legs to awake themselves. He sloppily made his way toward the bathroom door, but took a glance toward the second bed in the room to see Naruto upside down with his feet on the pillow and head where his feet should've been.
Gohan tilted his head, but didn’t question the ninja’s apparent backward sleeping ways. After cleaning himself up quickly and putting on a clean and repaired purple Gi, he opened the connecting door to the women's side to find Jaina fully dressed in her under armor leather as she sat and cleaned her runic steel-like armor.
"Morning." Gohan said.
Jaina peaked an eye at him, and nodded in repliance to his presence, continuing to clean her armor pieces.
Gohan looked to find Korra snoring quietly lying outstretched on the bed with one half in the sheets and the other uncovered.
He quickly moved his eyes away from her, a small blush on his face from seeing a half-naked Avatar in only her undergarments.
"Will you wake up Korra? We have things to do today." Gohan asked of Jaina.
She nodded, but said, "Of what sort, I am curious now."
"Training and evaluation of our skills." He replied.
"I see, best to utilize the people around you to your fullest advantage."
Gohan frowned, his tail twitched behind him, "Why do you say it like that? We're all in this together."
Jaina voiced an annoyed sigh, "I've heard that before, lies and scandal is what follows in the shadows."
"What's wrong with you to be so oppressive against being both friends and a team with us?"
Jaina was silent, having chosen to ignore him much to his displeasure. The only sound heard was the rag brushing against the armor. Gohan opened his mouth to say something, but Jaina cut him off.
“It’s a personal matter, I don’t wish to discuss it.” Jaina finished the topic off. “I’ll wake up Korra if you wake up the blond.”
“His name is Naruto.”
Jaina shrugged and continued her work. Gohan turned around back into his room and reached Naruto’s bedside, where he then shook awake the ninja of Konoha.
“What do you want Kakashi? Waking me up so early… Sheesh is grandma Tsunade in a fit of anger again?” Naruto grumbled in drowsiness.
“Uh Naruto, it’s me, Gohan.” The hybrid Z-fighter replied.
“Gohan? Gohan… Gohan… Oh! My bad!” Naruto said, sitting up and realizing his awkward sleeping position. “Don’t tell anyone or I’ll fling kunai at you.” He said jokingly.
Gohan smiled, “My lips are sealed. Anyhow you should get ready, we going to train quite a bit today before we head toward the Fairy Capital.”
Naruto got off the bed, stretching before walking to the bathroom door. Gohan eyes looked across the room, and settled down at the sight of a necklace upon a table. He walked forward, and grasped the Element of Kindness before putting it over his neck. He could sense the magic binding around his neck, as if a child holding onto him with its small little arms.
It wasn’t half surprising when Gohan heard snoring coming from the bathroom door. He chuckled, knowing that only one person could’ve fallen asleep in the bathroom. And that would be the only person in the bathroom. So it didn’t take much for our hero to go and reawaken him, much to the ninja’s embarrassment.
“I’m awake, I’m awake!” Naruto exclaimed twice, his own voice didn’t seem to believe itself.
“Yeah huh, sure you are.” Gohan said in amusement.
Suddenly both Gohan and Naruto bolted up in surprise when they heard some very loud, and very angry, yelling.
“WHAT WAS THAT FOR?!”
Gohan simply stated, “Looks like Korra’s awake.”
“I wonder what caused her to be so loud?” Naruto said, rubbing his ears.
“YOU DIDN’T HAVE TO ZAP ME!” Korra yelled from the other room.
“Well, there’s your explanation.” Gohan commented.
The sound of stomping feet came barging into the two boys’ room. As a, thankfully has a bathrobe on, frustrated Korra eyed Gohan with an intent and determined face, it felt like he was facing Chi-Chi on a bad day. She came right up to him and said…
“Make Naruto share rooms with her next time, cause there is a No-Can-Do with me!” She demanded, pointing right at Gohan, then Naruto, then toward Jaina’s area.
Naruto had a mouth agaped, before he retorted, “No way! I would sooner sleep on the roof!”
“Oh come on you two, she’s not that bad.” Gohan defended Jaina.
“She just zapped me with her magic!” Korra argued.
“She nearly burnt off… Everything on me! Plus, she’s mean! Like, very mean!” Naruto added on to Korra’s argument.
“Look, can we make some sort of compromise?” Gohan tried to reason. It seemed to quiet down their anger a bit for them to listen.
The ninja spoke out. “What kind of compromise?” he questioned.
“We’re are going out to train for most today, evaluate our skills and techniques with each other. Then we are going to head toward the Fairy Capital first thing tomorrow. So I’ll share a room with her for this night so you two don’t have to deal with her.”
“What? But-” Korra started to say, but Naruto cut her off.
“Agreed!” Naruto yelled, “I’ll get ready for training.” He finished as he went to dress up.
“Gohan… “ Korra trailed off.
“Yeah, what is it Korra?” Gohan questioned with a smile.
“Nevermind… I’ll go get dressed up. I’ll tolerate her for now.” She finished.
Around an hour later, in the outskirts of Silvercross Town; Korra, Gohan, Jaina, and Naruto now stood in an grassy plains, provided a few trees here and there. The ninja of Konoha, jinchuuriki of the Nine tailed fox spirit, or at least, half of it. Stretched a bit in preparation for the training session.
“So… “ Naruto began to say, “What’s first?”
’You breaking the seal so I can-’
‘Oh shut your muzzle fur face!’ Naruto yelled back through his mental link.
Thankfully, Gohan broke the silence, “We can try sparring, it seems the best way to show off our abilities while training simultaneously.”
Naruto nodded, a grin plastered on his face. He took a glance toward Korra and Jaina, the latter who finished placing the last pieces of armor upon herself. Jaina grasped on to her two blades, placing both on her back.
She looked toward Gohan and said, “Will we make an effort to train in weapons?”
“Weapons?” Korra questioned out loud.
Naruto then remembered, Korra didn’t really have a weapon. Blazing fire, ground shaking earth, and whipping water, yes. But weapons? Nope. Not that it seems like she needed any, and Naruto can relate to that as ninja tend to do hand-to-hand combat quite a bit. Though an occasional kunai and shuriken never hurts.
“Yes, most notably swords. I need a sparring partner and Gohan is the only one with such a weapon on hand.” Jaina said.
“Hey!” Naruto exclaimed, “I’ve faced a… swords user… before! And I need to learn how to fight hi- them when they use those blades!” He finished, almost mentioning his best friend.
“What can those daggers of yours do against a blade?” Jaina questioned with curiosity.
“Kunai, kunai.” Naruto corrected, “And with a little chakra they can be very hard to break!”
Jaina smirked, “Well then we’ll just see how durable they can be.”
The Dragon Knight’s hands reached for her blades, pulling them out in a slow menacing matter. Naruto stepped a bit back, raising his hands in alarm.
“Whoa, whoa, we haven’t even made any sparring rules!” He exclaimed.
“No killing, only injuries that we can treat without much problem, and try to show off.” Gohan set the rules.
“Hey, showin off is my specialty- Ah! Sword of sharpness dattebayo!” Naruto yelled in surprise, narrowly avoiding a front arc slash of Jaina’s blade. Spontaneously a kunai appeared in hand and blocked the second incoming blade with a high pitched tang.
The ninja leaned back avoiding a horizontal strike, twirling the kunai in his hand before stopping with a good grip on it. He thrust the weapon forward and parried Jaina’s second sword. Naruto applied some Chakra into his muscles, giving him a boost of strength and speed, and leaped away from the Dragon Knight of Rivellon.
Forming a handsign in mid-air, two clones appeared behind him. All three Narutos landed on the ground, the clones moving toward the original’s right opened palm where they started to claw the air above his hand in a fast paced motion.
A spiraling sphere of blue chakra began forming within the original Naruto’s palm, the technique spinning around with great speed clearly told of a drill-like intention. The clones dispelled themselves and Naruto glanced toward his technique, a small frown appearing on his face.
“It’s incomplete… Oh… Still have to do water walking before I have a decent enough control to form it fully.” Naruto said to himself.
The Kyuubi Jinchuuriki looked upward and yelp in surprise as Jaina approached him with inhuman speed, a small trail of red magic lines in her wake as she approached him with the, unknowingly to him, Charge spell.
Quickly Naruto thrust his right hand forward, just in time for Jaina’s blade to come up toward him.
“Rasengan!” Naruto yelled his attack’s name.
The spiraling chakra smashed into the enchanted blades, in which both forces collided and imploded outward with a sudden burst of wild energy. Jaina recovered quickly, only having stumbled back from the collision, and raised an open gauntlet that conjured a flaming bolt toward the orange-clad ninja.
"Fireball." Jaina stated as the spell came at Naruto.
Quickly Naruto formed a few hand signs before he was engulfed in flame, but his figure was replaced with a burning log that appeared in a puff of white smoke.
"What? A log?" Jaina said in confusion.
"Up here silver eyes!" Naruto yelled as he came down from the air with two clones by his side. All of them carrying shuriken in their hands that they all flung at Jaina.
The Dragon Knight crossed her swords at a specific arc, deflecting the metal stars off the enchanted blades upon impact.
Naruto frowned, "I'll get around those swords!"
'Sure you will.'
'Go back to sleep fuzz ball!'
'You could easily beat her with just a snippet of my chakra. The nine-tailed fox spirit retorted.
'I will not use your power, now stop disturbing me from training!' Naruto thought back.
'You will one day brat, you will have no choice, and when you slip, I'll be there.'
Naruto leaped back as he took notice Jaina had dispelled his clones by severing their limbs. Not pleasant memories for sure.
At this moment, the ninja saw Gohan fly down right beside him.
"Having trouble Naruto? Perhaps you should switch tactics from using clones all the time." Gohan suggested.
"Clones are my speciality, my main fighting style is based around them." Naruto replied.
"Seems limiting."
"Hey! If I kept all my training I would've used Sage mode and the frog fu style already!" Naruto argued.
Gohan blinked, "Sage mode?" He questioned.
"Yep, makes me pretty much indestructible and allows me to use more badass techniques!" The ninja boasted.
"Magic missile!" The voice of Jaina made itself known.
Two white spheres of magical energy shot into the sky from Jaina’s raised fist, each individual bolt heading toward their two targets of Naruto and Gohan, locked into delivering some damage.
“Dodge!” Gohan yelled as he leaped away.
“Uh yeah!” Naruto said, doing the same.
But the magic missiles weren’t ordinary projectiles, they turned their direction, albeit slowly, and continued locked on the two boys. Who both repeatedly dodged the magical spell until it ran out of energy to consume in its chase.
No longer distracted at the idea of being struck by a ball of arcane energy, Naruto Uzumaki looked toward his Dragon Knight opponent to find her dodging boulders of earth by an Avatar. He had to admit that Jaina has quite some agility even if she's wearing heavy armor as she rolled gracefully from being hit.
Forming his signature handsign, Naruto shouted "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" as two clones appeared on both sides of him with puffs of white chakra smoke. And they, including the original, charged forward.
Truly when it came to Korra's turn for deep thinking, there wasn't much for her to miss from her world. But there was still notable people, like her spirit animal, Naga; her best friend, the polar bear dog. There were also her parents, as well as Tenzin, his wife and kids, and her surrogate grandmother Katara.
Only then did she realize, she barely if never called Bolin and Mako to mind whatsoever.
She should be concerned shouldn't she? But when it came down to it, she had only known them for a day at most, give or take a few more hours. But since arriving in this world, it was as if her perspective of the sentence "Friends her Age" shifted one-eighty degrees.
It was like it just seemed so much harder to gain recognition from people, only now did the title as "Avatar" aka "Balancer of the World", "Reincarnation of Aang", "Bridge between Worlds", the latter being even more true nowadays, were they so meaningless.
And yet... She felt so much more like a person! Gohan, Naruto, and even Jaina actually felt like she would have to gain their friendship the way it's suppose to be gained, not through title or reputation.
Wow, talk about overreaction. Where was she? Oh yes, about to give a few boulders to Jaina.
Korra slammed her right foot forward, and outstretched her arms, fist clenched, before rising them alongside medium sized boulders of rock flying from the ground. Korra then drew back her fist before punching the floating rocks toward Jaina's direction.
Then suddenly taken by Jaina’s swift movements of rolling forward and about in dodging her earth bending, Korra opted to change tactics and placed her legs firmly diagonally, and brought her fist racing through the air like a sucker punch.
A torrent of earth came rushing like a torpedo, following the movements of Korra's fist as it closed it from an angle at Jaina. The Dragon Knight never saw it coming, for she had not any experience in fighting a skill that can manipulate the earth below her feet.
“Wha- Oof!” Jaina shouted.
Jaina promptly fell on her bottom in sheer surprise, vulnerable and open to attack, which Naruto gladly did.
The orange-clad ninja charged toward the downed Jaina, his right hand outstretched to his left side, carrying a ball of spiraling energy that Naruto had recently gave name to.
“Here’s a Rasengan!”
The Dragon Knight quickly got up to defend herself, but it only served to expose her entire torso to the jutsu, the light blue ball slammed into her chest armor; Jaina went flying before gravity retook control and she skid along the grassy ground.
Korra smiled and rushed forward with fist straight forward, a spew of flame firebended right at Jaina. “Firebending never gets old!” Korra commented.
But the flame was disrupted, evaporating into the air as it was blocked by another force, revealing Gohan in front of Jaina’s figure with his palm open, albeit a bit burnt.
“Gohan what are you doing!” Korra shouted.
“Wha? What does it look like, I’m defending her. Plus… “ Gohan started saying, “Isn’t this a free for all?”
Naruto stopped in mid-motion, “Oh crap.”
One moment, Gohan stood there still.
The next, he was speeding right toward Naruto faster than Korra could turn her head.
“SHI-” Was all Naruto had time to say before a fist slammed into his stomach.
But Naruto still had some tricks, as apparently all Gohan had punched appeared in smoke as a wooden log. Gohan spun around, his right feet dragging along the dirt in his quick movement before his left fist slammed into the newly appeared Naruto’s right cheek.
The ninja crashed into a stray tree, his head spinning and the words coming out of his mouth, “Hit hard for a granny.. Tsunade…”
Korra mouth went agape slightly, “But-Huh-How? That was so fast, I barely caught up!”
Gohan looked to her, “Really? Sorry, I’ll tone it down if you like.” He replied kindly.
“What you mean really?!” Korra questioned loudly.
“I’m more powerful than the rest of you, I know I am, so I’m holding back my strength to avoid causing too much injury.” Gohan paused for a moment, “Let’s say I didn’t get affected by the transportation here than the rest of you did.” He finished, an excuse that Korra didn’t pick up.
A trail of red lines rushed past Korra, who she identified as Jaina rapidly approaching Gohan with blades drawn. Gohan brought his own sword out, and parried the Dragon Knight’s blows before kneeing her and knocking her back with a blast of blue Ki energy.
“You can’t rely on the speed of your techniques all the time, sometimes opponents can react faster than you give them credit for.” Gohan told Jaina.
Jaina got up, and responded by blasting a fireball toward his direction; Gohan merely moved his head to the side as it shot past him. He narrowed his eyes toward her.
“Why are you so against us?”
Jaina still didn’t respond, grasping her blades and running at Gohan. He brought his sword up and began parrying blow after blow, not with skill, but with speed alone. But even with speed and power, the lack of skill took its toll. As Gohan found himself having to use even more Ki to compensate for it.
Gohan moved his feet about, backing away from Jaina’s relentless assault. But with a small opening in her stance, Gohan dropped downward, a hand keeping him up as he spun and tripped Jaina with his legs.
However Jaina stabbed her blade into the ground to prevent her fall, and using the momentum, quickly got up and knocked Gohan back with the hilt of her sword.
Korra charged in firebending, fire coming from both her hands, Gohan disengaged from Jaina and flew up into the air to avoid the flame; Jaina dodged by rolling to the side. Korra landed, turning hundred-eighty degrees and kicking at Jaina’s torso.
Jaina attempted to raise her blade, but underestimated Korra’s speed and was knocked back. She stumbled, but regained herself. Korra struck fast, not allowing Jaina time to bring her blades to bear. But even with her relentless assault of punches and kicks, the armor Jaina wore prove very effective in defending her.
But before Jaina had time to retaliate.
Suddenly, out of the blue, hundreds upon hundreds of white smoke covered the area. From Gohan’s point of view, it seemed the plains had become literally Naruto.
“You better believe that you’ll going to get all your asses handed to you!” The seemingly original yelled.
Then all the clones spoke in unison, “BY NARUTO UZUMAKI!”
They charged forward, all at once, countless numbers of the color orange swarming over Korra and Jaina. Even Gohan found himself pulled down by the overwhelming odds of clones grasping onto his legs.
They tried to resist, with bending, magic, and Ki they struck at Naruto’s endless clones. White chakra smokes dispelled numerously as clone after clone met their demise by blade, martial arts, or bending techniques.
But with every clone brought down, another lands a blow upon them. Jaina, even with her incredible armor, found herself being worn down by Naruto’s one-man army. Korra could also be seen with a number of bruises laced on her body.
Gohan, with his incredible strength and durability, didn’t seem worse to wear compared to the others. In fact, it looked like he was excited, having fun. His lack of weariness was strange in Korra’s opinion. But Naruto didn’t seem to mind, it only fueled his determination to defeat Gohan.
Thought defeated, the clones left Korra and Jaina in favor of the Ki wielding martial artist. Giving precious recovery time to the two.
To the ruler of the great Battle Tower, the Dragon Knight Jaina Draconis was quite irritated by the fact that her ass had been handed to her multiple times in a single sparring session. Even her enchanted armor, something that she earned through hard work, sweat, and lots of killing, seemed only to balance herself to fight evenly with Naruto, let alone Gohan who still held back his true strength.
Of course, her pride would not allow her to respect the orange infested idiot, but still the thought remained. Naruto Uzumaki proved some challenge, perhaps it’s because he’s skilled, or the energy known as chakra provided a more potent augmentation to the body than previously thought.
Son Gohan on the other hand, was on a whole other level of physical superiority. He wasn’t skilled in the arts of swordsmanship from their spar, but he made up for it in speed and strength. It irritated the living hell out of her, that all her training proved useless, or at least pitifully, against Gohan.
Korra, self-proclaimed ‘Avatar’, had the full control of the elements. Even her Fireball spell paled in comparison to Korra’s control over flames, not to mention Korra also had control over the Earth and Water elements as well. And if Jaina could recall, had the potential for the wind element if she trained in it; a fact that should be rectified with the ‘Airbending’ scroll they recovered within those ruins.
Jaina scowled at the army of Naruto clones and the Ki using human fighting them, she didn’t have much in spells that affected an area around her, the only spell being that of the Whirlwind which required close proximity to be useful. Magic Missile only launched two arcane bolts, and Fireball is a single shot.
The only other skills she had that would be extremely useful would be in her Dragon form, but the cursed stone wouldn’t work for some reason!
She needed to vent off some frustration, and the nearest target, Korra.
Jaina began spinning in a three-sixty rotation, her blades pulled out and her magic coursing through her.
“Whirlwind!” The Dragon Knight shouted.
Korra had been close to her, and so the Avatar is within the Whirlwind's proximity. Korra threw up her arms in defense before being blown off her feet, small cuts forming in her arms, and falling to the ground in pain.
"Argh! Why did you do that!" Korra shouted at Jaina.
"The fight hasn't ended as of yet," Jaina simply replied. She raised a blade at Korra, "Yield."
"Kamehameha!"
Now, when a destructible force meets an indestructible object, what exactly happens?
*Kaboom!*
A cloud of debris and smoke covered the entirety of the training area. No one could see, but with our Dragon Knight Jaina...
Jaina reopened her eyes, and attempted to get up. But an immense pain flares throughout her entire body. She falls down against her back, numb, and unable to move. Last thing she could remember was her blade raised at Korra.
Were they attacked? If so, she better get up quickly.
Her hand reached for her expansive slayer pack, a bag enchanted during her time as a Dragon Slayer, she had no time to think back to that time; proceeding to merely think of the item she wanted from within and felt it within her grasp.
A bottle with red liquid was pulled from her bag, she popped the cork off and gulped it down. She felt the restorative properties heal over her wounds and rejuvenate her body. She still had low magic through, but she had enough for now.
Jaina stood back on her legs, grasping her fallen sword and lifting it up in a stance. Her eyes scanned the battlefield, but besides a fallen Korra, and unconscious ninja, only Gohan stood in sight, a aura of energy encasing his entire being from the feet up. Powerful in every sense of the word.
Gohan’s aura vanished soon after, his stance relaxing. “Think we’re done for today.”
“What did you do?” Jaina questioned, as he sheathed her blades.
“Huh? What you mean?” Gohan replied in confusion.
“That explosion, you used a spell- technique. The force impacted against my armor-”
“Kamehameha Wave.” Gohan informed.
“Explain.” Jaina demanded.
“Later, Korra and Naruto have to recover first.” He said, walking toward Korra.
Jaina gritted her teeth, she wasn’t used to being disregarded. She’s not some green-leaf rookie out of training! “Don’t you ignore me!”
Gohan stopped, and turned around. “I’m not? Why you think that?”
“Because you just ignored my demand for no reason, dammit! Now answer!” Jaina shouted.
Gohan narrowed his eyes, “No.” And turned, walking away.
Jaina clenched her fist. Why, why! Everyone else… Anyone else…
“Hey, are you alright?”
Jaina turned her head. Naruto stood there beside her, his clothes ragged, and injuries adorning his body, yet slowly healing. He looked to her, with an odd expression that she had never seen someone make at her before.
“I’m fine.” Jaina replied in feigned annoyance, she glanced back at Naruto’s wounds, and took a Potion of Healing from her back, the same type of potion she used beforehand.
“Here, drink this.” She mumbled, handing him the potion. Naruto looked at it strangely, “It heals you.” Jaina informed.
He grasped it with his hand, “Thanks!” The ninja exclaimed, gulping down the liquid held inside with no hesitation. Naruto’s wounds began to knit themselves even faster than before, the blondie’s eyes widening as he no doubt felt it’s regenerating properties. But he stopped drinking it halfway, and looked toward Gohan and Korra’s location.
“Hey guys! Jaina’s got this magic healing stuff! Doesn’t taste that good though, so fair warning on that!” Naruto shouted, causing both of them to walk toward Jaina and Naruto.
Jaina groaned silently, “Just give the remains of yours. I’m going to eat alone back in town.” she said, turning direction and heading back toward Silvercross Town.