Graduation III. Me and the Boys
“Hello Sunset.”
“Good morning, Princess,” I smiled at Celestia, who was standing alone in the room. My room, in fact. What was she doing here? I wondered as I cantered in, before looking at the book on the table. Guess we were going to be going through Pyrokinesis today.
I frowned, wondering why we would be going through this subject today, considering how skilled I was in it.
I shook my head. Better not to question it. Besides, Celestia was giving me a personal lesson, meaning that she was prioritizing me over that stupid pegasus. That alone would make it more worth it to be here.
“Are you ready for today’s lesson?”
I nodded and followed as she led me to the balcony.
I followed and stopped when I saw Konoha outside. Burning.
What in the world was going on?
The world seemed to bend and distort as the Konohagakure burned. From where she stood, she could see figures darting about the hellish landscape, engaging in the bloody melee. Ponies and Shinobis fought and died, filling the streets with blood and corpses as the buildings around them burned, engulfing the sky with towering columns of smoke.
Then Celestia began to laugh.
I turned to look at her. No, I looked at him. Orochimaru-sama, laughing aloud as he looked upon the burning city of his hatred.
“Well done, Sunset.” He chortled as he looked at me. “Now, let us finish this.” He turned.
I followed him as the doors to my room flew open and stopped when I saw who had entered. Ino, Shikamaru, Chouji, Sakura, Naruto, Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei. They were all older than I remembered. How much time had passed since I last saw them, I wondered. Then they looked at me, and attacked.
I flinched and raised my hands. A great torrent of fire washed over all of them, and I shivered as they screamed in anguish.
Then it all stopped. And I was compelled to look down. To look down at the thin blade protruding from my chest.
“Well done, Sunset.” Celestia/Orochimaru said in my ear, I couldn’t really tell. The world bent around me, the walls curving on my as they laughed together, their voices intermingling like a terrible chorus of the end...
I awoke, shivering. Sweat made my hair cling to my forehead as I wrapped my arms around myself, taking deep breaths to calm myself.
A dream… I breathed. And such a vivid one at that. It just felt so… real.
“I am Kyoku Asagami.” I said to myself as my breathing slowed. I looked about myself, confirming my location. “I am not Sunset Shimmer.”
The world felt a bit more real after that mantra.
I got out of my bed and looked about my room. It looked the same as ever. Small and practical. A small table, and chair leaning by my bed against the wall, and a couple of cupboards to the side. One for clothes, one for equipment.
I reached out to the mirror on the table, and that was when the calendar caught my eye. I blinked and it struck me.
I am a shinobi now. I grinned. One step closer to helping Orochimaru-sama.
And today would be my first day on the job.
Washing up was a simple and quick process for me, especially since I was never in the habit to actually put much effort into my looks, a fact that Ino had always lamented. Once it was done, I immediately headed to kitchen, both to get my breakfast and my standing orders for the day.
Father was out early today. Not a rare occurrence considering that he was a Jounin, though it probably means that I had to make my own breakfast today. I meandered over to the kitchen counter, making sure to have a look at the arrangement of cups and plates in the corner.
No orders for today huh? I nodded. Not that I would mind, most of the time, the orders usually means keeping an eye on a certain building or going to the archives to copy some texts. I was not really in the proper skill level to be sneaking into the Hokage’s office or even the General Operations’ archives after all.
Well, at least I would get the entire day to myself, assuming that we did not run ourselves ragged doing missions.
“Of course he’s late…” I sighed.
We were told to meet at Training Ground Five, the very one that we had conducted our graduation exercise the day before, at the ungodly hour of six in the morning. Still, while I could understand the need to meeting early, the fact that sensei was not here yet somehow got on my nerves.
“What’s taking him so long!” Naruto cried out impatiently. Over to his side, I can somewhat sense Sasuke’s silent agreement on the subject.
Well, waiting would not be a problem, except that if my suspicions were right, we would probably be waiting for about two to three hours, if the past two days were any indication.
Should have brought something to read. I sighed. Well, there was no use crying over spilt milk, was there? I racked my brain to see if there was something, anything that I could do to pass the time.
After all, I hated wasting my time. If I was going to be waiting for Sensei to come, I would rather be doing something productive.
“Call me when Sensei comes,” I told the boys as I began to head off.
“Huh, where are you going?”
“Training,” I replied simply, pointing to one of the dummies set up at the grounds.
I stopped in front of the training dummy, which was more a stump with wooden logs hammered in its sides, and sectioned into a series of rotating rings, and immediately assumed the stance that was taught to us at the academy, the Konoha Katas. Created by the famed second Hokage, who was renowned for the discovery of multiple jutsus and techniques, the Konoha Katas were lauded as the easiest to learn and also the most general form of taijutsu to be taught to all leaf shinobis. Of course, as a rule, practitioners of it were often looked down upon, but no one could deny its efficiency and the easy transition from one technique to another when applying it. In fact, many different types of Kenjutsu and Taijutsu could be found to have derived their techniques from the Konoha Katas, with famous techniques such as the Juuken using the Katas as its foundation.
It was also the form that was taught to me at Otogakure, though they called it by a different name.
I lashed out with a kick, striking one of the wooden logs before transitioning swiftly to a series of blows from my arms and hands while blocking blows from the dummy. Quickly, I moved from one stance to another, unleashing a combo of attacks upon the dummy. It was more methodic than anything.
My form was not exactly perfect, to be honest. Once in a while, I had to dance out of range of the wooden log, other times, I was not so lucky and found myself struck rather painfully by the dummy.
Still, this was a form of endurance and reaction training, and as my chakra coils were still rather underdeveloped, Taijutsu was honestly the only form of fighting that I could count upon at the moment.
Palm strike, I muttered in my head. Block. Knee. Block. Arm Blade. Left Straight. Block. Right Hook, Upper Chop. Dodge. On and on I methodically worked, slowly and slowly increasing my speed.
“Kyoku-chan!”
I nearly looked to the side when I was called, and only barely dodged an incoming log from the dummy by leaping backwards, somersaulting in mid air to land on all fours. Looking up, I glared at Naruto, who grinned sheepishly at me.
“What?” I asked, a little annoyed at the sudden intrusion.
“Well, I was getting bored. And I really don’t want to talk to Sasuke…” He trailed off before looking up brightly, “so I want to train too!”
I considered, then nodded. I could definitely see the benefits for having a live training partner.
“Okay, stand over there then.”
“Huh, not beside the dummy?”
I blinked. “Oh.” I realised, “so you want to practice against the dummy instead of against me?”
“Against you?” Naruto tilted his head, then grinned. “Sure! But let me warn you that I’m not going to go easy against you!” He chuckled and assumed the standard stance of the Konoha Katas.
I winced as I saw him move into the stance. Not to be rude or arrogant or anything, but it was sloppy. I shook my head to clear my thoughts. Now was the time to practice, plenty of time to criticize him later.
I assumed the same stance, though I would like to think that mine form was much better than his.
“Taijutsu only and Academy rules?” I asked.
“Three clean strikes? Bring it!” He grinned.
I nodded, then charged at him. For a moment, I took satisfaction in the surprise evident on his face when I took the initiative. He was clearly not expecting it, and that would cost him.
I lashed out at him with my right. He ducked and tried for an uppercut, but I sidestepped it and transitioned my attack into a quick chop on his head.
One point for me.
“Urgh.” Naruto groaned. “Fine, no more holding back!”
Holding back? Well, that was rude. I deflected a series of punches from him. Not to discredit him or anything, but while Naruto’s sheer strength was definitely among the higher numbers in our class, his technique was really quite terrible. Each of his attacks, as usual, were widely telegraphed and left huge openings afterwards. Of course, they were swift and deadly in their own right, but against an opponent who was somewhat proficient in taijutsu, he would be no match.
It did not take long for me to score another two clean hits upon his chest. Of course, I tried to keep my strength to a minimum so as not to hurt him too much.
“Again!” Naruto growled. I quirked an eyebrow at him. Guess I brought the sore loser out in him.
The next bout went about as well as you would expect.
The bout afterwards though, he actually surprised me.
He’s learning. I realised, as I took stock of his attacks. Each blow, while still widely telegraphed, were much more concentrated and did not leave as much an opening as they used to. He even got a clean shot at my stomach once, driving the wind out from me for a bit and forcing me to disengage from him in order to regroup. Fortunately though, I still proved the better in that round.
“That was better.” I told a dejected looking Naruto as I massaged the spot he struck me. “But you still need to work on your form if you want to get better.”
He looked up at me with a somewhat pitiful gaze, kinda like those I’d seen on the kids back in Equestria use on their parents. I ignored that small pang in my heart as I continued. “Try not to go for wide swings unless you have the speed for it though. Too easy to read.”
“Right.” He mumbled.
“Hn, getting beat, Dead Last?”
We looked up at Sasuke, who had left our waiting spot to join us. Well, I looked. Naruto glared at him like he was the most irritating bug in the universe.
“Get lost, Sasuke!” He growled, “We’re training.”
“More like getting trashed,” Sasuke retorted, before looking at me. His eyes narrowed. “Kyoku? I’d like to request a spar.”
I frowned at the lack of honorifics used for my name, but ignored it. “Sure.” After all, Sasuke was the best in our class, getting near perfect scores in all the courses. If I wanted a challenge, Sasuke was surely one that I could stand a chance at beating.
We assumed our stances, though I could not help but notice that Sasuke’s one was just a touch different from the Konoha Standard. I narrowed my eyes, keeping myself alert. A different form would mean many things, especially different techniques.
“Same rules. Taijutsu only, Academy rules.”
“Agreed.”
As usual, I struck first, launching myself at him. Unlike Naruto, Sasuke kept his cool and dodged my attack with barest of movement before going on the offensive. To my unpleasant surprise, he was just a mite faster than me, but while his blows were slightly weaker than Naruto’s, they were still quite heavy.
To my detriment, I was only able to get one clean hit on him before he floored me with a right hook. At least he held back most of his strength for that one, or I would probably be feeling the swelling for days.
“Good fight.” Sasuke grunted as I stood up.
“Yeah,” I concurred, though inwardly, I was somewhat ashamed at my performance. I had honestly thought that I would fare better.
“Nah, you’re just tired.” Naruto consoled me, “I mean, you fought me a few rounds before he came along!”
“I don’t think that you posed any challenge against her, Dead Last.” I silently agreed, though in hindsight, he could have phrased it less bluntly, or…
“Oh yeah?” Naruto growled. “Fine, me and you! Now!”
Yeah, saw that coming a mile away.
“I’m not going to waste my time.” Sasuke muttered. “Get better and I’ll consider it.”
Okay, I’m calling it, he’s doing this on purpose. While what most of the things which he said were unfortunately true, chances were that a rather nasty fight would break out if this continues.
“Alright, that does it!” Naruto yelled. “Fight me now!”
“Oh, shut up.” Sasuke replied, clearly getting annoyed.
Yeah, I need to diffuse this, and soon. But how? Naruto wants to fight, but Sasuke would not accept unless he gets a proper challenge. Or at least that was the vibe I was getting. So how was I going to make sure that these two did not kill each other before the day even started.
Not that I was against them duking out, but I would prefer it to be after missions.
“Sasuke-kun, how about you let him use his shadow clones?” I suggested.
“Hn?” Sasuke replied, eyes narrowed in contemplation. “Not sure you would notice, but zero times anything is still zero.”
“Why you!”
“Then let him make as many as he wants to.” I folded my arms, “it would be good practice for us, especially for missions where we need to deal with huge numbers.” I jerked a thumb at Naruto, “And Naruto-kun could gain some experience with dealing with better opponents.”
Sasuke considered for abit, before nodding.
“Naruto, shadow clones please.”
“What are the rules?” Sasuke asked.
“For him?” I paused awhile, making some quick thoughts in my head. “Stop us from moving. For us, find the real Naruto.”
“Us?”
What? Did he actually think that I was going to sit this one out?
“I’m training too.” I replied bluntly.
“Right.”
“Can we start?” Asked one of the few dozen clones that Naruto just made. Or it may be the real one, I couldn’t really tell.
“On three?”
“Yeah, yeah, hurry up already!” That Naruto stuck out his tongue, “Slowpokes!”
Oh, impatient, were they? I smirked, a small devious thought coming to mind. I gave Sasuke a look.
“THREE!” I yelled as I leaped at the Naruto that backsassed me. A solid kick to his face caused him to dissipate in a cloud of chakra smoke. The rest looked dumbly at me, but sprang into action once I punched another in the chest, dissipating it.
The melee was messy and long. While I had combat experience before, it was an entirely new experience to be facing down a few dozen or so clones. While they were still rather lacking in technique individually, the sheer volume of attacks that came my way more than made up for the fact.
I lasted a good few minutes (I think) before a clone barrelled into me from behind, knocking me to the ground. A few more immediately grabbed my limbs and held me down. Effectively taking me out for the fight.
Note to self, next time, don’t face them head-on.
They didn’t hold me down for long, and by that, I meant that they disappeared in a puff of chakra smoke, leaving me to haul myself off the ground. Sasuke was about a few meters away, having taken down Naruto himself. To my immense satisfaction, it appeared that he didn’t actually get out of the entire debacle unscathed, sporting dirty clothes and a rather nasty bruise on his arm.
Truth be told, I was surprised that Naruto even managed to clock him a good one. Of course, Naruto himself was worse off, sporting a nasty swelling on his cheek.
“Well, well.” I nearly jumped when I heard Kakashi-sensei speak from behind me. “Care to explain what’s going on, my little genins?”
“So Kakashi-kun.” Hiruzen Sarutobi, Hokage of Konohagakure, an old man dressed in simple robes began, “May I ask why your genins are in such a state?”
I winced a little. We might have overdone our training a little bit. The three of us were in a rather sorry state, truth be told. Well, Naruto more than me and Sasuke, considering that his swelling cheeks had yet to heal yet, despite the healing salves we used. Not to mention how dirty we were.
“Well, they decide to hold a training session early in the morning, it would seem, Hokage-sama.” The ‘while they were waiting for me’ was left unsaid, of course.
“Huh,” the Hokage muttered. “I trust that this would not impede your team’s first mission?”
“Like hell it would!” Naruto proclaimed, before getting smacked on the head by Kakashi-sensei.
“Language.”
“Well, far be it for me to deter hard-working shinobis like yourself.” Hiruzen smiled as he picked up a scroll marked with a bright red ‘D’ on it. “How would a courier mission sound?”
“Sounds good, Hokage-sama, my brats still seem to have energy left to burn.”
“What are we taking?” Naruto asked excitedly, “treasure? Jutsu scrolls?”
I glanced at Sasuke, who merely smirked exasperatedly. I share his sentiment too. There was no way that it’d be anything important, especially considering that this was but a D-ranked mission. Those were infamous for being trivial work.
“Well,” the Hokage smiled as he took a puff from his pipe, “You are to deliver this documents to various locations in Konoha,” He looked at Kakashi, “Kakashi-san, please sign your name on this form and head down to logistics to collect the documents.”
Called it.
“Eeeeehhhh.” Naruto moaned.
“Shush you,” Sensei said as he began walking off.
Thanks to Naruto’s shadow clones, that mission was finished in record time, or it would have, if some of the clones had not gotten themselves lost. As such, we spent the better part of the afternoon finishing up a task that should have been done within a couple of hours.
“Do note that our quota each day is supposed to be two D-ranks.” Kakashi-sensei drawled. “I managed to convince Hokage-sama to let us off easy for today, but try not to make the same mistakes next time, okay?”
“Yes, sensei.” We chorused.
“Right, then I’ll see you all tomorrow at the same time. Be at training ground five tomorrow at six in the morning.”
Liar. I wanted to say as he disappeared with the use of the Body Flicker technique. Not to mention that he seemed rather happy that he only needed to do one mission today.
Still, this meant that I had the rest of the day free.
“Hey, Kyoku-chan, what are you planning to do later?”
I frowned. Normally, I would be spending the rest of the day working on whatever father orders father had given me, but as there were none today…
“Training, I suppose.” I mumbled in reply.
“What kind?” Sasuke asked.
“Probably projectile training.” I replied, looking at him. “Besides, we already did taijutsu this morning, so it would be better to work on my other areas.”
“Which training ground?” He asked.
“Probably five, since Kakashi-sensei had it booked for the year.” No, I was not kidding. He did. I checked. “Need to head home to get my senbons though.”
“Right, I’ll see you there then.” And without another word, Sasuke leaped up onto a nearby roof and left our line of sight.
“Huh?” Did he just… invite himself to my training session?
“Tch!” Naruto glared after him, “Don’t worry Kyoku-chan, we’ll show him that he’s not the best at everything!”
I blinked. Naruto too?
“Yeah…”
Well, the more the merrier, I guess?
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Bravo, I like how this is going. Let's all hope that friendship will prove far stronger than Orochimaru manipulations.
Also that bravo means a lot cause I'm Italian so it is the best bravo you will ever get XD bravo again.
I liked this chapter. While you may say that no proper development happened, there was still development. One, would be the skills Team 7 have. Naruto getting better at Taijutsu, both Kyoku and Sasuke getting more training in handling a larger group of enemies, and all of them getting better with teamwork.......Okay, last one might be a stretch, but this chapter still had a whole bunch of development, intended or not. But, that's just my own take on this chapter. In any case, keep up the good work. Looking forward to seeing more from ya.
OK, proper development, meaning it will be a couple of chapters before the real mission :D, waiting for it. :D
10083578
Well there is a theory that the portal turns the create that crosses through to become the age they act. Hence when sunset crossed she was doing so as a tantrum like a child. It would explain why the ages in the human world are so close. And twilight was rushing to get the job done just like a young adult. I think it is a sound theory that however you are behaving when you cross for the first time it will be the age you become.
More please?
10095785
Her dreams seem to be revealing ol'Orochimaru's true intentions.
10203003
I'm guessing it's in the same small town she appeared into, or somewhere close by like a hidden cave or something.