'Torture' Time

Jiraiya's training should be changed to "Jiraiya's Torture"

For the past month, Akari and I have been doing Saitama's workout on overdrive

Every morning we started off with a warmup which was usually ten laps around the whole island

Many times I couldn't finish that and many times was I hit with a thousand years of death

Afterwards, we had a light breakfast - Aka, a few grams of rice and two anchovies

Before you say something like "The human body can't live of something so low in caloric content" - that's exactly what I told the old man and you wanna know what he replied with?

"Shut up kid, we're shinobi"

Ass

Anyways, after breakfast we did push-ups, situps, squats, crunches, jumping Jacks - Till lunch

To give you a reference of time. We woke up at 4 A.M, ran until about 6:30, ate for around 15 minutes. Lunch started at noon sharp

5:15 hours of straight muscle cramps and torturous screams coming from the jungle…

Then we had lunch which was quite a bit more filling. A couple eggs from the overgrown jungle, some bacon from the wild Boars running around and some light soup. We even had some seasonings from the Uzushio gardens

That was the only motivation we got to continue on with the man's torture

After lunch, we began on chakra manipulation and meditation exercises. We also got an exact measurement on our chakra

I had about as much as a Low-Genin, almost Mid-Genin. That's about equal to someone of Kiba's level or maybe Shikamaru. Jiraiya also told me I had an excessive amount of Yin Chakra, Spiritual Chakra. Makes sense because of my reincarnations, however he said it would be dangerous in my future growth so he guy doubled my physical training regimen after that

Again - ass

Akari apparently had about High-Chunin reserves right now, almost Low-Jonin. Basically as much as Kurenai or Anko. She also had a fuck ton of Yang chakra, likely from her Uzumaki heritage. From the amount Jiraiya was saying, I was confused why she wasn't bouncing off the walls with energy like Naruto. Was she bottling it all in?

The Sannin doubled her meditation time to help balance her Yin side, just like me.

Chakra manipulation was interesting. Moving the stuff through my pathways when I first started felt like moving mud through a dirty tunnel - Slow and gritty. After practicing a bit, I felt it thin out a bit. When we got to Uzu, it felt like a Jelly - Kinda sticky but flexible and able to be spread out easily

I had only started on the leaf exercise and a bit on the tree walking exercise (Enough to help me jump through the trees comfortably) so my knowledge on control was rudimentary at best

When the old man started teaching us, it was like a light went off in the back of my head and I understood everything so much better

By the end of the first week, aided by my small reserves, I had all but mastered the leaf sticking exercise to an 'E' and had a comfortable foundation on tree climbing

I'm nowhere near being on par with someone like Tsunade in CC, but I'm definitely going at a comfortable pace

Akari, on the other hand, was having a hard time. The wild nature of her chakra and the massive amounts of the stuff made control hard for her. After the first week, she could barely stick two leafs to her palms. In fact, the little I taught her in tree climbing was easier than the leaf exercise

I suggested working front to back in control to Jiraiya - Doing something like Water walking and then tree climbing and lastly tell leaf sticking, however he told me to wait a while longer and that he had a plan laid out

We left it at that for the remaining future

Jiraiya's lessons on how chakra worked were fascinating. Hand Seals apparently were something akin to a wand focus or a primer in a firearm. It's the catalyst that makes chakra change its property into Wind, Fire, or something like Scorch

Theoretically, if you mastered an element to the highest it can go and had enough chakra control, you could create your own sub-element. People with bloodlines have that ability to create a Sub-element because their genetic code regulates the output of elemental chakra as needed, but you could do what that code does yourself with pure hard work and focus

He didn't bother giving us Chakra paper yet, however. Said we weren't ready to train in elemental affinities yet. I understood - You don't want kids running around, throwing Fireballs and Thunderbolts left and right before collapsing because of chakra exhaustion. Akari, surprisingly, looked a bit miffed that we couldn't learn yet

After the first week, he tested us on our Kanji and handwriting. Akari passed easily, having been drawing and writing most of her life. Apparently, I still needed some practice with my Calligraphy, so Sealing was postponed another week so that the Sannin could teach me how to write

Bonus - We got an extra week of training because of that! Insert morally confused hooray here

The week passed like a blur. During that time, Jiraiya left the island more and more, probably having found something in Kiri worth looking into. I was debating whether or not to give him a hint about Obito but if I did, he'd think I was crazy or try bringing me to Konoha, both of which I don't want

The start of the third week was the start of our sealing lessons and oh boy were they detailed

He listed of so many dangers that could happen if you did a seal wrong, I don't even know where to begin. You could blast your arms and legs off, you could teleport yourself into space, seal yourself into an alternate dimension and slowly disintegrate into cosmic dust, etc etc

I knew sealing was dangerous but this was on another level…

The actual art, however, was insanely fun. Kinda tedious, but fun. A single missing stroke could change the thing from a simple exploding tag to a portal that summons actual demons. A missing square or parallelogram could mean the difference between a storage scroll or the Hiraishin. OK no, that's a bit of a stretch but you get my drift

After those warnings, he started us on the basics - Low-powered exploding tags, storage scrolls that have a Mac space of a plastic bag, restraining tags that can at best hold a squirrel back, you know

Kiddie Toys

However, it was still insanely hard to learn. Jiraiya basically dropped a bunch of books at my feet and said "Have Fun" Before proofing away, so we had no guidance whatsoever, not that Akari needed it the cheater

Memorization was key in the beginning stages. There so many symbols and shapes I had to get locked into my head securely. Shapes with sharp edges such as squares and triangles were particularly good for barrier seals and the like. Circles and spirals were good for storage and things like Bijuu entrapment. Irregular shapes made up most of the explosive seals. Spirals were also particularly good with space-time jutsu - Hence the Hiraishin

I could barely complete an exploding tag without blowing myself up by the time Jiraiya came back, earning me a day of running laps around the island

Akari breezed through everything the Sannin gave her and showed no signs of slowing down anytime soon. Her capacity also allowed her use of an elemental clone technique - the water clone which helped her safely test out new seals

In the eyes of Jiraiya, Akari was already at apprentice level. Not quite ready to start her career but far enough along to learn the more advanced stuff

Eventually, it came to the point where when trying out my new seals, it was just frustrating. The fourth and second to last week had me debating whether or not I should quit before the old man came up from behind me and scared the fuck out of me

"Damnit Jiraiya, how many times?"

He sent a mischievous grin my way

"14. What are you doing out here in the forest? I don't remember saying you could take any breaks?"

I grumbled and propped my head up with my hands

"Starting to think this sealing thing is overrated…"

The perv laughed and patted me on the back

"I know how you feel kid. Believe it or not, this old man was once a little kid like you, training under the third Hokage. When he gave my team our first sealing lessons, I felt like my head was going to explode. It was only after Sarutobi-Sensei pointed one thing out, was it when I became any good at it"

I glanced over to his smug face, reluctantly waving my hand for him to go on

"It's not about the rules or dangers, sealing is about the art. Any good seal master shouldn't be following the guidelines. They should be practicing their love to create"

The moment he finished his monologue, the guy poofed into smoke

It was a shadow clone..

"That was… weirdly helpful? Thank you?"

And it kinda was. After that, I stopped going by the rules of the book and went by what I knew. After a few days, I could create Low-powered explosive tags in my sleep and my storage scrolls could hold about a drawers worth of things.

By the end of the final week, we could both comfortably say that we were at least apprentices in the art. My strength has skyrocketed. Before, lifting anything over 100 pounds would have taken almost all of my energy. Right now, 100 pounds is like lifting 2. I can punch a hole straight through a tree and my sprinting speed is about 45Mph. For reference - That's about as strong as a Mid to High-Genin specializing in Taijutsu

Basically Rock Lee in the Chunin exams but toned down a few notches

Right now, we were on a small canoe, getting ready to sail back to Wave

"The scrolls Jiraiya gave us?"

"Check!"

"Clothing?"

"Chyeck!"

"Food?"

"Checkity Check!"

"Check if we have the money Jiraiya left us!"

"Check Sir!"

I sighed at Akari's new behavior. If I knew it was going to be this way, she would have been left with the old man

"Let's set sail for wave then!"

"Cheeeck~~"

Damnit...