8 Painful Methods
Though he wanted to immediately begin learning as much as he could from the restricted sections of the library, Hatada had to suck it up and wait. Thankfully, there are still things he can do in the meantime.
For example: moving into his new apartment.
Hatada returned to his orphanage and immediately began packing up. He didn't really have much attachment to the place, and would much rather begin his real training now than continue to restrict and hide away while trying to do so.
"Hatada, where are you going?" 'Iwamida asked.
"Moving into my apartment, what else would I be doing with all my stuff?" Hatada responded
Iwamida's shoulders relaxed after hearing the response. "Was that what you were called to lord Hokage's office for? Thank goodness…"
"*Mhmm*, see ya."
Hatada cut the conversation short and left the building in a hurry. Iwamida had a habit of getting emotional/worrisome, and he had seen how he reacted when others left the orphanage in the years leading up to now. Hatada didn't want a grown-ass man's snot all over 1/4th of his clothes.
'Speaking (thinking) of that, I should probably get more clothes soon… oh well. I can't earn much money now, so I'll have to wait until I start getting an allowance.'
.
.
.
'When he said it would make my walk to the academy "a little bit longer", I didn't expect it to be a 2 hour walk away!'
[A/N: Konoha's size is tricky/inconsistent at best, so I'm gonna say it's as large as I've seen from a single google search: 150 km in diameter, meaning it's roughly 17,000-18,000 km squared.]
'I guess I'll just use the distance to get a 10k in everyday before school. Maybe I'll get some weights eventually to make it harder…'
Most kids would dread the walk to school every morning if they lived roughly 10 km from school, but Hatada saw it as an easily accessible training opportunity. Also, he could comfortably do 10 km with just a help from Mana Enhancement if he was ever running late, so there was no real risk involved.
Besides, he was already waking up at the crack of dawn every day to work out before the other kids did. Now that he basically had an entire training field to himself, he could really begin to take full advantage of this habit.
'Let's get in my house before I get too excited.'
Instead of an apartment building, it seemed that Hatada would be living in a situation more closely resembling a townhouse. It makes sense, since there was no way enough people would want to live this far away from everything to make such a place (an apartment building) worth the costs.
'All the better for me.'
Finding the building that matched the tag on his key, he unlocked the door, and walked in. The interior was as barren and simple as the outside, and just as dusty as he imagined it.
Each countertop and cabinet was layered in a thin film of dust. 'Would it have killed the landlord to take better care of the place?'
"*Sigh*"
He put down his humble belongings in the small bedroom and began cleaning.
In a few hours of diligent and efficient work, he got most, if not all of the dust off the surfaces, not that there were many in the first place.
There was a full kitchen with a small table, a living room without any furniture, a barebones balcony, and a mudroom. Near the back of the apartment was a single, small bedroom with a bathroom attached. Overall, it was just enough for one person to live in; which was exactly what Hatada needed.
'Finally.'
Satisfied, he finally felt ready to begin his training for the day.
'To start, I'm going to exhaust myself. I reckon that I'll need to grab some weights in a few months at the latest… maybe I can ask to borrow some from Hiruzen…
'Oh well, I'll figure it out when I need to.'
Hatada put on his shorts and a t-shirt and walked towards training ground 75 after locking up his apartment (not that there was anything of value in there to protect).
.
.
.
Just as Hiruzen said, the training ground was quite close. Not only did it contain a wide-open field, it also had tons of forest he could train in. Additionally, Hatada could hear a small stream somewhere nearby, which would be convenient to take a dip in after he finished his workouts.
Hatada removed his shirt and stretched for ten minutes. He was going to run harder than he had ever done in this body, and he didn't want to waste mana healing any injuries that would come from a lack of warmup.
Ten minutes of continuous sprinting, and he couldn't feel the lower half of his body anymore.
"*Pant~, Pant~, Pant~*"
'Light Magic: Heal, Light Magic: Basic Stamina Recovery'
A wave of euphoric energy flushed throughout Hatada's whole body. He went from never wanting to move another inch for the rest of his life to being overwhelmed with 3-am motivation… at 1:00 pm.
"Okay! Time to do that again!"
After he completed the same routine of running until his legs were about to fall off, then healing/recovering, another 10 times, he finally switched up.
"Hap~"
He fell down to the ground and began to do every variation of a pushup in existence: Regular, archer, handstand, etc. This time, his arms were the one's begging him to stop, and he soon did.
"Gah! I miss my old muscles…"
Although he truly did miss his old body, he was excited to see what he would accomplish, and how fast he could do so with the knowledge he had.
'Soon, I'll commission a squat rack and a bench…'
Sadly, his plans for weight training required skilled work, of which he was unable to afford (and would continue to throughout his time in the academy), so he was forced to put them on his growing to-do list.
In addition to needing weights, he needed clothes, books, stationery, and ninja equipment.
In his past life, he didn't have enough time to learn other forms of weaponry apart from the sword, so he was planning on practicing his ass off with whatever the academy introduced him to until he was satisfied. He had probably the highest personal standard of "proficiency" out of any person he knew, so that was saying something.
'That said…'
He needed a sword, and he wasn't sure anyone knew how to make the one he wanted: A claymore. Not only did he not see a sword like it in any book of weapons he could find, he couldn't even find a sword with a proper crossguard on them!
Describing exactly what he wanted would pose a few problems, even more so than his squat rack, barbell, and bench. For one, he would have to explain how he came up with the design, the easiest of the issues to solve. 'Hold on… who said I have to get someone to make it for me! What if…'
He thought for a moment.
'Yes, that should work…'
He had an idea of how to completely solve this problem already, but the issue was: 'I haven't even entered the academy, and my list is already this long! The only way I'd be able to accomplish all of what I want to do before I'm 20 is if there were… well… 20 more of me!'
Funnily enough, he will "soon" be able to solve this new predicament.
Next was the fact that he already had a sword style mastered to the nth degree. Although it would be annoying, he would simply pretend he made it up (although something like that is far less believable). Without any real evidence that he was trained or received the ideas from another person, everyone would just have to believe him.
"*Sigh*"
He sat down in exhaustion. Despite the fact that he felt none of the soreness he should after such a suicidal workout, he was completely drained, particularly in the mana and mental department. The only visible evidence of his work was the sheer amount of sweat over his shirtless body.
Thus was the end of his physical workout. Technically, he could have simply waited until Mana Meditation recovered all his mana, but he had other things on his agenda.
So he began a multiple hour long Mana Meditation session. Eventually, he was topped up.
'Now, how should I go about this?'
He had three things to work on. First was this body's acclimation with light magic, which was mostly taken care of with how much he healed his muscles and replenished his stamina. Next was his Mana Sense. 'Hmm… I think I can combine these two exercises.'
His mind was already able to split its concentration to a, quite frankly, ridiculous degree. With this skill, he would attempt an exercise only he would be able to accomplish.
First, he would do the mana tracking method (to an even more extreme degree now that he had so much space without much risk of being spied on). In addition to this, he would begin on the exercises Hiruzen told him about.
Before he left the Hokage's office, he took him up on the offer of "giving a few pointers". 'He said that I should be able to… stick a leaf to my head for at least 2 hours before I even begin to train my nature release…
'How the fuck can you stick a leaf on your body with just mana?'
Walking on water and up walls, while possible using some magical tools or specialized spells, was not common in his old world. In fact, it was entirely alien to him! Finally, Hatada had found something he had no clue how to do.
'Apparently, I should just have to use the "perfect amount of chakra" to do so…'
He took a leaf off the ground, and sat down in the middle of the field in a meditative position. 'Only way to go about this is to start.'
This time, hundreds of small balls of light erupted from Hatada's position.
'Mana Sense: Porcupine'
After allowing his mind to get used to doing that part of the exercise, he began the leaf concentration practice.
"*Haap!*"
"*Pop*"
"...
"shit…"
[A/N: Announcement:
Hey All, Ödiuss here (Oe --> Ö, aka umlauts), wanted to thank y'all for the support despite the low amount of chapters. I'd like to make clear how I intend to post for the foreseeable future:
I think 3-5 chaps a week is a doable pace. I'd like to build up a large number of chapters ahead in order to 1) have time to change my mind, 2) have chapters put away for rainy days, and 3) have the opportunity to do mass releases in the future.
Remember to join the Discord if you'd like more direct communication/want to ask questions/want spoilers/want to see pics of my idea of what the characters do/will look like.
P.S. I have lots of spells he will use in the future written down, so if you'd like to know what they are/will be, the Discord's a great place.
