Starting at the Academy

A week passed and it had been an extremely hectic period for Aoto.

He had spent the first few days training Kiyoshi but while he was doing this, he had been actively requesting the Second Kazekage for permission to let Kiyoshi join the academy.

Initially, Kiyoshi was very reluctant to be around other kids again but was eventually convinced when Aoto told him that both Ryuuya and Haru, once they woke up, would be able to join him at the academy.

This had left Shamon extremely curious about how much a development was able to happen and he had a long chat with Aoto.

Good news struck in the end as Shamon agreed to let Kiyoshi join the academy even though they are a year late.

Hearing such praises from Aoto, Shamon even ended up making a few visits to their and the relationship between him and Kiyo slowly grew as Kiyo's opinion of the Second Kazekage slowly began to change. He seemed like an extremely kind and fair man and likewise, Shamon seemed to take a liking to the child as he had good manners.

The day that the academy was set to begin, Kiyoshi stood in front of the academy, holding Aoto's hand with a reluctant and unhappy expression on his face.

Seeing this, Aoto complained as he explained, "Look, Kiyoshi. We already went over this, you can't be letting other people know that you can use Iron Sand. You are there to learn, not to show off."

"Hmpf!" Kiyoshi let out as he pouted and faced away from Aoto.

Aoto let out a big sigh as he conceded, "Look, I'll take you out for fried rice for dinner tonight."

At this, Kiyoshi's smile once again returned.

Seeing that he was now back to his old self, Aoto smiled as he asked, "Are you ready for this?"

"Yep," he replied with a smile, "I can't wait for dinner."

A dumbfounded expression appeared on Aoto's face as he couldn't help but smack right across Kiyo's head as he berated, "Just go! If you don't learn anything by the time I pick you back up, I'm not going to take you for food."

"Betrayer..." Kiyoshi mumbled as he began to make his way to the entrance of the academy.

The academy was huge. There were three doors to the academy which were located in different parts of the academy. The door on the left side was for students and pick up, the middle entrance was for people who were going to meet the principal, and the right side was for teachers to enter.

Before walking in, Kiyoshi paused to admire the building as his life had completely changed ever since he was taken in by Aoto. It had massively improved.

He never had to worry about starving ever again and was able to see how different the living quarters of the Shinobis were in comparison to the slums. Now seeing this behemoth of a building, excitement filled Kiyo's body as he couldn't wait until Haru and Ryuuya would be discharged from the hospital.

"You guys are going to love this," Kiyoshi mumbled as a smile grew on his face.

Kiyo then walked inside the student's entrance, and as he did so, he was met with a brown table where the young female receptionist with long straight brown hair and green eyes welcomed him, "Well hello there, I haven't seen your face around before. Are you the new student?"

Hearing this, Kiyo nodded respectfully as he walked over to her and asked, "Yes. I'm Kiyoshi. Nice to meet you, miss...?"

"You can call me Miss Hina. How come you're so early for your first day?" the lady replied with a smile.

"Oh, I wanted to get a good seat?" Kiyo tried to form an excuse when in reality, Aoto had something else to do so he could only drop Kiyoshi off early.

"Your class is down the corridor and towards your left. The door that says, 'First year B' will be your classroom," Hina replied with a smile, impressed at how polite the child was.

Kiyoshi thanked her and then began to make his way to his classroom.

Slide!

But at he was about to touch the door handle, the sound of a group of girls rang out from the opposite side of the door it was suddenly opened and three girls ran out. The first two girls had dark blue straight hair and eyes and the girl that had opened the door had dark green hair that turned orange towards the ends of the hair strand. Her pupils were a slightly murky-looking orange but gave off the feeling of purity and clarity.

They came out of the room with such excitement that they failed to notice that Kiyoshi was just outside. The dark green-haired girl seemed to be particularly excited as he was moving the fastest but she had her head turned towards her friends.

Crash!

The orange-eyed girl ended up bumping into him, right on the forehead and they both fell to the ground.

"Ow. Ow. Ow," the girl uttered as slowly sat up and immediately brought her hand to her forehead, painfully rubbing the site of the collision.

He managed to open his eyes despite the pain and he saw that the girl had fallen on top of him too, on the side of her head was a small red mark, acquired from the head clash a few seconds ago, she also wiped the side of her head as she closed her eyes in a very pained expression.

"Are you okay?" Kiyoshi as he stared at the girl, seemingly unfazed as he had taken harder hits to the head before.

Hearing the voice, the girl's attention diverted from her pain. She saw that she had ended up falling onto him and saw sitting on him at the moment.

Their eyes crossed and a flash of realisation struck the girl as an embarrassed blush appeared on her face as she quickly stood up and apologised, "Ah! I'm so sorry about that!"

"It's fine," Kiyoshi spoke as he slowly got up.

"Hey, I haven't seen you here before. Are you a new student?" one of the blue-haired girls asked, a curious glint in her eyes.

"Yes, I'm new here," Kiyoshi replied as he embarrassedly scratched the back of his head.

"Oh. Are you going to be in our class?" the other blue-haired girl asked in a quiet voice.

"I think so," he replied as he raised his head and saw the sign saying 'Classroom B.'

He asked, "Can I go through? I want to see the classroom."

The dark-green-haired girl was still blushing in embarrassment and she quickly move to the side and Kiyo made his way into the classroom.

Behind him, he heard the girls run off and now he was able to observe the classroom.

The room was just like a regular classroom. It had about five rows of seats with each row elevated by some stairs so that the people at the back would be able to see without the person in front of them blocking their view.

At the front of the classroom was a small desk that was totally empty and right next to it was a large blackboard that was almost as tall as the wall.

"Ryuuya and Haru are going to love this place," Kiyoshi silently spoke.

The other side of the room was filled with a huge glass window that had a great view of the playground and training areas of the academy. And he could see slightly more than a dozen children running around chasing each other and among them, he saw the girls that he had just bumped into.

"Looks fun," he mumbled as he looked towards the students.

"Why don't you join them?" a voice suddenly sounded from behind him and Kiyoshi turned around with a surprised expression.

The one who had spoken was a young man in his early twenties. He was wearing a dark blue vest and he had brown eyes and brown hair.

"Haha. I'm sorry there, I didn't mean to scare you," he spoke as he let out a short snigger before introducing himself, "I'm your class teacher, Benjiro."

Kiyoshi immediately bowed as he introduced himself, "Nice to meet you, Benjiro-sensei. I am Kiyoshi Kega, the new student."

"Nice to meet you, Kiyoshi," Benjiro spoke as he smiled at the kid's manners, "Do you not want to go and join them for Tag?"

"I'm fine, sensei. I want to get used to the classroom for now," Hitori politely rejected.

"I see. I'll be going for now then, the class will start in thirty minutes and I haven't eaten breakfast," Benjiro spoke as he turned around and walked out of the class.

Kiyoshi then proceeded to find a seat somewhere in the room where he could both see and hear the teacher during class time, preparing to save the seats for when both Ryuuya and Haru were to join.

He soon found a place that was just right and sat there peacefully as he placed his legs on the table and rested his back on the chair, gazing up at the ceiling as he enjoyed this silent, serene tranquillity.

'I've always enjoyed the moments when my mind is empty and I just stare at the ceiling while I relax my whole body,' thought Kiyoshi as a vague smile appeared on his face.

Kiyoshi stayed in class for the remaining time until class started.

_____________________

Well then, hello!

I deeply request some of yalls help.

If you are able to get this novel to 15 power stones before the end of today, I will upload another chapter today.

Good luck!

Also, please let me know if you would like the story to proceed a little faster or not.