4 Curse of Ice (Part 1)

Having been dragged to the Might duo's favorite barbeque restaurant, Hayase felt like a bit of a third wheel, but the duo's friendliness didn't let that feeling last long.

"Eat up, Hayase-kun! You'll need it for our training later," Duy stated while devouring his BBQ pork.

As Hayase did his best to keep up with their eating, he replied, "I'll try! But what kind of training exactly will we be doing? I'm not sure I'll be able to keep up with you both."

"Yeah, Tousan! what did you have in mind?"Guy chimed in.

"I've planned a race for today! 100 weighted laps around Konoha! And since Hayase will be joining us, Guy, we'll be carrying EXTRA weights today as we run!"

Gulping, Hayase tried to calculate how far that was going to be but stopped himself as that would only make it more overwhelming.

"Yosh!" replied Guy, "Tousan rarely lets me increase the weight very quickly. This will be great!"

'These training maniacs,' thought Hayase, 'I might need to speed up figuring out how to use water bending to heal if I want to keep up with these two.'

Pulled from his thoughts, Hayase saw that only he still had food left, and his companions were starting to leave! Stuffing what food he could in his mouth, Hayase followed after Guy and Duy.

Once they had arrived at the Might residence, Duy quickly pulled out various wearable weights. After he and Guy had all of their weights equipped, Duy says, "Now Hayase, Guy told me that you carry water around with you for your jutsu so I was thinking that you could just tie our water jug to your back. We normally leave it on our route for hydration."

As Hayase lifted the gourd, he estimated it must weigh at least 30 pounds. With a sigh, he thought, 'You get what you wish for, I guess', and Duy begins tightly tying the jug to Hayase's back.

Again, wasting no time, the race begins. As Hayase builds up into a jog, he can see that Guy and Duy are already off in the distance. With the weight of the jug impeding his every step, Hayase thinks to himself, 'I really need to learn how to pull water from the air. I don't want to lug around a jug of water everywhere that I go.'

Having given up on competing with the father and son in the race, Hayase ran at his own pace and began trying to pull what water he could from the air. At first, he wasn't able to sense water in the air much at all. However, by focusing on the feeling he gets when his chakra resonates with water, Hayase tries to resonate with water particles in the air. 'Ugh, doing this when I can see the water is so difficult,' thought Hayase.

As he came close to finishing his first lap, he heard Guy and Duy approaching him from behind.

"Hayase! Some water, please!" they said as closed in.

Uncorking the jug, Hayase used his bending to create blobs of a mouthful worth of water in the air. As the green jumpsuited pair ran past, they each captured one of the blobs in the mouth before swallowing and barely slowing down their run.

"Kami, I've become their waterboy, haven't I?" Hayase joked to himself. 'Although that does give me an idea, maybe I'm going about this the wrong way! Maybe I should practice making water into mist first, and then learn to use air moisture.' thought Hayase.

Summoning more of the jug water as he ran, Hayase struggled to maintain control of it. Whenever he would start to lose control, he would have to come to stop to regain his stability. 'Hah, this might take some practice,' he thought.

***Hours Later***

Exhausted by the running, Hayase sat on the ground, panting. 'Fuck.. I lost count of how many times they've lapped me.' thought Hayase. The only benefit of his lagging speed compared to Guy and Duy is that every time they passed him, his load got slightly lighter. Unfortunately, that also meant he was running out of water with which to practice.

After struggling for hours to turn the water into mist while running, Hayase could feel that his control had improved. The first few laps were slow as he lost control and had to recover the water, but he managed to keep the water steady. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to find the right way of resonating with the water to evaporate it.

'Why is this so difficult,' thought Hayase, ' I was able to accidentally lower the temperature of the water so easily even if I couldn't make it freeze.'

"Ugh, I'm such an idiot..." muttered Hayase. Shifting from his sprawled position to cross-legged poise, Hayase pulled the remaining water from the jug. Only about a cup of water remained, floating in the air in front of him.

Drawing on his resonance with the water, Hayase began by slowly cooling the water. A chill pervaded his body... 60 degrees... 50 degrees... 45... A shiver goes down his spine as he is reminded of the frigid river water that claimed him in his last life. 'I can't go much colder... It's triggering too many memories, I can feel the panic settling in!'

Holding on to the feeling of commanding the water to cool, Hayase thought, 'Now, I just need to do the opposite... Warmth... Heat...' Trying to remember the hottest most humid place that he could think of, Hayase is reminded of the hot springs sauna. The orphanage had taken them there before he entered the academy. The closest thing to a field trip that he had experienced in this world.

The Konoha Hot Springs... he remembered being so excited! The water felt so comfortable. Warm and pleasant, but the sauna... they had been warned not to stay in there long, but he and some of the other boys had made bets about who could stay in the longest. As the one who had lasted the longest, Hayase remembered the oppressive humidity well.

He could feel the water warming back up. Quickly, it reached the ambient temperature around him. At that point, Hayase felt like he could 'ask' the water so to speak to 'spread out.' The cups worth of water began to expand outwards. Gaps appeared in the blob almost like a bubble bursting.

And there it went, a small mist began to form at the edges of the water. He had done it! A partial success, Hayase felt his chakra still resonating with the mist. However, if the prior resonance had been a lower frequency, then the resonance with the mist (or steam?) is a higher frequency. 'Maintaining this resonance is a little more burdensome than my default resonance,' he thought, keenly aware of his dwindling chakra reserves. (AN: Unlike with reducing the temperature, Hayase is actually clear-headed here as he observes his bending of mist. Hence his new observation.)

Physically exhausted and having spent most of his chakra resonating with the water while running, Hayase held onto the feeling of the mist for as long as he could before letting the water fall.

"Hah, that's enough progress for me today... I've got nothing left" said the exhausted boy.

"Young Hayase! Are you finished for the day?"

Looking up, Hayase saw Might Duy looking back at him. He had a sweaty and sleeping Guy on his back.

"Ah, yes, unfortunately. I don't think I'll be able to walk home if I keep going," replied Hayase.

Nodding, Duy looked tired as well, but he carried Guy and his weights like they were nothing. "Well, I'm glad you joined us! Guy, has mostly just had me to train with so I think he appreciated it. Besides! Thanks to your help with the water, we were able to shave time off our runs and set new personal records, " Duy happily declared with a shining smile.

"-er glad that I didn't get in the way," Hayase somewhat nervously said, "Why did you let me join your training? I know most shinobi like to keep their training methods somewhat secret. Is it really alright?"

Although Hayase didn't know what to expect in Duy's reply, he was surprised to see Duy's features soften as he looked at Guy over his shoulder and said in a hushed voice, "Guy has rarely tried to introduce friends to me... Hayase, you may not know this, but my youthful attitude has earned me a title within the village: the Eternal Genin. For Guy to have introduced us meant that he trusted that you wouldn't look down on our hard work. That's enough of a reason for me."

Continuing in a hushed voice, he said, "Feel free to come by again tomorrow after finishing at the academy! I'll be sent out on missions in a few weeks, so you and Guy will need to train without me."

With his muscle soreness building up, Hayase returned home and collapsed on the bed...

***Next Day: Academy***

As the remaining students trickled in, the students of 2B waited for their sensei to arrive. The previous day's exam had lit a fire under many of them since they were able to see how far ahead their peers were.

Another reason that they were excited was that starting in the second year, students would be allowed to pick two intro-level electives so long as their grades were high enough. Introduction to genjutsu, tracking, survival, first-aid/intro to medical ninjutsu, advanced taijutsu. For children of civilian backgrounds, this was their first opportunity to explore these topics and maybe even learn a low-rank jutsu in the process.

Finally, Abe-sensei arrived! At a leisurely pace, he explained the options available to them and their normal schedule for the year: (1) Exercise and conditioning, (2) History and Culture, (3) Chakra Theory / Ninja Basics, (3) Practical (taijutsu, shuriken jutsu, etc), and then their two electives after lunch.

Per tradition, most girls in the class were required to take kunoichi lessons as one of their electives.

"Alright, I've placed the sign up on the wall. Try not to waste any time, and Hayase come to talk to me before signing up" Abe said.

"What did you want to talk about, sensei?" asked Hayase.

"I've spoken with the dean, and he's decided to allow you to use one of your electives for sessions with me. We'll use that time to understand your new ability better and learn to better use it," Abe-sensei stated matter-of-factly, "what do you didn't expect me to spend time outside of school to help you? did you?"

"-er that kind was what I imagined" Hayase found himself saying as he thought, 'well there goes my plan to take advanced taijutsu and medical electives..'

"In those sessions, will you be able to help me with my taijutsu?" Hayase inquired, trying to decide his remaining elective.

"In so far as your taijutsu is linked to that ability, yes... I've been instructed to provide what assistance I can, " replied Abe-sensei, "in exchange however, you're expected to not withhold information on your ability. Understand? this is not optional."

Nodding at his sensei's words, Hayase went to sign up for the medical elective. 'Learning first aid could be the difference between life and death,' he thought, 'plus water bending also has the potential to heal, medical ninjutsu might just help me figure out that bending sub-branch.'

Similar to Hayase's initial attempts at creating mist, he had played around trying to use water to heal training injuries but had no luck. It was like trying to make a sound that he's never heard or maybe more accurately speak a language that he didn't know.

Once all of his classmates had signed up, their first history lesson of the year began. Although Hayase knew that some parts of history could be useful (especially strategic knowledge about Konoha's enemies), Hayase opted to prioritize his bending as much as he could. Controlling a small thumb-sized bit of water under his desk with one hand, Hayase spun it clockwise over his hand as he practices the phase shift to mist and back. So far, he had only been successful in pulling small amounts of water from the air, but he had a gut feeling that mist bending would help him. 'This is about all the mist that I can manage while still somewhat paying attention in class' thought Hayase while half listening to Abe sensei discuss Iwa-Konoha relations.

"These tensions spiraled since the last war and, as you know, we are once again at war with Iwa. Can any of you tell me what techniques Iwa nin are known for?," asked Abe-sensei, "yes Hana-san, go ahead"

"Sensei, Iwa is known best for earth release jutsu, but the Tsuchikage is known for his particle release," chirped Hana.

"Hai, Hai, correct Hana-san." replied Abe before continuing his lecture.

Like that, both the history and chakra theory classes passed quickly. Hayase suspected that Abe knew of his covert training as he didn't call on him throughout either class.

***Practical Period - Shuriken Jutsu Training***

Today's practical session focused on throwing skills, but Abe told them all to be prepared for sparring each day in the future. As Hayase practiced throwing, he still feel the soreness in his legs from the previous day's conditioning. Throwing shuriken and kunai had been one of his weakest areas for the longest time. His last-minute practice over the break had only helped so much so he tried to squeeze as many throws in as he could during class.

Pausing after running out of shuriken, Hayase observed his classmates. Kojima, fairly skilled with throwing, causally tossed out the shuriken as his friends cheered him on. The shinobi world truly revolves around strength. Even from a young age, talented students were praised by their peers and envied. Big fish in small ponds, the academy lets students grow safely... until...

'How many of my classmates will make it through the war?' Hayase found himself thinking, 'It feels so far away now, but... none of their names are familiar from the series. If they're lucky, maybe they just live unremarkable lives long into the future.' Unlike it may often seem in the anime, the village is rather large so maybe many lower-level shinobi just go unnoticed in the protagonist-centered narrative.

Looking at the more talented members of his class though, his gut told him that they likely died in the original timeline. With that thought, he felt a sinking feeling and wondered, 'Isn't there anything that I can do? Maybe I can change things for the better if I'm strong enough, maybe they will want to be stronger too... '

With another goal added to his unending to-do list, Hayase retrieved his shuriken and prepared to begin throwing again.

"Hayase," interrupted Abe-sensei, "after this session ends, we'll remain out here for our meetings. Understood?"

"Yes sensei," replied Hayase nodding.

As Abe-sensei left to tutor some of Hayase's classmates, Hana approached him. "Hey Hayase-kun! Everyone has been talking about your spars with Guy and Kojima yesterday. Did nurse Nagi-san's treatment help much?" she asked.

"Oh uh, I'm still pretty sore from yesterday. I went out with Guy and his dad so I didn't get much rest," he replied laughing. "But don't let Nagi-san know, she made it pretty clear that she would be mad if I didn't rest properly!" He followed up quickly with a shiver.

"No promises," she teases, "if she asks, I'll have to tell her you were out partying."

'Oh she thinks I meant celebrating, that would make more sense than training... if it wasn't the Might duo,' thought Hayase before saying "Well I hope she doesn't ask I guess... how's your back doing? are you able to throw shuriken without bothering it?"

"It's still pretty bad, I have to go by the nurse's office again at the end of the day." she replied with a sigh before saying, "I should let you get back to practicing though."

Parting ways with a nod, Hayase turned back to his target with renewed motivation for the remainder of the session.

***Personal Session with Abe-sensei***

"Alright kid, to make the most out of this time, I'll need you to explain whatever you know about this ability of yours." said Abe.

Pausing, Hayase thought, 'do I tell him everything? the mist? the cooling? the resonance? how my chakra feels?'

Sensing Hayase's conflict, Abe spoke up, "Kid, I can't help you figure out how to make the most of it if I don't understand it. I'm on your side here, I want you to survive the war... I want you to be prepared."

"I'm sorry sensei... It's hard to explain, it feels really really personal, ya know. It's almost like having to describe my innermost thoughts to someone that I barely know," Hayase found himself saying.

"Alright! Let's start somewhere more basic then: name, likes, dislikes, and dreams. It's common practice across teams that you will see in the future to get to know each other quickly. My full name is Abe Tano. I like shogi and barbeque. I dislike slackers, whining, and recklessness. And my dreams... my dreams died not too long ago kid so my dream is to find a new dream I guess. Your turn!" Abe declared!

Looking at his sensei differently than before, Hayase noticed a pain in his eyes that he hadn't seen before. A pain with which he could emphasize. "My name is Hayase. I like... training with water and growing stronger. I dislike... feeling weak and helpless. My dream, for now, is to become strong enough to survive the war."

"Surviving isn't a dream, kid. What's your real dream?" Abe pressed.

"I haven't thought much beyond that yet... If I had to say, I think it would be mastering this ability of mine and using it to become a high-ranking shinobi," replied Hayase.

"Alright, that's better, a little closer to the kind of dream that kid your age should have. Hell, at least a quarter of shinobi kids dream of being Hokage at one point or another," laughed Abe, "feel a little better about explaining your water jutsu now?"

"Yes sensei... um, I guess if I had to explain it... then I would say it feels like my chakra connects with the water around me and resonates with it. By expending some chakra to maintain the connection, I can control it. Like you saw yesterday, certain taijutsu movements make it easier for me to control it. That's what I've figured out so far, but..."

"Interesting, so you're not performing a nature change for this jutsu? it just happens?" Abe asked

"I don't think so, so far I have just resonated with the water around me. I could probably use water from a normal water jutsu too I guess," replied Hayase.

"Hmm... we'll have to test that out in the future. How much chakra does it use up?"

"I mean it depends on what I'm doing... If I'm just doing a water whip, then I can do it a couple of dozen times without running out of chakra. But if I try to make steam or mist.."

"Steam?! " interrupts Abe-sensei.

"-er well, I can kinda control the temperature of the water that I connect with," replied Hayase meekly.

"Ugh, any other skill like this that I should know about?" Abe gruffly said while shaking his head.

"Umm, I'm trying to learn to control the mist because I think it might help me learn to pull more water out of the air like lord second. Does that count?" Hayase said tensing as he waited for his sensei to reply, but all he heard was a sigh.

"Kami, you're gonna be a handful, aren't you?" Abe, "I'm gonna need you to demonstrate all of these abilities that you've mentioned in our meeting today. Starting tomorrow, I'll come up with a training plan for you during these sessions and I'll evaluate you on a weekly basis. It seems like other than water control and combat technique practice, I also need to add temperature control and mist control to the list. You'll need to work hard outside of school if you want to make progress in all of these areas. I hope you weren't lying about liking training with water."

Over the next hour or so, Hayase demonstrated all of the moves that he had developed in front of Abe. The combat techniques: water whip, water wristguards, water gloves, and water punch. As well as training techniques like the push and pull exercise and the mist exercise that he did in class where he pulled small amounts of water from the air.

"What about lowering the temperature? You described the feeling of making mist as changing the frequency of the resonance. Does it work in the other direction?" asked Abe-sensei after seeing the mist exercise.

"It does. That's actually how I discovered that I could affect the temperature. Making the water colder came more naturally to me, but... whenever I start lowering the temperature much, I can feel the cold through my chakra," said Hayase with a shiver as he thought of the cold, "it's not a physical cold... but it triggers some bad memories for me so I haven't experimented with it as much."

"I'm sorry to hear that Hayase-kun. And I'm sorry to ask, but would you be able to demonstrate that side of your ability? I promise to make a fire to warm you up after," Abe requested, understanding that it was a difficult ask for Hayase.

Thinking about his desire to survive the war, Hayase resolved himself, "I can try, I can't promise much though," he said.

Bending water from the bucket that they had nearby, Hayase levitated it in the air in front of him and Abe for the sensei to be able to sense to change in temperature. Taking a deep breath, Hayase willed the water to cool. The resonance between his chakra and the water slowly shifted to a lower frequency as the temperature dropped. Like ice was slowly dripping into his veins, Hayase was reminded of his icy death. Fighting that feeling while maintaining his breathing as best he could, he thought to himself, 'I have to prove myself here! If I can make ice, then the village might just invest even more in me. I've at least got to try.'

**Abe POV**

From the outside, Abe watched as Hayase's breathing became ragged. He could feel the air cooling as the water swiftly dropped in temperature. 'This is different from the mist that he showed,' he thought, 'this is stronger.'

Moving a hand closer to the water in the air, Abe tried to get a more accurate read on the temperature. Suddenly, Hayase began shivering sharply and rubbing his arms. And then... it happened. For Abe, it was almost like time stopped when the water suddenly froze solid and fell to the ground.

Breaking from his shock, Abe quickly started a small campfire to warm up Hayase. Upon touching him though, Abe realized, 'He's not cold at all... I don't know if it's better or worse, but it looks psychological.'

Bringing Hayase near the fire, he seemed to visibly to better rather quickly. Relieved at his quick improvement, Abe thought, 'I doubt that I could get a Yamanaka to do a psych eval, they have their hands full with the war trauma and interrogations. An academy student would never be high on their priorities.'

"But, ice huh.. there's more to your kekkei genkai than meets the eye isn't there, kid?" said Abe under his breath, "I've got a long year ahead of me."

'Beats the war though...' he thought looking at the now mostly recovered Hayase by the fire.

***Hayase POV***

Hearing the crackle of fire and heat on his face, Hayase was reminded of his previous life's camping trips. 'Chilling water always brings my old memories to the surface' thought Hayase as he sat up. Looking around he saw Abe scribbling in a notebook and then he notices what remained of his earlier episode. A small block of ice still remained, having not yet fully melted in the heat.

'I did it!' thought Hayase, 'I really did it! I can make use of my bending to create ice!'

"Glad to see you finally woke up, it's almost time for your final session of the day. You better run if you want to make it in time!" Abe joked as the bell marking the end of the session rang.

Seeing a glint in Abe's eye, Hayase turned and sprinted off for his first aid class. Bounding through the halls, Hayase passed by other students. He could see some coming from advanced taijutsu practice, dirt still on their clothes and scratches fresh. Among some of the older students, he saw a few with glazed looks in their eyes before realizing that it was a genjutsu elective that had just finished. 'The most essential genjutsu skill is recognizing that you're in a genjutsu and breaking out of it so that class has got to be a nightmare,' thought Hayase, 'Now where is the medical ninjutsu classroom?'

"Obito, we're going to be late hurry up! I don't know why you signed up for the medical elective with me, but you're not gonna make me tardy," said Rin from around the corner.

"But I swear, I saw a ryo on the ground! that's free money!" whined Obito back as he was dragged.

"Mah, get me some dango after class if you really found some money! Hurry up!" said Rin.

Watching the scene, Hayase realized that this elective might be more chaotic than he thought if class 2A students were there as well. 'Heh, I bet Obito is enjoying being dragged around by Rin... foolish Rin, this will only make him go even slower in the future.' thought Hayase jokingly.

Following their lead, Hayase found his way to the classroom where he saw an older woman standing in front of the class. Most of the students seemed to have arrived already. It was a mix across the classes. 'I guess first aid and medical techniques aren't a popular choice,' thought Hayase upon seeing the relatively small class of only about 10 students.

From class 2B, he saw Hana Aoki and a couple of her friends as well as Reiji and Itsuki. Ever since Reiji and Hana's spar from the previous day where he injured her back, the tensions between their groups of friends were palpable. Hana's friends thought that he had used too much force on a sensitive part of the body. In response, Reiji argued that he was used to sparring with people who could take stronger hits like Kojima so he hadn't meant to injure her, which earned him a backlash from the group.

Looking at the divided members of his classmates sitting in the back row, the only remaining spot was between the groups. 'Ugh, there's no way. I'm sitting there. That's no man's land.' though Hayase. Looking at the rest of the class, he saw Rin, Obito, Kurenai, and a few others from 2A that he couldn't recognize. An open spot near the window was near the 2A students so he moved to sit there.

"Is it alright if I sit here?" he asked his would-be neighbors.

"Sure, we don't mind,' replied Rin, "you're the one who fought our new class-mate guy yesterday, right?"

"Yeah, haha. He sure kicked my ass," Hayase laughed awkwardly, "how's he doing with your class?"

Chiming in, Obito muttered, "He's definitely motivated and loud"

"Obito, don't be rude!" Rin said, "He's just upset because he had to spar against Guy today."

Putting his head on the table in embarrassment, Obito's ear could be seen turning red.

'Oh, he must have thought that he could beat a new student, oof that must have been a surprise.' thought Hayase.

Interrupting their pleasantries, the older women declared, "I know that many students who decide to take this class dream of learning medical ninjutsu, but I need to inform you that most of you won't succeed. The sheer amount of medical knowledge and chakra control needed means that less than a third of you will likely reach that stage. However, first-aid and medical knowledge is still essential even for those who do not become a medical ninja."

Pausing, she took to the time to look at each and everyone one of us. "You may call me Tagi-sensei. In my 10 years with the academy, I have had countless students. Shinobi die every day so it may not seem like much. But, every time that I hear from a former student about my lessons helping them or one of their comrades making it back to the village safely, I know that I am fulfilling my duty to the village and my students."

Continuing, Tagi-sensei said, "Most of them are not medical-nin, but even the relatively simple things like properly recognizing different types of poison and correctly applying the antidote requires some medical knowledge that you will learn here. Any questions?"

A single hand raised... "Yes dear," Tagi said.

Nodding Rin asked, "when will we get the opportunity to see if we can become medical-nin?"

"There's always someone who asks... well today I will give each of you some chakra control exercises. Once you have completed those exercises, we can talk about learning some basic medical ninjutsu. However, as you will learn, unlike other ninjutsu, medical ninjutsu requires a wealth of biological and medical knowledge to actually be used to its health potential. Otherwise, you risk killing or hurting your patient even when using a 'simple' medical ninjutsu so learning it and practicing it is a long process."

Reflecting on Tagi-sensei's words, Hayase wondered, 'How does water bending's healing work though? The Avatar world didn't seem to have advanced medical knowledge like the shinobi world... Will it be like that in this world?'

"Now class with that said, we will start today's lesson on the treating and wrapping of wounds to prevent infection and spread up the natural healing. Given that many of you often get hurt in spars, this will undoubtedly be useful."

__________________________________________

And like that, the first day of classes flew by for Hayase. After leaving the academy, he met up with Guy and Duy again for training. Instead of running around the village, today, the duo decided to do weighted punching and kicking while hitting a reinforced wooden target.

"Yosha! 1000 punches and 1000 kicks with each arm and leg!" declared Duy. In their matching green jumpsuits, they each held a horse stance and alternated punches with a steady pace. Each punch shook the wooden target.

Duy's target was substantially larger than Guys, and Hayase could see how he had slowly carved out the wood with his punches with his astonishing willpower.

Unlike Guy and Duy who could do so without flinching, Hayase clenched his teeth with every impact. He found himself wishing he could coat his fist in water for the exercise to take the pain away, but he felt like that would be cheating. 'But what if, I only used water from the air,' he thought, 'that would still be training... let's try!'

Motivated by the thought of reducing his pain, Hayase tried to resonate his chakra with the water in the air. Shifting his chakra to a higher frequency, he began to be able to collect a thin film of water on his fist. Maintaining the feeling, he punched out! *Thud*

'Ow!" he thought, 'that made almost no difference, I guess it's still too little water.' Looking over at his hard-working partners, he resolved to try again. And again. And again. Until he had to switch to kicking.

***Abe POV - Meeting with Academy's Dean ***

After his session with Hayase, Abe drew up a training plan for Hayase:

Training Goals and Plan:

- Based on his spars, Hayase needed to learn to control the water faster to avoid being disrupted like his fight with Guy --> More practice using his water in combat and training to move the water faster

- His attacks need more stopping power --> more water (training to get water from the air or make it with his chakra) or new techniques (the kid will have to get creative)

- He needs to learn to control his ability with ice and mist --> For ice, he might need some psychological help. With mist, it will mostly be helpful for obscuring enemies' sight, but it's worth training if it will help him pull water from the air as he thinks.

Other than the training plan, however, Abe had also written up a report to his higher-ups. Going to Dean Kona Sarutobi's office, Abe knocked before entering.

"How did your session with the young Hayase go Abe-san? What do you have to report on his kekkei genkai?" stated Dean Sarutobi.

"Sir, his ability is perhaps more unusual than I anticipated. So far, it appears like he hasn't been using a natural transformation, at least to his knowledge, to control the water. Rather, his chakra connects to the water at a distance. Additionally, as it stands, the chakra consumption appears rather low except when he performs other parts of his ability..." reported Abe.

"Other parts? beyond the hand-signless control that we've seen so far?" said the dean shocked.

"Yes, he seems to be able to control the temperature of the water. He was able to make and control a small mist as well as pull small amounts of water from the air. Moreover, sir, the most shocking thing is that he was also able to freeze the water..."

"Ice! could he be a lost member of the Yuki clan?" exclaimed the dean.

Trying to quell the dean's suspicion Abe said, "Um, I'm not sure sir. The background check reported that the boy's parents were merchants in the land of fire and seemed to have been killed by loan sharks. I doubt Yuki clan members would be so weak. Also, I must report that, although he can create ice, it seems like he has a psychological trauma blocking him from using it fully. He had a panic attack in the process of demonstrating the ability to me."

"Ah how troublesome, I'll see if the hospital can spar anyone to talk to him. Make sure to prepare him well. Given the unusual nature of his ability, the village's eyes will be on him." replied Dean Sarutobi.

With that Abe took his leave and went home to think.

***Dean Kona Sarutobi POV**

'Ugh, I wish I could hurry up and retire, but there's no way Hiruzen would let me retire yet,' thought dean Sarutobi, 'I'm tired of mediating between Hiruzen and Danzo's efforts to influence the academy students. Danzo wants us to stop being soft on them or turn over talented ones to him. Hiruzen thinks they should all have a chance to grow before seeing the harshness of the world.'

Looking at Hayase's file and thinking about Abe's recent report, he knew that Danzo would soon be knocking on his door to ask about the batch of talented civilians. Hayase, in particular, would likely catch his eye either as a potential spy or an asset. Dean Sarutobi was long familiar with Danzo's games though. There was a reason that so few talented orphans went missing once they entered the academy. Danzo may be able to snag orphans outside of the dean's sight, but not within his walls or, at least, not so long as a fellow Sarutobi was the Hokage.

"Ugh, I'll need to talk to Hiruzen about the boy... a talent with water like this and the ability to pull water from the air at such a young age. It bears too many superficial similarities to his sensei's skills for him to ignore it. That ought to be enough to keep Danzo's claws off of him" said the dean to himself, although he thought to himself, 'that similarity might just motivate Danzo as well... bah, they both have a war to worry about. They have bigger fish to fry.'

***Hayase POV ***

In the next couple of weeks, Hayase's days followed a similar pattern to the first day. Beginning with conditioning in the morning, he could feel his training with Guy and Duy paying off quickly. In all of his academic classes except the medical elective, he focused on continually practicing his water control under his desk and had even gotten to the point where he could answer questions in class without breaking his control.

Using the medical chakra control exercise that he had gotten, he practiced at home and found he had improved by leaps and bounds. Although he was still a long way off from mastering them, he hoped to soon be able to use the exercises from the chakra control book that he had stolen from the hospital all those weeks ago. Tagi-sensei's way of teaching about medicine and first aid was really engaging, and Hayase found himself really enjoying those sessions.

Every day after training with the Guy and Duy, Hayase found himself wishing that he knew a healing jutsu to ease his muscle pains and bruises. Speaking of which, while Duy was away on missions, Guy and Hayase had taken to sparing in the afternoons before exercising. Some days, Hayase would use his water bending, others he tried to just use his taijutsu (on those days, he definitely wished he knew medical jutsu!).

The class practical sessions had become a hotbed for the intra-class feud in class 2b. Most students had picked a side in the fight between Hana and Reiji. Hayase had tried to keep his head down mostly, but Reiji was an asshole so that didn't last long. Spars would need to be broken up, students would bump into each other, and just overall hostility kept increasing.

In the actual spars themselves, Hayase found himself enjoying going against Kojima and Caito the most. Compared to Guy, both of them were fairly slow so he could easily keep up with their movement although Kojima's hits still hurt like hell. His record against Caito was around 70% victory rate, but against Kojima, it was closer to 40%. Without his water bending, Hayase found it difficult to finish off Kojima and Kojima was especially weary of being pushed out of the ring now. Fortunately, Hayase could feel his own hits getting stronger and he was getting more comfortable with his smooth counter-oriented taijutsu.

The social environment made it easy for Hayase to largely avoid talking to his classmates since they seemed stuck in perennial arguments. Occasionally, he would chat with Hana who increasingly seemed awkward with being at the center of the controversy. In fact, through his sparring with Caito and Kojima, Hayase found himself talking with them more than any others although mostly about how to improve their taijutsu. The three boys seemed especially motivated in the aftermath of the tournament. Seeing Hayase's sudden growth, in particular, seemed to spark their competitive spirit.

Although the medical elective was awkward with Hana and Reiji both there, Hayase tried to ignore the rising tensions by chatting with the 2A students. He had perhaps gotten too friendly with Rin for Obito's liking since he had taken to glaring at Hayase when he made Rin laugh. Given Hayase's knowledge of the canon, he found it relatively easy to diffuse those moments since he knows about Obito's crush. A joke about 'glaring not unlocking the sharingan' here and there, and a compliment to Obito's goggles or something similar usually distracted him.

Before interacting with Obito, Hayase wasn't sure if he could get along with him given his future with the Akatsuki and Madara, but, for now, he was just a goofy kid, not too different from Naruto, clumsy, energetic, and dreaming of being Hokage. As someone who had also lost his parents, Hayase could sympathize with the orphaned Uchiha raised by his grandmother. These couple weeks of interactions had given them some rapport if not a budding friendship. It also became apparent that Obito cared little about the elective's topic and mostly snuck glances at Rin.

Rin proved to be as nice as she seemed in the series and very dedicated to learning medical ninjutsu. Thinking about her canon fate, Hayase often found himself thinking that it was a shame that she never got to realize her dreams of being a great medical nin. Kurenai, the third canon character in the lesson, proved to be as pretty as she was described.

'It was no surprise that Asuma fell for her,' thought Hayase. She didn't seem particularly interested in medical ninjutsu, but she had mentioned that the academy genjutsu classes were too basic compared to her clan techniques. That was one advantage of being a clan shinobi. All civilians got was what the academy offered, but clan shinobi could train better technique at home and learn other knowledge at the academy. Once they graduate, this meant that clan shinobi are either much more well-rounded like Kurenai or highly specialized in areas like tracking.

In contrast to the tensions pervading his other classes, Hayase's personal sessions with Abe-sensei were almost serene despite being so much hard work. He loved water bending. Abe-sensei had him doing a variety of difficult practice exercises every day and spared with him to help him perfect his taijutsu.

Some days, Abe would have him practice controlling large amounts of water. Letting it absorb into the soil and pulling it out before using it to attack. On other days, he would make Hayase use only the water that could pull from the air to put out fires. Most helpful of all, Abe had pulled some taijutsu katas from the academy archives that were similar to the techniques that Hayase was trying to develop. Upon seeing the techniques, Hayase almost exclaimed because, although it was only a few forms, the moves were very similar to Tai Chi. Having those katas as references would help him save a lot of time.

Today, however, Abe had a different plan.

"Hayase-kun, you've started to get a handle on your ability so I think it's time that you learned how most shinobi learn water-release jutsu. With elemental transformation, you will be able to create water with your chakra." said Abe before continuing, "therefore, I plan to properly teach you a low-level water release jutsu that you're already somewhat familiar with... the Water Release: Water Bullet Jutsu!"

And for a moment, Hayase felt like his world stopped. 'It couldn't be... why that jutsu, why not another one... why the jutsu that almost killed me.'

Snapping him from his thought, Abe said, "Kid, you need to understand that this is more than just about learning a water release jutsu. This is about conquering your fear... it won't be the same as last time."

"Sensei, I'm not sure that I'm ready..." replied Hayase, his palms already sweating.

"Don't worry, we won't jump right into it. You'll first practice elemental nature change of chakra and then we'll move on to the jutsu. Although people sometimes try to skip this basic training, that can be dangerous and limiting. Shall we get started?"

"Yes sensei," said Hayase somewhat relieved that he wasn't immediately expected to practice the jutsu.