2 Chapter 2
I'm in the chunin exam with Kabuto Yakushi and Misumi Tsurugi. Kabuto is an accomplished medic, despite being a gennin and Misumi has had surgery to make him more flexible, like a contortionists. His joints are similar to Orochimaru, and he has a similar fighting style.
I already know that he is a spy, but it ain't got nothing to do with me. We'll stay in each other's lane as long as he doesn't bother me. We have an understanding that even if he isn't feeling well or is nervous, he will pull through team rounds and is free to do whatever he wants in other rounds.
He though that I was just intimidating a fellow gennin, while i thought that we were just discussing stratagy for the exam.
I would be ashamed as Yamanaka if I didn't easily catch their mental manipulations for the first test. I exceeded expectations in our trip through forbidden Forrest for the second exam by helping other konoha teams through rescuing them from other ambushes or helping them recover with my and kabuto's medical jutsu.
Because of my efforts to help konoha ninja, we had to face an extra preliminary exam due to too many applicants getting through. Furthermore, Due to my efforts 50% of all remaining participants were konoha gennin, despite the konoha representing only 20% of total applicants for this year. That's so high only because the exam are held here this year.
I were forced to face mostly other strong konoha gennin, while the weaker gennin from konoha faced stronger gennin from abroad. This was manipulated such to not appear biased as the host. Still at the end, 10 total gennin were selected for final round that will take place after a Month. Even so, konoha had 4 shinobi out of 10 in the finals. And none of them are my team mates.
During this month, I intensified my training under Might Guy. He knew my promotion to chunin was on the line and by this point I had already been training with him for 10 months. In these 10 months he has not really taught me any Taijutsu but helped me develop my body to be stronger, faster, more flexible and have higher endurance.
Because of this 10 months he was impressed enough that he will officially take me as his apprentice and take the time out of his busy schedule to teach me Taijutsu for this month. He kept comparing me to his rival, for he too was a young prodigy, chunin at an age even younger than mine.
He even called me cool when i dyed black the green bodysuit he gave me, on the official Master-Apprentice ceremony. He even gifted me weights which look like orange leg warmers. I offcourse dyed them grey.
In this one month, neither of us left the training ground, training night and day till i reached a stage where i could open the 1st gate. Guy had been training me for 10 months before preparing and testing me for the 1st gate , "Gate Of Opening". By the time I officially asked him to teach me as his apprentice, I was already close to where my body needed to be. I just need to push my body beyond its limit.
The 1st gate - Gate of opening is even related to mind as it negates its users thoughts from holding them back. It is located in the left hemisphere of the brain. When I first opened it, it felt like i had cast my Genjutsu: Anastasia on myself, since I could not feel the pain and soreness from training. I had soon collapsed after it.
Rest of the training after it mostly involved training to not collapse after using it. It was so intense that I didn't get much chance to learn any Taijutsu moves. But I had shown Guy Sensei that I used chakra scaple technique for my primary offence with my hands, so he taught me some basic kicking techniques. He even suggested i learn some chopping or claw techniques to enhance my use of chakra scaples.
3 days before the finals, he said that I had reached a stage where I can freely use 1st gate without experiencing extreme backlash. He commented that he expected for it to take longer but due to my medical ninjutsus I was able to overcome it all much quicker by optimising training and recovery.
For these three days, he asked me to rest and chill out as he gave me some scrolls named dragon's claw and snake's fang. They were both claw techniques.
Snake's fang was simple in principle, create a claw shape with your fingers and targeted weak points like eyes, throat, gut and kidney. It was focused on targeting soft areas of a target so didn't requires as much strength in fingers that make up the claw.
Dragon's Claw in the other hand used same claw shape from hand and launches it to hard areas of body. A strike on chest to remove the breath from the target. A strike on the head to cause a concussion.A strike on joints to break bones. It required cultivating finger strength and is not as compatible with my chakra scaples technique as Snake's Fang is.
But guy sensei did not gave me this techniques to use in the exams, they are him pointing me to direction of my future training. After all, how can I learn them to sufficient extent in three days. I still practiced snake's fang technique to explore it's compatibility with chakra scaple technique.
Nobody expected that I would steam roll the final exam, I didn't even open the 1st gate. I was certainly not the favourite going into the exams, due to my performance in preliminaries and my age. Hence, Me and guy sensei made banks on the betting pool. The physique difference between someone who can open the 1st gate casually(even if not actively using it) and someone who can't at all is immeasurable. Nobody expected my speed or endurance.
I had already shown enough tactical, technical and leadership qualities in first 2 parts of the exam that only reason for someone to deny me promotion would have been my age and fragility. But with my demonstration by winning the tournament, any doubts left the stadium. I was instantly promoted with all the fanfare and ceremony.
Soon later, I was summoned by the Hokage. He praised my performance but informed me that he had called me for a much more serious reason. He told me that both my new jutsus have been evaluated and both are classified as kinjutsu (forbidden techniques)
He told me that it took unusually long to evaluate my jutsus because although the Genjutsu: Anaesthesia is clearly just a C rank jutsu with it's simplicity, the Fuinjutsu: Genjutsu tag is much more complicated. It will match the technique stored in it, if one uses S rank Genjutsu with it, it is practically an S rank technique.
We discussed what it being classified as forbidden actually means. He told me that only people with enough clearance can access them. My Genjutsu by itself is not so big a deal, but the combination basically removes two of the most known weaknesses of Genjutsu- Chakra disruption and pain.
The few doctors that had learnt the technique already had the clearance and Kurenai and Lee-chun are fine to use them as well because both get minor creators credit for them because I requested so. I would not have been able to complete this by learning Genjutsu or Fuinjutsu from the books.
The Hokage mentioned that we will get some royalties but they didn't really amount to much, specially for what i could get on the market. He said that he will allow me to choose a jutsu of my own from the forbidding library.
I told him I was honered. I asked him if there were any jutsus from Tobirama Sama, he really was my idol.
He pointed that most of the jutsu here are by his Tobirama sensei. A lot of the other are still explorations his creation. Tobirama created shadow clone, Sarutobi created Multi-shadowclone. Tobirama created flying Raijin. Minato created flying Raijin... Anyways, I pretend to think about it and choose shadow clone and multi-shadowclone.
I greet the Hokage and try to skiddale , showing my enthusiasm to learn the techniques, but Hokage stopped me. He informed me that I have to be very careful with those techniques as they require massive amounts of chakra that he doesn't think i have. I eagerly say that I just want them as scholarly curiosity, it was already mentioned in the technique that it requires high jonin level chakra.
Most jutsu are forbidden for a reason, so this is just that, tells me that there is no bigger drawbacks, atleast for the shadow clone. For Multi-shadow clone , the drawback mentioned in the scroll is the excessive feedback. Thinking about it, i told the Hokage that this excess feedback portion might even help me develope in my Yamanaka techniques.
The Hokage relented. Asking me to be careful and extra cautious when I'm testing the limit. He smiled at me and said that it's always good to have a medic nearby when testing your limits. Makes you think, huh.
After the meeting , I left to go to a Genyu Bar. The Elder chunins had organised a party for newly minted chunins. As the winner of the tournament, I was somewhat of a Chief Guest. After greeting and introductions we started mingling.
There was one other person who became chunin from the chunin exams and another one who got a field promotion, those are rarer now a days. I greeted everyone and started cataloging them in my head.
I Got a lot of offers from Big Sister Types and even some Big Brother Types to become thier teammate for future missions. I politely declined them all, talking about my commitments to the hospital. I finally find Hana Inuzuka , she was an hour late to the party.
I request her to become my teammate, I mention how we are both medics , she doesn't have to change the types of mission she takes part in.
She said she was one of the few solo chunin. With her dog's strengths combined, they are close to level of a chunin team anyway. She told me her job had more to to with tracking than medicin. She told me she can tell me more about her job, but not at the bar, we'll have to meet the next day to discuss this.
Next noon, I visit her at her animal infermary. In her office, she revealed that she was a hunter nin. She specialised in tracking and killing B,C and D rank fugitives in the bingo book. Out of all the ninja, a hunter nin spends most time outside the country with least support.
She was a medic thus, can treat herself and her dog's. For long periods of time, her dog's can pretend to be wild beast to blend in with the forest, or they can pretend to be starving city dog, to blend in the streets.
I tell her that I am interested in becoming her teammate and partner up as hunter nin. Although she is very capable, I bring a completely different set of skills in interrogation.
She says that she can atleast give me a shot, she was going to leave in a week for a 4 month long mission. If I turn out to be a burden, she will drop me back in one month, before she has to go out of fire nation.
I prepared some storage seals for the week. I kept training dragon claw , snake's fang and Strong Kick (derived from Strong first technique of Guy). I created an encrypted copy of shadow clone and multi shadow clone too take with me.
I had spoken to Kurenai Sensei and Lee-chun Sensei. They spoke about how they admired me and that they have earned more opportunities in these 11 months of training me than in last few years of their own efforts. They revealed to me the techniques they got from forbidden scroll for creator credits and said they are willing to teach me those as I am already their student .
Kurenai Sensei had learnt Genjutsu: Bringer Of Darkness. In it, The user places a hallucinatory darkness on a target's eyesight, causing them to see nothing but black. Basically a blindness spell That only last as long as you can concentrate on it.
Lee-chun Sensei had learnt Fuinjutsu: Bukijutsu : Sharp Dragon. It is great for us because it is one of the examples of storing ninjutsu in seals. Lee-chun Sensei probably chosen this specific one because of her speciality with Bukijutsu.
Her husband is a blacksmith so fuleing this jutsu with Slag-cast(disposable) kunai to power it will have cheaper chakra cost than charging a Fire Dragon Fuinjutsu or other elemental ones . The brittle slag will even make it act like frag-ammo, increasing the effectiveness of sharp dragon.
That night i celebrated at dinner with my family and my father told me that our clan head, Yamanaka Inoichi wants to see me tomorrow to congratulate me.
Next morning i meet Inoichi, ino and her mother for breakfast at their place. They all congratulated me and later I met Inoichi in his home office.
He told me that he was very proud of me and that as a chunin of Yamanaka clan , i am expected to learn a jutsu , just like i had learnt 'Mind Body Transfer Technique' as a gennin . Due to me bringing honour to Yamanaka clan, I can choose one more jutsu from the clan scroll. Jutsu's be pourin'
Clan scroll are like konoha's forbidden scroll. You need to be part of the clan and need to have contributed to the clan to learn from them. The technique i was expected to learn as chunin was a telepathy technique to transfer messages through eye contact.
When he asked me what other clan jutsu do i want to learn, i was struggling to choose. I couldn't choose between Mind Body Disturbance Technique and a compendium of Yamanaka Fuinjutsu.
Mind Body Disturbance Technique is a progression of Mind Body Transfer Technique, where instead of controlling someone as if you were them, you controll them as if they are your puppet.
This reduces the proficiency of the puppet fighting, but the benefit is that you don't have to leave your body to cast this jutsu. At higher mastery and with better mental power, one can control multiple people as mind puppets. This means practicing this jutsu is a good way to increase mental power.
The other option of Yamanaka Fuinjutsu were even more tempting as it was a compendium a Fuinjutsu techniques that can enhance Yamanaka techniques.
The communication department have a cerebro(X-Men)-like machine that increases the distance a Yamanaka can send telepathic message. The torture department has masks that enhance or smoothen mind transfer technique's journey into the mindscape. Basic building blocks of all that technology is this Yamanaka clan Fuinjutsu.
I don't really have enough chakra or mental power to make best use of mind body disturbance technique so my choice was made easier and i took the Fuinjutsu compendium.
The next 5 days before my mission was due was spent collecting supplies, greeting my goodbyes and learning Fuinjutsu and Yamanaka-jutsu : telepathy. Although at basics, it requires eye contact, with mastery and mental power it can bypass it's limitation and with added Fuinjutsu enhancement it can go even beyond that
I wanted to atleast be able to communicate with eye contact before we left. Out of all the jutsu scrolls i had recived, i was only taking the Fuinjutsu scrolls with me. I can not really perform shadow clone with my meager chakra, atleast without serious consequences, so i will focus on Fuinjutsu for next month.
Hana and I had already decided that we will come back to the village in 1 month before we leave the boundaries of fire nation for 3 months. I'll just learn those when I'm back. Otherwise People would really consider me an idiot if I carry all those jutsu scrolls with me.
I had packed a lot of canned sea food that my family's business produces as I went to gate where i was supposed to meet Hana and her dogs. She checked my supplies to see if I'm missing anything and after not finding any problems, we left the village.
For the whole month we were patrolling from outpost to outpost, to gain information about bandits or missions for the outpost. Bandits are much rearer inside the fire nation but peace brings prosperity, and prosperity brings greed. Then again, There were always some lowly spy to uncover or a merchant who thought hiring ninja bodyguards makes you God.
The Yamanaka name held a lot of weight in these outposts. A lot of my chunin cousins use their telepathy and range enhancing Fuinjutsu artifacts to keep the communications running between themselves and konoha. There are offcourse messenger, birds and other traditional ways of communication but the few most important outpost have a Yamanaka in communications department.
I learnt a lot from these Clansmen and their cumbersome artifacts. Almost none of them can make their own artifacts and said that they were issued said artifacts with the assignment.
I even learnt more about the fire country's politics due to Samurai that were stationed in all outpost. They range in capability and leadership, but usually more important outpost had pretty powerful samurai with a noble liniage.
The outpost themselves were in some sort of joint leadership under head samurai and head ninja of the outpost. With samurai acting like police force who mostly patrol cities while ninja acting more in rural areas, Highways and the Wild. Concentrated populations and ninjas don't bode well it seems.
During this time, I started experimenting with usage of henge(transformation) jutsu with my Fuinjutsu: Genjutsu tag. When i used this custom tag on myself, it didn't affect me much, just made my jutsu more resilient against disruption, but not by much.
The better use turned out to be using it on someone who can't cast henge themselves. Like animals. While hunting forest bandits, we discovered an animal trafficking network that was poaching and seeking animals in the black market. A lot of our enemys just want to avoid tax.
I adopted a young pangolin from their cages after vibing with it. We named it cat cause it was lazy but surprisingly agile. After experimenting with it, I was finally able to create a Fuinjutsu Collar for it with desired effects. It now looks like a fat grumpy cat.
Pangolin's scale Armor is no joke, even in shinobi world. Imagine throwing fireball at a cat, and it just curls up into a roll, undamaged. I have to daily recharge the illusion of transformation, but the process is simple enough.
Now I'm all about, catching spy's and invading their mindscape for information. Using clan techniques to determine if a witness is telling the truth. Rescuing fellow konoha shinobi. Medically treating rich and generous nobles . Guarding and patrolling highways. Bodyguarding a merchant caravan. Reminds me of my past CIA life, with much more of a field role.
But My favourite task is taking down bandits. It is often a very generous mission and me and Hana have developed a great ploy for it.
We use makup to disguise ourself as merchants. We disguise Hana's dogs as horses , with my Genjutsu tag. I used the chunin jacket's material from outposts to make the dogs a jacket Armor with this tag on it. We tie Hana's dogs to the cart. As ninja dogs, they are much more powerful than horses, so they are easily able to pull the cart.
We enter bandit territory with known bounties looking like a lone merchant cart. We are then ambushed by the bandits. But we reverse Uno the whole ambush. The horses they expected to run away start beating the shit out of them as two young looking merchants rain death on them.
Hana would formerly used to use her beast transformation jutsu to join her dogs in the vanguard, but upon my suggestion, she found it much better to just command her dogs in the fight from behind, notifying them of impending danger or juicy opportunities and using throwing knives and shirikens with me as distraction for the enemy.
She would still join the vanguard whenever we faced a close combat expert.
I mostly stay behind the vanguard and throw thin but long Senbons at enemy's week points. I sometimes fall short, but I always try for one shot, one kill stratagy.
For even stronger shinobi, I have plenty of Fuinjutsu: Sharp dragon stored in seals. Although most are made of wooden stakes rather than strong kunai, making them much less powerful. But I have so many of them stored that they will work great as distraction in case of retreat.
After a month of running Counter Espionage inside the fire country, Hana approved me for the 3 mouth Espionage mission on foreign lands. But first, we go back home to rest and retreat.
