Chapter 4

The paint on the wall was a pain to clean off. It would smear when you wiped it, and simply create a bigger blotch. Unfortunately there was no other way to fix it besides wipe it away hard with water. Having it slide down the wall until you fix even that.

After you spent a solid hour of your time cleaning the wall, you were then to help pick up and clean the scattered kunai used for practice. An easy enough task. After that you were home free.

And free to start plotting your revenge.

The Uchiha seemed to take their shurikenjutsu training seriously. As you noticed a much larger than expected number around the place. Most were embedded in their targets, though a few were scattered around the ground.

Whether or not they were missed shots or they pulled out their kunai and just didn't care about it anymore you didn't know. But you did find a suspicious amount that just laid in front of the targets. Not being buried in the ground.

They were more lazy than they seemed to appear.

While picking up the odd kunai and shuriken, you realized there was someone still practicing. You watched out of boredom as you carried on your menial task. They shot and just barely missed their target. They frowned before continuing again.

Your lip twitched as you realized their throwing stance was wrong. You looked away so it wouldn't bother you. Unfortunately the path you had taken simply led towards them. Practically forcing the Uchiha kid into your vision while picking up the throwing weapons.

She grunted in her next throw. Putting way too much strength in her throw. Despite this she still seemed somewhat confident that it'll hit its mark. Of course it didn't, which caused her to pout.

But she didn't give up.

Which meant she was going to keep messing it up.

Your eyes squinted in frustration.

You tried. You really, really, did. But it was just too much. It was too disappointing, and you got more than enough of that from the academy.

"Stop."

Your words made her jump forward and look at you in alarm. Which was something that caused you to raise an eyebrow. You hadn't been exactly lurking. Hell, you had been damn near in front of her for fifteen minutes.

"You're throwing it wrong."

She seemed nervous enough to be about to bolt, but you didn't really care. You took a kunai and showed her the correct position. Your arm slight raised and hand bent, ready to release.

You threw and hit the target dead center.

You turned towards her and noticed she was looking at you with awe. Your eyes narrowed in annoyance.

"Why aren't you copying me?"

She seemed to jump before attempting to reattempt your movements from before. The moment the kunai went from her hand you caught it.

"Wrong. I'll do it again."

Once more you gave a demonstration for her. This time she watched more seriously before imitating you. she threw the kunai and it hit the target. On the very edge outside, almost off of it, but it was still on it.

She looked at you with an excited look. In response you gave a small nod. It was an improvement, but not perfect. Next time she made an attempt you laid your hands on her arms. Fixing them into the correct positions before allowing her to continue.

And in less than twenty minutes, she was starting to hit the center of targets with consistency. She looked at you with a wide smile. You gave another nod.

"Good work."

Her grin threatened to split her face.

"Thank y-"

You moved on.

"Now it's time to practice with shuriken."

She blinked in surprise, but quickly grew a determined look and a slight nod in acceptance. Good. She was quick on the uptake. Something Naruko should consider learning.

You moved onto shuriken, showing her the correct way to throw them. After she achieved success, you showed her different ways to throw, this time from the waist where a ninja pouch was normally located. Then you moved on to throwing multiple at once. This time it took a much longer amount of time for her to get the handle of it.

So you walked her through it patiently. Every time she made a mistake she looked at you worryingly. You said and did nothing, besides fixing her stance or giving another demonstration. After awhile she grew out of it. You weren't sure what exactly she expected, you to smack her?

Uchiha's were strange.

After the multiple throwing technique was…well mastered was a bit of an exaggeration, but it was…acceptable. It was enough for you to start teaching her how to hit things in the air. Such as other shuriken and kunai's.

She interrupted your demonstration while panting.

"U-um, it's starting to get dark out."

You blinked, examining your surroundings. The sun had indeed started to set on the horizon. Almost winking out of existence. You turned back to her.

"And?"

She looked down for a few seconds before looking back up with a small nod. A smile tried to fight it's way to the surface but you made sure it didn't.

It took a bit more work as she was already tired, but she seemed determined to finish it through. It wasn't as if she'd suddenly become a shurkienjutsu master overnight, but it was a definite improvement. Though the real testing ground will be if the lesson stuck after she went to sleep.

Finally you waved your hand.

"Alright, that's enough."

She breathed as if on the verge of death.

"W-what's n-next?"

This time you couldn't help but smirk.

"We're done. Good work."

She seemed somewhat puzzled before taking a few steps forward. Reaching out slightly with her hands with a straining look on her face. What was she…oh, she was trying to hug you.

Hmm…

Well, she certainly did decently enough. Very well, just this once. But afterwards hugs would be off limits. You'd save them for your clan and only your clan.

You obviously accepting her hug seemed to make her lose all hesitation and start hugging you fiercely. Going so far as to rub her face on your stomach. Your face scrunched up in disgust. You didn't know where her face had been.

Even still, she seemed rather happy. Ick, and well…it was possible if you stopped her she'd just do something else gross so you'd just let her continue. Besides, it was better to reinforce good learning habits with equally good memories.

The sacrifices you made for progress.

The hug lasted an extremely uncomfortable and awkward amount of time before she left. Waving at you no less than five times before finally arriving at her house and going inside. As you started to leave the compound you found a familiar figure in the darkness.

"Guess big brothers just have an instinctual need to help little siblings huh?"

You decided to ignore Shisui's comment. Mostly because you were starting to be tired.

"Is there something you want to say?"

Shisui nodded and pointed in the direction you had been teaching…actually come to think of it you didn't even know her name. Whoops.

"You gathered most of shuriken and kunai's but you didn't clean them. So you'll need to come back tomorrow to finish the job."

…Fuck.


*~o~*
You found yourself gritting your teeth. The academy had given you everything in regards to the clone technique. Yet somehow despite you cycling your chakra in the exact way your teacher had told you to, it didn't seem to work.

Which was fine. You couldn't be expected to simply master every jutsu you came across. Though knowing you, it would likely be a recurring theme.

Yet despite all of that, you hadn't succeeded. Why? Were you overthinking things? Was it you cycling your chakra? But you've tried numerous other combinations and still came up empty.

…Before you had been given the instructions for the jutsu the paper had passed through several of your classmates. Could it be possible that they had changed something in that timeframe?

…no.

While it was possible, it's much more likely that you were simply lashing out due to frustration. You just needed to keep practicing until you finally got it.

No matter what you refuse to be kept in that academy for any time longer than strictly necessary. You would graduate soon and you will be at the top of the class, and you'd likely never see your fellow students ever again.

And for that you'd be thankful.

The solution to your problems was simple. If doing it repeatedly didn't help, than perhaps you could change a few things. Change the amount of chakra used in the seal, or change the seal itself.

And so you began to experiment. Playing around with seals and your chakra control until something worked. Thankfully the process wasn't exactly very strenuous. As you weren't actually using any of your chakra. But it was time consuming.

Thankfully not only was it a weekend, but Kushina was out on a mission. Which meant you had all the time in the world to train.

"Aoki! I made dinner!"

…after dinner of course. Can't learn jutsu's on an empty stomach after all. Concentrating and crunching your chakra down into the seals in order to produce jutsu's wasn't the easiest task, but it wasn't exactly difficult to understand.

Just extremely tedious.

Something you learned after spending all night until the sun had finally rose up. Well, when the sun had shined a bit in the rainy clouds above. Of course you weren't dumb enough to just practice in the rain, so you did it on the porch of the house.

Until finally, something happened. You could feel your chakra leaving your body and finally finding purchase. You watched the rain water near you rise up and form on it's own. After a few seconds of focusing, it finally formed itself.

You were looking at a mirror image of yourself, but soaking in the rain. He looked at you rather surprised as well. It would look like you had finally did it, somehow.

"Huh. That's weird. I can touch things."

Your clone stated with a bit of surprise. So that's what you sounded like. Huh.

He was also correct. Normal clones couldn't actually make contact with anything. They were immaterial, only an illusion. So why could yours?

"Well, you did come out of the water…so maybe that changed you in some way?"

Your clone nodded it's head.

"It's likely a possible variant of the clone technique. Iruka sensei was going over such things in class."

Ah, that was true. He had been talking about different clones being effected by the elements. Perhaps this was caused because of your own elemental affinity?

"So this means i have an affinity for water?"

Your clone nodded his head slightly.

"Damn it. I had been hoping for lightning…"

You nodded along to your clones despairing words. Lightning was just…so cool. Water…not so much. Well, if you already have a clone that can actually move, perhaps you should experiment a little with him?

So you began to spar with him. He wasn't bad, but he certainly wasn't you. Something both of you realized in a few minutes of taijutsu.

"Are you holding back?"

Your clone shook his head with a frown. Hmm, that probably meant there was some sort of limits to him. Unfortunate, but not exactly unexpected.

"I bet a lightning clone wouldn't have a limit."

You both frowned at that.

Well, you guess you'll have to just live with it. Just taking the genin test early and leave your shitty academy life behind you. To get stronger and better training, and then become a chunin.

And then?

And then you'd be strong enough to find your mother.

It was just a matter of time.


*~o~*
It wasn't long before you demanded to graduate early from the academy. Well, you didn't demand it per se. More like you asked somewhat politely if you could graduate early and become a genin.

And to your surprise the teachers were actually pretty supportive of the whole thing. So you were able to schedule the test in the next few days.

When that day came up, it was simply easy to perform. First you had to show the basics of skill. Being able to hit a point blank target as well as basic taijutsu capabilities. Next were the jutsu's.

The henge was easy enough. Transforming into Iruka sensei was easy. The only real remarkable feature he had was the scar across his nose. He seemed to find your henge rather bland in terms of details but you believe it to be true to life.

The next one was the substitution jutsu. Which of course was done rather flawlessly. Your teachers giving you a nod and some words of praise. But of course that wasn't your greatest technique so far.

Which is when you decided to do the clone technique. Your teachers eyes narrowed onto your hand signs in confusion and then surprise when you finally performed it. You had suspected that the nearby cup of water would be of at least some help in performing the jutsu, but that was not so.

No, instead you started to vomit out enough water to drown in. The feeling was incredibly disgusting and cut off your oxygen for a good few seconds. After you had summoned your clone, you felt much too exhausted and disgusted to be that happy when your teachers applauded you.

They went so far as to even pat your head and run their fingers through your hair. Well, so long as they didn't go to far you suppose it was all fine…

That was until they praised you for the water clone jutsu. Damn it, you had thought you created it, not discovered something that already existed. That sucked. A lot.

Despite the impromptu party given by your teachers in order to make you feel more like a genin, you didn't feel too much of it. Mostly because of the feeling of vomiting that overtook you. It wasn't an exaggeration to say that you'd likely never again use that jutsu unless there was water nearby.

The only bad news came afterwards, as they said you'd need to wait for other academy students to become genin in order to have a team of three assigned to a jonin. However there was at least a ray of light at the end of the tunnel. Which was some of the other classes were further along in their studies so it was likely you'd get one of them instead of one of your old classmates.

Which was enough to appease you.

It also meant that you'd have a bit of time while waiting for your jonin sensei to teach you. Which likely meant studying seals, or practicing with Naruko, or tending the garden or…all the above, actually.

The thought of a sensei came up to you in your mind. Konoha wasn't lacking much in the face of jonin. Though you barely knew a few jonin, that didn't mean you weren't curious as to who'd teach you from now on.

You wondered who'd you receive…