Chapter 7: Chakra Nature [Rewrite]

Thanks to our training and missions, I haven't gotten to see my other friends in a long time. We have been on the team for about three months now, and have even moved up again in our weights. I'm up to carrying over my own body weight now. We are finally given a day off to rest, and I choose to take this day to go and see my friends. I don't find Kiba in the forest like usual, so I head to the park instead. I do find Shikamaru there, but this time he has someone with him there.

"Hey Shikamaru, been a while." I say in introduction as he's cloud gazing. The other boy looks at me, and I notice that it's Choji.

"Hey Ami. Been busy since graduating?" Shikamaru asks me as I lay down.

"You have no idea. Who's your friend?" I ask him.

"This is Choji Akimichi." He says lazily.

"Hi Choji, I'm Ami Hyuga." I say almost just as lazily.

"Hi." Choji says shyly. He opens a bag of chips and begins to eat them loudly next to us. I notice Shika and I both sigh nearly inaudibly at the noise. 

I stay there for about an hour or so, feeling very relaxed by the time I leave. I got to know Choji a little bit, and he told me about good food places around the village to try. I make my way over to where I know I will find Sasuke, and sure enough, he's there.

"Where have you been?" He demands as I walk up.

"Hello Sasuke, nice to see you again. How's your day going?" I ask sarcastically, trying to get him to remember his manners.

"Hi Ami, nice to see you again," He sneers out, "My day's been boring, now where the hell have you been?"

"I graduated, brat. I've been training and on missions." I say shortly to him with a smirk.

"Hn." He does his annoying little hum he does all the time he doesn't have an actual response. 

"No 'hn' we talked about that. Real words, Sasuke, or I throw a knife at you." I threaten. I've scolded him many times over the years about his stupid non word answers. I have indeed thrown several knives at him. I never aim for vitals, but he also can't dodge them all. I'm fairly decent at patching him up by now.

"How's your team?" He asks after a moment. I smirk in victory.

"Team is good. I got my brother on it, so that's great. Our Sensei is crazy. Everything's a competition." I grumble out the last part.

"Everything should be a competition. Aim for the win, right?" He says to me while returning back to his acrobatic knife throwing he was doing before I came up.

"Yeah, but drinking a cup of tea shouldn't be a competition." I deadpan, and he misses the shot as he whips his head around to me. He glares at me when he realizes he missed, and I just give him an innocent grin. I get to work then, strategizing how best to use weapons in battle. 

"I think I need a new weapon." I think out loud at the end of our training time. "Something different. Maybe I can find something that would work with my sparring style." I ponder to him.

"You could see the town blacksmith." He offers up to me. "Are you thinking sword? Spear? Dual blades?" He asks. I must have touched an interesting topic for him, because he is really into this conversation.

"I don't really know. I haven't used anything beyond basic shuriken and kunai. I won't want something too cumbersome that could get in the way, but I won't really know until I've seen it and tried it, ya know?" I say to him.

"There's still time before they close, let's go now." He says, taking my hand and pulling me down the street. When he feels like I will keep following, he releases my hand so we walk together instead. We get to the weapons store and when I walk inside, I stroll around to the unique, specialty weapons on display.

Several catch my attention as I walk around. The first is a large scythe. I think about it, it sends a message for sure, but it would be too tiresome to carry around, and would get in the way of my Gentle Fist too much. It would be good in a big war with enemies surrounding me, but not good traveling or being discreet. Next, I find a beautiful, unique katana blade. That could work, it's not too big and I could wield it easily enough. The last I see that catches my eye is a bow and arrow set. It's set far away from the others, out of the way as if no one ever looks at it. I try to think of the uses of it, it would increase my long range attacks, which are limited to only as far as I can throw my kunai at this point.

"Seeing anything catching your eye?" The blacksmith comes out while Sasuke joins me.

"A few actually. But I don't know which would be best for me yet. I know I have no immediate need for this scythe, but it is beautiful. The sword could work... but I'm also interested in the bow as well." I tell him.

"Ah, interesting choices, the lot of them. Tell me, what's your chakra nature?" He asks me.

"I don't know yet. I haven't had the opportunity to find out. I should ask my Sensei about that soon though. Does it matter for the weapon?" I ask him curiously.

"Yes, it can. Take for instance the sword here, it works best with a lightning nature. The metal was crafted in just a way that channels lightning like a rod, and is enhanced by it. The scythe works well with all natures, but can work best with water nature. It flows well and is strong enough to cut through the water or even be surrounded by it. Then lastly there's the bow. That's been a hard one to match to people because it's designed to work best with wind nature, and unfortunately we just don't get too many of those here. Our main selection of weapon work best with fire nature, like all our tags and bombs." He informs us and we nod along.

"Guess I should find out my nature first before getting anything. Thank you for your advice, sir." I bow politely as we head out the door. Two more things catch my attention on my way out. On the wall, clearly on display only and not for sale, are a pair of the Fourth Hokage's Flying Thunder God kunai's. That reminded me that I should ask the Hokage if I can learn the technique. The other thing that caught my attention was a pair of decorative hand fans, but they had blades at the spokes. These were interesting to look at, and made me wonder their purpose. Sasuke nudged me to keep moving, and we headed out. We grabbed dinner together at the tea shop before heading to our homes. I greet Neji tiredly, and he did the same. He had spent the day working on the 64 palms techniques. We do this every day when we come home, so we are getting better at it slowly.

The next day after our morning training, I call Sensei's attention.

"Sensei?" I ask out to him, "Could we please figure out our chakra natures soon?"

"You chakra natures, hmm?" He asks me skeptically. "Why would you like to know those so soon, Ami? Usually elemental jutsu's are Chuunin level techniques."

"I was looking into getting a weapon, and the blacksmith said I should know my nature first." I tell him simply. Neji glances at me curiously, I hadn't told him yesterday because I was too tired. Lee looks curious too, his eyes growing large with excitement for some reason.

"Well then, I suppose there's no harm in knowing. I just so happen to have chakra nature papers here!" He enthusiastically pulls the papers out of nowhere. He does that a lot, I've learned to stop questioning it by now. "All you have to do is take the paper and channel your chakra into it. From there, how the paper reacts will tell us your nature." He says as he hands each of us one. Neji and I both look at Lee with a brow raised. He can't use chakra, why find out his nature? If it will even work at all.

"Don't look so skeptical, you two." Guy scolds us, "Just because Lee cannot manipulate and change chakra, he doesn't necessarily not have it. Look at how he can walk on water now! Same principle. He will have a chakra nature too, even if he cannot use it." We all nod in response, that makes sense.

I take my paper and channel chakra into it. The paper slices in half, and I grin at it. Wind nature. I look over at Neji, and his is burning. After he glances at mine, we both look to Lee curiously. I'm surprised when I see his paper crumble. He's an earth nature.

"You know, I really expected you two to have the same!" Guy says enthusiastically to Neji and me. "Just goes to show that even twins can differ! So we have a wind, a fire, and an earth nature. For you twins, we can start to train you on elemental jutsu, at least basic ones here soon. I am a fire and lightning nature, so Neji I can show you some techniques. For Ami here, there aren't many wind users in the village, but I know of one who may be able to help you out occasionally. When you are ready to learn, I'll reach out to him. For now, you can study up on your natures."

He must be referring to Asuma. I'm excited, Asuma is high up on my list of fates to change. He's actually in second place, just below Neji. I would love to get to know him early on and get to train with him. We finish up with training for the day, Sensei let's Neji and I practice our advanced Hyuga techniques while he works on sparring with Lee. We are all getting much stronger. Lee can now keep up better in the morning training, even if he still loses.

I drag Neji along with me to the blacksmith before he closes for the day, determined to get that bow. I'm excited at the possibilities that come with having ranged attacks, Hyuga clan styles are all close quarters combat. We make it to the store and I walk straight back to the bow, eyeing it with scrutiny.

"Back so soon?" The smith asks me happily. "Guessing you found out your nature, then?"

"Yes!" I say happily, "I'm a wind nature! Could I please take a closer look at the bow?"

He looks genuinely surprised for a moment before going to the bow and taking it down off the wall. He adjusts a few things on it before handing it to me. I take it firmly in my hand, a sense of familiarity coming back to me. I can't believe I almost forgot, but I used to do archery in my first life. Not often, and I certainly wasn't good at it, but it's like muscle memory coming back to me. I instantly trade the bow to the other hand, and poise it into position on my left side.

"Left handed, huh?" He asks me, eyeing my right arm knife pack. "No, that's not it. Left-eye dominate, that's it. Does it feel right there? Or do you want to try the other side?"

I put the bow in my other hand. It feels wrong there, and not as comfortable. I pass it back to my left, and immediately I know that I'm still a left handed shooter. In this world I'm very much ambidextrous with my kunai throwing, but then again most ninja can throw with both hands.

"Yeah, left handed. Can it be adjusted to that?" I ask, looking at the rest on the bow.

"Yeah, it will take me a couple of days, but I can do that for you. I can adjust the weight down too if it's too heavy for a little lady like yourself. Give it a try, pull it back and let me know how much I can take it down." He says kindly.

I turn to my brother and we share a smirk. I pull the string back easily, and hold it there as I aim the arrowless bow at the smith. "Actually, it feels a bit weak. Can you add 10 kilograms of strength to it?" I say boldly to him as he gawks.

"My apologies." He laughs gruffly in amusement. "I'll get right on that. Anything else I can do for you today?" He asks us both. We shake our heads and leave, but again the fans catch my attention.

"Actually, can I ask you about those fans? They're very beautiful." I comment to the smith before leaving.

He stares hard at the fans for a moment before going over and taking them out their case. "These were a custom order my father had made for the first Hokage's wife. She unfortunately passed away before she could ever use them, so I keep them here on display. She was a wind nature too, and these were crafted to enhance that. The fan spokes are all chakra metal, so they act as a conduit for all chakra natures, but the fan shape and blades are specific to a wind nature." I look at them in wonder, and he stares into my eyes for a moment. "Tell you what. You prove to me how serious you are with that bow. Master it within a year, and I will give you these fans. I would like to see someone wield them in my lifetime."

"Are you sure, sir? These seem like a precious family heirloom for you." I asks softly.

"Aye, they are precious. But weapons were crafted to be used, not sitting around collecting dust in the shop. Like I said though, I want to see you truly master that bow beforehand. Those fans are very dangerous weapons in the right hands, and are among some of my most deadly weapons I sell. Prove to me you're worthy, and they're yours." He warns me warmly. I smile politely at him and Neji and I head out the door.

"I can see you practically glowing over there." Neji teases me lightly as we walk home.

"Oh, I'm gonna get those fans. And I bet it won't take me a whole year to master the bow, either. I think... I think I could even use those fans with the Gentle Fist style. Definitely with the Rotation technique. I can do this, Neji." I say firmly with determination, "I can advance the main houses private techniques and make them my own. Just like you will take the technique and master it better than anyone else. We can do this." I smirk to him proudly and he returns it smugly. I always encourage his drive to be better than the main family. It's better than when he's just angry at them, or talking about how destiny will limit him. Over the years, he has built his own desire to be better than them, and to show it proudly. That's the motivation that I always encourage out of him. He thinks that's my motivation as well, and I let him because it's true to an extent, but I also train hard so I can become strong enough to change people's fate in this world.