chapter 4

Chapter 4:

Village Year 75, August 8th

Shopping with Suki thankfully didn't actually last until sunset. Around noon, a talking turtle randomly showed up and dragged my new friend away for a "surprise training exercise." The talking turtle was wearing a ninja headband. He looked adorable. I was jealous that Suki got such a cool sensei and I got… whoever I got.

I honestly already forgot the guy's name. 

"I guess I might as well do something productive," I said to myself. I asked a passing Chunin for directions to the nearest training ground with tall trees. 

I quickly found out that all the training grounds were technically outside of the village, which made a lot of sense in hindsight. The anime never quite did a good job at explaining how all those gigantic ninja training grounds could actually fit inside of Konoha. The answer was of course "plot holes."

So before I could leave the village grounds, I first had to go back home and get my ID and headband. Ryu wasn't home when I got back, I think he expected Suki and me to be out for the entire day and had left to do his own thing. 

That was good. Having a super strong protective older brother was nice, but I didn't need someone looking over my shoulder constantly. Once I got what I came for, I went back outside and looked up.

"Ok, Kasumi…you can do this. How hard can roof-hopping actually be?" I muttered to myself. It was a 30 minute walk to reach the village gates or a couple minutes hopping across the roof. I picked the latter. 

I called on my chakra and felt myself suddenly becoming energized and empowered. I kicked off the ground as hard as I could. 

"Holy shit!" My eyes widened in shock when I suddenly found myself 15 feet in the air! My feet slammed down on my neighbor's single story rooftop. I quickly cut off my chakra flow to my body. I still had 97/100 Chakra Points remaining. I didn't have a lot of Chakra so I'd need to conserve it by 'toggling' it on and off between jumps.

I walked to the edge of the roof and gazed at my next target. There was a 10 foot gap between buildings. I could make that easy…

…

"I made it," I huffed out, trying to catch my breath. I was sweaty and a bit tired, but I couldn't help feeling proud of myself. I had hopped all the way across Konoha without falling off a single roof. It wasn't exactly graceful, and a lot of other ninjas gave me funny looks along the way, but I did it.

I took a seat in the shade of a gigantic tree, needing a few minutes to recover some of my chakra before starting to practice tree walking. I knew it was going to be much more chakra-intensive than roof hopping, and I'd need plenty of breaks to recover my limited chakra pool. I just had to make sure I didn't hit zero, or I'd suffer a one-hour chakra exhaustion penalty.

Once my chakra was back up to half, I decided to get started. "Time to climb some trees with no hands!" I cheered, trying to psyche myself up. I hoped the inevitable falls wouldn't be too painful. I untied my Katana from my waist and placed it nearby on the ground. 

I took a few steps back, circulating my chakra before running at the tree full speed. One step, two steps, three steps!

Crack!

"Dammit!" The bark cracked under my foot on the fourth step, launching me backwards and landing me painfully on my butt. "Ow..." My memories from the anime told me that if the tree bark cracked, I was using too much chakra. Next time, I would need to circulate less chakra around my feet to stick to the tree.

*+50 Spirit XP*

*+100 Tech XP*

I ran at the tree again. This time, I managed to make it five steps before my foot slipped! I was more prepared and didn't end up falling on my ass. That time, I hadn't used enough chakra.

I checked my chakra reserves and found that each attempt used up about 5 points. With 43 points left, I could go eight more times.

*+10 Mind XP!*

So, for the next few minutes, I kept practicing over and over. Sometimes I would use too much chakra and get blasted backward; other times, I would use too little, and my feet would slip. Finding the perfect amount was proving to be very annoying. Every time I thought I had it, my concentration would slip a tiny bit and throw me off.

When my chakra reserves hit 3/100, I was forced to take a break. I didn't want to incur an exhaustion penalty. I'd worked up a pretty good sweat, so I decided to lay down under the tree for a while. I closed my eyes and decided to take a nap. Before I could, though, I heard someone walk up to me. I peeked open an eye and saw that it was a young boy, maybe 8 or 9 years old.

"Whatcha doing there, Nee-chan?" he asked curiously.

I noticed that he was wearing the ugliest helmet I had ever seen. It was so ugly that I couldn't help but recognize it.

Konohamaru?

He looked slightly different in real life than he did as an illustration. I honestly expected him to be a lot younger, but then I remembered he's supposed to be a Genin whenever Pain attacks the village.

I sat up and brushed off some of the dirt sticking to my clothes. "I'm trying to climb this tree without my hands," I said. "What are you doing out here?" I asked while glancing around. Where was his infamous babysitter/shinobi bodyguard Ebisu?

"My sensei was being boring, so I snuck out and wanted to practice shuriken. Then I saw you trying to run up the tree for some reason. Watching you fall over and over was pretty funny," he said. "Why were you trying to climb the tree like that?" he asked me.

"Because all the good ninjas can do it," I told him with a shrug. "And you really shouldn't run away from your sensei…" I tried to tell him, but he ignored me and walked up to the tree himself.

"If all good ninjas can do it, then that means my grandpa can too! If I'm going to defeat him, then I need to learn it!" he declared before turning back to me. "Can you teach me how? This seems way more fun than reading boring books about politics all day."

"Sure, I don't mind teaching you." I had nothing better to do while I waited for my chakra to recover anyway. It was probably better that the kid stuck with me for now. No one needed the grandson of the Hokage running off without supervision and getting kidnapped or something.

"This is what you have to do…" I started explaining the basics to him. He acted like he was listening and nodded his head excitedly, but I didn't know if he was really paying attention. I guessed I was about to find out. 

"Alright! I'm gonna give it a try!" He ran towards the tree full speed, took a single step up, and then promptly slipped and fell down. I was suddenly glad he was wearing that ugly helmet because I hadn't thought this through. What happens if he falls and hurts himself on my watch? Nothing good for my future career prospects, that's what! 

"Ow! What happened? I did exactly what you told me!" he complained while quickly standing up. I let out a sigh of relief when I noticed he wasn't hurt at all. 

Ugly helmets for the win!

"You didn't use enough chakra," I told him. In fact, I didn't think he bothered using any chakra at all on that first attempt. My suspicion was confirmed when he asked his next question.

Konohamaru awkwardly scratched his cheek. "Erm—How do I use chakra…?" he asked me. 

"...What?" He doesn't know how to use chakra yet? I get that he's only 8 or 9, but he's the grandson of the freaking Hokage! 

"Hey, Ebisu! How come I haven't learned to climb a tree with no hands yet!?" the kid loudly complained…to the air?

"We haven't gotten to those lessons yet, honorable grandson." To my credit, I only let out a small squeak at the fact that someone had completely snuck up on me! I quickly spun around and found the famous ninja babysitter standing directly behind me.

Damn, he was really tall. Oh wait, never mind, I forgot I'm just short again.

Ebisu gave me a polite nod. "Thank you for looking after the honorable grandson, miss…?"

"I'm Kasumi Hayabusa," I told him.

"Hoh… Hayabusa, you say? Your brother must be the famous Ryu Hayabusa. An amazing shinobi who's never failed a single mission! Even I am envious of his renowned skills." Coming from a supposed Elite Jonin, that was certainly high praise.

"Thank you, I'm out here practicing tree climbing. I was giving Konohamaru a few pointers while waiting for my chakra to recover a bit," I explained. "He told me that he ran away because he was tired of studying," I added with a sly grin.

Konohamaru pouted and stamped his foot in the dirt. "Hey! Don't snitch on me!"

Ebisu let out a long sigh. "Thank you for looking after him. He has grown surprisingly skilled at evading his guards after all these years. Come along, honorable grandson. Let's leave Miss Hayabusa to practice in peace."

"No, I don't want to go back to studying! I want to stay with the pretty Nee-chan and learn how to climb trees!" he whined.

Ebisu didn't give Konohamaru any room for argument. I had to stifle my laugh when he nonchalantly picked the kid up like a sack of potatoes. No matter how hard Konohamaru thrashed, he wasn't escaping. Ebisu gave me one last thankful nod before vanishing in a swirl of leaves. My eyes couldn't detect where he went at all. I knew it wasn't teleportation but sheer mind-boggling speed!

"Damn, that was cool…" I muttered to myself. "I'll get there someday soon! First though…a nap!"

I woke up in the shade an hour later and quickly got back to training. With my chakra completely replenished, I was able to practice another 20 times if I wanted to. To my delight, it didn't take that many tries for me to finally stick to the tree. After 15 more attempts, my feet finally stayed firmly in place on the tree bark as I did my best impression of Spider-Man and defied gravity!

*Achievement Unlocked: Treewalking! +500 XP!*

*+500 Spirit XP!*

*+500 Tech XP!*

*Tech has reached Rank 2 / 20*

*Spirit has reached Rank 2 / 20*

My eyes widened in surprise and I couldn't keep the grin off my face. Two of my Stats just reached Rank 2 and I was halfway to reaching Level 2. On top of that, my chakra capacity doubled when Spirit hit Rank 2! Would it double every single time!? I would have an insane amount of chakra by the time it reached Rank 20 if that was the case! It would be over 100 million Chakra Points! I was starting to understand just how amazing the Ninja System could make me one day. I don't know how I came to be paired with it, but I'm really lucky.

*+100 Luck XP!*

Name: Kasumi Hayabusa

Stat Points 0

Perk Points 0

Level 1 (500 / 1000 XP)

Chakra Points 200/200

Body 2 / 20 (80/2000 XP)

Spirit 2 / 20 (50/2000 XP) 

Mind 1 / 20 (630/1000 XP) 

Tech 2 / 20 (20/2000 XP) 

Luck 1 / 20 (200/1000 XP) 

"I think I'm going to go on my first mission tomorrow," I said to myself while glancing over all the new available perks that had just unlocked. There was one in Tech that I was particularly interested in, and I needed enough XP to level up so I could get it.

The perk is called Almost Lethal. Its details said that it grants the basics for Taijutsu, Kenjutsu, and Shurikenjutsu.

When Konohamaru mentioned practicing with his shuriken earlier, I realized that my own combat capabilities aren't just lacking—they are basically non-existent. That would need to be rectified as soon as possible. 

"That's a tomorrow problem, though! For now, I'm going to head back home and show off my newest skill to Ryu!" I managed to master Tree Walking in a single day!