Pact2

Even before the first ray of sunlight broke through the shadows of Hell Valley, Riki was already awake, the dense silence of dawn broken only by the rhythmic sound of his breathing as he got up with the precision of someone following a ritual.

The pale moonlight still filtered through the wooden slats of the shōji, drawing silver stripes on the floor and illuminating the sleeping contours of his five friends.

The futons were scattered in disorder throughout the room, with bodies wrapped in thin blankets and vague dreams. But Riki, alert as a predator in a silent forest, moved nimbly among them, dodging Kaede's arms, Satoru's loose leg, and Hina's disheveled hair that spread like a net over the tatami.

As soon as he reached the door and began to prepare himself in the hallway, tying his training bracelets and tying his red hair in a high knot, a familiar voice reached him, soft and awake:

"Hey... guys." Akari stood up with a half sigh, sitting on the futon. "I think Riki is getting ready for one of his famous morning trainings..."

"I noticed." Kaede replied, already fully awake, her amber eyes vivid despite her recent sleep. "I wonder if he'd let us come with him?"

"Oh, shut up... I'm sleeping..." Came Renji's muffled grumble, turning to his side and burying his face in the pillow.

"Renji, when you yell, you wake everyone up..." Hina murmured, still between sleep and wakefulness.

"Come on, let's train with Riki today!" Satoru exclaimed with his usual energy, jumping to his feet, his crimson hair disheveled and his golden eyes shining.

When Riki returned to the room, he found his friends standing, some already stretching their arms, others yawning silently.

"Are you awake?" he asked, surprised, but with a slight smile.

"Yes. We will train with you today." Satoru replied, crossing his arms with conviction.

Riki looked at everyone's nightclothes and frowned slightly.

"You can't train like this. Wait, I'll go get something more appropriate."

Before he could take the first step, Akemi's calm and firm voice reached them from the hallway.

"Good morning, children," she said, with her motherly tone and graceful posture.

"Good morning, auntie!" they all responded in unison, bowing briefly.

"I see you've decided to train with Riki." Hina, Akari, come with me, I have some clothes that will fit you better than my son's male attire.

The two girls followed her, smiling discreetly. A few minutes later, everyone was standing in front of the Uzumaki house, wrapped in simple training clothes, but reinforced in the right places, ready to withstand the friction of the rocks and the dense humidity of the valley.

The trail to the training ground crossed the heart of the Valley of Hell, but for them, children of that parched and steaming soil, it was just the usual path, dark and twisted rocks, cut by small veins of sulfur and hot vapors, made up the landscape. There was no vegetation, only burnt earth and constant mist.

The air, heavy and salty, was part of everyday life, and the young people's footsteps sounded determined against the uneven ground.

Arriving at the central plateau, a wide space between the black basalt rock formations, Riki stopped, watching the sky that was beginning to redden on the horizon like burning embers under ashes.

"Let's start with a warm-up, endurance run, three laps around the central gorge," he ordered naturally.

Without hesitation, the five of them began to run. The terrain was uneven, demanding care and technique, but none of them seemed at a disadvantage. Akari kept a steady and precise pace; Satoru, swift as the wind, made turns with explosive energy. Hina ran lightly, as if floating; Kaede, focused, kept pace with calculated precision; even Renji, with his dark mood, kept up the cadence like a hardened soldier.

Back at the center, after sweat began to wet their collars, Riki snapped his fingers.

— Now, conditioning, basic stance, thirty minutes, then kunai training.

Everyone positioned themselves naturally, the sequence was familiar, and even though it was exhausting, none of them backed down. Riki walked among them, correcting angles, suggesting minor adjustments, it was almost as if they had been training together for years.

When he passed Akari, she glanced at him, her scarlet eyes shining under the steam.

— Do you train every day like this… alone?

— Every day. He answered, without hesitation. — If we are going to rebuild something… we cannot do it weakly.

Hina nodded silently. Kaede gave him a firm look, the idea was already there, silent, germinating.

Riki then took out some kunai and began to demonstrate throwing them at targets marked on the stones with red paint. He didn't just want them to hit, he wanted them to predict the movement, to read the target's intention.

There, on the gray field soaked in vapors, there was no room for hesitation; it was a training session between equals, young people, yes! But shaped by the iron, ash and blood of a world that demands power to preserve what it loves.

And that was only the beginning.

The sharp whine of the kunai tearing through the air filled the rocky field like the metallic song of a storm; the weapons stuck hard into the dry rocks, echoing with a hollow sound among the volcanic formations; the red marks on the stones, painted by Riki before the start, represented targets, but not just for the eyes.

He had positioned them to test his friends' intuition, demanding that each one feel the moment of the shot, and not just see it.

"You must learn to throw with intention, not just precision," he said, picking up a kunai that had bounced off. Intention precedes movement; when the mind decides, chakra already flows. And the opponent feels it.

Satoru twirled a kunai on his finger before throwing it in a fluid motion. It hit the target squarely in the center, with a sharp impact.

"How's that?" he asked with a proud smile.

"Good. Now repeat... with your eyes closed!"

Satoru arched an eyebrow, but obeyed, took a deep breath, twirled the blade, concentrated, and threw.

The kunai hit a few inches from the target.

"Not bad," Riki muttered. "But you're relying on your vision, all of you are. The enemy won't wait for you to see, he'll act when you feel fear."

Renji crossed his arms, watching skeptically.

"This is more about meditation than combat."

"Wrong!" Riki replied. "It's about survival." He raised a kunai and pointed it at a high point in the rock formation, a narrow cut between two black rocks that formed a sort of natural gorge.

— Moving target, double throw, jump, trajectory correction.

— Hina, Kaede, you go first.

Hina and Kaede looked at each other, without hesitation, they took position, and Hina jumped first, light as a breath of wind, and threw two kunai in succession.