SC Training

Age : 32 Posts : 1178

After deciding that he would stick around in the land of fire for a few more days, the young Uchiha had started wandering through the forests and woodlands as a means of mapping everything in his mind. As a navigator, finding his way was never that hard for him while his advanced mind had no trouble memorizing every step of the way. Even though he had no reason for doing what he was doing right now, he believed it to be a good thing if someone took the time to study their surroundings to the best of their abilities. Figuring that there might be people from the Hidden Cloud coming to try and take him back to the village once they found him, he figured that he would have the upper hand if he knew the surroundings better than the people coming after him. Earlier, Hiruzen had been doing a bit of helping with retrieving a lost heirloom for someone living in the Hidden Leaf. At the time, he had been told that the people that had attacked and forced the original courier to hide the heirloom so it would not fall into the wrong hands while he made his escape had all been rounded up and got sent off to prison. While it was what he had been told, Hiruzen himself had come to find out that it was just a lie told to the people of the Hidden Leaf so they would not be afraid to venture outside of the village.

When the Uchiha was wandering through the woodlands to improve the information on the map he had inside of his mind, he had come across several signs that made it seem like there was still a fair amount of activity in the deeper reaches of the fire country on the way to the northern border. Having passed by a small town that seemed to exist out of no more than just a farmland, a farm and a couple of buildings, he had heard some stories that he believed were worth investigating. Going by their stories, people had often come to the village at night while taking cattle or other supplies from the otherwise defenseless village. Though shinobi often came by to check the place out and defend it from harm, it seemed that the people that came to steal their belongings always knew when to strike when there were no shinobi around. Having that much kept in the back of his head while he was memorizing the terrain, things got more interesting the further he left the civilized world behind him. The more he looked into things, he saw that whoever these people were, they were hunting down the local wildlife and only partially ate it, leaving the remnants of what had once been an animal to rot in the sun. Noticing several tracks that had been left by rather heavy individuals walking on a moist terrain, it was not that hard for Hiruzen to figure out where he had to go if he wanted to find out which people had left these tracks.

Though he already knew exactly what he was tracking in this case, he wondered if there would be a lot of them. Going by the stories he had heard, he had already established that some of the people in this place were rather organized and up to date on the routines of the Konoha shinobi. To him, it meant that they had either been spending a lot of time watching the groups of shinobi that worked outside of the village or had a man on the inside that fed them information. Constantly following the tracks, he eventually managed to find a small group of men that had apparently not heard of his approach. That said, no one knew that he was coming or who he was, so they had no reason to keep an eye out for him. Once he had gotten close enough to read their chakra levels, he had established that only one of them was above what he believed to be roughly around the average Chuunin. Sending out a sharp whistle, Hiruzen made an attempt at drawing their attention to him, giving them a clear sign as to him being a hostile target and a threat to them. Taking note of two men of a tall yet slender figure, one with a brutish appearance and one wearing an attire that covered most of his physical features, it was to be expected that he was also the owner of the larger chakra pool. Activating his Sharingan, he gestured at his enemies to come at him with a smirk on his face. Obviously striking at a nerve, one of the men came at him with a make-shift blade that seemed to have been made out of a piece of steel with a sharpened edge.

While it was far from a professional weapon, Hiruzen acknowledged the damage such a weapon could inflict upon him and was not all that high on getting hit. Hiruzen knew the dangers of getting hit by such a weapon, that his life would be over if he was to get himself cleaved by it, though that did not manage to kill the anxiety he felt. It had been quite some time since he had been in an actual fight like this, which made him believe that he would be having a fair amount of fun. Through his Sharingan, he looked on as the blade came in for a horizontal strike aimed at his shoulder and neck. With but a little bit of effort, he managed to evade the attack by dodging as fast as he could. Back when Hiruzen had first sparred against the Raikage, he felt that while his eyes managed to grasp the movement pattern of his enemy, his body had trouble keeping up with the Sharingan. Looking on as the man used the momentum of the strike that had missed to turn around and come in with another attack coming from above as a means of cleaving Hiruzen in the head or the shoulder, he clearly saw that this kind of adversary was using a combination of brute force and skill, yet lacked speed all together. While the wisest thing to do would have been to use the periods between the swings of the blade in order to strike him down, Hiruzen saw it as a chance to see just how far he could push his body in terms of evasiveness.

Normally, Hiruzen ended a fight before it had a chance to escalate too far beyond the point of containing it, though this was not one of those times. Following every move made against him with perfect accuracy, he let his body move itself out of harms way as soon as his eyes managed to predict the trajectory of the incoming attacks. The longer it took, the more aggressive the man became, occasionally mixing his strikes with a punch or a kick to push the Uchiha into the range of his sword. Unfortunately, the brutish attacks, while strong and well executed were way too slow to ever hit someone like Hiruzen. Hearing the amused laughter of his friends, the man just became all the more angry to the point where he was just leaving himself full of exploitable openings. Being done with this training, he was ready to step it up a notch. Side-stepping a final strike, Hiruzen put another step in and landed a punch on the man's throat, causing him to step back and start gasping for air for several moments before he passed out. Turning his eyes to the remaining three, he wondered what would happen next.

[[Tier II] Enhanced Evasiveness - 1282/1200]

Age : 32 Posts : 1178

As soon as the heavy man with the sword fell to the ground, the laughter suddenly stopped once they believed that their accomplice had been killed. Though the disguised man did not seem to be too affected by it, the two accomplices seemed rather impressed and worried about the fate of their comrade. With one of the men taken out, he wondered if he could coerce the others into acting rashly as well. For a moment, it seemed like the tall men planned on engaging him, though that was instantly cut short by the other man raising an arm, ordering them to stand down without using a single word. If nothing else, it proved to Hiruzen that this guy was truly in charge here and that he was either respected or feared enough to just order his men around like trained hounds. To the young Uchiha, it proved that the man was quite something and would most likely be a lot of fun to play with. Unfortunately for him, it did not seem like the man had any plans of fighting against the Uchiha that was currently nothing more than an unknown factor that messed up whatever he was doing. With his attention on Hiruzen, the two just stood there looking at each other. Though Hiruzen's physical features were quite visible, the leader of the group had his entire body covered in a black robe with a hood, a face mask, gloves and even closed sandals, leaving everything about him to the imagination. Once he started talking, Hiruzen listened just as closely as the two almost identical lackeys.

"I don't know who you are or what you want, but I do not appreciate it when someone walks up to me, taunts and mocks me and strikes down one of my people in such an effortless manner. The name is Ichimaru Gantenjima, but that is all you'll need to know. Ichiro, Nichiro, if you would be so kind as to do your job. I'll be on my way, return to the rendezvous point once you've taken care of this pest. After all, we wouldn't want to keep our contractor waiting too long now would we?".

With that, the disguised man bowed at Hiruzen and turned around, leaving the two tall and skinny men behind to deal with the Uchiha. Judging by how confident the man was, he did not stay around long enough to fight with the remaining members of his crew. Even though Hiruzen had some questions for the man as to why they were here and why they were stealing from villagers when they were all fairly skilled shinobi by the looks of it, he figured he would most likely get that chance at a later point. Just like he had gotten interested in the man that just left the scene, he had started getting interested in this contractor that he was speaking of, the one they did not want to keep waiting for too long. Once the leader of the group disappeared out of sight, Hiruzen was confident enough in his own skills to say that he would find the man again. For now, his focus was set on the duo of shinobi that were now preparing their weaponry. Taking note of the hip bags filled with Kunai, the scrolls on their back and the Shuriken that were in a small mechanized holder just below their wrist. Sinking his body into a lowered stance, he would be ready to move out as soon as his new adversaries chose to come at him. With the same grin still on his face, he was looking forward to seeing how well these guys would do in a two versus one battle. After a momentary stare-down, the twins both picked a side of Hiruzen and moved around him in a wide arc while using the mechanism mounted onto their wrist to fire Shuriken at him.

Figuring that it would be best if he traced his steps back to the woodland behind him, he did not want to stay out in the open against projectile weapon users. Turning around and dashing onto a branch not too far ahead of him, the Uchiha kept moving while using the treeline for cover. Though he could only keep his eye on one of them at a time, he had to rely on his ability to sense chakra to vaguely tell him where the other one had gone. Trying to reach for his own Kunai so he would have a weapon that could help him deflect incoming projectiles, the amount of hostile steel flying through the air made it just about impossible for Hiruzen to reach down and grab one. Feeling a little like an own that constantly had to turn his head just to keep up with both attackers and attempt to read the trajectory of their weapons with his Sharingan, it was about the only thing he could do right now. Maintaining his evasive maneuvers, he moved from branch to branch with moves that would put the average circus acrobat to shame. Using both his arms and his legs to move, he flipped through the air, caught on to branches with his hands and used them to swing him back to the next, all the while tossing and turning in ways that might appear strange to those that were keeping their eyes on him. To Hiruzen, they made perfect sense as he established that moving in such a manner would allow him to barely dodge the path the Kunai and Shuriken would travel down, thus remaining unhurt at the cost of being incapable of retaliating.

For now, it would be the best thing to do, at least until he found a better place where he could temporarily find cover. With all of the speed he had, he kept moving, trying to maintain a certain distance that granted him the time he needed in order to process the incoming attacks and evade them as well as could be expected. It was not long after that that he managed to finally spot a thick tree that could easily be used to hide his entire body behind for a moment or two. Deciding to make a move and get towards it, he would be able to start going on the offensive. When one of the Kunai finally got close enough to him to cut a piece of cloth out of his sleeve, Hiruzen had seen enough of their fighting style to know that it was about time to turn the tables. Reaching the tree, Hiruzen waited one moment while closing his eyes and forming seals, allowing his sensory ability to tell him exactly where he would be able to find his targets. With a few high paced seals and a puff of smoke, a second Hiruzen made it into existence. With the other Hiruzen standing next to him, they both reached for a Kunai in order to defend themselves from any other incoming attacks. Right before he stepped around the corner to show himself to his attackers, he had one short statement that he wanted to get across to them as a means of intimidation.

"You want to fight like this? Fine, lets see how you like it if you lose the upper hand...".

Evening the odds, Hiruzen went after the enemy on the left while his clone took the one on the right. With both of their Sharingan active, the twin attackers seemed rather annoyed with this turn of events. Proceeding to make the distance between Hiruzen and his clone even bigger, they picked up the pace and dashed back, all the while firing Kunai and Shuriken at vital areas. Now that they had been separated, the two trained assassins no longer had the upper hand that allowed them to attack from two sides at the same time. Rushing over to their respective enemies while evading the projectiles out of his reach and knocking those he could get to away with his own Kunai, he finally got within range. As soon as he got close enough, he cut at the mechanism under the man's wrist, disabling the ability to fire high paced Shuriken. Following it up with several punches aimed at his target's chest and the side of his head, he ducked under a punch that came at him with a wide arc, making it all too easy for Hiruzen to dodge it altogether. Ending his assault with a well placed shot to the side of his groin with his knee, the man lost his balance. Wasting no time, Hiruzen then grabbed him by the hair on the back of his head, pulled it and angled his face just about well enough for him to capture the man with the power of his Sharingan. Inside of his mind, the man started getting stabbed by stakes that held him in place. Noticing that his Genjutsu had set in, he looked over into the distance before a rush of memories made it's way back to the Uchiha.

Receiving the memories his clone had sent to him before it had dispelled itself, it seemed that he too had made quite the effort to close the distance, knock out his target and tie him up with wire once he had been knocked unconscious. Though it was not all that much, the memories he received from the clone in terms of dodging the attacks and deflected incoming projectiles to the best of it's abilities did help Hiruzen. It did so by giving some insight in how to improve his evasive maneuvers whenever he had to rely on them again in the future. With his Sharingan locked on the eyes of the assassin, he extracted every bit of information he needed from him about the whereabouts of their base of operations, crimes they committed in the past and were plotting for the near future and everything else he knew. Though Hiruzen could not figure out any information about the elusive contractor, he did know where to find the rendezvous point that they had mentioned earlier. If he moved quickly, chances were that he would get to the leader of the group before he would move on without the rest of his crew. Taking a bit of the time he had left to tie up the large man with the cleaver sword and the other assassin that had currently been left unbound, Hiruzen made his way back into the treeline to continue the hunt for the leader. While it seemed strange that he would run into something like this when hunting down bandits, the Uchiha did not mind. After all, this was just the thing he needed to sharpen his skills.

[[Tier III] Advanced Evasiveness - 1789/1600]