The Start of the Day

Akimaru woke up at 6:00am that morning. He wanted to lie in bed for a few more hours, but he knew he had to get going if he wanted to learn all the jutsu he had assigned himself in one day. Silently slipping on his ninja clothes, and folding up his pyjamas on his made bed he left the room. Doors. Doors often betrayed Akimaru's stealth schemes. The sliding doors often made such a racket when he slid them open. Bracing himself, Akimaru slid the door open. It made a noise like leather being rubbed on gushing wind. Akimaru winced, and slipped through the door. He took a few steps past his parents' paper door, incase one of them was awake and saw his shadow. Concentrating some chakra to his ear, Akimaru listened to see if he could hear one of his parents awake or something unatural. As soon as he did, he could easily hear two sets of rhymatic breathing, hidden behind his father's snores. He slid the door shut, leaving it open a crack for when he should return, if his parents were not up by then.

Akimaru jumped on the stair rail and slid down it, coming to a feline landing on the carpet. He walked in to the kitchen, and took a bowl out of the cupboard. Not wanting to place the ceramic bowl on the ceramic kitchen surface, he took his bowl of muesli in to the living room, lay down his futon, and happily lapped up his healthy breakfast. He was going to need as much energy as possible for today. Enjoying the burst of flavour in his cereal from all the different fruits and grains, Akimaru was finished within a couple of minutes. Grabbing his backpack from beside the house door, he gently opened it, and embrace the fresh, morning air of Konohagakure no Sato.

Akimaru closed the door behind him, and couldn't supress a sigh of relief at his success to exit the house unnoticed. Since becoming a ninja, his mother had gotten a little more protective of him, due to the fact he was putting himself in danger. But today wasn't dangerous. It was just training. But he doubted his mother would believe him, and he didn't trust her to not end or bothering him or someone else about it, which would put his father in a bad mood. Akimaru glanced up at the Hokage Building, and wondered whether the Hokage was up and working already. He doubted it, but couldn't help wondering. His eyes strayed from behind the building, to the mountain face with all the previous Hokages' faces imprinted on it. Akimaru changed course, towards the mountain.

Once he reached the bottom, he looked up at the sheer height of the mountain. It would take him at least 20 minutes to take the public footpath up to the top. "Well, I need a ninja warm-up." Akimaru chuckled to himself in his head. Making sure his backpack was firm on his back, he concentrated chakra in the palms of his hands. The blue glow was very mysterious, but Akimaru didn't have time to marvel upon it. He placed his palms against the mountain, and began to climb. As he did, more strain was added as he concentrated chakra in the balls of his feet to aid the speed of his climbing. Making sure to avoid climbing across any Hokage's faces. The sheer thought of it made Akimaru laugh to himself. Within minutes, Akimaru was at the top. Wiping the dust and rock from his hands, he slung his backpack down and centred himself several metres away from the cliff.

Genjutsu Kai

Akimaru walked back to his backpack which was on the ground. He unzipped it, and pulled out a personal scroll. On the top of the list, he had written quite neatly; Genjutsu Kai. The technique to repel genjutsu. One must stop the flow of chakra in their body; then apply a strongy power to disrupt the flow of the opponent's chakra. Pondering on how he was going to do this, Akimaru carefully lay down the scroll next to his backpack. He walked back to where he was originally stood, and thought to himself. After a few moments of determination, Akimaru formed the required hand seal. His eyes were close, and he was concentrating to the best of his ability. His hands were interlocked and pressed firmly together. They started to shake a little from the effort. Akimaru almost felt the flow of chakra come to a slow stop within his body. It felt like holding his breath. Removing his hands and taking a deep breath, Akimaru was sure he had completed the jutsu. But he wanted to be sure.

Akimaru formed a different hand-seal, and created a shadow clone, which appeared faithfully beside him with a small pop. Thankfully, Akimaru didn't have to talk to the clone, for it to know what he wanted it to do. Because his clone was a shadow clone, it had access to Akimaru's arsenal of jutsu, and a percentage of his chakra. Akimaru braced himself, and repeated his previous steps for Genjutsu Kai, whilst the shadow clone was forming the handseals for Magen: Narakumi no Jutsu. Hearing a strange sound of the leaves being blown in the wind, Akimaru opened his eyes. A tornado of leaves were leveitating in an unnerving way. Not wanting to see what horrifying image his shadow clone had in store for him, Akimaru concentrated very hard on Genjutsu Kai. To his relief, the leaves fell dully to the ground, and disappeared in a puff of smoke, as did his shadow clone. Genjutsu Kai, had been a success.

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Koe no Mozouhin

Returning to the open scroll, which despite a strong burst of wind had stay obidiently where it was, Akimaru scanned it, past the description of Genjutsu Kai, until his eyes lay upon the next jutsu: Koe no Mozouhin. Though it was hardly a jutsu, but merely a ninja skill Akimaru wished to learn, should it become useful for later in life. The user alters their larynx and vocal tract to change the way their voice sounds. Akimaru read off of the page. Knowing what this meant, but not quite sure how to do it, Akimaru set about his vocal training. He used different muscles from different points in his mouth and throat. It was a skill which didn't seem to be coming to him naturally. After 15 minutes of identifying parts of his vocal tract, Akimaru found the area he was looking for. Just below, if pushed it up slightly, his voice went a higher pitch. Testing this out for the next 15 minutes, playing around with words and accents. To his surprise, Akimaru found he could imitate his mother's voice quite well by the end of the training. He was going to have fun with his parents tonight, he could feel it already.

Deciding that if a higher pitch meant pushing up, the logical explanation for a lower pitch would be pulling down. Spending a few moments giving this a try, Akimaru found it harder. It took him a whole twenty minutes to alter the sound of his voice from the lowest it could go naturally. By the end of the hour, however, like the higher pitch, he had mastered it. He managed to imitate his father's voice eventually, but he found it quite difficult because it was quite robust and Akimaru had inherited his voice off of his mother. Testing out different noises and sounds, Akimaru found he could imitate animals as well, though not to such a degree. Happy with his progress, Akimaru decided to move along.

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Kusai

The next jutsu Akimaru was to learn was a single word jutsu. 'Kusai' it was simply called. A technique similar to the Utsusemi no Jutsu. "Utsusemi no Jutsu - I wonder what that is."Akimaru thought to himself as he read the scroll. Shaking his head, he concentrated back on Kusai. He needed to move his scent somewhere else within the vicinity. But how would he know if he succeeded? Deciding to use his earlier tactic, he create a shadow clone. Like before, the shadow clone knew what Akimaru wanted it to do. It closed it's eyes, whilst Akimaru hid in a nearby bush. He then used Kusai to emit chakra from his body, carrying his scent to a nearby tree. Sure enough, when the shadow clone tried to find Akimaru via smell alone, he walked over to the tree where Akimaru's scent was hovering, and began swinging his arms. Akimaru couldn't help but giggle. His shadow clone did look rather peculiar. Remembering some of the later jutsu Akimaru had to learn he decided he would recap Kusai a little later, to see if it could work to a larger degree.

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Utsusemi no Jutsu

Walking back to the scroll again, Akimaru thought to himself. "This is getting rather repititive." That was until he saw the name of a jutsu which was familiar. Utsusemi no Jutsu. Akimaru read off the page. Where had he heard that before? "Kusai!" Akimaru exclaimed, the first time he had spoken that morning, and it was without warning so it was no surprise that his voice cracked a little upon such immediate use. Scanning quickly through the description of Kusai, Akimaru read the sentence; A technique similar to the Utsusemi no Jutsu. Smiling to himself, he decided it was time to discovered just what Utsusemi no Jutsu did. Reading the description of the jutsu, Akimaru smiled. It was quite similiar to Kusai. Deciding to use the same tactic, Akimaru created yet another shadow clone. This method of his seemed to help train a lot of jutsu.

Once again, a familiar scene was upon them. The clone closed it's eyes and tried to locate Akimaru, this time using sound alone. Even Akimaru was surprised at the awesomeness of this jutsu, and it was his favourite one he had learnt so far in the day. He could feel his throat vibrating when he spoke, yet he could hear the sound from different places in the vicinity. It was a very odd sensation, but enjoyable nontheless. After Akimaru made his voice trail along a nearby river, and his shadow clone fell in, much to his amusement yet sadness, Akimaru decided his training for this jutsu was over.

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Hakken no Jutsu

With new energy spurring through his body due to the fun he had had with Utsusemi no Jutsu, Akimaru jogged lightly back to his backpack, picked up the scroll and rapidly began to scan the page for his next jutsu. His eyes were somewhat of a blur as they scanned the page very quickly. After a few seconds, he found the one he was looking for. Hakken no Jutsu. "Now this is a C-Rank Jutsu." Akimaru told himself. "So it's going to be a step up from the ones earlier." Ready for the challenge, Akimaru stood up. He was ready, and he knew what to do. Akimaru closed his eyes, and began to feel his chakra flowing throughout his body. Concentrating harder than he had done with Genjutsu Kai, Akimaru concentrated his chakra towards his nose. He knew he was succeeding due to the fact that smells were becoming more prominent. He kept on concentrating, until he could smell new odours behind the stronger ones.

Perhaps getting a little too carried away, Akimaru snorted and some mucus fell to the floor. Disgusted at himself, Akimaru washed it away with some of his suiton chakra. He had concentrated too much chakra to his nose, causing an odour to become too much for his nose to handle. He wanted to make sure his nose didn't bleed, so he sat for a while reading the scroll. No blood came, so after a quarter of an hour he assumed he was safe to try again. This time, being more wary of the smells around him, Akimaru began to concentrate chakra to his nose. It was at a slower rate than before. He began to smell delicious smells, such as ramen, fresh grass and he could swear he could even smell the wind and water. Things which should not have odour. Akimaru's stomach panged liked a pendulum. He looked at his watch. It was midday, he had been training for at least 4 hours. With all his breaks and reading, and the fact he probably hadn't started until 6:30am. Deciding to take the public footpath down the mountain, he hid his backpack in a bush, and took some ryou out of it and went to a ramen bar in the village. He would've normally gone home, but he wanted to finish his training before his mother tried to prevent him from going out again. Although Akimaru was extremely quite, he was still outgoing.

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Jibaku Fuda: Kassei

Akimaru very much enjoyed his ramen. It was not long though before he was paying the bar owner and making his way back up to the top of the mountain. He decided to use the pulic footpath again, and let his food settle. It was quite an enjoyable experience, actually. The walk lasted 20 minutes up a slope, and Akimaru felt refreshed, and ready to train. He pulled his backpack out from a nearby bush and pulled his scroll out of the bag. His next jutsu to practice was the activation of exploding tags. Deciding to use his favourite method of a shadow clone, Akimaru created one, and gave it 10 exploding tags. Akimaru sat down and read until his clone returned, which happened to be around 10 minutes. The shadow clone had hidden the 10 exploding tags around the area. Akimaru could've just used the jutsu to blow them all up now, but that was a risk, he didn't know how close each exploding tag could be. He snapped his book shut, and put it back in his backpack. Akimaru stood up, and scanned the area, looking for the tags. He saw one on a nearby tree. Deciding where he was sat was a safe enough distance, Akimaru concentrated on that exploding tag, and that exploding tag alone, and concentrated his chakra.

To his surprise, not only did that exploding tag detonate, blowing the tree it was on to smithereens and sending bark all over the place, but there was a moderate splash in the river beside it. When Akimaru went to investigate, he realised there had been an exlpoding tag in the river, which had also exploded, even though Akimaru hadn't meant it to. "I need to concentrate more." Akimaru thought harshly to himself. It wasn't long before Akimaru saw another exploding tag, laying simply of the floor. Staying a safe distance from it, Akimaru concentrated as hard as he could, activating his chakra, and the explosion with occured was controlled, even if it did cause the ground to shake. Akimaru was pleased at his success. He had made that exploding tag explode, and that one alone. Akimaru had destroyed 3 exploding tags, which left 7. As he made progress, he only made the mistake of blowing up 2 instead of 1 once more. But at least there was room for mistakes. Towards the end, after getting 5 successful explosions in a row, Akimaru felt confident with this jutsu.

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Kawara Shuriken

Akimaru was now well over half way past the jutsu he wanted to train. It was now 2:30pm, and the sun was blazing over the mountain he was training on. Akimaru's next jutsu, however, was going to be the hardest to pratice. It required roof tiles, and he doubted any good citizens of Konoha would donate parts of their roofs to his training. With a sigh, Akimaru went at sat at the mountain face. He had an aerial view of Konoha and could see the village sprung in to life with it's daily hustle and bustle. Seeing his hometown like this made Akimaru smile. Until he saw something undesirable. An old lady who had just left the cafe was unfortunate enough to be knocked over by a adolescent. The teen seemed to be about 16, and was running. He didn't seem to care he had knocked the frail old woman over. Akimaru frowned. His eyes widened in shock as he watched the boy come to a dead end, yet this didn't stop him. He ran up the side of a house, grabbed on to the upstairs window sill and pulled himself on to the roof. The old woman seemed to be trying desperately to persure the young man but he was too agile. Akimaru had seen enough, standing up, he launched himself off of the top of the mountain into a majestic dive. He span around, and concentrated chakra into the souls of his ninja sandals.

As he came to the end of his air dive, he heard people shouting as they saw him. It must look like a suicide attempt to them. Fighting against the force of gravity, Akimaru pulled himself upwards mid air just in time for his feet to land on a roof. It seemed like slow motion to Akimaru. The roof tiles around him popped up out of position, and within his reach. The thief was across the street, running across the roofs of residents houses. Grabbing three of the roof tiles, Akimaru lobbed all of them in quick succession, one medium, one high and one low. The first roof tile hit the thief in the stomach, causing him to be winded and slow down, the second smashed across his face, so blood came pouring down his face. The third, hit him in the shins, and he dropped to the floor. Akimaru jumped across the street beside his body. He was clearly unconcious. Akimaru deisregarded him and grabbed the handbag he had stolen. He returned it back to the woman who wouldn't let him refuse the ryou she shoved in his hand. Knowing one of the good citizens would report the incident, the thief would be trialed for what he had done. Feeling happy with himself for doing a good deed, Akimaru checked Kawara Shuriken off of his to do list.

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Chakuranōdo [Chakra Concentration]

Akimaru looked down at his final two jutsu. Chakra Concentration was the first of the two. Having flashbacks of the day, Akimaru felt like he had already accomplished this by scaling the cliff face as a warm-up. But sticking to his own rules, he decided he better get in a little more practice just to make sure he had fully mastered the jutsu. Akimaru walked over to the nearby river, concentrated an equal amount of chakra in the souls of his feet and stepped gingerly on to the water. He never got over the sensation it gave him, walking on water. It was always the same, yet different everytime. As if everytime was the first time. Doing a couple of laps on the water confirmed Akimaru still had this skill with him, so he stepped out on to land again. He found some nearby trees, and began to climb, his hands sat firmly behind his back, so he wasn't tempted to cheat. He even let off a little steam and jumped from tree to tree, securing each jump with only his feet.

When he had finished, Akimaru had a triumphant look about him. He read the description of the jutsu, and noticed something else. The user successfully concentrates chakra to one part of their body, be it for increased strength or control. Though walking on water and climbing trees were both useful ninja skills, Akimaru felt like increased stength was a little more interesting. Following the steps written on the scroll, Akimaru walked over to a nearby rock, wedged in the ground. Akimaru had never really been confident in his strength, which is why he never really followed up in Taijutsu. However, he looked at the rock with a determined look. Despite himself, he couldn't help but imagine it was Akira's face. He had concentrated the chakra within his knuckles and let out all the rage which had haunted him the past couple of weeks which, admittedly, wasn't much. It was enough. The rock crumbled to pieces before his very eyes, and even Akimaru couldn't help but be surprised.

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Kanzen Na Chakurano Kontorōru [Complete Chakra Concentration]

As he looked at the rubble left behind from the rock, Akimaru wondered if there were any way he could expand on the jutsu. It interested him very greatly, so he began to think about the theory behind it. "When I concentrated the chakra to my knuckles, I shifted chakra from my hands into my knuckles to give my knuckles more strength and more power. But what if I were to simply inflame my chakra, and make it expand? Then sure, I could simultaneously concentrate chakra within every cell in my body!" Akimaru was deep in thought. He had just created a good theoritical explanation behind his own jutsu. It was his first idea for one of his own, so he felt attached to it, and really wanted to make it work. The theory behind the jutsu was that Akimaru would concentrate his chakra at every major part of his body, so his head, torso, arms and legs at the same time. Doing so would cause a lot of his chakra to shift around and expand. With that, his chakra would begin to merge, as if his whole body were just one big vessel for one flow of chakra. It sounded great within theory, as this would grant him extreme power, speed, even intelligence as he was concentrating chakra in his brain. But even at this point, Akimaru knew it would come with it's drawbacks. Such as the amount of chakra it would use.

"I can't let that hold me back!" Akimaru thought angrily to himself. "This is my own creation! I have to see it through!" With new determination, Akimaru braced himself for a plunge into the unknown. He stood up, and without his control, his body tensed. He closed his eyes, and formed a hand seal, gripping both his hands together. His eyes opened, and he was set. He slowly began to concentrate the chakra in the four main areas of his body. He could feel it happening. He really wanted to back out at this point. But he didn't. "This is dangerous." Akimaru thought wildly to himself. He kept concentrating, and concentrating. It was weird, the task became easier, yet harder. He supposed it was because of the chakra in his brain pulsing his intelligence along, yet the task itself becoming more difficult. His body began to get hotter and hotter. After a few moments it felt like he was on fire. But the pain was distance. It was if he had taken painkillers. Scared, but unable to stop, Akimaru felt himself tense even more. He looked down, and it was as if his body had been engulfed in blue flames. He stood strong, his hair became more prominent and pointy and on end. His eyes became wider, as did his nostrils.

Then, Akimaru really tested himself. He began to punch away at the next mountain along. As he became more ferocious, the cracks he was making became larger. His strength was incredible compared to what it was before. He found himself able to react to what he was thinking before he had even finished thinking it. And his speed, was phenomenal. The pain however, was getting more prominent now, but Akimaru prentended he didn't noticed it. It was as if the painkillers were fading. He couldn't ignore it anymore, when his nose began to bleed. He had never felt so strong, yet so weak. His vision became hazy, and he began to sway. His eyelids slowly closed, and he fell to the ground in a heap.

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The Next Day

Akimaru woke up to the sound of birds chirping in the nearby trees. The ones he hadn't destroyed. Upon this sight, Akimaru felt a pang of guilt. He had destroyed the homes of the wildlife that lived here. But, where was here? Akimaru sat up, and his head felt like it had split in two. His vision blurred, Akimaru blinked away tears. Rubbing his eyes, everything came in to focus a bit more. He was on top of the Hokage Mountain. "But why?" he thought to himself, bewildered. Then he saw his backpack and the scroll. "Did- did I come up here to train?" Akimaru asked himself. Sliding over to the scroll, he read the jutsu that were written there. As he got to the last one; Kanzen Na Chakurano Kontorōru [Complete Chakra Concentration], his memory flooded back. How he had exerted all of his chakra too fast, and left himself unconcious. "How stupid." he thought sadly, shaking his head. It hurt, so he stopped. But at least now Akimaru knew the dangers behind his jutsu. It was very useful, and made him much faster, more agile, stronger, quick-witted. But this all came at a price. His chakra, and a short amount of time to use the jutsu. He decided he would save this jutsu, and only use it to protect himself, or someone dear to him. Glad of the experiences he had had the day before, Akimaru smiled. He was still stiff and a little tired, but he got up. He walked over to the river, and washed his face. He felt much fresher for doing so.

As he set off home, he decided to save time by repeating what he had done yesterday and diving off of the mountain. Just as he though about if people were watching him again this time, he wondered what the time was, he knew it was dawn, so he guessed around 5:00am. A look at his watch told him he was correct. His parents would be worried sick about him. As he got to his house, he slipped in silently, and saw a note on the table. "YOU ARE IN SO MUCH TROUBLE." was all it said. Akimaru pulled a pen out of his backpack and wrote. "Sorry." and a smiley face. Then he slung his backpack aside, ran silently up the stairs, and clambered in to bed, for another 3 hours sleep.