Chapter 8

It only took Sano two more attempts at making explosion tags before she remembered that she still had the 10% chakra sealing tag on. After quickly looking over her shoulder to make sure nobody would notice, she hastily removed the tag and shoved it into her bag.

That could have been bad…

Explosion tags were not simple tools you messed around with. Make a mistake and at best you get a dud. At worst, you blow yourself up. Koji’s missing arm and leg were a good example of what could happen if you created explosive tags without caution. The next few tags were made more easily thanks to her chakra returning to its baseline. She didn’t need to wrestle it for control against the chakra seals any longer, which increased her speed and eased the strain of her focus.

After an hour, she felt like her chakra was dipping into the ‘unsafe’ territory and took a small break. If Koji came and complained about her taking a break, then he could complain all he wanted to uncle Jogan when the shift was over. Jiraya, her books, and everything she had learned during her time alive had stressed the dangers of what she was doing. She wasn’t going to rush ahead and put both herself and those in the garage at danger due to recklessness.

She grabbed a small bag of dried fish chips from her bag and pulled down her facemask to snack during her break, watching the others in the garage work as her chakra regenerated. She could have meditated, but believe or not, meditation also took mental focus. It was best that she relaxed normally and saved her focus for making tags.

The group manning the forge, as best as she could tell, didn’t use any chakra during the smithing of ninja tools. For some reason, she had thought that they’d use some secret ninja-forging technique to make special weapons… In hindsight, it was kinda a silly thought. They were here making the standard issue kunai and shuriken for the village ninja, not custom made tools! They would hide their secret ninja forging techniques for the special stuff, surely.

The two teens sharpening the finished tools also didn’t use any ninja magic, only elbow grease, skill, and time. One of them must have sensed her gaze as she watched on, as he locked eyes with her for a moment before nodding and getting back to work. Instead of sharpening a kunai, he dipped a starkly clean cloth into a clay pot filled with some sort of oil, then ran the cloth along a finished kunai.

By time she finished her snack and was feeling much better chakra wise, he had moved onto wrapping a thin bandage looking wrap around the handle for a grip.

The next two hours, along with another break in between, went by as she churned out explosive tags as safely as she could. Her fingers were still clean as could be, not having any ink spray from exactly where she wanted. If someone making seals or tags got ink on their hands during the creation process, they were not long for the world. That was the kind of slop that got you killed.

It was right at the third hour when she was preparing to take another break that Koji returned to check on her. His eyes took in her immaculate workstation and the small pile of five tags tucked off to the side—her ‘unsure’ pile. “Any trouble?”

‘No.’ She signed once she was sure that he could see her hands. ‘I took breaks. That is okay?’

Koji continued his inspection, looking through several of her completed tags. “You do what you need to do. As long as the work gets done in a reasonable timeframe, I won’t complain.” He tapped his one good hand onto her stack of completed tags. “These are solid and you’re making good time. Do another hour and then you can head on home. Show up after class everyday. If you don’t have class, then you take the day off.”

‘Okay.’ She signed before taking out her bento-box. She popped open the lid, revealing her rice, roasted salmon, and tiny side of vegetables. It was a simple dinner, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t tasty or filling.

After eating, she finished up the last hour of her work, cleaned her workstation, then took her ‘maybe’ pile into the safety room to blow some of them up! She knew how to activate the tag, as she made them. The whirlpool marking in the center was the activation trigger. Pulse a bit of chakra inside and its ‘fuse’ begins. The fuse wasn’t any sort of carefully timed thing either. The timing of the explosion was solely based on the failure cascade of the seals themselves.

Sano grabbed a rock, but after a few seconds of debating on sticking the paper to the rock… she realized she didn’t actually know how to do it. Sticking things to herself was fairly simple. Sticking objects onto other objects once it left her sense of touch wasn’t something she dabbled in.

Not wanting to throw the flimsy bit of paper and have it suddenly flutter right back at her, she hopped the stone safety wall and laid the explosive tag right in the center of the blast room. With a quick poke, she pulsed the activation whirlpool then hurriedly hauled herself over to safety. As soon as her butt bounced on the floor, the room rattling boom blasted outwards, sending tiny pebbles zooming right overhead and lighting the room a bright orange for a quarter of a second.

Rising up, Sano peeked her equally bright orange eyes over the lip of the safety wall. Just like the explosion at the start of the day, all that was left in the center of the boom room was a blackened circle. Judging that her other tags would probably be fine, she only blew up one more… for testing purposes only—Definitely not just for fun…

Heh…

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Tanaka-sensei’s chalk raked across the blackboard as he wrote out the hand seals for the jutsu they’d be practicing today. Sano’s bleary eyes blinked as she did her best to write down some notes and tips Tanaka had provided.

After returning home last night, not wanting to be put behind in her training due to working at the Supply Depot, she’d done her usual several hour long training in the empty training field like usual—this time with one of her new chakra suppressing seals. Training with the seals on was… different. She could do most of the same things as usual, not feeling physically weaker during her taijutsu practice, but ninjutsu slipped through her fingers.

After frustratingly failing using jutsu with even the weakest of the chakra suppressant seals, she eventually called it quits around midnight, having fallen asleep even later than that when she arrived home.

All in all… she was tired today.

“Sano Aburame. Show us what you can do.” Tanaka-sensei called out with a smile as his final swipe across the blackboard resounded around the room.

Sano got up from her seat and stood beside Tanaka, her eyes taking in the handseals written on the board for a final time even though she was confident she could recite them in her sleep. Today, they were practicing the Henge-No-Jutsu, or the Transformation Jutsu. Unlike the clone jutsu, this jutsu transformed the caster into another person or object, using visualization.

At first, Sano had high hopes for the jutsu. Theoretically, you could turn yourself into a sword and become hard as steel to tank a devastating blow. Sadly, while you could turn yourself into a sword, your durability didn’t change past that of your normal body. It had something to do with the physical chakra a person had, although the specifics were often glossed over in class.

The transformation jutsu was often used for infiltration, or at least that is what they’ve been learning it for. You could, with proper casting and a solid image, transform yourself into another person—disguising yourself. This is what they were focusing on today.

Under Tanaka’s and her classmates watchful eyes, Sano blasted through the Dog -> Boar -> Ram hand seals faster than any of her peers could do and mentally called out, ‘Henge-No-Jutsu!’

Her classmates watched on with curious gazes as the chakra smoke sank to the ground by her feet. Unlike her normal state of being, Sano was now much taller, eyes able to match Tanaka-sensei as a peer.

“And who are you?” Tanaka-sensei asked with a proud smile as his eyes roamed over her new form, inspecting it for any errors.

Sadly, even as a new person, she wasn’t able to speak. ‘Kisaragi. He was the iyro-nin who helped me in the hospital.’ She signed.

Not to be mean to Kisaragi, but her former nurse wasn’t a stand-out when it came to appearances. He had simple if slightly spikey brown hair, a fair complexion, warm-brown eyes, and a pleasant smile. Kisaragi could blend in nearly anywhere and not grab too much attention. She chose the appearance he had when they always saw each other, copying his white lab-coat, shoes, tan pants, and all.

“Very good! But you forgot about the minor details, such as his name-tag and the lettering stitched into the coat. Right now, they’re just squiggles. Although, the physical characteristics of the man appear solid! Can you open the lab-coat?” Tanaka-sensei asked.

Sano tried to open the lab-coat by undoing the little ribbon belt that wrapped around the waistline, but it wouldn’t budge. She then peeled back the necklike, peering down the front of her shirt to find that underneath her transformed clothes, she was an inhuman white styrofoam-esque body. She gave Tanaka-sensei a guilty look as she leaned over to show him what she found.

Tanaka-sensei peered down her shirt, which is something no teacher should ever do, and nodded at the findings. “Common mistake, Sano-chan. Still very good for a first attempt. Next, Riba Nara!”

Sano let go of the transformation, poofing into a cloud of smoke as her vision abruptly shot down to her normal height, then passed the Nara girl on her way back to her seat.

Surprisingly, she was actually quite good at the Henge-No-Jutsu! While not the best in the class, she was firmly in the top three students for the jutsu. The worst was Kenji Kurosaki, the boy who had poked fun at Murakuma Kurama during the first day of sparring. The boy had turned into a… blob of limbs and panicked as he didn’t have a mouth. Sensei had to bonk the poor kid on the head to knock him unconscious to forcefully end the transformation.

At least the blob of flesh was cartoonish looking and not more viscerally life-like. That would have scarred the classroom.

After one more round of attempts from each person in the class, with roughly the same results, Tanaka-sensei led everyone out to the sparring field for their daily taijutsu practice. Normally, their small class of fourteen took turns against one another. Today, another class was waiting for them at their normal sparring spot.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Were they doing interclass spars? She thought, lining up in a neat line across from the other class, following the lead of her classmates.

Tanaka-sensei took his place at the head of the line, standing across from what must be a different teacher. The other teacher was also friendly in appearance, with sandy tan hair tied back in a tight bun. He looked to be in his late teens or very early twenties. This new teacher let Tanaka take the lead.

“Yesterday, you all got a chance to use ninja-tools and jutsu in your spars.” Tanaka-sensei’s eyes roamed over the gathered students, making sure they were listening. “Yet, you have always sparred with your own class. You’ve grown accustomed to them and know their fighting styles well. Today, we’re having a little competition!”

Tanaka and the other teacher walked off across the small field they often used for spars and took their spots as judges or arbiters. “Class versus class! A gauntlet! One by one, by your order of choosing, you will enter the ring and spar as normal. Unlike standard sparring, the winner of the spar will remain. The one who lost the spar, will leave the field, and a classmate will take his place. The winners will spar until they lose.”

“You will be able to use any tools or supplies you’ve brought today, as well as any jutsu you have learned.” The other sensei continued on from where Tanaka left off. “Remember! This is for learning and bettering yourself against unknown foes. There is no reward for being the winning class and no punishment for the losing one. You will all stop when either myself or Tanaka say so.”

“You have one minute before we begin. Choose your starting classmates!” He finished with a yell and a smile. Instantly, both classes broke their lines to huddle up in conversation.

Sano was a little late to the party, having to shove herself a bit to enter the huddle of her class to listen in on the plan. Obviously, she wasn’t going to make the plan, as communication was key for leading and planning, especially in a time crunch.

“I say we alternate from strong to weak. Start off with someone strong, beat our opponent, then have them soften up the next person for a weaker classmate.” Riba Nara immediately offered her side of things, and Sano agreed with that plan. They didn’t have time to flesh out something solid, but anything was better than nothing.