Chapter 19: Chapter 19 : Shadow Clone Jutsu
The following day, Genki was very busy with the counselling of all his students. Fujin was the first one in at 8 am as Genki had set the schedule according to their ranks. Seeing Fujin, Genki's thoughts were, 'This kid has done well. But he is only an orphan. I don't think he has any idea how vast this world is. Even though he ranked first twice consecutively, there is still a lot he needs to do. I need to ensure that he doesn't get arrogant and lose his way.'
Fujin first greeted him, "Good Morning Sensei."
Genki replied, "Good Morning. Congrats on your performance yesterday."
Fujin smiled and replied, "Thank You sensei" and took his seat.
Genki smiled, and then quickly got serious. He said, "So this meeting is in order to review your performance until now and to see what you should do in the vacation and in the next year. Of all the students from this class, I have interacted with you the most, so don't worry and listen to my advice properly. Feel free to ask all your doubts." Fujin nodded.
Genki continued, "Your performance has been very good so far. With you ranking first in both years, that is very obvious. However, in both exams, it was only due to you scoring very well in one exam that you ranked first."
Fujin nodded seriously, while thinking 'I'm not even 8 years old yet! Should you be having such a serious talk with me? Are 8 year olds supposed to understand this?' Genki on the other hand thought, 'The kid didn't get upset? He is more mature than other kids his age.'
Genki continued, "So you will have to put more focus on other areas. Tell me, what do you do after the lecture is over? Also what do you do on weekends?"
Fujin had already guessed that such a question might be asked, though he had thought something like this would have been asked long back! He replied, "Sensei, I mostly study what you taught in class, try to understand it. Then I train on the Ninjutsu you taught us or I do leaf concentration exercise. And before sleeping, I meditate. On the weekends I study a lot and also train on my sensor skills"
What Fujin said was a properly thought out answer he had prepared long back. Showing a major focus at studying would explain why his scores in written exams were so high. The listener would think that he spent most of his time studying. He said that he spent very little time on Ninjutsu, which would justify his slightly lower scores there. While his meditation along with morning exercises would be the reason for the high growth in his chakra levels. The answer also showed that he was a very diligent student.
Genki wasn't surprised with the answer. He had guessed that it'll be something along these lines considering Fujin's performance. He said, "I see. Now let's look at your performance this year. You have done very well in the written exam, chakra control and Taijutsu. However your Ninjutsu needs a lot of work. So over the next 2 months, you should focus on improving the 3 Ninjutsu I taught. Also, even after the 3rd year begins, spend more time on learning Ninjutsu and less time on studying. After all, in the future, when you do missions, it'll be a lot more important than what you read."
Fujin nodded, inwardly surprised, thinking 'That's a first. No adult has ever told me to study less! Especially not a teacher.'
Genki was satisfied with his words being listened to seriously. He had a little gift in order to get Fujin work more on Ninjutsu. He said, "I know that you have asked Lord Hokage for shadow clone jutsu. So do learn it properly, in the future it'll be very helpful. However, I have a little gift for you." Saying this, he put a paper in front of Fujin.
On seeing that paper, Fujin sighed internally, 'I wasted my 100 Ryo!' and then asked curiously, "Sensei, what's this?"
Genki replied, "This is chakra paper. It'll tell you what your chakra nature is. Here pass some of your chakra through it."
Fujin did it. The chakra paper split into two. He gave Genki a puzzled look. Genki then explained a bit more about chakra paper and said that Fujin's chakra nature was wind. Fujin nodded excitedly despite already knowing it.
Genki said, "The way to train your wind nature is that you should take a leaf and try to cut it with your chakra alone. It may take a few months to do it. Once it is done, you can then use wind style jutsus." Fujin nodded again. Genki also informed Fujin that Yori and Teru could already perform elemental jutsu in order to rouse his competitive spirit.
After some more discussion, Fujin took his leave. He was a bit sick of having to feign ignorance of the stuff he already knew! Still he was a bit glad of this discussion. He would have a proper excuse if anyone in the future asked him about when he trained in wind style. Sadly, he'll still have to repeat this again today.
Genki spent the remaining of his day counselling 14 other students, while the other 15 were scheduled for tomorrow. He had such advice for everyone else.
Teru was advised to get the same seal as Fujin. He didn't have much advice for Nobu, so he just tried to get him to be more social.
For Hana, he consoled her a bit due to how upset she was. Then he informed her that she put a lot more focus on her rank instead of important aspects. He told her to reduce her time spent on studying and leaf concentration as the majority of her time was spent on it. Instead he asked her to focus more on Ninjutsu and Taijutsu.
For Yori, he strongly suggested his parents to ensure that he meditates for at least an hour daily. For Hoka, the advice was to focus more on academics. And in a similar way, the advice continued all day as well as the day after.
At noon, Fujin visited Hokage's office. Hiruzen handed him a scroll saying, "This scroll has the shadow clone jutsu. You are not allowed to share this scroll with anyone else and have to return it to me after you have learnt it." Fujin nodded. Hiruzen then talked a bit about the shadow clone jutsu. He warned Fujin, "For the time being and maybe for the next year, don't ever try to create more than 1 shadow clone. Also, when you dispel the clone, all its memories will be transferred to you. And that might cause you a huge headache. So always be careful while dispelling your clones. Also, don't use shadow clones while you are sleeping. It'll be very bad for your health." Fujin nodded and thanked him again. Hiruzen then talked a bit about Tobirama and Fujin had to feign interest in listening to it.
After half an hour of stories, Hiruzen finally let Fujin go. Fujin sighed and complained, 'Isn't a Hokage supposed to be super busy with his paperwork? Why did he have so much time to talk with me?'
Two consecutive sessions of having to feign ignorance as well as interest had Fujin a bit tired. He decided to skip his ration bars and instead went to Ichiraku for lunch. His thoughts were, 'Fuck it, I have saved decent amount of money, I can afford to treat myself for today!'
Soon after lunch, he started training for the Shadow clone jutsu. After reading it properly, he thought, 'This is easily the most difficult jutsu I have seen yet. The process of molding chakra is very complicated. Makes me wonder how did that brat learn it in less than a day! However, this shadow clone is a bit more flexible than the one in Naruto. Chakra doesn't necessarily have to be distributed evenly among my clones. It is upto the casters' will and capabilities in deciding how many percent of his chakra must each clone have. He could create them with equal chakra to hide himself, or give it more or less chakra depending on the need. Another difference is that dispelling the clone won't return all its chakra to the original body. Instead there is some chakra loss that happens during this process. As the jutsu is mastered, this loss reduces, however it won't ever go down to zero. So in the future, I need to be careful in the amount of clones I make. Otherwise I could run out of chakra very quickly.'
On finishing his analysis, he began learning Shadow Clone technique. Knowing the basic clone jutsu helped a bit. The training continued for a while. Fujin noted that this training drained his chakra very fast. He could only practice for an hour before he was out of chakra. So from the next day, he practiced Shadow clone jutsu, as soon as he got up, then around noon, and finally again in the evening, getting 3 hours of training done while doing either physical exercises or meditation for the remainder of the time. He also carried a few leaves with him. On the ninth day, he was finally able to make a clone.
Fujin noted that while molding the chakra is more difficult, it's execution was much easier than the body flicker jutsu. After another 6 days, he was finally able to create an acceptable clone. It was entirely identical and took half of his chakra. However, on sensing, Fujin noted that some chakra was lost while creating the clone, resulting in the clone having slightly less chakra. This wasn't acceptable. However he decided to test the clone first. He asked the clone to go into the bedroom and write any random number somewhere and then dispel.
The clone went into the bedroom, and wrote 8196 on a scroll there. On dispelling, Fujin got all the information and checked if it was true. He thought, 'alright it works.'
He made another shadow clone. This time, he stabbed the clone's arm with a Kunai, causing the clone to dispel. He waited for a few seconds and then concluded, 'Alright, I just got the memories of the clone. The pain wasn't transferred to me. So this jutsu should be safe to use in battle.'
He then formed the clone again and this time had the clone do the 3 basic jutsus. The clone could perform them as good as he could. He couldn't test body flicker at his home, so he decided to leave it for later. He then had the clone perform shadow clone. The clone managed to do it, but within a second, they were both dispelled. Fujin sensed that their chakra was very unstable.
On thinking, he came to the conclusion, 'The clones were dispelled as they didn't have enough chakra. Even though a ninja could make a shadow clone with a small percent of his chakra, the shadow clone still needs to have some minimum chakra level. And my single clone, probably barely exceeds that limit. Wait, does that mean, after using a few jutsus, my clone will disappear even if it has some chakra just because the chakra isn't enough?'
This conclusion had him on alert. He quickly rushed into a mini-forest nearby. After transforming and confirming no one was around, he made a shadow clone. The clone, knowing the plan, started performing body flicker again and again, within the main body's chakra field as the main body kept a track of its chakra level. The clone had around 49% of Fujin's chakra. When it fell down below 41%, the clone dispelled.
Having confirmed his theory, Fujin sighed, 'I guess it is impossible to have the clone assist me in Ninjutsu training. Though to be honest, it's kinda pointless too as I can't last long on Ninjutsu training without having my chakra depleted.'
After spending half a minute grumbling about his low chakra reserves, he decided, 'Well whatever. This was expected. Hopefully someday in the future, I'll be able to use clones to train! Let's just learn this jutsu properly and be done!'
In the next 5 days, he had learnt the shadow clone, to an acceptable level. Now no loss of chakra happened while forming the clone. As for the chakra loss while getting chakra back from the clone, it was around 5%. Fujin noticed that it was reducing quickly. With the work on shadow clone done, he decided that it was time to finally start practicing elemental jutsus. Though he decided to wait for another 10 days before he returned the scroll to Hiruzen. That way Hiruzen would underestimate his talent a bit.
Visit freewe𝑏(n)ovel.𝘤ℴ𝑚 for the best novel reading experience