Chapter 5 - Jiraiya

(A few months later)

Beneath the rain, two figures stood beside each other in the middle of an open field.

"Water Release: Gunshot!"

Yahiko opened his mouth and spewed out a small amount of water that condensed into an orb, heading right at a dummy target in the distance.

Since Jiraiya took him and his companions in, he had spent the first few months learning ninjutsu and kenjutsu. Yahiko had chosen a sword for close combat practice, and his teacher had been having him focus on learning water release techniques.

"Not bad at all." Jiraiya gave him a pat on his shoulder.

"Can I try learning some earth release techniques, sensei? I want to try them!"

"I would recommend you focus on your water release techniques. The weather in Amegakure makes it the ideal place for water ninjutsu." Jiraiya said. "Besides, It would take a lot of training to use earth-style ninjutsu since you don't have an elemental affinity for it."

"... but why is Nagato able to use all five though?"

Jiraiya scratched his head. "I'm baffled too. It's the first time I've seen someone able to use all five basic nature transformations at such a young age. If I had to guess, it's something to do with his eyes - the Rinnegan."

His heart jumped at the words. Rinnegan, the power he was supposed to receive was called something like that as well. However, Yahiko didn't see anything special with his eyes, they were normal as far as he could remember.

"Could you teach me an earth release technique, sensei? I would like to give it a try."

"Brat. Weren't you listening to what I said earlier? You really don't know when to give up." Jiraiya said, sighing.

Twenty minutes later, Yahiko stood ready. His teacher had finished the explanation and demonstration. It was his turn to try.

He ran through the same seals that Jiraiya had shown him and slammed his palms to the ground.

"Earth Release: Rock Shield!"

Immediately, Yahiko yelled out in pain, clutching his head as he doubled over on the ground. His eyes forcibly shut off and darkness completely overtook his vision. He felt something like electricity coursing through his eyes.

Shortly afterward, the pain subsided and his sight was restored. He looked on at his sensei who stood beside him and could see small light-blue flames in his body. It wasn't there previously.

Was that his teacher's chakra? But it would be annoying if it was visible all the time. He silently willed in his mind, and the blue spots disappeared from view.

He was surprised at what happened - it was like he instinctively knew how to do it.

"Yahiko! Are you alright?" Jiraiya extended a hand to him, pulling him up.

"I'm fine sensei."

"I-incredible. You actually managed to use the jutsu, and the size of it …" Jiraiya looked at the rock in the distance, then pulled out a piece of paper.

"Chakra paper? I thought we already did it before."

"I want to ascertain something. Hold it again and do what we did the last time."

Yahiko nodded and held the paper in his hand, channeling chakra through it.

The paper split cleanly into five pieces - one ignited and turned to ash, the other wrinkled up, another piece became wet, the fourth one turned into dirt and crumbled away, while the final one split into even smaller pieces.

"I-Impossible! That's the same as how it reacted to Nagato …" Jiraiya pulled him over and inspected him closely. "Just how …? You don't have the Rinnegan, but yet possess an elemental affinity for all the nature bases. This …"

He kept quiet. Earlier after the pain hit, Yahiko felt something change in both of his eyes but didn't want to try it out yet. He could now feel the chakra presence of his companions inside the house. It seemed that he had gained sensory abilities as well on top of being able to perceive chakra flow in people.

This meant he had most likely awakened the Heavenly Rinnegan the goddess talked about. There was no other explanation for this sudden change. However, his sensei was unable to see anything unusual with his eyes, perhaps this meant his Rinnegan was able to camouflage itself to appear normal in the eyes of other people.

Until he was confident and had figured out his new power, he wasn't going to expose it carelessly. He would need to find pockets of space where no one was around, to secretly test and ascertain his new abilities.

"I want you to try this other ninjutsu, Yahiko."

Jiraiya's curiosity was visibly aroused by what he had demonstrated, and he began to demonstrate one technique after another from the earth release element.

Yahiko picked up on all of them easily, leaving his teacher's jaw hanging at the speed of the progress. Even Yahiko himself was in disbelief at how much had changed.

He sensed that the chakra levels in his body had skyrocketed, allowing him to use more for his techniques, increasing their power. Yahiko learned all the lower rank D and C ranked techniques shown to him in a matter of minutes. The B ranked techniques took him around ten minutes each.

"Sensei, what do you think is the level of my chakra reserves at now?"

"Unbelievable … I would say at very least mid-jonin or higher … based on the amount and level of techniques you've demonstrated without taking a break." Jiraiya said thoughtfully, then clapped his hands together. "That's it for today. We'll continue tomorrow."

"Come on sensei! Can't we try some A-ranked techniques?"

His teacher shook his head. "Tomorrow. It's already getting late."

Dejectedly, Yahiko dragged his feet through the mud as he headed back to their house. He supposed he would have to wait a little longer to ascertain his exact chakra levels.

Soon it was dinner, Konan and Jiraiya had helped to prepare the meals while Nagato and himself set the tables. They occupied four sides of a small table, and in the middle was a huge Grouper Fish, giving off a fresh fragrance that enveloped the area. Upon saying 'itadakimasu!', all of them helped themselves to the food.

"H-how's the fish? I hope I didn't overdo the seasoning …" Konan eyed him nervously.

Yahiko took a bite of the dish "Hmm, it's not bad. A little too salty. I'd prefer a spicy base, but that's just my preference. The fish is cooked just right, it's soft and tender."

The girl stared at him with a little blush, then slipped a piece of paper out from her pocket and scribbled something on it.

Opposite him, Nagato simply nodded and gave a thumbs up. The boy didn't really have too much of an opinion and always went along with whatever he proposed. Jiraiya-sensei on the other hand was too busy munching down the food to speak.

Something that happened recently came to his mind, and he decided to enquire about it.

"Actually sensei … There's something I've wanted to ask you."

"Hmm?"

"What do you usually do at night? Whenever I walked past your room then, I always hear you making some weird giggling noises."

Jiraiya's face paled instantly and he gave a forced smile.

"... err well. You see, I was doing research! Very important research! As shinobi, we must not remain stagnant and lazy, but move ahead with the times." The man folded his arms. "Research plays a crucial role in discovering new ways shinobi can improve their combat ability, allowing us to find out things that are unknown, filling in gaps in knowledge and changing the way shinobi fight in battle. I-it's my part-time hobby."

Konan looked at the man, starry-eyed. "Wow … I didn't know Jiraiya-sensei is a researcher as well. Amazing!"

Nagato nodded. "Jiraiya-sensei is really a busy man."

"I see! You're really talented, sensei!" Yahiko pretended to be convinced.

But inside, he knew something was off. It's the first time he'd seen his teacher get that nervous. Whatever Jiraiya was hiding, he would get to the bottom of it.

"Haha, of course!" Jiraiya chuckled, clearly delighted with the praises he was being showered with. "Who do you think I am? I'm the great awesome incredible toad sage!" he stood up and did his usual idiotic pose. "I'll have you know I used to be the most popular guy in the academy and all the girls would flock to me. I was suffering from too much success - you all have no idea how difficult it is, being pestered by beautiful girls all the time. But it can't be helped, I was just too charming."

"Jiraiya-sensei is sooo cool!" he said, continuing to feed his teacher's ego.

Definitely, something was fishy.

(1.4k words)

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A/N: Since I did a rewrite from the start, I'm gonna make it a little different, instead of having an all-knowing system that lays out everything for MC. He's gonna have to figure out the powers and info he has by himself.

After we're done with this short training arc there will be a time skip to the start of the 3rd Shinobi World War. Don't really want to spend too much time on their lives as kids.