7 Chapter 7: Lean on me 1/2

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, The Gamer or any other familiar characters.

Chapter 7 – Lean on me

The shinobi opened the door to the Raikage's office and stepped in with me following closely.

The Raikage was sitting with a hard expression behind his mahogany desk, resting his head on his right fist, propped over some documents lying around on top. His left hand held another file which he seemed to be reading with a hard expression. He was wearing the standard kage robes and the hat, but nothing covered his chest. His office was huge, glass walls covered the back of the room and his desk stood at center. To its right were weight racks and a punching bag, and a small bookshelf filled with scrolls stood to the left. Dumbbells were laying everywhere, and I almost tripped on one when we walked through the doors.

When he heard me almost trip, his eyes found mine.

"Raikage sama, this is Kioshi Shirasu, son of-"

"Ah!" the Raikage's voice bellowed around the office, "Yes." He dropped the document over his desk, never breaking eye contact. "Kioshi Shirasu, son of Denji Shirasu, yes." He cleared his throat and continued with a much softer voice and a solemn expression, "Kumo will always be thankful for your father's service in the force. Rest assured that he'll be given all the proper burial rights, and his name will be engraved on the White Wall." He closed his eyes and breathed in, "Denji Shirasu died on a border patrol mission. From the information we collected on site, his team was attacked by unknown shinobi." he continued opening his eyes. "Evidence points to Stone shinobi, but we have reasons to believe that was a set up. Only one of our own survived and was left for dead by the enemy, he found his way to the next patrol control point, but it was already too late."

I wasn't really hearing anything; my mind was still trying to get a hold of the concept that my dad was killed on duty, that I had to identify the body -what was left of it- and that I was, starting from now, an orphan.

A hand rested on my left shoulder.

What was wrong with this world, where people could die a violent death and their children were required to see whatever was left, burning that image on their minds as the last one they would have of a loved one? I found myself gripping the hand on my shoulder with my own while my thoughts wandered. My eyes were fixed on the floor trying to find meaning between the tiles.

When the Raikage spoke again, I lifted my eyes to his.

"I called you here to discuss your future. It has come to my attention your outstanding academic results; even for someone as young as you. You are called a prodigy and a genius in more than one way." He exhaled a long breath. "In normal cases when an academy student is orphaned and he's got no direct family to receive him… well, Kumo's orphanage is always open to academy students. But, we have a proposal for you." He showed me a red folder with my family name on it and continued "Your parents owned the house you are currently living, their only remaining asset after your mother's disease, so it's yours. The Shinobi Life Insurance and the Survivor Benefit Program will both pay for your expenses and bills at least until you graduate. It's not much and you'll have to get a weekend job to get some pocket money, but the Shinobi council has already made the calculations and it all adds up. In the end, it's your decision; you can either live in your house by your own or you can go to the orphanage and live there with other academy students."

I was looking at the red folder while my mind went through the possibilities. I could live alone at home, training away from prying eyes. I make enough money from the dungeons to pay taxes and bills myself and I don't have to expend money on groceries. I lived alone before, if you had the money and knew how to cook and clean, it was easy. "I'll go back home, Raikage-sama."

"A shinobi will check up on you from time to time, any inquiries or monetary issues can be addressed to the shinobi council via the formal communication methods available." The Raikage said in a matter-of-factly voice. "Kioshi Shirasu, we will watch your career with great interest." He gave me a somewhat proud look and nodded, "Dismissed."

My eyes went back to the floor, the image of my father's body still engraved in the back of my mind. I turned around and walked through the doors followed by the same shinobi that escorted me before.

I could do it, living alone in this world. It wouldn't be so different from what I've been doing the past years, dad wasn't really there for me, he didn't clean and barely cooked. But something in my heart was aching; I didn't want to feel so alone again, not in such a savage world. 'Why do I end up alone every time I try to move forward?'

. . . - . . - - - . . . - . . .

As Kioshi exited the office, the Raikage dropped the file over his desk.

"So," he said slumping into his chair, "what could you sense?"

"Yo Bro, kid's got spirit, what else can I say, looking in his eyes he-"

"Shut up, B! It's too late in the night to hear your rapping!" The Raikage bellowed.

"It-it's not that bad, B-sama" a voice responded. A teenager with blond hair emerged from behind the bookcase. "Sorry, Raikage-sama," he answered apologetically to the man behind the desk.

Said man continued to gaze at his eyes with a serious expression.

"Right, sorry. Ehm, from what I could sense, that kid had the biggest chakra reserves I've felt in someone that age," He answered with a thoughtful look, "and the density of his chakra, it was… just… so dense. It gleamed dark purple. I'm sorry Raikage-sama, that's all I could get from him." He finished shaking his head.

"Then it's decided," the Raikage answered, "Mabui, get me the paperwork!" he yelled.

Next to the closed door, a young woman stood with her arms crossed and a worried expression. Kioshi didn't see her standing there and she wouldn't blame him for that. She was happy that he was alright, or, to be fair, as well as someone who lost his parents could be; he didn't even realize it was her hand over his shoulder back then. But what Matatabi said to her when he left, those words would echo in her mind for years to come.

"So," the Raikage interrupted her thoughts, "let's go on with the border issues with Water Country..."

. . . - . . - - - . . . - . . .

I didn't know what I was expecting from the Raikage. I didn't expect anything to be honest. I didn't care for speeches, void of feelings and only given to those who were already tired of sympathy. But, the Raikage was a serious man, even more than your everyday shinobi from what I could gather. He was stern and cut right to the point, and I could appreciate that.

That night, after returning home, I locked the front door and went to my room. I immediately sat cross-legged on the floor and calmed my mind.

If there was one thing I was grateful for in this world, was how simple it was to enter a meditative state with chakra. Chakra could soothe you heart and meditation became addictive when your mind begged to be freed from physical constrains, freed from the emptiness and the banal, from the masks and all the lies, freed from the tears and the sorrows. As they say, if your soul is tired, no amount of sleep will help you rest.

I opened my eyes to the morning sun four days later. My muscles were cramping but my spirit was eased; like a switch inside my mind, my subconscious was silent once again and the image of my father's dead body didn't perturb me anymore. But deep inside, the melancholy remained.

Old man Yataro was sitting on a cushion in my dining room, drinking what smelled like tea.

"You're awake," he said to me when he noticed me, "Sadako was worried, you weren't answering your door for two days straight. I even got a note from the academy... but it's good to see you up on your feet."

He was waiting for me to do something, so I sat down next to him.

"I'll be checking on you if you miss our Saturday afternoon talks." He looked conflicted about whatever he wanted to say. "Take a bath and go to see me, there's a new type of tea I received directly from Tea country we have to try," he finished standing up, "a strong one."

As he left the house, I smiled a bittersweet smile; at least I had some sense of normality with the old man.

I had to study and practice; the end of my second academy year was near, and I would, as always, ace it.

The following summer was also drowned heavily in training.

I got a check on my mail every following month from the insurance company. It wasn't that much money given the inherent risks of the profession, but it was enough to pay the bills and property taxes. The Survivor Benefit Program was a non-governmental organization that cared for the surviving relatives of ninja that died on duty and fostered most of the orphanages in Kumo; they also sent me a check every month with a little bit of money. It would be enough for groceries if I had to but some, but given my gamer's body, I cashed those checks and saved the money in my inventory. I sent a little bit of it to the nearest orphanage every month, anonymously… at least I had a father in this world for some time.

I focused almost completely on my training and my skills grew at an outstanding pace. I completed the wall walking exercise which granted me another 10% bonus to my Chakra Control and moved on to water walking. I filled the bathtub to the brim with water and practiced standing over the surface. It was simple enough, until I tried to move. Every step I took made ripples on the water and required me to compensate the chakra output on my feet. Then I tried with my shoes on.

I was certain that training my chakra control as much as I could now would yield great results on the long run, so I focused on it and the skill grew by leaps and bounds.

Water Walking. Lvl 7. (56%)- Yet another staple of shinobi training.Increases Chakra Control by 7%.

My Observation Skill also leveled up nicely, now sitting at level 43. I maxed out shurikenjutsu and beginners bukijutsu, both now at level 20. I still had the advanced teachings scrolls the old man lent me, but I had a lot on my plate and frankly, I was satisfied with my aim for the moment.

There was a shinobi library in Kumo, it was located in the Raikage's tower in fact, but only genin and above were allowed to enter.

Observe. Lvl 43. (23%)- Observing what's around you is a great way to obtain information. At higher levels, more information is revealed.

Shurikenjutsu. Lvl Max.Increases shuriken damage and accuracy by 20%.

Beginner's Bukijutsu: Short Blades. Lvl Max.- The basics of any respectable blade style.Increases damage and accuracy by 20% when using kunai and other short blades.

Stealth. Lvl 11. (66%)- The shinobi art of concealment.86% chance of going undetected, -1% per each level below the target.

My taijutsu prowess was developing incredibly, that book old man Yataro gave me had a lot of corrections to the basic and advanced katas, describing minor deviations on feet and hand arrangements and hip rotation. I tried those new moves in the dungeons.

Advanced Taijutsu. Lvl 8. (71%)- The advanced forms of any taijutsu style.Increases unarmed damage by 8%.

My meditation now sat at level 55, with a new effect:

Meditation. Lvl 55. (79%)- Achieving a mental state of self-awareness and emotional serenity.Increases HP, SP and Chakra regeneration by 104%.Meditating now grants the benefits of sleeping.

I've never slept since the first days I arrived at this world, but now, whenever I meditated, any status I had like bleeding or poisoned was cured in less than an hour.

And regarding poisons, well, I received a new skill from all those dammed Komodo dragon bites I received in the lizard dungeon.

Poison Resistance. Lvl 13. (42%)- Your resistance to all physical and chakra poisons and venoms you could find in the elemental nations.Reduces severity and duration of toxins by 13 percent.You are now immune to basic toxins.

That immunity part of the skill? I only unblocked that at skill level 10, way after I completed the lizard dungeon. In fact, the reason I leveled that skill so fast was that the next dungeon I found was full of spiders.

I stumbled on it at the cellar of the academy one lunch hour I went to explore the building. The worst part weren't the jumping spiders or their burning venomous bites, no, the worst part was the dungeon boss: a lustrous black ten feet long centipede monstrosity that spat venom. Spat venom to your eyes to be exact.

Centipede MonstrosityLevel: 10.- Don't let it hug you.

It also had the nasty habit of finding me no matter where I tried to hide. Only by the second dungeon run it occurred to me that chopping off those horrible foot long antennas was a good idea. Its venom, by the way, was a horrible thing. It was a paralytic agent and with each spit that landed on my bare skin, however small, I got a paralyzed status that halved my DEX stat and doubled my SP usage. I still get goosebumps whenever I think about that creature. Yet, it was nothing a dozen magnet release enhanced kunai couldn't handle. I had to go buy a lot of kunai to replace those I lost in battle, though.

By the end of the summer I decided it was time to start training nature transformation. I knew I was a wind and earth elemental from my kekkei genkai, but, nevertheless, I bought some chakra paper. As expected, the paper tore by the middle and crumpled to dust after I ran chakra through it.

I decided to start with wind, as it was an offensive element and I really wanted to enhance my kunai with wind chakra. Earth chakra, as I remembered it, had also a great skill I wanted to try, but it could wait.

So, remembering what I read in the manga, I tried to cut a leaf with chakra:

Wind Release. Lvl 1. (0%)- The rarest of nature transformations, transform chakra into wind or control the winds themselves. At higher levels, more advanced techniques can be used.

Cutting or trying to cut a leaf slowly increased its level, just like levitating kunai did to my magnet release.

I knew wind was an amazing thing, you could compress it, accelerate it, expand it… and when the time came and I had the wind release skill leveled up enough, I could start experimenting with temperature, viscosity, compressions, expansions and supersonics.

Regardless of all the stress, the skill-leveling and the spider bashing sprees, there was just one exiting thing that happened that summer: I finally unlocked the iron sand.

It happened in the middle of summer when I was sharpening my kunai in preparation for a dungeon dive; I could somehow feel the metal particles floating inside the resulting slurry. With wide eyes, I rushed to get a finer whetstone and grinded a kunai dry against it. I was left with a minute amount of iron sand and I was able to make it float above my hand.

That day I was ecstatic, I was finally advancing on my kekkei genkai. I could control floating kunai and shuriken around me and fling them over with precision and a great deal of force behind them, and now I had access to the form that made magnet release a force to be reckoned with; the fucking Iron Dust.

I started to grind up as much kunai as I could while waiting for my chakra to recover, and by the end of the summer I had a fistful of iron dust at my disposal. I carried it around in my pockets at first. I had to concentrate and use a little bit of chakra to control the magnetic fields to maintain the sand in a solid shape, so carrying it around as a wristband or any other shape was a momentary thing I did in class or walking to train both my magnet release level and chakra capacity; I wanted the Iron Dust to be as natural as breathing for me.

I looted some interesting things from the dungeon bosses. Apart from ryo, kunai, shuriken and etc, I found a total of six venom capsules. The little glass containers had the same venom the dungeon spiders injected when they bit.

Spider Venom Extract- In case of accidental ingestion, consult a mortician.Causes intense pain in the affected area. -20 HP.

Other than that, the spiders and the centipede didn't drop anything worth mentioning except absurd amounts of kunai.

Onwards to jutsu, my only way to get those was by dungeon crawling since I couldn't get into the shinobi library. I got the replacement technique scroll from the lizards that proved very useful against the spitting centipede.

Body Replacement Technique. Lvl 1 (1%)E rank- Replace yourself with an object of similar size.Cost: 10 Chakra Points per use

I also got a genjutsu scroll on my third dive through the spiders, the False Surrounding technique.

Demonic Illusion: False Surroundings Technique. Lvl 1 (1%).C rank- An area of effect genjutsu that layers an illusion over a location.Requirements: 30% Chakra control.Cost: 30 Chakra Points.

And that was my summer: training myself to exhaustion, exercising, leveling up my skills, reading and meditating. Dungeon diving like crazy was the only way to receive experience and leveling up. And fuck I was leveling up fast; I finally caught up to my classmates.

Character Status:Select an item to view additional information.

Name: Kioshi Shirasu

Title: Academy StudentAge: 7Level 13 (610/8300)

HP: 290/290SP: 413/413Chakra: 574/574Chakra Control: 58%

STR: 25DEX: 37VIT: 27INT: 31WIS: 28CHA: 7/10Points: 17

Money: 88260

I can't forget Sadako.

After my father's death, she cooked a dozen muffins as a sort of "feel well soon" gift. I convinced her to invite old man Yataro to try those obviously undercooked horrors and fuck they were terrible, but we both swallowed a couple with a smile in our faces. The next day I bought a big bag of expensive tea to drink with the old man as reparation.

Sadako continued to visit twice a week just to check on me and sometimes to give me something to eat. Mostly sandwiches, you can't mess a sandwich too much, thankfully. She wanted to take the next chunin exams in Stone and was training like crazy. In my opinion, her sensei was an overprotective jerk, I learned that one of his teammates was the son of a council member and was a pampered asshole, her words, and that's the reason they didn't take almost any missions outside the village.

Did I believe she could make chunin after almost a year of training under a jonin? Well, skill wise, yes. From what she has been telling me and old man Yataro, she's skilled enough. She even dropped that naïve mentality regarding ninja life, became a more serious person and started to comprehend the real struggles of our line of work. We didn't really know about her leading capabilities though, and only time would tell.

I always wished the best for her; she was up for a tough awakening soon. I once witnessed my dad come back home with a thousand-yard stare and his white jonin vest covered in blood, and all I could do was stand there petrified. I stopped judging his drinking habits that night. This life we chose, the ninja life, was an unforgiving one. We could lose our lives in an instant, or worse, slowly. We could lose those we love and those that love us.

We would, eventually, lose our minds.

By the start of the next academy year there was a surprise waiting for me.

Ignoring all the new hopeful kids at the entrance of the building waiting to be herded to their respective classrooms to begin their new academy life, I went straight inside only to be stopped by Shinzo sensei.

"Kioshi, hey! I knew you were going to be early today," he said, "here come with me." He took me to his office with a proud smile on his face. His office was… frugal, but messy; a bookcase filled to the brim with binders and books, a simple wooden chair and a big wooden desk covered in papers and other files. "So," he continued sitting down and looking me with a big smile, "The academy received a letter from the Raikage himself yesterday. You, Kioshi, are being promoted to fourth year!"

I was confused, wasn't I too young to be promoted to senior year? I knew I was the top student of my class, but… I must have made a great impression to the Raikage at his office for him to send such a letter.

"From now on you have been transferred to classroom 402 under Ando Nakayama," Shinzo sensei continued after sniffling a bit, was he crying a little? "I'm proud of you Kioshi, you've proved yourself to be an exceptional student and I believe you will be a great shinobi. Just…just be sure to take things slowly please." He added with a little melancholy in his voice before standing up and patting me in the shoulder. "You'll have to catch up on a lot of things Kioshi, you'll need to master the wall walking exercise and at least start the water walking one in just a year and you'll have to learn the replacement, the transformation and the clone techniques you were supposed to learn the year you're skipping. I know you are talented on Taijutsu and Bukijutsu, but polish those up too. Oh, and maybe you should take the extracurricular lessons on kenjutsu if you like! This year you'll also start nature transformation so it's imperative to—" And he was on lecture mode again.

His words made me realize how far ahead I was on my training and that I grew by leaps and bounds. I was 4 years younger than a senior student and, somehow, I learned almost everything they were supposed to know. Was this an effect of the gamer's body and the gamer's mind or was it because of my own efforts? I was inclined to believe in both, it was a gruesome summer. It was another reminder that levels weren't such a reliable scale to compare shinobi.

When I arrived at my new classroom that morning, I was greeted by… different faces; expressions of surprise, disdain and apathy.

"Are you Kioshi Shirasu?"

I nodded to sensei, a black haired tanned chunin.

"Go and sit down," Ando sensei continued before addressing the rest of the students, "welcome back you all, it's good to see most of the same faces as last year. Only two students dropped out of the academy and that's a new record. So, to begin this year we are going to start with the theory of nature transformation. As most of you know, chunin are required to at least be able to use some jutsu of any nature. There are five types of nature chakra transformation, disregarding kekkei-genkai…"

I sat at the middle row, next to a blonde-haired boy with dark skin and bandages around his right hand. He looked at me and, to my surprise, whispered.

"Hey, I'm Tadashi. I heard you were recommended by the Raikage to skip to this year from your second."

"Hey, I'm Kioshi. And yes."

"Shit, we have to have a spar one of these days. You've got to be good, but I bet I can kick the shit out of you! Have you started with nature transformation yet? I'm a Storm release user, so my clan kind of start that training pretty young, thou not as young as you..." He continued eyeing me. "Fuck, you are young."

'Storm release, clan? Ha, so this kid is a Horiuchi'.

Kumo's clans were more like families with political ties with the village and some sort of shinobi special training. Kumo didn't have a lot of kekkei genkai like Konoha did, so clans were not such a big thing; the only exceptions being the storm release users.

From what I read at the academy library, almost half of the storm release users came from the Horiuchi clan. Yet, sometimes, some children were born outside of the clan and somehow carried the kekkei genkai gene -I wanted to believe it was a genetic thing, but hey, ninja world. Occasionally those children could be incorporated into the Horiuchi clan and change their last names. Darui might have been the case, but I didn't recall him having a last name though.

I looked at Tadashi, just to see him lazily taking notes. This kid might be interesting to spar with.

Name: Tadashi Horiuchi.Title: Academy student.Level: 15Age: 11Tadashi is a senior student and is considered a genius among his peers.Relationship level: Neutral.

He was an interesting match. He hit hard, had a great taijutsu technique and he seldom gave any opportunity to counter. To my surprise, I won most of our fights and lost only one that somehow ended in a grappling match on the floor; the weight difference was notorious, sadly. The kid also had quite a sailor's mouth, cursing whenever he could and whoever he wanted. Mostly as insults to other kids, but with me, he seldom insulted me directly. He didn't even saw me as a younger kid, even with the age difference. He respected me, and that was a new thing for me.

I later discovered that three other clans had children in that classroom.

The Mizuno clan, a politically strong clan in Kumo, with a lot of older members working as advisors to the village's shinobi council. They specialized in ranged lightning ninjutsu and were known to be quite intelligent. Two girls in my class hailed from the clan, twins, I learned, and were constantly fighting to get the title of kunoichi of the year.

The Fuse clan was a clan of heavy hitters and notorious kenjutsu users, producing almost half of the blade wielding ninja of the village. They also had a lot of political leverage; the clan head was in charge of training Kumo's ANBU corps and, obviously, most of their own followed that path. I could easily recognize the Fuse clan member in my class; a somewhat short black-haired kid with bulky arms and a wakizashi strapped to its back.

The last clan was the Makino clan, which owned most of the iron mines in Lightning country and controlled the weapons commerce and most of the customs offices along its borders. There was nothing to note about their ninja, but they were a clan, nevertheless. The Makino kid in the class was a scrawny dark-skinned boy with an aptitude for genjutsu.

The last academy year was tough, but it quickly fell to the same old routine as the previous summer. Taijutsu and body exercises were more challenging, and the age difference was a drawback in most of them, but I was fast. Really fast. I focused a lot of my physical training in speed and DEX training -I even used some of the spare STAT points to boost it-, and the differences were astounding; kids at the middle of the scoreboard were no match for me, and the few that made me break a sweat were still slower. I got hit a lot, mostly when trying new stands and counters, but I learned from them, and the gamer's body took care of everything after a good meditation session.

When I told Tadashi that my primary affinity was wind, he went ballistic, demanding to have a ninjutsu spar to test his advances on lightning release and what he called a 'beginner's storm release jutsu' that he wanted to start working in as soon as he completed the initial steps on his water release training; we both were advanced. Ninjutsu fights though were heavily prohibited in the academy's training halls and, well, everywhere. Elemental manipulation was restricted to genin and above and we, as students, could only train in its basics with wooden dummies and leaves and whatnot. We could get into serious trouble for violating that specific law, so we didn't even try. After learning my nature, Tadashi's training became harsher than ever and our fights escalated up to the point Ando sensei once received a busted lip while trying to stop us.

"Remember the rules, strictly taijutsu fights. You lose if you step out of the area, you surrender or-"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, we know." Tadashi interrupted sensei with a serious look and half a grin, never taking his eyes from me.

"Begin."

But neither of us moved. He was studying me just as I was studying him, it was our first match in a whole month. His left arm was coiled next to his left hip and his right arm extended to the front, both his fists were clenched and his legs separated; it reminded me a little of the Hyuga's gentle fist stand.

I was standing in the balls of my feet, legs slightly apart, my breathing calmed and ready to strike. My left arm relaxed, the back of my open left palm resting near my chin and my right arm slightly in front of me, with my right palm near my left hip.

After some seconds, he lounged and quickly threw a roundhouse kick to my chin. I blocked it with my left hand trying to grab his foot, but he flexed his knee and continued spinning. I took a step back to avoid the next kick as it had a lot of momentum behind it, and ducked under the following back handed punch, throwing my right fist into his exposed left kidney. He blocked my fist with his right hand, stopping his momentum and bending just a little, exposing his nose to my forehead.

Hit!60 DMG.

A crunch sound echoed in the practice hall before Tadashi skidded back with a bloody nose and a furious look. Whenever he got angry, he always tried to turn the match into a grapple fight, it worked only the first time and I could easily read his intentions this time.

He immediately lunged again with a right hook, using his taller frame as an intimidation tactic. I lunged left and threw my right palm upwards to his chin. He moved his head to the side and grabbed my shoulder with his already extended right arm, his stake at a grappling match. But my left hand quickly went to hold his extended right arm; my right hand was next to his face and I had the advantage: my legs were already poised to strike whilst his were overextended.

As his left fist flew trying to hit my exposed right kidney, my right knee flew up while my right hand grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him closer.

Hit!50 DMG.

-40 HP!