Chapter 6 Chakra Control

Riku walked through the large territory he bared witness to a fair amount of Kumarai partaking In what looked like training, which was somewhat different from what he expected as he watched multiple smaller Kumarai sitting and eagerly listening to a larger Kumarai teaching what looked like slash projection utilising their claws to send slashes through the air.

Watching as the slashes cut through the training dummies, Riku's eyes were practically glittering as he was clearly very interested in learning this interesting ability. "Are you interested in our claw technique?" Nariko looked at Riku with a knowing look as the child's eyes were damn near glowing with greed.

Riku wasted no time replying with an affirmative "yes." To which Nariko replied with a chuckle "You need claws to even think about learning it, besides the point; what do I call you, child?" Nariko had finally asked Riku's name after almost three days of knowing him.

Riku thought for a second, thinking wether or not he should change his name, but he made his decision and replied,

"My name… I am Riku Kuroshiro, the last remaining survivor of the Kuroshiro swordsman clan." Riku spoke with resolve.

Nariko now understood why the child was so good with the sword, He was from a family of swordsmen. Swordsmen were scarce throughout the world as people were usually Shinobi.

"Are you certain I need claws? I'm sure I could just pretend to have claws and use it, or even use it with my sword?" Riku continued, he really did want to learn this jutsu after all.

"Maybe if you impress me enough to ask my father, but I doubt you'd get his permission, meaning you'd have to impress him also which I can't envision you doing unfortunately." Nariko replied to Riku's childish tone, not knowing what he had just gotten himself into.

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…

In Nariko's personal training quarters, sat two figures, one large and one small, they both sat in medatitive positions while the larger one spoke, "I can sense that you already have chakra. So what I will be teaching you here is how to feel and shape your chakra, keep in mind this is how Kumarai do it, so it would be different from what you humans will do." Nariko warned Riku before he continued, however to Nariko's surprise, Riku interjected "I already know how to sense my chakra and how to circulate it, but I'm having trouble with using chakra in a certain point to strengthen it." Riku said thoughtfully despite Nariko's shock being evident in his speechlessness. "Well… Ill try to teach you that, then." Nariko said slightly disheartened.

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In Konoha, the Hokage office, Hiruzen sat at his desk with his fingers massaging his temples, when all of a sudden an anbu shinobi flickered in front of Hiruzen, "lord hokage, Osamu's squad of 20 shinobi has yet to return after 4 days." The anbu spoke in a respectful manner, to which Hiruzen replied "Hmm? He's a Jōnin so he should be fine, but send an anbu squad to search for any indication of Osamu's presence." Hiruzen said with a wave of his hand, he truly believed that Osamu would be okay, he was a Jōnin after all. Hiruzen sat back on his chair as he puffed his pipe, not knowing that Osamu was mauled to the point of non recognition and burnt to the bone in a forest deep into the land of fire.

…

The anbu squad sent to locate Osamu quickly found traces of battle, however what they saw shocked them despite them being trained Anbu shinobi, this sight was too gruesome for even them. 20 bodies littered everywhere. 9 were completely obliterated, bone and flesh splattered everywhere as their bodies had lightning scars and some were even fully burnt and the 11 remaining were all sliced cleanly, they all had their entire bodies sliced into pieces of flesh with what it seemed swift, undodgeable slashes. However one body still had its head fully intact, the shinobi died from being slashed at the throat, it was the first shinobi Riku had killed with one swift slash. Due to the bodies head being unharmed unlike the other bodies, this then allowed the anbu to gather his memories of the battle, and so they sealed all 20 of the corpses in a scroll and made their way back to the village, which took them 2 days all together, but during this time..

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In Nariko's personal training ground

"Wow, to think you were able to perfect everything I taught you within two days… I must say you have genuinely impressed me." Nariko said to Riku with a bright and hearty laugh, Nariko was pleasantly surprised that the child he saved was such a quick learner… No, he was a genius! Nariko had really hit the jackpot by helping this kid out.

Riku stood up and wiped the sweat from his forehead, in just the two days he had been training he had already nearly learnt how to use the summoning jutsu and he had mastered how to manipulate his chakra properly, He could now send his chakra anywhere in his body to enhance its power thanks to the Kumarai Chakra Control — which was different from normal chakra control as the Kumarai focused more on destructive power over the stable power of shinobi, which allowed them to scale trees and walk on water; the Kumarai's chakra control focused more on destroying their enemies rather than practicality.

Over the 2 days Riku had learnt all of the hand seals and what they do from Raiden, thus learning what he would in the ninja academy from Raiden instead, he then was taught what seals he would need to use in order to use the Summoning jutsu.

However, when he moved his chakra to his slowly regenerating arm, it grew back overnight. Which had then given Riku an inkling of how his regeneration worked, he had realised that even without his chakra his body would naturally regenerate, however, if he used his chakra to speed up the process it would then naturally become much faster.

Riku stretched his muscles as he asked Nariko in a childish tone "Can you teach me that claw jutsu now?" Riku said with puppy eyes.

"Maybe if you can master summoning jutsu in 3 days, but we both know you won't be able to do this." Nariko replied matter of factually, but Riku only smiled as he knew damn well he could master it by tomorrow.

And master it by tomorrow he did. Riku bit his thumb and slammed it down on the ground, creating a large seal which then exploded into a cloud of smoke, however nothing appeared; This was naturally because he had no summoning contracts.

But Nariko, who was now in utter shock and disbelief watched as the small child was able to use the summoning jutsu even some shinobi weren't capable of doing overnight, he couldn't help but place Riku on his back as the ran all the way to Raiden's quarters.

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…

"He did WHAT?" Raiden exclaimed loud enough for the whole territory to hear, he had naturally learnt of Riku's development in mastering the summoning jutsu overnight.

Nariko sat in front of his father as he explained what Riku had accomplished, Raiden looking at Riku with much joy and curiosity. He was now fully aware that his gamble had not only been a win, but had been a JACKPOT! However Nariko then requested "father, Riku is interested in learning our claw projectile technique, I came here to request permission to admit Riku to join Karah in learning how to use this technique." Nariko said pleadingly with a bow.

"Well, I don't really see why you're asking permission, The child is already a high ranking member of our tribe and I even consider him my son. Why would he need permission to use his fathers technique?" Raiden said shamelessly with his nose poking into the air. It seemed he had taken a huge liking to Riku and even considered him one of the tribe which left Riku speechless as he had only met the beast 4 days ago and was already being treated with such love and care.

Little did Riku know that the beast was already making arrangements for the human to marry into his family through Karah, Raiden was not going to let go of this golden lamb. Raiden couldn't let this opportunity go to waste as he hadn't seen a child with this much potential in his entire life. Unfortunately for Raiden however, Riku was not into animals nor did he consider this possibility for even a second.

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A day later, Riku watched as the sun rose.

It had been over a week since he had reincarnated for the second time and he couldn't help feeling a sense of loss, he had a loving family in his first life and he was really hoping they dealt with his death well as he couldn't bare the thought of his family in agony over his death. However his second life, as Ren Arden was harsh. He spent the first 9 years of his life learning the sword and was even forced to blacksmith as he wasn't a high ranking family member he was enslaved for a while, however after many witnessed his prowess on the battlefield he quickly became revered as the most powerful man amongst the soldiers and thus was dubbed the moonlight swordmaster. His affinity for lunar magic mixed with his families moonlight sword style created a terrifying fusion that not even the king himself could combat, and after fighting alongside the king in war from the ages of 13-27 they became good friends. He was even known as the right hand of the king, but truth be told Ren just wanted love. His first life was good, yes. But he had never experienced a romantic relationship as he was too focused on his boxing career and his studies, and then in his second life he spent his entire life as a warhorse, he was bred for combat. He grew up on the battlefield and even after growing up he spent his entire life on the battlefield which naturally didn't give him time to romanticise. And so he hoped that he could at least get a girlfriend in this life, but that was the least of his worries as of now, He could worry about women when he's in Konoha.

Riku made his way over the Kumarai training grounds where he met Karah and a few other Kumarai that gave him weird glances except for one Kumarai that was bigger than the others that gave him a disgusted look as the Kumarai muttered under his breath "disgusting creature." However it was loud enough for a certain scaly beast to hear.

*Kill that one.* Kokuenryū spoke for the first time in 3 days, informing Riku that he needed to kill.

But Riku brushed it off and asked "Why?" He thought for Kokuenryū to hear.

*That vile little creature called me disgusting. And therefore shall be granted judgement.* Kokuenryū said matter of factually which made Riku frown, the dragon wasn't the only one with an ego. Riku was quite proud of his looks and hearing that someone had called him such an obscenity lit the flame of battle in his heart.

Riku sat down next to Karah who looked at him strangely "what are you doing here, human?" She said with a curious gaze, to which Riku replied with a short "gramps told me to attend your lessons so I could learn the claw technique thing." He said with a straight face as he listened to the lesson.

The lesson went by fast but right as Riku was about to leave he was quickly informed,

*behind you.*

As Riku turned around he saw the larger Kumarai standing at 1.9 meters tall which was quite tall for a young Kumarai.

"I am Yuji, and I would like to request a duel with you." The large Kumarai named Yuji asked with a commanding tone, to which Riku replied "Oh? I am Riku Kuroshiro and I humbly accept." He said with a polite smile, but behind this mask both him and Kokuenryū were grinning maniacally.

Within the Kumarai territory duels were common, many Kumarai warriors enjoyed engaging in friendly duels with eachother to gauge their abilities. However this was different; Raiden, Nariko, Karah and a large amount of Kumarai watched as the two faces eachother.

At one end was a large Kumarai, he was nearly 2 meters tall and was mostly black with white around his eyes and in the shape of a sword on his back. This was Yuji, the most popular Kumarai amongst the students and at the other end stood a small boy, no taller than 1.40 meters / 4"7 tall which is fairly tall for an 8 year old but he was still tiny in comparison to Yuji. Luckily for Riku however, he began boxing when he was just 6 and he was used to fighting hand to hand with a smaller body.

Riku got into his out-boxing position as he wasn't equipped with a sword.

Riku then smiled to himself as he thought "I haven't fought like this in a while." Riku then smiled demonically in his mind, he was looking forward to embarrassing this cocky Kumarai.