As he traveled down the path towards the Kirigakure training grounds, Rysano had a couple different thoughts running through his head. First and foremost was that the longer he lived in the Hidden Mist Village, the more he hated the weather here. He had never known what it was like to live in a different climate, but on the rare days the sun was able to pierce the cloud cover and actually shine down on his home, it only gave a taste of what the weather could be. It was always so muggy here. Some days it felt like you needed to swim through the air there was so much moisture. This intensified the temperature as well. Heat was one thing, but when there’s almost as much moisture in the air as there is in the bodies of water, it makes the heat downright unbearable sometimes. Sometimes he just wished he could go somewhere far away. He’d either find somewhere he liked more, or it would help him realize his home wasn’t so bad after all.

The second of his thoughts was more inwardly focused. After spending some time getting to know some of the other ninja that resided in his village, he began to realize how much focusing so heavily on learning his parents’ trade in the medical field had actually cost him in terms of shinobi abilities. Sure, being a village ninja was a dangerous job, and it was always useful to have a medic around to help on missions. If not for the team’s sake, then for any innocent lives that might get caught in the crossfire. And sure, he loved what he did. He was proud of who his parents were and how he was able to carry their legacy to places outside of the village hospital. As a medical ninja, he was able to provide care for those they came across during missions, and nothing warmed his heart or brightened his smile more than helping those in need. But despite all of this, Rysano was more than aware of his own shortcomings as a ninja. He was next to useless in an actual fight at this point. Being a genin was no excuse either. He knew plenty of genin with power leagues above his own. He had been working on some custom jutsu that would allow him to be a larger player on a battlefield, but he would still have to rely on others to shoulder the majority of the burden for him.

This thought was the reason he had traveled out to the training yards today. He intended to increase his combat potential, and so he had asked the most fearsome combatant he knew to join him out here away from the village proper to assist him with finding his flow in combat. He had been engaged in combat alongside the Karisuma woman a few times since their meeting and he was consistently amazed at her ferocity and sheer power in the midst of combat. He knew he not only lacked the equivalent power as a much lower-ranking ninja, but also he would never achieve the same combat attitude as her. He knew this. He knew he’d never be an equal fighter to her, and he was okay with that. He didn’t want to be. He liked being a support ninja and he wanted to stay that way. He just wanted to stop being such a burden on the rest of his friends during a battle. He wanted to be able to at least hold his own and defend himself while he was defending his teammates.

Arriving at the training yards and finding it deserted, Rysano took a couple minutes to compose himself and prepare for the day ahead of him. It seemed Izumi would be slightly late, as usual. It was expected at this point, but he didn’t complain. It always gave him some time to himself before they would meet. He had never asked her to do anything like this for him before, but it was safe to assume she would be a harsh mentor and he would be pushed to his limits during their training. He decided to begin warming up before she arrived so they would be able to begin immediately. He began practising shaping his chakra in different ways, flowing between harnessing his affinity with Raiton, the sparks crackling at his fingertips before willing it to be replaced with the warm amber glow of his medical chakra. Shifting smoothly between these different forms was becoming an important skill in the heat of battle. Lastly, he attempted his newly learned technique, the yellow chakra flowing from his hand to form a corporeal orb which he now held in his grasp. He looked it over, turning it in his hands as he thought about how this ball of hardened chakra would sometimes be the only thing between a friend and a deadly jutsu.

A small skittering sound from the nearby underbrush would draw his attention. As he turned to look in its direction, the globe fell from his grasp. Falling to the ground it would shatter into many shards of amber chakra that would glitter in the light before disappearing completely. Quickly determining the noise to be of no importance Rysano would survey the training yard one more time. He hoped Izumi would arrive soon. There was only so much trouble he could get in to without her.

[WC 907]

As Rysano had just begun looking for whatever it was which had startled him enough to drop his shield orb with its sound in the bushes, but before he could get a good look at whatever it was, he was distracted by Izumi’s arrival. She startled him with her sudden appearance as she rounded the corner just as Rysano began searching. The young medic quickly spun around at the sound of her voice from behind him. “Sorry I’m late Rysano-kun. I didn’t want to break sweat in this dreadful heat before we even started exercising." He knew she would be late today, she normally was, but he couldn’t blame her. He figured coming out to help train a young ninja like him was fairly low on her list of priorities. As he had gotten closer to her and Nova, he had begun to realize just how important the responsibilities of these higher ranked ninja were, and compared to that, coming out to the middle of nowhere outside the village to train someone who had next to no combat abilities must have seemed like a serious chore to her.

“Don’t worry about it Izumi, I just got here myself. Just thought I’d warm up a little before you arrived.” Rysano would flash his trademark smile at her in the hopes she had not seen him drop his chakra at the small sound earlier. “Do you have any plans on what we should start with today?” He asked his elder. He really had no idea what she possibly had that she could teach him. He was sure most of her techniques would be far out of his reach, so he would have to leave it up to her to come up with the lessons.

“I was thinking today we could work on some basic defensive jutsu and if you take well to that maybe I could even show you how to use those medic skills to hurt people instead of help them.” Rysano almost winced as he heard this. He had never really developed any offensive skills not for lack of ability, but because he had tried to devote himself to protecting and helping others like his parents had done throughout their careers. Of course he took the time to learn a few techniques just for self-defense, he wasn’t stupid. But he preferred to leave the harming to others, and he would support them however he was able. “But first things first, since you’re not that good at attacking we can kill two birds with one stone! You try your best to hurt me, and I show off some basic defensive jutsu. If you can hit me, I’ll give you something special.” Of course. Izumi was well aware of Rysano’s lack of combat ability. It seemed she needed to witness his failure first-hand in order to pinpoint his flaws. This was shaping up to be an embarrassment. “Umm… other than that I’ll try not to hurt you… so uh… let’s get started.”

That was at least a little comforting. Through some of the fights they’d be in together, Rysano had seen her lose control once or twice and it was a frightening sight to behold. Knowing she would at least be trying to hold back was a nice courtesy. “Well, if you say so Izumi, but prepare to be disappointed.” Rysano gave her another good-natured smile as he began backing away from his trainer. Keeping his gaze stuck on her, he would begin to think over a plan of attack. He truly only had one offensive jutsu at his disposal, the Lightning Javelin jutsu he had picked up at the behest of his former sensei in order to support his squad with long-range attacks. He figured if Izumi wanted his best shot, that would be what he would resort to.

Eyeing the distance between the two ninja to be about ten meters, give or take, the young man stopped walking and settled into a combat stance. Knees bent, arms hanging loosely at his sides, he stared at his target. He tried to visualize his attack, where he would aim, what it would look like hitting her, how he would move and act afterwards. A cool breeze drifted across the training ground as Rysano began channeling chakra into his hands. As quick as he could, the blonde ninja formed a series of hand signs, lifting one hand above his head as the lightning surrounding his arms coalesced itself into a vague weapon that arced and roiled with electricity. Rysano began his only attack on his friend with this. As he launched the bolt of electricity toward his foe, it traveling the distance between them in under a second, he charged behind the attack as well, albeit much slower. About two seconds after the javelin would impact, Rysano would make it up to Izumi. Reaching her he would aim one punch with each hand at either side of her stomach, hoping that at least his size advantage may give him any sort of edge here. After those blows connected, he would aim a straight kick squarely at the center of Izumi’s chest and attempt to jump away to break contact. This was the plan he had formed, and he hoped it would pan out.

[WC 880/1787]

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