The streets of Iwagakure had not been what Huan had been expecting.

On his travels to Iwa, Huan had heard at first that the village was completely crime free. There were many rumours as to the cause of the lack of crime running freely around the village's streets. Some people claimed that the Tsuchikage, Kazu Kanetsu, had become fed up with the rampant activities of the various gangs that had popped up in Iwagakure, interrupting the peace of the Kage's beloved village, and had personally dealt with every last one of them, making sure that their demonstrations were so brutal that no one would dare try to interrupt the peace of the village again.

Other sources told him that there had been a civil war in Iwagakure, between the ninjas and the various criminal organisations, syndicates that had banded together in a vain attempt to overthrow the Tsuchikage and make the Village Hidden in the Stones their own. Needless to say, many of the tales stated that this small rebellion had failed miserably, while the few that stated it succeeded spun up tales of how someone was impersonating the Tsuchikage with a transformation jutsu. All those tales always ended up with the village impressively managing to conceal such a large scale war from the prying eyes of other nations, hiding its weakened state behind its ever glorious former shell to avoid other nations from taking advantage of its vulnerable state. Of course, such tales were only just that – tales, nothing more, and Huan knew it. So, of course, people who had charged him for such useless information had been quickly dealt with. He still remembered how he enjoyed hanging that rich businessman – greedy to the third degree, he had to admit – from the flagpole in front of his mansion in nothing but his boxers. He wouldn't be conning Huan again if he knew what was good for him.

One even crazier story Huan had heard had been that of a foreign ninja infiltrating the village and striking up a deal with the Tsuchikage just before he had been struck down. The man would, in exchange for his life and the protection of the Tsuchikage, round up all the cirminal organisations and make it his own, before controlling them and having said criminals police the village from time to time, giving them a job to do while also keeping them out of much responsibility – they were of course never told what method was acceptable in making sure others did no wrong – and more importantly, out of prison. Huan had to admit that out of all the crazy stories he had heard, this was the most farfetched. The Tsuchikage was a wise man, one who actually, unlike the past few Tsuchikage, wanted to help his village improve, to expand, to flourish and prosper unlike Iwa has ever done before. Given that Iwa was once filled with beggars on the streets due to the high crime rate, it was a notion that gained Huan's undying respect.

Until now.

As Huan walked the streets of Iwagakure, his nightmares became real. He had thought at first that Iwagakure was changing rapidly for the better, in which many people were still on the streets. He saw a child hugging his mother for comfort, the woman who could only do so much was also sobbing yet trying to keep the majority of her tears in check for her son's sake. He felt pity for them, knowing just how it was to be poor, to want something you couldn't have, to be told you couldn't have it because you weren't meant to at birth. He wanted to help them so badly, but he knew it was a bad idea to just interfere with another village's operations. If they were poor, they were poor for a reason. It was up to the Tsuchikage to do something for them.

However, it must've been extremely busy around Iwagakure, seeing as he had still yet to do anything about the matter. Huan would trust the man who had vowed to change Iwagakure for the better to deal with the problem. He may not have known the man personally, and he may never get the chance to, seeing as he was a mere wandering ninja while Kazu on the other hand was the grand leader of a changing village, but he would put his trust in Kazu anyway. He had heard stories about the man from the few villages he had crossed in the Land of Earth, and needless to say quite a lot of them had showered Kazu with praise.

Okay, maybe he had been exaggerating when he mentioned the people's lives. They weren't exactly living on the streets, but it was close to it. Their huts were quite run down, from what he could see, though that could've possibly just been poor outside decoration on their part. Their clothes, however, did give the notion off that they were poor, with them being quite dirty – though being in the Village Hidden in the Stones could explain that to a degree – and somewhat torn in some places for some people. But, he was sure that they would not be leading 'gracious lives' as he would put it. Their faces just screamed that they weren't pleased with how they were currently living, and it wasn't the 'We have everything and we want more' type of displeasure, but more to the 'We demand our rights' type of displeasure.

In any case, missions were out of question. If the Tsuchikage was so busy, Huan would not bother him by requesting simple missions that would do the village little good. So, to make sure that his trip all the way from the Land of Lightning to the Village Hidden in the Stones was not a waste, Huan decided to get some training in. Specifically, more training on controlling his fire chakra, on channeling said chakra through his body and maybe even specific parts of his body, as well as manipulating it so he could perform more concentrated or spread jutsu with relative ease compared to how he was dealing with it now. He had heard of ninja who had mastered their Katon to such a degree that any Fire Release jutsu they attempted would almost guarantee to incinerate their targets, leaving behind no proof of the target's existence but the ashes that remained.

With that, Huan settled down once more, sitting in a cross-legged position. He didn't look too out of place from the beggars that lined the streets, or the various people who walked by. His clothes were not fairly exaggerated or open, and they did not stand out too much. In fact, they were the clothes that his father had presented him when the two of them still led poor lives, so it was a perfect blend in to the environment.

Huan felt around him again. He felt that these practices he always entered before actually actively practicing any fire jutsu were highly beneficial to his learning curve. It was like a warm up to the actual training, to get his body more accustomed to fire hchakra so he could manipulate it and throw it around easier later when he decided to. Sure, he could cut back on all the hassle of meditating to find and focus his chakra before playing around with fire, but experience had proven and dictated, as well as continues to dictate, that such meditation always helped him get more prepared for the pyrotechnics that would surely come into play a rough hour or two afterwards.

… Boy did his meditations take a long time.

Perhaps training with someone else would have been more... beneficial? Yes, the heat of the battle and the adrenaline coursing through his veins would be more than enough to help stir his mind and force it into overdrive, forcing him to quickly adjust to his new surroundings and forcing him to actually mold his jutsu quickly, channeling and directing his chakra here and there without actually thinking about it. It would help make performing jutsu and getting ready for them second nature to him, helping him even quicker than these meditations were supposed to.

Huan opened one eye and peeked around. He was searching for someone who seemed in the shape to fight him, or to give him a good challenge and to give his muscles a good stretch. It needn't be a ninja; a civilian would have been just fine if he could keep up with a ninja, but it was highly unlikely. Not only was it that many of the ninja seemed to be out of Iwa at the moment, all the civilians that currently surrounded his position, curious as to why a stranger was meditating amongst them. Huan's eye closed, not wanting to attract any more unnecessary attention to himself, though that probably couldn't be helped as of now. Well, if he wanted to find more ninjas, he would most probably have to get where they were most likely to be situated at, and at the moment, the only place worthy of garnering the attention of ninjas worldwide was Kirigakure, his initial destination. With the conflict going on there, it would only be natural that it would be a nest of ninjas there.

Well, so much for his fire chakra training. He had been meditating for a good five to ten minutes and gotten much less than he hoped out of the training, but it would have to do. It may have been slow, but what was done was done, and what little training he had garnered was training nonetheless. Oh well.

Huan got up, ignoring the various stares from the people around him. Time to get going back to Kiri.

Word Count: 1648

Training Katon [B -> A] 1648 + 49 = 1697/3000