Hisai continued her practice as Kazu watched her; it infuriated the girl to a certain degree, but she soon got over it. She wasn't a child, someone whose emotions easily got the better of them.
"Say, how do you unlock chakra?" She heard the boy say it, and she turned her head, her brows furrowed.
"Bother someone else." She told the kid, Kazu sighed. The others in the camp were doing something mundane, like chopping wood, standing guard, or just playing cards with each other.
He sighed and continued observing her; she made the same mistakes every time with no innovation, like brute-forcing her way through the training, hoping some miracle would magically let her stand on water.
A wise man once said, One who does the same thing over and over and expects a different result is the definition of a madman.
He walked over to the bag where the girl kept all her belongings; it was leaning against the wall of the cavern nearby.
"Hey, Thief." The girl said as she slammed her feet on the water, creating a big splash.
"Relax, I am just taking a few stars and knives." He waved her off like a child.
"They are called shuriken and kunai, you dimwit." She said angrily. She would insult the kid every chance she got.
"Whatever." He said nonchalantly as he took out three kunai and three shuriken. He was going to seek the guidance of some other shinobi.
"Mr. Shinobi, Can you teach me how to throw kunai and shuriken?" He asked a shinobi who was playing cards with two others. Kazu had identified him as the sensor nin who had tracked Kazu's chakra signature before.
Miyashi, that was his name.
"Aren't you a little young for that?" The shinobi said. A child could easily get cut with a sharp kunai or shuriken.
"Can't you dull them out?" He asked the man, who hummed slightly in affirmation.
Miyashi picked up a stone from the ground.
"C'mon, Give them to me." The man said. Kazu gave him the weapons; a few moments later, the kunai and shuriken were dulled.
"Here, you go." He handed him the dulled kunai and shuriken. Kazu took them and inspected them for a second. The edges were dulled, but the pointy bits were not dulled, since it would change the aerodynamics too much, and they wouldn't be imbedded.
With a look of confusion, Kazu said, "How do I throw them, though?"
The shinobi sighed and taught the boy the proper posture to throw the weapons, after a while and multiple repetitions, he asked, "Do you understand it now?"
"Yes, Mr. Miyashi. Thanks." Kazu thanked the man and went towards a triangular stack of three logs that had been prepared to be chopped down.
He began by first imbedding the basics of the technique into his muscle memory by making sure every throw he performed was perfect; after all, a house needs to have a strong base, or even a small earthquake can make it collapse.
The shuriken were easy since it was just a simple flick of the wrist, but the kunai were much harder because they required the movement of the entire elbow.
In under an hour he had completely gotten the technique for throwing shuriken down to a T. The kunai throwing was harder because they more or less relied on strength rather than rotation, strength a 4-year-old child didn't possess.
Through quite a bit of struggle, he had the technique for kunai throwing also imbedded in his muscle memory.
As the sun started setting, Kazu realized that everyone had gathered around a campfire; a large boar was being roasted in the fire, one that could feed the 20 shinobi present there.
"Hey Kazu, get over here?" He heard Arashi call out, and he looked at the man with perked-up ears as he stopped his training.
"Yes, Mr. Arashi." He replied, and the man motioned for him to come near; the boy nodded and moved towards the campfire where they sat.
"You are quite determined, aren't you?" The man said with a slight smile, and the boy nodded in response. "You know the difference between motivation and discipline, right?"
"Yes, Motivation is short-term bursts of desire and dedication, while discipline is long-term." Kazu told the veteran shinobi.
"You're quite knowledgeable for someone who is barely not a toddler." The man said with a chuckle. Kazu smiled.
"Well, I like to read, that's why." He replied. Kazu was quite aware that he was not normal; he had the mind of a fully grown adult and the partial knowledge of the future. Reading was the only explanation he could provide of his intellect.
Kazu wasn't scared of showing his intellect to the Rebels, though.
Their goals aligned perfectly, and they had a potential shinobi genius at hand. It would be within anyone's self-interest to mold Kazu into a capable shinobi.
"Maybe, but I have been watching you for a while today." The man paused. "You're a fast learner, aren't you?"
"Perhaps, but Mr. Miyashi taught me very well." Kazu said as he gestured to Miyashi, the shinobi who had taught him the technique earlier today.
"Ah, Miyashi, He's a good shinobi." Arashi said as he looked into the trees; Miyashi was on guard currently.
From what Kazu had learned, there were 3 sensor nin in the group; Miyashi was one of them, and they worked alternately in 8-hour shifts.
"He is." The boy said, with a pause, he asked the man. "Besides learning to use tools, What can I do to become a shinobi, Mr. Arashi?"
The man sighed, "Strength is not very important to you right now Kid, You're still a child. Learn to be a Child first."
The man continued, "I was around your age when the Second shinobi world war started. Both my parents were frontliners and died just in a few days, and I lost my childhood."
"I... am sorry for your loss and reminding you of them." Kazu apologized to the man. "I dislike being a child, though. I never even had friends because they all acted like I was weird because of my hair."
"It's alright to have no friends; Hisai over there had no friends either." He gestured to the girl sitting on the other side of the fire.
The girl produced an "Hmph" sound and turned to the other direction.
No explanation is needed, sir.
"Maybe you two can be friends." The man said, and Kazu inwardly sighed.