Chapter 2: Beginning to Practice
Suzume nodded and replied, "Dinner is being prepared. It will take a little more time to be ready, but I'll get you something to eat first."
She brought Kaito a plate of food, while Takeshi and Ryo ran off to play.
Kaito thought as he ate.
The food here is pretty basic, not very tasty, but considering it's an orphanage, it's not bad. It looks like they provide three meals a day—breakfast, lunch, and dinner—and there's plenty of fruit to eat. It's a shame there's no meat, but the nutrition should be adequate. At least I won't have to worry about going hungry when I start training.
Oh well, I'll just eat my fill for now.
After finishing his dinner quickly, Kaito returned to his room.
He flopped onto his bed and began to think.
Today was really exhausting. Playing the part of a five-year-old is harder than I thought, but luckily no one noticed anything different about me. It's a good thing there are no active ninja living in this orphanage. Now I need to figure out what to do next.
Since I've been reincarnated into this world, I don't want to be just another nameless casualty. My knowledge of future events gives me a huge advantage. But how should I use it?
Kaito spent the next half hour contemplating his future plans and deciding what he should do.
Finally, he reached a conclusion.
Even though he knew about future events, that knowledge would be worthless without sufficient strength.
Not to mention, future events might not unfold exactly as they did in the series—there were always inconsistencies and plot holes to consider.
Revealing his knowledge to others was absolutely out of the question.
They'd either throw him into the Torture and Interrogation Department or, worse, hand him over to Danzo!
If that happened, the future trajectory of this world might change completely, and his advantage would vanish.
So Kaito decided to save worrying about the future for later. Right now, the most important thing was improving his strength.
But what could he do now? Learning ordinary ninjutsu was out of the question for the time being.
Regular civilians simply couldn't access ninjutsu techniques—he could only learn them at the Ninja Academy.
That meant he'd have to wait until next year to enroll.
Although Kaito remembered many ninjutsu and their effects from watching the anime, he didn't remember most of their hand seals.
The only technique whose hand seals he clearly remembered was the Shadow Clone Jutsu.
Unfortunately, that was a jonin-level technique, dangerous enough to be classified as a forbidden jutsu in the Scroll of Seals.
Besides, merely knowing the hand seals wasn't enough.
These seals required chakra to flow in specific patterns or display certain elemental properties to successfully execute the technique.
Until he learned how to properly mold and control his chakra, practicing hand seals would be meaningless.
That meant he should focus on training and techniques that didn't require hand seals.
Kaito thought about it. The Rasengan, chakra nature transformation, and chakra control exercises could all be practiced without formal instruction.
Since he'd already awakened his chakra, chakra control practice was absolutely crucial.
The only problem was that Kaito didn't want others to know he was training in secret.
He could probably do some training later, like the Leaf Concentration Exercise.
Tree-walking and water-walking training might attract too much attention, and in a village full of ninja, ensuring complete privacy would be impossible.
Fortunately, the first and second stages of Rasengan training could be done privately, as could the first stage of chakra nature training with the paper test.
Besides that, Kaito knew he should also work on improving his physical condition.
Actually, this might be the most crucial part.
Although his body was in decent shape, it wasn't in excellent condition.
He should start with light exercise to build up his physical endurance and strength.
Kaito even wondered if he could incorporate some intense conditioning training he'd seen in other anime.
Ugh, never mind. At least this headache should be gone by tomorrow.
After thinking everything through, Kaito drifted back to sleep.
Waking up early the next morning, Kaito looked out the window and found it was still pitch black outside.
Wow, I woke up really early. It's probably only 5 o'clock. Well, I slept all day yesterday, so no wonder I'm up this early.
Then he remembered his plans from the night before.
Anyway, if I'm really going to get stronger, I need to make this a habit. On the bright side, at least this damn headache is finally gone!
He got out of bed and saw that Takeshi and Ryo were still fast asleep.
Moving quietly, he washed up and left the room, then walked out of the orphanage building.
To the north of the orphanage was a fairly large playground for the children to use.
To the east and south, however, were clusters of trees that looked like a small forest.
Konoha seemed to have many wooded areas like this scattered throughout the village. Many such places were used as training grounds for ninja.
Unfortunately, there were no official training grounds near the orphanage.
To the west was a residential area, with a market a few hundred meters away.
This forest might give me some cover and privacy. While it's not perfect, it does offer an option for some secret training. I should also see if I can get my own room in the orphanage eventually.
Anyway, I should start with some warm-ups to see how much stress this body can handle.
Kaito began stretching and loosening up his muscles.
After about 10 minutes of stretching, he started running laps around the playground.
By his estimate, the circumference of the playground was about a hundred meters.
He completed the first few laps easily but quickly began to feel tired.
After pushing himself to his limit, he completed 28 laps around the playground.
Kaito took a deep breath.
Wow, I just ran almost three kilometers! In my previous life at age five, I couldn't have possibly run more than one kilometer.
He didn't remember if the original Kaito had done any exercise before he'd taken over this body.
He also wasn't sure if it was because people's bodies in this world were naturally stronger, or if unlocking his chakra had enhanced his physical abilities.
It was probably the former, since he'd only just awakened his chakra yesterday.
After a short five-minute rest, he continued with push-up exercises.
He successfully completed 2 sets of push-ups, 12 repetitions per set.
Next were sit-ups—he managed 4 sets of 15 repetitions each.
Then squats, completing 3 sets of 12 repetitions per set.
Finally, he attempted pull-ups, managing only 8 total.
This workout had definitely stressed his body, but he hadn't pushed himself to complete exhaustion—suddenly pushing the body to its absolute limits would be harmful.
After completing his workout, Kaito returned to the orphanage, took a shower, and changed into fresh clothes.
Returning to his room, he saw it was already 7:30 AM, and his roommates were still sound asleep.
Interesting. When do they usually wake up, and is it consistent? If they wake up around 8 AM when breakfast is served, then I might be able to practice the Leaf Concentration Exercise without anyone knowing. I should observe their schedule this week to confirm.
Kaito sat on his bed and picked up a leaf he'd collected during his morning workout.
He stared at it thoughtfully.
In the shinobi world, there were five basic chakra natures to master—Fire, Wind, Lightning, Earth, and Water.
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