(April, year 51 AK)
*AN: (AK = After Konoha's establishment, like BC-AC = Before/After Christ)
Three months passed in a flash. Yuta was still training each day, Manabu was giving advices to Yuta from time to time to correct and improve his routine, but nothing significant or shinobi-related, just simple training routine for a child, nothing crazy like kicking a tree until it falls.
Yuta made a solid progress in these three months, but at the end of this period his improvement rate slowed down significantly. If before Yuta noticed that he could train significantly harder and push himself further with each passing week, but now for the past couple weeks his progress became quite low, like one or two more pushups in a row than last week or so.
Yuta felt that he hit a soft ceiling of sorts, and now his advancement went from fast progression to a slow crawl and hard efforts just to advance a little bit further.
Such a drastic decrease in his improvement rate for the past couple weeks caused Yuta's mood to plummet.
Feeling down Yuta added a third training session a day for the last week and pushed himself to the limit for the whole week but as a result his overall training routine only worsened, he felt extremely exhausted all the time and in the end there is not only no improvement during the last week at all, but there even a slight decrease.
Today Yuta completed his third and last training session for a day, he sat on the ground exhausted, his whole body ached, there is some pain in his left ankle and right shoulder from the slight injuries that he got like a five days ago and it didn't heal yet for some reason. It wasn't the first time he got slight injuries like straining a muscle or sprains, but they usually healed in a few days or so, but not this time.
Yuta was sitting on the ground and feeling like shit, he felt like throwing up.
'I want to die...' Yuta thought absentmindedly, 'Why am I doing this? Why I'm pushing myself like this? What is the point? Didn't I just wanted to prepare for the academy? This is excessive...'
...
'But there are no more improvements with my training anymore! What is the point of continuing training if there are no gains? I thought that I just didn't do enough, that I just have to push myself harder, and I did, but this is not working...'
...
"How are you feeling, kid?" Yuta heard Manabu's amused voice from behind.
'When did he... Ah, whatever...'
"I feel like I'm about to die..." Yuta said in a depressed tone.
"Ha ha, yea, that checks out." Manabu laughed, "So you've increased your workload recently I noticed, do you gonna continue it like this or what?"
'Am I going to continue like this? Definitely not! I rather die! Or to be more specific – I will die if I continue like this!'
Yuta glanced back at Manabu's amused face.
'But what should I tell him? That I'm going to drop it? What if it's a test of some sort and if I pass it, is he going to train me or something? Should I endure and continue with this extreme workload?'
...
'No, it's not realistic...'
"No, it's not working, I'm not going anywhere like this." Yuta said apathetically.
"Yea, that's a lesson for you, kid. Don't overwork yourself." Manabu said in amused tone, "After all you are just a small kid from a civilian background with no clan and prior chakra training, take it easy."
After saying that Manabu was leaving, but before he left, he said without turning back, "After you learn to control your chakra at the academy - your training progress will improve."
'So, this is how it is! I must learn how to control my chakra so my chakra would improve not just passively with physical training but also with chakra exercises and by using it up. And with my chakra improving from using it directly, my physical condition and training gains will improve as well because of it, or so I think.'
'I thought that physical training would directly increase the physical energy, that is a one of the two components of chakra, and this would increase my chakra in general, but now I guess that without a specific chakra training and direct control of the one's chakra, there won't be too much progress in this regard.'
'Afterall there is no shortage of hard laborers in this world among the non-shinobi population, they are building up muscles, but they aren't getting super-human strength and abundant chakra. And that happens not because they lack the hard and intense workouts, but rather because they lack the shinobi-specific training to utilize their chakra.'
'I must learn how to control my own chakra to move forward!'
"Wait, Koboshi-san!" Yuta hastily stood up, spending a lot of effort to make his trembling and unresponsive legs to move, and run after Manabu and blurted out at the spur of the moment, "Teach me to control chakra, please!" Yuta wanted to politely ask but ended up shouting with some desperation sipping in his voice.
"You have no idea what you are asking for." Manabu glanced back with a cold look in his eyes, their eyes met, Manabu's eyes, cold and heavy, and Yuta's eyes, serious and complicated, and with a bit of desperation.
A couple of seconds passed, and only Yuta knows how hard it was for him to not look away and not break eye contact. It was a gamble that will decide whether he will be able to learn chakra control a year before the academy or not, and he didn't want to lose the opportunity to do so. Yuta tried to figure out his chakra on his own many times with no results after all.
"Sigh, why do you think I know how to teach chakra control? I'm just an old man working at the orphanage..." Manabu sighed tiredly, coldness and heaviness left his eyes.
"Isn't it obvious?" Yuta blurted refusing to back down, "Your advices on training, how you easily sneak up on me each time, and the way you carry yourself, there is something similar to that with my father who was also a shinobi."
The last part about his father was a lie that Yuta added to the mix to reinforce his argument, as he didn't remember any shinobi-like behavior from the original Yuta's father, as the original Yuta didn't pay much attention to such details back then, and he was not even four years old when Masahiro Arai died on a mission.
But still this is only partially a lie, since Yuta did notice that there is something different about Manabu from the other adults, like he was always blending into the environment and it's easy to forget that he was there, or like he isn't showing much emotions and always remains calm, and other minor things like that.
"Whatever, and what about it?" Manabu said irritated, "I don't owe you anything, kid, and you are asking a lot from me, things aren't that simple!"
"Please!" Yuta pleaded emotionally, as he felt that the opportunity was slipping away.
Manabu sighed tiredly, "I could've taught you secretly and you could've told everyone that you learned it on your own, there are some kids who do that every now and then, but now that you yelled to the whole orphanage about it, there is no way."
"Why? What's the problem with that?" Yuta asked, confused.
"Teaching anything shinobi-related to civilians is prohibited, that's why." Manabu stated and was about to leave.
As Manabu was about to leave, Yuta desperately thought of an argument or something to convince Manabu, but as nothing came to his mind, he hurriedly blurted out in a last-ditch attempt.
"Is there absolutely no way for you to teach me chakra control at all?"
Manabu hesitated for a few seconds, then said seriously, "It would be fine if I officially register you as my student." Manabu gave Yuta a heavy look, "But that won't be a good thing for you, you will regret it later."
"And why is that?"
"Sigh, you see, my reputation in the village is not great to put it frankly. It will be harder for you in the future if you associate yourself with me, trust me on this, Yuta, just forget it and wait for the academy."
'It seems he is not entirely against the idea of teaching me...'
'His reputation is bad, huh, and why does that matter? Those people who are upset with Manabu, would they try to interfere with my promotions in the future or something like that? Do I really care about some shitty politics like that?'
...
'In a perfect world I would've chosen not to have some minor stain on my reputation from the start, but this world is far from perfect. And the memory of those thirty or so kids disappearing overnight is still fresh in my mind. If learning chakra control will help me to finally grasp my Time Control ability, it would allow me to defend myself if something happens, I don't feel safe at all since that incident with kids' disappearance.'
'Anyway, as a novel protagonist material with a cheat ability I shouldn't concern myself with some minor details like that and go for every opportunity to grow stronger, right? What's the worst thing that could happen after all, right?' Yuta thought jokingly while making up his mind.
Manabu observed how the kid in front of him was lost in thought for a few second, then after a brief hesitation Yuta looked directly into Manabu's eyes and said loudly and with determination just the two words, "Koboshi-sensei!"
Manabu shook his head and sighed tiredly, "Sigh, fine, whatever... But don't come complaining later!" But as he was trying to appear annoyed and tired, a small smile crept into the corners of his mouth, "Rest for a few days, we will begin your training after I file the paperwork."
--- AN ---
I know I mentioned in the last chapter author notes that I would flip a coin, but I must confess, I didn't, it was a lie, I just wanted to build up some suspense.
What if Manabu's bad reputation is a result of him offending some village's advisor, for example Danzo, that might end up badly, isn't it? (Not a spoiler, probably...)
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