Suna's Ninja (Gaara Love Story)

30: Team training

Author's POV

Today was another day of the Khaotic Party's weekly training for Akimi and her teammates. Jini had set up a hardcore training session for each person, doing his best to exploit everyone's weakness to each other. It was humiliating, at first, but Akimi had learned to face the humiliation and fight on.

Their training routines would usually involve mediation for over three hours in the morning when the sun hasn't risen yet, much to the team's hatred. Per Jini's orders, they all had to arrive at the training site exactly at 4:00 AM. Whoever was late was ordered to do push-ups. Then Jini would have them sit on the ground and meditate. If anyone fell asleep, Jini wasn't afraid to wake the victim awake with freezing ice water. Embrace the ALS bucket challenge, KP.

When they finished mediation time, Jini would make the team get up and run laps until they couldn't run anymore. Whoever dropped out first had to run an extra thirty laps. Afterwards was stretching time, and Akimi learned that it wasn't just "yoga." It was aerial workouts. The KP would troop into the exercise room in the watch towers and stare in horror of the fabric ropes tied to the ceilings, taunting them.

To motivate them, Jini created endless punishment games. Whoever couldn't keep up with the team had to endure Jini's sadistic punishments. Thankfully, none were publicly humiliating, but punishments such as drinking energy drinks that tasted horrible, carrying all the equipment while running, relentless weight push-ups, and others were just as painful.

But the pain didn't stop there, oh no.When noontime rolled around, Jini made them all skip lunch and fight in matches instead. Surprisingly, Akimi enjoyed these match sessions, despite being exhausted and hungry. During these times, Jini was kind to let the losers off the hook without any punishments, and she loved watching her teammates leap into action. She admired how her teammates could move so elegantly and swiftly, probably due to Jini's training.

"Ready, begin!" Everyone watched as Kui and Kosei faced each other off. No ninjutsu was allowed. Everyone watched as Kui attacked Kosei with a dagger, her eyes full of mirth and fun, while Kosei's eyes bore excitement. Kosei met her attacks with a naginata, using just the same amount of force and energy from behind. The two clashed furiously, neither side letting go of the control.

"Snap!" Jini yelled, as the two were about to run forward again. Kui and Kosei glared at each other, a sudden change of atmosphere. Akimi waited eagerly for the show that was about to begin. Kui's stance changed. Then suddenly, she jerked forward, letting her speed shorten the distance between her and Kosei.

CLANG!

The two blades struck against each other harshly. Akimi blinked and grinned in amazement how Kosei had caught her own dagger against his naginata.

Neither side spoke a word. Their eyes had turned cold and calculating, trying to outdo each other. Kosei sidestepped and thrusted the bunt of his weapon towards her abdomen, only for Kui to duck below and kick his weapon upward. However, instead of letting go on the recoil, Kosei threw his weight behind the weapon and let it fling upward into an arc, where his entire body was thrown into a perfect backflip, letting Kui regain time to recover from her flip.

"Time's up!" Jini yelled. The two team members seemed to revert to normal and return to their cluster of friends. "Well done, you two."

"That was amazing, as usual," Pearl added, handing Kui a towel.

"It was like you two were dancing or something," Akimi said in awe.

"And that will be a skill for you to learn," Jini added, rapping his knuckles on her head.

"Huh?"

Jini sighed. "Come with me, Aki. It's time for your training to go up a notch."