Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Games of Body and Soul

Reflections Inside a Dark Cave

"Given how you've mastered a bunch of techniques of different natures than your affinity, I'd say grasping the basics should be a piece of cake." Musha grinned with a full-teeth smile. "From what I've heard, you're plenty resourceful, you can pick up from there on out."

"Works just fine with me." Mana stretched out with her eyes closed and her breathing steady. This was just her own way to warm up both her physical body and her mental and spiritual state as both needed to be in perfect harmony to master new concepts or begin learning new techniques.

"I think you're more experienced than me with the theory, given how you've been using low-ranking jutsu of different natures whereas I've been focusing on stronger techniques of a single nature but each nature has a way it is manifested," Musha explained as her hands danced through hand seals in a controlled pace, the woman purposefully weaved them in a way that the magician could see and pick up on. Given how the woman is a respected Jounin, in an actual fight, the magician would have had little luck in picking anything up at all.

"Yeah. Lightning Release is ignited through muscle tension. Once it sparks from a signal in-between neurons, chakra assists it to manifest into actual lightning." Mana added. "Wind Release is more of a breathing style of an element. Instead of controlling the nerve signals and muscle tension, you're making gusts of wind and controlling it to the finest extent through controlling the air inside your lungs."

"That's it!" Musha pointed at the magician bursting with energy. "That's a lot how Fire Release works too!"

"Really?" Mana wondered, repeating the hand seals that Musha had made. The magician breathed in and tried to mold some chakra into her breath just to see if this theory held water. What came out from Mana's mouth was a shower of winds strong enough to bend the blades of grass and rustle the creek behind Musha but not much else. It was not even that warm...

"No, no, no... You don't breathe through your lungs, you build up the air inside your stomach. It's more of a diaphragm motion than blowing." Musha explained as she weaved those same hand seals and breathed in deep. Mana noticed the woman's belly inflate abnormally while her cheeks puffed out and she blew out a stream of flames that quickly gathered in a large ball of blazes. It was not rolling towards Mana or moving at all, it was just a giant blaze doing what it did best and covering a wide enough area to make Mana quickstep behind.

"Huh? Did that accidentally burn you?" Musha wondered, looking at Mana clutching her hand and wincing every time she tried to caress the red swelling on her hand. "Sorry, sorry..." the woman laughed out in apology while acting out her guilt in overly expressive manner, just to show her spontaneously appointed student that there was no mean intention. "You'd think that I'd learn to control my one elemental nature but... Sometimes I overdo it a bit."

"It's nothing. Just a little burn." Mana played the irritating burning sensation off while she pressed her burnt hand to her skirt. "That was the Great Fireball Jutsu, right?"

"That's right, you've seen it before?" Musha wondered.

"Yeah, I've seen you do it before, in fact," Mana recalled the painful memories from the scuffle inside the Ninja Academy when the calamity threatened to swallow the entire village whole.

"You should try it, really. From your stomach." Musha instructed, showing the magician every tiniest bit of how the technique was performed. "Breathe in... Hold it in your stomach, feel it and give it hell. Charge it up until you cannot hold anymore. Then let the hell you gave it out."

The magician went through the batch of hand seals, it was extremely difficult and tedious given her aching hand but it was not a matter of being able to do it, it was more a matter of how long it took her. In addition, how much pain and irritation she was willing to sit through for this impromptu training session that may not have wielded much success at all.