Innocent Ignorance

CHAPTER NINE - Suspicion

OC is mine, Naruto is a mister from another sister. I've just adopted him~~

'...' Inner

'...' Outer

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I sat peacefully underneath the huge peach tree in the backyard, focusing on my breath as I breathed in and out. Inner furrowed her eyebrows as she, too, concentrated. It was winter, and there had been a pretty good snowfall just yesterday. Some of that snow now fell from one of the tree's broad limbs and plopped on my head, making me open my eyes in surprise and shiver.

"Stupid tree," I grumbled, swiping the snow off my head. "You broke my concentration."

'And mine when you broke hers,' Inner added, sighing.

'We gotta hurry up and expand our chakra,' I said, determined. 'We can't afford to lose time.'

'I already know that.'

Despite having said this, I allowed myself a brief second to smile at the bright memories of me, Naru, and Ducky having fun and giggling hysterically together. The first time I had dragged them both to my house and invited to have a sleepover with me (well, Naru happily obliged, but Ducky required some forcing) was a couple months ago. Since then, our bond had only grown. The little sunshine now clung to me as fiercely as I squeezed him into a hug whenever we met, and even Ducky had opened up to me more and allowed me to sneak more hugs in without much resistance. All in all, I had become a sort of slightly insane older sister to the pair, and our trio had formed a strong bond that marked us as best friends.

I had also introduced Lee to them. Now he was a part of our gang, and although shy at first, formed an instant connection with Sunshine and Emo. We had all celebrated Naruto's birthday together, and my heart warmed to see the touched tears in his eyes and was glad to be able to provide him a birthday where he wouldn't be alone. You'll never be alone as long as I'm around. Since then, our days were filled with screams of laughter, constant shouts of challenge, and light-hearted banter.

With a small, absent smile on my face, I stared nostalgically at the little puff of steam that came from my mouth when I exhaled. My training was going pretty well, too. Over the past couple of months, my training with Gai and Lee had proved to be very, very effective. With the continuous spars, training, and exercise—not to mention the four weights on each of my limbs that kept growing heavier every three weeks or so—I could feel new, solid muscles rippling throughout my body. Gai had taken his own chakra out of my weights and had made me insert my own into them so that I could extract chakra from the weights whenever necessary—nice, I mused. My body had also gotten used to basic fighting and was filled with power, and Gai had now moved onto teaching me and Lee tactics and cultivating fighting styles for each of us.

Inner and I had also considerably built up our chakra and were now able to control the flow and usage of it in small intervals. This had allowed me to be able to faintly sense people's chakras and chakra signatures. This, combined with my extensive physical training, had also allowed me to walk halfway up the trunk of the peach tree a few days ago.

'YUZ!' Inner had shouted in triumph, and I had just grinned, sweaty and tired but rejoicing in the still, cold air of early January.

But it still wasn't enough for me. Hence why we were training to build up our chakra and control our flow even more as of now. Inner and I had gained control of about 25 of our tenketsu and were currently working on our 26th.

'Hurry up, would you,' Inner huffed impatiently. 'I'm already ready to go again!'

'Gotcha. Sorry. Let's do this!'