Of Bone And Ice - Chapter 6

The first two weeks of the advanced classes had flown by, our Kenjutsu instructor had changed from Juzo to another jonin ninja. Most of the students were happy about it, to be honest, now the classes were spent learning forms and drills. We were made to spar but had to use blunted swords to minimize the fatality rate. Some students had started to be able to stand on the water using their chakra, I had also managed to figure it out, after all, it was a very handy ability living in the land of water.Taijutsu was still the same but the instructor had us battle in teams. This proved a new challenge as you had to compensate for your teammate’s ability. We were placed into three-man squads made to battle until one team could no longer stand, we were not allowed to kill each other but other than that there were no rules. I had been placed on a squad with one other boy and a girl. Their names were Kaito and Izumi. Kaito was older than me being 11 and was quite large for his age, he had short but wild spiky black hair and his teeth were filed like most mist ninjas. Izumi was also the same age having started the academy at 8 years old, she was about the same height as me. Her hair was long but she kept it tied back in a neat ponytail, her teeth were also filed down and she had a crazy look in her eye. Both of them had only been chosen for the Taijutsu class meaning that this was their strongest attribute.

The team we were facing consisted of Zabuza and two other boys whose names I had not taken the time to learn, they to had only been placed on the Taijutsu class while myself and Zabuza had been placed on more.

“Begin!” The sensei shouted.

Zabuza’s team charged and before I could come up with a plan my teammates had already gone. Zabuza started by throwing two Kunai at Kaito who deflected them with good reflexes. Izumi and one of the boys from the other team locked into a clash of kunai and started to compete in a power struggle. Kaito and Zabuza had also started to exchange blows which meant my opponent was.

I quickly spun around dodging two shuriken as they flew past my face. “You,” I said a smile forming on my face. The boy was the average height for his age, he wore the standard black training clothes we still had to wear while in the academy but he had tied his headband around his arm. He pulled out more shuriken one in each grove of his knuckles.

He threw them with great accuracy aiming for vital points throughout my body. I charged straight down the center towards him blocking the shuriken with bones coming out of each of my forearms. I closed the distance quickly and took him off guard, flipping over the older boy I landed behind him and kicked the back of his knee. The force of my kick dropped the boy hard onto the ground causing him to lose his breath. Quickly rolling I slammed my heel down onto his ċhėst finishing him off and taking him out of the fight.

Meanwhile, Kaito and Zabuza were locked in fierce combat. Kaito was much stronger than Zabuza and seemed to favor focusing his chakra into his fists as he attacked. Zabuza was faster than the large boy and he used his speed to his advantage, he dodged two punches that had enough force to take his head off and dropped down to one knee as he shot into Kaitos left leg. Using the Kunai in his hand he slit the back of Kaitos leg and quickly spun around to take his back for the final blow.

Just as Zabuza kunai was coming down to stab Kaito in the back I launched my own projectile. It was the distal phalanges otherwise know as the fingertip bone. I had shoot it out the tip of my index finger just as I remembered Kimimaro had in the anime. The bone projectile struck Zabuzas kunai at the last second taking it out of his hand and saving Kaitos life. Zabuza quickly moved back and created some distance as I ran over to Kaitos side. His leg was bleeding badly and he couldn’t stand, as far as I was concerned he was out of the battle.

Izumi had not faired too well against her opponent either as she landed hard on her back after taking a spinning heel kick to the face. She was struggling to try and get back up but the boy sat on her ċhėst and placed a kunai to her throat. “Give up.” He said fixing his eyes on hers. She had no choice and rose her hand in the air signaling she had given up.

The boy joined Zabuzas side and the two began circling us like preditors. Kaito tried to stand but his leg was limp from the loss of blood and he fell back to his knee. “Your out of this fight Kaito,” I said my back facing him. I couldn’t afford to take my eyes off the others and I didn’t know if I could protect Kaito. The larger boy nodded and raised his hand in defeat taking himself out of the fight, now it was two on one and my chances were looking slim. Ninjutsu was not allowed in the Taijutsu matches which meant no ice style. Luckily for me, I could use my Shikotsumyaku abilities for Taijutsu and not break the rules. I spun the kunai around in my hand and quickly grabbed it holding it backward as I took a fighting stance.

“Bring it,” I said taunting them with my free hand. The two charged in at me both of them zigzagging as they did to confuse me. Zabuza struck first and I blocked his kunai slash with my own kunai the sound of metal on metal ringing in my ears, the force pushed me back and I shuffled backward to create more space. Suddenly the other boy came from my right slashing in multiple directions, I quickly ducked and weaved avoiding two attacks before I blocked a big right hand. I grabbed his wrist and shot an elbow into his ribs cracking them, quickly pulling his arm over my shoulder I flipped him over and slammed him on the ground hard knocking him unconscious. I didn’t have time to even turn around as Zabuza took my back thrusting his kunai into it, he didn’t stop there as he jumped into the air spinning around and slamming his heel into my head hard, knocking me to the ground. The rest of the class were silent as they watched what was happening and waited to see the outcome.

To Zabuzas surprise I stood back up unaffected by his blow. I had managed to stop the kunai with a layer of bone under the skin where he tried to thrust it in, I had also reinforced my skull and the force of his kick had done little more than knocking me off my feet. Still, his speed and ability were amazing, especially considering he hadn’t even been trained in the academy. Still, I wasn’t about to lose here.

“Is it my turn now?” I said as I took a fighting pose. I crossed one foot behind the other and opened my arms out low to my sides. Bone spikes started to protrude from all over my body and I must have looked like a porcupine. Zabuza took a low fighting stance and his expression looked shocked.

“Enough!” The instructor shouted as he appeared in the middle of us. He gave me a hard look. “That’s enough for today you two, this fight is over.”

I allowed the bones to return back into my body and turned around. The look of all the other students was no surprise, they were whispering amongst themselves and I swore I had heard someone call me a monster.

It made sense I supposed. The Kaguya clan had their own settlement away from the village and they never sent students to the academy. Even more so I had over herd some of the instructors speaking about my abilities saying how rare it was to see. Thankfully because I had been born into the Yuki clan the Kaguya had no right over me even though I possed their Kekkie Genkai. That was the way it worked around here each clan and family falling into a social order. The main clans and families were the founding families of the hidden mist, they had their own clan members trained outside of the academy and were exempt from the final test, after that it was the clans that lived outside of the hidden mist, they had to make offerings to the mist village and were only useful in times of war. The last on the list was the families that had been forced to live in the hidden mist for protection, mostly members of fallen clans. They were what made up most of the hidden mists military force but were also seen as poor and just cannon fodder.

If I remembered correctly not long after this war there would be a number of small civil wars where most of the clans outside of the hidden mist would be killed. That also included the Yuki clan and the Kaguya clan. I wondered where I would fall into the equation and if my life would be threatened. I shrugged the thought off and headed to my next class, Ninjutsu.

In the last two weeks, we had all been taught the hidden mist jutsu and how to operate in it. It made sense, of course, we did live in the village hidden in the mist. Along with the hidden mist jutsu, we had also been taught a more advanced substitution jutsu, it would certainly come in handy for future battles. We had continued to learn and practice more jutsu involving our element. I had been left along mostly as my Kekkie Genkai abilities could not be taught by anyone other than those with the same abilities. Given that, I was still able to come up with a few new tricks as well as figuring out some moves I had seen in the anime.

Zabuza and the others had been given one basic jutsu to work on for their element, they had been shown the jutsu first and then taught the hand signs. Zabuza, as expected, had learned his water style quite quickly while the others came along more slowly. We were not allowed to practice our ninjutsu on each other and were only allowed to use it against training dummies. Our training field was located on one of the academy’s training fields outdoors. Learning the hidden mist jutsu was very interesting, it allowed us to use our chakra to turn the moisture in the air into mist that spread out the more chakra you pumped into it. The mist was thick and clouded our enemies and our own vision. Our sensei said that if we focused our chakra in the mist we could locate anyone who the mist made contact with, we could even sense our surroundings, it took some practice but pretty soon we could all move quite freely in the mist. Zabuza seemed to take to it almost naturally but I remembered he was famous for his silent killing art which used the hidden mist jutsu a lot.

Pretty soon our three weeks was up and all of the students who had made it found themselves in the large announcement hall. Usually, the Mizukage was the one to give the ceremony but he was currently out of the village on a top-secret S rank mission. Instead, the head instructor of the academy and two of the Mizukages advisors gave the speech.

It was long-winded on how we had all proved our strength as hidden mist shinobi and that we deserved to be here. I didn’t really pay to much attention to it as I was to busy trying to think what was going to happen next.

“We will now announce your new position and ȧssignments. Listen closely as I will not repeat myself!” The instructor said. He began reading names on a large piece of paper and ȧssigning them to positions or squad within the village. The first and most common position was a posting to the gate guard and village patrol. It was given to those who had scored the lowest. Next was an ȧssignment to squads or regiments, this position was given to those who were believed to be ready for combat outside of the village and it was considered a great honor. out of the 51 students who had made it past the final exam only 47 had made it to today. Out of the 47 students only 7 had been placed on gate guard and the rest into units.

“Fuyona Yuki. Assigned to front line infantry unit.” It was considered a death sentence among the other students. The front line infantry unit was as the name implied, front line. They were always at the head of any major battle on the war front and usually acted as cannon fodder. I hadn’t expected anything else, after all, I had not one but two Kekkie Genkai’s, I was even sure most of my clan members would also be in the same unit.

“Zabuza Momochi, Assigned to the advanced sword unit.” The advanced sword unit was the most sort after position to be ȧssigned, as the members of the unit were usually the ones who would become future members of the seven ninja swordsmen and in Zabuzas case. That was true.

I didn’t pay much attention to where the others had been placed, but I did know that none of them had been placed with me on the front lines.. It was either a testament to my abilities or a death sentence for sure.