Chapter 14 – Beginner-Training Regime
The following day Ren and Nagi is with Azuma at the training court. They wanted to see if Azuma could attain his chakra meditative state on his own. They told Azuma to try to achieve the state he was in before by himself while they observed him. Azuma nodded in agreement and started his meditative process.
It took Azuma an hour to achieve the state he was in yesterday, his feat made Ren and Nagi feel ecstatic and proud. They knew that Azuma would be a great figure rivaling the greats, granted that he do not lose out with his training and practices.
They walked further away from Azuma to discuss plans for his daily training and practices so to not disrupt Azuma meditative state.
During their discussion, Yuna and Hina also came by to see Azuma progress. When they arrived at the training court, they saw Ren and Nagi having a contentious discussion.
Looking at it they went over to get to know the reason why, however when they realize the topic of discussion they joined in giving their insight as well. After sometime, they all agreed about what training regime Azuma would have for his initial phase.
Yuna and Hina then left the discussion as they have daily chores to do, while Ren also left to do the necessary preparation for Azuma training and Nagi continue observing Azuma at his state.
…..
A week has passed since then. During the past week, Azuma was wondering why he have not got his chakra element tested. The only thing his parents told him to do is to continue doing his chakra meditative state, which stumped Azuma.
At that day, while Azuma was eating his breakfast with his family…
Nagi who was sitting eating breakfast with Azuma said, “Azuma, after eating we will start packing, we will be changing our training location.” Azuma while quietly eating still feeling slightly baffled about the reason why he did not get his chakra nature tested heard his father. “Huh, packing? What do I need to pack? Am I going to stay there dad?”
“Yes you will be staying there during all your training from now on. We have been discussing it for a pass week about how to provide you the best training we can. Your grandpa went ahead a week ago to find a place for your training. We just received his message that he found the place. All of us will go there to have a look as well.” – Nagi
Hearing his father reply Azuma was baffled, ‘For them to actually plan this well… and I thought that I need find a way to do my own self training… I have been overthinking things. To get such devotion over their child future training path… I still remember my past life, as a kid at this age it is just all play and fun…sigh… now though I wonder what are their plans, if needed I will do their training and incorporate my own training as well when necessary.’
“All right dad, I will pack right away!...” – Azuma (rushing to his room to pack)
“Sigh…” – Nagi
“Azuma-dear what about your breakfast?” – Yuna
“I am done~” – Azuma
“…” – Yuna
“At least he is eager, and shows that. Sometimes he just acts too mature for his age but looking at it now he is still a kid… I still remember how you acted when we started teaching you ninjutsu, hehehe…” – Hina
“Mum!~” – Yuna (blushing)
“Ooh…hehe I will keep it quite…” – Hina
“Mother, later lets go for tea…” – Nagi (asking cooly)
“NO you don’t!...” – Yuna (glaring at Nagi)
“Ahaha… another time then…” – Hina (smirking at Yuna)
“MUM~” – Yuna
“Ok ok… let’s get ready as well…” – Hina (Joyfully changing the topic…)
“Yes we should…” – Nagi (clearing up the dishes bringing them to the sink)
“Phew…” – Yuna (^_^;)
“…” – Hina (quietly looking at her daughter smirking…)
…..
When Azuma arrived at the location Azuma was speechless, ‘… what am I seeing here… what is this place. Ok it keep calm and let’s see… hell I cannot do that… But one thing I am absolutely sure, This is artificially made! It is impossible it is natural.’
What Azuma is seeing is a high-leveled earth mound wall that looks like a cliff from below, it looks artificially made. That mound connect to a natural water source, where it divert part of the water to flow through the mound wall.
The water diverted flowed down through that mound to create a waterfall that connects to an artificial lake. The lake then have an exit point which created an artificial river, which flows down further away connecting back to the natural river.
Trees were then planted around the area to make it naturally beautiful.
Next to the lake was a large cottage, when he arrived there he saw that the cottage is spacious and what was inside the cottage blew his mind away.
Within the cottage beside rooms and a kitchen, there was a hot spring.
From how his father, mother and grandmother reacted looking at the place, he knew that everything here was design and built by his grandfather.
Everyone looked at him while he showed a proud face to them letting them know that he have design and built a masterpiece training location.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” – Ren
“…”
“Dear, this…” – Hina
“This is nothing, initially I wanted to do a higher cliff but it’s hard to find a natural source of water for that. I do not want to waste my chakra to maintain the water flow so I have to find a location for it, luckily I found this place.
What is more to it? The Daimyo gave us the rights to manage this Gifu region! Turning a few acres for private use is up to us not them. It will not disrupt our business what so ever.
And so since I plan to use this land for training, why not make it something grand and permanent. Also look at the place; it could be our own private vacation spot in the future.” – Ren
“…” – Everyone
“Oh, by the way there is a reason I built the cottage here at that location. I discovered a natural hot spring while excavating for the artificial lake. The hot spring is natural and not done by jutsu.” – Ren (smirking)
“!!!” – Everyone (looking shocked)
…
After the tour around the place…
“So Azuma we should get started with your training.”
“Yes grandpa.”
“Em, but first I think it’s best to explain and layout our plans for you first… we decided to train you this way because of your chakra meditation accomplishment. We think this will be the fastest way to show long-term results. We will build your foundation up before anything else, no techniques or ninjutsu, but only foundation building for now.”
“Ah…”
“Do not worry little Azuma. As you know, the quality of chakra is reflected by the quality of your primal physical and spiritual energies. With your chakra meditation technique you have already pass the beginner training for spiritual energy. That is why this beginner-training regime is for building up your primal physical energy quality. To do that we have to build a good foundation for your body physical fitness. There is five components in that and we will target all of them.”
‘Oh, don’t tell me that he is really planning what I am think off when he was talking about physical fitness…’
Ren started his explanation, “The five components we will be targeting is your cardiovascular endurance, muscular strength, muscular endurance, flexibility, and body composition.”
‘I knew it, it’s the same as my past life…’
“At your current stage we will merge your cardiovascular endurance and body composition training into one, your muscular strength and endurance into one, and flexibility alone. Although all the training is related, the workout that you will be doing will focuses more towards the specific part of training. So for cardiovascular endurance and body composition you will be doing running and swimming in alternate days.
For your muscular strength and endurance, you will be doing body weight training such as push-ups, squats, planks and sit-ups. We will add on pull-ups, cliff climbing and hand walking later after you strengthen up your core muscles.
The endurance part is from the repetition you will be doing. We consider you passing this part of the regime when you are able to do a thousand reps per sitting. However, we will start by you trying to accomplish a quality twenty, then fifty, then hundred, then two hundred, and so on as your initial goal until the last one a thousand.
Finally, for your flexibility we will be teaching you body stretching (Yoga). We will also include a game for you for this regime.” – Ren
“Game?” – Azuma
“Yes, you will be playing catch.” – Ren
“Huh, catch? Who am I going to play with?” – Azuma
“Your mother’s cat summons, you will be playing catch with them. You will pass this regime when you are able to catch every kind of cat summons that your mother summoned.” – Ren
“Ah…” – Azuma
‘For such a well thought out plan, it is perfect to build up a monstrous physical fitness body even in my past life. The thousand quality reps is slightly overkill if it is in my past life but this overall plan is indeed great. For building up a fit foundation.’ – Azuma mind
“Oh before I forget, we will also continue to include your chakra meditation as well during this period of training, it will help you greatly as well.” – Ren
After the explanation, Azuma began his beginner-training regime with his family supervision. The first thing they thought him was swimming, but before that, they introduced dynamic stretching warming up methods for Azuma. They explained that knowing physical warming up is also important for a shinobi.
They mentioned that using chakra method of warming up is the norm as it is easier to do during active missions.
However due to certain reasons they advised Azuma that its better know how to do physical warming up as well.
It was especially true if he for whatever reason had his chakra sealed. When that happen he is going to be reliant on only physical techniques such as Taijutsu combat method, it also helps especially during friendly sparing when he wanted to conceal his abilities.