Two hours later, Kenshin reached the city, noting that he was hardly tired — his daily training was paying off.
The young man wanted to get into the best possible shape, determined not to lose face compared to his stronger children.
After eating lunch at a local caf, he started wandering around the city, learning a lot of new things.
He saw a Konoha shinobi up close for the first time, and outwardly, the man standing ten meters away from him inspired no awe at all.
At first glance, an ordinary man around thirty, about 170 centimeters tall, with a build that didn’t show any prominent musculature — but the next moment, Kenshin stopped considering him “ordinary,” because the man suddenly turned sharply toward the young man, as if he could feel the gaze directed at him with the back of his head.
Kenshin quickly looked away and walked on, trying not to attract unnecessary attention.
A minute later, he came across a shop with a shuriken on its sign and went inside.
Inside the store, he found a huge variety of shinobi gear, ranging from vests with extra pockets to shuriken and kunai.
“Hello, do you have a basic guide for chakra control?” he asked the fat seller, who was lounging lazily in a rocking chair.
“I do, but you can’t afford it,” the fat man replied with contempt, throwing a single appraising glance at the young man, then closing his eyes again.
“And how much does it cost?
Maybe I can find the right amount…”
“The basic guide to chakra control costs 50,000 ryo, and it contains explanations on chakra control and forming hand signs.
Find the money — come back, and until then, don’t let me see you.
Now get out, you’re poisoning the aura of my pious shop with your beggarly presence!” the fat man grumbled irritably, and closed his eyes again, completely unafraid of any displeasure from the seemingly sturdy young man.
Kenshin realized that this fat man wasn’t acting so relaxed for nothing — he knew who he could be rude to and who he had to grovel before.
The young man decided not to argue, left the shop, and headed to a clothing store.
Picking out a simple pair of pants and a T-shirt, the young man paid, becoming 200 ryo poorer, and stepped outside.
The sun was already setting, and Kenshin decided he wouldn’t make it back before dark, so he asked a passerby for the location of the nearest inn, headed in the right direction, and decided to spend the night in the city, heading home in the morning.
Aya knew about this plan, so Kenshin wasn’t worried she would panic.
Finding himself in a dead-end alley, the young man realized too late that he had taken a wrong turn when he heard a shout three meters away.
“Hey, what are you doing hanging around here?
This is my territory.
Pay 500 ryo to pass, and you can go on your way,” said a bald thug who appeared out of nowhere.
“Yeah, pay to pass, or you’re done for!” added one of his two lackeys.
“Damn, of all the luck, getting into trouble on level ground!” Kenshin thought, tensing his whole body, ready to fight back.
He had absolutely no desire to give 500 ryo to unknown bandits, and he understood perfectly well that once they saw his money, it wouldn’t stop at 500 ryo — the robbers would take everything.
“What, cat got your tongue?
Hand over the money!” the bald thug spoke up again.
“Maybe we can just go our separate ways peacefully?
I don’t want any trouble,” Kenshin declared, smiling and waving his hands in front of him.
“Trouble?
Ha-ha-ha, no, did you hear that?
He’s going to cause us trouble.
Who do you think you are, you pup!” The thug’s smile instantly twisted into a feral snarl, and he reached out a hand to grab Kenshin by the neck, but the young man dodged to the side and threw two punches.
The first hit the thug in the solar plexus, and the second aimed for his chin, hoping to knock him out by using the element of surprise.
The right punch to the chest hit its mark, but at the last second the thug shifted his position slightly, and Kenshin’s fist slammed into a pectoral muscle as hard as steel, doing little damage to the bald thug.
The planned left punch didn’t reach its target at all.
The thug nimbly jumped back a meter.
“Stay back!
Don’t interfere!” the thug commanded his two henchmen, who were about to attack Kenshin from both sides.
“We weren’t going to, Koga-san,” said a skinny kid, who looked about twenty, in an ingratiating tone, and added: “And the little guy’s no slouch, daring to fight back against the boss…
You must not know, kid, but Koga-san studied at the shinobi academy in Konoha!”
“Yeah!
So what if he got kicked out?
He’ll still take you with one hand!” the second henchman added ingratiatingly, just as skinny as the first, an eighteen-year-old kid with a big scar on his cheek.
“Shut your mouth!” the thug snarled at him, and the second henchman fell silent instantly.
“You want to cause me trouble?
Come on then, show me what you’ve got!” Koga said with a laugh, and walked toward Kenshin.
Kenshin assumed a familiar boxing stance, surprising the bald thug, and as soon as Koga was within a meter and a half, Kenshin made a sharp swing with his right hand, aiming for the enemy’s chin, but the man dodged fairly easily and threw a counter-punch to Kenshin’s chest.
Kenshin blocked the punch at the last moment, putting up an arm guard, and took two steps back.
His left arm exploded with pain, and the young man could barely use it.
Koga grunted in surprise and made another fist lunge.
Kenshin struggled to react to the thug’s speed and dodged only at the last second, swerving to the side, and the next moment he took a straight punch to the stomach.
The young man’s vision went dark almost immediately, and his stomach exploded with unbearable pain.
Kenshin dropped to his knees, reflexively curling onto his left side, bending his knees and elbows to protect himself from further blows.
But the next blows never came.
Instead, a loud shout rang out: “Hey, what’s going on over there?!”
“Damn it, let’s go!” Koga commanded, and the trio vanished around the nearest corner in an instant.
“Hey, you alive over there?” a man in a green vest, with a Konoha forehead protector, asked Kenshin.
The young man recognized him as that same “unremarkable” man with eyes in the back of his head.
“Kha, kha!” Instead of words, a cough and half-digested miso soup burst from Kenshin’s mouth.
“Get up and get out of here,” the shinobi commanded, completely uninterested in helping the young man.
He had been watching the whole situation from the start but hadn’t intervened, wanting to see what this unusually curious kid was made of.
Seeing how the young man “deflated” from one weak punch from a half-baked genin, he instantly lost interest in him and had called out to the trio only to give them time to escape, not wanting to bother with detaining them and complicating his own work.
Kenshin somehow got to his feet, coughed a few more times, and, holding his stomach, slowly trudged toward the exit of the alley.
Finding the right inn, the young man managed to order a room for the night.
Once inside, he locked the door and collapsed onto the bed, almost immediately falling into a deep sleep.
During the night, he woke up several times and vomited the remains of his dinner.
His left arm hurt badly, but not as much as his stomach.
The young man hoped his internal organs weren’t damaged and that everything would be fine.