The afternoon sun beat down on the Academy’s packed-dirt training ground, baking the chalk dust and sweat rising from two dozen restless six-year-olds.
At the center of the yard stood a weathered wooden post wrapped in frayed straw targets.
Instructor Akabane, a scarred chunin with a perpetual scowl, slapped a leather-bound clipboard against his thigh as he paced back and forth in front of the line of students.
“Alright, listen up!” Akabane barked, his voice carrying easily over the murmur of the class.
“Today is your first practical baseline evaluation.
No fancy jutsu—most of you don’t even have the chakra control for a proper substitution yet.
Today is strictly about basic footwork and blunt-force weapon handling.
When I call your name, step into the circle, pick up the training wood, and spar your partner until one of you hits the dirt or yields.”
Ren stood near the back of the formation, his hands tucked loosely into the pockets of his dark blue civilian tunic.
Beneath his skin, his Kazeshira Aero-Dynamic Receptors remained active, quietly mapping the ambient pressure shifts of the yard.
He could feel the slight, erratic wind currents displaced by Akabane’s pacing, the heavy, rigid breathing of the children at the front, and the distinct, tense pressure wave radiating from Itachi Uchiha three steps to his right—a boy whose posture was entirely economical, wasting zero energy.
“First match: Uchiha Itachi versus Inuzuka Kima.”
A collective murmur rippled through the class.
Itachi stepped forward smoothly, his expression a mask of absolute calm.
Across from him, a rowdy, wild-haired boy with red fang-mark tattoos on his cheeks grinned fiercely, bouncing on the balls of his feet.
The match lasted less than four seconds.
Kima lunged with a headstrong, aggressive charge, telegraphing his movement with a loud yelp.
Itachi didn’t even drop into a formal stance; a subtle pivot to the left, a sharp displacement of air that Ren’s skin registered instantly, and Itachi’s wooden training knife was already pressed firmly against Kima’s spine.
“Yield,” Itachi stated flatly.
Instructor Akabane scribbled a quick note on his clipboard, barely blinking.
“Next.
Chen Ren versus…
Akimichi Chouma.”
Ren blinked, schooling his features into the slight, passive reluctance of a quiet civilian kid who would rather be anywhere else.
He stepped out of the ranks and walked toward the marked dirt circle, his soft-soled sandals kicking up tiny puffs of dust.
His opponent was a stout, round-faced boy from the Akimichi clan who gave a nervous, friendly wave, clutching his wooden training club like a baseball bat.
“Begin!” Akabane shouted.
Chouma charged forward, relying entirely on mass and momentum, swinging the wooden club in a wide, sweeping arc aimed at Ren’s shoulder.
To a normal six-year-old civilian, the strike would have looked blindingly fast and terrifyingly heavy.
To Ren, whose mind still held the cold, calculating reflexes of a Warring States scout who had dodged flying shuriken in blinding rain, the attack moved in slow motion.
More importantly, his skin spoke before his eyes even processed the trajectory.
The Kazeshira Receptors read the exact compression wave of air curling off the moving club, calculating the vector, speed, and terminal impact point a millisecond before the wood reached him.
Ren didn’t counter with flashy martial arts or heavy blows that would blow his cover.
He simply executed a textbook, utterly mediocre civilian dodge.
He leaned his torso back just enough for the wooden club to whistle harmlessly past his nose, letting his momentum carry him into a clumsy-looking stumble.
As he tripped over his own feet, he thrust out a hand to break his fall—and incidentally clipped Chouma’s supporting ankle with his heel.
Thud.
Chouma lost his balance, tumbling forward into the dirt with a soft grunt. You are reading on g.com, the official source.
Ren landed right on top of him, kicking up a small cloud of dust.
For a second, the training ground was dead silent.
Then, Akabane sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose in disappointment.
“Incompetent recovery, Chen.
You tripped over your own shadow and somehow took your opponent down by sheer accident.
Get up, both of you.
Match over.
Winner: Chen.”
Ren scrambled to his feet, dusting off his dark blue tunic with a sheepish, slightly embarrassed expression that instantly satisfied the instructor’s low expectations.
He muttered a quiet “Sorry,” and shuffled back to his spot in the ranks.
From the corner of his eye, Ren caught a flicker of movement.
Itachi Uchiha was standing by the stone railing, his dark eyes lingering on Ren for a fraction of a second longer than necessary.
There was no visible expression on Itachi’s face, but the air pressure around him tightened microscopically—a sign of analytical curiosity.
Let him look, Ren thought calmly, slipping back into the background noise of the class.
His civilian mask was intact.
His points were safe, his physical limits were hidden, and his first practical test in Konoha was successfully logged as a stroke of pure, clumsy luck.
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