Chakra Magic![Mission]

Mission Details:

As the sun rose through the thick Mists of the land of Water, it made a warm glow that could be seen throughout the entirety of the Mist Village, and the lands surrounding it, if they were at a high enough level above sea level to actually see the sun just as it rose over the horizon. The glow filled with warm oranges and light purples as the sky seemed to be painted. Because of the heavy mists that surrounded the village at nearly all times, one could look towards the sunrise without fear of it harming their eyes too much, as it was mostly obscured. This warm light found it's way into the window of Keita, and he groaned lightly as he grumbled and stirred around under the covers of his bed. He didn't really want to wake up, he was a bit of a lazy person when it came immediately to the morning, and he liked to sit in bed and watch the shadows dance on the ceiling for a little while before he actually got his glasses and headed out to do his daily routine. Today, however, he had scheduled a mission, and it was with the same partner he had last time, and even though the partner had to do all the heavy lifting the previous mission, this time all they had to do was to increase their chakra supply, and somehow prove that they did so to the people who were handing the missions out, but he assumed they had some sort of sensor waiting. Such a high level mission that gave good money, and it was for something so rudimentary, apparently the village was getting ready for some sort of conflict or natural disaster, if they desperately needed their village to be so strong so quickly, that they were shelling out quite a lot of money to have their ninjas get more chakra. All these thoughts simply drifted out of Keita's ears as he finally threw himself to the floor, out of the warmth of the covers and into the cold of his non-heated and cramped apartment room, which made him get up and run to the bathroom and start the warm water. It was at these times that he wished he was somewhat of a fire elemental, but due to the threads that made up his body, he wondered why he even got cold anymore anyways, but he assumed that the threads of his now rag doll type form were something of alive, with their own tissue that would stop him from simply being numb. Plus it was a good defense mechanism he supposed, since not knowing when you're hurt or burning or something else of the sort would be more of a hindrance than a blessing, and he was simply glad he hadn't died along with his parents that day, and he silently prayed for his mother, as he undressed and slid into the shower. He sighed as the water slid down him, but it was more of a contented sigh, as the water was delightfully warm to the touch, unlike the surrounding air, and he didn't want to think about getting out of the shower, although he had a schedule to keep.

He jumped out of the shower and grabbed his towel and dried off most of his skin and hair, making sure to work his hair quickly so that he wouldn't catch a cold. He wished he had a better bathing situation than he currently did, but this was the best he could afford, which was why he was doing all of these missions. He still couldn't afford the puppet designs that he longed for, which was why he was doing these missions in the first place. After drying up and getting dressed, the cold wasn't that bad to deal with, although since the threads on the inside were still sort of wet, he was a bit cold internally. Still, he grabbed his glasses and then headed outside, as the best chakra meditation and discovery was best in the morning, or so he thought at least. He sort of skipped to his destination, the small little demons that he would normally see were replaced with much happier things in the back and front of his mind, as well as his vision. It wasn't always bleak and crazy for him, and sometimes his mind would allow him to be fairly happy as well, but then again, he was always happy, no matter what state of mind he was in, except for when he thought about his mother. Still, he saw happy things as well as demented things, and he had learned to live with both of them as he traversed the ninja world. Still, he hadn't really seen much except for this village he was in, and a little bit of the region that led from this village to the village he was from, but other than that, he hadn't quite seen the world. It was his goal to travel and meet all sorts of individuals, and perhaps devour their hearts, if they were jerks. He really disliked people who didn't really get along with others, and he wanted to peel their skin off and devour their faces. Still, he was getting ahead of himself as he went towards the small clearing in the village where the two of the ninja on this quite easy mission were to meet and greet, and then of course start to get the chakra capacity training underway. As he showed up there, he was sure that he was a bit early, and seeing as how he didn't have his puppets yet, they were safely tucked away inside of his brain, he would have to do something to entertain himself. He wasn't a big fan of using shuriken and kunai himself, instead choosing to leave that to his puppets when they were finally completed, he simply tossed rocks into the air, and then hooked onto them with hi chakra strings as a sort of accuracy training. He was going to wait until his actual mission partner got there to start channeling his chakra.
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Word Count: 1027

Early morning rising had been a part of Akuharu's schedule since his birth, although for largely different reasons then he currently maintained. The hot cup of steaming coffee lightly burned his hand as the ceramic material conducted the thermal energies with its usual inefficiencies, a flaw he was glad for - it kept the beverage warmer far longer then it would otherwise in a container of metallic construction. It was probably also better for him. As he came from a fishing village in the Far Reaches of Kirigakure -it was properly labelled Lundechi Island, but no one really cared that much. For the majority of his life, he had known his Father to be up and out of bed at any early hour. Such an early start that Akuharu frequently didn't see him 'til late in the evening. So he started trying to rise with him, made it a game - after a fashion. When he had been on board the pirate ship, you got up when someone wanted the cabin boy cleaning and stole a few winks of sleep in between tasks. He had intially had some trouble sleeping in the middle of his classes at the Academy, but those troubles were behind him for the most part now. He could sleep in the oddest spots, but that seemed to be one of the few remaining aspects of his time beyond the law. It also occurred to him that the inefficient heat conduction of the mug in his hand also saved his hand from having direct exposure to the scalding temperature contained within the glass. There was something deeply contemplation and satisfying about beating the sun over the horizon. Eyeing the mentioned explosion drifting towards the position also previously mentioned. The tip of it was starting to poke itself over the lip of his view of the world.

Catylin's Coffee boasted some of the better views available in Kirigakure while also being a very affordable shop, mainly due to the fact that she got so much business. Her simple method of cornering the market was that she herself, was a customer. And a customer that subscribed to a particular group of coffee drinkers that Akuharu himself also claimed membership. They were competitive, desperate on occasion, inclined to view their beverage as something more then a substance to be consumed when greater energy was required. It was a vital part of their daily routine; an essential element. If you drunk less coffee then the average member of this unofficial club, then you weren't holding up your part of the bargain and fell in standing. Akuharu didn't delude himself about his standing, he wasn't very far up at all. Some of the officials who frequented the shop were likely to do so upwards of fifteen times a day (which included a night typically) due to their high workload. Shinobi were blessedly less involved in some of the more domestic and unworldly affairs those poor fellows were. Although, admittedly Akuharu had found himself feeling a little disappointed at the variety (or lack thereof) in the missions offered at the basic level of Shinobi education. It was to be expected, Akuharu mused in retrospect, it was hardly like he or his team would be able to handle terribly much in the way of military action yet. They weren't /weak/ in terms of offensive capability, they were just likely to goof up while doing it and get someone injured. Possibly themselves, possibly not the person whom they were supposed to be targeting at all. Civilians caused a good deal of paperwork for the most part. Anyone could draw a knife through someone's neck. Actually doing the job properly required some training, and even then there was a chance you wouldn't be able to do it in cold blood when the time came. You could receive all the emotional conditioning in the world, it didn't mean jack squat if you didn't believe in it. Coming back to himself, Akuharu turned in his chair slightly to watch the approach of the new arrivals for the morning rush. It signalled his time to leave, getting here before everyone else was a luxury. Sometimes he talked to Catylin, but generally he picked a seat to watch the sun and kept to himself- letting his coffee restore some humanity to him. It had taken its time this morning, the process of percolation seemed to last more then it fair share of the early morning session- removing some of the enjoyment he generally took from it. It wasn't a terribly nice feeling, that he had missed out on such a pleasant start to the day, but he could make the most of what remained.

Trecking his way home, Akuharu intercepted the daily correspondence delivery, saving the postie boy a portion of his rounds to Akuharu's own apartment. He flicked through the various Medical Journal readings he was subscribed too, looking for a more interesting package. And he wasn't to be disappointed, stamped in the usual bold heading was the request for attention from the Kirigakure Administration Mission Allocation Division. Apparently he'd been allotted a particular slot under a Professional Development Class mission. It wasn't exactly what he had expected, but money was money and he could possibly use some sort of training. There was many rumours circulating at the moment. Fishermen coming home with 'nought but empty nets. Sea-food was at a premium at the moment. Stuffing the rest of the notices into his mail slot, Akuharu meandered towards the training grounds with the intention of making something worthwhile out of the fairly lack lustre start to his day.
Throwing sharp pointy objects in a near blinding mist seemed to make sense to people who had death on the mind, so there was no form of seal or jutsu to try and make the training grounds a little less potentially dangerous. As such, Akuharu was always careful about making his way across it, eventually entering the 'pen' as they were called in which he'd been told to visit.

"Ah, Keita-san, they didn't tell me I'd be working with you today." He inclined his head respectfully.

1025 words.

As Keita was distracting himself, he heard the various metallic things whizzing through the air, but he didn't really care, he had been injured before, and it took a little bit of chakra to heal himself, but he could easily heal himself due to the threads that now made up his body. He was wearing his traditional clothing, or the clothing that he wore most of the time when he was actually doing ninja things. He was wearing his top hat and royal purple clothing, and of course he was wearing his glasses and his gloves. The glasses were slightly annoying, simply because the mist would often get on the glasses, and cause him to have to clean them off. He would eventually need to get something that allowed the glasses to be water proof and simply have the water bead and fall off of it so that he would never have to clean off his glasses to see during a fight. His mind wandered, as he was simply itching to actually fight someone, whether it be to the death or not. He was so excited for his first blood lust that he sort of ignored the fact that at his current state without his puppets, he wouldn't even be able to do much of anything in a fight, let alone enough to kill someone and devour their heart. He was definitely getting ahead of himself then, but he liked to have his mind wander to the most bizarre of circumstances, and even though he was a cute little kid, he had some pretty demented stuff and ideas circling around in his head most of the time, and this was simply one of those completely normal thoughts. He didn't quite remember when he started thinking about devouring people's hearts, and he believed that it was the work of the kinjutsu that turned him into what he was now, which was basically a doll made of threads. He didn't really feel like a normal person, and he had a mental attitude to match. The threads thirsted for someone's heart, as if it would allow Keita to become a lot stronger than he usually was. Still, he was suppressing the urge to simply start killing people for their hearts, especially because he would never betray the village or the people within it unless they betrayed him first, and then all of his morals and limits were going to be thrown off the table. He was simply absent mindedly still throwing the stones, as he was skillful enough with the chakra string technique that he didn't even need to pay attention to hook to a simple stone within the air. Still, he was hoping that soon he would be skillful enough to turn them invisible to the naked eye. Eventually he would have to learn how to do that, but currently, he would have to make due with them, and resort to traps and such. He sort of spaced out a bit, and barely heard his name being called off into the distance, or at least it was off in the distance to him because of his daydreaming. Keita turned and looked to see Akuharu standing there and bowed his head, and he figured that he was the one that said his name, so he gave a smile.

"Hello Aku! you're just in time to sit and meditate with me, and get a gigantic chakra pool! I would prefer a normal pool of course, but chakra is ok I guess, although I don't use a lot of that stuff anyways."

Keita had gone off on a little bit of a tangent, but that's just what he did sometimes, as he was a bit unpredictable most of the time. Some days he would go a whole day trying to include a certain word into every sentence, and it would be a weird word, like potato or something of the sort, that didn't really fit into a sentence unless you were specifically talking about the subject. Still, he would simply wave slightly wildly at his new friend that showed up, and he had forgotten to use his nickname, and he hoped that he wasn't mad that his precious nickname that he cherished wasn't used. Keita wanted to badly to take it back, but a slightly newer and less cool nick name was already established, and he had to roll with it. So, they had to increase their chakra pool by any means necessary, whatever that meant, and technically Keita could just kill his new friend and eat his heart, but that wouldn't be cool, simply because then Keita would be out of one friend, and he liked having a friend or two in the village. Still, that would be the easiest route, and Keita considered it for a moment, and then decided to go against it, simply because he believed that it would violate one of his own life rules to not kill a friend unless they betray him first. Keita thought about it, and wondered what the quickest way to gain more chakra and chakra control would be, and after a little bit of staring into nothingness, he snapped out of it and then turned to Akuharu.

"I've got it! Let's go to the pond where they practice the water surface walking and then practice that. We would need to be in awkward positions and stuff to truly train our chakra reserves, but whatever."

Keita would then pretend to sneak over to the small pond on the east side of the training field, where the less experienced genin or the academy students would train the water surface walking technique, but now he only saw a very small amount of genin there practicing. He jumped onto the water with one foot, in sort of a swan lake type move, focusing chakra into the ball of his right foot, which is the one he landed on.

"C'mon Aku! Hurry up and get over here so that your chakra can get huge!"
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Word Count: 1005

"Hello Aku! you're just in time to sit and meditate with me, and get a gigantic chakra pool! I would prefer a normal pool of course, but chakra is ok I guess, although I don't use a lot of that stuff anyways."

The boy whom the small burst of vocalisation was aimed at couldn't help but bemusedly blink for a second as he considered the message in all its entirety. The message was so contradictory that he almost considered it nonsensical in its entirety, but given that some information could actually be gleaned from the utterance that would be a designation far to harsh to lay upon it. Still, first Keita would propose that gaining a larger chakra pool was worth his time, however given the fact that Keita had already ticked off several of Akuharu's psychological profiling boxes somewhat indicated that he was somewhat at odds with typical social norms. When one suggested that one should do something, they generally considered it to be worth that individuals time. Depending on their relationship with that person it could be a genuinely useful statement, or an insult. So in this case, Akuharu would normally interpret Keita's intial statement as him considering that gaining a larger resource of the metaphysical substance that they used to make ice-cream, coffee and do various others impossible things to be a good activity.
However that statement was almost immediately refuted by a following preposition, asserting that he would actually prefer a normal pool of chakra. Then he changed tact again, following along his previous train of thought by stating the chakra was 'ok'. Then he jumped ship again, stating that he didn't tend to use the resource a lot. Perhaps if Akuharu talked in the same jumpy fashion the two would be able to develop a rapport after a fashion. He seemed to be encountering the little Shinobi a great deal more then he would have expected to. Such was life, Akuharu summarised before replying without trying to consider his words too much. If he thought about trying to replicate his partners own speech paterns he'd give himself a headache - they were so convoluted. But what if Keita found it as difficult to properly understand what Akuharu considered to be the 'norm' as Akuharu found Keita to be. The thought dried out his mouth a little as he shot back his own timely reply.
"Well I'm glad that you didn't wait up for me," he said simply gesticulating at the rocks he'd seen been thrown around a few moments earlier. He thought about doing the tact changing trick he'd seen Keita perform but decided that he was more likely to just confuse both of them in the process. Him more then the other. "I guess that makes one of us, most of my techniques tend to be quite hungry blighter to use. It'll give me a bit more breathing room after using some of the heavier items in my arsenal."

Making his way further into the 'pen' Akuharu idly snagged the gate behind him, dragging it to a close but not locking it or otherwise obstructing the entryway. If needed Keita seemed to be a dab enough hand at using his chakra threads to do some lifting, and would hopefully be able to use it in a pinch. The threads of chakra seemed to be a most peculiar way of controlling items in his experience, which was of course, very limited. But from the small demonstration Keita had given in on their first encounter the strings amplified the movements of the fingers into a larger degree of kinetic impact on the current thing they were manipulating. However this was such a dynamic state of chakra moulding, Akuharu wondered if there weren't other restrictions on it. Perhaps the hand motions were as much for flicking the strings as they were for moulding the chakra itself. After all, it was an extremely condensed thin trail of chakra that contained remarkable strength in of itself. In fact, Akuharu considered it something of a miracle that it actually functioned at all. He could eject chakra all he liked from the tenketsu of his body, but without handseals and mental focus, it was just hot air escaping from a kettle. Puppeteers seemed to have discovered a method for creating this 'tunnel' from their tenketsu straight to the target and could manipulate the variable in the relationship to their liking by moving it in three dimension space. Perhaps he could ask Keita about it at some point? Even better of course would be to find out himself and invest some time into learning it. Although his continued studies into Medical and Sensory Ninjutsu seemed to be quite contentedly consuming the majority of his time at the moment.

"I've got it! Let's go to the pond where they practice the water surface walking and then practice that. We would need to be in awkward positions and stuff to truly train our chakra reserves, but whatever."

Despite his smaller size, it seemed that Keita was actually the more focused and driving of the pair, which was potentially a cause of distress for Akuharu given on his probably older status. Still, he was hardly complaining if someone else wanted to take the reigns for a while. Just so long as it wasn't forever, or to the point that if he was the metaphorical oxen and Keita the driver, then he was a nice enough one. Akuharu had no mind to be used and abused for his services. Meandering forwards at Keita's prompting, Akuharu also gave a relatively small jump by Shinobi standards and soared through the air- landing onto the water on two feet. He didn't bend his knees on impact as one normally would on a substance with a more solid configuration, merely allowed the water to buck under the sudden impact- the chakra currently being channeled through his feet and into the water allowing him to keep himself from succumbing to the laws of reality and falling underneath the water.

WC: 1012.

OOC: Cutting is short again so that I have exercises and such to write.

It seemed that Keita's words were getting through to the man, which was slightly strange to him, considering almost no one ever even payed attention to Keita's odd ramblings, let alone make sense of them. Then again, when a person didn't even bother to listen, instead writing Keita off as being crazy and not really worth the time listening to, then they didn't get the rather obvious message that his sentences held. He was basically saying that a larger chakra pool was definitely beneficial, even though he didn't really feel like putting in the amount of effort that it would take to increase the chakra pool, so he would prefer a normal chakra pool, especially because he didn't really use much of his chakra regardless, he was adept and proficient enough in his chakra thread technique that he didn't even need to use as much chakra as another person did with the same technique. Of course, that would be to say that they were less experienced than him, as he had heard of people who were masters at the art of puppeteering, but he hadn't seen anyone use the puppetry thread technique other than himself. Still, it was rather interesting to muse about that now, as Keita was simply speaking to his mission partner, and they were going to increase their chakra rather quickly.

"I guess that makes one of us, most of my techniques tend to be quite hungry blighter to use. It'll give me a bit more breathing room after using some of the heavier items in my arsenal."

This was said by Akuharu, and Keita wondered what the young man was skilled in, as he was skilled in puppetry and genjutsu, but his partner might have ninjutsu by the sounds of it, or perhaps he was more of a supporting person because of his personality. He seemed rather nice and courteous, so he could definitely be more of a helpful person, and helpful people usually liked to help others by healing their wounds, so medical ninjutsu would of course be a big possibility. There were many things he could be however, and Keita didn't really judge based on a limited amount of knowledge. He could of course simply ask, but there wasn't much fun in that, especially because his partner had the unfair advantage of seeing Keita use the chakra threads, but then again that was Keita's own fault. As they kept talking, it seemed that Keita's idea was much appreciated, or at least Akuharu acknowledged it as a good idea, and hopped onto the water with him, however, he wasn't having as much fun with it, and simply jumped on it with both of his feet planted firmly. He wasn't going to build his chakra reserves if he wasn't stressing his chakra control like that, he needed a little push. A wry grin crept onto Keita's face, as he analyzed his mission partner, and then he quickly formed his chakra threads, and tugged at his feet, lifting one of the feet into the air.

"You have to stress your chakra and chakra control!"

Keita was a bit fanatical about that sentence, and kept lifting the foot higher and wiggled it a bit to unbalance his partner, so that the chakra fluctuations would become harder to control. This was of course if he didn't fight it at all, and if he did, that would actually help Keita more, simply because he would have to dance around on the one foot trying to maintain the grip on the foot. This would most likely increase their chakra pools without having to think about it, and Keita was simply chuckling during it. After a while of this, it would be fairly easy to get a bit tired, as they were simply messing around. No reason to make a mission so boring, and have a bit of fun, although Keita's version of fun was messing with his partner, and might be considered a bit immature, but he didn't care, if he could link a chakra thread to your foot during a fight, Keita could easily kill you, so it was a good exercise in most regards, not just him amusing himself at the expense of his partner, although that was simply an added bonus for him. Keita also had a few genjutsu he could use to mess with his partner, and while that was tempting, that wasn't what the mission was about, and that could be saved for later. Most people didn't even know the horrors that genjutsu could wreak on your mind, and because of this, eventually Keita would want his partner here to come under it's effects, simply because he wanted to teach him how to fight it for later, against people who might actually use it to harm him.

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Time Skip
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After a few hours of doing different exercises and playing around with his chakra threads, Keita had decided that he was nearly out of chakra because of the training, and figured that they must have increased their chakra pool by now, even if it was a very small amount, it was still good enough for the mission, and they would need to head out and get checked by the advanced sensory nin that was put in charge of this particular mission.

"Let's go Aku! I'm pretty sure we did it!"

By this time, a bit of sweat or a lit of mist had collected on his head, he wasn't sure which one it was, because he wasn't even sure if the sweat glands in his skin even worked anymore because of what he was now, but he didn't really care, as he could still feel temperature, and he was feeling fairly nice as a breeze came through and cooled down the field. He would exit the field, whether or not his partner came with him, and sort of hop towards the mission center, and he would go and turn in the mission. It was a fairly simply mission, but it did eat a couple of hours out of the day, but it also made sure that they had more chakra to spend later, which was always good, especially in a combat scenario. Keita, after turning in the mission and the sensory ninja gave the ok that they had completed it, would wave goodbye to his partner, a farewell until they met again, and simply walked home.

[exit]

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Word Count: 1071
Total Word Count: 3103

As Akuharu landed softly down onto the puddle with nary as much as ripple, he studied his reflection momentarily, the duplicated features worrying him momentarily. As with most people of his particular lifestyle, he didn't suffer from the normal troubles of acne and other teenage issues- of course the problems of maturity itself remained as present as ever, but they were occasionally quite pleasant, so he had no constipations about living through some of those symptoms. Or treating them. It was all a matter of perspective, however, there were moments when he felt like he'd trade out of equal value. Like when someone seemingly randomly jerked your foot from underneath you while you were contemplating the nature of reality. Really, how could they? Akuharu didn't exactly turn a baleful stare onto the younger of the two, but in between laughing good naturedly and weakly protesting the situation, his initial startle/glare fell to the wayside for the most part. His weak kicks and attmempts to dislodge the thread via increased chakra output -to the point where the water constantly rippled and churned around his feet when they were in contact with the water, Akuharu tried to get back to the peaceful state of mind he had previously been in.

Athough Keita had risen a valid point by saying that line ("You have to stress your chakra and chakra control!") Akuharu had begun to contemplate some of the finer natures. He'd been doing some reading previously on the subject.

"Chakra is the the essence of life and existence, it exists within the body, in the atmosphere and throughout nature itself. It is in the very water we drink, the air we breath, and the land upon which we tread. It is in the food we eat, it is at the very heart of our mind, body and soul.  At its earliest stages, learning first how to breathe and cultivate one's energy in order to separate it into its yin and yang components is key. The reason for this is by utilizing this breathing method, and meditation one can purify one's energy as it is being gathered. Inhaling generates yin chakra, while exhaling generates yang chakra; as the energy is passed through the body, meditation is used to help purify the energy, enhancing its quality. The reason for this is that most humans possess an imbalance of yin and yang energies. In shinobi this manifests itself in the form of elemental affinities, and the disparaging difference of chakra levels between its members. As one's training progresses, the practitioner learns to harness their internal purified energies, and use the yin-yang chakra to alter or amplify the presence divine elements. By manipulating the elements found within the body, one can achieve superhuman physical abilities, even going so far as to change the nature of one's body."

Akuharu recalled it being a good read, but could not remember the title of the novel -much to his personal dismay. Recollecting those detail- it seemed like an idea basis for his to do some experimentation. While what they were doing here seemed like an imbalance, Akuharu supposed that the two boys naturally tended towards the other end of the scale, so perhaps this was actually more beneficial then doing more of both.

Mentally shrugging, Akuharu decided that he might as well attempt to put up more of a struggle then what his current weak floundering amounted towards. Pitching forwards onto his hands, he coated these limbs in the chakra currently surging within his feet and used this to stabilise him whilst he dealt with the string making part of his body turn traitor on him. Vaugely he wondered why he suddenly felt that disputing this loss of control was suddenly such an issue for him. Perhaps it was because showing too much weakness towards anyone, even a member of your own Village could eventually come around to bite. Keita seemed fundamentally like a nice enough boy, he was polite, cool headed, perhaps a little self-centred and seemed to either desperately crave attention/recognition -which didn't fit with the previously other observed characteristics- or he was a little mentally quirky. The later was his most strongly assumed preconception, and insofar it had been a reasonable and accurate enough to justify him making it. Akuharu merely felt that much like wiggling a bleeding limb in the ocean was sure to attract a shark, his struggling on the end of Keita's metaphorical line seemed more and more like the limp flailing of a fish. Very cynical thoughts, granted, but Akuharu tended to swing more in that direction as it was. Still, he couldn't complain about the workout he had gotten insofar.

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After what felt like an age, Keita finally called it a break in his usual cheerful tones. As per usual, he didn't seem to have sweated much at all, while Akuharu was covered in the stuff- although it was mixed in equal parts with the water he'd managed to splash all over himself during their little training session. Also making his way over to the side of the pool, Akuharu weakly waved as Keita made his way home first. Cleaning up a little would be nice, and he'd be damned if he wasn't going to bathe. Hell, he assumed a lot of people did it after training anyway. Stripping off, he stepped quickly into the pool and went through the usual stages of washing away the grime of a day of work. Well, it was more like a morning, but he'd be damned if there was anything else he felt like doing for the time being. Finally re-dressing after he'd dried off some, Akuharu also made his way home. Stopping by Catilin's again, he took his time in her parlor, sipping on his coffee as he thought about a young boy named Keita. A pool of clean, fresh liquid that he'd spent half of the day jumping around on, and whether or not he was being charged too much for this coffee. He might need to go spend some time in her competitor's shops to get her to lower the price a little.
[Exit]
Word Counter: 1025
Total Word Count: 3062