>>5936555>>5936576>>5936595>>5936681>>5936694>>5936883The week drags on without excitement.
It’s not until the third day, when you want to ask Hotaru if she has any paper/ink you can use, that you realize that you have absolutely no clue where she’s at. It’s not until you call out her name that she emerges from the nearby brush and approaches.
“What do you need, young man?” She asks.
You just don't ask questions about where she was or what she was doing, instead cataloging her stealth as another example of what you should aspire to be capable of as you develop. “I was just wondering if you had any paper and writing material. I want to start a journal.”
She quirks her eyebrow at you but does dig into her clothing to produce a notebook and pen. She tears out roughly a dozen of the pages within, tucking them away neatly before handing you what you asked for. “What’s the purpose of the journal?”
“I don’t know how to say it without sounding pompous.”
“So sound pompous.”
“Well, I’ve spent a lot of my life in search of spiritual growth. But I feel as though a lot of those ruminations are easily lost in time, hard to recall even though they’ve helped me move beyond obstacles that have been in my way. So I want to write my ideas down. I could also stand to work on my penmanship.”
“That’s not pompous at all. Just as a taijutsu expert needs to spend long hours in physical training to master their bodily chakra, a ninjutsu expert needs to spend long hours looking inward to master their spiritual chakra.”
“Is this a process that all ninja have gone through?” You ask.
“Yes and no. Every soul is different. Just as every true expert of the martial arts will eventually realize that their body and style are unique, so too will every spiritual expert learn that their way of understanding the kami and their own inner nature is unique. For example, I can’t simply explain to you the things I’ve learned that have helped me along my own journey because our natures are different. Concepts that grant wisdom to me might be irrelevant to you, or worse, they might actively poison your development by sending you down false trails that lead nowhere. There are many among the ninja clans that hold fast to traditions and the expectation that the generations that come after should simply replicate the techniques and ideas of their predecessors to succeed, but nobody who has walked such a generic path to its conclusion has ever achieved true greatness.”
“Is that what I’m after? Greatness?”
“No. Greatness only comes to a rare few, and even then, only as a byproduct… But as I said, I don’t want to spoil your journey.” With that, Hotaru turns to re-enter her silent vigil of the caravan from the woods. Perhaps she’s attempting to show you how a ninja should act, or perhaps she’s merely letting the reins of leadership fall slack so her three students can learn how it feels to get by on their own.
