>>5791821Illusionary or not, flopping around like a dead fish during Shigure-Sensei’s class when shit hit the fan irked your pride. By now you had picked up basic proficiency in moving like a ninja, able to jump over obstacles and do basic acrobatic stunts when necessary, but your reaction speed was limited and you were beginning to fall behind some of the crazy moves you could see someone like Shizuka pull off. If you wanted to get on top of a building, you had to take a running start and kick off a wall, grabbing onto the ledge of the roof and pulling yourself up. Shizuka could just execute a single kickass front-flip and land wherever she wanted to be, even if she needed to clear over 15 vertical feet.
Of all the people in your class, you had the least experience with her. Your personalities were just completely opposing: Where you were introverted and calm, she was extroverted and bombastic. She didn’t really seem to care too much about you, and you didn’t really care too much about her.
Still.
“Shizuka, how did you get to be so fast and agile? I mean, where did you start?” You ask, during Shizuka’s lunch one day.
She puts down her fourth strawberry yogurt cup.
“I just did it! Whenever I was thinking of doing something normal, instead I was all like ‘Wouldn't it be cool if instead of hopping down there all normal I did like a BOOM, POW, WHAM-”
You’re already walking away from her.
—
Junpei teaches you some shit.
“You already have all the equipment needed to move faster and stealthier than you currently do.” He says, with his perpetually flat, professional look. “It sounds like what you were saying when you tried helping us all improve in our spiritual awareness, but inverted. You are overly attached to theorizing about your body as a container of spiritual energy, and forgetting that this spiritual energy is coming from your actual, physical being instead of just inhabiting it. Your body is something you have control of. I will show you some tricks, but the key here is just practice. Constant practice until your body is part of you and not just some avatar your spirit is piloting. Stop moving ‘normally’. Every step should be made with intent. Measure the weight of your steps, move with conscious purpose, not like an animal. Be aware of how you can move, any time, how far you can go, how easily, how impressively. Be more dramatic in your movements when explosivity is required, but more subdued and controlled when it isn’t. With time, this will become second nature. With more time, it will be your only nature.”
>+0.5 Speed—
The end of your second year comes to a close. Before you leave for summer break you present Juro-Sensei with a figurine you carved of him. He tells you it was a waste of your time that you should have spent training, but the figurine would become a fixture on his desk for the rest of his life.
