Once I decided to be a ninja, I didn't hesitate any more. I got ready for the day and headed out to discover how strong or weak I really was.
Strong, incredibly strong. Now I know why the me from yesterday didn't feel the need to train hard anymore. Jumping over 10 feet in the air, easy. Running over 100 meters in less than five seconds, easy. Throwing ninja weapons wherever I wanted them to go, easy. Doing hundreds of pushups, pull ups, crunches, easy. Running over 20 miles, easy. Katas done correctly, easy.
This is already better than super soldiers, while not as good as Spider-Man, it is definitely stronger than Captain America.
It is normal for a 12 year old girl to let this kind of strength go to her head and think that she doesn't need to train anymore, she was already stronger than her Genin parents.
The one that really blew me away was how fast I was. Due to our shape and wind resistance as humans run past 100 meters per 10 seconds things will become exponentially more difficult. The air will become like an invisible concrete wall, just leaning down in a ninja run is not enough to greatly reduce this effect.
100 meters in 5 seconds was actually faster than what Master Roshi ran in the original Dragon Ball before training Goku. The reason being that running 100 meters in 5 seconds is definitely much more than 2 times as difficult as running 100 meters in 10 seconds, it is more like 100 times more difficult.
The reason I can run this fast is due to chakra. Obviously, chakra boosts my strength, but not enough to run that fast or jump that high. We just leak chakra out of our skin, ninja students are not good enough to hold it onto and around the body, but it's not hard to just randomly leak it, just several years of training. We can make the chakra slippery and the air slides around us. As long as the amount is enough it doesn't need good chakra control, and the amount needed is not a lot either just a layer, it doesn't need to be enough to be visible, obviously having better chakra control and more chakra reserves would mean more stamina and being able to run farther, but it's an easy technique when your get the hang of it.
This method is obviously rough and I am sure there are better methods out there, but anything like that would be a family secret.
There is little to no sharing of ninja techniques in this world, people constantly kill and are killed for that kind of knowledge. The ten ninja techniques taught in the academy are already very generous.
Ten not three, there is no such thing as the academy three here. No one calls them that and the academy actually taught 10 ninja techniques on top of all the theoretical things a ninja should know
1. Putting your chakra on your skin and making it sticky - the Leaf Concentration Exercise.
2. Putting your chakra on your skin and making it slippery - the Rope Escape Technique.
3. Adding your chakra to an object and letting the object's color and pattern blend into the environment, this is normally done with a sheet or cloak - The Cloak of Invisibility Technique. Often used by Konohamaru to sneak up on Naruto.
4. Covering yourself with your chakra and using it to change how you look - The Transformation Technique.
5. Covering an object with your chakra to make it appear to be yourself - The Body Replacement Technique.
6. Shaping your chakra in the air to appear to be yourself - The Clone Jutsu.
7. The ninja run already mentioned.
8. Sealing an item into a seal scroll - the sealing technique. The scrolls made with Fuinjutsu do not do this for you automatically, you still have to learn to drive it.
9. Unsealing an item from a seal scroll - the unsealing technique. Believe it or not these techniques are actually different techniques. Often used with explosive scrolls.
10. Pulse your chakra, used to help release yourself or others from illusion - The Release Technique.
These ten ninja techniques are the foundation for becoming an excellent ninja. They teach you a lot of different ways to manipulate your chakra, making it easier to learn other techniques.
My proficiency in all of them is extremely high, even better than my parents. This explains why the original me's growth as a ninja exploded when Tsunade trained me for 3 years. While Naruto's time with Jiraiya was spent practicing his foundational skills and he didn't appear to get much stronger during that time, but after he came back from this training he started to get stronger like a rocket.
A strong foundation for your skills gives you the ability to gain strength at a faster rate. This is why, so called, geniuses learn faster than normal people, as you know more, it becomes easier to know more, and it snowballs.
There was a joke back in my old world that said one year of constant effort is not as good as a month of cheating. This was obviously referring to Sasuke's speed equaling Rock Lee's one year of effort in only a single month before the Chunin exams.
This joke is humorous, but untrue. Guy once said that when he met Lee he didn't have any talent, not even in Taijutsu. When Rock Lee became his student his foundation must have been terrible.
Sasuke's foundation is actually extremely strong. Currently, he is only a little weaker at chakra control, but he beats me in every other foundational skill. Once he learns tree climbing during the wave mission he will become much stronger than he is now, while this will not increase my strength much at all.
It had nothing to do with genius. There is no such thing, in order to become great so called geniuses have been working hard when other people have been playing around.
He didn't say this exactly, but Jiraiya once told Naruto that there are two ways to get stronger. One way is to strengthen and make up for your weaknesses and another way is to strengthen your strengths to the extreme, this is right before he taught Naruto to summon toads.
Strengthening your strengths is what I believe is considered cheating.
Obviously, I don't have a lot of time to get stronger, the best way would be to cheat. The problem being that I don't seem to have the ability to cheat right now.
All the protagonists of Naruto had cheats, which is why they all became so strong. The problem being that the original me's cheats cannot seem to help me right now.
Original Sakura's cheats were a double personality and medical ninjutsu.
During the Chunin exams Ino got into Sakura's mind and confirmed that Inner was a separate personality. Since I got here I have not noticed any signs of a separate personality, but this doesn't mean that I have lost the talent that came with it.
In the world of Naruto, a second personality is a sign of being talented at Genjutsu and Yin Release, but it is usually there because the person is unable to handle their own talent, and it doesn't bestow any real benefits, except maybe fighting against ninjas that invade your brain, the second personality disappearing is a sign that the main personality has become stronger. So, I am not worried about Inner being missing, my talent should still be there.
Me having a talent for Genjutsu is already known by the Konoha higher ups. The original me was constantly tested in Genjutsu, Kakashi and Iruka both tested this talent after the original me graduated. Even Sasuke got the original me to brag about the class number being wrong, when the original me was obviously spacing out. She only failed during Kakashi's test, which may have been the most important test, and she failed it miserably.
The original me never worked on this talent, Kakashi never taught her anything, maybe because she failed so badly that he was truly surprised, and it rotted.
Medical ninjutsu is actually the hardest kind of jutsu. While this is true for all medical ninjutsu, it is especially true for Yang release medical ninjutsu. Despite Tsunade's wishes, we will never have enough medical ninja to put one on every squad, they are just too rare and precious.
The reason for this is that medical ninjutsu requires a very large amount of biological knowledge. The people who are able to memorize a large amount of knowledge easily are generally of the Yin nature. Yin nature is the power of the mind. Being Yin natured means that using Yang Release is extremely difficult, like trying to teach a Fire Natured person Water Release.
On top of this, this person also has to have extremely good chakra control.
The difficulty of being able to do this at all is so high that actually being talented at it is definitely a cheat level.
The original me was definitely a talent at medical ninjutsu. She became very good in only three years. The speed for normal smart people is more than ten years to learn.
It would be like going to the hospital and finding out the doctor is actually only 15 years old, most people would not believe it.
This is an amazing talent, although this talent doesn't look as great as doing an eye replacement surgery in a cave when ninja could swoop down to attack at anytime at 12 years old.
The problem with these two cheats is that I have no way to leverage them right now for a quick power up. Both of them take a long time to learn and both of them require a teacher.
Even when Kakashi becomes my sensei he doesn't actually have any obligation to teach me these things, let alone the fact that he couldn't even teach me medical ninjutsu.
I have heard people say before that Kakashi acts like Sasuke was his real teacher's son and taught him everything. The truth of the matter was actually very different. Before the Chunin exams all he taught Sasuke was tree walking, and this actually helped Naruto even more than it helped Sasuke.
In addition, he only taught these things to them because he felt that we would be in danger when he was busy fighting Zabuza.
This is always the case; he will only teaches us when he thinks we might be in danger and need a quick power up, otherwise he lets us grow at a normal pace.
He only took Sasuke to train for a month after he was targeted by Orochimaru. During this time he was nice enough to pull in favors to get Naruto training, and he found the teacher he believed would be best for Naruto, which was to fix his foundation.
Training for a month from a Special Jonin could not have been a small favor. He didn't ask anyone to train the original Sakura during that time, she got no training.
Later, he taught Naruto after he got back from his training trip because he was being targeted by Akatsuki.
He still didn't train the original Sakura. It is true that she was learning from Tsunade, but Naruto was also learning from Jiraiya, this was not the reason.
The truth is that so many bad things have occurred to Kakashi that he is only moved to do things by fear and obligation. And Jonin leaders of Genin are not actually obligated to teach anything. They are called sensei, but they are not actually teachers like Iruka. We are actually his subordinates.
This was also common in Japan in my previous life, many people were called Sensei, but they were not actually expected to teach anyone anything.
This means that I only have two ways to become stronger and that is to work on my greatest weaknesses, my chakra reserves, which are very small, or maybe my fighting psychology. I never fought anyone to the death or even for real, veterans and non veterans have a very different combat power because non veterans are likely to freeze up in the face of death while veterans can fight back.
However, I can't train fighting psychology right now, the best way would be to fight someone with killing intent and training my chakra reserves is something I have already planned to work on long term, while it is unlikely to ever be as good as even Kakashi, this will likely be something I will have to work on for my whole life.
The only way was to try to create a new cheat for myself that can give me a quick power up. However this will take an indeterminate amount of time and may even never happen.
This was a total gamble. But when you have nothing to lose gambling doesn't look so bad.