Forming Hand Seals

Soon, Mirai stood on the one-meter-tall pillar, balancing on one leg. Ten minutes passed, and several children fell off; after all, they had just finished a long-distance run, and their bodies were drained of strength.

However, the training arranged by Nakamura was very reasonable. Many of them couldn't even take another step, and this time they really didn't have to run, but the energy expenditure was still significant. Especially after such high-intensity running, it was truly a test of willpower.

None of the children who came here wanting to become ninjas wanted to fall behind the others, especially not to be the first to fail. Mirai gritted his teeth and persisted. Half an hour later, more than half of the students had fallen to the ground, and Nakamura recorded everyone's performance.

An hour later, only two people remained standing on the pillars: Mirai and Uchiha Itachi. Mirai had been struggling to hold on for a while, but for the sake of his life, this bit of hardship was nothing.

Nakamura Hino nodded, secretly thinking that a child from a prominent clan was indeed much stronger than the others. "Alright, time is up. Both of you, come down." Mirai felt as if he had been granted a reprieve and jumped off the pillar, but his legs went soft, and he collapsed onto the ground. Uchiha Itachi was also sweating slightly and let out a breath.

"Very good. It looks like you've rested enough. The next training is 100 push-ups."

"Ah! There's more training, Teacher!"

"Of course. What you just did doesn't even count as a warm-up for a ninja. Every item here is designed to fully squeeze out your body's potential. If you want to become an excellent ninja, this is only the first step. Every day from now on, the training intensity will increase. Prepare yourselves mentally! Of course, this will also be recorded in your exam grades!" Nakamura tapped his teaching pointer against the ground with a rhythmic thwack.

(⊙_⊙)? Fuk! Mirai cursed fiercely in his heart, then silently began doing push-ups. One hundred was not difficult for him—at least, not when his body was in peak condition. But now, the tight schedule of one exercise after another was pushing him to his limit.

However, he knew that Teacher Nakamura was absolutely right; this didn't even count as a ninja's warm-up. It seemed he really was on the path to becoming an excellent ninja.

Mirai finished first because he had started earlier. Soon after, the other children finished as well. Once done, they realized their bodies had truly been trained from head to toe.

"Very good. Since you have become my students, I will guide you until you graduate as excellent ninjas. To reward your hard work today, I will teach you a hand seal."

"Teacher, what is a hand seal?" asked a child from a civilian family who had never been exposed to ninjas.

"Good question. When a ninja performs a ninjutsu, they must use hand seals to convert the refined chakra into a 'jutsu' and release it. This process requires a calm mind to ensure the accuracy of the seals, as well as skilled technique to ensure no mistakes are made. Any negligence will cause the jutsu to fail or its power to be reduced, wasting chakra. Therefore, if you want to learn ninjutsu, you must first learn to form seals."

"Then Teacher, what is chakra?"

"Chakra is a form of energy produced by the perfect fusion of spiritual energy and physical energy. Simply put, it is the energy necessary to use ninjutsu. Roughly speaking, this energy is extracted cell by cell from the ten trillion cells in the human body as physical energy, and through much training and accumulated experience, it is forged into spiritual energy."

"However, you are all still young. In future lessons, I will teach you how to refine chakra. Try to do it sparingly for now. You are still growing; if you consume too much cellular energy, you won't grow tall. It is best to wait until you are five or six years old before performing ninjutsu that consumes a lot of energy, and even then, not too frequently..."

"Just like Teacher Nakamura? That's too scary!" a blunt child blurted out. A vein popped on Nakamura's forehead.

"Yeah, yeah, I definitely can't end up like Teacher Nakamura. It seems I shouldn't learn powerful ninjutsu just yet."

"Yeah, yeah, Teacher Nakamura must have used a lot of powerful ninjutsu in the past..."

Listening to the students' chatter, Nakamura Hino finally couldn't take it anymore and shouted angrily, "Cut the chatter! I was born this way!" Upon hearing Nakamura Hino's words, all the students looked at him with silent, sympathetic gazes, which only served to irritate him further. His height had already been teased by several previous classes of students.

Mirai listened to the dialogue between the children and Teacher Nakamura and smiled. Nakamura Hino was only 1.6 meters tall, perhaps even less, but this made him seem more approachable, which was why the students felt comfortable joking with him. Mirai also felt that this teacher was good; while teaching correct knowledge, he would also give reminders that made it easier for the students to remember.

"Are you going to learn or not? If not, then we'll do it another time."

"We'll learn!"

"Then watch closely. This is the Rat Seal, one of the twelve basic hand seals. Overlap your thumbs, with the right thumb on top, just like this." Nakamura Hino formed the Rat Seal with his hands. All the students crowded around to watch carefully and began to practice. The Rat Seal looked relatively simple, and all the students learned it quickly.

"Don't think this is simple; it requires diligent practice. There are twelve types of seals in total, but the number and sequence of seals for each ninjutsu vary. Some powerful ninjutsu require over thirty seals. Any error in sequence or movement will cause the jutsu to fail or weaken. At the same time, the speed of forming seals must be fast. For the same ninjutsu, if your opponent is one second faster than you, the result is obvious."

"So, go back and practice forming seals constantly. After each training session from now on, I will teach you a new seal. Once everyone has mastered forming seals, I will teach you ninjutsu."

"Really! Teacher Nakamura!" All the students were overjoyed to hear that there was ninjutsu to learn, as if their fatigue had vanished. Mirai couldn't help but admire the resilience of these children.