Etienne sat in the middle of the Iga Clan headquarters with his knees under him. He kept his back perfectly straight and rested his hands in his lap as a dozen men surrounded him, sitting in a similar position.
Etienne remained still as the doctor drew symbols in the middle of his chest with black ink.
"Don't worry, I'm almost done, Ike-kun. Usually, there is a more extensive vetting process to make sure you're compatible with this process. But at the behest of the clan head, I'll be bypassing all of that. But I still wanted to take a few precautions."
Etienne glanced around the small hall. He spotted the men staring at him and whispering to each other.
He turned to the doctor with a smile, "No need to apologize, Doctor…"
The doctor backed up and examined him. Etienne had rows of symbols drawn precisely up both his arms and a circle of symbols on his chest.
"It's Saizo. Saizo Setsuna. I'm sure you'll be seeing me quite a bit, so feel free to call me Doctor Setsuna."
"Is he ready, Setsuna?" Hattori called out. He leaned against a nearby wall with his arms crossed.
Setsuna nodded at Hattori, then turned back to Etienne.
"This is a ritual one of my ancestors created, the Iga clan has been using it since. Everybody has chi in their body, but for most, they cannot control it to any significant degree, no matter how much training they do. This ritual grants you increased control over your chi and increased chi regeneration."
Etienne nodded his head, "So what's the catch?"
Setsuna shook his head, "There's no catch. The only issue is that the ritual does not work for everybody. If we try to perform the ritual on you and it doesn't work, you will die immediately."
Etienne was taken aback slightly, "That's a pretty big catch! So I'm assuming you already confirmed I'm compatible, right?"
Setsuna stared at him blankly. Hattori cut in, "Yes, yes, we took all the proper precautions. Now I'll begin the ritual proper."
Hattori made several signs with his hands, and chanted to himself. The other men in the circle followed, making the same signs and chanting the same chant.
Setsuna shook his head and bit his lip. He looked down at the ground and mumbled, "I'm sorry, kid."
Setsuna put his hand out over Etienne's chest and it began to glow. Etienne's head leaned back and black ink dribbled from his lips. Black ink leaked from his eyes and the symbols on his arms and chest grew in size and blacked out his body.
Setsuna winced and struggled to hold his hand up, "This isn't working, Hattori! There's something strange going on, his chi pathways are opening too quickly!"
Hattori smiled maniacally, "He's the one, Setsuna! I can feel it! This is your family's technique, right? Don't let him die!"
Setsuna took a deep breath in and made a few signs with the hand near Etienne's chest. He pushed his hand into his solar plexus hard and backed up.
Etienne was dazed for a moment. He looked down at the ground before throwing up black ink into a large pool. He lifted his head slowly and wiped his mouth.
"Am I alive?" He thought to himself.
Hattori walked up to him and put a hand on his shoulder.
"You had me worried for a second there, I think I see what happened. Your body is overflowing with chi, if we did this process properly, we would have put more seals on you. But it was successful. Congratulations, you are now a ninja."
Etienne lifted his arms up. Both of them were unnaturally black, like obsidian. He looked down at the middle of his chest, and there was a circle tattooed on it the same color.
"I'm a ninja…" Etienne thought to himself.