Duy didn't move a muscle as he stared at him with a strange intensity in his eyes. The flames behind those dark pupils seemed to burn with even more passion and vigor as he asked him that question. This was the question of a man who had spent too many nights alone with nothing but his thoughts and his will. The silence of the Forest of Death seemed to press in on them, heavy and stifling.
"They teach it to us before we can even hold a kunai," Might Duy began, his voice dropping an octave, losing its usual boisterous edge. "In the orphanage, the matron would tell us that the village is a family. That every leaf, no matter how small, is fueled by the same flame. They told us that the Will of Fire was a shield, that it existed to protect the weak and uplift those who fell. They told us that having that fire in your heart was the only thing that made a shinobi 'brilliant,' the only thing that mattered the most in every ninja, the thing that defined them and gave them the courage to press on in spite of all the difficulties faced by them."
Duy looked down at his calloused, scarred hands, slowly curling them into fists as if trying to crush the memories held within his palms. "Yet, I have lived nineteen years in the heart of that flame, Hidetada-sama. And throughout those years, I have felt nothing but the cold. I have been belittled by the geniuses, whether aspiring from famed clans or mere civilians like me, and mocked by the very teachers who were meant to help us stand on our feet despite all the odds stacked against us. I have been told at every turn that I am a failure, a mistake, a waste of Konoha's rations. They told me I would die the moment I stepped past the gates because a man who cannot mold chakra is a man without a soul, with a sword hanging right above his neck on a rope threatening to split in two."
He looked up, and for the first time, Hidetada saw a glimpse of the exhaustion Duy usually hid behind his grin. "I have pushed myself until my bones screamed and my lungs bled. I have followed the rules. I have loved this village even when it didn't love me back. So I found myself wondering... is doing your best simply not enough? If the Will of Fire is truly about the heart, then why does everyone I meet treat my heart like it is worthless because my hands cannot perform a sign, because my tenketsu do not expel chakra? Why does the village founded by the Lord First fundamentally go against the very thing he preached?"
Duy took a step forward, his shadow stretching long and jagged across the dirt, "The teachers say the Will of Fire is about the village. The elders say it is about sacrifice. But you... you are the blood of the man who named it. You are the grandson of Hashirama Senju. You know the man behind the legend. So I ask you, Hidetada... when the world is dark and the people are cruel, what is the Will of Fire to you?"
Hidetada flexed his hands and stared at them, rotating them slowly to observe the lines running through his palms while he thought deeply.
Within a few seconds, he relaxed his arms and let them fall beside him, resting them against the harsh texture of the rough terrain. He looked at Duy, a glint in his eyes that could have been a trick of light.
"I suppose... To me, Duy, the Will of Fire is something that every human, whether a civilian or a great ninja, whether a lowly peasant or a high-born noble, carries deep within their heart. That urge to protect the innocent, the drive to leave the world a better place than you found it, that is the spark. That is the flame, the will that burns brightly in everyone's hearts. It pushed my grandfather to build these walls and even forced him to kill his best friend to protect what was inside them. I believe, and so did he, that as long as the flame of passion to save others burns in the heart of even one person, the Will of Fire can never truly die." Hidetada took a deep breath, his back leaning against the rough, mossy texture of the bark on the tree, his expression hardening as he addressed Duy's struggle.
"But you asked why the village belittles you. You asked why the people who preach this Will are the same ones trying to blow yours out. The truth is, most people are afraid of a fire they didn't start themselves. They have turned my grandfather's dream into a set of rules and ranks to make themselves feel superior. They think the 'Will' is a gift the village gives to you, and because you don't fit their mold, they think you don't deserve it."
Hidetada shook his head slowly, a hint of steel in his voice. "They are wrong. The Will of Fire isn't a rank, and it isn't a ninjutsu. It is the raw, stubborn endurance to keep standing despite of everything you go through. My grandfather didn't build Konoha for the geniuses alone; he built it so that people like you, people like me, old men and women, young children, the rich and the poor would have a place to bloom, a place to lay their worries to rest and relax, not having to worry about the terror of being killed by a crusading clan just for the crime of being in their specific path. If the village has forgotten how to value your effort, then the village is the one that has lost its way, not you. To me, Duy, your struggle, your refusal to break despite twenty years of mockery, that is the purest form of the Will of Fire I have ever seen. You don't need their permission to be a shinobi. You already are one."
Might Duy seemed to be lost in his thoughts as he stared upward into the vast, unending blue of the afternoon sky. He did not move, nor did he offer a single word of rebuttal or agreement after Hidetada had finished speaking. A heavy silence eclipsed the clearing. The forest itself appeared to hold its breath, the rustle of leaves slowing to a faint whisper, sensing the shift in the air.
Pulling his knees back toward his chest as he leaned against the rough bark of a towering cedar, Hidetada watched as a small sparrow fluttered down from the branches. It landed lightly on his knee, tilting its head with a curious, jerky motion as it observed the boy. Unable to resist the urge, Hidetada brought his hand forward to stroke its head. The bird did not fly away in terror; instead, it leaned into his gentle touch and chirped with a soft, melodic trill. Hidetada couldn't help but think that this was one of the better benefits of his bloodline. It was just another theory that he was working on, but Mokuton seemed to make him a breathing component of the living, existing world.
A few more minutes of peace passed by as Duy contemplated the weight of his words. Finally, the spandex-clad man broke the silence, his voice lacking its usual thunderous volume, replaced instead by sincerity. "You have given me a great deal to think about, Hidetada-sama. It has been a true pleasure meeting you today." A genuine smile, one that reached his eyes, broke across Duy's face as he continued. "I hope with all my heart that we can train together in the future."
Having said his peace, Might Duy performed a crisp, respectful bow. Without another word, he turned and darted into the thicket, his green form blurring against the foliage as he disappeared into the dense canopy of the forest. Hidetada remained still, his eyes glinting, fixed on the spot where the man had vanished with. He resisted the urge to upturn his lips. The only living things left in the small clearing were Hidetada and the small sparrow, which still refused to leave its perch on his knee, he could feel its tiny heart beating in its chest.
Suddenly, the reality of the intense exercise that he had just completed crashed back into him. The thirst he had pushed to the back of his mind during their talk returned with a renewed and desperate vigor. It had been hours since their grueling run began, and now that the adrenaline was fading, his throat felt like it had been scraped with dry sand.
Forming a snake hand seal with a small smile on his face, Hidetada molded his chakra into that of Wood Release and supplied it into the tree behind him. A second later, a clean and polished piece of wood clattered against the ground before he picked it up.
Now, forming a bird hand seal, which felt lighter and more fluid than the grounded snake hand seal, he condensed the water vapor around him to pour itself into the wooden cup.
Satisfied with his handiwork, Hidetada picked it up and took a sip of the perfectly cool and fresh water before gulping it down in large mouthfuls. Once the bottom of the cup was empty, he set it aside and released a content sigh.
Chakra was strange and weird in its own way. In Hidetada's experience, the simplest way to describe it would be to compare it to a vibration or a frequency, but even that was way off the mark. Every living thing possessed a unique chakra signature, a specific resonance born from the delicate balance of Physical Energy, the Yang, and Mental Energy, the Yin. No two people shared the exact same signature, which was precisely why the art of Medical Ninjutsu was so notoriously difficult and dangerous.
The human body was an instinctively defensive machine; it would naturally attempt to repel any foreign or unfamiliar energy. A medic-nin had to possess surgical control of their own chakra to try to mimic the frequency of their patient, tricking the body into accepting the aid, though mimicking the chakra signature of someone completely was simply not possible.
The Five Nature Transformations operated on a similar principle of resonance. While hand seals acted as external catalysts to guide and mold the chakra through specific tenketsu, a true master could eventually discard the 'crutches' of physical signs once they had gained enough experience with that particular element; even then, the most complicated jutsu still needed at least more than one hand seal. To convert base chakra into an element, a shinobi had to stimulate their chakra to mimic the fundamental physics of that nature. For Hidetada to produce water, he had to exert his control over the surrounding chakra present in the water vapor and saturate it with his own chakra before stimulating it to flow in a more fluid manner.
The same logic applied to the other chakra natures. To produce Earth Release, he had to lower the frequency of his chakra until it reached a state of extreme density, essentially calcifying the chakra to mimic the molecular structure of stone. Fire Release required a violent agitation of his internal reserves, where he forced the chakra to vibrate at such a high speed that the resulting friction generated heat capable of igniting upon contact with the air.
Wind Release was a matter of sharpening and thinning the flow. He had to hone the chakra into millions of microscopic, razor-thin shards that vibrated with enough velocity to shear through solid objects. Lightning Release was the most chaotic of all. It required him to break the steady flow of his energy into jagged, irregular pulses. By clashing these unstable spikes of chakra against one another, he could generate a high-voltage electrical charge that excelled at piercing through defenses.
A person's chakra nature was influenced mainly by genetics; that is why most people in the Land of Fire had the Fire affinity, whereas they had Earth in the Land of Earth, and so on. There were a few more factors, though they weren't nearly as important.
It was incredibly rare to possess an affinity towards all five elements, and almost no one alive had it.
Except Hidetada Senju, of course.
Though Kekkei Genkai were another matter entirely, their usage and application were too difficult to describe in a short span of time.
Done with his recollection of things related to chakra, Hidetada stood up and stretched before letting out a yawn. Taking a glance at the sky, he realized that it was still afternoon. The sun hung high, casting long, dappled shadows through the ancient trees, the light filtering down in golden shafts that illuminated the dancing dust motes. Forming a quick snake hand seal, the wooden cup that he had made disintegrated into tiny flakes of air.
He had a lot of time and not a lot of things to do.
Making up his mind, Hidetada jumped onto a branch, making his way out of the Forest of Death, the vibrant green canopy rushing past him like a sea of emerald.
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Word Count: 2224