The next day everyone was just sitting in the hall with a cheerful atmosphere because of the prospect of training to become a shinobi. They were munching on the boar meat that Asahi and Konan had hunted yesterday.
While that was happening, Asahi asked Knight as he was looking at Nagato discreetly 'Hey Knight, can Nagato see you? After all you were created from my Yin Release.'
'In normal case, it would be impossible. As only other Stand users can see a Stand, no one in this world will see me. Unless I let them to see me. But, the Yin Release users will be able to detect me as I'm the manifestation of your Yin Release.' Knight told Asahi.
'Good. I thought Nagato could see you, since yesterday he has been looking your way form time to time.' Asahi sighed in his heart, as he had thought that Nagato could see Knight.
Biting into the roasted meat, Asahi told Knight 'Put up a barrier around the house, that would detoxify and purify anything that is passed through. And key Jiraya, Nagato, Yahiko, Kyoko, Konan and me as the only ones who can enter and exit the barrier. You can do that right?'
'I can. The barrier power has evolved from your first life as King. Don't worry.' Saying that, Knight erected an invisible barrier around the house.
Just as Knight erected the barrier, Nagato's head snapped upwards. Seeing that, Yahiko asked "What happened Nagato?"
"I felt something?" He said as he tilted his head in confusion.
Asahi noted this and came to a conclusion 'That confirms it. Yin Release users can detect Knight. But, I'm pretty sure that once the Rinnegan is matured, or someone became the Jinjuriki of Ten Tails, they will be able to see Knight. Maybe, even the Mangekyo Sharingan will be able to see Knight, unless he is merged with me.'
All of them looked at Nagato for explanation, including Asahi. Seeing that, Nagato ducked his head and said "Since yesterday, I have been feeling that there's one more person with us, to be more specific, someone with Asahi."
Playing dumb about what Nagato was actually implying, Asahi asked "Is it a spirit?"
"Spirit?!" Yahiko and Kyoko asked in unison with their face going pale and Konan had a wide eyed look too.
"Yeah, well I can't see it like everyone else or feel it like Nagato, so it has to be a spirit." Then tilting his head, and observing the ashen faces of them, Asahi continued "Maybe it's a guardian spirit, protecting me all along or it might be a hunting spirit. Yeah! That have to be it."
At that, they looked intrigued and thought to themselves 'A guardian spirit will be cool, so would the hunting spirit.'
"What's this about spirit's and whatnot?" Jiraya asked, as he came back with a sack in his hand, filled with paper scrolls.
"Asahi have a spirit attached to him." Yahiko blurted out, thinking that Jiraya will be able to solve it.
"Really?" Jiraya looked sceptical.
"I felt it doing something, sensei." Nagato chimed in.
At that, Jiraya looked at Asahi and observed him with his senses, but he couldn't get any feedback. Shrugging, he told his new students "What did you feel the 'Spirit' do, Nagato?"
"I don't know. It was like a dome appeared around the house?" Nagato said with unsure voice.
Asahi was intrigued at that 'He can detect the barrier too? Well, he can detect Knight, so it's possible.' Asahi then paused as an idea struck him "Sensei, aren't you a sage? Can't you detect spirits and stuff?"
Jiraya shook his head with a small smile as he sat down next to them and said "I don't know. I'll have to consult with others."
"So you won't?" Asahi asked as he thought 'There goes my plan to see if sage mode can detect Knight.'
"I will summon my Senjutsu sensei. May be they will be able to sense the spirit or see it outright. But I won't summon them until we start training in the forest." Jiraya told Asahi and he started to open the scrolls he bought.
From the scrolls he unsealed, training gears for five of them started to pour out. He had even had a fifteen kunai, shuriken, senbon. While the four children were marveling at the things bought by Jiraya, Asahi was holding one of the sealing scroll. Then looking at Jiraya, who was unsealing the final scroll, Asahi asked "Sensei, what are these?"
"Sealing scrolls. Can be used to store things in it." Jiraya said, then with a smug smile he continued "I made them myself."
With star's in his eyes, Asahi asked "Can I learn it too?"
Seeing the genuine interest of Asahi, Jiraya told him "It's called fuinjutsu and studying it requires a long time."
"I'm ready for it. If I can make these then I don't have to carry everything in a sack!" Asahi said with so much enthusiasm 'No way I'm not going to study fuinjutsu. It's the most broken Jutsu in this world if you ask me.'
Scratching his head, Jiraya nodded and said "Sure, no problem. At first I was going to teach you Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, Taijutsu and some Bukijutsu. Adding Fuinjutsu is not going to be problem."
By the time Asahi had talked Jiraya into teaching Fuinjutsu, the other's had took things that they claimed for themselves. Seeing that, Jiraya had wry smile and clapped his hands to get their attention.
When they looked at him with a sheepish smile, he told them "I'll be helping you all to unlock your chakra now and then, we will check your nature affinity." Then looking at Asahi, Jiraya continued "Since Asahi have unlocked his chakra, why don't we all see his nature affinity."
Handing Asahi a square paper from his pocket, Jiraya said "Channel your chakra to the chakra paper. It will react and show your nature affinity."
Asahi did as Jiraya said and channeled some chakra into the chakra paper and in an instant it crumbled. Seeing that, Jiraya smiled and said "Asahi have Earth nature affinity. Learning Earth Release Jutsu will be easier for Asahi."
Turning to look at the other four, Jiraya said "Alright everyone! Line up! I'll unlock your chakra and test to your nature affinity, one by one.
True to his words, Jiraya unlocked chakra of Nagato, Yahiko, Kyoko and Konan. And then he tested their nature affinity, Nagato having all five nature chakra's, Yahiko having Water, Fire, Wind, Kyoko having Water, Lighting, Wind and Konan having Wind, Earth, Water.
Seeing this, Jiraya looked shocked at first, then a thought occurred to him and he looked at Asahi to see his reaction. Seeing the bored look on Asahi's face, Jiraya thought to himself 'He doesn't care about how many chakra nature others have? Or is he hiding it very well? I should ask him privately in time.'
Nagato, Yahiko and Kyoko looked ecstatic knowing that they have more than two nature affinity. Konan was ecstatic too, but then her face fell and looked at Asahi in worry, but seeing his bored face, she chided herself 'Stupid! He can use his Earth Release without any kind of training, he told you that clearly. And from the look on his face, he isn't that worried about having only one chakra nature.'
Clapping his hands to get the attention of his five students, he said "Well then. Now we know what your chakra nature is and have unlocked your chakra. Now, I'll teach you about chakra theory."
At that, all of them perked, even Asahi 'I know how chakra is formed in a human body, but beyond that I have no idea. I'm sure that this will help me in increasing my chakra reserve.'
"The chakra is the product of fusion between spiritual and physical energy. If you have high spiritual energy, then you will be able to master ninjutsu faster, create new ninjutsu, being able to master genjutsu, break away from genjutsu easily. If you have high physical energy, then you will be able to do taijutsu for a long time and have enough stamina to last long fights." Jiraya told them, and after hearing that everyone thought to themselves 'Spiritual energy can do so many things!'
"Now, your chakra reserve can only be increased by increasing your spiritual and physical energy. For that you need to do training." Smiling, he continued "To increase your physical energy, we can do physical exercise. For spiritual energy, we need to study hard, practice ninjutsu, gain chakra control and practice genjutsu."
Seeing that they were engrossed in his teaching, he continued on another topic "I have checked your chakra nature, and we found out your affinity. The important thing you have to understand is that, some elements compliment each other while some elements oppose each other."
Then picking out a sheet of paper, brush and ink pot, Jiraya drew a circle on it with five bubbles outside the circle. The children hurriedly huddled around the paper to see what their sensei was drawing and Jiraya didn't say anything, just smiled.
On each bubbles, Jiraya wrote elements in the following order: Fire, Wind, Lightning, Earth, Water. Seeing the drawing, all of them had a puzzled look on their face.
Seeing their faces, Jiraya smiled and started his lecture "This is The Five Basic Natures. Here, the Fire is weak against water, but strong against wind. Wind is weak against fire, but strong against lightning. Lightning is weak against wind, but strong against earth. Earth is weak against lightning, but strong against water. Water is weak against earth, but strong against fire. Understand?"
"Yes sensei." The five students chorused.
"Good, because basically, if an elemental technique is put against another elemental technique of the same level, but of a stronger nature, then the technique with the superior nature will prevail. However, a technique with a weaker nature can overpower a technique with a stronger nature if the former is of a higher level. For example, fire can overpower a water technique if it is first strengthened by a wind technique.
A similar principle applies in how techniques of the same element interact, which is called counterbalancing. If two techniques of the same nature and the same level are used against each other, they will cancel each other out. However, if the two techniques have different levels, the higher-level technique will not only prevail but will grow stronger from interaction with the weaker.
Do you understand? As long as you have strong base and great techniques, you can easily defeat one's with superior nature than yours." With that, Jiraya ended his lecture.
"Now it's time to sleep, we will continue our training tomorrow. And Asahi, stay for a bit. As the eldest of the bunch, I have to talk to you for a bit." Jiraya told his students and looked at Asahi at the last part.
When the others left to their room, Jiraya asked Asahi "Asahi, are you alright?"
Tilting his head in confusion he said "Yeah, I'm alright. What is it sensei?"
"Well, I thought that you would be downtrodden after knowing that you're the only one who have one chakra nature." Jiraya said with a serious face.
Bewildered, Asahi said "I'm not downtrodden. But why did you think so again?"
Scratching his head, Jiraya said "Since you have only Earth affinity, training in other nature chakra will take time and effort, while the rest of them will pull ahead with their multiple affinity."
Nodding his head with his hand on his chin, Asahi said "I see."
Then chuckling, Asahi said "It's not a problem. I'll just train my Earth Release to it's highest degree. If I reach that, then I don't have to worry about the elemental weakness of Lightning, I can dominate all my fights with my Earth Release."
Jiraya smiled and said "That's the spirit. But still, it's best if you train in other affinities too. Don't worry, I'll be training you in all the affinities, I can't have the students of the Toad Sage be mediocre! That'll be a blow to my reputation."
"I see, then I'll try not to be a blemish in your reputation." After saying that, both Asahi and Jiraya burst out laughing, which attracted the attention of the other four students.
After a few moments, Asahi also changed into his training gears. Since everyone was ready, Jiraya bought them to the forest near the house for training. But before they even began, Nagato asked "Sensei, aren't you going to check if there really is attached to Asahi?"
"What spirit?" Jiraya was confused at first then it clicked in his mind, "Right, that spirit. Wait a moment, I'll get ready on few minutes. Everyone sit down."
His used the hand signs for summoning jutsu and slammed his hands on the ground. And with a puff of smoke, two small toads appeared on the ground. Asahi observed them a green toad with white hair styled in somewhat of a mohawk, very thick eyebrows and a small goatee and another toad with a green underside with purple marking around her mouth and the back of her body. The top of her head looks as though she is wearing a hair net with hair-rollers underneath, giving her an 'old woman' look.
'Their eyes are locked at Knight. Can they see hi? Or are they sensing him?' Asahi thought as he saw them looking at his right side.
Before Jiraya could say anything, the green toad asked him "Jiraya-boy. Why is there a spirit attached to that boy."
At that, everyone perked up, and looked towards Asahi. Jiraya looking around Asahi asked "Pa, can you see the spirit?"
Shaking his head, Pa said "No. But I can sense it, that's why asked. Whose the boy?"
"My new student, Asahi." Sighing, Jiraya continued "I was thinking that you guys could see the spirit."
"You knew about it?" Pa asked Jiraya with a pointed glare.
Shrugging, Jiraya told the toad "I didn't. One of my students sensed it. And Asahi said that since I'm a sage I might be able to see it, even he's not able to see it."
Looking back at the five children and a tiger cub, Pa said "I'm Fukasaku, also known as Pa, a Sage Toad from Mount Myōboku, and this is my wife Shima another Sage Toad. What are your names."
The children introduced themselves, and after that, Fukasaku said "From what I can sense, it's not a malevolent spirit. You're lucky it's not one too." Shaking his head, he asked "Did anyone sense anything else?"
Without rising his head, Nagato answered "I felt some kind of dome appear at our house and I still sense it there."
"Is it so?" Turning to his wife he said "Ma, you stay here with Jiraya-boy, I'll go and check it out."
"Alright, but hurry up. We have to have our dinner." Shima said and the two of them started to bicker with each other.
Seeing that, the children were bewildered and thought 'Are they really Sage? They look more like children now.'
Jiraya interrupted their bickering, to save himself from the second hand embarrassment. Huffing and puffing, Fukasaku went to the house where they have stayed. Right before, the Toad Sage left, Asahi ordered Knight 'Knight, key both Shima and Fukasaku to the barrier.'
'Done.' Knight replied.
As Fukasaku left to check the house, Jiraya told his students "Alright, I'll teach you the chakra control exercise. The first one is leaf concentration method."