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He’d been far too focused on his academy essentials that he had been failing to construct even the briefest of mental acuity. Yes, a lot of his focus would be on how he would beat down a prospective enemy or using his chakra to do good like Ninjutsu or pulling off tricks, but generally, if he didn’t train anything else he would end up being dull as a rock. Excluding the fact that he was actually a rock. The near-man would therefore be in the place you’d least likely find a Yamakira, a library. One of Takigakure no Sato’s many, and not one particularly prominent. But you’d find your regular shuffle of nerds here. So Hotarubi thought. As a Shinobi there were plenty of schools of thought to cross, whether in history, geography, survival skills, ethics (which he hated, and kept coming back to hating), and many more. Hotarubi had not specifically wanted to focus on anything and so his current book was a mathematics one. He hated mathematics. Just – when it came to throwing a weapon, he didn’t need to know Trajectory, he needed to be good enough to hit the damn target. So, perhaps futile. As he went across questions (copying from a book into his own little paper-based one) he would attempt to answer them.

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The mathematics was going by about as well as a house on fire, and he had resorted to counting on fingers and all other assortment of thought techniques, little boxes to try and add numbers, weird hieroglyphic cryptography styled puzzles of yore in the side columns as he tried to understand them. To little avail, unfortunately, but they did end up getting answered. Because he used the back of the book to get the answers. It was useful to a degree that he learned how the questions came to their conclusion, even if he didn’t find himself using it later in life. He had a grasp of economy and his own coin, how to save when necessary. It was what he had done with his old job, but also how to spend it. Hotarubi did not live a frugal lifestyle and so while everything had been saved, majority had also been spent. He was getting side-tracked. The questions would not answer themselves and through his own grunts and mental side-tracking. There were many roads to becoming a great shinobi and he was skirting most of them. This was not helping at all. But, through the grit of his pebble brain, he persevered. Went through the book until it was all finished in the section he was looking in and then he would move on to another subject.

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Chemistry: biology and other sciences were strange. Everything seemed to have a purpose and a place, Amino acids were the building blocks of life and energy had to come from somewhere. But Chakra? Hotarubi could not understand how chakra played into it at all and yet there it was being explained to him in single format. There were plenty of questions that weren’t even being derived from the exams that were taking place in his mind. It certainly helped to understand for his rock body how heat was transferred from one substance to the other. That had practical uses: but how Chakra worked in how it was transformative in nature? On one hand you had the capacity for shape transformation, the shape in which your chakra contained something. On the other, you had its transformative properties: into different natures and what he supposed were other building blocks of life. But still as Hotarubi worked through the book you could see the cogs trying to make sense of the other things happening in his body. It didn’t provide any exact understanding where it related to a Yamakira, but you could seldom get that from a Hijutsu, a secret it was meant. Nonetheless, he continued reading – and eventually would make some sense of it.

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Practical applications of math, was the name of one of the other books he’d been working on – that was in throwing projectiles, or creating simple survival structures through aqueducts created from nearby material: how to fashion a working sieve that used gravity, a form of math, allegedly (which he wasn’t sure he agreed!) by stacking on various layers of different grit objects, dirt, mud, rocks, twigs: all to get nice clean water at the end. And gravity, that was its own section! He wound his neck around, he had been staring down so long that he was starting to get a back neck. His muscles weakened, more his mind than anything withering away his musculature by applying himself to the menial mental arts. Still, in picture format it would also render better explanations about how you could apply torque and rotation to projectiles, including how to get someone behind a wall. In short terms? Physics. It handled all of the necessary reading material to make it a candid case of multiplication or whatever it needed, percentages, not that he knew how to quantify his own strengths – but he supposed it would provide useful for something sooner or later. Not that he ever intended on reading a book again when he was out in the field and doing missions.

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Why did he need to know about the histories of yore? Well – this one intrigued him a bit more, as he read through his generalized book of many subjects. History was a needed element to understand how to dominate your opponent. Legend said that Yoshino Asuka had opened a castle gate and enemies feared to walk through it – fearing a trap, although in fact the man had near to no troops. A bluff that was successful. And that was something that Hotarubi could abide by; he read about the tactics, though he wondered how it came to be written in books – did scholars come before or after the battle, or during? Were there ninja scholars, who’s duty like medics were to sit back and write? He would despise them, not doing their part. Weaklings. But he would think little of it – and at least saw intriguing diagrams of how a fort had been held: and it’s defences were legendary, which is what made it their downfall, using one fort to defend the other only required the initial assailants to secure the first: and the second would fall for lack of resource. That was awesome, so he thought to himself. By the time that he finished the portion relating to the battle history – the sun had gone down. Hotarubi supposed he could go home and return tomorrow; he quickly began to collect a few books so that he could take them out – perhaps to read in bed tomorrow? So long as Nageku didn’t try to bother him.

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The next day rolled by for when Hotarubi went home he had dinner; washed up for a long-heated bath and then made his way into bed. By the morning, the am rolled by and he rolled out of bed. He did his morning duties, morning wake up calls and then went out for a run – knowing that it was boring but needed to be done for him to keep up his academy instruction, he needed to be fit. But being physically fit was only one half of the puzzle, knowing the tricksy instructors would test his mind as well. He took the lesser-known paths of Takigakure no Sato, keeping out of the way of any reputable faces if they knew his, so that he could learn in peace. He had taken this route to prevent anybody from seeing him, since if it broke word that he was trying to become a Shinobi then hell would be wrath down upon him. Not something he wanted out there for now. He would do his learning from home today – the best place was out of prying eyes and sight, and he ducked his way back into his own home, keeping out of the way of family and to his own room. It was a simple room; they were a simple enough family. Nageku had the better (and bigger room) as he had taken it from Hotarubi in time past.

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Hotarubi set to his desk and right back into it. Where was he? ‘Battle history.’ He did enjoy reading through this more than any of the other subjects and spent more time on it to understand the battles of the past. Hotarubi’s mind did wander a little bit, wondering why children as old as 13 were learning about some significantly difficult topics. It went to show that not everybody was cut out to be military. Some were destined to just be… noodle makers. Not a bad career, he supposed, having done it himself for a few years: but not one he wanted to be in forever. He was internally glad to have chosen this again. Hotarubi focused on his reading again, finishing off the chapter just in time for an alarm to go off – Hotarubi sighed. He would have to go to the academy and finish this off later. So, he did: packed his bag, took an apple, and would be munching on it on the way over to the Shinobi Academy, face blank all the while he relaxedly walked. He had already been awake for several hours at the point of him entering the Academy doors, fresh in time for one of his first lessons to start. .

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Hotarubi raised his hand. "Yoshino Asuka.” He nodded – knowing, and felt some delight in knowing that his self-learning had been useful in the academy since he didn’t always participate so rapidly, but he knew that the lesson was coming up and chose to do some reading in advance of their battle history lesson and advanced art of war. "Correct!” The instructor enthused, giving a toothy smile as she continued teaching, and he continued listening, and noting that Hotarubi did actually offer a correct answer in something that wasn’t provided with sass or sarcasm, which usually dripped through his voice. Hotarubi took a few notes here and there because the battles being brought up were different and for once he was actually listening, not being known as the ‘king of ruffians’ as once he had formerly clung to as a nobody. That nobody was the one that got beat down and he was tired of having to be weak, and like his brother said: be stronger. As it came nearer to the end of the lesson though even its fatigue was setting in to Hotarubi’s skull as he began drifting off. Not enough to not be caught by a rubber thrown at his head, which he promptly ducked by. "Don’t doze off!” he was admonished by the same teacher. Well. He tried.

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As it neared toward the end of the day he found himself in another classroom and staring down at a piece of paper: a test paper specifically, and the pencil he had been using broke against it, as he had been making little doodles in the side margin. It wasn’t that it was too difficult, but they’d covered it already. It was a boring topic, ethics. He didn’t have the time for it, much less for it to be put into paper how he was viewed, it would be for naught. He held one hand in his jaw, ticking off each of the individual column areas for the answers, but he was ready to take the tests now – not these measly ones. But the advanced ‘Genin’ exams, which he hoped would be done sooner rather than later. He sighed, waiting for the bell to be rung. "Let me see that..” Another instructor took the paper from Hotarubi, tutting as they initially saw the doodles made in the side margins but read through the answers given by Hotarubi, while Hotarubi leaned back in his chair and stared out at the world. "Good work.” Hotarubi nodded. The bell went. Well. If he wanted to get something done, best he did it himself. Back to his own room at home on the Yamakira estate to get more reading in. The boring shit. But, it would be complete all the same.