[Oborozuki Yuri]

Despite being teammates, it'd been a week or two since they last caught up - Yuri didn't blame either of them for the lack of comradery. They were without a Sensei, they were only two, and their age difference and capabilities set them far apart. But what was a team that never interacted? Directionless or not, they could surely put their heads together at least once a week, couldn't they? When was the last time they even attended a mission together? In just under a year, Yuri could safely say.... she barely knew Midori.

Even now, she barely knows her as they train together, though separately. 

A smoke hangs from Yuri's lips as she concentrates her chakra, working to walk the surface of the pond at the center of their training field. It's nested on the south side of the bridge, tucked somewhere under the shade of The Great Tree. But not close enough to be anywhere near it. There's a fountain spewing water at the center of the large pool, a rock basin keeping it neat and collected. The sun is high overhead, but it doesn't do much against the cold - still, Yuri is wearing only a school-shirt style sweatshirt and shorts. 

Smoke pools under her eyelashes so they flutter, breaking her concentration. She falls only a foot into the water, catching herself on the rocky edge so she doesn't fall in entirely. 

She looks over her shoulder toward her teammate, observing her silently. "Oi," she says, one loud syllable echoing through the clearing for just a moment before Yuri tilts her head, brown eyes searching for Midori's as she turns to face her. "Shouldn't we, like... I'unno, train together or something?"

---

Netsu Midori - 282
Post 1/8

[Netsu Midori]

Midori is busy beating the ever-loving crap out of a wooden training dummy while her teammate is having a smoke and training a bit on her own by the pond. While the Netsu clan member had been busy running missions with Hotarubi, who had once been a Genin member of their own Team 1, Yuri had been busy with her own things. They rarely interacted much before anyways, so it was actually a bit of a surprise to get an invitation to train with her own teammate, and not just training near one another, but actually training together. So much of a surprise in fact that Midori pauses in her striking patterns to turn and look at Yuri with one delicately trimmed eyebrow raised upwards in a sign of almost sarcastic surprise.

"The hell would we even train together for, squirt?"

Despite the insulting tone, Midori does actually seem genuinely interested, fully stopping her striking pattern on the wooden training dummy, which was still bearing a series of indentations from where her fists had impacted the wood in on itself. Of course, with Midori's gloves, she doesn't have to worry about splinters digging into her skin. The rest of her body is mostly covered with the green and black catsuit she likes to wear, along with boots and the classic Takigakure headband hanging loose around her neck. Her neon green eyes meet with those much more plain honey-colored eyes that Yuri had. Where Midori was striking in her appearance, Yuri was just as plain. The bit of training that Midori had done with her Hung Gar rings was making her wrists a bit sore, but she was learning to work through the pain of it, but now she can relax a little while leaning against the training dummy, wondering what her much younger teammate might have in mind.

[Oborozuki Yuri]

While when she had first met her older teammate the abrasive nature and insulting names had been a bit off-putting, Yuri had since learned that it was not exactly personal. She does not bat an eye at being called squirt, but she does take a long drag from her cigarette before taking it between her fore and middle fingers, flicking ash into the water with her thumb. She holds the lit stick at her side, shrugging as she steps out of the water.

"Eh. I'unno."

Standing on the edge of the rocky basin, Yuri sways a little, hips rocking side to side as she wiggles out of some stiffness in her limbs. She looks upon her beautiful teammate, her expression a little blank save for the twitch of her lopsided eyebrows, and speaks blasé. "Raise morality, er whatever? It's just us now. I figured..." Her gaze fuzzes, looking beyond Midori as the trail of her thoughts are interrupted by the cigarette she brings to her lips. The cherry burns bright, and a cloud of gray rises around the teen's head. Her voice is steady and plain. Even now as they are idle, she's concentrating on her chakra - it starts in her core. Her eyes snap back into focus and the cigarette hangs at her side again, then she is watching her step as she staggers backward slowly, gently testing the surface tension of the water compared to the chakra she's trying to concentrate into her feet. "Well, just figured maybe it'd be fun."

---

Netsu Midori - 254
Post 2/8

[Netsu Midori]

Midori stays staring at the more plain girl that was her teammate, considering the idea of raising morale by training together. She doesn't see how that might raise morale at all, but when she suggests that it might be fun, Midori changes her mind on the idea. Even if Midori is extremely abrasive, she wasn't above having fun, or at least seeking it, especially if it was through training. Training was certainly something Midori had a bit of delight in, so she couldn't really say no to that, anyway, and she knows that her teammate is a member of a powerful clan, just like she is. With both of them having an advanced nature, training between the two of them could actually be fun.

"Yeah, alright, why not?"

She bounces herself off the wooden training dummy so that she's standing now, walking over to Yuri and showing off a bit by focusing chakra to the bottom of her feet in order to stabilize the water surface she's walking on. She takes her steps just like she'd been walking on the ground earlier, apparently quite confident in the use of the water surface walking technique. In reality, it had taken her longer to perfect the Kesshoton Meditation than it had taken for her to learn the more normal version of water surface walking, but her years of training in the Meditation practice had made it somewhat simpler for the older Genin. She even does a bit of a somersault on the water, leaping up into a kind of cartwheel without using her hands, just to show off a bit. After all, she's older by half a decade, so she feels she ought to be somewhat impressive compared to her teammate.

Not that Midori doesn't worry for a moment while she's airborne that she won't be able to refocus the chakra to the bottom of her feet again to land on the water and not in the water. Luckily, she manages to do so, but that doesn't mean she wasn't scared at the halfway point.

"How about we work on some Ninjutsu skills? Like handseals?"

[Oborozuki Yuri]

As Midori contemplates for just a brief moment, Yuri manages to funnel the chakra correctly in a way that stops her from breaking through the pool's level surface. It's only a little wobbly as she steps backward onto it, finding it akin to standing on a waterbed filled to bursting, and she looks up when her teammate agrees. She sucks down the rest of her smoke before crumpling it, still lit, into her palm and then her pocket. She's apparently unfazed by the burning heat.

Yuri blinks and turns around as the older woman walks easily onto the surface of the water and shows off with a fancy jump flip land, expression still empty. The ripple of water disturbs the younger genin a bit and she wobbles, arms once crossed coming apart to float at her sides, a weak attempt at keeping steady. One heel dips below the surface - she closes her eyes, takes a deep breath, and takes a step back onto the pool's edge before she can fall in again. She gives a small shiver, but it is not indicative of her temperature - even in the few weeks before winter, she feels little of the season's chill.

"Handseals? Isn't that kinda... lame?" Yuri's face scrunches up just a little as she folds her arms again, cocking her head over her shoulder. "Er, I mean, it's whatever you wanna do. Yer the oldest."

---

Netsu Midori - 233
Post 3/8

[Netsu Midori]

Midori hears Yuri call her idea of training to better use handseals lame, and she flips that long black hair over her shoulder before she fixes the most wilting blank stare directly at her own teammate, even as the other Genin actually agrees to the plan for handseals training.

"You know what's really lame? Trying to get out of a bad situation with Ninjutsu only to get your face smashed in by another Genin that's 7 years older than you because you can't get the handseals out fast enough in a combat situation."

As Midori speaks, she firmly squeezes her right hand into a fist, until the glove's material makes a soft grinding noise, and she unclenches her fist while changing from a firmly blank stare to a little smile in Yuri's direction.

"So let's not call this training lame, right?"

The suggestion that Midori might commit violence against her own teammate for something so small as calling her lame isn't quite toothless, but Midori probably wouldn't, to be frank. Especially not within the walls of the real Takigakure. It didn't help that she'd just gotten out of a spar with Hotarubi not too long ago, and after such a trouncing, she was perhaps looking for someone or something to smash, just to get her aggression out. In any case, the black-haired kunoichi raises both hands, performing a series of four handseals as quickly as she can while focusing on her own Kesshoton chakra, then pulling it to both of her fists as she clenches them again. The advanced element surrounds both of her fists, making her hands glow with a neon green light that pulses from both of them in what looks like a fluid energy, before she sucks that Kesshoton chakra back in so as to not cause any kind of concussive blast from the highly volatile chakra.

"Easy like."

[Oborozuki Yuri]

Midori's blank expression matches Yuri's for a moment, and the younger one's face still doesn't shift even as the older woman sort of threatens her. She blinks, narrows her eyes with thought. She's twenty-one...? Yuri thinks waywardly.

Watching as Midori strings together four handseals before focusing chakra into her fists until they emit a goopy, ravenous green energy, Yuri feels just a twinge of jealousy. She did not know how to control her chakra just yet, and she also definitely didn't know how to manifest her chakra so vividly and physically. It must be part of her clan's special jutsus - unfortunately, Yuri did not know much about the Netsu all too well. "Okay. Not lame."

Casting a single handseal, Yuri focuses intently on her free hand. Just one hand. She could totally manifest her chakra physically into just one hand, couldn't she? It was no different from a medical ninja emitting their own essence to heal - could she not emit her own energy with far less pressing matters in mind?

After a moment of it not working, Yuri sighs and drops her hands. "What should I know about 'em, then? I don't know a lotta jutsu with handseals, but eh, maybe I should get comfortable with them."

---

Netsu Midori - 207
Post 4/8

[Netsu Midori]

Midori simply shrugs when Yuri brings up the fact that her own jutsu generally don't have a lot of handseals. That's not really her problem, now that she thinks about it, so she considers what else they could train on regarding Ninjutsu, something they seem to have in common at least. Midori was also specialized in Taijutsu, but her brand of combat might be too much for Yuri to keep up with. Whatever technique she's using with only one handseal certainly won't help her teammate to switch between handseals on the fly the way Midori's own Atsuki Ken technique requires. So she starts to consider different options that might still be on the table.

One might think that Midori changing her plans to actively help another member of her team was quite odd for a woman that made a habit of insulting everyone she meets, but in reality, she felt it was justified enough, since Yuri had actually acquiesced to her idea of training handseals by retracting the idea of it being lame. It made sense that Midori would at least try to think up something to help the younger Genin out. And then she comes up with an idea; they can just as easily work on improving their chakra reserves. Or at least, Midori can do so.

"Well, yeah, I guess we can try something else. Let's just do a lot of jutsu, one after another. It'll make our chakra reserves grow from using so much of it, and then we'll have more chakra to use later."

Midori performs the same four handseals again, a bit faster this time around, and rapidly focuses chakra to both her hands once more, causing them to glow again. She was definitely getting faster at making those handseals, but the technique she was using was still quite draining on her own chakra, so it was quite intense in that regard, as well.

[Oborozuki Yuri]

Yuri feels as though maybe she's offended Midori, but only because she was being kind of nice about it? But that surely didn't make sense. Yuri doesn't think too much about it, instead blinking at what her teammate suggests before immediately casting another set of handseals herself, at a speed Yuri could not quite match if she tried. It's a good idea, honestly, but did Yuri even have enough chakra to do something like that? She'd never tried it before.

Instead of saying anything, although with somewhat of a perplexed face, Yuri casts three handseals at a rather medium pace. Her heart thumps in her chest and her throat burns, and a familiar pang burns at her core, begging to be met by smoke. Yuri ignores it, focusing on the technique she's trying; it's one she does not know how to do personally, but her mentors had gone over it explicitly with her.

Leaning down at the pool's edge, Yuri places her hands, fingers fanned out and palms flat, to the water's level surface. How did it go again? She channels futton chakra into her hands, stirring upon katon and suiton, and then tries to pump that gathered chakra into the water. Though maybe for someone who was proficient with the technique the task would already be complete, for Yuri it felt impossible to tell whether or not she was actually doing anything to the pH balance of the body of water. After only a few moments, she feels the chakra come to a flittering end. Quietly, she casts the same three handseals with her wet hands before repeating the motions; hands on water, pump futton chakra to shift the water's components.

Even if it wasn't working, Yuri was using her chakra. So far she did not feel too much of a drain on her reserves, but she'd only cast the jutsu twice.

---

Netsu Midori - 313
Post 5/8

[Netsu Midori]

Midori notices that Yuri is using some kind of technique on the water she's currently standing on, or at least trying to do so, and she quickly decides that she doesn't really want to be standing on the same water that her own teammate is trying to use jutsu with. She was aware, from working and training occasionally with Yuri nearby, that her own clan's advanced nature release had something to do with making things acidic, at least usually, and she didn't want to be on the water when her Genin teammate does eventually figure out how to change the acidity of the water. She hurries off the murky pond, the Kesshoton chakra still covering her fists as she leaps off the water and onto dry land. She considers giving Yuri a piece of her mind for a moment, but figures it'd just interrupt her concentration when she wants to be training.

Instead, Midori returns to the training dummy, looking it over a bit, and then lifting it up and hurling it directly into the pond, over Yuri's head so that it misses hitting her by a couple of meters. With that in the water, they could probably gauge how well she's using her clan's advanced elemental release. Meanwhile, Midori returns to forming the handseals and focusing the chakra into her fists, and she's glad to see that she's gradually getting faster with it. At this rate, she'll likely be able to perform the handseals for Atsuki Ken quickly enough that it won't be so easily interrupted during close-range combat. But she needs to train more and focus much harder to make sure she's doing this correctly. The last thing she wants to do is try it out and end up being smacked around the way she had been during the spar with Hotarubi.

She was getting tired out by the constant drain on her own chakra reserves of her own technique, though. Midori stops after a few more tries to wipe sweat off her brow.

[Oborozuki Yuri]

It's only as Midori is jumping off of the water that Yuri considers how dangerous that would have been, and she doesn't know if she should be amused or apologetic. But she says nothing, continuing to pump as much chakra as she can into the small fountain's pond. The water is lukewarm, and feels almost pleasant stretched out under just her palms and fingers. There's a slight ripple coming from the center of her grip, flushing outward in the wake of her chakra coursing through it.

Then a wooden dummy comes crashing into the water, making a splash and sending Yuri backwards. She catches herself with a knee, hand on the rocky edge of the pool. They seem to be out of sync, but Yuri tries not to fret about it. Surely they would find some grace eventually.

At the very least, she saw what the woman was intending. Instead of being sassy about it, Yuri simply calls over her shoulder in a gently neutral voice, "Thank you."

Giving a hearty stretch, fingers locked over her head as she takes a few deep breaths, Yuri focuses on her chakra. Returning to the lip of the pool, the young genin strings together the same three handseals before replacing her palms. This time, even as the jutsu runs its course, Yuri continues pumping futton chakra into the reservoir if not only to waste the energy. She keeps going until a bead of sweat rolls over her temple and she feels a light stir in her core; the emptying of her own pool.

---

Netsu Midori - 260
Post 6/8

[Netsu Midori]

Midori considers the fact that Yuri doesn't even insult her when she gets surprised by the wooden training dummy being thrown into the pond water, and that she even gives a thank you, though it could have just as easily been very dry sarcasm with how neutral her teammate's face always seems to be. She does at least give the younger Genin a little grunt of acknowledgement, apparently too focused on what she's doing herself to really do much in response to the short expression of gratitude. As it is, she performs the series of four handseals one more time, feeling that she's quite close to being drained of chakra, and she stops immediately. It was far too dangerous even in the middle of the Kesshoton Meditation to try and focus Kesshoton chakra when her reserves were so low.

It seems that Yuri is just as tired out from the training she's been doing, although Midori doesn't notice much of a change. At least, not until the training dummy slowly floats back towards the two of them, and Midori can clearly see a change in the wood between the half of the wood floating above the water and the half that is now under the water, with the air-side wood looking beaten up but whole and intact, and the wood under the water was clearly a lighter color, having had a few outer layers eaten through by some kind of change in the water. At the sight of that change, Midori lets out a low, slow whistle of astonishment. then she turns to look at Yuri directly.

"Remind me not to let you invite me to any hot springs where you've been practicing."

[Oborozuki Yuri]

Another set of three handseals, hands to the water, channel chakra. The water around her connection to the body feels just a bit off, just a bit thicker, but it doesn't extend too far beyond her. There is a hint of corrosion feeding the wet, as made evident by the turning over of the training dummy. It nearly sizzles, revealing what's beneath the first few layers of its wooden flesh. Eaten away.

She's pushed herself off the ground by the time Midori has approached, wiping her hands off on the front of her sweatshirt before producing a pack of smokes and a lighter. There's already a butt in her mouth by the time Midori remarks, and she's lighting it before she speaks, hand cupped around the flame. "I don't even think I did it right, but thanks." Inhale, hold, exhale. She sighs, stretches one arm over the other shoulder, hooking an arm around its elbow to give some tug. Her muscles felt a little achy, like she was running on half a tank of gas, but otherwise she felt no harrowing difference in her person. She wanted to go further, if Midori would allow it.

"Let's keep going," She puts one hand on a cocked hip, other hand wrapped around her mouth, the butt of the cigarette. The cherry glows, and smoke billows from her nose in two long streams as she speaks. "Now that we're out of chakra, we could... I'unno. We could spar." Quickly, Yuri points to where the dummy had once been with her stick, and then to where it floats half-eaten in a pool of futton water. "But. Um. Maybe go easier on me than you did that thing."

The teen was unaware that Midori was feeling particularly inclined toward kicking someone's ass, but if she did, Yuri would approach her the same way. She was confident she could at least not die at the hands of her beloved teammate. Definitely.

---

Netsu Midori - 325
Post 7/8

[Netsu Midori]

Midori watches with an air of nonchalance as Yuri lights up a cigarette. The kunoichi herself didn't much care for them, even though she'd likely die before lung cancer or anything else became a major issue for her. She also likes being able to breathe clearly, and she wasn't sure that smoking would be helpful for her Taijutsu capabilities. She doesn't mind so much if Yuri smokes. She knows her own parents would have likely had a fit if she'd picked up the practice, but then her parents had always been throwing a fit.

She's a bit surprised when Yuri suddenly suggests that they keep going, and she wonders for a moment what kind of training she has in mind now that they're almost out of chakra, but then she suggests a spar between the two of them. Midori takes a quick inventory of herself. She definitely has a little bit of chakra left in her tank, but she knows better than to try and use that during a simple spar. It ran the risk of overusing her chakra core and damaging herself and others around her if she were to do so. But she knows some basic Taijutsu strikes and she knows some serious dodging techniques that make full use of her acrobatic style and flair, so she figures it wouldn't be too difficult for herself to make good on a sparring offer.

"Okay kid. I won't hit you like I did the training dummy, as long as you promise not to turn my blood into acid."

She moves over to where Yuri had pointed out, then turns to face her teammate, the weighted Hung Gar rings tightly wrapped around each wrist and her ankles as well, providing her with much more weight than she would normally have on her limbs. She moves into a fighting stance, her right hand balled up into a fist at her waist, just above her right hip, while her left hand is raised a bit higher, with her arm horizontal at about chest height, and each of her knees bent to provide a springy base for movement.

"Ready when you are!"

[Oborozuki Yuri]

Just as Midori agrees, Yuri rethinks the idea - did she have any chance against the older woman? She outmatched her in Ninjutsu clearly, and appeared to be a little better on her feet. Yuri had a few offensive techniques and some dodging capabilities, but for the most part she would be relying on skill and skill alone. And though it stung to face, Midori might prove to be far superior.

"Promise."

Then Midori is assuming some kind of stance and Yuri balances it out with her own, a couple yards away from her teammate. Because she is most familiar with the neko style of taijutsu, Yuri takes on a cat-like pose with her shoulders dropped and hips square. Her knees are bent, hands raised like she might pounce. But then Midori urges her to take the lead and Yuri tilts her head. Maroon locks fall across her face, a line of smoke coming off the tip of her smoke. The tendril twists through her locks of red, obscuring her honey eyes momentarily. "Eh? Me first? All right then.."

Even though she's low on chakra, the girl kicks off her back foot with a surge of chakra as a head start. She barrels forward in a straight line, covering the distance in just under a few breaths. She comes in first with a fist aimed at Midori's head - without following through to a collision, Yuri drops her weight entirely, bending her body at an awkward angle so that she is nearly diagonal before sweeping her legs out, catching her weight on one hand and shoulder. As if break dancing, the sweep that aimed for Midori's legs is followed up by an attempted shin kick to the flank. All the while, smoke trails in the wake of her movements, cigarette still hanging from the teen's lips.

---

Netsu Midori - 304
Post 8/8. END