That pillar? Yeah, it was tall. No, super tall. Akina stared up at her only option for training this particular skill. She had spent her whole morning looking for something suitable to climb up and here it was. Her day had originally started out with her determined to find a nonexistent tree in the middle of the desert, but that idea was quickly shot down. Of course, not before she let her temper get the best of her and punched anything and everything in sight. Yeah. Her knuckles were sporting some nasty scrapes after that one.

She pulled out an old scroll that she had stolen from her mother while she was on a mission. It’s not like she would need it anyways, right? She already knew this stuff. Akina quickly read over the instructions on it and considered what would be the smartest thing to do.

Okay. I’m supposed to stick my feet to… that thing and then creep my way up to the top. And if I fall I’ll just land in a pile of sand. That’s just great. Well, I should probably start out practicing focusing my chakra to my feet before I even start walking up. Yeah! That’s exactly what I’ll do. I’d rather not land on my back more times than I need to.

Akina stared down at her bright shoes as she attempted to concentrate chakra to her feet. She could feel it as the amount increased. It was a rather odd sensation, but she quickly got over that distraction and snapped back into training mode. As she added more chakra, Akina placed her foot on the side of the pillar and attempted to stick. Unfortunately, it wasn’t working as well as she wanted. Her foot slipped after a few seconds of contact and she stumbled backwards. Once she regained her balance she returned her gaze to her feet. This was going to take a while.

Alright. I obviously wasn’t using enough chakra, so I’ll put in even more. Then I’ll stick to it!

Akina took a few steps back before lifting her leg up and placing it on the pillar. She exerted more chakra and, hoping it would work, quickly placed her other foot up as well. Gravity caught up with her, though. She fell right onto her back thanks to the fact that she was using too much chakra. It created an opposite effect and pushed Akina away from the pillar instead of gluing her to it. And after getting back to her feet, she promptly punched kicked the pillar out of frustration.

“Damn thing,” she complained, “I can’t even get up more than an inch.”

Her next move was to get a running start before trying to move up. She moved back and ran at a reasonable speed towards the pillar in front of her. Akina concentrated more chakra to her feet before moving up a foot due more to her speed than her chakra control. Unfortunately, it wasn’t long before she slipped and landed in the sand with a sound somewhere between a groan and squeak.

She had been training for an hour or two already, and the progress that she had made was minimal. Although she hadn’t bothered to mark where she had previously been, it wasn’t hard to tell that it was all around the same height. She was frustrated and cranky, and she just wanted to get this down. Akina hadn’t been able to get the right recipe yet. The genin either exerted too much or too little chakra. It took less than a minute for her to fall back to the ground every time. And for the first few times that she fell, she had some rather ungraceful landings.

Her patience was already nonexistent and this was just pushing her to the limit. With some rather unladylike words, Akina slowly conjured chakra to her feet. She placed one foot up and then the next. She was sticking, so she slowly made her way further up the pillar. After a short while she began slipping though. She pushed away from the pillar and landed onto her feet with a loud thud. Sand flew up around her and Akina replied by coughing in an extremely obnoxious way.

This wasn’t going anywhere. Akina was convinced of it.

Akina stared at the open scroll in front of her. She had stopped training a while ago and decided to take a break. She wanted to read over what to do again. If she wasn’t getting anywhere, then why should she bother to continue? There was nothing more to it in her mind. It was just that simple.

The remains of her lunch were scattered around. She’d finally taken out the snacks that she had packed earlier and eaten them all faster than a starving hobo. Her muscles ached, her frustration was through the roof, and she no longer wanted to continue. Too bad for her that without this skill she’d look like a complete loser, so she knew that she had to go on. If it wasn’t for her pride, then she would have left after her first failure.

She started concentrating chakra to her feet without even bothering to stand up.

I need less than before, but more than that other time. Guess and check system, right?

“Alright, this thing isn’t working,” Akina told herself, “I need to get to the top of this damn pillar, and I need to do it now.”

Yes, she was speaking to herself. Yes, if you came close to her she might have hurt you out of frustration. She’d spent a while working on this technique, and she was upset with herself. Akina wanted to be at the top and not at the bottom, but that was exactly where she was at the moment. Literally. She was on the ground with a rather unattractive scowl on her face. Her clothes and body were covered in sand no matter how hard she tried to shake it off, and she looked like a mess. Her chakra control wasn’t where she wanted it to be, but she was going to get it there. She was going to get it there.

Akina placed a foot on the pillar… and then the next. She was getting higher, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to slip in another second or two. She’d done this how many times before? Her confidence would get higher and she’d be distracted, or she’d just be too frustrated to continue. And, right on cue, Akina did a flip in the air and landed on her feet with a cloud of sand puffing up.

At least she’d gotten higher?