A Whole New World

It was hard to keep her mouth closed whenever she entered the grand training facility. Mae’s mouth always dropped whenever she saw the sheer size of the place and tried to imagine how land ownership worked. Was this place owned by the village like a park? Or was it actually owned by someone even higher up than that? She thought she remembered someone named Airi that people had mentioned on the streets the other day. Pretty cool that they elected a woman president. Mae smiled at the progress that these people had made. It looked like they were a bit behind technologically than what she was used to, but in their defense, she didn’t know how any machinery or phones and stuff worked anyways! So now there were jutsus and ninja magic that made equally no sense. She shrugged at the craziness of it all and walked towards what looked like an indoor section of the training grounds. As she opened the doors she immediately spotted some punching bags in the back that were just begging to be used.

The member 'Mae' has done the following action : Dice roll

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'Bunny Arrival' :

Punch punch punch! Each time her fist hit the sandbag she exclaimed the activity to herself. A wide smile broke out on her face as she wailed on the punching bag with reckless abandon. She was beginning to work up a sweat, but it felt good to let all the energy out. Back before the incident, she needed to wear gloves or put wraps around her fists to prevent them from being wounded when hitting a bag, but now she had no problem doing so! With her new indestructible body, she could punch all day and her knuckles would never open and bleed. Back in the day she had gotten yelled at by a gym owner for getting blood on the sandbag from that very activity. It wasn’t her fault that her skin was weak! Or was it? Whose fault was it anyway? She paused her punches and thought for a second. Eh, doesn’t matter. Back to business. Punch punch punch!

The member 'Mae' has done the following action : Dice roll

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'Bunny Arrival' :

Punching was beginning to get boring, but she had come here to try out the facility so she couldn’t leave just yet! There were so many other things to explore! She looked around in wonder, and eyed a wooden training dummy with shuriken sticking out of it. Bullseye! Well, not really, but it was a phrase people used so… Mae skipped over to the next section with blissful merriment. Before she quite reached her destination she froze in place and slowly looked over her shoulder. She had forgotten to wipe down the equipment after use! Embarrassed, she walked back over and looked around for cleaning supplies. Thirty seconds passed and she wasn’t able to find anything. Eh, well it's not like I bled on it or anything, it's probably fine! Back to throwing sharp objects!

Several shuriken stuck out of the wooden dummy and a couple lay scattered on the ground next to it. During the ninja school that Mae was forcibly enrolled in, they had her try to throw these, but she wasn’t very good. In her old life, she had been pretty good at axe throwing, but there were also usually drinks to be had at the same time. She wasn’t supposed to drink yet according to “the law”, but it was fun to do so anyway. What was the drinking age in ninja world anyways?

Shuriken were the epitome of what a ninja tool was in Mae’s mind, and as she held one in her hand, she took a second to marvel at it. All of the cool Japanese movies had shinobi throwing these at their opponents and sometimes that ended in a sweet kill! Looking at it in person was a different story. How were you supposed to use this thing? She turned it over and over in her hands and recognized that if her skin wasn’t unpierceable, she would be bleeding everywhere by now. The hole in the middle had to be there intentionally right? She put her finger in the middle and tried to throw the shuriken at the training dummy. Not even close. The metal weapon fell to the ground with a clank and she felt her face grow red in embarrassment. They had taught her how to use these in ninja school, but she hadn’t really been paying attention. At that point she was still shell shocked about the whole scenario! Like, it was probably a dream, but she had fallen asleep and also had dreams within this dream! She was pretty sure they didn’t have Inception in ninjaland, so that was probably out.

After messing around with shuriken for a bit, Mae picked up a kunai off the ground. With a smirk, she flipped the kunai into the air and tried to catch it with her hand. Not even close. The kunai fell clattering to the ground and her smirk turned into a look of disappointment. That would have been so cool though! She pouted for a moment before throwing the kunai at the training dummy. Surprisingly, the sharp pointy end actually stuck into the wood and made a very satisfying “thunk” sound. Yay! Mae jumped in the air and gave herself a high five. She reached down and picked up another kunai and threw it towards the same target dummy. Metal clattered on the ground as her throw skittered across the tile. What the hell? She had just done it perfectly so what gives? Maybe there was some ninja magic in the air or something. Eh, kunai were stupid anyways. Either pick sword or knife right?

After changing her mind and throwing the kunai a couple more times at the training dummy, Mae began to grow bored once more. On to the next thing then! There was a weight lifting set in the corner that caught the pink hair girl’s eye. Still the only person in the facility, Mae didn’t feel embarrassment as she skipped once more over to her next destination. People didn’t talk enough about how skipping brought more happiness to travel than just normal walking did. Everyone always gave her a weird look when she did so though! The judging assholes. Mae found her brow had furrowed at the thought of other people making fun of her and she slapped her face to snap herself out of it. No time to be thinking about people you don’t even like! Better to spend the time on stuff and people you do. Starting with yourself! Mae bent down and grabbed the first dumbbell she could find.

Her muscles didn’t quite ache, in the sense that her body hurt, but she could feel her strength beginning to fail her as she did bicep curls. It was a strange in-between feeling due to the conflicting state of her invincible body, but not a crazy level of strength. Mae was a little disappointed as she set the dumbbell down, and picked up one with her other arm. She had hoped that the new state of her body would allow her to train indefinitely until she became super yoked, but that didn’t seem like it was the case. Maybe she could push herself a bit further than other people? But she also remembered gym instructors telling her that rest was an important part of a work out. BUT that was also for normal people and not for super ninja people! She had riled herself up a bit, and began to breath heavy as the thoughts confused and angered her. Mae put the dumbbell down and started to look for a track or some place she could run off the energy. Where was there a ninja coach when you needed one?

Run, run, run! Mae had found what looked to be an oval-shaped track within the training grounds that seemed to be about the same size as the ones she used to use in high school. The lines that marked it up were a bit different, and the turf wasn’t as mass-produced, but the vibe felt the same. The moment she saw the track she had bolted towards it and began sprinting at her full pace. She could feel herself getting tired, but her body refused to quit as she ran several laps. Although the world that she was in had changed pretty drastically, there were some things that stayed the same. She didn’t need to think about the complexities of what was real and what was a dream, or if she would see her parents again. The only thing that she needed to focus on right now was making sure she alternated her feet while running. Mae was here and the one thing she knew she could trust was her body. Run, run, run!

Sweat dripped off her body as Mae outran the troubles and worries from her past and with each step, she tried to ground herself more in the present. Regardless of if this was a dream or she was in a simulation or a video game or if this were real life, the main thing to note was that she wasn’t waking up anytime soon. She had treated the people as more like NPCs than actual people, but that needed to change. It would get lonely really quickly if she just talked to herself every day alone. After her day at the gym, or she guess the training grounds, she would make friend-making a top priority. Coming to this resolution, Mae stopped running and tried wiping off the sweat on her face with her shirt. Unfortunately her shrit had sweat completely through as well. Where was there a towel or something that she could use in this place? And maybe a water fountain? She was parched and was still unsure on her body’s need for food or water.

Mae found what looked to be a pile of clean towels, and without someone else to tell her they were off limits, she grabbed one for herself. As she wiped the sweat off, she thought about what kind of exercise she could go through next. Would it make more sense to test her durability and try to damage herself wth weapons or gym equipment? It seemed like it would be good to know the limits of her extreme toughness, but what happened if she passed the limit and actually hurt herself? It wasn’t like she had any ability to heal herself with ninja magic. Hell, she didn’t even know where she could find a first aid kit or some bandages. She shook off the self-harming thoughts and tried to focus on something new. Mae didn’t think they were suicidal or anything too worrisome, but unless she had someone who could provide help, she should probably steer clear. Maybe she could focus on some target dummy stuff? It had been pretty fun to throw weapons at them, maybe she could practice some more punches and kicks with them too! With renewed spirits, Mae wandered off to look for an area to practice tie jutsu.

Fresh off her run, Mae ran around the empty training facility looking for a training dummy with limbs that mimicked an actual person’s anatomy. It was good and all to punch a sandbag, but having limbs to duck and weave around was even better. Once she found one, Mae tried to unleash a combo of kicks to the left and right of the target. The wood resisted her attacks, and didn’t make a satisfying thud sound that she had hoped for. A frown appeared on the pink haired fighter’s face as she tried to unleash a combo of jabs and straights against the target. It turned out it was more fun getting her energy out on the sand bag. Even though this was more realistic, she had been getting into spars lately where she wasn’t able to land solid blows, and the sand bag was good for her self esteem. Mae would leave this dummy and return to her old sandbag for a few minutes before preparing to head home. It had been a fun day with a diverse training regiment, but it was time to find some people!

[exit thread]