Akio ran through thickets and dodged trees, his footfalls barely louder than the softest pats against the moss-covered earth, their sound intermixing with the countless chirps of birds, hums of bugs, and soft rustles of flowing leaves. Many wouldn't expect a child as young as he to wander off into the infamous 'Forest of Death' without a chaperone. However, this place was not the same thing to Akio that it was to so many who heard its frightful moniker. After all, he'd grown up surrounded by nature, guided by his Senju clansmen and especially his grandfather, to know and respect the trees, animals, and even spirits that found their places within it. No, to Akio this place was not a place of death. It was a Forest of Life.
Swiftly and silently he dashed, breezing past leaves and bushes that blew as though in a breeze when he rushed by. The young Senju's pace and the focus he placed on trying to be as quiet as he could that made it clear this was no mere stroll. In fact, the boy had a very specific destination in mind. It was one of the last afternoons before his first day at the Academy, the day he'd start growing into the shinobi he was just a sapling of in the present. Even while wandering in the forest, the thing he loved most, he was trying to learn and practice and get better as a shinobi. And after his latest lesson with grandpa Itsuki, he was eager to see how another young sapling was faring. After a couple minutes' sprint, Akio came upon a small clearing, the foliage-covered ground dancing with the daylight that cascaded through the soft canopy of leaves overhead. In the center, where the most light shone, stood a patch of soft recently-turned earth. Out of the loamy soil poked a tiny green stem, the beginnings of an orange tree, one he'd planted after a meal a couple months prior.
"Ahh!!" Akio exclaimed excitedly, raising his arms and jumping in a couple jubilant hops. "I just knew you'd sprout! You're looking sooo~ healthy!" He gushed, speaking kindness to the baby orange tree as he knelt down and examined the minute pair of leaves that extended from the earth. The young boy carefully tilled the soft dirt around the petite sapling, turning it slightly as he sprinkled in some of his grandfather's secret fertilizer recipe. To him it definitely had an odd smell, and he didn't know what it was made of, but it always seemed to work in the past. He removed a small band of cloth from his arm, soaked it in the leather flask at his side, and squeezed out droplets of water to let the mixture flow into the loosened earth, then softly pressed the dirt around the sapling to ensure it was well-anchored. 'Moving towards oranges...' Akio thought, his grandfather's wise words echoing in his mind as he lovingly tended to the plant whose destiny seemed not so different than his own.
[MFT] .:. [504 words]