Do one's best always (D0, EM, Training Grounds - Expecting but Open)

[Ikoma Aya]

The sun was still rising in the horizon as a short-ish girl first stepped into the city of Tsuma, dressed in a drab coloured kimono which, while acceptable for samurai, was clearly less suitable for the courts than for travelling.

Or training.

And it was, in fact, the Kakita Academy where she first set off to after getting to the city. Finding the building was not hard, for obvious reasons. Finding the Training Grounds within it was also easy.

Keeping her mind focused as she walked through the new landscape, hearing different ways of speaking, seeing new places and experiencing for the style of the famous city - and the famed Kakita Academy - was not that easy, though.

As she made her way to a free spot on the Training Grounds, where some people were already going through their routines, she shook her head slightly, as if trying to keep her mind focused on only one thing. Here and there, it seemed as if she were muttering something to someone. An apology, perhaps?

It was difficult to tell, but after a while, and after a set of dutifully performed, traditional rituals, she was ready. She slowly took her right hand to bokken with some inscriptions tucked in her obi, drew a long breath, and stood there, silent and immobile. Reviewing exercises on her mind, maybe? Or was this the first exercise in itself? Or was this some type of Iaijutsu practice?

Whatever it was, she really seemed to put her mind to it. Her eyes still shifted to the sides here and there, but she was clearly trying hard.

[Kakita Rin]

In the midst of her training, from the opposite side of the Training Grounds, a throaty shout signaled another proto-samurai hard at work. Pale blue training clothes ruffled thunderously through the former silence, accompanied by the shriek of air parted by a swiftly-moving bokken.

It would seem that another student was at work, this one with a somewhat more bombastic regimen.

[Ikoma Aya]

In the midst of her training, from the opposite side of the Training Grounds, a throaty shout signaled another proto-samurai hard at work. Pale blue training clothes ruffled thunderously through the former silence, accompanied by the shriek of air parted by a swiftly-moving bokken.

It would seem that another student was at work, this one with a somewhat more bombastic regimen.

The girl's eyes instinctively shifted to the source of the sounds - her hands still unmoving for a minute or so as her mind undecided between continuing to focus and paying attention to the energetic movements of the other student.

She tried the former for a good while, but the second apparently won out in the end. Closing her eyes for a moment, she soon started going through the movements of a quick, aggressive kata herself. Whether due to the form itself, or maybe something other than it, the series of movements brought her closer and closer to where the other one was training, the throaty shouts now pairing in a duo with kiai shouts in a surprisingly deep voice.