Chapter 11: Small Hands, Big Words
Ren sat hunched over a tattered scroll, tongue sticking slightly out of his mouth like a child trying to balance a spoon on his nose.
He tapped the paper with the brush, frowned, then scribbled again.
"Is that supposed to say 'medical salve'?" Taro asked, peering over his shoulder.
Ren stared at the characters he'd written. "I think I accidentally wrote 'pickle rice'."
Taro snorted. "Delicious. Definitely cures bleeding."
Ren groaned, dropping his head on the desk. He was using the edge of a crate as a writing table, seated on a water barrel. His fingers were smudged with ink, his brush worn at the tip.
Learning to read in a new world was hard enough. Doing it with war drums in the distance? Even worse.
But he was determined. He couldn't just rely on memory. Knowledge from his old world helped, but it didn't translate into usable skills here unless he put in the work.
And if he couldn't fight well—or at all—he could at least read the damn label on a medical kit.
---
Earlier that day, the medic-nin barked orders as two genin stumbled in, supporting a third who had a long gash on his side.
"Get gauze, antiseptic, and stitching needle. Now!" she snapped.
Ren ran to the shelf.
He froze.
Four boxes. All labeled. All in a script he could barely read.
He squinted. The first word looked familiar—something like "bandage." Or was it "barley"?
In a panic, he grabbed one, sprinted back, and held it out.
The medic-nin opened it.
Out spilled dried beans.
She stared at him.
"…Are we cooking or healing?"
Ren wanted to vanish.
She shoved the box at Taro, who ran to get the correct supplies.
Later, she didn't yell.
Instead, she pulled Ren aside and sighed. "You've got steady hands. But you need to know what you're doing. You can't guess in this job. Learn the words. Or people die."
---
So he learned.
Each night, after duties were done, he scribbled, repeated words aloud, practiced reading old mission reports left in a storage bin. Half of them were boring. One detailed a missing chicken. Another a dramatic account of a ninja who'd stubbed his toe and blamed a cursed scroll.
He copied each word anyway.
---
By midweek, another emergency arrived. A boy—no older than Ren—was brought in with a deep cut along his thigh.
Ren didn't panic this time.
He ran the boy's leg under clean water. Pressed gauze against the bleeding. Called for a medic-nin without shouting.
When she arrived, she nodded at the clean wound.
"Better," she said. "Still can't stitch, can you?"
Ren held up trembling fingers.
"…Not well."
She chuckled. "Stick to cleaning and holding things. For now."
---
Ren spent the next day practicing knots on spare fabric and pretending they were wounds.
When Kenta passed by and saw him tying a mock bandage to a sack of rice, he burst out laughing.
"What are you doing, marrying the rice bag?"
Ren deadpanned, "We've grown close."
"Truly touching."
"Emotionally, yes. Also physically. I tied it too tight."
---
By the week's end, something strange happened.
A genin came into the tent, holding his bleeding hand and looking faint.
"I, uh... cut myself on a kunai," he said.
The medic-nin was treating someone else, so she waved Ren over. "Get him patched. Just wrap it. He's being dramatic."
Ren obeyed. Cleaned. Wrapped. Sat the boy down.
When he was done, the genin muttered, "Thanks. Better than some of the others."
Ren blinked. "What?"
The genin shrugged. "You're slow, but your hands don't shake."
That… felt good.
---
That night, he added a note in his small, self-made medical journal:
Day 21 – Hands still shake with stitching. Not with wrapping. Improvement.
Day 21 – Language improving. Learned difference between 'ointment' and 'cat food.' Important distinction.
He looked up at the stars.
Somewhere in the distance, a bird called. Farther still, the faint crackle of fire and muffled voices—older shinobi, talking about strategies and missions Ren couldn't understand yet.
But that was okay.
He didn't have to understand everything yet.
He wasn't strong.
He wasn't fast.
But he was steady. He was learning.
And slowly, slowly… he was becoming useful.
---
The next morning, someone stole his makeshift dictionary.
He found it later under a pile of boots, with an extra page added.
A sketch of a kunai with legs chasing a screaming rice bag.
He stared at it.
Then he laughed so hard he cried.
---
End of Chapter 11