The students all excitedly agreed that things were indeed as Shin had said.
Left with no choice, Nishinodera announced that the rest of the class would be self-study.
Then, under Shin's lead, the students "enthusiastically" cleared away the broken desks.
After that, Nishinodera left the classroom to fetch new desks.
"Now that the evidence is gone, are you still thinking of continuing?" Shin felt it was better to stop while they were ahead.
He believed that before he started causing trouble, he could not let the neighboring class notice anything suspicious.
After all, if they kept fighting, it would be hard to cover it up.
"Of course. You promised me." Nao had gotten plenty of time to rest.
Her current condition was not much different from before the duel.
Shin felt utterly miserable. Was this little iceberg sent specifically to restrain me? Does every thing really have its natural nemesis?
Pah... a certain troublemaker smugly declared that he had no such thing as a natural enemy.
"You're not thinking of going back on your word, are you?" Nao had no doubt about it.
After chatting with him for a while, she had discovered that he was definitely someone who acted without restraint.
Things ordinary people considered embarrassing were perhaps exactly the sort of things he would dare to go back on.
Shin shrugged helplessly. "Whatever you want. It'd be best if we finish before the teacher comes back."
"Looks like you came to school today with some unspeakable purpose..."
Nao looked at his tightly furrowed brow. "You can rest assured..."
She solemnly promised, "I have no interest in knowing your true purpose."
"Whatever. The winner will be decided in an instant anyway." Shin began infusing every cell in his body with lightning-natured Chakra.
To Nao, Shin now looked as though his entire body was covered in Chakra.
She knew that his astonishing Chakra control was something she still could not achieve for the time being.
"I haven't been idle lately either." Nao swiftly tapped the acupoints at the major joints throughout her body with her fingertips.
"Her presence is clearly different from before. Is this the Hyuga Clan's acupoint stimulation?" Shin's mind raced.
The increased bodily reaction speed gained by stimulating acupoints was very similar to his Elemental Chakra Mode.
One was a mode that could be maintained as long as one had enough Chakra.
The other was a double-edged sword that required enduring intense pain throughout the body in exchange for improved attributes.
Shin decided that he would defeat Nao head-on.
That was a form of respect.
After exchanging a glance, they both knew they did not have much time left.
Waiting for her opponent to attack first was not Nao's style.
With Chakra rapidly flowing through her body, she threw a full-force punch forward.
"What is this? Why does it feel like I've been electrocuted?"
As her fist passed through Shin's body, it turned into wisps of white lightning.
Her entire arm felt waves of numbness as it was enveloped by the electric glow.
Without time to think, she stepped out with her left foot under the Byakugan's perception and dodged the attack from above.
"Crackle..."
A sound like lightning piercing through an object came from the floor where she had just been standing.
The onlookers below were all baffled. After the two had vanished, a bolt of white lightning had fallen from above and carved a neat cut into the floor.
No matter how they thought about it, they could not understand how such a fantastical scene had appeared.
"The Byakugan has no blind spots..." Shin understood that it would be difficult to end this duel quickly with his speed.
And since children of the Hyuga Clan trained in taijutsu from an early age, he truly did not dare guarantee victory.
Through Nao's Byakugan, she could see only a streak of lightning hurtling toward her.
As though she had no good way of dealing with Shin while his entire body was covered in Chakra, she swiftly ducked to evade the attack.
"Looks like she doesn't want to clash with me head-on..." When Shin's kick missed, he felt numbness spreading through every cell in his body.
He immediately switched to Wind Elemental Chakra Mode, using its vibrations to ease the discomfort in his body.
Soon, the discomfort in every cell gradually began to fade amid the vibrations of wind-natured Chakra.
"His Chakra changed again in an instant..." Nao seemed to understand something.
She decided to verify whether her earlier guess was correct.
The moment Shin landed, he immediately sensed danger approaching.
Without the speed boost of his lightning nature, his bodily reactions could not evade this strike.
He could only expend the wind-natured Chakra within him to form a barrier before himself and block it.
Nao's small fist instantly shattered the barrier, but the resistance created when it struck the barrier allowed Shin to retreat and avoid the attack.
"Don't think this is over!"
Seeing that Shin had indeed slowed down, Nao closed in on him.
The increasingly intense pain from the acupoints throughout her body forced her to decide to end this duel quickly.
The Byakugan's penetrating vision saw through Shin's current condition.
His mind could perform rapid calculations, but without lightning nature empowering his body, his attack speed was far slower than at the start.
Fighting the Hyuga Clan in close combat? Without lightning nature's numbing effect, who would dare take their attacks head-on?
Yet Uchiha Shin would not easily give up this taijutsu match.
"His Chakra changed again. Lightning, wind, and earth—how many natures does he have?" Nao thought, but her hands did not slow down in the slightest.
"Gentle Fist Art: Eight Trigrams Thirty-Two Palms!"
After a sharp cry, she struck toward him with the first palm of this taijutsu technique.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
Shin blocked the first palm with a rock shield created by Earth Elemental Chakra Mode, but the second palm shattered it. Facing the third, he raised his right arm and gritted his teeth as he endured it.
Nao was the opponent Shin had valued most in the five years since coming to this world, apart from his family.
The Byakugan, her superb taijutsu, keen perception, and powerful intuition all made his blood begin to stir.
Shin barely defended against the fourth palm, but by the fifth, he had raised his clenched left fist, preparing to counterattack.
"You still want to resist against a close-range Hyuga?"
Nao's attacks grew faster and faster, and Shin, who had raised his left hand, instantly shifted into a defensive stance.
Even with earth nature's increased resistance to impacts, he could still faintly feel the pain coming from his hands.
Heiji stared blankly at the two on stage, one attacking and one defending.
The other students were the same.
Faced with classmates like these, they felt that not becoming withdrawn was already an achievement.
Why were they still in school if they were this strong? Couldn't they just graduate on the spot?
"Thirtieth palm!"
Shin's right hand clasped Nao's slender wrist. Before he could properly appreciate the delicate feel of her skin, he released her and blocked the thirty-first palm coming straight at him.
The stabbing pain in her acupoints did not make Nao choose to give up.
She hasn't used ninjutsu or Genjutsu this whole time. Is she looking down on me...?
With sheer willpower, she forcibly suppressed the pain in the acupoints throughout her body.
In that instant, she felt all the pain vanish, and her entire body seemed lighter than ever before.
The thirty-second palm struck toward Shin's chest.
Shin had no time to think and immediately crossed his arms in front of his chest.
"Ugh..." He felt the force coming from Nao's palm.
That heavy strike directly numbed both his arms.
"After the Thirty-Two Palms comes the Sixty-Four Palms..."
With his mind unusually clear, Shin smiled as he watched Nao's palm strike toward him again.
Before you continue