Leaving the Village

A week later, at the village's main gate.

A girl carefully adjusted Hyuga Kagami's gear.

Her pale eyes revealed that, like Hyuga Kagami, she was a member of the Hyuga Clan and roughly his age. Yet her delicate brows were slightly furrowed, and her pretty face carried a heavy air of worry.

Hyuga Kagami, who was gazing at the distant Hokage Rock, smiled. "Don't worry. It's only a routine reassignment."

The girl nodded slightly, then took a new pair of goggles from her waist pouch and handed them to Hyuga Kagami.

Hyuga Kagami glanced at the girl without saying much, then tucked the goggles into his own waist pouch.

In fact, Hyuga Kagami had begun wearing goggles long ago, just like Obito. Only, the lenses of his goggles were darker, more like sunglasses.

He did so not only to protect his eyes, but also to conceal his identity as a member of the Hyuga Clan on the battlefield and avoid becoming the target of enemy attacks. More importantly, it would help conceal the Tenseigan he might possess in the future. After all, there were still certain differences in appearance between the Tenseigan and the Byakugan.

The girl was clearly worried that the old pair of goggles on Hyuga Kagami's head might break, and that replacements would be difficult to buy at the border. That was why she had bought him a new pair as a spare.

At that moment, a middle-aged ninja in the distance waved and called out, "Time's up. We should be leaving."

Hyuga Kagami patted the girl on the shoulder. "Rin, I'm leaving. Don't worry about me. Maybe I'll be back soon."

The girl named Rin nodded gently, but she could not hide the worry on her face.

At last, Hyuga Kagami looked once more toward the distant Hokage Rock.

In the turmoil caused by Orochimaru's defection, the village had been the greatest loser. Orochimaru had defected, and Jiraiya had pursued him. Thus, Konoha's Three Sannin, renowned far and wide, had all left the village!

Orochimaru had lost the village's support, but he had also escaped its restraints. He had gotten what he wanted, so it could hardly be called a win or a loss.

Danzo, who had absorbed most of Orochimaru's forces, had undoubtedly been the biggest winner. Hyuga Kagami even suspected that Danzo had used this takeover to obtain some of Orochimaru's human experimentation results, laying the groundwork for his future theft of the Sharingan and First Hokage Cells.

But none of that mattered to Hyuga Kagami anymore.

The village's higher-ups had reached a consensus: all of Orochimaru's former subordinates, like Hyuga Kagami, who had not been absorbed into Root would gradually be reassigned to border regions.

Simply put, they were being exiled to the frontier, far from the village!

After joining the middle-aged ninja, Hyuga Kagami looked over his companions.

Including himself, there were twelve ninja in total, divided into three squads. Aside from the three squad leaders, the remaining nine members were all Orochimaru's former subordinates.

Their destination was a border outpost at the junction of the Land of Fire and the Land of Wind.

The moment they left the village, Hyuga Kagami activated his Byakugan and became fully alert, as though entering a war zone.

He was not being overly cautious. He had learned a painful lesson several months earlier, when he had been attacked less than ten miles from the village. The entire unit escorting wounded soldiers back from the front had suffered devastating casualties. Had the Jonin reinforcements from the village not arrived in time, his name would likely have been on the Memorial Stone by now.

The cruel war had taught Hyuga Kagami many things. Though the war had now become a thing of the past, some habits were not so easily changed.

Hyuga Kagami was not the only one on guard. After leaving the village, the other ninja traveling with him also became vigilant without needing to say a word, with one exception.

Glancing at the small, thin figure at the back of the group, Hyuga Kagami sighed softly.

If there was anyone in the village least willing to believe that Orochimaru had defected, it was undoubtedly Mitaraishi Anko, walking behind Hyuga Kagami!

Almost overnight, Mitaraishi Anko had fallen from being a disciple of one of the Sannin and a rising star of the village to becoming a prisoner. After several weeks of confinement, she had been exiled to the border alongside Hyuga Kagami, completely removed from the village's center of power.

Her hollow eyes and vacant expression alone showed that she still found it impossible to accept that her teacher, Orochimaru of the Sannin, had betrayed the village.

The collapse of something so close to faith might never be healed in her entire life.

After looking away from Anko, Hyuga Kagami carefully examined the ninja traveling with him.

Of the twelve, only the middle-aged squad leader was a Jonin. The other eleven, including Hyuga Kagami and Anko, were all Chunin. It could be said that this team possessed a certain level of combat strength. As long as they did not encounter an ambush squad composed entirely of Jonin, there would be virtually no safety concerns along the way.

Besides, the war was over. The chances of enemy Jonin appearing within Konoha's territory were already negligible.

Just as Hyuga Kagami had expected, they encountered no trouble along the way and arrived safely at the border outpost.

After settling into the border outpost, the group of twelve was formally divided into three squads. Hyuga Kagami, Anko, and a Chunin named Oda were assigned to the Jonin squad leader's team.

The Land of Fire and the Land of Wind did not directly border one another. Small countries such as the Land of Rivers and the Land of Rain lay between them, but in reality, those small nations offered little separation.

The border outpost where Hyuga Kagami was stationed was responsible for a stretch of border around forty miles long. One end of its patrol route lay at the edge of a forest, while the other opened onto an endless sea of sand.

And so, Hyuga Kagami began his dull days of patrolling back and forth through the desert.

Time passed swiftly, and two months went by in the blink of an eye.

All news from the village had been completely cut off. At the border, Hyuga Kagami was like a man isolated from the world, spending every day in an endless cycle of patrols, guard duty, and rest.

During this time, he could sense that the Jonin squad leader had been monitoring the nine former subordinates of Orochimaru, including himself. So he behaved properly and made no unusual moves.

He secretly guessed that this surveillance would not last long.

Even a large village like Konoha did not have enough manpower to keep more than a hundred ninja under long-term surveillance. There had to be a time limit.

Sure enough, not long afterward, the village sent three new Chunin to replace the three previous squad leaders, including the middle-aged Jonin.

At first, Hyuga Kagami thought the village had lifted its surveillance of them. But after observing them for a while, he discovered that all three new Chunin squad leaders were taciturn and gave off a cold, sinister feeling!

"These people aren't ordinary Chunin!"

Hyuga Kagami quickly came to understand: the three new squad leaders were either Anbu or Root!

Did an ordinary border outpost need three Anbu or Root operatives serving as squad leaders?

The answer was obvious. Hyuga Kagami's thoughts immediately began racing. He did not know what had happened in the village over the past two months, but he knew that danger had arrived.

There was no time to lose. He had to launch the Tenseigan Project immediately...