Hyuga Yūsha walked out of the ninja tool shop with a 2.5-meter-long bow case strapped to his back and set off for home.
Inside the huge case were the giant Japanese bow forged by Sulfur, three hemp bowstrings, fifty Japanese Arrows, and the corresponding quiver, finger guards, and arm guards.
Walking through the streets with such an exaggeratedly large case made him extremely conspicuous.
Along the way, Hyuga Yūsha could vaguely hear passing ninja pointing and whispering about him:
"Whoa, what kind of ninja tool is that guy carrying? Even a Fuma Shuriken isn't that big, is it?"
"Hmm, isn't that the freak from the Hyuga Clan, Hyuga Yu?"
"Who's Hyuga Yu?"
"Heh... A jinx. Keep your voice down, unless you want him picking you as a teammate."
"That weird kid from his Ninja Academy days. He refused to learn the Hyuga Clan's inherited secret techniques and was always hanging around that eternal Genin, Might Duy, and his son, practicing Iron Fist. What a pity. His talent was so terrible that even Might Duy didn't want anything to do with him."
"After becoming a Genin, he's already gone through two dead teammates..."
"Every time, he's the weakest one, yet he's the one who survives. It's almost as if he drained all his teammates' luck..."
"Now, I guess he realized that practicing any ninja technique or Taijutsu was useless, so he switched to throwing ninja tools that don't require chakra. Hahaha, no wonder they call him the shame of the Hyuga Clan."
Listening to the murmured discussions all the way,
words of pity, mockery, and envy drifted past his ears.
Hyuga Yu's gaze darkened slightly. He didn't argue, merely quickening his pace as he hurried away from the area around Konoha Training Ground.
The clouds of war had already descended over Konoha.
After leaving Konoha Training Ground, the streets grew increasingly deserted. Few pedestrians stopped along the roads, and the scattered Konoha villagers who passed him all wore grim expressions and hurried along.
The shops had closed, and the entertainment venues were shut down.
Only the areas around Konoha Hospital and the Training Ground were more crowded than usual.
Soon, the sun sank in the west.
After spending the day rushing between several places and using every possible means to prepare for war, Hyuga Yu returned to the vicinity of the Hyuga Clan Grounds.
He had two places to live.
One was a side room in the residence of Hyuga Takahiro, the Hyuga main family elder, where servants and attendants lived.
The other was a narrow apartment on the outskirts of the Hyuga Clan Grounds, left to Hyuga Yu by his parents in this life.
After refusing the appointment letter from the Main House elder, Hyuga Yu had effectively been fired by him. As a result, he could only return to that cramped little apartment.
Fortunately, although the apartment was small, it gave Hyuga Yu a unique sense of security.
However,
just as he was about to step into the Hyuga Clan Grounds,
while walking along the road, Hyuga Yu suddenly sensed a gaze hidden in the shadows beside the street, spying on him!
Hyuga Yu's heart immediately tightened.
In his early days, Hyuga Yu had been extremely weak and could rely only on the Kekkei Genkai [Byakugan] as his core ability. As a result, he was extraordinarily sensitive to the gazes of others.
It could even be said that this was precisely what allowed him, as a disposable Genin, to survive two years of direct participation in the Third Shinobi World War, despite nearly all his teammates dying.
It was an almost uncanny sensitivity to the abstract concept of a "gaze."
The average human field of vision covered roughly 180 degrees horizontally and 135 degrees vertically.
When looking straight ahead, the range one could see clearly was about 120 degrees. Peripheral vision could sense sixty degrees on either side, while upward vision generally reached sixty degrees and downward vision about seventy-five degrees.
The Byakugan's field of vision, however, covered 360 degrees. Even as a member of the Branch House, Hyuga Yu's field of vision reached 359 degrees. Moreover, it came with penetration and a godlike, all-encompassing view of the surroundings.
In other words, even while standing behind an enemy, Hyuga Yu could see through the enemy's body and observe the direction their eyeballs were turning, thereby determining what they were looking at.
In theory, as long as he made proper use of this difference in vision, Hyuga Yu could approach an enemy at close range and remain behind them the entire time, achieving a peculiar form of "Invisibility."
That was right. This was the [Invisibility Jutsu] that the genius kid Xiaoshuai had invented in prison in the movie The Empty Room.
Once he mastered this ability and combined it with the Three Body Techniques common to ninja,
Hyuga Yu's ability to survive on the battlefield instantly rose by more than one level.
Just like now—
Hyuga Yu's keen senses instantly identified a killing intent within the gaze fixed on him.
It was a sinister, decisive gaze, like the kind he had encountered on the battlefield: devoid of personal emotion, existing only to complete a mission by taking an enemy's life.
A gaze filled with killing intent!
Hyuga Yu didn't understand where this killing intent had come from, nor did he know who could be bold enough to ambush him near the Hyuga Clan Grounds.
After noticing the gaze,
he didn't activate the Byakugan immediately.
Instead, relying on the instincts he had honed on the battlefield, he continued walking forward.
His toes turned slightly as he walked along the right side of the street and entered a patch of shadow cast by the buildings in the setting sun.
The gaze quickly followed Hyuga Yu's figure, shifting its angle.
Using the change in this "sense," Hyuga Yu quickly deduced the other party's position—
Behind the eaves on the roof of a two-story wooden residence to the front right.
The area near the Hyuga Clan was filled mostly with such rustic Japanese-style buildings.
Gray roof tiles, white walls, and wooden floors gave the buildings a dignified appearance.
Naturally, they also created a great many blind spots.
Hyuga Yu remained calm and made no sign that he had noticed anything. When he drew to within roughly fifty meters of the other party's position, he suddenly turned sideways and wedged himself between the building's shadow and a utility pole.
From the hidden enemy's perspective, Hyuga Yu seemed to have suddenly noticed something posted on the utility pole. He showed a trace of interest, then walked around it and leaned closer to take a look.
The large wooden case on his back, the utility pole, and the building's shadows and blind spots all concealed Hyuga Yu's face.
Then—
"Byakugan, activate!"
The veins around his eyes instantly bulged and filled with blood, while his colorful field of vision turned gray and white.
Then—
Farther. Farther!
As his vision spread across a radius of one kilometer,
he clearly saw the face of the ninja secretly watching him.
The other party wore a cat-faced mask with only two whiskers and a pale-yellow hooded cloak that concealed his entire body beneath it.
Under the mask was a broad face with a slightly cold expression.
His outfit looked like that of Konoha's Anbu or Root.
However, Hyuga Yu's brows furrowed slightly as he immediately recognized the man as the owner of a medicine shop that had opened on the street beside the Hyuga Clan Grounds three months earlier.
Hyuga Yu had passed by that medicine shop before.
In his memory, that kind-looking broad face had an extremely affable smile.
So, was he from Root?
Was he someone Shimura Danzō had sent to invite me?
But that didn't quite make sense...
Hyuga Yu couldn't help frowning deeply. Then he thought of how Konoha's Anbu and Root had no reason to monitor the Hyuga Clan at this point.
Moreover, monitoring the Hyuga Clan was completely meaningless. Any surveillance of the Hyuga Clan—or of the [Byakugan]—had an almost one-hundred-percent chance of being exposed.
Besides, this Root or Anbu man had clearly come with hostile intentions.
Why would he want to kill me?
Hyuga Yu had never provoked the Anbu. Third Hokage Hiruzen Sarutobi would not have nothing better to do than send an Anbu operative to kill Hyuga Yu, who had no connection to him whatsoever.
And that very morning, Hyuga Yu had tossed Root an appointment letter for an S-Rank Mission, which was actually an application to join Root.
No matter how much Danzō disliked him or how unwilling he was to let Hyuga Yu join Root, as long as Hyuga Yu had not offended Danzō or touched any of Root's secrets,
Danzō had no reason to kill him.
Hyuga Yu had a very clear understanding of himself.
A worthless person like him was not worth Danzō killing.
Then now,
which faction did the man who wanted to kill him belong to?
Before you continue