The two little ninjas who had skipped class were soon caught by their Ninja Academy teacher, who grabbed them by the ears and hauled them into the hallway. But before long, the bell rang, and they said goodbye at an intersection.
Little Uchiha Jie headed toward the Uchiha Clan compound, while Hyuga Yue returned to the Hyuga estate.
Uchiha Jie followed behind Hyuga Yue with Hinata. Unlike Hinata, who kept her eyes fixed entirely on Yue, he looked around as they walked.
"I've never been over here before," he whispered to Hinata.
"You and the Uchiha Clan have never gotten along very well, so Uchiha usually don't come around here. Even the old Security Force never sent anyone to patrol this area."
"Mm, is this the shop Yue said had really good food? It's open this early?"
After walking a little farther, Uchiha Jie saw Hyuga Yue stop outside a takoyaki shop. She bought a bag of freshly grilled takoyaki from the owner, then returned to the Hyuga estate.
"Wow, your gate is so grand!"
Uchiha Jie tilted his head back and took Hinata by the hand, ignoring the Hyuga Clan members coming and going. Even with their Byakugan activated, they didn't react at all to the two passing right in front of them.
Hinata even dared to wave her hand in front of a handsome young man. For her, it was a wonderfully strange experience.
Before, no matter what she did, someone was always watching her closely, judging whether she was right or wrong and criticizing everything about her.
Now, in this strange place, she could do whatever she wanted without anyone saying a word.
"That's your dad," Uchiha Jie said with a quiet laugh, covering his mouth. Little Hinata hadn't recognized that the handsome young man was her father.
"Ah!"
Hinata jumped. She took a closer look at the handsome young man with the Byakugan, and her face flushed red. If Uchiha Jie hadn't quickly pinched her philtrum, she would have fainted on the spot.
Just from his eyes and brows, it was clear that the handsome young man with the Byakugan was Hyuga Hiashi in his youth. Several clan members surrounded him, chatting and laughing together as they discussed what had been happening in Konoha lately.
Uchiha Jie listened for a moment. They were talking about Namikaze Minato.
But their conversation lasted only a few seconds. Hyuga Hiashi's voice grew fainter and fainter, and even the surroundings began to change.
Hyuga Hinata covered her mouth as she watched the colors fade from her father and the other Hyuga Clan members, leaving them a stark white, outlined only in lines. Then the Hyuga Clan gate, the trees, the houses, and the roads began to change the same way.
Then, from the distance toward them, the remaining outlines were slowly erased.
Only she and Uchiha Jie still had color and form.
"We're too far from Yue." Uchiha Jie immediately realized what was happening. This was his Ninjutsu, but its medium was Hyuga Yue's blood, and the surroundings were part of her memories.
The farther they got from her, the more everything around them disappeared. The reason they'd had such a wide view from the roof of the Ninja Academy that morning was simply that he and Hyuga Yue had lain there every day.
If he'd left Yue's side back then, he would have realized that the scenery elsewhere was just blurry scenery pasted in place, without substance.
Uchiha Jie grabbed Hinata's hand and leaped into the air, running toward the part of the world that still had color. The familiar surroundings came into view again.
After racing over the eaves of several houses, Uchiha Jie saw Hyuga Yue once more.
She had returned home and was happily telling her parents about everything that had happened that day, as if it were no more than an ordinary day in her life.
"Are those Sister Yue's parents? I've never seen them before," Hinata murmured beside Uchiha Jie.
As the eldest daughter of the Hyuga Clan, she had met almost every member of the clan. Some she saw often, while others she met only once a year.
But Sister Yue seemed to have been visiting her family often even before Hinata was born. A year ago, Sister Yue had even started teaching Hanabi how to train,
and after Sister Yue's ninja squad disbanded some time ago, she spent almost every day with Hanabi.
That was also when Hinata lost to Hanabi in a spar. A simple feint, a clear "Big sister," and Hanabi's little hand caught Hinata's sleeve the moment she was distracted. Using Hinata's momentum, Hanabi tripped her, and she fell flat in front of her father.
Hanabi had jumped up in delight and leaped into Sister Yue's arms. Even then, Sister Yue had remained expressionless, only gently patting the excited Hanabi.
That was everything Hinata had known about Sister Yue before today.
"It's hard to imagine that the little ninja we've been following today is the Hyuga Yue of the past," Uchiha Jie said softly.
"She wore red, smiled a lot, and had parents who loved her. She was always top of her class, and she had me to skip class with. On top of that, she came from a distinguished clan. To everyone else, it must have seemed like she had it all."
"Let's keep watching," he told Hinata.
"Okay..." Hyuga Hinata nodded. She and Uchiha Jie moved closer to Hyuga Yue and listened as she finished telling her parents about the day at school, then began discussing what she had learned about Gentle Fist.
Hyuga Yue's mother looked as though she had been made from the same mold as her daughter. Like the grown-up Hyuga Yue, she was reserved. As she listened to her daughter, she only nodded from time to time, showing little emotion.
Though she was older and faint wrinkles had appeared at the corners of her eyes, they only made her look both cool and alluring, like a frost-covered rose.
Hyuga Yue's father, on the other hand, was much more ordinary. He looked like an average middle-aged man, with nothing particularly noteworthy about him. The most striking thing was a scar on his arm, as if a blade had once cut deep into the muscle. Even though it had healed, it was still unmistakable.
His Forehead Protector, like Hyuga Yue's mother's, was tied tightly around his forehead.
Crouching to about his daughter's height, he showed much more emotion on his face: affection, pride, and a faint sadness hidden between his brows, difficult for anyone else to notice.
Hyuga Yue was very happy with her father and didn't sense a thing, but Hyuga Hinata, quietly watching from the side, could feel it.
"Sister Yue's father... he seems really upset," Hinata said in a low voice.
Hyuga Yue's father's hand began to tremble slightly. After listening to Yue promise that she would win against Uchiha Jie again in the match at school the next day, he gently patted her shoulder. His voice turned hoarse in an instant.
"Yue... after dinner, come with us to see the Elder."