By My Count, It's About Time...

"Fuyuki, remember this: you're the most likely clan member to inherit the Main Branch. I hope you'll take things seriously. Don't become obsessed with ninjutsu and Summoning Jutsu. Work hard at training in the Gentle Fist!"

To build up his chakra, Fuyuki had spent the day lazing around at home. Today, though, he'd drawn the short straw and run into the Hyuga Clan's most hidebound, conservative elder. As expected, the old man gave him an earful, practically wearing his disappointment on his face.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not in the mood today. I'll work twice as hard tomorrow."

Fuyuki lazily rolled over, ignoring the Great Elder, who had evolved into a full-blown nag.

Only one person in the Hyuga Clan could belong to the Main Branch. Even if someone passed the Byakugan purity test, they still couldn't become part of it. The elders might not be bound by the Caged Bird, but they couldn't affect Fuyuki in the slightest.

Because he was the rightful heir to the Main Branch!

"sigh"

The Great Elder let out a long sigh, thinking, The Hyuga Clan is doomed.

Then he left. Coming to hassle Fuyuki was a task assigned to him by the Clan Head. The Clan Head was busy with daily affairs and simply couldn't supervise Fuyuki's training, so he'd asked the Great Elder to do it instead.

And the result?

Fuyuki had gone from sleeping on the tatami to sunbathing.

After the Great Elder left, Fuyuki rolled over. Natsumi hurried over to help him up. "Young Master, careful!"

"I'm fine."

As Fuyuki stood, chunks of sticky green matter began falling off him. When they hit the ground, they dissolved into pale blue chakra and returned to his body. "The ultimate secret of the Strong Fist Style really is something else. If I keep taking shortcuts to open the Eight Gates, I'll probably end up in the hospital."

Fuyuki's Summoning Jutsu training hadn't hit a bottleneck—not exactly. He was simply too young, and his developing body limited his chakra reserves. As a result, he still couldn't summon a powerful High-ranking Elemental Spirit.

The elders thought Fuyuki had been slacking off for months. They had no idea he'd developed a new form of the Gentle Fist, a style of combat on par with the Eight Trigrams Palms.

Well, he hadn't exactly developed it. He'd simply used his knowledge of the human body to locate the Eight Gates, then used the Gentle Fist to strike them and increase his chakra reserves. The technique could be used either on oneself or against an opponent.

Used against an enemy, it would break through the restrictions on the first six of their Eight Gates in one go, killing them on the spot.

Used on oneself, it had to be done gradually. You couldn't just smash the gates open with brute force; you had to pry them apart slowly, or you might find you couldn't close them again. That would be ridiculous.

Fuyuki was short on chakra, so he'd thought of a technique he'd once envisioned: using the Gentle Fist to open his own Eight Inner Gates. As it turned out, the idea worked perfectly, and the technique wasn't difficult to perform.

However, this fist technique, which Fuyuki had named "Eight Trigrams Collapse Strike," had one unpleasant drawback.

The Eight Inner Gates Formation wasn't a forbidden technique that could be mastered through talent alone. It also required perseverance and an extraordinarily strong will.

Opening the first gate merely removed the brain's restriction on the muscles; there wasn't much to say about that. But from the second gate onward, chakra levels surged dramatically. It was like a wild tabby cat had burst into one's fragile body and was clawing around inside, causing excruciating pain!

As more gates opened, the pain became increasingly unbearable.

So opening the gates was never the real challenge. The real challenge was making the body endure the unbearable pain!

It took sheer willpower and unyielding determination!

Fuyuki wasn't Lee or Might Guy. He didn't have their screw-loose kind of spirit.

He used Eight Trigrams Collapse Strike to open the first and second gates, then immediately summoned a group of Yang-attribute Lesser Chakra Elemental Spirits into his body. They stopped the pain, then repaired his damaged cells, allowing his body to slowly adjust to the sudden, violent surge of chakra.

The green slime falling from Fuyuki's body was Yang Release Elemental Spirits that were nearly spent.

"Young Master Fuyuki, you're being too impatient. Your chakra reserves aren't easy to increase. You could wait until your body has developed before you start training in Eight Trigrams Collapse Strike."

Fuyuki was only six and completely unsuited to training in the Strong Fist Style. His bones hadn't even finished developing, yet he'd already started practicing its ultimate techniques. It was far too reckless. Natsumi felt both worried and helpless. Her young master pushed himself too hard, while the clan elders knew nothing about it and understood even less.

At such a young age, Young Master Fuyuki had the power to drive Orochimaru back and the talent to develop jutsu.

He was simply too talented for words. Unfortunately, he couldn't even be bothered to talk to the elders. He treated them like idiots and couldn't be bothered to give them the time of day.

"If I wait until my body develops, it'll be too late. I can wait patiently for my body to grow, but events won't wait for me!"

Fuyuki worked the arm that had gone numb from lying down and replied without turning around.

Natsumi's helpless expression shifted to surprise. "Young Master, have you discovered something?"

"I've discovered plenty, but right now, the Uchiha are what deserve my attention most. Do you remember the Hyuga clansmen who came back on leave last week?" Fuyuki didn't tell Natsumi outright that the Uchiha Clan was about to be wiped out. Instead, he gave her a very subtle hint and let her figure it out herself.

Whenever something happened that went against common sense, it meant there was a problem!

Although the Hyuga Clan's main forces were stationed at the border, Hyuga clansmen still kept watch around Konoha. The village didn't rely entirely on the Konoha Sensory Barrier, since it couldn't detect very far underground. Sensory ninja and the Hyuga Clan had to make up for that weakness.

Knowing that Konoha had sent the Hyuga clansmen home to rest and reassigned the sensory ninja to the village's central areas under the pretext of assisting the Sealing Squad, it wasn't hard for Fuyuki to infer what was about to happen.

But Fuyuki was training hard not to save the arrogant Uchiha Clan. He wanted to take advantage of the situation!

He planned to get his hands on Uchiha Fugaku's eyes!

The Uchiha Clan was beyond saving. The rift between them and the village ran too deep, and neither side was willing to sit down and speak openly. No one could help the Uchiha Clan now.

Whenever Fuyuki thought about the Uchiha's destruction, he found it absurd—especially Uchiha Shisui!

He actually thought that if he came clean to the village about the power of his eyes, he could save the Uchiha Clan. The sheer stupidity was appalling. Had he never tried putting himself in other people's shoes to understand how terrifying his power was?!

How could anyone tolerate him? As far as Konoha's High Command was concerned, Shisui's very existence was a crime!

What he should have done was use Kotoamatsukami on the Hokage to force him to hold a meeting with the Uchiha leadership. Then he could have controlled the Hokage into formally apologizing to the Uchiha, promising that they could return to the center of Konoha's power and allowing them to participate in the next Hokage election.

The Uchiha's dissatisfaction with the village ultimately came down to the Senju playing tricks. They'd promised that the Second Hokage would definitely be an Uchiha, but now they were already at the Fourth Hokage—and even if you went back to the Third, there hadn't been an Uchiha among them.

During the Nine-Tails Incident, the Uchiha Military Police Force hadn't taken part in the fighting on the front lines. Even so, many of them had sacrificed their lives saving Konoha's civilians. And what had they gotten in return? Persecution from Konoha's High Command!

From Fuyuki's omniscient perspective, both Konoha and the Uchiha seemed entirely in the wrong. It was years of misunderstanding that had brought them to the point of mutual destruction.

The Uchiha were wiped out, while Konoha lost more than ten named Elite Jonin, dozens of Jonin and Special Jonin, and at least a hundred Chunin. It was a true case of mutual destruction!