"Stealing a girl's things isn't very nice..."
Sato Hideaka tilted his head and watched Sarutobi Asuma coldly, trying to gather his aura. He had felt something similar when he saw Hatake Sakumo, and again when he killed the Root members. His presence had coalesced, and his killing intent had become palpable...
At the time, Hatake Sakumo had merely been leaning casually against a tree, yet his aura had been astonishing.
When Sato Hideaka had killed a Chunin with the intent to finish him off, he had also let his killing intent show, frightening another powerful Root member so badly that he hadn't dared take a single step closer.
A person's aura was generally proportional to their strength. When they were determined to do something, their presence rose from within and showed itself through their eyes, posture, words, and other means. It could also play a tremendous role in battle.
There was an episode in Naruto where, during the Chunin Exams, Orochimaru used his aura to pin Uchiha Sasuke in place. People like the Shinobi World Professor Sarutobi Hiruzen, the White Fang of the Leaf Hatake Sakumo, the Sannin Jiraiya, Orochimaru, and Tsunade, as well as the later Yellow Flash Namikaze Minato—
All had the presence to make their enemies surrender without a fight, thanks to their tremendous strength and inner resolve. That, too, was a kind of conviction!
The air in the classroom seemed to drop a few degrees. A chill and a flicker of fear suddenly rose in the students' hearts. Sarutobi Asuma, whose hands had never been stained with blood, backed down. Beyond the difference in strength, it was a fear that came from deep within.
"Hmph. It's nothing special." Sarutobi Asuma grudgingly pulled back his right hand and returned to his seat. He picked up his chopsticks and shoveled the food from his lunchbox into his mouth, as if turning his anger into an appetite.
"Kurenai, let's eat first!"
In an instant, the icy blue eyes of Sato Hideaka turned warm with a smile. The chilling killing intent vanished along with them, and the oppressive atmosphere in the classroom disappeared, as if nothing had happened.
"Mm, mm... okay, let's eat!"
Yuhi Kurenai blinked hard and studied Sato Hideaka, as though trying to figure out whether the terrifying aura he had unleashed a moment ago had been her imagination. But she couldn't see anything unusual. Sato Hideaka was smiling warmly, looking handsome and gentle.
The lunchboxes came with both forks and chopsticks. They were used a little differently, but both were still eating utensils. Yuhi Kurenai took a fork and Sato Hideaka took chopsticks, and the two began to happily enjoy their delicious-looking lunch...
The afternoon class was an outdoor practical lesson: kunai throwing.
Led by Yano Koji, the class went out to the school field. The students lined up according to the list on the roster, split into groups, and took their places in front of the targets, preparing for the afternoon lesson.
The targets were circular, about half a head in diameter, and set twelve meters away. A red circle marked the center. Hitting it with every throw earned a perfect score, while landing all the kunai in the outer ring was just enough to pass.
Sato Hideaka was the youngest and had only just joined the class, so he was assigned to go last. That gave him a chance to observe the students' throwing skills and learn from them...
Yuhi Kurenai, Asuma, Anko, Ibiki, Shiranui Genma, Might Guy, and Nohara Rin all threw well, generally hitting the inner ring around the bull's-eye. There were also plenty of students whose names Sato Hideaka didn't know, and some of them even outperformed the characters from the original story...
That confirmed one of Sato Hideaka's suspicions. By the time Yuhi Kurenai became a teacher in the anime, she had only reached Special Jōnin through her genjutsu. If everyone in Konoha had been at that level, how could they have won the Second and Third Shinobi World Wars?
Just think of the episode where the Six Paths of Pain invaded Konoha. A few Anbu wearing animal masks could casually perform powerful combination techniques and subdue a summoning beast from the underworld. They must have been Jōnin or even elite Jōnin.
Apart from Kakashi, Yuhi Kurenai, Might Guy, and the others from the original story, Konoha must have had powerful shinobi who weren't given much attention in the source material. In this real Naruto world, the waters ran far deeper than in the anime!
"Sato Hideaka, Hideaka, you're up...!"
Yano Koji's voice reached his ears. Sato Hideaka picked up a kunai and stood at the throwing line. From the dozens of throwing stances he had just observed, he chose the most common one. He aimed at the bull's-eye and flicked his wrist—
The kunai shot away and sank deep into the wood!
The whole field fell silent. Everyone stared at Sato Hideaka, frozen in place, and it seemed as if they could hear a leaf fall.
"What's wrong?"
Feeling the strange looks around him, Sato Hideaka straightened up and asked.
"Ah, it's nothing... Sato's got a lot of strength... Haha... hahaha!" Yano Koji froze for a moment, then scratched the back of his head with his right hand and laughed. He looked a little embarrassed.
That was right. He was embarrassed!
A black kunai was buried deep in the trunk of a large tree three meters away from the wooden target. It was the kunai Sato Hideaka had thrown. He had obviously missed the target—and missed it by a wide margin!
"Wahahaha, hahaha... I'm dying! How can someone still miss the target at this stage, when we're about to graduate?!"
Sarutobi Asuma was doubled over with laughter. He wanted to return the humiliation he had suffered earlier in full. At that level, he couldn't even imagine a middle-grade class dunce missing the target. How had someone like that ended up in an upper-grade class?
Uchiha Obito had a strange look on his face. He had missed the target himself a few years ago, but only to set himself apart from the others and attract their attention and approval. Did this transfer student need attention too?
Faced with Sarutobi Asuma's exaggerated laughter, Sato Hideaka didn't show the slightest displeasure. He moved to the next throwing spot, steadied himself, and aimed at the target. Then he flicked his wrist again—
The target went flying!
The kunai struck the edge of the target. Its tremendous force flipped it over, and it spun through the air a few times before landing on the ground. Sarutobi Asuma's exaggerated laughter stopped, and the field fell silent again.
Sato Hideaka didn't stop. He controlled every muscle in his body, making an extremely fine adjustment as he aimed at the next target. He flicked his wrist again, using almost exactly the same technique as before.
The sharp kunai struck the red bull's-eye, earning a perfect score!
"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—"
Sato Hideaka repeated the same technique and threw seven more kunai in quick succession. The pointed ends of every kunai sank deep into the red bull's-eye. His accuracy on those last seven throws was one hundred percent.
Yano Koji stared blankly at the bull's-eyes and asked in surprise, "H-Hideaka, if you can hit the bull's-eye, why did you miss so badly on your first throw?"
"I was rusty with kunai throwing at first. Then I got the hang of it." Sato Hideaka returned to the group as he answered calmly.
Rusty, then got the hang of it!... Rusty, then got the hang of it!...
The words kept echoing in Yano Koji's mind. He looked at Sato Hideaka in shock. Had the boy really never thrown a kunai before?
On his very first try, he had practiced until he could achieve one hundred percent accuracy—a level that others couldn't reach even after years!
Yano Koji seemed to understand why Anbu had placed a five-year-old with no shinobi experience in an upper-grade class. It wasn't because of some unusual background. It was because he could keep up with the upper-grade curriculum—a genius every bit as gifted as Kakashi Hatake!
The kunai-throwing lesson had deeply shaken Yano Koji. It had also made the other students respect Sato Hideaka even more. From the astonishing aura he had unleashed at lunchtime to the extraordinary talent he had shown now, he had left them all reeling.
The kunai-throwing class had finally given Sato Hideaka a chance to put his theoretical knowledge of kunai into practice. By the end of the lesson, he had mastered seven throwing techniques, reached one hundred percent accuracy within fifteen meters, and learned to focus all his strength into a single point for devastating force.
After school, parents waited eagerly outside the gate for their children.
Yuhi Kurenai's father came too: a handsome young shinobi wearing a Konoha Forehead Protector, with red eyes like his daughter's. His expression, however, was stern and subdued. He was one of the Eight Colors of Konoha, later known as the Red Sunset, Yuhi Shinku.
"Hideaka, aren't you going home?" Yuhi Kurenai asked, opening her jewel-like red eyes wide as she watched Sato Hideaka sitting calmly at his desk.
Sato Hideaka nodded. "Yeah, I have something to take care of. Kurenai, do you know where the biggest hospital in Konoha is?"
After Yuhi Kurenai told him where the Ninja Hospital was, she skipped away with her father, Yuhi Shinku. Sato Hideaka slipped his hands into his pockets and strolled toward Konoha Hospital...
Yesterday's experiments with Lightning Release Chakra Mode had really hurt!