Parting

It was already dusk by the time Hyuuga Nen returned to the samurai quarters. He stood at the entrance for a moment, lost in thought, before finally walking inside.

Hyuuga Nen arrived in front of Yamamoto Yuuichirou's room and said to the two samurai standing guard at the door, "Excuse me, I would like to see Master Yuuichirou."

Before the two samurai could answer, a voice familiar to Hyuuga Nen rang out from within the room, "Come right in, Nen."

"Master Yuuichirou."

After entering the room and offering a greeting, Hyuuga Nen sat down across from Yuuichirou, who was in the middle of brewing tea.

Yuuichirou merely nodded without speaking, choosing instead to observe Hyuuga Nen's expression first. Upon seeing it, Yuuichirou's naturally stern and rigid features seemed to become even more pronounced.

"Your mother, she..." Yuuichirou looked at Hyuuga Nen with a gaze full of concern.

"My mother passed away last night," Hyuuga Nen said, looking at Yamamoto Yuuichirou.

Hearing Hyuuga Nen's words, Yuuichirou's tea-brewing motion came to a halt. He looked at Hyuuga Nen and said two words in a solemn tone:

"My condolences."

"I am fine, thank you for your concern, Master."

Yamamoto Yuuichirou was not a man who knew how to comfort others, so the two of them fell into silence.

After a while, Yamamoto Yuuichirou continued, "I had heard of your mother; she was an excellent doctor."

"Yes, she was an excellent doctor."

Yamamoto Yuuichirou had absolutely no intention of being sarcastic; he simply felt a sense of regret over Rika's passing.

However, as Hyuuga Nen told Yuuichirou that Rika was an excellent doctor, he heard a note of irony in his own words.

My mother was an excellent doctor, that's true. Yet she died so young, Hyuuga Nen thought with a touch of sorrow.

After another period of silence, Hyuuga Nen said to Yamamoto Yuuichirou, "Master, I would like to request permission to go out and train for a period of time. I hope you can grant it."

Hearing Hyuuga Nen's request, Yamamoto Yuuichirou frowned. "You want to go out and train? What is your reasoning?"

"There are two main reasons. First, my swordsmanship has reached a bottleneck. I need to engage in more battles with other samurai and witness more styles of swordsmanship before I can achieve a breakthrough."

"Actually, I have had this idea for a long time, but I kept delaying it because of my mother's health."

"The second reason is that I want to leave this town where I've lived my whole life, go see other places, and clear my head."

After finishing these words, Hyuuga Nen looked at Yamamoto Yuuichirou with a serious expression.

"Hmm, reasonable grounds. Your swordsmanship has reached a fairly high level; you truly cannot continue to work in isolation. Going out to see the world is a good idea. As for the duration, how long do you intend to train?"

"One year."

"One year? That is a bit long, but I can agree to it." Yamamoto Yuuichirou looked at Hyuuga Nen's earnest expression and sighed.

"Thank you, Master!" Hyuuga Nen said, expressing his gratitude to Yamamoto Yuuichirou with great solemnity.

When the subject turned to the samurai, Yamamoto Yuuichirou shed his earlier silence. As they drank tea, he began to explain the requirements, precautions, and taboos for samurai going out on training journeys.

"Every few years, a group of samurai defects from the Land of Iron. Some of them use the excuse of going out for training to do so," Yuuichirou said, his words seemingly pointed.

Hearing this, Hyuuga Nen paused for a moment before replying, "Master, please rest assured. Once the year is up, I will return immediately."

At this point, Hyuuga Nen shifted the angle of the conversation and asked Yamamoto Yuuichirou, "Then, why do these samurai defect?"

"Some have violated the laws of the Land of Iron, while others do it in pursuit of power. Most of these samurai are New School Samurai."

"New School Samurai?" Hyuuga Nen asked, puzzled.

"That's right, New School Samurai. As you know, they, like ninjas, have mastered the power of chakra, but in the Land of Iron, there is no way to learn ninjutsu."

"These people are obsessed with the pursuit of power, so they choose to defect from the Land of Iron, becoming rogue ninjas or bounty hunters, trading their lives for some low-grade ninjutsu. Most of them do not meet a good end."

Hyuuga Nen expressed his disdain for such people, and Yamamoto Yuuichirou agreed with his sentiment.

"Do you know why there are no ninjas in the Land of Iron?" Yamamoto Yuuichirou then posed this question to Hyuuga Nen.

Hyuuga Nen thought for a moment and replied, "Because of the Five Great Nations. They do not allow such a situation to occur."

"Correct. The Five Great Nations would never allow it. If the Land of Iron were to become a land of ninjas, almost all the smaller nations would follow suit. This would affect the interests of the Five Great Nations and could potentially multiply their enemies several times over."

"That is why there are only samurai and no ninjas in the Land of Iron. If it were otherwise, the Land of Iron would become the second Land of Rain."

"The Land of Iron is a neutral country, and it must remain a neutral country!"

Hyuuga Nen sensed the resentment in Yamamoto Yuuichirou's final sentence and tried to comfort him:

"Although the Land of Iron is a neutral country, at least it is rarely affected by the ravages of war. Compared to the small nations caught in the crossfire of the Five Great Nations, it is already much, much better."

"Indeed, the situation in the Land of Iron is already much better than in many other small nations. What more could we hope for?"

As Yamamoto Yuuichirou said this, his hand gripped his teacup tightly; the lack of peace in his heart was evident.

At the end of the conversation, Hyuuga Nen used the excuse of having drunk too much water to excuse himself. In the restroom, he performed a ninjutsu using the Seal of Delay hand signs, then went back out to bid Yamamoto Yuuichirou a final farewell.

Walking to the door of the room, Hyuuga Nen turned back to look at Yamamoto Yuuichirou one last time, his lips moving as if saying something.

When Yamamoto Yuuichirou met Hyuuga Nen's eyes, his expression went blank for a split second, and then he nodded.

Hyuuga Nen had cast a suggestive genjutsu on Yamamoto Yuuichirou. Through this illusion, he would slowly forget all memories of Hyuuga Nen. The process would be gradual, lasting about six months to a year.

Although this ninjutsu took effect slowly, its concealment was extremely high. Once the technique was complete, even members of the Yamanaka Clan would find it difficult to detect.

Hyuuga Nen returned to his living quarters to organize his belongings and clear away any traces of his presence. As he stepped out of the room, he saw Miyaichi waiting at the door.

Before Hyuuga Nen could speak, Miyaichi cut in, "Nen, I heard you're heading out for training. Is it true?" A look of envy appeared on his face as he finished the sentence.

"That's right. Don't slack off on your training while I'm gone, or the gap between us might only grow wider."

"Just you wait, I'll definitely catch up to you." Miyaichi wore a defiant expression.

He then added cautiously, "I heard about your mother. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, you don't need to worry."

Hyuuga Nen patted Miyaichi on the arm and said in an encouraging tone, "I hope that when I return, you will have become an outstanding samurai." With that, he bid him farewell.

Hyuuga Nen went on to say goodbye to Miyaichi and the other samurai he knew, casting a genjutsu on each of them during the process.

Although Yamamoto Yuuichirou, Miyaichi, and the others possessed chakra, they had never received training to resist genjutsu, so Hyuuga Nen encountered no difficulties in casting his techniques.

The day before, Hyuuga Nen had already cast this same genjutsu on Rika's friends, neighbors, and long-term patients.

Finally, Hyuuga Nen arrived at the archives room located in the corner. After searching for a while, he found the scroll containing his personal information and mission completion records.

Hyuuga Nen took out another prepared scroll and swapped it. The ink on this scroll had been specially treated; after one year, it would completely evaporate, leaving the parchment blank.

Hyuuga Nen walked out of the main gate of the samurai compound and turned back to look at the imposing building.

"Everything that needed to be handled has been taken care of. In about a year, the traces of my mother and me in the Land of Iron will be buried by time. This parting may well be forever."

Hyuuga Nen recalled the scene of his first samurai examination in front of this building, as well as his first spar with Miyaichi. He silently wished them well in his heart, turned around, and left without looking back.