The word "death" made Hinata realize how serious the situation was.
Since the Diary could easily reward her with chakra, killing her would presumably be just as easy.
Hinata decided to watch what she said.
Clearly, the advantage the Diary gave her was a chance to become stronger, while the downside was that she had to keep its existence a secret.
That wasn't much of a downside. She could keep something like loving someone buried in her heart without ever saying it, so what was keeping the Diary's secret to her?
"I have to hide this Diary somewhere safe. I can't let anyone find it. This is my secret."
Hinata didn't have time to investigate whether the Diary had any other functions. Her top priority was keeping its secret.
Where should she hide it?
Once she realized that being discovered could get her killed, the Diary felt like a ticking time bomb. Nowhere seemed safe.
Just then, a line appeared in the Diary:
[Reminder: The Diary can appear or disappear according to your will]
"Appear or disappear according to my will? What does that mean?"
As Hinata wondered, she focused her thoughts, and the Diary in her hand suddenly vanished.
Hinata jumped in surprise.
"Huh? Where did it go? It was just in my hand."
The next second, the Diary reappeared in her hand.
Vanish, appear, vanish, appear, vanish, appear...
After repeating it a few times, Hinata finally realized something.
She seemed to have mastered a space-time ninjutsu that only worked on the Diary.
In other words, she didn't have to worry about anyone discovering its secret.
Hinata breathed a sigh of relief.
With the threat posed by the Diary dealt with, she instinctively began looking forward to the rewards it would bring her.
"The Diary's rewards must depend on what Takasaki writes in it."
"It looks like Takasaki has a Diary too. Whatever he writes gets synchronized with mine."
"And the more often Takasaki mentions my name in his Diary, the more rewards I get."
How should she face Takasaki from now on?
She was the sort who couldn't keep things bottled up, and she was also shy by nature. She really didn't know what to do.
"I'll just act like this never happened and face Takasaki as I usually would." After finishing her bath, Hinata stood in front of the mirror, taking several deep breaths as she tried to reassure herself.
She still had a sparring match with Neji coming up.
Neji's father had died because of her. She had apologized to Neji many times, but he had never blamed her. Even so, she could still feel his hostility toward her.
Especially since, despite being from the Main House, she was nowhere near as strong as Neji from the Branch House. Whenever she lost a sparring match, his contemptuous gaze always made her want the ground to swallow her up.
If she lost focus during their next match, Neji would blame her even more.
But she just couldn't stop thinking about Takasaki. A part of her wondered if his next Diary entry would mention her name again.
"Stop daydreaming!"
Hinata looked in the mirror and tried to reassure herself.
Her reflection had fair skin and a slender figure that was still developing, but already hinted at how stunning she would be one day.
The flush on her cheeks showed that her heart was far from calm.
At that moment.
Takasaki had no idea that his Diary was being publicly exposed.
He had written its indecent content on a whim.
Who kept a Diary, anyway? Who wrote their innermost thoughts down in one?
Since he couldn't have all the beautiful kunoichi in the Ninja World in real life, surely he could let loose and enjoy himself in his Diary.
It wasn't as if his entries were essays for a language test. No one would grade them, and no one could read them.
He was just placating the system.
What he really cared about were the rewards he got for writing.
The Three Body Technique was only the reward for his first entry. There would definitely be more to come.
Takasaki wasn't in a hurry to write another entry.
First, too much at once could be counterproductive. The most important thing was to master the ninjutsu he had already obtained.
Second, even if he wanted to write another entry, he first had to unlock permission to do so.
That meant raising the Clone Technique to level 3.
So he kept grinding its proficiency.
Takasaki didn't want to stop for even a moment. Whenever his chakra ran out, he waited for it to recover, then kept practicing the technique.
His chakra had recovered to 6 points.
"Clone Technique!"
A puff of smoke appeared, and Takasaki formed a clone.
His chakra dropped to 0, and the Clone Technique's proficiency reached 2/100.
That was some timely positive feedback.
You reap what you sow. Once his chakra recovered, he would keep grinding!
While Takasaki was working hard to raise his proficiency, Hinata wasn't the only girl in Konoha secretly cursing him out.
The girl closest to him was Ino, who was arranging potted plants in her family's flower shop.
Ino had inherited her father's pale blond hair and blue-green eyes. Her hair was tied in a high ponytail, and she wore a sleeveless jacket. She had been watering the flowers when she spotted a gold-trimmed notebook on a shelf. Its cover read: [Takasaki's Diary (Ino Yamanaka)]
"Did Takasaki come to our flower shop? How careless of him to leave his Diary behind. And why is my name written on it?"
"Let's see what Takasaki wrote in his Diary. Hehe."
Ino giggled and opened the Diary curiously. One look at its contents left her stunned.
The smile slowly froze on her face.
A dozen seconds later, she burst out: "What the heck! That's so lewd! Takasaki looks like such a gentleman, but he's nothing but a womanizer inside! What does he mean, 'When we get together, I'll have you on top, moving yourself'? That has to be some kind of indecent act! It's so shameless I can't stand it!"
Ino had never even been in a relationship. Her ideas about love were still innocent and idealistic.
But in the Diary, Takasaki seemed to take it for granted that he would make her his.
What the heck! Even if you were dating, there was a whole process to it. You couldn't just claim someone as yours from the start!
How could that kind of disrespectful attitude not make Ino furious?
She was even tempted to march over to Takasaki's house right then and beat him up.
"No, I can't wait until tomorrow. Takasaki is infuriating!"
Ino clenched her fists, looking furious as she grumbled, "After dinner, I'm taking this Diary to Takasaki's house and demanding an explanation. I'm going to hit him at least once!"
The next second.
Two lines appeared in the Diary:
[Takasaki has mentioned your name in the Diary for the first time. Reward: Chakra increased by 10%] [Reminder: The more often Takasaki mentions your name in the Diary, the more rewards you will receive.]
"Huh?"
Ino wasn't sure what to make of it.
A warm current swept through her body, washing away her fatigue.
Her chakra and stamina felt completely replenished.
"What's going on? My chakra has increased... It feels like I've trained hard in ninjutsu for a month."
Ino stood dazed for a few seconds. Once she came to her senses, she calmed down and looked at the Diary again, her eyes widening in shock. "This Diary seems like it can make me stronger!"
That shameless guy she wanted to beat up could actually help her grow stronger?
The same thing was happening at Sakura Haruno's house, just two streets away from the Yamanaka family's flower shop.
Sakura Haruno had a red ribbon tied around her head, pink hair that revealed her broad forehead, and a red short-sleeved robe. She was sitting on her bed in her bedroom, flipping through the Diary that had inexplicably appeared in her room.
Her face was downcast, but her inner voice was already fuming: "What does 'simp' mean? It sounds like an insult!"
"Takasaki's such a pervert! He wants to take all those girls home as his wives. He's even more shameless than Naruto! Sasuke's a thousand times better!"
"And why does he like so many girls but not me? How could that not make me angry? Not that I'd like him anyway."
After venting, Sakura was about to toss the Diary onto the floor.
Two lines appeared in the Diary:
[Takasaki has mentioned your name in the Diary for the first time. Reward: Chakra increased by 10%] [Reminder: The more often Takasaki mentions your name in the Diary, the more rewards you will receive.]
A warm current appeared out of nowhere inside Sakura and swept through her limbs.
Her energy and stamina felt especially abundant.
Most importantly, Sakura could clearly feel that her chakra had increased.
She seemed to realize something. The anger vanished from her face, replaced by disbelief.
"Could it be... that Takasaki can make me stronger indirectly by writing in his Diary?"
Sakura's slender, pale fingers rubbed the Diary a few times as her heart began to pound harder.
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