Hinata: So I'm Not the Only One with a Diary

"What do you mean, 'If I want to marry her someday, even if all his wives object, he'll still marry me'?"

Hinata stared at that line in Takasaki's diary for several seconds, feeling deeply uncomfortable. Why would I marry Takasaki? I definitely won't marry him. I really don't like him.

"Besides, Takasaki is such a womanizer. He wants to marry lots of wives someday. Konoha clearly practices monogamy, so he's going too far. No woman would agree to that."

She couldn't help imagining the worst.

If she really did marry Takasaki someday, would that mean competing with his many wives every day for his affection?

Yikes.

That was terrifying.

Absolutely not.

At the same time, remembering that she was the heiress of the Hyuga Clan put Hinata somewhat at ease.

Her family valued suitable matches. If she got married someday, her father, Hyuga Hiashi, would never allow her to marry a man who already had a wife—let alone lots and lots of wives.

Fortunately, not everything Takasaki had written about her was insulting.

He had recorded how she ate breakfast with him, paid for him, agreed to help him cheat, and even pinky-swore with him.

If he had mentioned her often enough, she should receive a reward, right?

A line appeared at the bottom of the diary page.

[You have been mentioned in Takasaki's Diary more than 5 times. Reward: Chakra increased by 10%.]

In an instant,

Hinata felt a warm current flow through her body.

The chakra and stamina she had used up while practicing with Hanabi were replenished.

She had been so sleepy she could barely stay awake, but now she felt exceptionally energetic.

Hinata could clearly feel the amount of chakra inside her increase.

She casually swung both palms.

The sharp gust of air from her palms sent her short, dark-blue hair fluttering.

She could clearly feel that she was stronger.

"I really did get stronger thanks to Takasaki's diary!"

"So all those things I did to deliberately get close to Takasaki were worth it. I got something out of them."

"Next month, maybe I'll be able to last more than three minutes when I spar with Neji?"

Feeling herself grow stronger, Hinata sat at her desk and looked again at the insulting things Takasaki had written earlier.

Suddenly, they didn't seem quite so insulting.

To be precise, it wasn't so bad to let Takasaki say a few insulting things about her, because the rewards were so good.

After receiving her reward, Hinata didn't put the diary away. She stayed at her desk, reading by the light of her little lamp.

She was waiting.

"I got an extra reward from Takasaki's last diary entry. Will there be another one this time?"

Now that she had received a reward from the diary once, naturally she wanted another.

The extra rewards were just as appealing.

Hinata waited in anticipation, nervously picking at her fingers.

Ten minutes later,

another line appeared in the diary.

[In this diary entry, Kurenai Yuhi was mentioned the most. Kurenai Yuhi receives an extra reward: Chakra increased by 20%.]

"The person who got the extra reward this time is Teacher Kurenai?"

Hinata stared at the line in surprise, then finally understood.

So Teacher Kurenai had a diary too!

A lot of things suddenly came to mind.

No wonder Takasaki had managed to clear his name after Sakura Haruno reported him for cheating several times. Teacher Kurenai had been secretly helping him.

Combined with what this diary entry said about Kurenai Yuhi, everything suddenly made sense.

"So I'm not the only one with a diary."

Hinata sat back in her chair and put the diary away in her mental space. After thinking for several minutes, she took it out again and reread Takasaki's entry from today.

After pondering for a while, she switched off the desk lamp, put the diary back in her mental space, and returned to her bedroom.

She tossed and turned, unable to sleep.

A sense of crisis welled up inside her.

A few minutes later, she switched on the bedside lamp and read Takasaki's diary again. Then she said enviously, "I wish I'd been the one to get the extra reward today. Then my chakra would have increased by another 20%."

Of course, it would have been a lie to say Hinata wasn't jealous of Teacher Kurenai.

"From now on, I need to seize more opportunities and spend more time with Takasaki..."

Inside a flower shop on a street in Konoha,

Ino finished spraying the roses on the shop's shelves to keep away pests, then went upstairs to her bedroom. Following the hand seals for the secret technique her father had taught her that day, she continued training.

She was training in the Mind Transfer Jutsu.

"Still can't do it? Sigh."

After her technique failed, Ino let out a long sigh and sat dejectedly at the head of her bed.

She didn't need to practice on a real person. She could practice on empty space, because so far, she had never managed to perform the Mind Transfer Jutsu even once.

It wasn't that Ino didn't know the hand seals for the Mind Transfer Jutsu, nor that she didn't understand how chakra flowed through the technique.

The main problem was that the technique consumed a great deal of chakra.

Three days ago, when she got the diary and received a 10% increase in chakra as a reward, she had excitedly tried to use the jutsu, but still failed.

She still didn't have enough chakra to complete the technique.

She was so close.

"As a member of the Yamanaka Clan, I'm about to graduate from the Ninja Academy, and I still can't even use my clan's secret technique. It's so embarrassing." Ino was utterly dejected.

Footsteps sounded outside the door. Inoichi Yamanaka passed by and glanced into Ino's room.

As her father, he had watched her grow up and knew her extremely well. He smiled. "Ino, practicing the Mind Transfer Jutsu again?"

"I failed again." Ino shook her head.

"Don't rush. Take your time, and don't put too much pressure on yourself."

Inoichi was usually calm and ruthless during Konoha's military operations, but when he came home to his daughter, he was especially gentle. "Talent is something you're born with. If you can't learn it now, you'll definitely manage in a few years. Even if you remain an ordinary ninja your whole life, I'll still think you're wonderful."

His words warmed Ino's heart.

But Ino was so competitive that the more her father said things like that, the more she wanted to make him proud of her.

The problem was that if she relied on training alone, it would take years to increase her chakra.

So she could only put her hopes in Takasaki's diary.

Inoichi had only just started walking downstairs when Ino suddenly sensed something and jerked her head up.

"Takasaki's writing in his diary!"