Hyuga Hayato 1/2

Konoha Year 59, a crisp autumn day.

On the outskirts of the Death Forest.

A wooden training dummy stood on a level, compacted clearing. It had been specially made and was covered in 361 red dots, each representing a chakra point in the human body.

A gray-haired boy stood before it in the opening stance of the Eight Trigrams Palm, completely focused.

"Gentle Fist Art: Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms."

As his words rang out~~~

The gray-haired boy suddenly sprang into motion, shifting from stillness to movement like a hare bolting from cover, so fast that he left a trail of afterimages.

"Two Palms!"

"Four Palms!"

"..."

"Sixty-Four Palms!"

The gray-haired boy's footwork was light and graceful, his palms flowing smoothly one after another. It was a feast for the eyes.

Tap, tap, tap...

For a moment, palm shadows fluttered everywhere, like butterflies dancing among flowers. Every strike landed squarely on the wooden dummy, producing crisp, pleasant sounds like a mountain stream flowing through a ravine, or pearls falling onto a jade plate. The marvelous rhythm was utterly captivating.

As his voice fell silent~~~

The gray-haired boy had already withdrawn his palms and come to a stop. The pleasant sounds abruptly ceased. He panted lightly, fine beads of sweat forming on his forehead.

The dummy's red dots had been painted with special red paint. They turned white upon contact with chakra, then returned to red once the chakra dispersed.

The gray-haired boy wiped away his sweat, then carefully inspected the dummy and counted the white dots.

There were fifty-nine white dots.

"Not bad." That meant five of the sixty-four palms had missed. The boy let out a breath, then said, "Not good enough."

His seemingly contradictory assessment was not contradictory at all.

"Not bad" was because he had only practiced the Sixty-Four Palms for a short time. Hitting fifty-nine points was already beyond reproach.

"Not good enough" was because the dummy was dead, while people were alive. Living enemies would not only move, but also unleash all manner of ninjutsu. In other words, the hit rate of his Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms would be even lower in actual combat.

The gray-haired boy had delicate features. His white pupils and the bulging veins around his eyes were distinctive traits of the Hyuga Clan. He was only twelve this year. Hyuga children his age were still learning the Eight Trigrams Sixteen Palms, and even the more talented ones could barely manage thirty-two palms.

As for the Sixty-Four Palms...

Sorry! The Sixty-Four Palms and the One Hundred Twenty-Eight Palms beyond it were exclusive privileges of the Main Branch. Did the Branch Family want to learn them? They could either figure them out themselves or wait for the Main Branch to bestow them as charity.

Comprehending and using the Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms at his age meant his talent was comparable to Hyuga Neji's. Hyuga Neji was considered an unprecedented genius of the Hyuga Clan, one not seen in a hundred years. That alone was enough for the boy to take pride in himself.

But the boy knew that the plot of Naruto had already begun. Konoha, which seemed so prosperous and peaceful, would soon face several crises of destruction—this was no longer a safe haven.

When the Fourth Shinobi World War erupted, even Kage-level shinobi would be everywhere, and overpowered freaks would run rampant. Even a genius like Hyuga Neji could not escape the tragedy of death.

The gray-haired boy was unwilling. Unwilling to drift with the tide, unwilling to be a mere spectator after being reborn, unwilling to hand his fate over to some so-called Child of Prophecy.

Reality was not manga. There was no protagonist, nor was there any law declaring that protagonists could not die. If someone was killed, they died—that was reality.

At this point, the gray-haired boy's identity as a transmigrator was obvious.

The gray-haired boy had originally been an ordinary civil servant in China on Blue Star, known as "an officer from such-and-such neighborhood office." With no connections, no money, and no bright future, he had already developed the mindset of a retired old cadre. One day, while rewatching Naruto during work hours, a ball lightning bolt dropped from the sky. From then on, Earth had one less deadbeat civil servant, while the world of Naruto gained a transmigrator.

The boy's name was Hyuga Hayato, a member of the Hyuga Branch Family. His parents had died in the Nine-Tails Uprising, when he had still been an infant in swaddling clothes.

In the more than ten years since his transmigration, there had been no system and no Tenseigan. Hayato had relied only on hard work and the insightful opinions shared by countless Naruto fans on online forums.

"I can't even mess with Nagato or beat Madara into the ground, much less flirt with married Kaguya. What a disgrace to transmigrators. Hyuga Hayato, you should leave the group chat." Hayato staged the scene in his mind, amusing himself to relieve the pressure.

A moment later, the chakra left on the wooden dummy dispersed, and the white dots vanished with it. Hayato assumed the opening stance of the Eight Trigrams Palm, preparing to have another go at the dummy.

Just then~~~

Hayato vaguely heard a sound. At the same time, a signal flare shot up from the center of the Death Forest, exploding high in the sky into a cloud of red smoke.

Was that... a distress signal?

The Death Forest lay on Konoha's outskirts and was usually used as a training ground. There was a tall tower at its center, permanently staffed by one or two squads of shinobi. Aside from that, shinobi teams occasionally entered to cull the venomous insects and fierce beasts that had multiplied excessively. In short, no civilians entered the Death Forest except those who were lost or had a death wish.

Enemy attack!

"Byakugan!"

He formed hand seals, gathered chakra, and sent it into his eyes. At once, veins bulged around Hayato's eye sockets, and his vision became farther-reaching and broader.

The Byakugan was a dōjutsu originating from the Otsutsuki Clan. It possessed three basic abilities: the Telescopic Eye, the X-Ray Eye, and the Insight Eye.

The Telescopic Eye allowed its user to see objects more than one kilometer away.

The X-Ray Eye allowed its user to see a target's chakra pathways and chakra flow, even distinguishing whose chakra it was.

The Insight Eye gave the Main Branch a 360-degree field of vision. Because of the Caged Bird, however, the Branch Family had a blind spot extending outward from a single point directly behind the first thoracic vertebra.

Judging solely from those three basic abilities, the Byakugan was no weaker than the Sharingan. Each had its own strengths. Unfortunately, the Sharingan received all sorts of upgrades later on. How was anyone supposed to deal with Susanoo being dropped right in their face?

Under the Byakugan's surveillance, everything within nearly a kilometer was under his control.

There were no enemies nearby.

He was three or four li from where the signal flare had been launched, so it was only natural that there were no enemies here. He had activated his Byakugan out of caution. Who knew? Maybe the enemy was a Road Idiot who had wandered headfirst to the edge of Konoha's core.

As he breathed a sigh of relief, Hayato considered whether he should provide aid.

If he did not, no one could blame him. After all, Hayato was merely a Ninja Academy student, not yet a shinobi.

If he did, the enemy's numbers and strength were unknown. One careless move, and he might get himself killed.

There was no obligation, and there was danger.

So...

Hyuga Hayato hunched low and carefully made his way toward the center of the Death Forest.

Punching trees, punching dummies—how was that any different from doing endless practice exams? Obligation? Danger? How could he care about any of that! At this moment, Hayato just wanted to hit a real person, preferably the kind he could beat to death without consequences.

Before long, Hayato found the enemies.

There were three of them. Judging by their chakra reserves, one was a chunin and two were genin.

One genin was curled up inside a hole in the ground, with several explosive tag traps arranged near its entrance. What was he thinking? Was he not afraid the explosion would bury him alive?

Another genin was squatting on a tree trunk, twisting his body in small movements. Maybe he needed to pee, or maybe his legs had gone numb from crouching too long.

Hayato nearly laughed out loud.

As for the chunin, he was crouched in the grass without moving an inch. His shinobi discipline was clearly better than that of the other two.

The three enemies formed a three-dimensional triangular formation, able to support one another at any moment. It was somewhat troublesome.

"There's no jonin. Should I have a little fun..." Hayato stroked his chin in thought. The enemies were not particularly strong. If he kited them while attacking, he felt he could pull off something flashy.

The prerequisite was luring them out, drawing them away from their trap zone, and then breaking their formation. Otherwise, even with top-tier equipment, no one could withstand fighting inside the enemy fountain.

During those brief seconds of thought, a figure entered the range of his Byakugan from behind.

"That direction should be Konoha reinforcements. That chakra feels familiar. Looks like someone I know." But Hayato did not relax. Once the person drew near, he tossed a pebble from afar.

"Who's there?" The newcomer stopped and asked quietly. He held a kunai in a reverse grip as he looked toward Hayato's hiding place.

The man wore a green flak jacket and Konoha forehead protector. He was Hayato's teacher at the Ninja Academy, Shimizu Shunsuke, a special jonin who had participated in the Third Shinobi World War.

"It's me, Teacher Shimizu." Hayato stepped out and asked, "Why are you here, Teacher?"

Ninja Academy had not yet dismissed for the day at this hour, so Shimizu Shunsuke's appearance was a little strange.

Shimizu Shunsuke glared at Hayato. "Because of you! The graduation exam is coming up, yet no one can find you. Do you want to spend another year at the academy? And put away that explosive tag behind you. You're not under a genjutsu, and I'm not someone else using the Transformation Technique."

One could never be too careful.

Hayato gave an awkward laugh and put the explosive tag into his ninja tool pouch.

Shimizu Shunsuke continued, "Still, it's right for you to be this cautious. As I said in class, the essence of ninjutsu is deception. Shinobi who trust others too easily do not live long."

"Oh." Shimizu Shunsuke had indeed said that in class, and emphasized it more than once. Hayato finally confirmed his identity. With a flick of his wrist, he tucked the other explosive tag into his ninja tool pouch.

Shimizu Shunsuke: "...You're being overly cautious, aren't you?"

Time was of the essence. Hayato immediately described everything he had observed with the Byakugan and drew a rough diagram on the ground.

"Hayato, you did very well—far better than I expected." After listening, Shimizu Shunsuke said, "But leave the rest to me. Return to the village by the way you came and pass the information to the reinforcements that follow."

Hyuga Hayato: "???"

What was this, burning the bridge after crossing it?

That was absolutely not what Hayato wanted. He hurriedly said, "Teacher, I'm a shinobi too. I want to fight!"

"What kind of shinobi are you? You don't even have a forehead protector! Wait until you graduate from the academy first," Shimizu Shunsuke said.

Hayato immediately played the righteousness card. "Teacher Shimizu, the destiny of the Hyuga Clan is to be shinobi, and the destiny of shinobi is to fight. Our comrades in the village need help right now. How can I run away? Don't worry, I promise I won't hold you back. And don't forget—the Hyuga are Konoha's strongest clan."

The strongest clan?

After living in the Naruto world for so many years, Hayato knew the Hyuga Clan was definitely stronger than it had been portrayed in the anime. But at the same time, he was even more certain that their so-called strongest clan was nothing more than a castle in the air fabricated by the Hyuga.

Uh... Why did shouting "strongest clan" make his blood boil a little?

Still, among Konoha's lower-ranking shinobi, the claim that the Hyuga were the strongest clan had quite a market, especially after the Senju Clan declined and the Uchiha Clan had nearly been exterminated.

After thinking it over, Shimizu Shunsuke nodded in agreement.

First, Shimizu Shunsuke had confidence in his own strength.

Second, the Byakugan's scouting ability was indeed extremely useful.

Finally, Hayato had remained calm from the very beginning and did not act like an ordinary Ninja Academy student.

"This is not an exercise. You must follow orders, and do not act recklessly under any circumstances. Otherwise, don't even think about graduating from the academy. Understand?" Shimizu Shunsuke gave his final serious warning.

Hayato nodded, obedient as a quail.