The Byakugan's Gaze

After the taijutsu class ended, Shinichi did not return to the classroom right away.

He bent over at the faucet beside the training ground and washed his face, the cool water rinsing away the dust and the red mark Sasuke had rubbed onto his face. April sunlight warmed the back of his neck, and water dripped from his chin into the dirt, leaving a string of dark wet marks on the packed earth. Nearby, several boys who had just finished sparring were comparing whose wrist guards looked cooler, loud enough to startle the birds off Hokage Rock. Shinichi turned off the faucet, shook the droplets from his hands, and prepared to return to the classroom for his schoolbag.

Then he felt someone watching him.

It was not the ordinary kind of feeling that someone was looking at him. This gaze carried an extremely faint fluctuation of chakra—not hostile, more like a cautious probe, like a butterfly landing on his shoulder. It was so light that it was nearly imperceptible, yet the fine scales on its wings still revealed its presence. The Byakugan's penetrating vision. He knew who it was without turning around. In Leaf Village, there was only one person who could awaken the Byakugan at the age of six, and this gaze had already appeared several times before taijutsu class began—once from the left while they were lining up to enter the training ground, again during the explanation for paired sparring, and a third time while he lowered his head to wash his face.

He straightened up, wiped his face with his sleeve, and decided to give this little classmate who had been peeking at him a way out. He turned and headed toward the equipment storage room at the edge of the field, neither too fast nor too slow—just enough to let someone hesitating over whether to follow make up her mind.

Hinata stood around the corner from the equipment storage room, her back pressed against the wall and both hands covering her mouth. Her heart was beating too fast. She deactivated the Byakugan, then activated it again, trying to calm herself with the motion, but it had the opposite effect—the instant the Byakugan activated, her chakra perception briefly sharpened, and that person's chakra crashed into her vision once more.

Within the Byakugan's field of vision, everyone's chakra had a different color and texture. Teacher Iruka's chakra was a warm, steady bright yellow, like the classroom lights. Sasuke's chakra was a cold deep blue, bright but covered by a thin layer of gray, somewhat like a winter morning sky before it had fully brightened. Naruto Uzumaki's chakra—she did not dare look too closely at Naruto Uzumaki's chakra. Behind that cluster of orange light was another undercurrent of dark crimson, and every time she drew near it, an inexplicable chill ran down her back.

But Shinichi's chakra was different from everyone else's.

When taijutsu class had begun, she had merely habitually swept her Byakugan over the chakra pathways of the students around her—this was a conditioned reflex from Hyuga Clan training. Her father had said that the Byakugan must always remain aware of the chakra flowing nearby. Then her gaze passed over Shinichi, and she could not look away. His chakra was not merely one color. Its main hue was emerald green, like a springtime canopy, threaded with several layers of different light—pale blue wind-nature chakra circulated through his chakra pathways like a stream, deep brown earth-nature chakra sat steadily in his lower abdomen, and there was also a faint golden glow she could not identify at all, quietly pulsing at the deepest point of his lower abdomen. These colors were not mixed together, but layered in clear order. Every layer had its own rhythm and direction, like the canopy, trunk, and roots of a tree—lush branches above, deep roots below, every part breathing in perfect order.

What shocked her even more was the way that emerald green chakra overflowed. An ordinary person's chakra clung to the walls of their chakra pathways like a thin veil, while a ninja's chakra formed clear flowing paths. But around Shinichi's chakra was an extra, exceedingly faint halo. That halo did not flow. It spread outward—like patches of sunlight filtering through leaves onto the ground, naturally radiating gentle warmth. She remembered her father mentioning this trait when he explained Byakugan perception: when a person's vitality was so powerful that their chakra could not fully contain it, excess yang-nature chakra would radiate outward in the form of a halo. In all of Konoha's recorded history, only one person had displayed this trait: the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju.

But the person before her was not Hashirama. He was a boy the same age as her, one who had just fought Sasuke to an almost even draw on the field and was now walking toward the equipment storage room.

Hinata covered her mouth and hurriedly deactivated the Byakugan. She knew she should not peek at someone else's chakra. Her father had said that using the Byakugan to inspect another person's chakra pathways was rude. But her feet would not obey her. The moment she had seen him head this way, they had automatically carried her over from the edge of the field. Now she was hiding around the corner of the equipment storage room, trapped between advancing and retreating.

The approaching footsteps stopped five paces away.

"The equipment room key is with Teacher Iruka. If you want to look inside, you can ask him for it." Shinichi paused. "Or are you here to put something away? There usually isn't anyone in this storage room at this time."

Hinata poked half her head around the corner, met Shinichi's gaze, then immediately ducked back behind the wall. She felt her face burning and covered her mouth again. After a long while, she finally took a deep breath and stepped out from the corner, her hands behind her back and her head lowered, too afraid to look into his eyes.

"I-I'm sorry... I wasn't trying to peek. Your chakra was just so beautiful, like the sun falling into a river." The moment she finished the second half, she realized what she had said, and her entire face turned completely red.

Shinichi froze slightly. The sun falling into a river. He had never heard that metaphor in the original story, yet it was closer to the truth than any professional chakra assessment term from the Hyuga Clan—the yang-nature chakra of the Senju bloodline was, in essence, the radiance of life. From her outsider's perspective, Hinata had inadvertently seen its true form. At the same time, he remembered that in the original story, Hinata initially could not even make eye contact with Naruto Uzumaki. Yet now, she could take the initiative to describe the form of his chakra. The change was minuscule, but it was moving in the right direction.

"It's fine." He handed her the clean towel he had swiped from the classroom. "But next time, you don't need to hide so far away. Stand closer. You'll be able to see more clearly."

Hinata took the towel and stood there blankly, her fingers clutching and releasing its edge. She could not speak, but a thought quietly and firmly took shape in her heart—this person would not dislike her for peeking at him.

When Shinichi saw the little movement of her tugging at the corner of the towel, he added another note to the off-field observation section of Hinata's profile: Her personal affection curve is naturally rising; future contact opportunities can be opened earlier than expected. He turned toward the classroom, draping the other end of the towel over his shoulder as he walked. Soft footsteps sounded behind him. Hinata followed him back, maintaining a distance of about two meters. She no longer hid in corners, nor did she activate the Byakugan. She merely quietly studied the figure walking ahead of her. Sunlight cast their shadows one before the other onto the packed earth, one long and one short. The distance between them was not actually that far.

(End of Chapter 34)