The Branch House's Blade

At dusk, in the woods at the edge of the training ground, Hyuga Xiao leaned against an old locust tree.

The setting sun filtered through the gaps in the leaves, casting mottled shadows across his face. In the distance came the weary footsteps and chatter of Branch House members finishing their training, their voices carrying the numbness of day after day.

Xiao had his eyes closed, but his Byakugan had long since been activated.

Three hundred meters away, Tokuma Hyuga was putting away the training equipment alone. This twenty-four-year-old Branch House Elite Ninja was one of the most talented of his generation, yet because he had "failed to protect a Main House member in time" during a mission, he had been punished with three years as a training ground instructor.

Xiao remembered Tokuma's eyes—the look of someone whose edges had been worn smooth, yet whose unwillingness still burned deep within.

He opened his eyes and walked toward Tokuma.

"Senior Tokuma."

Xiao's voice was soft, nearly inaudible in the evening breeze.

Tokuma turned around, still holding several kunai. When he saw it was Xiao, his brow furrowed almost imperceptibly. "What is it?"

There were ranks even within the Branch House. To an Elite Ninja like Tokuma, a boy like Xiao, who had just turned thirteen and was not even a Chunin, was merely a junior who needed looking after.

"I wanted to ask you about something." Xiao put on the slightly timid smile common among Branch House members. "About the guard arrangements for the evening after tomorrow."

Tokuma's hands stopped moving.

He stared at Xiao for two seconds before lowering his head and continuing to wipe his kunai. "That's not something you should be asking about."

"I'm just worried." Xiao's voice dropped even lower. "I heard... the young lady is going to the Hokage Tower the evening after tomorrow, with only two Branch House guards."

"So?"

"So I was thinking." Xiao stepped closer and lowered his voice until only the two of them could hear. "If Hidden Cloud spies really are nearby, and if the Main House deliberately leaked the information as bait, what will happen to those two guards?"

Tokuma's fingers tightened around the kunai.

The metal edge reflected a cold glint beneath the setting sun.

"Where did you hear that?" Tokuma's tone changed. It was no longer the perfunctory manner of a senior speaking to a junior, but sharp with scrutiny.

Xiao did not answer. Instead, he continued, "I heard that six Branch House Elite Ninjas have been transferred toward Hidden Cloud, and their families have not been relocated. I also heard that the Main House has been frequently changing patrol routes recently, leaving... gaps in several critical positions."

Each sentence was like a nail hammered into Tokuma's mind.

How could this young Branch House boy know these things?

"What exactly are you trying to say?" Tokuma set down the kunai and turned to face Xiao. His Byakugan activated and deactivated in an instant as he confirmed that there was no one else nearby.

Xiao met his gaze.

At that moment, Tokuma suddenly found the boy before him unfamiliar. Beneath that gentle, timid facade seemed to lurk something he could not understand.

"What I'm saying," Xiao said slowly, "is that if something really happens the evening after tomorrow, those two guards will become scapegoats. The Main House will say they failed in their duty. They may even say that they colluded with outside enemies. Then their families will be implicated as well."

Tokuma's breathing grew heavy for an instant.

He knew the Main House too well.

Three years ago, he had fought desperately to repel three Hidden Sand Elite Ninjas. Yet because the Main House's eldest young master had suffered a minor injury, he had been deemed to have "failed in his duty as a guard." For three years, he had watched young Branch House members, just like his former self, devote themselves to the clan with loyalty in their hearts—only for reality to grind their hopes away bit by bit.

"You..." Tokuma's voice was dry. "What evidence do you have?"

"I don't need evidence," Xiao said. "Senior, you understand the Main House's ways better than I do. When have they ever cared about the lives of the Branch House?"

Those words were like a blade piercing the flimsy layer of self-deception in Tokuma's heart.

That was right.

When had they ever cared?

The names of Branch House members who died on missions did not even enter the clan shrine. Those Branch House members killed by the Caged Bird Seal could only be buried carelessly. The Branch House existed to die for the Main House—if their deaths had value, all the better; if not, it did not matter.

Tokuma's hand trembled.

Not from fear, but anger. Anger that had been suppressed for three years, perhaps even longer.

"So what?" He stared at Xiao, something awakening in his eyes. "You tell me all this because you want me to do what? Question the Main House? Go die?"

"No." Xiao shook his head. "I want Senior to protect the young lady with me."

Tokuma froze.

"What did you say?"

"The Main House wants to use the young lady as bait, purge the Branch House, and capture Hidden Cloud spies for merit." Xiao spoke evenly, but every word carried force. "Then we'll make their plan fail. We'll protect the young lady in secret and ensure she remains absolutely safe. If Hidden Cloud really makes a move, we'll intercept them."

"And then?" Tokuma sneered. "The credit will still belong to the Main House, and we'll still be Branch House members."

"What if..." Xiao paused, lowering his voice further, "the ones who save the young lady are not the two assigned guards, but us, who 'just happened to pass by'?"

The woods suddenly fell silent.

The clamor from the distant training ground became indistinct, while the rustling of leaves in the wind grew clear.

Tokuma looked at Xiao for a long time.

This thirteen-year-old boy was proposing something insane—snatching prey from the jaws of the Main House's trap and taking credit that should have belonged to the Main House for the Branch House.

"Do you know the risks of doing this?" Tokuma asked. "If we are discovered, we'll be branded traitors to the clan. The Caged Bird Seal will activate immediately."

"I know," Xiao said. "But Senior, what difference is there between our lives now and being dead?"

He raised a hand and pointed at the forehead protector on his brow.

Beneath it was the Caged Bird Seal.

"Our lives are in someone else's hands. We can live only if they allow us to live. If they want us dead, then we die." For the first time, Xiao's voice revealed genuine emotion. It was not an angry roar, but a cold statement. "I don't want to live like this. I want to take a gamble."

Tokuma fell silent.

The sun sank lower, and the shadows in the woods stretched long, shrouding both of them in dimness.

"Why did you come to me?" Tokuma finally asked.

"Because you still have unwillingness in you." Xiao looked straight into his eyes. "I can tell. The eyes of those who have completely accepted their fate are dead. There's still fire in yours."

Still fire.

Those three words struck somewhere soft in Tokuma's heart.

That was right, there was still fire. Even if only a spark remained, it was still burning.

"Even if we succeed," Tokuma said, "the Main House won't be grateful. They'll only think the Branch House overstepped its bounds, that we have ulterior motives."

"Then let them think that," Xiao said. "We don't want gratitude. We want leverage. If we save the young lady, we'll have leverage. At the very least, the next time the Main House wants to casually sacrifice the Branch House, they'll hesitate for one more second."

One more second.

For the Branch House, that second could mean the difference between life and death.

Tokuma took a deep breath, then slowly let it out. He closed his eyes as scenes from the past three years flashed through his mind—young Branch House children asking him, "Teacher Tokuma, if we train hard, can we really change our fate?"

Every time, he had said, "Of course."

But in his heart, he knew he was lying.

Now, the boy before him had given him another answer: No, unless you dared to gamble with your life and seize it.

"Do you have a plan?" Tokuma opened his eyes, and his gaze had changed.

It was the look of someone who had made up his mind.

The corners of Xiao's lips rose slightly. It was not that timid smile, but a sharp curve carrying something dangerous.

"I do," he said. "The evening after tomorrow, the young lady will depart from the Hyuga Estate and take the third route to the Hokage Tower. The two assigned guards will be Ko Hyuga and Iroha Hyuga."

Tokuma nodded. He knew both of them. They were capable, but fiercely loyal to the Main House.

"If Hidden Cloud makes a move, the most likely location will be that secluded stretch of road upstream from the Nanga River." Xiao continued. "It's farthest from the Leaf Security Force's patrol zone, and there are several high points suitable for an ambush."

"How do you know all this?" Tokuma could not help asking.

Xiao did not answer. He merely said, "I'll go there ahead of time to make preparations. Your task is to leave fifteen minutes after the young lady departs, under the excuse of 'inspecting the area around the training ground,' then take a detour to the Nanga River. If everything remains peaceful, then treat it as an actual inspection. If something happens..."

"I'll make my move," Tokuma finished.

"Right," Xiao said. "But remember, don't use the Hyuga Clan's Gentle Fist. Use kunai, shuriken, any ninjutsu that can conceal your identity. We need the Main House to think an 'unknown third party' intervened."

Tokuma understood.

That way, the Main House would be unable to directly credit the two guards, nor could they immediately identify who had disrupted their plans.

"What about those two guards?" Tokuma asked. "If they fight to the death to protect the young lady..."

"They will," Xiao said. "But if Hidden Cloud dares to act, they must be confident they can deal with two Branch House Elite Ninjas. I estimate they'll deploy at least four Elite Ninja-level combatants."

Tokuma's heart sank.

Four against two, and in a planned ambush. Ko and Iroha would likely not survive.

"Can we save them?" Tokuma asked.

Xiao was silent for a moment.

The wind in the woods grew colder.

"The young lady comes first," Xiao finally said. "That is the bottom line. As for those two guards... if possible, I'll do my best. But if I have to choose between them and the young lady, I choose the young lady."

Cruel, but real.

Tokuma did not argue. He had been on too many missions to not understand that choices sometimes had to be made.

"One more question," Tokuma said. "Even if we succeed, when the Main House investigates afterward, how do we explain why we 'just happened' to be there?"

Xiao pulled a small scroll from his robe and handed it to Tokuma.

When Tokuma unfolded it, his pupils contracted.

It was a simple map marking thirteen suspicious incidents around Leaf Village over the past three months—merchants vanishing, patrol squads suffering unidentified attacks, border watchposts being briefly infiltrated. When all the locations were connected, they formed a semicircle centered on Leaf Village with a radius of twenty kilometers.

And upstream from the Nanga River lay precisely in the gap of that semicircle.

"This is intelligence I gathered," Xiao said. "If the Main House asks, tell them that you had long suspected Hidden Cloud was planning a large-scale infiltration, so you had been investigating in secret. Going to the Nanga River the evening after tomorrow was to verify a suspicion."

Tokuma looked at the map, then at Xiao.

How long had this boy been preparing?

"This intelligence..." Tokuma's throat felt dry. "Where did you get it?"

"The Branch House has its own eyes." Xiao took back the scroll. "We can see what the Main House cannot. We can hear what the Main House cannot. It's just that no one ever put those fragments together before."

No one had put them together.

Because there had been no point. What could the Branch House do even if they knew? Tell the Main House? The Main House would not believe them. Instead, they would suspect the Branch House of harboring ulterior motives.

But now, those fragments had become weapons.

"I understand." Tokuma memorized the map and returned the scroll to Xiao. "I'll go the evening after tomorrow."

Xiao nodded and turned to leave.

"Wait." Tokuma stopped him.

Xiao turned back.

"Why are you doing all this?" Tokuma asked. "It's not just to stay alive, is it?"

Xiao stood in the shadows of the woods, the final rays of sunset falling across half his face.

"I want to see," he said, "whether the Branch House's blade can cut through the cage."

With that, he turned and left. His footsteps quickly vanished into the depths of the woods.

Tokuma stood there for a long time without moving.

He lowered his head and looked at his hands. These hands had practiced Gentle Fist for eighteen years. They had killed enemies, protected companions, and once knelt before the Main House to receive punishment after failing a mission.

The Branch House's blade...

He clenched his fist, his knuckles cracking softly.

Then let's try it.

Let's see whether this blade is sharp enough.

After leaving the training ground, Xiao did not return home directly.

He took a detour upstream along the Nanga River. Before night fell, he carefully walked the stretch of road where the ambush might occur.

The sound of flowing water was especially clear in the silent evening. Dense woods lined both banks, and several raised slopes were indeed suitable for an ambush. If Hidden Cloud intended to act, this was the best location.

Xiao activated his Byakugan, extending his vision one kilometer outward.

Nothing unusual.

But he knew that this place would become a battlefield the day after tomorrow.

"System," he silently called in his mind.

[Fate-Breaking System activated]

[Current main quest: Prevent the Hinata Kidnapping Incident and alter the Fate Node]

[Quest progress: Planning stage]

[Key figure "Tokuma Hyuga" has been incorporated into the plan. Faction relationship updated: Potential ally (Trust: 42%)]

[Warning: Traces of Root ninja activity detected. Number: 2. Distance: 800 meters]

Xiao's gaze sharpened.

Root?

Danzo's people had indeed gotten involved.

He immediately deactivated his Byakugan and pretended to be an ordinary passerby, slowly walking along the riverbank. The Byakugan's field of vision was too conspicuous and could easily be noticed by sensory ninja.

The two Root ninja did not approach. They merely watched the area from afar.

It seemed Hiashi and Danzo had some sort of tacit understanding—or rather, were using each other. Hiashi wanted to purge the Branch House and capture Hidden Cloud spies; Danzo wanted to use the opportunity to gather intelligence on the Hyuga Clan, perhaps even capture a few Hidden Cloud ninja for interrogation.

The mantis stalked the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind it.

And what Xiao needed to do was become the archer behind the oriole.

He reached a bend in the river and crouched down, pretending to wash his hands. The icy river water flowed over his fingers, taking away the heat of the day.

His face reflected on the water's surface, along with the clear shadow of the forehead protector on his brow.

The Caged Bird Seal.

This Curse Mark was not merely carved into the flesh, but into the soul of every Branch House member. It told them: You are a slave. Your life does not belong to you.

Xiao scooped up a handful of water and splashed it over his face.

Droplets slid down his cheeks like tears, only colder.

The day after tomorrow.

The day after tomorrow would be his first test.

If he passed, he could go from being a piece on the board to the one moving the pieces. If he failed, he would die.

There was no middle ground.

He stood, shook the water from his hands, and turned away from the riverbank.

Night had fully fallen. The lights of Leaf Village glowed in the distance, warm yet remote.

Those lights belonged to the Main House, to those who stood high above.

Xiao walked along the dark path, his steps light and steady.

Step by step, he would walk toward the light.

Then he would seize that light in his own hand.