Time flowed quietly by, like water.
Lady Mito Uzumaki had passed away, and the transfer of the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki had been completed.
On the surface, the Leaf Village remained peaceful, but the undercurrents never ceased.
As Tsunade's disciple, a member of the Leaf Village's ANBU, and one of the few who had personally participated in that succession ceremony, Hyuga Tianyi knew what had happened.
His list of duties now formally and explicitly included the long-term assignment of maintaining security around the Jinchuriki.
It was a routine arrangement, but there was something Tianyi found troublesome.
Ever since that night at the border, when he had saved Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki first from a Hidden Cloud Village Jonin and then from A.
The two youngsters seemed to have latched onto him.
Especially Kushina.
Before Lady Mito died, she had called Tianyi to her side and entrusted him with those words in Kushina's presence.
Since then, the red-haired girl's gaze had grown complicated whenever she looked at Tianyi, carrying a junior's awe of his strength.
There was gratitude toward the man who had saved her life, but more than anything, there was an easy closeness born of an elder having entrusted her to him.
What made it even harder for Tianyi to avoid her was the arrangement made by Konoha High Command.
Kushina Uzumaki, the new Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, had officially moved into the Senju Clan Grounds.
She had a house of her own beside Tsunade and Nawaki's residence.
And Tianyi, as Tsunade's disciple, already spent most of his time living on the Senju Clan Grounds.
Thus, whenever he opened his window in the morning, he would very likely see a head of vivid red hair and a head of blond hair wandering around the courtyard.
Whenever he returned from a mission in