Chapter 30 C30

Of course, she couldn't stay in the tribe's territory forever without interacting with others.

Insufficient observation time will lead to insufficient information to make a judgment, which will in turn prolong the period of her surveillance. Her aloof and indifferent daily life is also not conducive to the observer's subjective evaluation of her.

The feeling of having one's privacy violated is terrible, far worse than going out and interacting with people.

Despite Neji's homeroom teacher's heartfelt admonitions and ineffective objections, Kana, as the only family member still alive on his current household registration, took it upon herself to request a week's leave for him.

She grabbed the child by the back of the collar and found a relatively open space—the secret agents who were following her were forced to maintain a distance where they could see but not hear in order to hide.

As long as he can't hear her, in his investigation report she's more likely to be a good girl who, after escaping death, only wants to be close to her younger brother and has no intention of gathering intelligence.

There's a reason why it can't be heard clearly: it could lead to suspicion of child abuse.

“Don’t let your eyes, which are so big, just be decorations,” Kana said, sitting cross-legged on the ground. A hand-drawn diagram of the human meridians hung on a tree stump that had been sawed off. She tapped it with a small twig and pressed several acupoints from bottom to top. “You just used your Byakugan to observe the meridians when I activated the Water Fang Bullet—the chakra of the last seal should flow rapidly from the Qi Hai acupoint to the Tian Tu acupoint.”

With his Byakugan activated, Neji maintained the posture of interlacing his fingers and clasping his palms together, forming a "巳" seal. The chakra surging in his dantian was like a gushing spring of clear water, dissipating in all directions along the riverbeds of dozens of meridians, not flowing in an orderly manner as required. Fine beads of sweat appeared on his forehead.

Whether they were clansmen or teachers at the ninja academy, they were all staunch supporters of the "practice makes perfect" philosophy, and their teaching style was basically "demonstration plus arduous practice."

It's hard for people to escape their environment and era. Neji originally followed the same conventional path, but fortunately, he had good personal qualities, so he learned quickly among his peers.

But that's not enough.

If you want to survive in this dog-eat-dog world, if you want to protect the people you care about, this is far from enough.

He said he wanted to learn.

Kana teaches.

Unlike physical training, which has no shortcuts and requires constant physical honing, this is different.

Ninjutsu is nothing more than the flow of chakra between various acupoints in the body according to a certain arrangement and combination, possibly with the addition of control over the amount of chakra used.

In Kana's view, ninjutsu, compared to taijutsu, at least has a logical basis and can be mastered by understanding the principles behind it, so she prefers ninjutsu.

—Although saying this might get me a lot of flak.

After all, compared to taijutsu, which can be rewarded through hard work, ninjutsu is often considered by most ninjas to be the insurmountable barrier that determines their strength, and it is also the ultimate test of talent.

The Byakugan, being the only known bloodline in the ninja world with the ability to see through objects, should have been the best cheat code for learning ninjutsu. However, in reality, because the activation time of ninjutsu is extremely short and the flow of chakra within the body is very complex and difficult to discern, few Hyuga clan members would waste time researching tens of thousands of chakra flow patterns.

There's always a chance of something going wrong.

Kana is that oddball.

In her past life, she preferred to spend more time and energy figuring out the principles rather than mastering knowledge through doing a lot of practice problems.

Relying on the advantage of "one section is stronger than six sections", she started practicing various hand gestures and seals in front of the mirror from the very first day she opened her eyes, while observing the flow of chakra with her Byakugan.

By analyzing a large number of experimental samples and summarizing them, we can identify some patterns.

Hand seals are merely a means to guide the flow of chakra, not the end goal. Therefore, practicing precise and skillful control of chakra is the most important foundation.

Compared to the six or seven years she spent studying chakra flow, Neji now only needs to memorize, practice, and master what she summarized into theories, and follow the path she paved through. He has already gained a great advantage.

She wasn't a giant, but Neji certainly stood on her shoulders.

As someone who is being trampled on, they lack the spirit of selfless dedication, and naturally, they cannot offer any earnest advice.

Chakra reversal can damage meridians. Kana kept an eye on him with her Byakugan activated. Once Neji got close and his chakra became disordered, she would strike his pressure point without mercy to stop him. This kind of training was much more painful than him practicing Gentle Fist by hitting wooden stakes with his fists.

"You've already tried it, do you still want to learn it?" She had warned from the beginning that this kind of practice would be very tedious and boring, inevitably accompanied by the pain of chakra going in reverse and out of control, and that there was a high probability that no results would be seen for a long time.

Even a donkey pulling a millstone needs a carrot in front of it, let alone a little kid who's eager to grow up and become stronger.

"Will I be able to do it someday?" Neji asked, looking up at him. "I'll be able to do it someday, won't I?"

"No." He flicked the small twig in his left hand upwards, separating his tightly clasped hands.

If Neji's homeroom teacher at the Ninja Academy had known, he wouldn't have wasted an hour in the morning painstakingly advising her not to spoil her child, saying, "You should be prepared that you might never learn anything properly in your entire life."

"There are some things in this world that can be achieved through hard work, and some things that are beyond our control no matter how hard we try."

The child's face was covered in sweat and dirt, which was quite an eyesore.

Kana pulled out a handkerchief and wiped his face haphazardly. When she peeled it off, it met his eyes.

Stubborn, obstinate, and unwilling to accept defeat.

It seems particularly unappealing to appear in a child who should be innocent and naive at this age.

Just like she was back then.

"But you're better than me."

So there's no need to rush.

She admitted that at Neji's age, she did not possess his unwavering determination and indomitable resilience.

If she didn't possess the memories of an adult, her so-called "talent" might not be superior to his.

Effort determines the lower limit, but ultimately, talent determines the upper limit.

"You will be stronger than me in the future."

Neji had the same blindingly positive view of her as Sasuke did of Itachi: "My brother is the most powerful and invincible person in the world."

The difference is that Sasuke is eager to surpass his brother and takes him as his current life goal, while Neji doesn't care who is stronger between him and her—he just needs to be stronger than those who might hurt her.

Neji felt that Kana was just trying to comfort him, and he didn't believe her, but he was happy because of the act of "comforting" her.

Kana was telling the truth—she couldn't be bothered to take care of the baby.

"If it weren't for fate, Neji might have been stronger than Sasuke," she said to a certain brother-obsessed person.

The other party's first reaction, as a conditioned reflex, was naturally one of dissatisfaction.

But reason prevailed over emotion and grasped the key question: "What 'destiny'?"

This was the first time the two had met alone since Kana was relieved of her training and returned to the team.

Ten kilometers southeast of Konoha Village, in a valley, the trees grow extremely tall, straight like giant pillars soaring into the clouds, making humans sitting on the branches appear as insignificant as ants.

Kana turned her head and, unsurprisingly, met those eyes. The already limited space between them was further engulfed by this action. Ignoring the system's warning in her mind that she couldn't reveal anything, she said, "It's fate."

She saw her own reflection in the dark pupils of the mirror. "Do you believe in fate?"

Uchiha Itachi pondered for a moment. Clever people can always find something beyond the problem itself, even if they sometimes seem tactless: "You're... worried? Worried about 'being powerless'."

People collectively refer to what they gain, what they lose, and what they cannot change despite their best efforts as fate.

Otherwise, one cannot alleviate the depression stemming from being born with a harder life than others, being abandoned by loved ones, or feeling inferior to others.

Human psychological protection mechanisms force her to believe in the existence of fate, yet most of the time she doesn't accept it.

So after the numb skin was torn away, even more pain came back to haunt them.

"I had a dream..."

For a fleeting moment, the scene before me was ripped apart by the blade, dissolving into fragments, like the static on an old-fashioned television set, emitting a crackling alarm.

"In my dream, Itachi Uchiha was all alone..."

The system screamed loudly in my mind, as if it had transformed into a sharp claw with long nails, scraping heavily across the glass surface.

Sound waves can transmit energy, far exceeding the limits of a level three shield. Her face began to turn pale, and beads of sweat appeared on her forehead.

The shattered pieces of the world were barely pieced back together. Itachi's voice seemed to be behind a thin membrane, and she was like a silkworm cocoon, her lungs squeezed dry, making it hard to breathe. A flash of white light appeared before her eyes, and her hearing weakened. The only thing she could still feel was the increasing pressure of his hand gripping her shoulder.

The aftereffects of the pain were exhaustion; her voice seemed to float in the air, and at first glance, it even carried a hint of tenderness, "I wonder if he'll regret it?"

He didn't refute that dreams are all fake, nor did he question why she asked. He simply continued to ponder her description, "Was that his choice?"

“If so,” he said calmly, “then it’s probably a choice that we have to stick to even if we regret it.”

The system rapidly played back records of those who had chosen the Uchiha branch in her mind, including those who truthfully reported their experiences, those who had exterminated his clan, and those who had betrayed him and joined Akatsuki before him.

However, his fate of dying alone and being betrayed by everyone remained unchanged.

The melting glaciers formed numerous rivers, rushing endlessly, winding and turning, each heading in its own direction, but ultimately all flowing into the deep sea, where everything was swallowed up.

The information overload made her brain sluggish; she couldn't remember what she had originally intended to say to him.

Holly is a tree species with lush foliage throughout the four seasons. The branches that I held with my palm still had a bit of warmth left by the autumn sun. The serrated edges of the leaves cut the twilight into pieces and fell on me. Kana looked into his eyes, which were empty, with nothing in them, yet seemed to contain everything.

“You’re not surprised at all.” Kana turned her head back. “You haven’t faced a choice yet, but you’ve already made that decision.”

He was a devout martyr.

She's a selfish person who's afraid of pain.

For the first time, Kana realized clearly and intuitively that they were really, really different.

The soft, red sun dipped below the mountaintop, and weary birds circled from the other side of the sky, descending into the secluded, dense forest, their fluttering sounds breaking the brief silence. Even though this place resembled a crack isolated from the world, it was ultimately not real.

Time never stops flowing.

By this time, Neji and Sasuke should have already finished school. The ninja on duty stood at the gate of Konoha, their black shadows stretched long and thin, as they handed over their duties to the next shift. Smoke from cooking fires rose from the open windows of the village, and warm yellow streetlights spread out from the village entrance, like fishing lights floating on a night river, guiding people home.

"I'm hungry, let's go." The grass dragonfly she was weaving flew away with the wind, and Kana jumped down from the branch dozens of meters high.

Both she and he should go back.

"Kana."

She paused, but did not turn around.

"What was your fate in that dream?"

"Maybe he's dead." She shrugged indifferently.

The ground was covered with short, withered, and dark yellow grass blades, along with the remnants of broken twigs. When not deliberately concealing one's presence, the sound of one's footsteps crumpling on the ground was like the sound of dry, brittle paper being crumpled.

The voice was very close, circling halfway to the right from behind her before coming to her front.

Her half-lowered gaze fell on his tightly clenched hands.

These hands, in countless parallel universes of mission takers, have ruthlessly severed the red threads of the past time and time again, leaving only the half connected to the heart, bleeding year after year.

She thought for a moment and then added, "It's also possible that they were abandoned."

"I know you disagree, but the world is irrelevant to me."

The Uchiha clan has nothing to do with her, nor does Konoha. As long as he keeps his promise and continues to treat her as a friend, her biased stance will not change.

She looked up and met his gaze. "You're not as much of a jerk as him, are you?"