---
Bang!!
The door slammed shut with a loud thud, causing Homura Mitokado to flinch slightly.
Seeing this, Koharu Utatane sighed, her heart heavy with thought. Danzō was still firmly under Sarutobi's control.
She hoped that after this lesson, Danzō would behave himself just a little more...
"By the way, Sarutobi."
Koharu suddenly frowned as if remembering something, turning to look at Sarutobi with narrowed eyes. She lowered her voice and asked hesitantly, "With the village already so weak in strength, is it really okay to let Jiraiya stay out there?"
Hearing this, Sarutobi thought of Jiraiya, who had left the village under the pretense of chasing after Orochimaru. He exhaled silently and replied calmly, "When the time comes, he will return."
Koharu and Homura exchanged a glance and, sensing Sarutobi's unwillingness to say more, sighed in resignation before getting up to take their leave.
Click.
As the door closed behind them, Sarutobi remained silent for a long time. The only sound in the room was his slow, steady breathing.
After a while, he slowly rose from his seat and walked to the window of his office. His hazy eyes were obscured by the swirling smoke rising from his pipe.
After the rain, Konoha always looked especially clean. Dew clung to the eaves like tiny mirrors scattered across every surface—on leaves, on lampposts, on the tiles of the walls—all reflecting the prosperity of the Hidden Leaf.
Looking at the scenery outside, Sarutobi's mind wandered.
He thought about the hard-won peace Konoha now enjoyed, about the internal and external struggles beneath that peace, about Orochimaru and Jiraiya who had left the village, about Tsunade, who spent her days drowning in gambling to numb herself, about Minato and Kushina's orphaned child, about the hopeful gaze of that Hyūga boy when he looked at him...
Hiss...
Sarutobi's chest rose sharply as he inhaled the bitter, sour air into his lungs. Slowly, he exhaled, the ember in his pipe glowing briefly, suppressing all emotions deep within.
"It doesn't matter," he murmured after a moment of silence, his voice slightly hoarse, as if speaking to himself. "No matter what must be sacrificed, we must protect everything Konoha has fought so hard to preserve."
---
Meanwhile, at Training Ground 44 on the outskirts of Konoha, inside the Forest of Death, sunlight filtered through the branches and cast dappled golden patches on two figures standing side by side.
"Senior, power starts from the ground, flows from the spine, and combines both hardness and softness..."
"Ahh!"
The wooden training posts in front of Unkawa Hyūga and Might Gai were already shattered. However, the one in front of Unkawa clearly showed signs of an internal explosion, while Gai's post appeared to have been brutally crushed by sheer force.
Watching Gai, whose movements were almost entirely unstructured and powerful enough to break bricks, Unkawa could barely hold back his smile anymore.
"Huff..." Usually, Gai could run around Konoha all day without tiring, but now he was drenched in sweat, panting heavily, and rubbing his head with a helpless laugh. "Unkawa, your modified Gentle Fist is really tough to learn."
"After all, Senior has spent over a decade mastering the Iron Fist. Adjusting your body's instincts naturally takes some effort." Unkawa shook his head. "Let's stop for today."
During the second round of the Chunin Exam match between Neji and Hinata, Gai and Rock Lee had once discussed the classification of taijutsu.
Taijutsu that caused visible injuries such as broken bones or external wounds was called the "Hard Fist," whereas the Hyūga clan's techniques that damaged the opponent's chakra pathways and organs were known as the "Gentle Fist." As for Tsunade and the Fourth Raikage's styles, which combined ninja arts with physical combat, they were referred to as "Nin-Taijutsu."
What Unkawa was currently experimenting with was combining the strengths of the Iron Fist and the Gentle Fist, aiming to eventually develop a taijutsu system best suited for himself, building upon the foundation of the Eight Gates.
"Alright, then..."
Gai was mid-sentence when Unkawa suddenly felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, a chilling sense of danger rising up from deep within.
It was abrupt, terrifying.
His muscles tensed in an instant, the veins around his Byakugan bulging outward.
Nothing unusual.
Absolutely nothing unusual.
"No, wait!" Unkawa's expression changed dramatically. "It's the blind spot!"
The Byakugan gave the Hyūga clan a full 360-degree field of vision, but due to the caged bird seal, branch members had a 1-degree blind spot extending backward from the spine!
If the enemy was close, the 1-degree blind spot wasn't a big issue, but if the enemy was far away...
That 1 degree would become a fan-shaped area with an arc of 1 degree, expanding into a massive blind spot as the radius increased!
Shriek!!
Sure enough, the moment Unkawa realized, an almost imperceptible whistling sound reached his ears.
This was an assassination—an extremely deadly one aimed directly at him.
At this distance and speed, trying to locate and dodge was already too late.
Realizing this, Unkawa's previously grim expression suddenly turned calm. Driven by instinct, he slowly closed his eyes.
"If I can't see," he thought, "then I won't look."
In the next instant, invisible ripples spread from his body, as if stepping into another world.
All physical senses were cut off, leaving only the spiritual perception.
No wind howl, no insect chirp, no breath, no heartbeat...
The world was eerily still.
As if time itself had stopped for him.
And so, he 'saw.'
Unkawa 'saw' the kunai behind him, trailing a sharp current of wind.
Wind Release: Vacuum Blade—a high-ranked Wind Release technique combining shape transformation and nature transformation, infusing foreign objects with wind chakra to create an impossibly sharp and swift blade.
The assassin had mastered this technique to its peak, moving so fast that even Gai hadn't reacted in time.
But under Unkawa's intuition, the kunai, which should have been impossible to fully perceive due to its speed, seemed to drag a line with no end, gliding toward him at an agonizingly slow pace.
Without turning around, Unkawa raised his hand, fingers splayed like the wings of a spreading crane. His knuckles glimmered faintly in the sunlight, showing the pale yellow calluses formed from years of training.
He gripped the handle of the kunai, the whirling wind blades slicing through his palm, yet as if colliding with an invisible iron wall, it abruptly halted in midair.
Unkawa opened his eyes. His calm, snow-like pupils reflected the tense face of Might Gai beside him, and the fragmented forest beyond the trees.
Whoever you are, not returning a blow is considered rude.
"So, I'll return it."
He turned and flicked the kunai forward, the motion as swift as falling leaves scattered by the wind. His sleeve fluttered, revealing his lean waist, his spine arched like a taut bowstring, unleashing all his strength in one explosive burst.
The next moment, the kunai flew free.
Whiz!
A shrill, ear-piercing screech tore through the air beside Gai. Leaves in midair were instantly shredded by the gale, and the yellowing fallen leaves on the ground were caught in the wind, spiraling upward.
Almost simultaneously, from afar came the unmistakable sound of a blade piercing flesh.
Pshh!!
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