Meanwhile, Renjiro steadied his breath. His chest rose and fell once, then his expression sharpened as he slipped into flow.
His footwork turned light, elusive, each step coiled like he could spring forward from any angle without warning. The tanto angled low, gleaming faintly, always ready to cut.
Ryusei mirrored him, sliding into the rooted stance of his Senju taijutsu. His arms rose, body balanced, weight spread with clean precision. Each movement carried the grounded stability he'd forged under Duy's drills.
Kanae stepped back a few paces, pale veins swelling at her temples as she opened her Byakugan.
She said nothing, but her gaze lingered on Ryusei longer than before. His frame was different now, muscles denser, chakra pulsing stronger.
Only now did she seem to accept his claim that he would face Renjiro with taijutsu alone.
The two boys stared across the dirt. A few quiet words passed between them, sharp and short, before both moved at once.
Their first exchanges weren't strikes but probes. Renjiro's speed matched Ryusei's exactly, which didn't surprise him. Hatake style was built on it. What caught him off guard was the footwork.
Renjiro's steps were slippery, refined, looping around in unpredictable arcs. Feints from every side, sudden shifts that blurred forward, left, right, then back again, as if his body rejected any straight rhythm.
Ryusei's own movements were fast, explosive bursts meant to overwhelm at the right moment.
But against this, he couldn't predict Renjiro at all. Renjiro, meanwhile, could read Ryusei's rhythm just enough to stay a step ahead.
No more words. The fight was on.
That was when Ryusei noticed the blade.
The short tanto in Renjiro's hand glowed with a strange radiance, white instead of the pale blue chakra every shinobi knew. Its edge hummed with energy, each faint swing tracing a white arc in the air.
Ryusei's mind ticked. Ordinary chakra never shone like that. It was too concentrated, too pure, enhanced by the nature of the material itself. Not a mere sword, but something advanced and precious.
'So it isn't just Sakumo,' he thought, eyes narrowing. 'The Hatake must have passed down more than one of these. Relics of their bloodline, from far older times.'
Ryusei's sensing told him the truth: the chakra in that blade stretched just beyond the steel itself, so thin and sharp it vanished to the naked eye.
A weapon that could cut through the smallest joints, nerves, and hidden weak points in the body. It was the sharpest, most refined edge of chakra he had ever seen.
'It's probably some advanced form of chakra shape manipulation, fused with the channeling,'
He thought, watching the white glow hum faintly in Renjiro's grip, dancing around elusively.
Renjiro struck first. He slipped in from a sharp angle, tanto gleaming white as it cut straight toward Ryusei's torso.
The blade never landed. Instead, it slammed into Ryusei's forearm, perfectly aligned along its path.
Renjiro's eyes widened. 'He read my move… but why block with his arm? Does he really think flesh and bone can stop this?'
Ryusei didn't flinch. He met the scorching edge head-on, not because he was reckless, but because he was prepared.
His forearm glowed faintly with chakra. The technique was one he had learned fully during his recent pause: 'Flowing Willow Guard'.
A traditional Senju taijutsu defense, it hardened the forearms and shins with dense chakra reinforcement, turning them into natural shields.
Bones were already the strongest structure in the body. Shins and forearms, in particular, were perfect for intercepting attacks before they reached vital spots.
The Senju style took that principle to the extreme, flooding those bones with chakra until their density rivaled stone.
A thin layer drawn from surrounding muscles cushioned the outside, dispersing the initial force before the bone took the rest.
Against rocks, this technique crushed them without fail. Against blades, it dulled their edge before they could bite deeper.
Ryusei had tested it himself, against such advanced materials as this tanto was made of, and proved it could withstand them one-on-one.
So when Renjiro's ancestral White Light Blade struck, the chakra edge faltered on the cushion, and the steel itself recoiled off Ryusei's arm.
The shock traveled all the way up to Renjiro's shoulder, numbing his grip. His jaw clenched in disbelief. 'That edge should cut through almost anything… yet he just—blocked it?'
Pain stung faintly in his own hand from the backlash.
'Damn it… my basic form still isn't complete,' he realized, frustrated.
And he wasn't wrong.
But what he didn't know was that this was only the entry-level application of Ryusei's idea.
Flowing Willow Guard was just a C-rank defense.
In time, once Ryusei layered it with Gates or higher chakra control, that durability could get even more exaggerated and powerful, and even spread across his whole bones and body.
This was only the beginning.
However, Renjiro had no time to think further before a powerful shin-centered kick tore toward his lower body, chakra surging along Ryusei's leg.
It was the same technique, but just because it was meant for defense didn't mean it couldn't be turned into offense to some extent.
Renjiro slipped aside from the kick and kept circling, his footwork weaving with feints and sudden shifts.
He struck in bursts, probing for weak spots, but the moment his blade was about to clash with Ryusei's forearms or shins, he angled it out slightly, refusing to take that full recoil head-on again, only grazing it instead.
Meanwhile, Ryusei wasn't content to rely only on defense.
By now, he had read Renjiro's style. It was precision-based swordsmanship — observe, find an opening, strike the weak point. Simple in concept, dangerous in practice.
There were countless weak points in the body. The Hyuga, for example, sealed tenketsu to disrupt the chakra flow or sent the small showcase to your chakra pathway system to cause internal damage.
The basic Hatake approach was different. They cut from the outside, aiming directly at nerves, joints, organs, and even chakra pathways. The sharper the blade and the sharper the eye, the deadlier it became.
Of course, newbies like Renjiro probably couldn't target all of those yet.
That was also why the style demanded so much: intuition, experience, and a steep learning curve.
Against such a user, the longer a battle dragged on, the worse it became.
Every extra exchange gave them more data — your rhythm, your habits, which weak points were most exposed, and when to strike.
That explained the elusive footwork. They couldn't rely on defense to survive until they figured you out.
Instead, they danced constantly — feints, sudden shifts, unpredictable angles.
They thrived on trickery, surprise, and precision kills.
Less like honorable standard samurai, of the Land of Iron, who relied on sheer speed or crushing force, more like assassins suited for ANBU, where execution mattered more than glory.
Ryusei understood all of this after only a few minutes of trading blows.
Renjiro wasn't simply fast. His body was enhanced by chakra to the same degree as Ryusei's was — speed, strength, and agility.
Logical, since both kenjutsu and taijutsu practitioners lived and died by chakra enhancement.
The difference lay in how it was applied. Ryusei hardened bones and muscles into shields and weapons.
The Hatake refined their bodies into blades themselves, every motion tailored to cut down prey with precision.
By this point, Renjiro was rattled. He had read Ryusei's movements again and again, yet every time he went for the strike, Ryusei's arm or shin was already there to meet it.
Their bout looked less like a fight and more like a dance with some contact but without fully connected blows. That was when it hit him.
'So that's it… he's been using his sensory perception this whole time. Tracking the flow of my chakra, even the exact direction of my blade. I've been obvious from the start. But Hatake style… it's supposed to be stealth…'
Renjiro's breathing shifted even lower.
His stance lowered, movements loosening into a deeper flow. For the first time, his chakra stilled and twisted inward. Instead of letting it leak through the tanto, he masked it, blending and confusing the flow.
It was the awakening of his own sensory mode — not to sense others, but to erase himself. To blur his presence, his edge.
This was why the Hatake thrived in ANBU.
Their style was too complex to master in drills.
It demanded live feedback, growth inside a real battle.
Renjiro's instincts sharpened before Ryusei's eyes, and his movements grew harder to trace with each passing second.
Ryusei smirked faintly. 'Not bad. But it's time to end this.'
He knew exactly how to beat a style like this.
You didn't play its game.
You didn't linger, probe, or try to out-sneak them.
You crushed it with the opposite — overwhelming power, speed, and relentless strikes that left no room to breathe.
But Renjiro's speed was already at the limit.
Ryusei couldn't set up his heavier taijutsu without ninjutsu support, which he had promised not to use.
That left him one option — his fastest, strongest fist technique.
He shifted his stance. So far, he had only attacked with his legs; forearms reserved for defense.
But his true close-range weapon was the fist.
"Coiling Serpent Fist."
It was a Senju C-rank, a strike that drove the body's full weight from the ground up into one motion.
Chakra coiled around the arm, spiraling down into the fist, then unleashed forward in a violent burst.
Even a miss could rattle the target with the explosive shockwave.
Ryusei waited, patient.
And Renjiro gave him the chance — lunging in with new confidence, his masked chakra making him almost vanish from sight. Almost.
To Ryusei's senses, the chakra blade still flared like a beacon.
The instant it drew near, Ryusei stepped into it, not away.
His fist snapped past the tanto, coiling chakra stripping away the blade's aura like snuffing a candle.
The strike drove straight into Renjiro's chest.
The sound was like a cannon.
Renjiro's body rocketed backward, trees shattering in his wake.
He tumbled through trunks, coughing blood mid-flight, before finally skidding to a stop dozens of meters away.
Silence fell over the clearing, save for the splintering wood still collapsing around him.
Ryusei lowered his fist, exhaling slow.
The truth was simple: Hatake style was built on deception, trickery, unpredictability.
But the tanto's chakra glow betrayed it from the start, and Ryusei's sensory ability read it like an open scroll.
Renjiro had only just awakened the sensory masking that true Hatake needed to vanish in battle.
Against a master sensor, it was nothing but a child's trick.
This fight had ended the moment it began.