Chapter 44: This is a Test I Set for Myself
The head hit the ground with a dull thud, spraying blood like a burst watermelon.
Even without it, the Uchiha Chunin's body kept running a few more steps, driven purely by momentum. The muscles were still moving, unaware that the brain—the command center—was already gone.
Then, slowly, the body stumbled. The severed nerves finally caught up to reality. The legs faltered. And the body crumpled with a heavy thump.
It all happened so fast—so abruptly—that neither the headless Chunin nor the two Hyuga, Souji and Hoshicai, realized what had just taken place. In fact, they ran right past the corpse without stopping, still chasing the fleeing Uchiha Jonin.
Even the Jonin, who was trained to react instantly to danger, froze in place for a split second.
His body continued running on sheer instinct, but behind his mask, panic had set in. Deep, suffocating panic.
He hadn't seen a thing. Nothing at all.
No chakra surge. No killing intent. Not even the sound of movement.
One second, his comrade was at his side—and the next, he was dead, beheaded without warning.
"What the hell...?" the Jonin thought, his breath catching.
His Sharingan, though only two-tomoe, should've noticed something—anything. But nothing registered. And yet, his companion had been cleanly executed.
It wasn't the fault of his eye. He was a Jonin. Years of life-or-death missions had sharpened his instincts far beyond just doujutsu.
But still... nothing?
No. Something was definitely wrong with that Hyuga.
He glanced back, spotting the confused faces of Souji and Hoshicai as they chased him.
They didn't know what happened either.
Which only left one possible explanation.
"That kid," he thought. "It has to be that Hyuga!"
And yet, his only instinct now was to run. Fast.
He had to make it back to the village. He had to report this—to tell the clan what he'd seen, what he felt.
Whatever that kid had done—it wasn't normal.
But before he could take ten more steps, something shifted.
His body tensed. Danger.
He reacted instinctively, hurling a kunai straight ahead.
The sound of metal on metal rang out, echoing through the forest.
A figure appeared—materializing out of seemingly thin air.
He stepped out from nowhere, casually knocking the kunai aside with his own.
The Uchiha Jonin gasped, eyes wide. "Genjutsu?!"
He'd been running with his Sharingan active the entire time—pushing it to the limit.
The two tomoe inside his pupils spun furiously. His vision sharpened—too sharply.
The third tomoe bloomed in his eye.
With that, the illusion peeled away.
He realized they'd been running in circles. The dense forest they couldn't escape? It wasn't real. Or rather—it was, but they'd been manipulated into looping through it.
Standing calmly ahead, Ryosuke held a kunai in his hand. His face was still young and innocent, but there was something in those pale eyes... something far too sharp for someone his age.
Those Byakugan—no, they were different. Clearer. Brighter. Too perfect.
The Uchiha Jonin clenched his fists, trembling.
The illusions, his teammate's mysterious death, the feeling of pressure—all of it made sense now.
He glared at Ryosuke, fury and awe battling inside him.
"Hyuga... HYUGA! What the hell is the Hyuga Clan hiding?!"
With a roar, he charged.
He had no more illusions about escaping. He knew now—he wouldn't make it out of this forest alive.
But if he was going to die, then he'd at least take something back.
Because those eyes...
Those eyes might just be the Hyuga Clan's greatest secret in a thousand years.
Ryosuke didn't flinch as the Jonin rushed him. Instead, he raised his weapon slowly, calm as ever.
"I've been waiting for this," he whispered.
This wasn't arrogance. Ryosuke wasn't foolish enough to believe he could defeat a Jonin head-on.
But the moment the Uchiha charged him, Souji and Hoshicai reappeared—having flanked the Jonin from both sides.
Rather than Ryosuke being the one surrounded, it was the Jonin now caught in a pincer.
But Souji and Hoshicai didn't move in. They simply stood guard, eyes wary.
They remembered what Ryosuke had said before the battle started:
"This is a test... I gave myself."
And now, watching him face a full-blown Jonin with poise and control—they understood what he meant.
"Fire Style: Phoenix Fire Jutsu!"
The Jonin spat out a barrage of fireballs.
His chakra reserves were running low after prolonged battle. He couldn't use anything stronger. But the point wasn't to hit Ryosuke.
It was to limit his movement—to pin him down.
Ryosuke didn't dodge.
In a blur, chakra erupted from every tenketsu on Ryosuke's body. A spiraling shield formed around him, deflecting the fireballs and redirecting them harmlessly into the woods.
The Uchiha weaved to the side, evading his own attack effortlessly. He hadn't expected the jutsu to land.
The kunai in his hand hummed, sharpened with wind chakra until it shimmered with lethal force.
Wind-style chakra. Rare among Uchiha. But this one had mastered it.
Ryosuke's Rotation was powerful, but not invincible. It was chakra-intensive, and its effectiveness could vary depending on control and power.
So he gambled everything on one last, pinpoint strike.
With a roar, he hurled the wind-infused kunai straight at Ryosuke.
The weapon sliced through the air with a sound like tearing silk. It blasted into the spinning chakra shield—
—and pierced through it!
But Ryosuke was already gone, having slipped aside the moment before impact.
No panic. No hesitation. He knew the limits of his defense.
His expression didn't waver.
He countered immediately.
"Gentle Fist Art—Eight Trigrams..."
His hands moved like lightning.
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