Crunch… crunch…
Hyūga Kumokawa walked slowly along the path, the howling wind and snow a constant din in his ears.
The blizzard that had raged yesterday finally spent its fury before dawn, leaving a thick blanket of snow on the ground.
Thud! Thud!
From the distance came intermittent, muffled thumps, torn apart by the wind's scream. The closer Hyūga Kumokawa got, the clearer the sound became.
The paths taken by others were completely erased by the snow, leaving only Kumokawa's footprints on the ground. It seemed as if the entire Konoha had been scrubbed clean overnight.
But the sky was a stifling leaden gray, grudgingly letting through a faint, sickly morning light that reflected off the snow with a lifeless chill.
Hyūga Neji stood in the center of this white, silent world, still wearing only that thin black mourning robe. His young face was expressionless as he hammered blows against a wooden training post.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
He had completely abandoned the Gentle Fist technique, using only the most primitive, brutal strength to drive his fist forward again and again. Each impact produced a sickening, solid thud.
The skin on his knuckles quickly split and peeled back. Bright red beads of blood welled up, staining the wooden post, forming splotches of stark crimson.
With every swing, fine lines of blood flicked through the air, splattering onto the pristine white snow at his feet like blooming, exquisite red plum blossoms.
Clearly, the boy was once again using this self-destructive, self-harming form of training to vent the grief and anger in his heart.
"How pitiful."
Hyūga Kumokawa leaned against the courtyard gate, arms crossed, watching the unmoved Hyūga Neji with a smile. "A pointless vent. Do you want me to hug you and say, 'Stop hitting it, it's all in the past'?"
Neji's movements abruptly stopped. He stood still, then slowly turned to look at him, his white eyes filled with resentment.
"What do you know?" Hyūga Neji rasped, his voice raw with hatred. "You couldn't even protect my father's body. You're just a powerless failure too!"
Hyūga Kumokawa couldn't muster a single spark of anger at a child's resentful words.
However, if all that anger and hatred were poured onto a silent wooden post, it was truly meaningless.
"The genius of the Hyūga branch family," he asked with a smile. "Dare to make a bet with a failure like me?"
Hyūga Neji didn't answer immediately, just looked at Kumokawa in silence.
So, Hyūga Kumokawa placed both hands behind his back, giving a slight nod to Neji. "I'll give you both hands, Hyūga genius."
Perhaps stung by his dismissiveness and mockery, a flicker of anger finally surfaced on Neji's young, impassive face.
He did look down on Hyūga Kumokawa somewhat. From both Lord Hiashi and his own father, he could always feel that pervasive pressure. But from Hyūga Kumokawa, he felt nothing at all.
But for a well-known clan failure like him to boast so brazenly about giving him both hands...!
"You—!"
The words barely left his mouth when Hyūga Neji charged at Kumokawa, his movements instinctively falling into Gentle Fist patterns.
Hyūga Kumokawa lightly slid the tip of his foot into the snow at his feet. Just as Neji raised his palm to strike, Kumokawa flicked up a wave of snow into his face. In that instant, Neji's vision was filled with a blinding white torrent.
Hyūga Neji violently swiped his left hand, shattering the snow meant to obscure his vision, only to find Hyūga Kumokawa's figure had vanished. The next moment, almost by reflex, he swung his palm toward his own right side.
Thud!
Neji's gamble was right.
His palm collided with the shin Kumokawa had raised. The force felt like a crashing ocean wave meeting an immovable cliff face.
The snow beneath their feet exploded outwards in a ring. Neji staggered back, leaving two uncontrolled trails in the snow.
"What's wrong, genius?" Hyūga Kumokawa lowered his leg, narrowing his eyes with a cold smirk. "Can't even handle a little force like that?"
What happened?
Did the force... rebound?
Looking at Hyūga Kumokawa before him, the dismissive thoughts in Neji's mind instantly evaporated, replaced by a rising sense of gravity.
Unfortunately, that gravity didn't last long, because the fight ended in the very next moment.
Hyūga Neji's right leg buckled as if struck by an iron bar. He half-knelt on the ground. Before he could even rise, a knee was rapidly expanding in his vision.
Thump! Crack!
After stomping down to buckle Neji's right leg, Hyūga Kumokawa practically launched himself up, driving a vicious knee strike straight into Neji's face.
Amidst the sound of a breaking nose, Hyūga Neji was sent flying. Blood sprayed through the air. He landed with a heavy thud, startling clumps of snow to slide whispering from the eaves.
"Urgh..."
In his dazed state, he pressed his right hand against the ground, trying to get up, only to have a merciless foot stomp down on his wrist.
"Pathetic. All you know is self-harm. Seems you don't need this hand either." Hyūga Kumokawa's voice was cold. "Someone like you should just stay quietly in your cage, a little songbird for others to watch and tease."
"No!" Hyūga Neji jolted in panic, but couldn't wrench his arm free.
"What's wrong? What's so bad about being a caged bird?"
Hyūga Kumokawa applied a little more pressure, his voice icy. "Who are you putting on that act of angry helplessness for? It's just that you think, now that you're branded with the 'Caged Bird,' your inexplicable fate can't be changed, and you can only be controlled by those lofty main family members."
Hyūga Neji's lips moved soundlessly. The chapped skin cracked, seeping blood that instantly froze in the frigid air. He kept shaking his head, struggling.
Bullying the young, picking on a child—of course, it's immoral.
Unfortunately, Hyūga Kumokawa had no morals, so moral high ground held no sway over him.
He didn't have time to wait for Hyūga Neji to come to his own realizations. He had to rekindle the desire and ambition in the boy's heart.
Thump.
Hyūga Kumokawa suddenly lifted his foot. Neji, unable to pull back his strength in time, collapsed face-first into the snow.
"Fate is a tyrant's tool to shackle thought, a fool's excuse for self-consolation."
Hyūga Kumokawa looked down at the utterly disheveled Neji, his tone calm. "If you truly want to rebel, then stomp that condescending arrogance under your heel. Make them taste the humiliation and despair of having their dignity and freedom toyed with."
"Not sit here wallowing in self-pity, venting your bitterness with impotent rage!"
Huff! Huff!
Hyūga Neji struggled to roll over, his cheek pressed against the bitingly cold snow, gasping for air. The white puffs of his breath were instantly scattered by the wind. Finally, he could no longer hold back, and tears streamed from his eyes.
In every parting, the one left behind suffers more than the one who goes. The greatest fear of death is that it passes us by, leaving us utterly alone.
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