34 Young master Neji

In the Hyuuga compound, Kimimaro groggily opened his eyes as the warm and soft sunlight of the winter morning touched his face.

"Ahh…" he softly groaned while slowly opening his white, pupil-less eyes. Looking around, he found Haku sleeping peacefully on another bed, with the white rabbit cutely snuggled into his arms.

'Should I wake up Haku-chan?' Kimimaro proced to wake him up. 

'I should call him Haku; I don't know why he didn't like it when I called him that. He became very scary when I called him that.'

'And that rabbit, he is also the same as Haku-chan,' he thought to himself. Grabbing Haku's shoulders, he shook his body while saying, "Wake up, Haku. It's the third-day Hinata-sama told us to be ready for training."

He continuously shook Haku's body until Haku also opened his white, pupil-less eyes, similar to Kimimaro's. 

"Stop shaking me; I am already awake," Haku glared at him.

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"Ahh... I see," he awkwardly withdrew his hands with a somewhat wry look. He still didn't know how to properly interact with people.

Haku got out of bed, holding the rabbit in his arms, and with his iconic smile and closed eyes, he teased, "Do I look like a girl."

"No."

"Then why are you behaving like that?" he asked. However, Kimimaro didn't know how to answer his question, so he stayed quiet. 

Haku just laughed at him.

'Why do Haku-chan and Hinata always make fun of me?' he thought. It's not like he didn't like it; on the contrary, he liked it very much.

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It was their third day since they arrived at their new home, and they were slowly starting to familiarize themselves with the clan and its rules. 

Kimimaro, who was looked at with fear by his barbaric and savage clan, found that here it was different—nobody feared him, everyone treated him as a normal child. 

Kimimaro didn't know how, but everybody in the clan knew his and Haku-chan's names.

'Maybe those old-looking guys had told them,' he concluded with his limited knowledge. 

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An old lady in maid's clothes cleaned their house and made food for them.

In just five days of traveling and two days of living in the clan, his pale face had regained color, and his malnourished body started to show great signs of improvement.

In the bathroom, he looked at his brown hair. "I still don't know how they changed my hair color."

"Let me bathe quickly, so the maid wouldn't get angry for being late." He quickly took a bath and reached the dining table with quick steps, where Haku was already waiting for him.

'How did he get here so fast?' he wondered, sitting down on the chair.

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The maid had already prepared the food. She had received strict orders from the elders to dutifully serve those kids as caretakers. She couldn't go against their orders. 

With a happy smile, she asked, "If you need anything, call me, okay?"

Both of them nodded and quickly finished their food. Without thinking about the plates, they rushed out of the house to find Hinata. 

She had told them to meet her on one of the training grounds. So, with excitement, they started to approach the training ground. She hadn't met them for two days, and they both understood that she had a lot of things to do as a clan heiress.

As soon as they reached the training ground, they didn't find her, but there was someone else sitting motionless on a rock. 

It was none other than the genius of the Hyuga clan and the dear brother of Hinata herself, Neji Hyuga. 

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Slowly opening his eyes, he stared directly at them. With an emotionless voice, he spoke, "Who gave you the permission to enter this training ground?"

This training ground was for him and his little sister, and to him, they were just random children who lost their way and mistakenly entered. He behaved like a spoiled child and a cute older brother in front of Hinata, but that was only in her presence.

Other than her, he was cold, and arrogant, and believed in his superiority, not considering anyone worth his time. This attitude was engraved in his bones by his devilish sister. 

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And this was the first time he was faced with someone who so casually entered their sacred place.

Slowly standing up from the stone, with steady steps and his head held high, he approached them. 

He stopped 5 meters from them; there was stillness. Haku and Kimimaro stared back into his eyes, the wind ruffling their long hair.

Neji wasn't informed about them, so he didn't recognize them. He had only heard that his sister had two kids from her trip, so he didn't know their faces. 

As for Haku and Kimimaro, they also didn't know Neji, but they had heard about him. Every clan member talked about how talented and genius he was, second only to his sister. His praises were everywhere.

The staring contest intensified, and tension grew higher in the air. Haku and Kimimaro knew they had Hinata's backup, and she had told them not to fear anyone.

As for Neji, he was Neji.

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Haku, the peaceful one, spoke with a smile, "Hinata-sama told us to come."

Neji squinted his eyes when he heard his sister's name. He knew better than anyone else that no one had the audacity to even utter her name without permission. Her name was forbidden. Her terror was real, and if someone dared to address her so casually, that meant they either didn't value their life or had permission to speak.

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"Oh, so you are the two kids that my sister bought…" It didn't take him long to understand the situation.

"Yes," Haku nodded with a smile. "Then you must be Hinata-sama's brother, Neji Hyuga," he politely asked.

A smirk appeared on Neji's face; his young master's demeanor was on full display. "So, you're here to train," he asked.

Both of them nodded at the same time; that's why they were there.

"Tell me, why do you want to become strong?" he asked in Hinata's way.

"Because we want to protect and stand beside Hinata-sama," Haku said.

Neji looked at them. Hinata had briefly told him how she saved them, and they became dedicated to her. Even in the face of death, they wouldn't back away. And here they were in front of him. To him, his sister mattered the most, and he wanted to test if they were worthy or not.

"I see," he nodded to himself after seeing their eyes. "Let me see what you got." He put his hands in his pockets and instructed them to attack him. He was using one of the techniques taught by his sister—A technique to hurt someone's pride.

Haku, trained by Hinata for around 20 days, didn't underestimate him. However, Kimimaro, who had zero experience in fighting, rushed towards him, and he didn't like Neji's attitude.

Kimimaro's flesh ripped apart, and a dagger made of bone appeared in his hands.

Neji raised his eyebrows in interest, "So this is the Shikotsumyaku, the best taijutsu ability," then memories of his sister telling him about this rushed back. When he looked at Kimimaro, a smirk appeared on his face. 'You devil sister… haha,' he inwardly chuckled.

He swiftly spun on his toe, avoiding Kimimaro's attack. Raising his left knee, he hit him in the guts. "Ohh… so that's why it is called the best taijutsu ability," he literally felt a jolt of pain in his knee. 

On the other hand, Kimimaro didn't feel as much pain as he should have from the attack.

Neji dodged a barrage of senbon needles that were aimed at his vital points. "I see, you are better than this one," he commented while slightly jumping in the air. 

With a roundhouse kick, he buried Kimimaro in the ground, placing his foot on his back. "Is that all you've got?" he mocked.

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Kimimaro grunted when the soil entered his mouth. He tried to move, but Neji's force was too much for him to overcome. 

Not knowing fully how to utilize his kekkei genkai, in a last-ditch effort, spiky bones burst out from his back where Neji's foot was placed.

"Nice," Neji commented, but before the bones could pierce his foot, he jumped away. 

As soon as he landed, he skillfully dodged a kunai aimed for his heart. Haku had used the Body Flicker Technique to quickly appear in front of Neji. Spinning the kunai in his hand, he sliced at Neji's throat, but Neji skillfully dodged by arching his back to gain distance between the kunai and his neck.

'He is moving the same way as Hinata,' thinking this, Haku again stabbed his kunai towards Neji's heart. With his left hand, he shot three senbon needles at point-blank range.

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 Neji, unfazed, raised his left knee and hit Haku's wrist which was holding the kunai. Before the three senbon needles could reach him, he bent backward, his head literally touching the ground.

With a quick motion, Neji shifted his body and kicked Haku in the chest.

'How can he move like this?' Haku thought before hitting the ground.

Hands still in his pockets, Neji slightly shifted his neck, and a bone dagger passed beside his ear. Spinning around and slightly jumping, he performed three kicks simultaneously—one to the knee, one to the shoulder, and lastly to the head—and Kimimaro was again buried in the ground. 

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The force behind his kicks was tremendous. If Kimimaro didn't have his kekkei genkai, he would have had many bones shattered.

Neji knew this, and that's why he was using so much brute force against him. If he wanted to injure him, he could have done it in just one move. 

The Gentle Fist directly damages internal organs; it doesn't matter if you have strong bones or armor to protect you, as it bypasses all defenses and damages the body internally. 

'The perfect counter,' Neji thought while looking at Kimimaro, who was still trying to hit Neji. In Neji's eyes, he was moving at a snail's pace.

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Haku used the Body Flicker Technique and appeared in front of Neji, all of his movements lethal and precise. However, these proved futile; Neji's speed was too much. 

While dodging Haku's kunai, Neji swept Kimimaro's legs, and when he was about to hit the ground, with a powerful kick, Neji sent him flying at breakneck speed. Kimimaro hit the ground many times before finally stopping.

"It's your time, pretty boy," Neji bent his body to the left and lifted his right leg to deliver a powerful kick. But Haku raised his hand and poured all of his chakra, and a slab of ice appeared in front of him.

However, Neji increased the power behind the kick and slightly expelled the chakra from his soles. His kick shattered the ice slab like a mirror, and at the last moment, Neji dramatically decreased the strength behind his kick. When the kick finally made contact with Haku, he was sent flying back, landing beside Kimimaro.

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Neji didn't want to hurt them; he knew if he did, his sister would be angry at him. He would never do things that could make his sister angry or sad. 

However, from this spar, he knew the potential of these two was immense, and they had the capability to protect his sister. That was enough for him.

As he looked at the two boys lying defeated on the ground, 'I finally won for the first time, but this doesn't feel like a victory,' he thought as he approached them, his hands still in his pockets and an arrogant smirk on his face.

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'I have to become strong,' Kimimaro looked at the blue sky. This was the first time he had been defeated like this. He had done some little spars with Haku-chan, but this was completely different. 

He wasn't able to land a single hit on Neji—no, he didn't even make him break a sweat. 

He felt like a rabbit surrounded by a pack of lions. 

The fire to become strong burned even more ferociously inside him.

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'If the gap between us is this much, I wonder how powerful Hinata is,' Haku thought while standing up. 

He hadn't won any spars with Hinata, but she at least showed him a very little bit of mercy while teaching him. Neji, on the other hand, was different; he just toyed with him.

 'He really is her brother,' he thought, finding so many similarities between them—the same air of superiority, the arrogance, the way of walking, speaking, and fighting were almost identical.

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But what he didn't know was that his goddess groomed Neji and molded him into what he was. He didn't even know the true extent of her darkness. 

'I can't stay behind anyone,' he thought with determination after witnessing Neji's strength.

This was another eye-opener day for them. 

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Today was Hinata and Neji's rest day, that's why he was practicing his chakra control.

He walked past them without saying anything, he heard from his aunt that Hinata had gone to the park, and he also wanted to go there.

But before he could exit the training ground, Haku asked curiously, "Where are you going?"

Neji looked at him for a long minute before speaking, "To meet my sister."

"Can we come along?" Haku asked. He had nothing to do, and he didn't know anyone except Hinata.

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Neji took a deep breath, then looked at their clothes. "Change your clothes," he said. If they were going outside the clan, their every move and representation would affect the clan, and he didn't want anyone to think less of his clan.

In just 20 minutes, both Haku and Kimimaro had another bath and were dressed in new clothes.

"Let's go," Haku said with excitement. This was the first time he would be seeing the village. Neji, Haku, and Kimimaro walked side by side. 

The most excited one was Haku, and even though Kimimaro held the same excitement, he didn't speak aloud. And just like this the trio slowly approached the park with energetic steps.