Chapter 11

Chapter 11 — Swear Loyalty to Me!

The pain felt as if ten thousand shuriken were stabbing into his brain. Hizashi had experienced it not long ago.

It happened when he was watching Hinata’s training. Seeing her overwhelming talent had stirred a deep killing intent within him, which was noticed by Hiashi Hyūga. In response, Hiashi activated the Caged Bird curse seal and punished him on the spot.

And it was done right in front of Neji.

But why did the mysterious person before him know the hand seals required to activate the Caged Bird curse mark?

This was the most closely guarded secret of the Hyūga main family, passed down orally between clan heads and elders for hundreds of years. It had never been leaked.

No branch family member could possibly know it.

Since the birth of the Caged Bird seal centuries ago, no outsider had ever been able to use it.

Yet this man kept shattering everything Hizashi believed about Hyūga traditions.

As Uzumaki Menma finished forming the seals, the splitting headache finally eased.

“You are not a member of the Hyūga clan,” Hizashi said, breathing heavily, still shaken. This was the only thing he could be certain of.

“And you’re not one of those who once slaughtered my clan.”

Without realizing it, Hizashi had already accepted the “historical truth” Menma had implanted in his mind.

It was not as if the Byakugan had never fallen into outside hands. During the Third Shinobi World War, Ao of Kirigakure had stolen the Byakugan of a Hyūga main-family ninja, earning the title “Byakugan Killer.”

But incidents like that were extremely rare—far from enough to justify the widespread implementation of the Caged Bird seal.

Only an external enemy powerful enough to threaten the entire Hyūga clan could explain why such a seal had been created.

“Your target… is that eye formed from countless fused Byakugan, isn’t it?” Hizashi’s voice trembled as he recalled the immense power of the giant eye.

He was no fool. On the contrary, Hizashi was intelligent—intelligent enough to leave behind a so-called suicide letter after being forced toward death, instructing Neji not to resent the main family.

That letter had remained in Hiashi’s possession until the first Chūnin Exams, when it was finally given to Neji.

In its own way, that had been Hizashi protecting his son.

“You’re very perceptive. That’s one of the reasons I chose you instead of your brother,” Menma admitted without denying his ambition.

The giant Tenseigan was essentially a celestial weapon capable of launching attacks from the moon onto the shinobi world while leaving no possibility of retaliation.

Naturally, Menma wanted such a weapon under his control.

In the Inifinite Tsukuyomi world, he had searched for the giant Tenseigan and the lunar Ōtsutsuki clan, but even after combing through all Hyūga records, he found nothing.

Hearing himself compared with his brother made Hizashi’s fingers clench white.

“You are no worse than him. I can tell you’ve already grasped the essence of the Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms. So why didn’t you use it in the earlier battle?” Menma continued, deliberately provoking him.

Yes…

Thinking back, if the mysterious attacker had not struck from his blind spot and forced him into a life-or-death crisis, he would never have used the technique Rotation.

“I… am not inferior to him…” Hizashi murmured.

This had been the wound in his heart for over twenty years.

Because he was born merely minutes later than his twin brother, he was relegated to the branch family. The Caged Bird seal was carved onto his forehead, denying him access to higher-level Gentle Fist techniques and the clan’s secret arts.

Even his descendants would bear the same mark, generation after generation.

“Swear loyalty to me.”

Wearing a white three-eyed fox mask, Uzumaki Menma approached and formed a one-handed seal.

“Caged Seal!”

After completing the hand signs, Menma pressed his palm against Hizashi’s forehead.

A dark, violent chakra surged into Hizashi’s mind, temporarily sealing the Caged Bird curse mark.

In that instant, Hizashi felt something he had never experienced before—

Freedom.

The seal on his forehead did not disappear, but it dimmed significantly.

The lingering pain vanished. The blind spot behind his head was gone. His Byakugan vision returned to a full three hundred and sixty degrees.

Tears streamed from his pale eyes.

He had nearly forgotten what complete vision felt like.

The long-lost sense of freedom awakened something that had lain dormant for more than twenty years.

“This technique will last only twenty-four hours,” Menma said, withdrawing his hand.

In the Inifinite Tsukuyomi world, Menma had developed this sealing method using the Uzumaki clan’s natural talent for fūinjutsu specifically to counter the Caged Bird.

The principle was simple. Curse marks like the Caged Bird were combinations of sealing techniques and chakra. Like parasites, they attached themselves to the host and consumed chakra to sustain their existence.

Anyone proficient enough in sealing arts could theoretically devise a method to suppress it temporarily.

But only temporarily.

Menma already possessed at least three methods capable of completely removing the Caged Bird seal.

Unfortunately, none could be tested within the Inifinite Tsukuyomi world.

And even such a “simple” research topic was forbidden.

The Uzumaki clan—masters of sealing arts—had been destroyed. Within Konoha, only a handful of ninja understood sealing techniques, and any Hyūga who approached such knowledge would immediately be stopped by the main family.

Hizashi raised a hand to his forehead, feeling the rare sensation of freedom.

“Will you remain a coward for life… or become a hero of the branch family—even if only for a few minutes?”

Menma dispelled the illusionary space and vanished.

Hizashi found himself back in the hospital room. Sunlight streamed through the window so brightly that reality itself felt uncertain.

After enduring multiple layers of genjutsu, he could no longer distinguish illusion from reality.

Activating his Byakugan, he sensed the restored three-hundred-and-sixty-degree vision and felt an unprecedented exhilaration.

“So this… is the scent of freedom?”

He thought of his child.

When Neji cried in agony during the ceremony where the Caged Bird seal was carved onto his forehead, Hizashi—the father—could only kneel nearby and watch helplessly.

He thought of the branch family members bearing the same mark, their Byakugan eyes filled with numb resentment.

And of the brother who had been destined to stand above him simply because he was born earlier—

Hyūga Hiashi.

“A coward for life… or a hero for a few minutes?”

The mysterious whisper coiled around his heart like a venomous snake.