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🕑 Added 2025-06-02 16:24:45 +0000 UTCChapter 88: Tailed Beast Fusion
Thud!
Thud!
Three figures collapsed into a pool of blood.
Yatsume Yurei’s neck was snapped from above and below, his head rolling far across the ground.
Naruto, his skin shed and skull fox-like under the Kyuubi’s influence, stared through Yurei’s severed white vertebrae at Hikari. Her face was half-split, jagged teeth dripping with blood.
His vertical pupils trembled wildly.
“Hikari, how did you—”
“Cough, cough—give me your hand.”
Hikari hacked up charred blood clots.
Her condition was dire.
Her chest was pierced through. Though she’d shifted her lungs and heart in advance, it only downgraded a fatal wound to a severe one. The enemy’s desperate counterattack had sent terrifying Raiton (Lightning Release) surging through her abdomen, cooking some of her organs.
Thankfully, she’d blocked out her pain receptors.
She only felt weak and heavy, not on the verge of passing out from agony.
She was clinging to life purely on adrenaline.
“Give me your hand!”
“Huh?”
“Now!”
Naruto didn’t understand why Hikari had become so monstrous, but her tone was unmistakable—this split-mouthed girl was definitely Hikari.
He extended his hand.
But what met his eyes wasn’t the familiar arm he knew. It was a blood-red claw, muscles and flesh exposed, with menacing nails protruding from the fingertips.
So I really am a monster?
Naruto finally understood the source of the village’s hostility toward him.
“Pfft!”
Hikari spat out chunks of the enemy’s flesh, squeezing out her last bit of chakra to reshape her jagged teeth.
Then, she bit down on Naruto’s arm.
“Hiss—!”
Naruto shuddered in pain but forced himself to endure, letting Hikari bite.
Her sharp teeth tore into his arm, miraculously avoiding tendons and only piercing blood vessels.
Sweet, metallic blood flooded Hikari’s mouth.
Gulp!
Gulp!
Her throat worked as she greedily drank Naruto’s blood, along with the lingering Kyuubi chakra within it.
Drip, drip!
The scalding tailed beast chakra flowed down her esophagus with the blood. The blood spilled from her pierced chest, sliding along Yurei’s severed arm, but the tailed beast power was intercepted by Hikari.
Whoosh!
The fiery, life-filled Kyuubi chakra seeped into Hikari’s near-exhausted body.
Crackle!
Her esophagus and meridians were scorched by the domineering Kyuubi power, but the tailed beast chakra immediately converted into vitality, restoring her damaged flesh.
Destruction and repair cycled endlessly.
Her chakra seed pulsed with joy, her meridians like roots greedily absorbing the foreign chakra. Her deep blue essence clashed with the scarlet Kyuubi power once more.
Hikari cautiously manipulated her chakra, splitting the Kyuubi power.
Back at Peichuan Port, she’d devoured tailed beast chakra once before.
That time, it mutated her chakra seed into blue, turning her ordinary azure chakra into a deep ocean blue, granting her seal-less Suiton (Water Release) and the tailed beast cloak.
The unexpected Hyoton (Ice Release) chakra nearly froze her solid, making the process more perilous than a battle.
Now, fully prepared, Hikari was caught off guard again.
Her deep blue chakra tried to slice and consume the Kyuubi power bit by bit, but before she could break it down, the wild Kyuubi chakra acted like it had found kin, ceasing its resistance.
The Kyuubi power even began to meld with Hikari’s chakra willingly. The blue and red chakras intertwined seamlessly, merging without her control, forming a faint purple hue at their contact.
The Kyuubi chakra showed none of the Sanbi’s earlier rejection.
Arrogant, huh?
Hikari kept sucking on Naruto’s arm until his demon fox transformation faded and no more Kyuubi chakra could be drawn. Reluctantly, she let go.
Naruto was utterly exhausted.
He’d split into hundreds of shadow clones to fight the beast horde, then battled Yurei—an opponent far beyond him—while in demon fox mode, and now he’d lost a ton of blood to Hikari.
His blue eyes lingered on the gaping hole in Hikari’s chest.
Crack!
Her chest bones, like a whittling knife, spun along Yurei’s arm, carving it apart like a butcher.
Flesh and bone separated.
The arm fell through the cavity in Hikari’s chest.
Thump… thump…
A heart glowing with a purple aura pulsed rapidly. In Naruto’s blurring vision, it slowly rose from her abdomen, returning to the massive cavity.
Flesh buds sprouted, filling the gap.
As Hikari regained vitality, Naruto grinned, unable to hold on any longer, and passed out.
Hikari examined her body internally.
The four green light points in her brain and chest dimmed.
The four gates of the Hachimon Tonko (Eight Gates) closed one by one.
Her body grew heavier.
At her heart, the purple chakra gradually consumed the red and blue. Once the blue was gone, the red could no longer merge.
Hikari tried to force the new chakra to consume it, but her once-controllable chakra became unruly. The purple was overtaken by the overwhelming red.
The demon fox transformation began spreading through her body, startling her into halting the fusion and expelling the excess Kyuubi power from her heart.
Her chakra and body normalized, steadily fueling her Shikotsumyaku (Dead Bone Pulse) to repair her flesh.
Charred organs shed their blackened shells, revealing fresh pink tissue.
Hiss!
Scalding steam evaporated.
The fused purple chakra flowed through her meridians, inheriting the Kyuubi’s Yoton (Yang Release) traits, rapidly healing her battered body.
Her Byakugan’s pale gray pupils filled with purple.
Her Shikotsumyaku tapped into new potential, vying for the remaining Kyuubi power.
Her steel-like bones, now absorbing Kyuubi chakra, grew denser, a faint ashen hue creeping across their surface.
All her powers were evolving.
A tidal wave of strength surged from the depths of her body, filling Hikari’s heart with joy faster than the flesh filling her chest cavity.
The Kyuubi’s power was like a supreme tonic—abundant and satisfying.
The chakra lingering in Naruto’s blood alone surpassed Hikari’s peak reserves.
Most crucially, this life-filled chakra not only healed her internal injuries but synergized with her Shikotsumyaku, elevating her self-repair to near-Sage Body levels.
In moments, her near-death state recovered to roughly a severe second-degree injury.
Still grievous, but no longer life-threatening.
That was enough!
As her chakra neared depletion from healing, dizziness hit Hikari’s brain, and the world blurred.
Her head grew heavy.
Her vision darkened, and she collapsed.
Thud!
Her small but heavy body kicked up dust.
Moonlight poured down.
Silver-blue light flowed through withered branches, the scent of humus and night dew chilling the air.
The chaotic battlefield fell silent.
Only the crackling of flames on branches broke the quiet.
It was just past midsummer, the foliage lush. The fire couldn’t sustain itself, soon fading into choking green smoke.
Insects, disturbed by the smog, crawled away through the grass.
Time passed swiftly.
The forest’s insect hums faded, sinking into deep silence.
Whoosh!
Rustle!
A swift figure darted through the treetops.
Swish!
Like a falling leaf, an old man in black combat gear stepped into the shattered battlefield.
His boots paused on the brittle branches.
Sarutobi Hiruzen, finally arriving, was stunned by the scene.
The ground was scarred with jagged trenches, irregular pits as if the earth had been overturned. Charred tree trunks leaned over, split by lightning, their fires gone but smoke still billowing.
At the battlefield’s center, three figures lay still.
The towering, muscular man was unrecognizable, his chest torn open, heart exposed. His scarlet neck revealed jagged vertebrae, wounds torn as if by a beast. His head rested quietly on the ground, features twisted, legs limp like noodles, arms shredded.
Hiruzen frowned, thinking.
Elite Jonin from each village were well-known. This man’s familiar face and imposing build, even in death, sparked a memory.
Moments later, details surfaced.
Kumogakure’s Wild Thunder—Yatsume Yurei.
A veteran elite Jonin of the Yatsume clan, active in the ninja world forty years ago.
When Hiruzen accompanied the Second Hokage to Kumogakure for a peace treaty, Yurei was already a renowned master. They’d even met once.
Decades later, this old man had infiltrated Konoha by some unknown means, only to die at the hands of two academy students.
Hiruzen’s emotions were complex.
He was shocked at Konoha’s massive defensive lapse—how had an enemy entered undetected? Furious that Kumogakure dared send a ninja after the Kyuubi during peacetime, risking war. Yet proud that Konoha’s young saplings were so exceptional, with Hikari and Naruto slaying such a foe together.
His gaze shifted to the other two.
Naruto, with his yellow hair, lay bloodied, his exposed flesh slowly regrowing skin.
Hikari was even more horrifying, her white robe soaked red, a massive cavity in her chest.
Hiruzen could see her pulsing lung lobes.
His throat tightened.
Their horrific wounds made even Hiruzen’s heart skip.
But considering the strength of their opponent, surviving with only severe injuries was a miracle.
He couldn’t help but wonder.
What kind of brutal battle caused such explosive injuries?
No time to linger.
Hiruzen swiftly formed seals, spitting water to douse the smoking trees.
He hoisted Naruto and Hikari over each shoulder, their contrasting weights making him pause briefly. Grabbing Yurei’s head, he turned to leave.
A gentle breeze blew.
At the battlefield’s center, only a twisted, headless corpse remained.
Training Ground Zero, South Gate
Firelight illuminated the crowd.
Medical ninjas with kits bandaged injured students. Teachers with notebooks recorded names, compiling a death toll.
“Iruka-sensei… sob… Taiji, he—he’s gone—”
Yuta and Ryuya, sobbing, reported to the recording teacher. Yuta, usually arrogant when bullying Naruto, was red-faced, trembling with gasps.
Iruka, already aware of the tragedy, wrote Taiji’s name heavily, his expression somber.
Every encounter with death was heavy.
Recalling his family lost in the Kyuubi attack, Iruka gazed toward Training Ground Zero.
Naruto carried the Kyuubi. From Shino, he’d learned the enemy’s target was clearly the Kyuubi.
If the Third Hokage didn’t arrive in time, if the enemy unleashed the Kyuubi…
The disaster from six years ago would strike Konoha again.
How many would lose their lives?
Iruka couldn’t bear to imagine.
He could only close his eyes and pray that the Third would resolve everything and his students would return safely.
Hyuga Neji prayed alongside him.
“Neji, aren’t you hungry?”
Tenten eyed Neji, who was squeezing his bread to a pulp, her big eyes full of confusion.
Not to your taste?
No need to strangle it!
The bread was practically flour now.
Neji, ever polite, opened his mouth to reply but found his throat voiceless.
Kazama Etsu’s arms were destroyed. Even the hospital’s head medic could only save his life.
This showed how terrifying the enemy was.
An elite Jonin, one of the handful in any village. No matter how gifted or strong Hikari was, her age limited her. Holding out until the Hokage arrived was a slim hope.
Yet she was the branch family’s only hope in a millennium!
Neji closed his eyes in pain.
His fingers grazed the Caged Bird seal under his headband.
The world’s greatest pain wasn’t living in darkness but glimpsing light only to fall back into shadow.
Hinata, the main family’s heiress, faced the enemy and emerged unscathed despite her weakness. But Hikari, the branch family’s genius, was still missing, her survival unlikely.
Is this… fate?
The inescapable Caged Bird, the destiny of all Hyuga branch members?
An intangible fate felt all too real.
“They’re out!”
“It’s the Hokage!”
“That’s…”
Neji, lost in pain, was jolted by the teachers’ cries.
“Medical ninja—hurry!”
“This girl’s badly hurt!”
Whoosh!
Neji’s eyes snapped open.
A crowd blocked his view.
Byakugan!
Activate!
Never had he formed seals and activated his eyes so fast.
At the crowd’s center, a pulsing argon-purple chakra filled his vision.
It was a chakra he’d never seen, yet the most beautiful color he’d ever witnessed, sustaining its dying owner’s final spark of life.
A radiant smile spread across his face.
She’d beaten fate once again!
Chapter 89: The Hospital Trio
Midnight.
Konoha Hospital.
Moonlight slipped through the window, casting orderly white patches on the pristine bedding.
Uchiha Sasuke lay curled up on his side in the hospital bed, his eyes hidden in the darkness, staring blankly at the pale windowsill. His pitch-black pupils were dull, like unpolished pearls devoid of luster.
Clan. Brother. Parents. The sticky blood and everything shattered to pieces.
He didn’t even know what he was thinking about.
Pain, sorrow, rage—but above all, confusion.
That morning, everyone had been talking and laughing. By the time he returned from school in the evening, everything had changed.
Sasuke couldn’t understand.
In just one day, what had happened to the clan? Even after days of resting in the hospital, he still couldn’t fathom why Itachi had been so heartless.
Tap, tap, tap…
Urgent footsteps and heavy breathing echoed from the corridor outside, accompanied by hushed voices.
Huff…
Sasuke let out a long, heavy sigh.
The hospital, quiet until moments ago, had suddenly grown noisy. Already plagued by a throbbing headache, he now found it impossible to sleep, irritation gnawing at him.
Tap, tap…
The footsteps grew closer.
The nurses’ hushed murmurs, faint as mosquito buzzes, became clearer.
“How did so many kids get injured all at once? There aren’t even enough beds!”
“I heard the ninja academy held a wilderness training exercise and ran into an attack from rogue ninjas from another village!”
“No wonder! Did you see how badly those two kids were hurt? Especially that girl—I was scared to even touch her while bandaging her…”
“Shh, stop talking. I think this room has two empty beds.”
Knock, knock, knock!
A soft knock came from the door.
Sasuke squinted, pretending to sleep.
He didn’t want to share a room with strangers.
Since the Uchiha clan’s massacre, every nurse and doctor who saw him gave him strange looks.
Pity? Sympathy?
He couldn’t quite read their expressions.
But those looks constantly reminded him of the pain he’d endured—inescapable, unforgettable.
Knock, knock, knock—click!
The door swung open.
“Two empty beds, perfect.”
“Isn’t that kid from the Uchiha—shh, keep it down!”
Their voices were low, but to Sasuke, they were just noise.
Rustle!
He pulled the blanket over his ears.
The two nurses froze mid-conversation, quickly retreating from the room.
Moments later, the sound of a medical cart rolled in from outside.
This time, there were more people. The footsteps were heavier—not the two female nurses from before.
“This girl’s kinda heavy. Lend a hand!”
“One, two, three—go!”
Thud!
Creak, creak, creak!
A heavy body hit the old bed, making it groan as if a seven-hundred-pound giant had been hoisted onto it.
Huff, huff…
The male nurses panted heavily.
“She’s built like a tank!”
“Hope you say that to her face when she wakes up.”
“What good would that do me?”
“Hey, if you survive her, you’re basically Konoha’s next elite Jōnin!”
“Pfft, elite Jōnin? I’d rather pass.”
The group chuckled as they lifted another person onto the adjacent bed.
Click.
The door closed.
Their busy footsteps faded into the distance.
Sasuke, still under his thin blanket, heard every word clearly.
Curiosity sparked by their conversation, he quietly lifted the blanket and turned to look at the bed beside him.
Long, silver hair spread across the pillow, glinting like matte metal under the moonlight. The girl lay flat on her back, arms splayed out, her delicate features unobscured. Her profile was speckled with bloodstains, and her cherry-blossom lips were slightly pursed, a flash of crimson peeking through the gap between them.
Despite being gravely injured and unconscious, she showed no trace of weakness or fatigue.
Her bandaged chest rose and fell every seven seconds, her heavy breathing paired with a steady heartbeat, like a slumbering beast ready to devour anyone the moment it awoke.
“ Kaguya Hikari?”
Sasuke froze for three seconds before snapping out of it.
He’d never seen Hikari’s full appearance before.
At the academy, she always wore a loose cloak and a large blindfold that covered most of her face, giving her a mysterious air.
If not for the undeniable strength radiating from her even in this state and her signature silver-gray hair, he might not have recognized her.
Recalling the nurses’ earlier conversation, Sasuke pieced together what had happened.
A wilderness survival exercise had gone wrong. Rogue ninjas from another village attacked the students. From the men’s teasing remarks, it was clear Hikari had faced their main force—and likely killed them.
Surviving against Hikari was enough to qualify as an elite Jōnin?
Sasuke didn’t know how much of their talk was exaggeration, but for them to say something like that, Hikari’s feats must have been extraordinary.
He gazed at the beautiful girl sleeping like a lion.
If he remembered correctly, his father, the head of the Uchiha clan, and his brother, the clan’s prodigy, were on that same level.
But Hikari was so much younger than them.
This was a true genius.
Compared to her, the man who destroyed the Uchiha clan seemed utterly ordinary.
As for himself… Sasuke looked at his hands.
Scolded by his father since childhood, crushed by the “mediocre” Itachi, he was probably closer to “trash” or “dead last” than anything else when compared to Hikari.
Pride and inferiority were two sides of the same coin.
Sensitive after the clan’s destruction and the trauma of Itachi’s genjutsu, Sasuke felt the weight of a peer’s overwhelming talent. His mindset, already teetering on one extreme, began to quietly tilt toward another.
Huff… huff…
Suddenly, a loud snore broke through the room, jolting Sasuke from his spiraling thoughts.
He glanced at Hikari.
Her chest rose and fell slowly, her breathing steady like the heavy pendulum of a clock tower.
It wasn’t her.
Sasuke shook his head and sat up, his gaze moving past Hikari to the bed on her left.
There, a blond kid covered in bloodstains slept sprawled out, mouth wide open, snoring loudly with each breath.
Yup, the real “dead last” was right there.
Sasuke suddenly felt less inferior.
No matter how bad he was, he was still better than Naruto, right? At least he could see the gap between himself and a true genius. Naruto, that idiot, probably didn’t even realize how high Hikari’s level was!
With that thought, Sasuke felt he was still a step above “dead last.”
With Naruto as the bottom rung, his mood lifted considerably.
Even his sleepless mind started to feel a hint of drowsiness.
His eyelids grew heavy.
Sasuke slowly closed his eyes.
Eng… eng…
The snoring grew louder, eventually sounding like an elephant trumpeting in a zoo.
For a long time, the restless boy covered his ears, irritably counting the stars in the sky.
Despair filled his eyes.
Damn that dead last!
Eng!
“ENG!!!”
Naruto, mouth agape, slept soundly.
The next day.
Konoha Hospital, Room 203.
Morning light flooded the room, bathing the stark white walls in a warm, golden glow. Three beds stood side by side, evenly dividing the space and the sunlight into thirds.
The black-haired, dark-eyed boy, sporting heavy dark circles under his eyes, tilted his head to stare at the still-sleeping silver-haired girl. His handsome cheeks flushed red.
Her chest rose and fell slowly, and he mimicked her breathing rhythm, as if trying to uncover the source of her strength.
On the other side, the blond, blue-eyed boy gazed at the girl’s delicate profile, wondering if last night’s bloody, terrifying battle had been real.
An impregnable armor of lightning, an unstoppable spear of thunder, a massive fox caged in a mountain-like prison, Hikari’s body pierced through, her snarling fangs—and his own terrifying power, no less frightening.
He touched his forearm, where a bite wound had been.
The injury, along with the charred flesh across his body, had fully healed without a single scar.
Yesterday felt like a dream.
Waking up in the hospital bed, even seeing Hikari’s bandaged chest, Naruto couldn’t tell dream from reality.
He noticed Sasuke across the room.
Naruto had heard about the Uchiha clan’s massacre. He didn’t know the pain of losing family, but it couldn’t be lighter than the agony of seeing Hikari’s body pierced through.
Best not to bother him right now.
Time passed slowly.
The sunlight in the room grew brighter, almost blinding.
A faint tremble of eyelashes.
Hikari, the most gravely injured, finally stirred, squinting as she woke.
“Mmm…”
Hikari struggled to open her eyes.
A faint light greeted her.
The membrane over her pupils blocked most of it, leaving only a hazy white glow. Having exhausted her chakra and lost consciousness, her Shikotsumyaku’s ability to suppress pain had failed, and a sharp, drilling pain stabbed at her chest.
Something’s wrong with my Byakugan—wait!
Instinctively, she tried to channel chakra to activate her Byakugan but stopped abruptly.
Her fingers brushed against her smooth eye sockets.
The wide cloth that usually covered her eyes was gone.
Hikari dispersed the chakra gathering in her eyes.
When the Byakugan activated, the veins around her face would bulge—an unavoidable effect of chakra flooding her meridians.
This visible effect couldn’t be controlled by her Shikotsumyaku’s bodily manipulation.
Forcing it would be like biting a straw flat and trying to drink through it—no matter how hard she tried, the chakra flow wouldn’t pass through the narrowed pathways.
Until she could overthrow the Hyūga main branch, the blindfold was essential for freely using her Byakugan.
She opened her crystal-like eyes.
Raising a hand, she groped blindly at the pillow and headboard, like a severely nearsighted person searching for glasses.
Naruto and Sasuke, who had been watching her, snapped to attention at her movements.
Sasuke quickly turned his head away, his chest heaving guiltily, afraid Hikari would notice him mimicking her breathing.
He wasn’t sure if her unusual breathing rhythm was some secret technique.
In ninja battles, information was everything.
Stealing or prying into someone’s secret techniques was an absolute taboo. He wasn’t close to Hikari, and if she took offense, a single punch could justifiably crush him.
Even the Hokage wouldn’t have much to say about it.
Compared to Sasuke’s complex thoughts, Naruto was far simpler.
Seeing Hikari awake, he scrambled off his bed, brimming with questions. “Hikari, you’re finally up! Last night—”
“Stop!”
Hikari raised a hand, cutting off the overwhelming presence of the massive “chakra mass” to her left.
Then, a jumble of emotions—murky confusion, vibrant orange joy—poured from the “chakra mass” on her left, flooding her mind through some unknown means.
What’s this?
The unexpected sensation confused her. She turned to “look” at the “chakra mass” on her right.
It was much smaller, barely a speck compared to the left, but it too carried a mix of emotions.
Deep yellow tension, green jealousy, gray-blue pain…
These emotions were darker, more complex, and harder to distinguish than the vibrant hues on the left.
Hikari was certain her Byakugan wasn’t active, and it didn’t have the ability to sense emotions anyway.
That left only one possibility: the Kyūbi’s “malice perception.”
Could malice perception distinguish emotions this clearly?
Watching the colorful emotions drifting from both chakra masses, Hikari was astonished.
She’d thought the Kyūbi’s sensory ability would be vague, but it was incredibly precise, capturing every nuance of emotion, not just good or ill intent.
No wonder the Kyūbi liked Naruto so much.
His mind was pure, his emotions bright and full of goodwill.
Just looking at his vivid, untainted emotions lifted Hikari’s mood.
The other “chakra speck,” though?
A mixed bag.
No extreme malice or killing intent, but the tangle of negative emotions suggested that, while not a bad person, they could easily veer to extremes under prolonged influence.
Hikari closed her eyes, immersing herself in the radiant emotions of the two, as if stepping into a new world.
Their feelings were laid bare, no secrets hidden. She observed them freely, gradually understanding the colors corresponding to each emotion.
Naruto, seeing Hikari close her eyes as if probing something, grew anxious. He knew she was blind—if her injury had robbed her of her ability to sense the world, it would be a devastating blow.
In Hikari’s perception, gray and yellow lights flickered over Naruto, settling into a gray-green hue she hadn’t seen before.
Was this… concern?
A spark of insight hit her, and she quickly identified the emotion.
“I’m fine, don’t worry.”
“Heh, good to hear! Wait—how’d you know?”
Naruto’s emotional light shifted from gray-green to orange-yellow, then to blue-white surprise. Hikari marveled at the cheat-like power of her new ability.
No wonder the Kyūbi, Kurama, was the strongest of the tailed beasts.
Even an obscure ability from the original story was this powerful.
To reduce such a nuanced emotion-sensing ability to mere “good or evil” detection was such a waste—only a creature as naturally gifted as a tailed beast could afford to squander power like that.
Thinking of Kurama’s terrifying chakra, Hikari could understand why it opted for a simple approach: sense malice, blast it with a Tailed Beast Ball. Quick, brutal, effective. Far easier than analyzing every flicker of emotion.
She found the ability powerful precisely because she wasn’t strong enough yet.
Clatter, clatter…
As Hikari immersed herself in Naruto’s emotions, the sound of a cart rolling in from outside the room broke her focus.
