Chapter 51: Hinata vs Kurenai

Hinata vs Kurenai

At nine in the morning of the next day, Hinata's last test before becoming a genin began. Truth be told, it was a rather boring affair. Kurenai hid herself inside a nearby forest, while Hinata, Shino, and Kiba had to track her down. Unlike Kakashi's test, there were no hidden conditions and no tricks to make the team fight each other, so the trio passed easily. The truly interesting part, however, happened after they passed the test.

"You were holding back, weren't you, Hinata?"

This question was asked by Kurenai, who noticed that Hinata clearly wasn't giving it her all while chasing Kurenai down.

"Indeed. We were supposed to work together as a team. It wouldn't make sense for me to go all out."

Kiba, naturally, was outraged by this.

"What!? Are you looking down on us? Do you think we are too weak to fight together with you?"

Hinata could only smile wryly while lifting her hands in a disarming manner.

"Please calm down, Kiba. This wasn't meant as an insult. I went through a lot of harsh training to reach my current strength. I didn't want to say that you two are weak, but that I am rather abnormal."

Before Kiba could argue some more, Kurenai intervened.

"How about we put that to the test? Let's have a little sparring match, Hinata. You against me. Like this, you can go all out without worrying about hurting someone."

Hinata pondered for a while and then nodded in agreement.

"Sure, why not? So far Yuna is the only one I ever fought seriously, so this might be interesting."

Kurenai felt that something was off about that sentence, but due to her own ignorance, she decided not to bother.

"Kiba, could you start our little match? Then we will see if what Hinata said was actually true or not."

Kurenai, naturally, already knew that Hinata was much stronger than a normal academy graduate, her two teammates need to be made aware of that, as well. That is why she decided to have this little sparring match. She would fight Hinata for a while to show off her strength instead of defeating her instantly. That should probably make those two realize the difference and might even result in them putting more effort into training from now on.

Although Kiba wasn't happy about being on the sidelines, he begrudgingly accepted his sensei's suggestion. He walked between the two fighters, lifted his hand, and then slashed it downwards.

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"BEGIN!!!"

The moment the battle started, Hinata's face twisted into an aggressive smile, while her battle intent crashed into Kurenai. Before Kurenai could fully understand what was going on, the sword in Hinata's hand that seems to have come out of nowhere was already about to pierce through Kurenai's shoulder.

Kurenai's eyes widened in shock. She quickly circulated chakra through her body and moved her shoulder backward, barely avoiding the first blow. Hinata, however, was far from done. Her left hand, which wasn't holding her sword shot forwards as well. Her index finger was straight and blue chakra was glowing at its tip, while the other fingers were balled into a fist. The finger was aiming straight at Kurenai's neck and if it hit, it would be a fatal strike no questions asked.

Kurenai's eyes bulged when she saw Hinata actually aiming for the kill. She already was in an awkward position from the last dodge, but still somehow managed to dodge the second one by jumping backward. She was just about to yell at Hinata for attacking this seriously when her eyes widened yet again. Kurenai didn't see every hand seal Hinata did, but considering she was taking a deep breath and was about to blow it towards her direction it was rather obvious she was using ninjutsu.

"[Water Style: Raging Waves]"

A torrent of water was shot towards Kurenai. Although this wasn't as dangerous as the last two attacks, Kurenai would rather not be hit by it either. She put some chakra into the soles of her feet and jumped up while doing half a spin. The soles of her feet stuck to one of the tree branches above her, while Hinata's jutsu passed through underneath Kurenai harmlessly. Kurenai thought she could finally take a breath and analyze the situation, but with a flick of Hinata's sleeve, a volley of senbons was shot at Kurenai, forcing her to dodge, yet again.

'What is wrong with her? She is absolutely relentless.'

Kurenai went through some hand signs in an attempt to stop Hinata with a genjutsu, but just a split-second after she was hit, she had already released herself from the genjutsu.

'Isn't she supposed to be a genin fresh out of the academy? How can she spot and dispel my genjutsu this easily? If I had the time to create something stronger, I could probably stop her, but her relentless attacks prevent me from amassing the necessary amount of chakra to do so.'

Kurenai had to, yet again, dodge Hinata's sword. This time, instead of going for one lethal strike, Hinata chained her attacks together into a dangerous combination of broadly spread sword strikes and pinpoint precision finger attacks. Thanks for reading on ManaNovel!

After Kurenai managed to get away from her, Hinata, for the first time in this fight, didn't continue her attack. With a happy smile on her face, she started speaking.

"Haha, Yuna was right. Fighting different strong opponents really is fun. The way you react to my attacks is totally different from how Yuna would react. It is really hard to chain my attacks together properly when I can't predict your movements."

Kurenai, understandably, almost spat out blood when she heard that.

'Hard to chain your attacks properly? You have spent the last five minutes relentlessly chasing me around the training ground without even giving me the time to properly gather my thoughts and yet you claim you weren't chaining your attacks properly? No! calm down Kurenai. There are more important questions to ask, now that you finally have the chance to speak.'

"Hinata, it seems like most of your attacks were either lethal or at least could cripple your enemies. Why did you use attacks this dangerous in a simple sparring match?"

Hinata, however, only tilted her head in confusion.

"Kurenai-sensei, you told me to go all out without worrying about hurting you, so I would naturally fight you in the most efficient way I know. The most efficient way to defeat someone is, obviously, to just kill him as soon as possible. That is what Yuna taught me."

Kurenai made a mental note that she definitely should have a serious talk with Yuna before she could teach weirder things to Hinata. Kurenai was just about to stop the fight when Hinata clapped her hands together in front of her. A battle thirsty smile appeared on her face and her chakra flared out.

"Anyway, Kurenai-sensei, how about we continue? I still haven't shown you the jutsu I personally created after all."

Kurenai was, naturally, surprised that Hinata apparently created a jutsu on her own. After all, the creation of a new jutsu is usually something only an incredible genius could do. Yet again, Kurenai made the mistake of not thinking too much about Hinata's words and nodded in agreement.

Hinata kneeled down and slammed both of her hands on the ground while closing her eyes. She hasn't mastered this jutsu enough to use it in actual combat, but since Kurenai agreed that she wanted to see it, Hinata naturally went for it. A few seconds later the ground started to shake as massive amounts of water started to ooze out of it.

"[Water Style: Water Spear Domain]"

A few moments later, everything around Hinata in a radius of about 50 meters had around 10 centimeters deep pools of water almost everywhere. Kurenai was just about to ask what the use of such ninjutsu was when a massive amount of water moved and formed into dozens of spears that were pointing towards Kurenai from all directions. Right now, Kurenai really regretted suggesting this sparring match, but she was a newly appointed jonin sensei, so she decided to at least keep her dignity and not stop the match right here. Yet another decision, she would regret later on.

-

Kurenai couldn’t help but curse her own stupidity as she barely dodged another high-pressured jet of water that was shot at her.

‘Damn it, I should have just stopped this match when I had the chance.'

“HAHAHA, this is so much fun, Kurenai-sensei!”

Hinata could feel another genjutsu slam into her mind and quickly dispelled it. Yuna has spent a lot of time training Hinata and Naruto against genjutsu, after all, being caught inside a genjutsu for a single second could be a death sentence.

Feeling another one of her genjutsu being dispelled easily, Kurenai really wanted to curse, but another volley of water spears being hurled at her prevented her from doing so. She deflected a few with the kunai she was holding and dodged the remaining ones. While dodging, Kurenai pulled out a few shurikens and tossed them at Hinata in an attempt to break her concentration, but the moment the shuriken got close to Hinata, a wall of water formed in front of her and blocked the shuriken.

If Kurenai had more time to think, she would probably be terrified about how versatile Hinata’s jutsu was, but considering she had to constantly dodge around the battlefield, she really didn’t have the time to think about it too deeply.

As a jonin, Kurenai had a lot of actual battle experience, so seeing through the weak point of Hinata’s jutsu was rather easy: Hinata couldn’t move while using it. The problem was actually abusing that weak point. Projectiles will simply get deflected by a wall of water. Kurenai’s genjutsu doesn’t seem to work on Hinata at all and Kurenai didn’t know any ninjutsu powerful enough to break through Hinata’s water shields. Her next idea was to approach Hinata and attempt to entangle her in a taijutsu battle, but Kurenai quickly realized that the closer she came to Hinata, the more powerful and fast the water jets became.

Kurenai felt her dignity as a sensei take somewhat of a dip when she decided that the best move for victory was to keep dodging Hinata’s attacks while pressuring her with shuriken, but decided that this was still better than actually losing the fight.

It took another five minutes for Hinata to finally run out of steam and Kurenai couldn’t help but sigh in relief. Her stamina was rather close to being depleted, while her chakra was rather close to that point, as well. Despite that, she still held her head high and pretended to be totally fine. She couldn’t lose her dignity as a jonin after.

“Haha, as expected of a jonin, Kurenai-sensei still seems to be completely fine. Since you seemed to be surprised by me going for a lethal attack, I toned it down, but it seems I should have just kept going for the vital points like I previously did since you are fine despite me attacking you for so long. Oh well, I guess I will just have to give it my everything in the next sparring.”

Kurenai, understandably, almost coughed out blood when she heard that.

‘Is this how I will die? Killed by my own student, because I pretended to have everything under control? No! I won’t fall that easily! I am not a jonin for nothing. I will increase my training while thinking about strategies to counter Hinata. No matter what, I won’t allow myself to lose to one of my students!’

While Kurenai reignited her passion for training and becoming stronger, Shino and Kiba looked at Hinata like she just grew a second head. The only Hinata they knew, was the silent and meek Hinata inside the classroom. Although Hinata has already shown that this was just a façade, neither Kiba nor Shino expected it to be this extreme. Rather than a battle between a jonin and a freshly graduated genin, the whole fight seemed more like a battle to the death between experienced jonin to the two of them.

It took a while for Kurenai to gather her thoughts, but when she did, she decided that it was time to separate.

“Alright, as I have already said, all of you pass the final test and are hereby officially promoted to genin. Although all three of you have the same rank, Hinata will be assigned as the leader of your three men cell for now. If you have any complaints about that, please state them now.”

Kiba and Shino, however, were only looking at Kurenai like she was making a joke. After witnessing that kind of fight, who would still dare to oppose that kind of arrangement?

“Good, it seems like everyone is fine with that arrangement. We will meet again tomorrow at 8 in the morning for you to receive your first official mission. Dismissed.”

As soon as Kurenai left, a rather awkward silence descended onto the three-remaining people. Kiba and Shino had no idea how to talk to the “real” Hinata, while Hinata was contemplating what to do with the rest of the day. A few seconds later, Hinata noticed how awkward Shino and Kiba looked and decided to do something about it.

“Well, since we are a team from now on, how about we grab something to eat together? There is a really good ramen booth near the market, my treat.”

“Really? A ramen booth? How could something as simple as ramen be special?”

As soon as Kiba said those words, he felt the atmosphere shift. He had no idea what was going on, but he felt like he just created an enemy for life for himself, somehow. Hinata could only shake her head in disapproval.

“Kiba, you shouldn’t say things like that out loud. There are people out there that have a lot of passion if it is about ramen. Naruto is one of those people, so I hope you don’t say anything you will regret later on.”

Kiba, however, didn’t seem to care about that at all.

“Haha, isn’t ramen just a bunch of noodles that gets dumped into soup? What is so special about that?”

This time, instead of just creating an enemy for himself, it felt more like he just created someone who literally couldn’t exist while Kiba was still there. It felt like someone was created for the sole purpose of fighting against him.

Hinata, meanwhile, couldn’t help but flinch a little when Kiba said that ramen was “just a bunch of noodles that gets dumped into a soup.”. She knew how important ramen was to Naruto, so she decided to never talk about what just happened ever again. Since Naruto would probably go into a rampage if that kind of sentence was revealed, it was better to never speak of it again.

After a few more minutes of discussing how to proceed, it was finally decided that they would indeed have some ramen together to celebrate their graduation.

Hinata could only shake her head with a wry smile when she noticed Kiba happily eating his ramen without any complaints.

‘He should have agreed to my words. Those that badmouth ramen had, as far as I know, quite a few pranks played on them. Oh well, I guess it is finally time to graduate, to break free of the chains shackling me. To finally live freely. To finally be…ME.’