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Severed Fates: Hyuga SI Ch.3
🕑 Added 2025-08-08 20:14:46 +0000 UTCChapter 3
NEJI HYUGA
Neji hated weakness. He hated the fate that bound him to being a lesser human being than his cousins, all because she was born to the clan head, while he was the son of the branch line.
He hated seeing the rest of the children being loved by their parents while his own father was dead and buried, as a replacement for the clan head.
But there was one thing he hated more than weakness.
Cowardice.
And the boy in front of him may be his own brother, yet that did not mean that Neji would ever forgive him for his cowardice.
“Here, take it,” his brother offered, and it was a little box wrapped up in paper.
“Consider it my gift to you for your graduation,” Neji wanted to scream at him, wanting to force him into revealing the true emotions hidden underneath that fake smile of his, but he couldn't be bothered to try.
“I have no need of your gifts,” and he pushed it away as he finished packing up his clothes. Now, as a full-fledged genin, he was finally free from the chains of this clan, and though the chains of the ‘Caged Bird Seal’ would forever hang around his neck, he would finally gain the autonomy afforded to an adult of this era.
“Just take it,” his brother pushed forth, but Neji’s patience ran thin as he shoved it away forcefully.
“I said I do not need your gift!” and the box fell to the floor and cracked open, revealing a pair of matching earrings, as he looked into his brother’s eyes, and unlike the others, he was not blind to the rage that lingered inside them.
The storm of anger and rage that mirrored the one in his own eyes, yet their actions could never be different.
“The only gift that you can give me is for you to stop pretending,” Neji snarled, for he wanted to see the real Hikari hidden underneath this mask of smiles and laughs.
No, not just himself, he wanted the world to see it, for he knew that his brother was special. That his brother held both the potential and the power to do what he had always dreamt of doing, for while he may be bound by the chains of the Caged Bird Seal on his forehead, Hikari was free.
He was free to live a life of his own, free from this clan, free from this servitude.
“What pretendin...” and his hand moved on its own as Neji pushed chakra into his fingertips and aimed it straight at those white eyes, yet in the blink of an eye, his brother’s hand moved, and just pushed his hand a bit wide as the smile vanished from his face.
“It's not polite to attack one’s brother,” his younger sibling chastised him slowly, as if speaking to an indolent child, as Neji ground his teeth, for this was what he wished for the world to see.
“Why won’t you do it?” he raged, as his body trembled with anger, as he found himself face to face with his greatest shame.
“WHY!” he screamed, and tried to attack him once more, but Hikari was quicker than him, and grabbed his hand, holding it so tightly that Neji found it impossible to move.
“You can show them! You can show all of them that we are not weak! That just because we are of the branch line, we are not any lesser than them!” But just like the hundred times before today, his brother remained quiet despite his screams, before offering him a small smile.
“I don’t have to prove anything to anyone,” he answered, and Neji ground his teeth as he finally managed to pull away his arm from his brother’s grasp, as he glared at him.
“It’s because of her, isn’t it?” he whispered, and apart from him, there was one other person he would often be seen with, and it was none other than the daughter of the clan head, the heir, Hinata-sama.
“Do you really think that she is our friend?” Neji scoffed, for his brother was rather naive.
“She is just like her father, and the only reason that she plays along with you is because you pamper her like a child,” but again, Hikari refused to answer.
“She is weak! A stain on the very Hyuga name! No matter what she does, she will remain a weakling,” and he finally spoke up.
“Do not speak of her like this, Neji,” his brother whispered, and he came to his defence.
“Do you think she will take pity on us and free us! If so, then you are a bigger fool than I thought,” and with that, he picked up the bag and walked right past his brother, leaving behind the gift that he had brought for him down on the floor.
And just as he had reached the doors, Neji stopped and spoke without glancing back.
“You know when we were young, you made a promise to me,” and though they were the words of a young boy, Neji had clung to them all his life, for they were a promise of freedom.
“That you would bring our suffering to an end,” and yet while he had clung to those words, his own brother had forgotten about them.
“But it seems like you forgot about them all, while I clung on to those words like an idiot,” and he shook his head as he walked away.
“What a fool I was,” and as the door closed behind him, Neji’s ears did not hear the whisper that came after his departure.
“I still remember, brother. I still remember...”
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HIKARI HYUGA
Freedom.
It was not a right in this world, strife with war and death. It was the desire that drove his brother, a desire to be free of his chains and burdens, of his rage and of his anger.
Hikari had once hoped to give him that freedom, but the Gods had other plans for him as the Kumo team made a mistake on that fateful day and entered his room instead of Hinata’s and whether this was because of his own actions or because of fate itself but the Kumo shinobi captured him, a tired boy who had just been stripped of his freedom and ran away, humiliating one of Konoha’s most elite clans.
They were struck down, but not before he was stripped of his Kekkei Genkai, as the selfish elders in charge could not even be bothered to wait for a few hours, pushing his chakra networks to the brink and stripping him of his Byakugan.
But that came with a blessing of its own, for without those chakra networks, the Caged Bird Seal became ineffective in controlling him, and though it had come at a significant cost, a part of him was happy to have his freedom back.
But alas, he had been wrong, for even without the ‘seal’ holding him back, the elders had other methods of ensuring his servitude.
Yet, unlike his older brother, Hikari did not blame the world for his problems. No, he blamed only those responsible, and so despite his fight with him, he still went to the forest and saw Hinata already there, her eyes pinched in a frown as she gazed at a particular set of trees.
“What happened to these trees?” she asked softly, not needing to turn towards him to see him, because of the Byakugan, and as he gazed at the tree, he winced slightly, for this was where he would often train.
“Their wood,” she began, touching the outer bark.
“It’s almost as if it has been burnt from the inside,” and indeed, for though the trees stood tall and firm to the common eye, the sad truth was that they had been hollowed out, or more specifically, burnt out on the inside.
And as she tried to push the tree, he stopped her quickly.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he whispered, as she finally turned towards her, those eyes narrowing in realization.
“You did this,” she asked, and he nodded.
“Yeah, and that is why I asked you to come here as well,” for the clan prohibited the use of ninjutsu for its shinobi. A stupid rule that made little sense to him, but thankfully, he was not a shinobi.
“How?” she asked, and the answer was somewhat challenging to explain, for circumstance made it so that he could not train openly, and without the Byakugan, he could try as much as he wished, but he would never be able to match a Hyuga in taijutsu.
So, that meant he had to rely on genjutsu and ninjutsu, and as the clan prohibited the training of ninjutsu, he had to get creative.
“Well, you see, I found out what the difference is between using ninjutsu and what it means to master your nature affinity?” and that was the question that had plagued his mind for a few years now, and things finally began to make sense.
And he touched the bark of the tree, and began to gather chakra in his palm, compressing it as much as he could, which, with his control, was quite a lot.
“You see, when you have mastered a nature transformation, then you don’t need to rely on hand signs to shift the nature of your chakra. All it takes is intent, and technique, and your chakra gains the properties of the said element,” and slowly he pushed his chakra into the bark before he quickly shifted its nature as Hinata’s eyes widened.
“Fire,” she gasped, and yet the tree remained standing even though it had been burned from the inside.
“Yes,” but her face dimmed as she looked down at the floor.
“But the elders,” she whispered as he ground his teeth in disgust and rage.
“Ignore them, you just need to master your natural chakra affinity, and then use it in conjunction with your taijutsu,” and she nodded, and so he reached into his pocket and took out a small stack of chakra papers.
“Try,” he said, and she reached out for a paper and channeled some chakra into it, and much to his surprise, the paper shrivelled around her finger.
“This means....”
“Lightning,” he answered, as Hinata nodded excitedly.
“You should look in the family library,” he said, and as a member of the Branch family, he had no access to that library, for it was the place where the clan kept most of their kinjutsus and other secrets. Information that only the main line was privy to.
This was one reason why it had taken him so long to learn all that he had, for he had to learn everything through experimentation, and he had to do it all in secret.
“I will,” she said as he gazed up at the darkening sky.
“Well, I think it's best that you leave now,” and she nodded, though not before reaching into her pocket and offering him some folded papers.
“These are all my theoretical lessons from this week,” and that was the deal he had with Hinata, for the clan had forbidden him from attending the academy, but Hikari was not one to give up on his dreams.
He would much rather die than be a slave to the people of this clan, no matter what Hiashi Hyuga may say.
“Thanks,” he said as he pocketed the papers, as she rushed out of the forest, leaving him alone in the forest, as the crickets began to chirp and the Moon began to glimmer.
He took a deep breath as he picked up a leaf from the ground and began to push his own chakra into it.
“Lightning,” and he was pretty surprised by that, for, given her personality, he had thought that she would have a more docile or grounded nature, such as water or Earth.
But lightning, and he could think of a dozen ways of incorporating Raiton into Hyuga taijutsu, yet that all would remain beyond him, for he had been robbed of his eyes years and years ago by the elders of this clan.
The very elders who had kept him chained up for years in fear of retribution.
The leaf in his hand began to burn as he used his chakra to ignite it slowly, showcasing his mastery over his natural affinity. And this had taken him years of work, but now using Katon was like a second nature to him, and just as he was admitting his work, a nasal voice from behind interrupted his thoughts.
“Now what do we have here...”
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