But that excitement and joy only lasted for a short while. Very soon, Hyuga Neji saw something that nearly drove him to despair. In Kaede Kitahara's understanding, it was almost impossible for the Hyuga Clan to awaken the Tenseigan. They did not even have a clear upgrade system.
But then another thought occurred to him. Was the Tenseigan hard to obtain? Then was the Rinnegan supposed to be easy?
It was known as the Sage's Eyes, the first among the Three Great Dojutsu, and in all these years, had there not only been one Nagato?
Even Uchiha Sasuke's was an incomplete version.
Once he thought of that, he felt even worse. Even if Uchiha Sasuke's was incomplete, it was still a real Rinnegan. But what about him?
He had died early in advance. He had nothing.
Then he looked further down. The same Byakugan, placed in Hyuga Hanabi's eye sockets, was only an ordinary Byakugan. Placed in Otsutsuki Toneri's eye sockets, it could become the Tenseigan.
He had only just been thinking about how difficult it was for the Tenseigan to appear, and now a pair of Tenseigan had appeared right in front of him. From the sound of it, Otsutsuki Toneri had taken the Byakugan from Hyuga Hanabi's eyes.
He thought of what Kaede Kitahara had written about the Caged Bird Seal. The Caged Bird Seal was a kind of restraint, but at the same time, it was also protection to some degree. Just now, he had still been wondering what kind of protection that was.
He had never heard of protection that demanded such a brutal price.
But now Hyuga Hanabi's situation gave him an entirely new perspective. So the Byakugan really could be dug out?
And the one coveting the Byakugan was their own relative, Otsutsuki Toneri.
Clearly, this Otsutsuki Toneri should not be one of the Otsutsuki from deep space mentioned in the diary. He was most likely from that so-called Otsutsuki Branch Family on the moon.
But Neji could not understand it. Why dig out Hyuga Hanabi's eyes?
Of course he knew who Hanabi was. She was his uncle's second daughter, and even at such a young age, she had already shown astonishing talent in training.
He even knew that Hyuga Hanabi had not been marked with the Caged Bird Seal. She possessed the freedom he dreamed of.
And the fundamental reason she had not been marked with the Caged Bird Seal was the mediocrity of his other cousin, Hyuga Hinata, that younger sister who was always careful around him, always trying to get close to him from behind.
He understood that perfectly. It was just that his heart had been filled with hatred, so he had always dismissed Hyuga Hinata's attempts to show him kindness.
He had even embarrassed Hyuga Hinata during their practice matches before. In his eyes, Hyuga Hinata had become the representative of the useless Main House.
The Main House was filled with useless people like that. They clearly had no real talent, yet just because they were born earlier, they could occupy the position of Main House. As for the Branch House, which one of them was not descended from the brothers and sisters of the Main House in the past?
There were plenty of outstanding people in the Branch House. In fact, the Hyuga Clan's reputation as a noble clan was supported by the Hyuga Branch House, since everyone knew the Hyuga Main House did not go to the battlefield.
The one time they did, they lost an eye, and that incident had once thrown the Main House into a fury.
And as the Clan Heiress of the Main House, Hyuga Hinata's performance was so poor that it had also caused much dissatisfaction and criticism among the clan members.
Precisely because of that, Hyuga Hanabi should have already been marked with the Caged Bird Seal, just like him.
But she had not. Because right now, there were rumors throughout the clan that clan head Hyuga Hiashi wanted to make his second daughter, Hyuga Hanabi, the heir.
That could barely even be called a rumor anymore. Anyone with half a brain could figure it out.
So his feelings toward Hyuga Hinata had always been mixed with a little pity beneath his dislike. He pitied such a mediocre person, someone who would lose her identity as heir to the Main House and fall to the same status as him.
It was just that Hyuga Hanabi was still young, so he had never paid much attention to her. Now he was being told that in the future, that man named Otsutsuki Toneri would dig out her Byakugan and use them to evolve the Tenseigan?
How was that possible?
Did Hyuga Hanabi really have that kind of talent?
There were rumors in the clan that Hyuga Hanabi's talent and potential far surpassed her older sister Hyuga Hinata's, but in his eyes, that potential was only impressive compared to Hyuga Hinata. There was no way she could surpass him.
And now reality had overturned that belief. Was Hyuga Hanabi's Byakugan purity really that high? Was her potential really that great?
How was that possible?
"The Tenseigan… So the Hyuga Clan doesn't lack an evolved form after all."
Uchiha Sasuke gave a proud little snort. Although he still did not know what the so-called Tenseigan was, anything Kaede Kitahara could describe with a word like treasure definitely could not be bad.
"The strength of the body itself can also determine the evolution of the eyes?"
Uchiha Itachi silently recorded that point. This was an entirely new idea.
He had never considered before that there might be any connection between those two things.
"Otsutsuki Toneri, the Otsutsuki Branch Family from the moon…" Uchiha Itachi wrote and sketched on the paper.
If Kaede Kitahara's guess was right, and the Hyuga Clan were the remnants of the Otsutsuki Main House from the moon, then using the word remnants to describe them meant things must have been miserable back then. Calling them Stray Dogs was probably not wrong at all.
But judging from the later fact that Otsutsuki Toneri dug out Hyuga Hanabi's eyes, the Otsutsuki Branch Family should also know how to reach the Shinobi World. In other words, they should have had a way to come down and pursue them.
Then what had caused the Otsutsuki Branch Family to choose not to come down and hunt down the Hyuga Clan?
Do not talk about familial love. That was not realistic. Since internal strife had already broken out, it meant the Otsutsuki Branch Family must have hated the people of the Otsutsuki Main House to the extreme. One only needed to look at the Main House members of the current Hyuga Clan, every one of them strutting around with their noses in the air. Back when he had still been in Konoha, he had already heard plenty about that.
They practically did not treat the Branch House as human.
From that, it was clear that the original Otsutsuki Main House probably had not been any better. That was why the Otsutsuki Branch Family had rebelled.
Then why had they not chased them down?
Was it because they could not find them?
Or was it because the Otsutsuki Branch Family was also in bad shape after the rebellion?
That was very possible. Generally speaking, in every major ninja clan, the Main House possessed an absolute advantage. Resources were all concentrated toward the Main House. For the Branch House to rebel and actually succeed, they had likely exhausted all their potential.
Then what exactly was this so-called God Tree?
What was this thing the Otsutsuki Clan relied on?
This related to a possible future war against the Otsutsuki Clan.
However, what interested him even more was the evolution method of the Rinnegan that Kaede Kitahara had mentioned. From the Sharingan to the Mangekyo Sharingan, then to the Rinnegan, there had to be some method to achieve it.
It was just that Kaede Kitahara knew but refused to say it.
He wanted to record it for Sasuke. If they could learn the method, they could arrange for Sasuke to complete it instead of ultimately obtaining a half-baked Tomoe Rinnegan.
"Kekkei Mora? What is that supposed to be now?"
Jiraiya looked at yet another concept raised in the diary and felt his head ache.
From the initial concept of Kage Level, to Super Kage Level, to Six Paths Level, and now to Kekkei Mora, he suddenly felt that his own Kage Level strength was truly insignificant.
"The known Six Paths Level is named after the Sage of Six Paths. Since Otsutsuki Hamura's strength was inferior to his older brother, the Sage of Six Paths, then he definitely did not reach Six Paths Level. In that case, this Kekkei Mora may be even stronger than Six Paths Level," Jiraiya judged.
It was just that there was currently too little information to reference, so all he could do was make blind guesses.
"Otsutsuki Toneri, the thing mentioned in the previous diary entry about the moon rushing toward the Shinobi World… Could it have something to do with this Otsutsuki Branch Family?"
Hatake Kakashi looked at the contents of the diary and suddenly thought of something.
If there really was a connection, then that would be terrifying.
That was not the moon rushing toward the Shinobi World. That was the moon crashing into Earth!
[But Otsutsuki Toneri is honestly impossible not to laugh at. Misunderstanding things runs in the family. Though it's hard to say whether the Otsutsuki Branch Family really misunderstood Otsutsuki Hamura's last words, or whether they simply used them as a reasonable excuse for their own betrayal and rebellion.
Because the Otsutsuki Main House couldn't carry out the ancestor's will, it's our turn to take charge of the moon and the Shinobi World? Kill off the Earth's Shinobi World?
That's too ridiculous!
Not to mention Otsutsuki Toneri, that unlucky kid. At his peak, he could go Fifty-Fifty with Naruto and Sasuke, but later he couldn't even beat the Otsutsuki Fisherman. He got taken out the moment he showed up. Was it because he no longer had the Tenseigan to use?
But that makes sense. This world's power system is basically divided into two things, the Legend of Eyes and the Legend of Tattoos. If you don't have tattoos and you don't have eyes, of course your strength is going to drop sharply. It's just that the drop was a little too ridiculous.
The Otsutsuki Fisherman couldn't even withstand the Uchiha Pile Driver, which shows just how weak he was. For Otsutsuki Toneri to actually get ambushed by the Otsutsuki Fisherman, what a miserable man. Was it because he wasn't in his own movie anymore?]
The new information Kaede Kitahara revealed made everyone's pupils tremble. Aside from Seventh Hokage Naruto, who knew the situation more clearly, everyone else had no idea such a thing had happened.
So the moon crashing into Earth mentioned in the diary was not some kind of accident after all. It was inevitable?
And it had even come from the last command of Otsutsuki Hamura, one of the two Otsutsuki brothers. Destroy the Earth's Shinobi World?
That was simply too terrifying!
No wonder there had been an incident where the moon was going to crash into the Shinobi World. So this was the reason behind it.
Everyone could fully imagine what would happen if a celestial body as massive as the moon slammed directly into the Shinobi World. It would be a catastrophe beyond comprehension, the sky collapsing, the earth splitting apart, the world ending.
Everyone's wariness toward Otsutsuki Toneri instantly rose to the highest level. After all, compared to Nagato, who had merely destroyed one village, or Otsutsuki Momoshiki and Otsutsuki Kinshiki, who had only come for the Tailed Beasts, Otsutsuki Toneri, who wanted to destroy the entire Shinobi World from the start, was the most terrifying and the great villain they needed to guard against most.
"Madmen. These people from the Otsutsuki Branch Family are madmen!"
Hyuga Neji's face turned deathly pale.