There was still one year left before school started.
It had been the most fulfilling year since Hinata's Transmigration.
In that year she grew from five to six, her cultivation quietly climbing from Qi Refining Fourth Layer to the Peak of that stage, only a hair's breadth from breaking through to the fifth.
Konoha lived under high pressure every day, yet nothing actually happened—only the air stayed tense.
The extra year of buffer let her consolidate her foundation at leisure and probe more deeply how this Ninja World could mesh with her own path of immortality.
Most of the time Hinata stayed secluded in her courtyard inside the Hyuga Clan Compound, her consciousness slipping again and again into the Legacy space.
The ten-to-one flow of time was her greatest reliance.
Inside, she focused on perceiving the essence of spiritual power and on forging microscopic control.
She spent long hours coaxing a single thread of lightning-attuned spiritual energy to gather at a fingertip, not as a crackling arc but as a stable, nearly invisible edge of numbing sharpness.
She imbued her palm with fire-attuned spiritual power, not chasing explosive flames but sharpening its instant penetration and heat, simulating an "internal scorch."
The techniques were weak, yet they taxed the finest control of spirit; for weaving spirit into real combat they were indispensable.
At the same time she began using spirit to assist taijutsu.
While rehearsing the Hyuga Clan's most basic Gentle Fist stances she guided an imperceptible wisp of spirit through certain meridians, not to strike but to fine-tune muscle tension and perfect the line of every motion.
The result lent the soft-looking punches and palms a hidden resilience and sudden explosive potential.
All of it stayed perfectly masked by the Breath Concealment Technique; to outsiders she merely practiced with dull diligence.
System points crept upward, slow but steady.
Apart from daily cultivation quests and the occasional trivial task involving main characters, nothing major triggered.
The points came in scraps and fragments—never many.
"Looks like only big events give real rewards; dailies are peanuts."
She browsed the System mall carefully.
"Tch, I want everything—so why is it all so expensive? I can't save a thing…"
Hinata hesitated over exchanging for a higher-grade qi-refining technique, but Basic Qi Introduction Art was not yet at Perfection, and swapping arts carried risk, so she stayed her hand.
A shaky foundation brings the whole building down…
That year her contact with the outside world remained limited and deliberate.
Her relationship with Hyuga Neji hovered in a delicate state of "pointer" and "questioner."
Neji seemed to treat her as a special cultivation benchmark, occasionally bringing doubts from his own training.
Hinata could always pinpoint the slightest choke in his Chakra flow or hitch between Moves, yet never explained, attributing it to "the Byakugan's sight."
But Neji never saw her activate the Byakugan.
Perplexed, he grew ever more aware of the heiress's perception; his attitude shifted from initial resistance to a complex mix of respect and curiosity.
With Uzumaki Naruto she kept her distance, watching from afar.
She glimpsed Uchiha Itachi several times; he looked busier each time, his brows heavier with fatigue.
Hinata dared not approach any Uchiha—she had no idea whether the Sharingan's genjutsu could affect her. If she were controlled, her secrets might spill; she would not gamble.
Illusions are hardly weak in the cultivation world, yet they work only on the weaker; otherwise the caster dies.
She could sense the mighty Chakra inside Itachi and the darker, gloomier ripples of ocular power.
"Hah… being a double spy must be stressful. Wanting peace for the Village and redemption for the Uchiha—since when did the world offer cake and let you eat it too?"
Hinata murmured.
The power struggle between Uchiha and Senju had raged since the Village's founding; how could one man change that?
Without strength you're only swept along, a piece for others to play.
Later Danzo will hold Sasuke's life over Itachi, demanding the clan's annihilation before the coup, birthing tragedy.
Yet for Konoha it will be the cleanest ending; the Third will silently approve.
Sacrifice the Uchiha, buy Konoha's peace… The compound's collective Chakra of resentment, far from easing that year, built like steam in a sealed boiler, restless and desperate.
Another winter passed; spring returned, and the Ninja Academy's admission letter reached the Hyuga household—she was to enroll.
What surprised her was that the Uchiha catastrophe had not come early; it had held out until her opening day.
Apparently Fugaku still wanted one last gamble.
Though Fugaku possessed the Mangekyo, his goal was not to raze Konoha but a bloodless coup to seize the Hokage seat and restore clan pride.
He planned to use Itachi's Anbu access to strike the Konoha Leadership, never expecting to be stabbed in the back by his own son.
Itachi's loyalty to the Village outweighed loyalty to clan—or even to parents.
Thinking of it, Hinata had to snort.
"Your Uchiha really are prodigies—perfect demon-cultivator stock."
Still, it had little to do with her; their choices were their own, and minds rarely change with words.
Naruto?
Oh, he's different—he has the Otherworldly Mouth.
"I'm a warrior, not an orator…"
Soon the admission letter arrived at her home.
Looking at the envelope, Hinata sighed.
"Tch, so I still can't escape the tragedy of school…"
"Well, at least there's no math or physics—otherwise I'd lose it."
Wait, there is—but it hardly matters. Look at Naruto: zero on the written test, strongest in the Ninja World later.
Still, cultivating immortality is tougher than math, but the feedback is real.
Math and physics… unless you're so good you can build high-tech gadgets with your bare hands, they stay useless—trash skills.
Here, might makes right. Should she analyze the world's physical Laws, dissect Chakra, invent the most scientific cultivation method?
Even if she succeeded, the higher-ups would clamp down; one day she'd "commit suicide" by taking five Kunai to the back.