Naruto: Pride - chapter 5 (Patreon)

The third-year classes were easy to understand; there wasn't much to do or to fail at, except for the Taijutsu classes; no matter how hard I tried to be first in the ranks, Neji always managed to beat me in hand to hand combat, wrath always made it look so easy.

But in the end, none of this mattered since I was number one in the class, and in a real fight, I knew that Neji would be easy to eliminate; unfortunately, the teachers didn't let us fight for real.

My mother, however, had taken to heart to teach me to fight hand to hand; she was not exactly the best in the subject, but her fighting style was very compatible with mine, especially since I am not the type that fights in close-quarters, which was great, because the style of combat that she was teaching had one sole objective, to open space between my opponent and me to subjugate him with my shadows, of course, in my case, I would not subjugate but kill my opponent.

If I had to be honest, I was enjoying part of this strange scenario I had found myself in, because never before I had to train or struggle to get anything I wanted, I was always the one at the top of the food chain, the very best amongst my siblings, I was Pride, the strongest homunculi, I still am… but now, I know my power is not as absolute as I thought it was, I died at the hands of a lowly human because of my inability to see he was a threat that needed to be taken care of.

I learned a lesson the day I died at the hand of Edward Elric, a wound in my pride I will never recover from, a scar to forever remind me, I was killed by a human, and not even the strongest amongst them, not even Van Hohenheim, but his bastard, that day I learned… life is not endless, it always comes to an end, human or not.

“Are you ready?” Neji inquired, bringing me out of my own head.

“Lead the way,” I nodded, wondering what did the Hyuga clan wanted from me and how would I benefit from it.

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The Hyuga compound was big, not as big as the Nara compound if you count the massive forest the Nara clan has; anyways, the Hyuga compound was intriguing and somewhat unsettling; after all, they were the reason I didn’t use my shadows as often to spy on others, their eyes were annoyingly good at catching things, and I didn’t want that, not now at least.

“Hiashi-sama,” Neji kneeled in front of a man that looked exactly like the other fifty hyugas I had seen so far before this point, not surprising though; they all dress the same for clan reasons, I assume.

“A pleasure to meet you,” I smiled, bowing like mother had taught me when meeting clan heads and other important people in the village, “though I must ask, why have I been invited to the Hyuga compound? Neji didn’t elaborate that much on the reason behind this invite,”

Hiashi looked at me, his eyes almost dead before he replied, “I wanted to see the newest prodigy in person,”

So my original assessment was correct, “Oh, I see,” I smiled as innocently as possible.

“Neji, take our honored guest to the main house,” Hiashi ordered, and Neji nodded.

“Follow me,” Neji said, walking past Hiashi, and for a brief moment, I realized something, the kid hated Hiashi, what an exciting development.

“Will do,” I nodded, following him through the large compound until we arrived at a massive house in the middle of the entire Hyuga district.

“Here,” Neji instructed, opening a door for me to pass, “wait here, the main family will be here shortly,” with that, he left, leaving me to wait for who knows what.

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Five minutes after Neji dropped me inside the room, the doors opened once again, this time revealing Hiashi, a bunch of other Hyugas, and two little girls by his side, one around my age and the other around Neji’s age.

“I hope we didn’t make you wait long,” Hiashi smiled a very fake smile.

“No, I just got here,” I shook my head, wondering where was this going.

“This is my oldest daughter, Hinata Hyuga, and my youngest, Hanabi Hyuga,” Hiashi proceeded to introduce me to his daughters; the oldest was shaking under her breath while the youngest was glaring at me, one was shy, and the other was suicidal, fun.

“My name is Hokori Nara, a pleasure to meet you both,” I bowed, as they had bowed to me.

With that said, Hiashi and his daughters took a seat on the table, followed by everyone in the room, leaving me a seat close to Hanabi; what were they playing? “I have heard you have skipped two years and still have perfect scores in every subject,” one of the present Hyuga commented.

“I like to excel at what I do,” I replied, and the Hyuga in question nodded in approval, odd.

“The first in every class, but Taitjutsu, your parents must be proud,” Hiashi added, and I knew where he was going with that.

“I never practiced Taijutsu before joining the third-year class,” I sighed, “But from that to being now the third-best in the class, I have certainly jumped a few spots,”

“I think you very well could graduate right now if you wanted,” A random Hyuga stated as servants entered with the food.

“I could,” I nodded, realizing they were testing me, measuring me up; the question now was, for what? “But first, I want to make sure I know everything the academy has to offer,”

“I see,” Hiashi nodded.

“Hm!” Hanabi rolled her eyes; what is her problem?

“Well, enough talk, for now, enjoy the food,” Hiashi glared at his youngest and from that point, everything was very quiet.

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After a quiet dinner, I left the compound, wondering exactly what was what they wanted, they barely asked me anything, and all the time I spend inside their compound, they forced their youngest to be with me in one way or another, something she didn’t seem to appreciate at all.

“How was your dinner with the Hyuga?” Mother inquired as I entered the house, giving me a cup of tea she had just made, “Did they treat you well?”

“They did,” I nodded, taking a sip of the tea.

“Hm,” Shukaku sighed, “I won’t beat around the bush with you, you are a smart kid… too smart for your own good… the Hyugas want to strengthen the bonds between our clans,”

It took me a second to process what he said, connecting the dots to how Hanabi had been behaving, and suddenly the invitation was clear, they were measuring me up to see if I was marriage material, “WHAT!?!” I coughed, spraying my tea all over the floor; me marrying a human, what an utterly disgusting proposition.

“They haven’t confirmed anything, but I know how they play,” Shukaku yawned, “This is one of the reasons we Nara don’t shine, to avoid these troublesome situations,” he chuckled.

“So you will say no?” I inquired, hoping the answer was what I wanted.

“I will, and your mother will too, but this is a matter of the Nara council kiddo,” Shukaku scratched the back of his head, “Besides, I am not one hundred percent sure they will propose something like that; the Hyuga are very well known for their selective mating, which most of the times ends up being with another Hyuga,”

“Keep me posted,” I sighed, wondering what kind of sick hell was I living in.

“Huh, sure will do,” Shukaku nodded, going back to his nap on the kitchen couch.

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Me? Marrying a human, I wasn’t wrath; the mere idea of having to kiss a human was repulsive, then again, if the clan tried to force me into something I didn’t want, I could always legally emancipate myself from them, but for that, I needed to be a Genin first, which would make me legally an adult.

“So not even ten years old, and you already have a fiance,” Shikamaru chuckled.

“I will cut your throat while you sleep if you keep bothering me, Shikamaru,” I threatened, but for some reason, he took the threat in a light-hearted manner.

“Hanabi is, according to Ino, very cute,” Shikamaru sighed, and I glared at him, “Well, then… what do we do?” he placated with his hand high.

“This is my problem,” I replied.

“You are very stubborn,” Shikamaru smiled, “Well… I have a few plans and ideas to save you the drag of marrying; you can. One start failing classes at a gradual rate, so they don’t notice, which would make you less...attractive, I guess, two you can graduate early and emancipate from the clan, at least until I become head of the clan… then you can come back, and last but not least, we can find the Hyuga girl another match, saving you from the nightmare that is being married,”

I chuckled, “I suppose plan B, plan A is making a fool of myself something I won’t do, and plan C seems like a waste of my time,”

“Thought as much,” Shikamaru nodded, “I think father will like our plans, but lets first wait until they actually make a move; otherwise, we could throw the game before it starts,”

“Very well,” I sighed; at times, it was difficult to remember he was a kid; this clan is filled with anomalies.