With the morning surprise match against her sister done, Hinata had her breakfast and went to the training ground forty-one to meet Ren and Ino as she thanked the sage it was Saturday.

When she arrived at their clearing, it was already ten in the morning and she was surprised that nobody was there yet. Ren usually had at least some clones over here by this time, ‘messing around’, as he called it, with seals.

Realizing she was on her own for now, Hinata plucked a leaf from a nearby tree and started converting her chakra into a lightning-natured one. The hand holding the leaf instantly shone bright blue and electrical chirping resounded through the clearing as lightning currents started dancing around Hinata’s palm, covering it alongside the leaf.

Ren did not know the Chidori and Kakashi was not using it in the village so Hinata had no frame of reference other than to concentrate lightning chakra in your palm.

By now, she lost count of how many times she zapped or burned herself with her own lightning chakra. Fortunately, as a medic ninja, she could fix her injuries in a short order.

Staring into the blinding lightning current with her eyes closed and her Byakugan active, Hinata’s mind strayed and she idly wondered why Ren asked her if chakra blinded her eyes.

It was such a silly notion. Her human eyes? The biological part? Yes, they could get blinded. But Hyugas could easily fight with their eyes closed and still see. The world they perceived through Byakugan was not based on visible light but on chakra. And it didn’t matter how intense the chakra was. It would not blind them.

If it did, then any sufficiently strong ninja releasing their chakra would have been blinding for them. How would they function as ninjas then?

For some reason, Ren was very disappointed about that but then he got this determined expression… Hinata wondered if it had something to do with his new experimental seals he wanted to show them today.

Honestly, she was excited but also quite apprehensive about the fact that her teacher might be making an anti-Byakugan seal.

She started feeding the technique more and more chakra, trying to keep the lightning chakra more concentrated without harming the leaf. Learning how to channel the chakra in order to keep her hand from being harmed was hard. But channeling the chakra without destroying the leaf? Hinata could feel the beads of sweat rolling down her temple.

It was distracti-

The leaf suddenly caught on fire due to the intensity of lightning when Hinata lost control for a split second.

She instantly smoothed the fire with her chakra and waved her hand in the air to cool it off as she sighed. Her goal was to be able to touch other people and make harming them optional for her while the lightning chakra ran through her hands.

It was an insane goal. The level of control necessary… Hinata couldn’t really imagine it. The lightning chakra was naturally destructive and volatile. But when she said her goal was to re-invent the fabled Chidori, Ren told her she should aim higher before dropping this insane suggestion on her.

Shoot high so even if you fail, you get much further than the average scrubs… was exactly what Ren told her.

It was obvious he didn’t expect her to succeed anytime soon, to be honest. Hinata knew that much. Her teacher loved to teach through failure. Even if she failed the exercise, by the time she got fed up with it enough to give up, her comprehension and control of lightning release were going to be top-notch by nowadays ninja standards anyway.

But she had her pride and was stubborn.

So, she plucked another leaf from a tree and huffed… only to stop in her tracks as Ino and Ren finally entered the range of her Byakugan. She smiled but didn’t pay them much attention just yet. Her range was two kilometers right now and they were not exactly in a hurry. Hinata had a few minutes before they arrived so she started the exercise again.

It was five minutes later and after two more failures when Hinata focused her attention on Ino and Ren just as they were entering the clearing. Her lips spread into a happy smile with a greeting on her tongue when she noticed one small detail that instantly wiped her joyful mood and her expression darkened as a heavy frown surfaced on her face.

Hinata felt as if somebody dunked a bucket of cold water on her as she noticed that Ino’s… insides had remnants of male sperm.

And there was only one man Ino would let touch her.

Hinata couldn’t help the feeling of soul-crushing disappointment and searing jealousy that popped into her mind full of newfound self-pity mixing with anger. Oh, she understood. They had an arrangement. But that didn’t make her feel hurt that Ino sunk her claws into Ren first.

But she took a deep breath, outwardly pretending that she didn’t want to curl up in a ball, and let out a sad whimper. She crossed her arms under her chest and put on a displeased expression.

When Ino and Ren finally arrived near her, she gave them an intense but dry look.

“You had sex.” She spoke in a slightly accusing tone, trying to not sound hurt.

But of course, Ino was over the moon and high on happy natural chemicals so her brain-to-mouth filter was malfunctioning more than usual, “Yes! We had a great night. And shower. And morning. And another shower!” Ino giddily boasted, almost preening in front of Hinata took a deep calming breath.

This girl… she felt the sudden urge to punt her across the village.

By then Ren separated from Ino and much to Hinata’s surprise he hugged her and asked in a concerned whisper, “Are you alright?”

Hinata felt conflicted as she melted into the embrace.

“I am jealous.” She sullenly admitted.

Ren was already opening his mouth to reassure her when Ino grinned and didn’t read the mood, deciding to tease Hinata like usual. “Aw~. Is the virgin Hyuga jelly that my world was rocked first? How cu- oi!”

She had to quickly duck under the senbon that almost embedded itself into her forehead. Hinata was already summoning another senbon from her storage seal and Ren thanked the sage she wasn’t mad enough to put explosion seals on them before throwing them. He quickly scrambled to put his hand on Hinata’s, preventing her from actually killing Ino on accident as he also gave the blonde girl a meaningful look.

“I was just joking! No need to get violent.” Ino, still in a crouch, frowned, the cheerful happy-go-lucky levity was gone from her tone as she realized it was not appreciated.

Ren sighed before releasing Hinata’s hand and his fingers relocated to her jaw. He gently made her turn her head toward him and looked her in the eyes, loving how her gaze softened.

“What about having dinner with me today?” He asked, “I will cook.”

Hinata hesitated for a moment but when she saw with her Byakugan how Ino gave her double thumbs-ups from behind Ren, she finally showed a small relieved smile.

Still… “Just the two of us?” She asked.

Ino had her first time alone with Ren and Hinata was smart enough to understand where this was going. And she would be pissed if she had to share her first time with Ino. After that? Sure. She liked Ino well enough.

But she wanted to be given at least as much respect as Ino.

“Just the two of us.” Ren agreed, causing relief to flood Hinata. “You, er, I mean, you can even stay the night? Maybe? If you want?”

Honestly, as he was asking her out, he felt nervous and awkward. This whole ‘asking a second girl out in front of his first girl he had just spent the entire morning dicking down’ was far more nerve-wracking than it appeared in stories.

Fortunately, they had talked about their relationship like proper adults long ago. They accepted its nature. And while Hinata most likely didn’t like that Ino had sex with him first, his Hyuga cinnamon roll was usually a non-violent person.

Her displeasure was limited to huffing and pouting… and raining down senbons.

Small stuff, really.

“Yes. I’d love that. I can send home a clone so I won’t be missed.” Hinata eagerly agreed, her entire expression letting up like a Christmas tree due to her newfound excitement.

Wryly smiling, Ren kissed her on her forehead before muttering only for her to hear, “That’s my girl.”

Hinata blushed a bit but she also grinned a bit and Ren chuckled as he pulled away from her and clapped his hands.

“Okay! Today we are going to spar! I have a few new seals I want to try and I will need your shadow clones as assistants. Release the gravity seals and make three of your clones please.”

He’d love to keep hugging Hinata, maybe even get handsy but if they started, then the test would be postponed to another day and Ren didn’t want that.

The girls almost instantly switched from casual mode to professional one as smoke briefly covered the clearing around them and when it dissipated, three more Inos and three more Hinatas stood in front of Ren, ready for orders.

Rolling his eyes, Ren unsealed a kunai, “Ino, no.” He said and looked the original Ino in the eyes to show how serious he was.

He then instantly inscribed a seal onto the kunai with his chakra and threw it at three further away from them. The second the kunai hit it, the seal on it destabilized and the tree trunk in a one-meter spherical radius around the kunai instantly turned into salt.

Only the upper branches of the crown were left intact and started falling to the ground with a resounding crash while creaking as gravity reasserted itself. They were swiftly followed by the waterfall of newly-made salt as it rained onto the ground and into the small bowl-shaped crater full of white underneath it because even the ground in the area of effect was turned into salt.

“Switch back with your clone. I am not fighting with the real you using these. It’s too dangerous.” Ren told Ino who stood ‘inconspicuously’ among her clones while one of her clones now stood next to Hinata.

Seeing the tree turn into salt, Ino paled a bit and obediently swapped with her clone again, deciding it would be safer not to try and sneak into this particular spar. “Yeah, you might have a point.” She shakily admitted, her gaze transfixed at the remains of the tree.

She understood why he wanted to fight only their clones now. Fire jutsu could burn you. Lightning jutsu could zap you. Earth could bury you alive… but being turned into salt? Instantly? There was no way to heal that.

There would be nothing left for Hinata to heal.

One missed dodge during a spar and that was that. Game over.

Ino shivered and even the original Hinata looked a bit dismayed, coming to the same conclusion. All of her medical training would amount to nothing in front of that attack.

But clones didn’t have such high self-preservation instincts so one of Hinata’s clones chuckled, “Behold! Ren the Salty Ninja.” She joked, getting an offended look from Ren in return.

As if ‘the bomber’ was not bad enough.

He really hoped that nickname would not catch on. That clone needed to be instantly eliminated and prevented from spreading its evil.

Unfortunately, he missed the momentary mischievous glint in Ino’s eyes before she hid it.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep