"Father, what's your read on tonight's kidnapping attempt?"
Sensing the anger simmering beneath Hiashi's frozen exterior, Miyuki knelt formally on his futon, his expression serious as he put the question to the head of the Hyuuga clan.
Hiashi didn't even need to think about it. "Kumogakure's obsession with the Byakugan isn't anything new. Throughout the entire Third Great Ninja War they've made countless attempts to steal it. The war's winding down and they still haven't gotten their hands on it. They're getting desperate."
This wasn't speculation. It was common knowledge. Everyone knew the Byakugan was what Kumogakure wanted most.
Kumo was widely regarded as the strongest of the Five Great Villages when it came to taijutsu. Multiple generations of Raikage had been close-combat specialists. For a village like that, the Byakugan was practically custom-built. Three-hundred-sixty-degree vision. The ability to see chakra flow in real time. Pair that with Kumo's existing taijutsu prowess and you didn't just get an upgrade. You got something exponentially more dangerous. Both Konoha and Kumo understood that perfectly well.
"So then, Father. If Kumo's operation tonight had actually succeeded, what would have happened?"
"That..."
Before Hiashi had even finished processing the first question, Miyuki hit him with a harder one.
Right. Darbi's mission had been a total failure. But what if it hadn't?
"If they'd taken you, you'd have been dissected for research before long. And if their operative had died here instead, they'd have demanded we hand over whoever killed him. Either way, someone in this clan was going to be sacrificed."
Hiashi's fist clenched as he spoke. He knew this incident ran far deeper than the surface suggested. The potential fallout could have been catastrophic.
"And if either of those scenarios had played out, how would Konoha's leadership have handled it?"
"They'd bury it. Pretend nothing happened."
"Why?"
"Because we're in the middle of ceasefire negotiations. As long as there's no damage that threatens the village's survival, a life or two means nothing against the bigger picture. Even if... those lives were ours."
He was right. The Third Great Ninja War had dragged on for years. If Kumogakure and Konoha signed this peace agreement, it was effectively over. Every level of Konoha's leadership was treating these negotiations as the top priority. Nothing else came close.
It wasn't that the Sandaime Hokage, Sarutobi Hiruzen, was cruel. It wasn't that the rest of Konoha's leadership didn't care about the Hyuuga. The reality was simpler and uglier than that: a handful of Hyuuga lives weighed nothing against wartime casualties measured in the tens of thousands. That was all there was to it.
No matter what price the Hyuuga had to pay, Konoha's leadership would push the negotiations through. You could call them cold-blooded. But from where they sat, the math was obvious.
I understand. The bigger picture comes first. You can't get hung up on the details. But if I understand all of that... then why does it make me so angry?
"Father, you don't look so good. Everything alright?"
Hiashi was still lost in that dark spiral when Miyuki's voice pulled him back.
"I'm fine. But none of this is your concern. You just need to..."
"It's frustrating, isn't it? Getting pushed around by another village, right to your face, and not being able to do a thing about it. Having to hand the man who invaded your home back in one piece."
"You..."
Hiashi's body went rigid. He had never expected words that cut this close to the bone to come from his three-year-old son.
Because that was exactly it. As the head of the Hyuuga, Hiashi wouldn't make a scene. He'd bring Darbi to Konoha's leadership, and he'd watch them return the prisoner to Kumogakure with a polite bow. That was how this was going to go.
Was he okay with that? Of course not. Someone had broken into his clan's home, targeted his son, and he couldn't even raise his voice about it. The enemy had come to his doorstep, gone after his own child, and the appropriate response was apparently to smile and move on. That kind of helpless, choking frustration was something only people who'd lived it could understand.
"What exactly are you getting at?"
Hiashi let out a long breath. Resigned. Weary.
The Hyuuga's position wasn't something he could change on his own. They carried the title of one of Konoha's two great clans, sure. But everyone knew the village really only had one clan that mattered, and that was the Senju.
The Shodai Hokage was Senju. The Nidaime was Senju. The Sandaime was the Nidaime's student. The Yondaime was the Sandaime's student's student. Every single leader Konoha had ever produced traced back to the Senju line.
After decades of that, virtually every position of real power in the village was held by people from the Senju's sphere of influence. The so-called "two great clans" label that the Uchiha and Hyuuga shared was nothing more than a hollow title. Decoration on an empty shelf.
Where there were people, there was power. Where there was power, there was struggle. Hiashi had no interest in playing political games. But tonight was a vivid reminder of what happened when you didn't have a seat at the table: you couldn't even avenge your own family.
"Father, the Hyuuga don't go looking for fights. But we're not pushovers either. Letting someone walk all over us sets a precedent we can't afford. Give ground once and you get breathing room. Give ground ten times and you've got nothing left."
"And so?"
"So that Kumo shinobi has to die. He can't be allowed to leave Konoha alive. Consider it a warning to both Konoha's leadership and Kumogakure's."
As he said this, something cold flickered through Miyuki's eyes. A glint of genuine killing intent, visible even on that small, childish face.
Darbi couldn't die inside the Hyuuga compound. But that didn't mean Darbi couldn't die at all. Since Hiashi was already here, Miyuki saw no reason to hold back. He laid out his thinking in full. Because the last thing he wanted was to watch Darbi stroll out of Konoha alongside the Kumo delegation, smug and breathing.
"Let's hear it."
Hiashi's interest sharpened. He'd known his son occasionally had clever ideas, but he hadn't expected the boy to see this far ahead.
"First, don't hand the prisoner over to Konoha's leadership yet. Hold him until morning. Then announce publicly that the Hyuuga have captured a Kumogakure rogue ninja who infiltrated the compound during the negotiations. Spread the word everywhere. Make sure the entire village knows."
"With our intelligence network, that's trivial."
"Once the news is out, go to Konoha's leadership and formally request that the Torture and Interrogation Division be brought in to extract information from the rogue."
A sly expression crept across Miyuki's face.
The Torture and Interrogation Division. Officially known as the Konoha Torture and Interrogation Force. Their job was exactly what it sounded like: extracting intelligence from captured enemy shinobi and monitoring missing-nin.
The critical detail was this: because most of their operations overlapped with ANBU missions, the Division had deep ties to ANBU. Intelligence obtained through interrogation wasn't shared with outside parties or individuals. It went straight to the Hokage.
So if the Hyuuga made this request during active negotiations with Kumogakure, how would the Sandaime react?
"The Sandaime would never authorize interrogation of anyone connected to Kumo during negotiations. Even a rogue. He'd bring the delegation in to discuss it together."
"Exactly. And Kumo's side will be panicking right now. Their operative failed the mission and didn't even manage to die. A living spy is a liability. As long as he's breathing, there's always the risk he talks."
"But the moment Kumo speaks up, the Sandaime will tell us to hand him over immediately."
"Which is why you need to do one more thing. In front of the Sandaime and both of his advisors, state that this rogue ninja stole classified Hyuuga intelligence."
Hiashi's pale eyes lit up. He was starting to see where this was going.
The first thing to understand was that Sarutobi Hiruzen would absolutely want to sweep this under the rug. Minimize it. Make it disappear. He would never stick his neck out for the Hyuuga over something like this, not when the peace agreement was at stake.
But what if he had no choice? What if the entire village already knew that the Hyuuga had captured a rogue spy, and that this spy had stolen sensitive clan secrets?