56 The Grind Continues - 1

…He was back.

Even from outside the training ground, Hinata could hear the loud sounds of training, masculine shouts and the ground trembling slightly beneath her feet.

Hinata had come around yesterday, after she was done with her mission with her team, but Daiki was nowhere to be seen, it seemed he had been on a mission.

Her feet had only idly carried her here after morning training with her team, she hadn't felt like going back home to her clan compound to rest yet.

Reaching behind her, Hinata nervously smoothed down her now much longer hair.

She wondered…how would he react? She hadn't had the time to show him yet because of how busy she'd been with missions and training, the last she'd seen her former classmate had been over a week ago.

'Will he like it?' she found herself wondering.

The last few weeks, she'd taken his words to heart and followed his advice and felt bolder than she ever had before. Kiba and Shino had been very taken-aback with her change at first.

Crude and crass as his words had been, very unlike the Hyuga Clan as a whole, that was nonetheless what made them stick with her, Daiki was bold and upfront, he had felt no need to mince words with her.

He was utterly genuine.

Shaking her head, Hinata swallowed the nervousness building up inside her and forced herself to boldly make her way into the training ground.

As she did, she was just in time to see Daiki shooting forward, spinning and lashing out with a knee strike that shattered straight through a large rock wall about twenty feet high and half a foot thick.

"Still needs work." he muttered to himself, before turning and looking at her, and it was then she noted a few changes that he had gone through since she last saw him.

He was wearing something akin to an armoured pauldron on one of his shoulders, but, shaped like some odd face, was it some form of animal.

…But what stood out more, was that his eyes, a light brown were now a bright crimson red.

He blinked, looking at her oddly, before grinning, newly crimson eyes looking her up and down, "Look who finally took my advice," he noted, "No idea how you grew your hair out so quickly, but you are looking real good now Hinata, definitely working that nine out of ten." he voiced appreciatively.

It took considerable effort on her part, to stop her cheeks from burning red and ducking away from his gaze, "Thank you…" Hinata replied, before giving a small cough, "Uh, Daiki-kun, can I ask what happened to your eyes?"

"Oh these?" He jerked a thumb up to point at his eyes, "Nothin' much, got into a fight with some missing ninja the other day, one of them had these, a pretty sweet doujutsu, so when I killed them, I took the eyes myself and implanted them using my Mystical Palm Jutsu."

Hinata stared.

She…wasn't sure how she should process that. It was, very morbid and horrifying to a degree that he would just replace his eyes with a dead mans. But at the same time, she had to admire the sheer pragmatism and decisiveness that would be needed for such an action.

It did hit a little close to home though, what with the reason why the Branch family of the Hyuga had to be given the Caged Bird Seal.

She decided to put it out of mind.

"Are you busy Daiki-kun?" she asked, moving on, "I was hoping to…do some training with you."

"I'm fine with it, you're the perfect person to test these new eyes of mine out with anyway," Daiki grinned and readily accepted, "Though, don't go thinking that just because you're a total solid nine now, that I'll go easy on you."

She didn't expect him to, she knew well enough, that was not what he was about, but still, his words did make her chest warm with pride and a smile quirk up over her lips, "What if I was a ten?" Hinata challenged, activating her byakugan, feeling her heart flutter as she did, and unzipping her new lavender and white jacket, exposing her torso underneath and wrapped it around her waist.

Daiki, had paid very special attention to her backside and her chest since he started helping her, and so had she. She'd changed up her mesh armour for a slightly more sheer and breathable version, which would have left her breasts very much bare and easy to see through the mesh links, if not for the small black half corset she'd added as well, it hid her large breasts, yet at the same time pushed up her cleavage quite abundantly.

Daiki just stared at her for a moment, before grinning, eyes feasting on her cleavage and giving her a wolf whistle, "Well now you're just making me jealous of Naruto." he shamelessly admitted.

Her smile spread so wide across her cheeks it almost hurt.

In spite of the happiness his words inspired in Hinata, she decided to move first, knowing that she was the one at the disadvantage.

Hinata dashed forward towards the boy, thrusting a palm out towards his lower left stomach with her right hand, she expected him to block with his outer forearm, catching her in the junction to leave her wide open for a counter and planned for it-

But, the taller boy stepped back a single step, easily avoiding her, but didn't counter himself.

That was fine.

She followed through, swinging her left palm out aiming for his right shoulder-

But his arm shot out, catching her wrist and stopping her in its tracks, before she even fully committed.

'What!?' Hinata's eyes widened.

Thinking quickly, she lashed out with a sweep at his legs, he jumped as expected, but did not let go of her arm as she wanted in the process. With her free hand, while he was in the air, she quickly took advantage to lash out at his stomach.

Or, that was what she attempted at least.

Just as her muscles tensed, his knee shot out and caught her in the cheek, letting go of her hand at the same time. Pain flared in her cheek and the force of the blow sent Hinata blasting backwards.

She grinded her feet across the ground, bleeding off the momentum and rubbed her cheek.

Daiki didn't pursue her, instead as he landed, he was grinning at her, wiggling his eyebrows as if to tell her 'come at me'.

That…something was off about how he countered her there.

Daiki was fast for sure, but…

That wasn't just speed.

Ignoring the pain in her cheek, Hinata spread one leg back behind her, before pushing off of it and launching back towards Daiki.