"How was your day, sweetheart?"
"Absolute disaster," Hinata said in a matter-of-fact tone, showing that she wasn't all that upset about it. "I had a hard day at the hospital. First, some genius thought it would be just great to use flammable oil to power up his fire release jutsu." A bit of peeved exasperation sneaked into her voice as she nuzzled her cheek into the pillow.
"Obviously, he was no Jirayia, so it didn't go well for him. I had to stare down his mouth for over an hour because he had third-degree burns on the inside of his throat and mouth." She let out a fed-up. sigh, and Ren resisted the urge to chuckle.
He could imagine how that might not have been a pleasant experience for either of them.
"Then, a guy came, bringing three of his severed fingers because he wanted to get an edge during the upcoming war, so he practiced a wind technique he was not ready for." Hinata continued, and Ren noted she probably didn't even care if he was listening at this point. She just needed to vent and get it off her chest.
"At least, reconnecting those wasn't that hard, but merciful Sage, was the man a wimp! As I was sewing the fingers back to his hand, he just wouldn't stop whimpering. Even my kid sister has better pain tolerance! How could he be a ninja if he can't even handle having his fingers sewn back to his hand? Could you believe that? Haaa~!"
"Indeed." Ren hummed in amusement. He wanted to ask her if she gave him any sort of anesthetic, but... the answer to that was kind of self-evident, wasn't it? He wouldn't have been whimpering in pain if she did. Poor guy.
Then again, Ren knew that the ninja medics could be quite rough when they thought somebody needed to learn a hard lesson. Ren doubted the man would try a dangerous wind technique on his own in the future.
In his previous world, it would probably be counted as medical malpractice. Here? It was a way to get the usually hard-headed ninjas to listen to reason and stop doing dumb shit, so they would not come back for healing every week or so.
Even then, it barely worked thirty percent of the time.
"And to end my shift on a negative note, there was a skirmish between ANBU and some Kumo scouts that went wrong for our side. They brought me three heavily wounded ANBU to heal, so I was ten minutes late for the council meeting. Something Sarutobi's faction just loved to point out." Hinata huffed in annoyance before turning over to lie on her back so she could look Ren in the face.
Ren's lips twitched into an easy smile while his free left hand rose from her abdomen to her face, cupping her cheek and making her slightly blush.
Ren affectionately rubbed his thumb over the upper part of her cheek, just below her eye, and Hinata put her own left hand over his, sweetly smiling.
"Did they make a lot of trouble for you at the council meeting today?" Ren asked, enjoying the warmth coming into his palm from her face.
"They shut up when I told them I was busy saving Asuma's cousin's life." Hinata cheekily answered, and there was something sly about the glint in her eyes.
Noticing it, Ren raised an eyebrow at her, "Did you?"
"No." She gleefully admitted, her expression oozing self-satisfaction at getting one over people she did not particularly like. "He was the only one of the ANBU who came back completely unscathed. But they didn't know that back then."
"You devious little minx." Ren laughed and weakly pinched her cheek, not enough to sting, only to show affection. "You are taking a bad example from Ino." He warmly warned her. "They are going to find out and will try to get back at you in the next meeting somehow."
Hearing that, Hinata's delightful mood visibly soured, and a trace of something complicated flickered in her expression.
"... That isn't very likely." She reluctantly admitted, her hand slipping from Ren's left hand as she sighed and ran her hand through her hair in a subconscious habitual manner, brushing past the fingers of Ren's right hand.
Ren's eyebrows furrowed at that, but before he could ask, Hinata dryly continued.
"In their infinite wisdom, the Sarutobi's faction pushed for sending me to guard a highly vulnerable position on the borders. You know, nothing major. Just the most likely spot from where the Iwa army will come." She snorted in a veiled contempt, "They didn't say it out loud, but they are hoping I would recreate the massacre I did against Orochimaru's forces and earn the village an easy win."
"I am sorry to hear that." Ren replied, trying to sound comforting, but the warm atmosphere between them somewhat cooled under this new revelation.
It was unfortunate. Hinata wanted to heal people. She went and massacred the Oto forces because they invaded her home. This was a bit of a different situation, and she most definitely didn't want to kill so many people again.
On the other hand, Ren could also look at it from Konoha's perspective. This could indeed be an easy victory for them without spending a lot of their resources. It could be a much-needed windfall, allowing them to focus more on the Kumo's side of the war.
That said, Hinata was his wife, so screw Konoha's or Sarutobi's reasons. This was so not cool!
"It's alright." Hinata replied without a worry. "Your training prepared me for it. It won't be that dangerous for me. Who knows? Maybe the Iwa army will choose a different route altogether, right?" She shrugged. "I just find it annoying that they are putting so much responsibility on my shoulders again."
"Plus, this is a blatant move from Sarutobi's hangers-on to temporarily get rid of my influence in the council." At that, a hint of annoyance returned to her expression, "I was opposing a lot of their proposals recently, so I knew some kind of retaliation was coming. I just didn't expect them to do this." She shook her head, chuckling in amusement. "They put in a whole lot of effort and called in loads of favors to pull this off."
"So, you can't refuse? You are still a clan head, no? Don't those have some sort of exemption from having to go to the frontlines or something?" Ren asked, but it was a rhetorical question. He knew they did. Most didn't make use of it, but it existed.
For ninjas, especially clan ninjas, battles and wars were places where they could earn 'glory' and 'honor'. Bullshit like that. It was their culture. So, clan heads usually joined the fighting anyway.
It was how Shikaku, Choza, and Inoichi got their clan head positions so young. Their previous clan heads died together on the frontlines.
"I could, but it would make me seem like a coward." Hinata huffed and rolled her eyes. "To be honest, if it were just me, I wouldn't care. But I represent my clan."
Ren nodded in understanding. He was pleased with her answer. Her uncaring attitude about being labeled a coward was no doubt his influence. It certainly was not something she picked up at home.
But her clan... she was kind of between a rock and a hard place there.
Ren doubted the current Hyuga clan would resent her if she chose to refuse the order. They loved her too much for that. Well, most of them did. There were a few previous main family clansmen who hated her guts, but even those grudgingly accepted that the times had changed and that she was the best thing that could have happened for the Hyuga clan in its entirety.
A lot of it had to do with how lenient Hinata had been with them. They still had their wealth. They were not executed willy-nilly. Only those who harmed the clan or the clan members lost their heads, and the blame was not shifted to their closest family members either.
For most of them, their life barely changed outside of losing their privileged status.
As for the former branch family members? Life was never better for them. Hinata ensured they were all taught the 'secret' main family techniques, bringing the Hyuga clan's combat effectiveness to a new height.
She changed the way the clan funds were spent and executed the elders who were embezzling part of those funds in the past. The economic situation of the branch family members improved overnight, and they knew exactly whom to thank for it.
She even allowed and encouraged those with talents for ninja arts outside of the Hyuga clan's usual expertise to go for it and learn. Even Hanabi started to learn Lightning ninjutsu, trying to imitate her big sister despite having Earth affinity.
Hinata only let that be because Hanabi was young, and she found her efforts adorable.
And while the rules about marrying outside the clan were not entirely dropped, relationships outside the clan were not completely forbidden. Hinata decided it would be highly hypocritical of her to forbid them due to security reasons and bloodline protection when she herself was married to somebody who did not belong to the Hyuga clan.
There were regulations and necessary precautions involved, but Hinata decided to simply make belonging to the clan so beneficial that parents would actually want their kids born in those relationships to be a part of the clan.
She turned it from an obligation to a privilege.
In the past few months, the Hyuga clan went through a drastic transformation. It had already been the strongest and most numerous clan in Konoha before that. Now it was a completely different beast altogether.
They were still in the initial stages of their transformation, and in the future, they would only get stronger, but they already started to show a lot of improvement.
Just the fact that every chunin and above had free access to Kaiten and the sixty-four palms technique was enough to entirely reshape the prowess of the Hyuga clan. Not to mention the rarer and higher-level main family techniques that even most elders usually don't bother learning.
Their jutsu library was stacked. And now, everybody in the clan had free access to copies of scrolls from it.
"The funny thing is, I only opposed the Sarutobi faction's politics as payback for Hiruzen's 'sending you to the Suna' scheme." Hinata continued, not noticing Ren's distracted look. "Don't get me wrong, Temari is a sweet girl, but it still pissed me off."
Returning to the present, Ren owlishly blinked as he refocused on the conversation.
"I even told him as much to his face." Hinata giggled, "He looked really sour back then. So much obstruction from my side, and it was, to him, for such a silly reason. I am not all that surprised he went the extra mile to get me out of Konoha."
A smile spread across Hinata's face as she locked her eyes with Ren's in a mischievous look. "What they don't know yet is that I have a Uno reverse card prepared for them." Her eyes deviously glinted. "Can't make it that easy for them, can I?"
---
AN:
DO NOT JOIN PATREON.
I am dropping this story there in favor of writing something new. I need a change and decided to do this after a long deliberation.
I will post the remaining 30-ish chapters in the same format as before, so you will get 5 chapters a week until I run out.
The new story will be available in a... month? Two or three weeks? Around there. My plans for now is a multiverse-type story because I wanted to try that for a long time, and my last attempt was a bit, well, pathetic.
That's it. I just wanted to inform you. Have a nice day.