"I'm sorry, Naruto-kun... I..."
Looking into the blond boy's eyes, the pale-eyed girl felt her own eyes welling with tears. Even she had nearly given up on her own existence—but this boy, the one she'd quietly admired from afar, still remembered that she was there.
"You... what exactly... Ah, forget it~! I'm doing great! So don't apologize to me~ Ahahaha~~"
Naruto had started to ask something, then stopped himself. He scratched the back of his head and broke into a wide, goofy grin instead. He understood that sometimes, rather than pressing someone about what was wrong, the better move was to show them everything was fine.
"Thank you... Naruto-kun."
Wiping the corner of her eye, the pale-eyed girl drew the charred scrap of scroll from inside her clothes and held it out to him with both hands. "I'm sorry... this was all I managed to find..."
"Oh? Is that so... Thanks, Hinata!"
Naruto accepted the fragment with complete, unquestioning trust. He raised his right hand and shot her a thumbs-up. "OK~! I'll definitely master it! When I do—come find me again, okay? I'll show you."
"Mm~ I believe Naruto-kun will learn it for sure."
Hands clasped against her chest, the pale-eyed girl finally let a genuine smile reach her face. But in the next instant her expression tightened with alarm. A terrible sensation—urgent, inescapable—seized her. She sprang to her feet. "I'm sorry, Naruto-kun, I have to go!"
"Huh? Already?"
He started to follow, but the girl fled toward the thicket, shaking her head desperately through gritted teeth. "Don't come closer! Naruto-kun! Please—don't come!"
There wasn't time to make it back to her room in the Uchiha Compound. She ran to the pond beside the training ground, clenched her jaw—and jumped straight in.
What the—?!
That was, without question, the first thing Hinata wanted to say upon regaining consciousness. For good reason: there was nothing quite as bracing as waking up to find a school of small fish swimming circles around you.
The water flooding her lungs and the sensation against her skin confirmed this was no dream. She was physically submerged in some body of water—which meant that while her soul had been out, the body she'd left propped up in the Uchiha Compound bedroom had wandered outside and gone for a swim.
Furious and alarmed in equal measure, Hinata righted herself underwater and kicked toward the surface. Coughing up several mouthfuls, she scanned the area and quickly identified the location: the pond beside the Uchiha Training Grounds.
"Tch... I knew it. Too many good things in a row, and something bad was bound to follow."
She dragged herself out, dripping wet, with nothing much to say about the involuntary cold-water reset. Ino had assured her the episodes were just fatigue-induced sleepwalking, but this was clearly something more.
Well—she was using someone else's body. Suffering the odd inconvenience was part of the deal.
She peeled off her soaked jacket, and immediately felt her mental energy start rushing back. While she'd been inside the Fūma Clan girl's body, her spiritual reserves had drained like a phone on the wrong charger. Back in her own body, it was as though she'd found the right outlet—recovery began almost at once.
Still, she couldn't afford to be this careless again. She'd returned early this time and the body hadn't drowned, but if the next "sleepwalk" took it somewhere more dangerous, the outcome could be much worse.
From now on, she'd need to secure the body properly before leaving.
While wringing out her jacket, she heard rustling behind her. A golden head poked out of the bushes. Spotting her, the owner did a double take. "Huh? Hinata?"
"Oh. It's you."
She didn't bother turning around—she could tell from the voice alone that it was Naruto. Wait—
Hold on. That meant her body had come here while she was gone. It had come near Naruto? Was it... deliberately seeking him out?
Don't tell me...
The hypothesis made her pupils contract. She let her fingers drift downward and spoke in an idle tone: "By the way, Naruto-kun—where were we in our conversation?"
The question was a trap. If this body had indeed met with Naruto and interacted with him in some way, it would be easy enough to get him to slip.
"Huh?"
Naruto blinked from behind her. The blond boy paused for one beat, then answered with perfect obliviousness: "What are you talking about? I just heard a noise over here and came to check, that's all~"
"...Is that so?"
His answer raised her suspicions, but she couldn't push further—doing so would expose her own greatest secret.
"Then never mind. Get back to training."
She shook her head, her face cold, and left the training ground. Inside, though, a hazy theory was taking shape. If it really was what she suspected, sooner or later someone would slip up. No rush.
Sai—faithful as any maidservant—had transported the spare body back to the Uchiha Compound bedroom. Because Hinata had felt her spiritual energy fading, she'd released the Soul Body Switch at the village gates, sending her soul back to her own body ahead of the spare.
But Sai found something unexpected: when he arrived at the bedroom, Hinata's main body wasn't there. The body had left his watch during the interval.
"How is she? Pulse, heartbeat—are they stable?"
Hinata's cold voice came from behind him without warning. Sai flinched and quickly bowed. "Her condition is stable, but there are no signs of consciousness."
"Of course not. It's an empty shell now. But a usable body double is hard to come by, so I need to keep this one alive for the time being."
Looking down at the dark-haired girl lying unconscious and pallid on the bedding, Hinata frowned. As the Soul Body Switch documentation described, after she'd forcibly absorbed this body's soul, she'd gained a portion of the girl's memories—though nothing particularly useful.
True, she couldn't stay away from her main body for long—but at least her experiment had been a clear success. She'd obtained a viable body, and her mission had produced the progress she'd hoped for.
"Good. Leave her here under your care. If anyone asks, tell them she's your younger sister—unable to wake up due to a severe illness. Understood?"
"Understood. I will say exactly that."
With that settled, Hinata finally lifted her gaze. A note of undisguised satisfaction entered her voice: "Now then—it's time we had a little chat about the ownership rights to a certain work~"
As a commercial product, books required dedicated distribution channels and printing facilities. Until now, Hinata had handed her manuscripts to a contact at the Konoha Bookstore, who forwarded them to a publisher in the Land of Fire for mass printing and distribution.
Under that arrangement, Hinata lost the lion's share of the revenue. What she received was a paltry author's fee; the real money went straight to the publisher.
Before now, she'd lacked the ability to print and sell books on her own—and her power base hadn't been strong enough to push for more. So she'd settled for the scraps. But now...
It was time to go independent.
Konoha was a village with a comprehensive industrial base. Establishing a new publishing and printing operation here wasn't particularly complicated. The shinobi world's economy was still developing; all you needed was sufficient startup capital and a guarantor with enough standing to ensure smooth operations.
Capital was no issue. She'd burned through most of her savings, but this time, she suspected she wouldn't need to spend her own money at all.
"Mr. Fujimura, I apologize for the short notice, but there's a matter of some importance I'd like to discuss with you."
Hinata wore her most formulaic smile as she faced the man sitting across from her: Sarutobi Asuma, who had previously assumed the role of the photo shop owner. She'd specifically asked Kakashi to bring "Mr. Fujimura" in again for this meeting.
"Not at all. Thanks to you, business has been quite good. So—what can I do for you this time?"
Playing his role as shop proprietor, Asuma wasn't exactly lying. Having first access to every new issue of Fox Tales had given him and Kurenai plenty more to talk about and much more time together—and their relationship was warming rapidly.
"Due to certain circumstances, I've decided to establish a publishing factory here in Konoha. We'll handle Fox Tales production in-house instead of routing through the old publisher."
Hinata stated her purpose without preamble. This had been in her plans all along. The Fox Tales brand had built sufficient recognition, and she now had the capability to match. It was time to cut loose the parasitic publishers.
As for a guarantor? Looking across Konoha right now, who could possibly be more suitable than the Third Hokage's own son—Sarutobi Asuma of the Sarutobi clan?
Besides, this man who would soon be married with a child on the way ought to start thinking about a more stable, safer line of work.
A satisfied smile touched the corner of Hinata's lips.
"So, Mr. Fujimura—I'd like you to come on board as a partner in our publishing factory. Together~"
"We'll build a publishing company that belongs to Konoha."