Chapter 482: The Dim Shelter

Chapter 482: Chapter 482: The Dim Shelter

Bzzzt... bzzzt...

The fluorescent lights overhead flickered on and off, giving off intermittent crackling sounds from their damaged connections.

Hinata, her face covered in dust like a little calico kitten, sat there staring blankly into space, completely dazed.

"Someone... someone save me!"

"It hurts!"

"I want Mom... I want Mom..."

Cries of varying intensity, broken groans, and anguished wails came from every corner of the shelter, overlapping one another and plunging the entire place into a strange, chaotic din.

Hinata stared numbly around her.

Everything before her was dim and hazy.

There had originally been a long row of fluorescent lights stretching across the ceiling of the shelter, but seven or eight out of every ten had already gone dark. Even the few that remained were damaged, flickering erratically between light and darkness.

On top of that, fragments of stone and dust continued to fall from the ceiling, filling the shelter with a thick haze. Even things only three or four meters away were difficult to make out clearly.

Suddenly, a figure rushed over to Hinata, grabbed her by the shoulders, and shook her.

"Hey! Are you hurt?"

Only then did Hinata’s pure white eyes slowly regain focus, a trace of awareness returning to them.

After finally recognizing the figure in front of her, she replied, "Naruto-kun...? I’m not hurt."

"You looked so out of it just now, I thought you were injured!"

Naruto muttered under his breath before immediately getting to work, quickly clearing away the pile of rubble beside Hinata.

"Ah!"

Only then did Hinata realize that Shion, who had been right beside her, had actually been buried beneath the rubble. She cried out in alarm and hurriedly began helping Naruto move the stones.

Before long, the two children had cleared away the rubble, only to discover that Shion wasn’t the only one buried underneath.

Ashiso had shielded Shion with his own body, protecting her beneath him.

After pulling Ashiho and Shion free, Hinata asked worriedly, "Are you two okay?"

Ashiho weakly shook his head.

Although he had been buried beneath the rubble, fortunately, none of the stones had been particularly large. He had only suffered some bruising on his back and wasn’t in any danger of losing his life.

Shion, however, burst into tears the moment she came back to her senses.

Right now, she was terrified.

The horrifying scenes she had witnessed in her Death Prophecy seemed to be coming true, one after another.

Not far away, Sasuke’s mother swept her gaze around the shelter. Looking at the horrifying scene before her, her expression grew grave.

She turned to Sasuke and instructed, "Sasuke, go help the others."

Although Sasuke was only eight years old, in the shinobi world, that was already an age at which one could be sent onto the battlefield.

During the Third Shinobi World War, many children who weren’t even eight years old had already fought on the front lines. Itachi himself had witnessed the horrors of war when he was only four.

So in Sasuke’s mother’s eyes, Sasuke wasn’t merely her son.

He was also an Uchiha shinobi.

Sasuke looked at his mother’s injured, bleeding leg and hesitated.

"But your leg..."

"I’m fine. You don’t need to worry about me."

As she spoke, Sasuke’s mother activated her Sharingan and gently rubbed his head.

"Don’t forget—I’m a shinobi too."

Sasuke hesitated no longer.

He got to his feet and called out to Naruto nearby.

"Naruto! Come on! Let’s go save the others!"

"Okay!"

Naruto quickly answered.

At that moment, Hinata spoke softly, "Naruto-kun, can I come with you? I... I have the Byakugan. Maybe I can help."

Sasuke walked over and looked Hinata up and down before saying haughtily, "Fine, you can come with us. But stay sharp and don’t get in the way!"

Hinata happily bowed.

"Thank you, Sasuke-kun!"

Amid the dust-filled darkness of the shelter, the three children made their way forward together.

Fortunately, with Hinata’s Byakugan, they were able to occasionally locate and rescue Konoha villagers who had been buried beneath the rubble.

A short while later, they arrived before a massive boulder blocking their path.

Looking at the completely collapsed passageway ahead, Hinata sucked in a breath and couldn’t help asking, "Why did this happen? What exactly happened just now?"

Naturally, Naruto had no answer.

He stepped forward and tried pushing against the enormous boulder blocking the passage, only to find that it wouldn’t budge at all.

Sasuke thought for a moment before casually saying, "This shelter is dozens of meters underground. No matter how big an explosion happened on the surface, logically speaking, it shouldn’t have been able to affect us down here."

Naruto curled his lips.

"Then why did so many parts of the shelter collapse?"

Sasuke was immediately left speechless.

He snapped, "How should I know?! But something definitely happened up there!"

Hinata said worriedly, "I wonder if Father is okay..."

Hearing Hinata say that, Sasuke also began to feel a faint sense of worry.

But he quickly reassured himself.

"Hmph! My father is the head of the Uchiha clan. There’s no way anything could happen to him!"

Tap... tap...

At that moment, the sound of unhurried footsteps echoed through the dim passageway.

Sasuke and the others immediately turned around and saw a dark figure walking toward them.

Once the figure drew closer, Sasuke instantly recognized him.

"It’s you—Hyuga Neji!"

Just as Neji had secretly been keeping an eye on Sasuke, Sasuke had also been paying close attention to Neji, who was known as a genius. So he recognized him at a glance.

Neji swept his gaze over the group before turning to Hinata.

"Lady Hinata."

Hinata quickly returned the greeting.

"Brother Neji."

Naruto scratched his head.

"The way you two address each other is kinda weird."

Sasuke crossed his arms and explained coolly, "What do you know? Hinata is the eldest daughter of the Hyuga Main Family. Her position is basically the same as my brother’s in the Uchiha clan. Neji is only a member of the Hyuga Branch Family, whose duty is to protect the Main Family. Even though they’re relatives, Hinata is one of the masters of the clan, while Neji is basically a retainer."

Naruto muttered, "They’re relatives and almost the same age, but they still have to separate themselves into masters and retainers? The Hyuga clan really makes no sense."

Sasuke shot Naruto a disdainful glance.

"Idiot. Prestigious clans like ours have all kinds of rules!"

Listening to Sasuke and Naruto openly discuss the difference in status between the Hyuga Main Family and Branch Family right in front of him, Neji felt his face burn.

As he grew older, Neji had gradually come to understand the difference between the Branch Family and the Main Family.

And he had also gradually come to understand his own position within the clan.

He didn’t resent having to protect Hinata.

But what he wanted was to protect her as an older brother protecting his younger sister—

not as a member of the Branch Family protecting the Main Family.

Just then, Neji suddenly shouted,

"Watch out!"

As he shouted, Neji instinctively grabbed Hinata and rapidly pulled her backward.

Sasuke and Naruto reacted just as quickly, retreating far away with them.

BOOM!

Not long after they moved away, the massive boulder blocking the passage was blown apart.

Through the newly opened breach, the children saw several Konoha shinobi locked in fierce battle with a shinobi wearing a black cloak patterned with red clouds.

After recognizing one of the Konoha shinobi, Hinata cried out in surprise,

"It’s Sister Rei!"