As soon as Fujin appeared in front of him, Hoka unleashed a barrage of strikes. He didn't increase his attack step by step and directly unleashed 32 consecutive strikes. Fujin looked at the flurry of incoming attacks and thought, 'Correct response.'
His arms moved at an even faster speed than Hoka's. But instead of attacking, he blocked all 32 consecutive strikes from Hoka. Hoka didn't manage to block even one chakra point on Fujin's body!
After blocking the last strike, chakra concentrated on Fujin's right fist as he punched towards Hoka. Hoka's eyes widened as his Byakugan noticed the high amount of chakra concentrated on Fujin's fist. He immediately moved backwards and released chakra from all of his chakra points and immediately began spinning.
'Eight Trigrams: Palm Rotation'
Fujin followed him and punched the protective shield around Hoka. The rotational force of Hoka's jutsu repelled Fujin's attack with an equal amount of power, forcing Fujin back a couple of dozen meters.
Hoka wasn't spared either. The force of Fujin's punch was too high and he didn't have enough time to reach his maximum rotation speed. As a result, he felt the full impact of the force as well and was sent flying backwards towards a tree.
Hoka flipped at the last moment and landed on the tree's trunk on his feet, before jumping back on the ground.
Fujin shook his right hand while looking at Hoka and evaluating him. He analyzed, 'Not bad. I would have been disappointed if 32 Palms was the best he could do. I wonder how he learnt it. Did he copy it like Neji or did Hiashi teach him for some reason?'
He said, "Palm Rotation, the secret Taijutsu of Hyuga's main clan. It's impressive that you learnt it."
Hoka was in no mood to hear Fujin's praise. His mind was in shock at how good Fujin's Taijutsu was! Not only did he take on the 32 Palms head-on, but he also made a dent in his best defense.
He asked, "Did you ever take me or Mieko seriously in a spar, Fujin?"
Fujin answered, "I always take all my fights seriously. I just prefer fighting in a way that has the least amount of risk."
Hoka immediately realized, 'He is fighting in this manner so that I won't be able to complain about not being able to use my forte in the spar.'
Fujin said, "Don't get distracted."
He disappeared and appeared behind Hoka and attacked him with a kick. Hoka barely managed to dodge the kick and counterattacked with Gentle Fist.
Both entered into an intense Taijutsu fight. Hundreds of punches and kicks were exchanged every minute. Neither Fujin nor Hoka made a single unnecessary movement. All their strikes were precise. Fujin had an advantage in speed and power. However, Hoka relied on his Gentle Fist style to counter all his attacks and forced Fujin to pull his attacks back several times, despite having the advantage, to avoid getting his chakra points blocked.
After 4 minutes of intense fighting, Fujin finally created an opening. He had blocked Hoka's arms and Hoka was barely off the ground. He immediately kicked towards Hoka's chest. Hoka saw the kick and cursed, 'Shit! I won't be able to block or dodge it.'
He immediately emitted chakra from the chakra points on his chest. Fujin ignored it and his kick landed on Hoka's chest. Hoka immediately coughed blood and was sent flying back.
However, Fujin had a thoughtful expression. He analyzed, 'I was planning on decreasing the amount of chakra I concentrated on my leg to not kill or injure him badly. But, I didn't expect him to emit such a large amount of chakra from his chest to soften the impact of the kick. He has improved a lot. However, it isn't enough.'
Though Fujin wasn't known for his Taijutsu, it was at a very high level as well. Sparring with Guy for a couple of weeks had resulted in rapid improvements due to how rarely Fujin had sparred in Taijutsu prior. As such, Fujin was sure that no one in the Hyuga clan, barring Hiashi, would be able to defeat him in a Taijutsu fight. By giving Fujin such a close fight, Fujin was sure that Hoka was one of the strongest among the Hyuga clan despite his young age.
Hoka, who was flying backwards, gritted his teeth and ignored the pain and blood as he began weaving hand signs.
'Water Release: Water Dragon jutsu'
Hoka spat out a large amount of water as soon as he landed on the ground. It immediately took the form of a Dragon and began moving towards Fujin who was just observing it. Fujin analyzed, 'His Ninjutsu is the biggest surprise though. To be able to create such a huge Water Dragon so quickly.
Combined with his Taijutsu, he is definitely at the Jounin rank. However, he is still some distance from the Elite Jounin rank. As for rank S…'
Fujin sighed and muttered internally, 'That's just too far.'
Just like Fujin, Hoka was thinking a lot as well. He had a bitter expression as he thought, 'My plan was to use Ninjutsu to force Fujin into fighting me with Taijutsu or at least his sword. To think that I'm the one resorting to Ninjutsu in order to buy some time.'
The Water Dragon reached Fujin. Fujin ignored it and just flickered out of its path. Though the jutsu was impressive, it was just too slow to be of any threat to Fujin. He flickered again to approach Hoka. Hoka's Byakugan were glued on Fujin.
As soon as he saw Fujin, he immediately attacked the spot he was moving towards with the Vacuum Palm jutsu.
Fujin immediately sidestepped it, but Hoka continued spamming the attack to target Fujin. Fujin continued dodging while getting closer to Hoka step-by-step. He wondered, 'Did he take inspiration from my Wind Explosion jutsu? Not a bad tactic, but he doesn't have my chakra reserves to support such a high chakra expenditure.'
In order to spam such tactics, the basic requirement was that your chakra reserves had to be higher than your opponents.
As Hoka fired the Vacuum Palm jutsus rapidly, he concentrated chakra under his feet. His eyes followed Fujin closely. After Fujin dodged the last attack, Hoka thought, 'That's it!'
He immediately jumped towards Fujin at blinding speed. At the same time, he shot the last Vacuum Palm. A smile formed on Fujin's face as he thought, 'As I expected. He was trying to lure me in.'
He dodged the incoming Vacuum Palm and got ready for Hoka's attack. Hoka took his stance and muttered, "You are in my range."
Hoka attacked Fujin twice, but Fujin blocked his wrists and didn't allow Hoka to hit him. Hoka followed with 4 strikes, 8 strikes, 16 strikes and eventually 32 strikes, his momentum increasing each time. However, Fujin blocked all of his attacks perfectly.
Hoka gritted his teeth and began attacking with even more ferocity and speed!
'Eight Trigrams: Sixty-Four Palms'
This attack finally forced Fujin to his limit. However, instead of being bothered, a smile appeared on Fujin's face as he continued blocking the attacks and thought, 'Now that's more like it.'
Fujin's arms moved at the same speed as Hoka's as he continuously blocked every strike that Hoka did. Hoka had a grim expression. He had already attacked 48 times without any success. He gritted his teeth harder and pushed himself to his utmost limits.
Fujin finally started having trouble keeping up. He barely managed to block 12 more strikes. However, just after he had blocked the 61st strike, Hoka's right arm passed through his defenses.
Hoka's eyes lit up. He thought, 'Finally!'
His right palm reached very close to Fujin's chest. However, before he could hit Fujin, blood sprouted out like a fountain!
Hoka was shocked! The blood that erupted was from his right arm. He didn't understand how he was hit. The sight and pain made him stop momentarily. Fujin used that small opening and kicked his stomach, sending him flying across the training ground once again.
This time, Hoka couldn't recover. Though Fujin hadn't concentrated chakra in the last kick, the attack had caught Hoka completely off-guard and stunned him. In addition, he was mentally and physically tired from using the Eight Trigrams: Sixty-Four Palm jutsu. So he couldn't brush off the kick and fight back like the previous times.
Hoka slammed into a tree and dropped to the ground. Fujin observed him and realized, 'It looks like he isn't used to using the 64 palms attack. All his focus was on the attack and he didn't have the capacity to focus on anything else.'
A frown formed on Fujin's face as he thought, 'I expected him to get much stronger than this. Did he lose the conviction that he had on that day? Or did he think that his current level was sufficient?'
This time, Hoka didn't get up. Instead, he just sat there while coughing. Though the kick hadn't done a lot of damage and the cuts on his arm were shallow, Hoka understood that he would have died had Fujin concentrated chakra on his leg. He muttered in disbelief, "I lost."
