Hiashi Hyūga

**Hiashi Hyūga** (日向ヒアシ, *Hyūga Hiashi*) is a shinobi from Konohagakure, as well as the current head of the Hyūga clan.

## Background

Hiashi was born only seconds before his twin brother Hizashi, making Hiashi the head of the Hyūga clan and Hizashi a member of the branch house, whose only purpose in life would be to protect members of the main house. Years later, when Neji was born, Hizashi became bitter that his son would never be able to reach his full potential like a member of the main house, causing him to be openly resentful of Hiashi and his daughter. Hiashi was also responsible for branding the family's curse seal on Neji's forehead, further straining the relationship between the two brothers. One day during Hinata's training, overwhelmed with resentment and anger, Hizashi gave Hinata a murderous glare, Hiashi sensed the killing intent and activated the curse seal on his younger brother, causing him intense pain. He told Hizashi to leave as he would no longer tolerate incidents like this, telling him to never forget his duties.

During a visit to Konoha by a Head Ninja of Kumogakure, who had come to the village to sign a peace treaty, a young Hinata was kidnapped. Hiashi however saved her, quickly killing her would-be kidnapper, only to discover that it was the Kumogakure ambassador. Kumogakure demanded Hiashi's head in return for the life he had taken, or risk resuming open warfare between the two villages. Konoha, wishing to avoid another conflict, was compelled to comply, but was not willing to fulfil Kumogakure's desire of getting to study the Byakugan. Their father suggested that Hizashi be used as a body double, since his cursed seal would seal off his Byakugan upon his death. Although Hiashi tried to find an alternative to this, Hizashi insisted, saying that he would finally get to choose his own fate (to make up for his wrongdoings against Hiashi), and save his brother's life. Before going to his death, he asked Hiashi to someday tell Neji about why he had made his decision.

Originally, Hiashi had trained Hinata to become the successor of the Hyūga clan. However, Hinata's lack of confidence ultimately led him to decide she was worthy.

## Personality

Hiashi's general personality is very stern and strict, as he assigned both his daughters arduous training, and rarely compliments their performance. Hiashi was willing to use the cursed seal to punish his brother and nephew for showing aggression towards the main house. This stern nature is especially true with Hinata; when she was assigned to Kurenai, he told her that he was unconcerned about the possibility that she would die, saying that the Hyūga clan had no use for a weak successor. However, he truly cares for them as part of the family as seen in his hesitation to allow his brother to die to protect the secrets of the Byakugan or when he asked Kakashi not to destroy the moon, as he thought Hinata and Hanabi were on it. Similarly, he did not view Hinata's talent or potential weak, but her drive to succeed as the successor of the Hyūga clan. In the anime, Hiashi believed she was worthy of being successor, repeatedly trying to motivate her, but ultimately was convinced by his father to focus on the well-being of the entire clan, reluctantly disinheriting Hinata of her status. In the anime, when Hinata began truly pushing herself to improve, Hiashi openly applauded her. Hiashi was also very proud to hear of how hard Hinata fought against Pain.

While a proud man who openly believes the Hyūga is the strongest clan of Konoha, Hiashi is also very honest, as he believed Hizashi should have been the clan's successor after seeing Neji's pure talent and potential far surpassing both his daughters'. Also having great humility, Hiashi began to have doubts of the clan's caste system after the noble sacrifice his brother made. Knowing of Neji's animosity towards the main house for its treatment towards the branch house, soon after Naruto Uzumaki made Neji question his choices in life, as the one who instilled Neji with such anger, Hiashi decided to make amends with his nephew by telling the full story of Hizashi's sacrifice, even going as far as to bow and apologise to his nephew. He also later decides to train Neji in the Hyūga clan's entire fighting style which was not the norm to pass down secret techniques to the branch house — this showed Hiashi to have become much more lenient and not as strictly devoted to traditions thus starting to unify the clan once more.

In later years, Hiashi is shown to become much more light-hearted and cheerful, doting over his grandchildren Haruto, Boruto and Himawari. As noted by Kurenai Yūhi, this in fact had always been Hiashi's true nature, but was previously suppressed by the loss of his brother and disillusioned by it into believing strength is everything to survive. Boruto himself stated he had a hard time believing Hiashi was so strict when his mother and father were teenagers. Hiashi admitted that it was seeing Naruto change Neji's outlook in life that ultimately helped Hiashi regain his former self. Even more, he became close with Naruto as his son-in-law addresses him as "Father". When he and Naruto are alone, he even encourages Naruto to cut all formalities as he knows Naruto is not a naturally formal person. His overall outlook has grown to see violence as pointless and wishes to avoid it whenever possible, valuing life and the prosperity of his clan more than ever. He has also grown more humble as he believes his past actions would make him a hypocrite for lecturing a young Haruto and later Boruto for getting into unnecessary fights. At the same time, Hiashi has developed a sense of humour where he told Naruto that Boruto being his son is precisely why he's "worried" about Boruto, referencing Naruto's mischiefs when he was younger.