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During the third part of the Chūnin exams when Naruto was fighting Neji,
Hinata begins coughing up blood. Kabuto, who was masquerading as a member of
ANBU, heals her and then, after she has been taken care of, he knocks Kiba out
instead of killing him.

Was there any shown reason for this or was it ever explained? If so, what is
the reason?


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2013-04-04T02:42:37.993
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naruto
Why did Kabuto heal Hinata?


As far as I know, this was never fully explained. But if you think about it,
it kind of makes sense.

First, if we look at the plot, healing Hinata is one of the best way for
Kabuto to fulfill his mission. Hinata starts coughing, nearly vomiting blood.
Let's say Kabuto had not interfere, her condition might have gone really bad.
At some point this would have made a fuss in the spectators (imagine Kiba
calling out loud "Hey, Hinata is dying !" and so on). This might interrupt the
Chunin exam, which is something Kabuto doesn't want. His mission is to wait
until Gaara fights Sasuke and then start the attack on the village. Healing
Hinata at that moment is a good way to keep the exam going.

Killing Kiba would not help at all. What to do with the body? Furthermore,
some ninjas can sense killing intent. So it's in no way a good idea to kill a
worthless kid at that moment. Just knocking him is enough. If somebody finds
the 2 kids (Hinata and Kiba) laying down but alive, nothing happens. While if
you find dead bodies, this might alarm everyone and Kabuto's mission would be
a failure.

This is also coherent with the role he is playing (a member of ANBU would have
done something, right?).

Now, why did the scenarist include such a scene? It is more difficult to
answer to that and what follows is only my own speculation. In my opinion,
this is a way to indicate to the reader that Kabuto made it to the arena and
is ready for the next part of his mission (last time we saw Kabuto, he was
still far away from the arena, just after killing the ANBU agent he replaced).

This is also a way of raising the tension. The reader has more and more
indications that something is going to happen soon (other ninjas talking about
"the mission", ...). When Kabuto knocks Kiba, this indicates to the reader "uh
oh, it's coming soon..."


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2013-04-09T06:53:49.930
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Might contain spoilers but just minor ones if at all.

I am up to the part of Neji's flashback in Shippuden and it reminded me to
inquire regarding this topic of Kabuto healing Hinata. I vaguely remember what
was and wasn't revealed and what was going on at that time in the story as
well as character development, and it hit me (at least If I am remembering it
correctly) it was still unclear how close Kabuto was to Orochimaru and his
loyalty to him, and Orochimaru was questioning his loyalty like whether he was
going to kidnap or kill Sasuke when they had that meeting by the pillars.

But my point is, I believe it was meant to play into more whether he was a
good guy or not, and if he was loyal to Leaf or Sound, etc... because when he
healed her, it continued to bring more uncertainty and curiosity if his
allegiances and whatnot. At least that's what just hit me and is making sense
to me. I don't know, it's more of an assumption or feeling more than anything
else.


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In my opinion, I think it was a distraction because when he healed Hinata, she
was knocked out, and then he knocked out Kiba and then cast the genjutsu.


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