With roaring noise, a meteorite passed over Shikamaru’s head. Leaving a trail, it disappeared beyond the mountain range. A bit later, the sound of an explosion and a gigantic mushroom-shaped cloud were identified—how much damage might have occurred beneath that creepy cloud?
Shikamaru opened the palm of his hand and checked the emerging clock. The clock indicated no delay until the destruction of humanity.
They were in the sky above the forest where Sai had lost sight of Hanabi and the enemy. Remains from both Hanabi and the shinobi—it was possible that there might be some kind of clue.
Shikamaru and the others were riding separately on the ink birds that Sai made, investigating. Sai, Shikamaru, and Sakura each rode individually, while Naruto and Hinata rode on a bird together. Hinata was a target of the enemy. Out of concern, it was decided that she would be placed near Naruto, the strongest on the team.
Naruto’s scarf fluttered in the cold wind in the sky. Behind him, Hinata searched the ground with her byakugan.
“!”
For an instant, she spotted something unusual on the snowy surface. The handle of a kunai was slightly visible above the snow. Flustered, she tapped Naruto’s shoulder and told him to land. As soon as they landed, Hinata jumped from the ink bird and pulled the kunai out of the snow.
A strap with a pink doll—
“This is Hanabi’s kunai…”
“Maybe Hanabi might’ve dropped it because she wanted you to notice it, Hinata.”
When Hinata gazed at the kunai with her byakugan, she could faintly feel Hanabi’s chakra. As if leaving a trail, the chakra continued into the forest. Furthermore, as Hinata looked through the trail with her byakugan, she could see the entrance of a cave far off in the northwest direction.
“A very deep cave… It continues underground… There’s a spring, and it’s glowing.”
“…Let’s go check it out,” said Shikamaru, approaching from behind.
*****
In one room of a particular lone castle:
Hanabi was asleep in the bed of an extravagant guest room. The door quietly opened, and a handsome young man with silver hair entered. It was Toneri. His eyes were closed as before. He placed his hand on the sleeping Hanabi’s eyes and tried to sense something.
“This is good. Certainly the kekkei genkai… a pure and fresh Hyuuga byakugan!”
The overjoyed Toneri opened his eyes—and in either socket, he had no eyeballs.
Hidden in the thicket of the forest, the entrance of the cave was open. Shikamaru and the others proceeded into the dark inside of the cave, being careful of their surroundings. There was no sign that the enemy would appear. As they continued to the center, they reached a huge limestone cavern. When they looked up, they could see a large shinobi character engraved onto the rocks of the roof.
“That character is the ‘a’ in ‘a-un,’” Sai said to Shikamaru.
“I guess that means ‘this is the beginning.’”
There was a spring filled with clear water, but it was so deep that when peered into, the bottom could not be seen. Even with the byakugan, Hinata’s field of vision was distorted and she was unable to see through it. The spring was at the end of the cave, with no other path that continued inside.
“Hey Shikamaru, don’t tell me we’re going to dive into this spring?” Naruto was strangely uneasy.
“Yeah, we are.”
“We’ll get w-wet?”
“Of course.”
“Don’t give me ‘of course’!”
Naruto hurriedly took off his scarf and began to put it into his backpack.
“So what if your scarf gets wet! You’re such a little boy…”
“It’s precious dattebayo!” Naruto scowled at Sakura’s mocking. Next to them, Hinata quietly averted her gaze.
“It looks like you won’t need to take off your scarf.”
Sai scooped up some water from the spring with his hand.
“This water… doesn’t get you wet when you touch it.”
-
Shikamaru’s team swam through the dark water. With the corpses of microorganisms and such floating about, it was as if snow was falling. The flickering might have been glowing bugs. Beyond the dim light, at the bottom of the spring, there appeared to be a wavering like the surface of water. They approached to find that it was indeed a water surface—a water surface at the bottom of a spring.
It might have been a trap, but there was nothing they could do but go. When Naruto and the others looked at each other, they came to the decision to go through the spring bottom. The next instant, the five of them plunged into darkness. Without knowing why, they raised their voices in astonishment. It was a cylindrical space surrounded by a wall of rock. Although they should have been steadily descending, it was pitch black, so they had no sense of up, down, left, or right. They did not even know where they were falling.
A light came into view below them. It approached steadily. The light’s true form was a large bubble.
“We’re going to run into it!”
The bubble burst open. They all involuntarily closed their eyes.
-
When Naruto opened his eyes, he was in a classroom at the academy. He had returned to his younger form. It was a familiar classroom. Sakura, Chouji, Shikamaru, and everyone else appeared as they had at that time.
Sakura-chan suddenly shrunk dattebayo!
Iruka-sensei began to speak.
“If the end of the world was coming tomorrow, who would you want to be with?”
“There’s no way the end of the world is coming!” Naruto responded the same way he had in the past.
Huh? I… feel like I’ve said the same thing before…
“Say for instance… if the moon was falling.”
“If it was the last day on earth, it would be nice if meat was falling instead of the moon.”
Everyone laughed at Chouji’s words.
“Haha, no, no. Like the moon would…”
Shikamaru stuck his head out the window and looked up at the sky. He suddenly turned pale.
“It’s-it’s-it’s the moon!”
Outside the window, a moon with a diameter of less than five hundred meters was suddenly falling.
“Aaaaaaaahhhh!”
A huge panic started inside the classroom. In the next instant, the moon fell and the school building collapsed. There was a tremendous cloud of dust. Naruto coughed violently and closed his eyes.
Is this a dream? Have I gone back to the past? No, it’s not the past… the moon didn’t fall back then!
When he opened his eyes, Naruto was standing in an open room. All around, his comrades were watching over him from a distance.
“Mn?”
His arms and legs were longer than before. Before his eye was—Inuzuka Kiba!
“Naruto… prepare yourself!”
Kiba was fully ready to fight Naruto.
This is the… ch-ch-chuunin exams dattebayo!
“Hey Kiba… wait a sec!”
“Idiot! There’s no ‘wait’ in an actual fight! Gijuu ninpou: shikyaku no jutsu!”
On all fours, Kiba attacked with raging force.
“Uwaa… wait –ttebayo!”
The fleeing Naruto ran into the wall, but there was no impact. He went straight through to the other side of the wall. Waiting on the other side was—the battlefield with Pain!
Th-this time it’s Pain?
“Banshou ten’in!”
Without warning, Pain form a hand seal, and Naruto was drawn in, caught, and slammed into the ground. His hands were then impaled by a black pole.
“Gah!”
It was there that Hinata entered, standing up to Pain to protect Naruto, who was unable to move.
“I won’t let you hurt Naruto-kun anymore!”
“Hi-Hinata… why did you come here dattebayo!”
“I’m not afraid to die if it means I can protect you! Because… I love you Naruto-kun!”
Hi-Hinata… it’s impossible for you… we’ll both end up dying like this!
-
There was a zero gravity space within the giant bubble. The five members of Shikamaru’s team were asleep while lightly floating.
This isn’t normal sleepiness… We’ve been caught in some kind of jutsu!
Only Sakura was trying not to sleep and desperately resisting, but her eyelids closed on their own.
“Sa-Sasuke-kun…?” Sakura murmured with her eyes closed.
Sasuke stood before Sakura, gently smiling.
“It is Sasuke-kun!”
Sakura stood up to run to the beckoning Sasuke, but lightly shook her head.
No, this can’t be! This isn’t Sasuke-kun!
In an instant, the scenery around her warped.
This is no ordinary dream… It’s genjutsu!
Sasuke, Naruto, Ino, Tsunade, and others appeared, clinging around Sakura as if to test her.
When trapped in genjutsu, the chakra in the victim’s head is controlled by the enemy. However, Sakura narrowly retained her consciousness. In the past, Kakashi had told her she was the genjutsu type.
Her teacher had taught her a method to deal with being caught in genjutsu—
I’ve got to stop the flow of chakra for a second and get back my own chakra!
Shaking off idle thoughts, she cleared her mind in meditation. The flow of chakra stopped, and the illusion of Sasuke and the others disappeared in an instant.
-
Inside the giant bubble, Sakura frantically opened her eyes.
“Hey, everyone… wake up! This is… genjutsu!”
Nearby, her comrades were drifting in a hypnotic state.
“Everyone… please! Wake up!” Sakura cried, but no one woke up.
Naruto and Hinata were next to each other, touching forehead to forehead as they slept. When Hinata had turned over in her sleep, the red scarf had spilled out of her backpack and wrapped itself around Naruto’s chest.
-
Naruto had returned to the scene of Iruka’s lesson.
“Alright, it’s the last day on Earth. If the world was ending tomorrow, who would you want to spend time with… write down that person’s name!”
All at once, the students began to write. Naruto bent forward in curiosity to see whose name everyone wrote.
Sakura wrote “Uchiha Sasuke-kun.”
Daaamn! That really was it!
Suddenly, Hinata’s form came into view.
He peered over to find that she was writing “Uzumaki Naruto-kun.”
Eh? Why did Hinata say me?
Naruto pondered over this.
Sakura-chan wrote Sasuke. It’s because Sakura-chan is that way about Sasuke… so that means that Hinata’s? Eh?
Hinata turned to Naruto and smiled sweetly.
“…Eh?”
Suddenly the scene changed to the battlefield with Pain. Hinata was standing up to Pain to protect the injured Naruto.
“I’m not afraid to die if it means I can protect you! Because… I love you Naruto-kun!”
She loves me? Love… Speaking of love, there’s ramen. I love ramen…
“I love you, Naruto-kun!”
No, Hinata’s “love” isn’t that “love”!
Hinata launched her juuho soushiken, but was mercilessly taken down by Pain’s Shinra Tensei.
“Hi-Hinata!”
In an instant, all of Naruto’s memories of Hinata ran through his mind like revolving lanterns.
So this means, the way Hinata feels about me… this means she… lo-lo-lo-
“Naruto! Wake up!”
It was Sakura’s voice. Sakura was somewhere calling Naruto.
“Sakura-chan?”
When he looked around, Sakura came running from the distance of the smoke-filled battlefield.
-
Naruto received a strong slap to the face.
“Owww!”
“This is genjutsu… a genjutsu space! It’s not real!” Sakura called while transmitting chakra into Naruto.
He was vaguely conscious, but it somehow seemed like they were still asleep inside the giant bubble.
The sleepy-eyed Naruto suddenly looked up.
Nearby were Shikamaru and Sai, along with Hinata, gazing worriedly at him.
“You finally woke up,” Sakura said with relief.
Shikamaru’s team had escaped the genjutsu bubble and was once again slowly descending through the darkness. Many spheres were floating around them. Upon closer inspection, there appeared to be two types of spheres.
One type was glowing bubbles like the one with which Naruto and his friends had previously collided—everyone’s past memories projected on the surface. If they touched them, they would be dragged into the genjutsu space again.
The other type was like knots of sand. Nothing happened when these were touched.
Naruto and the others avoided the bubbles, and jumped on the lumps of sand, stepping on them like stones as they continued descending.
“Using genjutsu to trap us in a world of memories… Confined in a memory prison,” Shikamaru explained while falling.
The enemy having gone as far as to set a genjutsu trap meant that there definitely had to be something beyond this darkness.
At that time, Naruto was thinking of something else entirely.
That was genjutsu… Then, what was that stuff with Hinata? Were those my memories? No, they weren’t regular memories… It was like dreams mixed with memories… So does this mean that for Hinata, I also…
His face reflexively turned red. He briefly glanced at Hinata. She jumped by kicking off of a sand lump.
Shikamaru stopped on a large lump of sand. The others landed next to him. Far below, they could once again see a water surface.
“Hinata, how is it?”
Prompted by Shikamaru, Hinata tried to inspect the water surface with her byakugan, but her field of vision was again distorted, and she couldn’t see through it.
“The enemy might be waiting to ambush us on the other side… Be prepared to fight!”
At Shikamaru’s command, the team members jumped one by one into the water. However, only Naruto hesitated, and stood on the ball of sand fidgeting. Seeing this, Hinata stopped herself from jumping.
“What’s wrong, Naruto-kun?”
“Well… about what happened in that weird bubble just now.”
“Yeah…”
Naruto was silent for a little while, gazing at Hinata.
“…It’s nothing. Sorry… Let’s go,” he said, then dove from the ball of sand and disappeared into the water.
“?”
As Hinata took a few steps forward to follow Naruto—
“Hinata…”
“!”
Surprised at the voice, she turned to find a man standing there. Hinata reflexively drew her kunai.
“I said I would come for you, but you were the one to come here… I’m happy.”
It was Toneri, the ringleader in Hanabi’s kidnapping, and the enemy who, with a smiling face, had also tried to abduct Hinata.
“Where is Hanabi?”
“Relax… She is quietly sleeping in my castle.”
“Give back Hanabi!”
“That depends upon your answer… Byakugan Princess.”
Byakugan Princess?”
“Hinata… Let us get married!”
“M-married?”
-
Swimming after Shikamaru and the others, Naruto turned to look behind him. Hinata was not following. This was enemy territory. He didn’t know if something had happened. Naruto decided to turn around and go back. When Naruto approached the surface of the water, Hinata and Toneri were facing each other atop the ball of sand.
That bastard again…
Hinata had her kunai drawn. Even in the dimness, Hinata’s face looked pale.
“…This is fate!” Toneri took a step closing to Hinata as he said this.
Naruto leapt out of the water. He jumped between the two of them, protecting Hinata with his back towards her.
“Hinata!”
“Naruto-kun!”
“Stay away from Hinata! You bastard, give back Hanabi right now!”
“Hmph, you again…”
Being mocked, Naruto became outraged.
“Youuu… You’re seriously pissing me off –ttebayo!”
Indignant, Naruto launched a punch. Toneri dodged and jumped to a neighboring ball of sand, but he was not very fast. Seeing his movements, Naruto hurried after and immediately shortened the distance between them. Struck by Naruto, Toneri went flying into the surrounding stone wall. However, a feeling of unease was left in Naruto’s hand. It felt like he had hit an object, rather than a person. Having been thrown into the wall, Toneri stood up awkwardly. His joints moved at square angles—this was a doll!
“A puppet…”
Just then, the broken puppet’s mouth clattered as it began to move.
“Naruto, your fists… won’t… reach me… they’ll never… reach.”
Leaving only these words, the puppet collapsed as if its strings had been cut.
“Don’t screw with me! If you’re so confident you won’t get hit, stop hiding in your puppet’s shadow and come fight me out in the open!” Naruto yelled into the darkness.
-
The water’s surface came into view above the heads of Shikamaru and the others who had gone ahead through the water. When the three of them rose to the surface and stuck their heads out of the water, they found themselves in a limestone cave like the one where they had jumped into the spring. The three got out of the water, and stood back to back, being cautious of their surroundings.
“What is this place?”
Countless bubbles and balls of sand of various sizes were scattered around on the ground. This might be where those spheres were being made.
“Where’s Naruto?”
“He was following behind me for part of the way…”
“I have a bad feeling. It’s as if we’re being watched…”
There was a sign of something in the darkness ahead. Two large eyes glowed.
“Prepare to fight!”
Shikamaru drew a kunai and put himself on guard. What appeared was a giant crab monster.
“A crab!?”
Several long, sharp, spines were sticking out of its scraggy, rock-like shell. With its right claw ten times as large as its left claw, it looked like it could cut even a giant tree in half.
And then the bubbles. The crab rushed at the three of them while shooting a mass number of bubbles.
“Disperse!”
At Shikamaru’s command, the group scattered in all directions and avoided the crab’s first attack.
“Watch out for the bubbles! We’ll get caught in genjutsu again!”
It was certain that the enemy this time was a “bubble-using shinobi.”
I guess this is… awaton (bubble release)?
Next to the mentally murmuring Shikamaru, Sai opened his scroll and smoothly ran his paintbrush.
“Ninpou, choujuu giga!”
The three lions that appeared plunged into the crab’s abdomen, but one by one, they were chopped up by its claws.
“Fuujin, Raijin!”
This time, two god statues appeared and wrestled with the crab—a pushing match of power against power.
The god statues caught the crab by the underside, swung it around and flung it upwards. The crab’s giant body slammed into the ceiling, making a large hole. Light shined in through the hole—seeing that he could make shadows, Shikamaru formed a hand seal.
“Ninpou, kage nui!”
The shadows wrapped around multiple times, preventing the crab from moving.
“Sakura!”
“Shaaaaannaroooooo!”
With her superhuman fist raised overhead, Sakura leapt at the crab.
-
Shikamaru, Sai, and Sakura were looking down at the remains of the defeated giant crab.
“That was quite impressive…”
“Y-yeah…”
The two men had a newfound fear of Sakura’s super strength.
Right at that time, Naruto and Hinata finally caught up, and jumped out of the spring.
“You’re late, Naruto!”
“Don’t say that… I was punching out the enemy’s boss!”
“What kind of guy was he?”
“He was… a puppet.”
Naruto said the last part in a small voice.
“A puppet?”
“Yeah, he said the real Toneri’s stronger and would never get hit… He’s definitely a sore loser –ttebayo!”
“That’s all?”
“Yeah, that’s all!”
There was still a lack of information, but Shikamaru tried to reason.
A strong enemy who had kidnapped Hanabi, tried to kidnap Hinata, and controlled bubbles and puppets—
Could it be that he needs live Hyuuga clan members? Speaking of the Hyuuga, there’s the byakugan… does he want to have them search for something?
Then why was the enemy only using puppets and holograms? Toneri was reading their movements. Rather than the puppet and the crab and such, it would be better to invest in a more powerful main force.
“Could it be that the enemies are few in number and they rely on puppets for fighting power?”
“Perhaps there may be a reason why Toneri cannot move.”
Sakura and Sai made guesses.
“Or maybe, it’s both of those things…” Shikamaru replied with a thoughtful expression.
*****
In a certain room of the castle:
Countless puppets were hanging on the walls, and a fire burned bright red in the fireplace. A man—Toneri was sitting in a chair, being illuminated by the fire. Both of his eyes were heavily wrapped in bandages. Beside him knelt a tall man with half of his face covered in bandages. It was the man that Naruto had supposedly beaten in Konoha.
“Leave Hinata alone until I am able to go for her… leave them alone for now, including that Naruto.”
At Toneri’s command, the tall man bowed, and promptly disappeared.
“Ungh!”
In an instant, he grabbed the bandages on his eyes and got up. He painfully shook his shoulder.
“Hehehe, the eyes are moving again… wonderful. This is an incredibly pure byakugan,” he contently murmured, then sat back down in the chair.
There was no other entrance or exit in the cave aside from the spring from which Naruto and the others had come. However, there was a hole open in the ceiling where the crab had crashed into it.
If we’re going to advance, that’s the only way…
Shikamaru decided.
Giant crystal pillars extending the height of the cave continued up to the hole. The group continued through a strange space with heaps of hundreds of transparent pillars. Wind was blowing from up ahead. The sound of waves could be heard. When they escaped the cave, the sun was shining on an ocean-like waterfront.
“What is this place? The sun’s shining when we should be underground?”
Not only that, but when they gazed into the distance, the surface warped with no horizon in sight. Rather than a blue sky, forests and lakes were blurrily visible overhead. It was as if the ground was upside down in the sky.
Maybe we’ve been hit with genjutsu again… Or thrown into another dimension…
Shikamaru was filled with unease.
First comes gathering information.
Shikamaru and the others soared through the air on Sai’s birds.
“So, Shikamaru… What is that?” Sakura asked from the back of a bird while pointing at the shining sun-like object overhead.
“Probably some kind of artificial sun… I think this an artificial space created underground.”
If this enemy possessed the power to move the moon, he may also be able to easily create an underground space and an artificial sun.
“A puppet, and then an artificial sun? He’s an obnoxious bastard just using fakes –ttebayo!” Naruto said as if spitting out the words.
“Hinata, any sign of the enemy?”
“It’s ok. They’re not here,” Hinata answered, investigating the forest below with her byakugan.
“But the enemy must have noticed our activity, right? Why wouldn’t they come to attack us?”
“Yeah, I don’t like that. It’s strangely quiet…” Shikamaru looked around at the dense forest spread over the ground as he said this.
-
In the forest, three puppet shinobi were looking up at the sky, peering through the giant treetops. From inside glowing bubbles, they watched Naruto and the others riding on the birds. Even the Hyuuga clan’s byakugan couldn’t see into these particular bubbles. Once the birds had passed them, the puppet shinobi once again began to follow Naruto and the others.
-
Nighttime arrived even in the underground space. Without setting, the artificial sun was releasing a cold light, similar to moonlight. It served the role of the sun during the day, and the moon at night—they didn’t know if this was a machine or some kind of energy source, but it was quite an ingenious device.
Shikamaru’s team ate their dinner around an open fire in their campsite in the forest.
“It really is quiet…” Sai murmured.
“Even though meteorites might be raining down on the surface right now…”
“I bet everyone in the village is destroying them without leaving a single piece –ttebayo!”
Shikamaru quietly looked at the clock in his palm. The time of the destruction of humanity was certainly approaching.
*****
“Don’t panic!” Tsunade yelled from atop a hill.
The road below her was overflowing with the people of the Fire Country carrying their household belongings.
“This bomb shelter was built to house every citizen of the Fire Country! Proceed in an orderly fashion! Don’t quarrel!”
After the previous Shinobi World War, Tsunade, the Fifth Hokage, had passed the position of Hokage on to Hatake Kakashi. For the safety of the entirety of the Fire Country, she was currently commanding everyone as the one in charge of guiding the evacuation, and as the leader in healing the injured.
“A meteorite! It’s huge!”
The crowd screamed, and began to rampage. They rushed to the entrance of the bomb shelter. Dragging a deep red trail, a giant meteorite plunged down from the sky. It was heading towards the village of Konohagakure. No matter what Tsunade yelled, she couldn’t stop the panic.
-
“Fifth gate, open!”
Standing up to the crisis in the village of Konohagakure was Rock Lee. He stuck out his fist, and leapt at the meteorite, prepared to give his life. He steadily rose, and approached the meteorite.
“Even if it costs my life, I will protect the village!”
Gradually, his whole body flared crimson, and his eyes widened, revealing the whites. It was approaching. The giant meteorite was before his eyes.
“Uryaaaa!”
Just like that he plunged into the meteorite and broke through. The meteorite cracked, rumbled, and finally exploded and scattered in all directions.
“Magnificent!”
Might Guy was sitting in a wheelchair, watching over Lee’s efforts from the window of a hospital room. Without even trying to wipe away his tears of excitement, he gave a thumbs-up, congratulating the heroic act of his favorite student. On his cast were the two characters meaning “youth.” His white teeth sparkled.
*****
Naruto spotted Hinata’s form from the shadow of the thicket. Hinata was sitting alone in the forest, mending a scarf. It was the red scarf that had torn lengthwise when she had fallen from the roof.
That scarf is really for me…?
Since the genjutsu incident in the bubble, he had been so conscious of Hinata that he couldn’t conduct himself naturally. When his eyes met Hinata’s, he was nervous, and his smile became stiff.
Hinata had always smiled for him, but when her eyes went to the bordered scarf wrapped around his neck, for some reason she would avert her gaze and look down.
Is it that she’s upset by this scarf? That’s a problem… I really don’t get girls’ feelings… Well, I’ll take this off for now.
Naruto quietly removed his scarf and put it inside his jacket.
-
The next morning, the members of Shikamaru’s team were soaring above the forest, riding individually on four ink birds. Naruto and Hinata rode on the same bird. Naruto was controlling the bird while Hinata focused on observing with her byakugan.
“Shikamaru-kun! I see a village twenty kilometers ahead.”
“Alright, let’s go check it out.”
Shikamaru waved his hand, signaling Sai and Sakura as well.
“……”
Hinata had noticed that the scarf wasn’t wrapped around Naruto’s neck. He had already taken it off when she saw him that morning.
Why…
As she looked at Naruto, he noticed her gaze and smiled—but his smile seemed a little bit stiff.
-
Along the hillside of a slightly elevated mountain, there was a town. It may have been a very beautiful town long ago. Cave residences made by carefully digging into the rock extended from the base of the mountain to the summit. Overgrowing with ivy and weeds, there was no sign that people lived there. It was a town that seemed to have been abandoned for hundreds of years. Rusted ninja tools and such were scattered about. They didn’t know what kind of traps had been set, but at least it felt like it wasn’t an illusion.
“…It looks like this was a shinobi village long ago,” Sai murmured.
In the afternoon, once it had been confirmed that it was more or less safe, it was decided that they would split into two teams, one with Naruto and Hinata and the other team with Shikamaru and the others, to gather information. At the place where they arrived at the town, black burn marks could be seen.
“There was a fire…”
“Maybe there was a war?”
In an abandoned house, a multitude of human bones were piled up to the ceiling.
“At any rate, this isn’t normal…” Shikamaru murmured as the light of the lantern illuminated the mountain of skulls.
-
Naruto insisted to Hinata that they take a break. Hinata was acting cheerfully, but she seemed exhausted. When they came to a resting spot, she sat down dizzily.
Hinata’s… worrying about Hanabi and pushing herself too hard.
“When you’re worn out, it’s important to eat something –ttebayo!”
“…But I’m not hungry.”
“You have to eat! I’ll eat half, too.”
Naruto offered his rations to Hinata.
“I really don’t want to eat.”
It was silent for a while.
“No matter how exhausted I am, if I eat ‘til I’m full and sleep, I go back to normal…”
Hinata lifted her face and stared at Naruto.
“Well, maybe it’s just that simple for me, hahaha.”
Hinata let out a quick burst of laughter, and took the rations from Naruto’s hand.
“Thank you Naruto-kun… I’ll eat.”
Naruto and Hinata walked side by side through sunlight filtered by trees. Naruto brushed off a spider web that was caught on Hinata’s head. He scooped up spring water from an old drinking fountain in the palms of his hands, and they drank it together. Hinata was smiling like a flower. To Naruto, it was a kind of happiness he was feeling for the first time.
He would never lie and say that he had been unhappy up until then. After forming bonds of mutual trust with his comrades and eating his favorite ramen, both his stomach and his heart were filled with a sense of happiness. He was blessed with Iruka, Kakashi, and Jiraiya as teachers. The existence of Kurama, the nine-tailed fox who had been bound to him at risk of life and death, was also important. It wasn’t that he had never cursed his fate as an orphan and a jinchuuriki when he was young, but all of these obstacles fueled his growth.
Naruto felt that he was happy. These were his true feelings.
But the sense of happiness he experienced in the hours of that afternoon—it was like a sweet and sour, light-headed overjoyed feeling that Naruto had never known until now. It wasn’t like the sense of accomplishment after finishing a mission, having friendly conversations with his comrades, or the instant that he slurped up the broth of Ichiraku’s ramen. It was a special happiness.
Naruto and Hinata took a break. They sat next to each other on the stone floor. Naruto was in awe of Hinata’s face in profile. He felt the impulse to trace that beautiful outline with his fingers.
Hinata suddenly turned her head. Naruto became flustered and averted his gaze.
“N-Naruto-kun… what happened to that scarf?”
“Th-that… It’s warm here underground… so I took it off.”
It was actually almost a little cold. Their breath was even a little bit visible.
“…You must be cold dressed like that.”
Naruto glanced at Hinata’s bare arms. Her skin was white, and had a sense of transparency.
“……”
“Don’t look too much… These are mission clothes… so it can’t be helped…”
Hinata shyly hid her exposed arms, and her expression as she blushed and looked down caused Naruto’s chest to tighten.
A-anything is fine… I have to say something! I’ve got to say something! Naruto thought.
He had to put his current feelings, his emotions, his thoughts, all into honest words and tell Hinata.
The moment Naruto opened his mouth—
Clang!
Hinata’s backpack fell over, and Hanabi’s kunai fell onto the ground, making noise. Suddenly coming to his senses, he sat up and made some distance. He felt like Hanabi’s kunai was scolding him for forgetting the mission and being in such high spirits.
It was silent.
“Naruto-kun, there’s something I need to talk to you about…”
“?”
“It’s about Toneri…”
“Hinata-san!” Sai’s voice broke in.
It seemed that Shikamaru had found an old building that had been converted into a shrine on the outskirts of the town, and wanted to examine it with the byakugan.
“…We’ll go now!”
Hinata recovered her kunoichi face, and giving a small nod to Naruto, walked out with Sai.
“……”
Naruto felt like he wanted more time. If the world ended like this, he would lose his chance to confess to Hinata. He just couldn’t bear to die with these feelings hidden in his heart. Naruto clenched his fist and made his decision.
-
The team set foot inside the shrine. The enshrined statues were cracked at the front, and the walls and pillars were beginning to crumble. The entire place was ornamented with an “eye” design drawn with a characteristic pattern on the pupil area. It was a pattern of light extending in eight directions from a circle in the center, like two crossed shuriken overlapping. A verse of poetry was engraved in ancient shinobi characters on a stone monument nearby.
“It’s an ancient oath. In the case that the path of mankind is in error…” Shikamaru began to read the verse aloud.
“The eye of reincarnation (tensei) will be resurrected, and the moon’s fist shall destroy mankind… I guess.”
“…What does this mean?” Sakura asked Shikamaru.
“Maybe it means this thing called the eye of reincarnation… is what’s moving the moon?”
“So maybe, Kakashi-sensei’s gut instinct about the moon and Hanabi’s kidnapping being related…”
“Well, that guy’s tends to be right on… in a bad way,” Shikamaru smiled bitterly.
For a moment, Hinata heard a strange voice.
“Byakugan Princess…”
She looked at Naruto and the others, but they didn’t seem to have heard it.
Rumble-rumble-rumble!
Making a strange sound, part of the stone floor at their feet crumbled, and they were enshrouded in thick clouds of dust. After the dust clouds cleared, a hidden level revealed itself. It seemed to continue underground.
-
The group descended to the lower level, carrying lanterns. In the lower level was a wide room with several thousand “stone boxes” neatly arranged in rows.
“Could these be coffins… is this a cemetery?” Shikamaru asked in a serious voice.
“Someone’s here!”
Hearing Hinata’s voice, Shikamaru turned his lantern, shining it on an old man. The old man’s eyes were closed. His form was shabby, but there was a quality about his appearance that made it feel like he had been someone in a position of responsibility in the past.
“The byakugan… I sense the byakugan.”
The old man turned to Hinata and held out his hand.
“Yes, there’s no mistake… Byakugan Princess!”
The old man took a step closer to Hinata.
“Stay away from Hinata!”
Jumping between the two, Naruto stuck out the hand that was holding the lantern.
The old man slowly opened his eyes—he had no eyeballs.
“!”
As he did so, the old man began to groan. He sat down on the floor, and spat up something from his mouth. It was a glowing bubble. The bubble immediately expanded, making its light stronger. Hinata’s byakugan reacted to the bubble’s light. Passing through the byakugan, images were projected into Hinata’s mind.
—A great number of soldiers began a war. A battle flag with a crescent moon and sun was being waved.
—In the center of their position, a giant orb was being prepared like a weapon.
—The next moment, the orb emitted a strong light, and she couldn’t see anything.
—The next thing she saw was the sight of countless people having collapsed. The heaps of corpses—this was certainly a depiction of Hell.
It was there that the images were cut off, and Hinata lost consciousness.
“Hinata!”
Naruto hurried to catch Hinata as she fell over.
“Bastard! What did you do to Hinata?”
The old man whom he asked got up.
“…The tenseigan… has been revived…”
At that time, the old man’s head fell from his neck. His hands and feet also crumbled as if they had lost their strength.
“!”
The severed head rolled onto the floor, and the mouth narrowly moved.
“You must stop… the Ootsutsuki’s… the Ootsutsuki’s…”
The old man completely stopped moving.
The group came out of the underground cemetery and returned to the middle of town. Shikamaru and Sai were on the balcony of a particular building discussing what had just happened.
“That man was saying Ootsutsuki, but isn’t Ootsutsuki the former surname of the Rikudou Sennin?” Shikamaru recalled.
“Ootsutsuki Hagoromo… that was the Rikudou Sennin’s name before he entered priesthood.”
The fact that he had called Hinata “Byakugan Princess” was also concerning.
“It seems like this is related to Toneri kidnapping Hanabi.”
After that, Shikamaru tried to check with Hinata about it, but she said that she couldn’t recall anything. Shikamaru became concerned at Hinata’s pale expression when she answered.
Was what happened in the underground cemetery really that much of a shock to her?
However, Hinata was a well-experienced shinobi. There was something a bit unsettling about the way she was so exhausted.
In Shikamaru’s line of sight was Hinata kneeling at a drinking fountain, and Naruto, who wouldn’t leave her side. Even Shikamaru had noticed that Naruto and Hinata were rapidly getting closer. Naruto falling in love was fine, but they were on a mission right now. It would be a problem if the strongest member of the team couldn’t use his full power.
Maybe I should reprimand Naruto…
But romance problems were delicate. Relationships of mutual trust could be harmed or completely lost because of rash words.
This is a tough one…
Shikamaru mentally expressed his discomfort.
-
That night, they decided to stay in an abandoned building that seemed useable. While everyone was settling down to go to sleep, Naruto, who was on lookout duty, stopped in the hallway in front of Hinata’s room. Light from a lantern was shining out of the room. When he peeked inside, Hinata was knitting.
Knitting just goes on and on… It takes time.
Sensing someone’s presence, Hinata turned her head. Hinata always smiled at him when their eyes met, but tonight she looked down.
“That thing you started to say this afternoon… what was it?”
“……”
“Something about Toneri…”
“It’s nothing.”
“Nothing… what do you mean?
“……”
“Hinata?”
“I’m sorry. Leave me alone…”
There was nothing Naruto could do but leave. He thought about it as he returned to his own room. Hinata was definitely acting weird. It probably wasn’t that she hated Naruto or that she was mad at him. Naruto got the sense that she was carrying some kind of heavy burden and suffering by herself.
*****
In the room of the castle where the fire burned in the fireplace, Toneri slowly got up and removed the bandages from his eyes. In his previously hollow eye sockets were glowing white eyeballs. It was the Hyuuga clan’s byakugan.
After blinking several times as though it was bright, he opened both eyes wide, and stared at the palm of his hand. Finally it came into focus, and he let out a satisfied smile.
“I can see… I can really see!”
Toneri suddenly grabbed a nearby puppet shinobi by the neck, and roughly drew it closer. Their faces close, he fixed his gaze on the emotionless puppet’s face.
“So this is what it means… to see things!”
His life had not been hindered up to this point. Although his fate as a member of the Ootsutsuki clan was to have his eyeballs taken from him at birth, he could perceive his surroundings by gathering chakra in his mind’s eye, and was able to act more quickly and precisely than he could by seeing with eyes. However, there was definitely a big difference between “sensing” and “seeing.” It was on this day that Toneri first knew the joy and excitement of seeing things.
“I wanted to… show you, too, Father…” Toneri murmured in a small voice.
Long ago, when his father was still alive—
Toneri and his father lived together, just the two of them. Many puppets worked for them, but they were really just dolls. Toneri wanted human friends. Going through the cave, Toneri’s father took him to the village of Konohagakure a number of times. The two would often spy on their distant blood relatives, the Hyuuga clan, from a hiding place.
—Look, that girl. Her name is Hyuuga Hinata. Focus and sense her well.
The eyeball-less father and son gathered their chakra in their foreheads, and observed the young girl playing in the garden.
—Yes, she’s a very cute girl.
—In ten years, let’s come for her. We’ll make her your bride!
His father, who had smiled happily when he said that, was no longer there.
Coming to his senses after reminiscing about his father, Toneri gazed at the flames in the fireplace.
“I want to see you! Hinata… I want to see your beautiful face with these eyes,” Toneri said as if he was possessed.
-
Naruto and the other left the abandoned cave dwellings and headed towards the next town in search of new information. The day grew dark during their traveling, so it was decided that they would make camp in the woods. The artificial sun was coldly glowing like the moon.
Naruto, who was dozing near the campfire, abruptly woke up. Hinata was gone. Naruto quietly crawled out of his sleeping bag.
Hinata was mending the red scarf by a spring. Giving up on greeting her, Naruto decided to watch over her from the shadows of the trees. He had worked so well with Hinata until the previous afternoon, but now she was acting distant. No matter what Naruto said, Hinata would vaguely answer and leave. Here, rather than calling to her, he thought he would watch her for a bit. Stitch by stitch, Hinata twisted the red yarn with her knitting needles. Her expression was still not so great. Occasionally, she would look like she was pondering over something.
The knitting needles sliced through the air. Her knitting hands stopped moving. She sighed deeply.
Hinata really is acting strange…
Without having been seen, Naruto stepped out of the shadows. When Hinata noticed Naruto, she stopped knitting.
“To be knitting when my little sister is in trouble… I’m a terrible older sister.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself! You’re the one who’s worried about Hanabi more than anyone else… Everyone knows that.”
If she hadn’t left the mansion that night, Hanabi wouldn’t have been kidnapped—Hinata deeply regretted this, being the one responsible in the absence of her father Hiashi.
It was quiet in the forest. Several glowing butterflies were fluttering around Hinata.
“I’ll definitely save Hanabi, so don’t worry!”
“Thank you… You really are kind, Naruto-kun.”
A glowing butterfly suddenly lit up Hinata’s face. Hinata was smiling sadly. Naruto got a little flustered.
“…It-it’s not like I’m just being kind because I love you. I’m really worried about Hanabi…”
“!”
Hinata was shocked. Her eyes widened, and she peered at Naruto.
“Wh-what did you say just now?”
“I said I’m worried about Hanabi…”
“Be… before that…”
“Before that…”
Naruto’s stomach tightened. What he ought to say as a man, he ought to say properly.
He looked into Hinata’s eyes. Her pure white pupils were wavering. He took a breath, and all at once, he said it.
“Hinata… I love you…”
“……”
As Hinata stared at Naruto, joy came into her eyes for just a moment, then it quickly changed to deep sadness. She looked down without saying anything.
“Hinata…?”
“……”
The moonlight that illuminated Hinata’s face as she looked down was suddenly obstructed. The butterflies fled. When the two looked up, an extravagantly ornamented circular stand was floating through the night sky, and atop it stood Toneri.
“Hinata… I’ve come for you.”
Toneri smiled at Hinata.
“Toneri! Are you a puppet again!? Where’s Hanabi!?”
“Shut up… I came to hear Hinata’s answer.”
Toneri held out his right hand as if to invite Hinata.
“Answer? Hinata doesn’t have any business with you! Anyway Hanabi…? Hinata…?”
At that time, Hinata bowed deeply in response to Toneri.
“!”
Hinata turned around, and pushed the red scarf against Naruto’s chest to give it to him.
“Wh-what is this?”
“Naruto-kun… goodbye,” Hinata whispered in a small voice, then walked of her own accord to Toneri’s side.
“Hey, Hinata… what are you doing?”
Hinata got onto the circular stand alongside Toneri, and they floated up into the sky.
Naruto clutched the red scarf. He couldn’t comprehend what was happening.
“Hinataaaaaaa!”
Naruto began to desperately chase after the circular stand as it flew away.
What is this, Hinata… why would you go with a guy like him?
Naruto asked Hinata over and over in his head, full of confusion.
Noticing Naruto’s screaming voice, Shikamaru, Sai, and Sakura chased after Toneri on ink birds.
The enemy’s eagle beasts appeared, and began a mid-air battle. Sai threw exploding kunai, shooting several of them down.
Sakura couldn’t believe what she saw with her own eyes. Toneri had his arm around Hinata’s shoulders.
Hinata, why?
“What a minute!”
It was Naruto’s voice. Riding on a bird, he caught up to the circular stand while forming a rasengan.
“Give back Hinata!”
“Give her back? Hinata came to me of her own free will.”
Toneri also began to form an eerily glowing sphere.
“It has been fated since ancient times. Hinata and I will be married.”
“M-married? Hinata, that’s a lie, right?”
“……”
“Hinata! Say something!”
“……”
Without answering, Hinata cast her eyes downward.
Holding his rasengan, Naruto was dumbfounded.
Naruto had first noticed Hinata’s feelings when they had fallen into genjutsu. He had known since long ago that Hinata had said she loved him. However, Naruto had confused Hinata’s love with the kind of “love” as in “I love ramen” or “I love shogi.” He must have caused her so much pain. Perhaps now he was receiving his punishment for the long years of being dense—that was how Naruto felt.
Toneri threw the glowing sphere. Naruto reflexively thrusted his rasengan at it. The glowing sphere and the rasengan collided head-on. However, there was no explosion or anything. The glowing sphere engulfed the rasengan, and intruded into Naruto’s body.
“Guh…”
For a moment, Naruto’s movement was stopped. His widely opened eyes lost their vitality. Forced out by the glowing sphere, Naruto’s chakra shot out of his body. The separated chakra took on a round form, and fell, drifting slowly. Naruto also began to fall. The scarf left Naruto’s hand, and the moment it came into contact with the chakra ball, it violently burst into flames.
“Na-Naruto-kun!”
Hinata turned to Toneri and glared at him.
“Terrible! That’s terrible!”
Toneri stayed quiet and put his hand over Hinata’s shoulder.
“What are you trying to do!?” Hinata yelled as she pushed Toneri’s arm aside.
“It was so that you wouldn’t get hurt in a pointless fight.”
Toneri made a small bubble explode in front of Hinata’s face. Breathing in the vapor that burst out, Hinata lost consciousness, and Toneri held her in his arms.
Toneri’s round stand ascended towards the artificial sun.
As the slowly floating ball of chakra lost altitude, it disappeared into the woods. Nothing happened for awhile, and then—
Kaboom!
Light burst out, and a mushroom-shaped cloud rose up. The trees were cut down, and a huge hole opened up in the ground. A jet-black darkness could be seen through the deep hole—it was outer space. A blue celestial body was floating in that darkness. A blue, shining, beautiful planet.
“C-could that be… E-Earth?”
Riding on a bird, Sai looked down at the planet through the hole in silent amazement.
As Naruto was falling, the flaming scarf floated in the air, and burned up.
“Hinata…”
He fell into a deep unconsciousness.
With roaring noise, a meteorite passed over Shikamaru’s head. Leaving a trail, it disappeared beyond the mountain range. A bit later, the sound of an explosion and a gigantic mushroom-shaped cloud were identified—how much damage might have occurred beneath that creepy cloud?
Shikamaru opened the palm of his hand and checked the emerging clock. The clock indicated no delay until the destruction of humanity.
They were in the sky above the forest where Sai had lost sight of Hanabi and the enemy. Remains from both Hanabi and the shinobi—it was possible that there might be some kind of clue.
Shikamaru and the others were riding separately on the ink birds that Sai made, investigating. Sai, Shikamaru, and Sakura each rode individually, while Naruto and Hinata rode on a bird together. Hinata was a target of the enemy. Out of concern, it was decided that she would be placed near Naruto, the strongest on the team.
Naruto’s scarf fluttered in the cold wind in the sky. Behind him, Hinata searched the ground with her byakugan.
“!”
For an instant, she spotted something unusual on the snowy surface. The handle of a kunai was slightly visible above the snow. Flustered, she tapped Naruto’s shoulder and told him to land. As soon as they landed, Hinata jumped from the ink bird and pulled the kunai out of the snow.
A strap with a pink doll—
“This is Hanabi’s kunai…”
“Maybe Hanabi might’ve dropped it because she wanted you to notice it, Hinata.”
When Hinata gazed at the kunai with her byakugan, she could faintly feel Hanabi’s chakra. As if leaving a trail, the chakra continued into the forest. Furthermore, as Hinata looked through the trail with her byakugan, she could see the entrance of a cave far off in the northwest direction.
“A very deep cave… It continues underground… There’s a spring, and it’s glowing.”
“…Let’s go check it out,” said Shikamaru, approaching from behind.
*****
In one room of a particular lone castle:
Hanabi was asleep in the bed of an extravagant guest room. The door quietly opened, and a handsome young man with silver hair entered. It was Toneri. His eyes were closed as before. He placed his hand on the sleeping Hanabi’s eyes and tried to sense something.
“This is good. Certainly the kekkei genkai… a pure and fresh Hyuuga byakugan!”
The overjoyed Toneri opened his eyes—and in either socket, he had no eyeballs.
Hidden in the thicket of the forest, the entrance of the cave was open. Shikamaru and the others proceeded into the dark inside of the cave, being careful of their surroundings. There was no sign that the enemy would appear. As they continued to the center, they reached a huge limestone cavern. When they looked up, they could see a large shinobi character engraved onto the rocks of the roof.
“That character is the ‘a’ in ‘a-un,’” Sai said to Shikamaru.
“I guess that means ‘this is the beginning.’”
There was a spring filled with clear water, but it was so deep that when peered into, the bottom could not be seen. Even with the byakugan, Hinata’s field of vision was distorted and she was unable to see through it. The spring was at the end of the cave, with no other path that continued inside.
“Hey Shikamaru, don’t tell me we’re going to dive into this spring?” Naruto was strangely uneasy.
“Yeah, we are.”
“We’ll get w-wet?”
“Of course.”
“Don’t give me ‘of course’!”
Naruto hurriedly took off his scarf and began to put it into his backpack.
“So what if your scarf gets wet! You’re such a little boy…”
“It’s precious dattebayo!” Naruto scowled at Sakura’s mocking. Next to them, Hinata quietly averted her gaze.
“It looks like you won’t need to take off your scarf.”
Sai scooped up some water from the spring with his hand.
“This water… doesn’t get you wet when you touch it.”
-
Shikamaru’s team swam through the dark water. With the corpses of microorganisms and such floating about, it was as if snow was falling. The flickering might have been glowing bugs. Beyond the dim light, at the bottom of the spring, there appeared to be a wavering like the surface of water. They approached to find that it was indeed a water surface—a water surface at the bottom of a spring.
It might have been a trap, but there was nothing they could do but go. When Naruto and the others looked at each other, they came to the decision to go through the spring bottom. The next instant, the five of them plunged into darkness. Without knowing why, they raised their voices in astonishment. It was a cylindrical space surrounded by a wall of rock. Although they should have been steadily descending, it was pitch black, so they had no sense of up, down, left, or right. They did not even know where they were falling.
A light came into view below them. It approached steadily. The light’s true form was a large bubble.
“We’re going to run into it!”
The bubble burst open. They all involuntarily closed their eyes.
-
When Naruto opened his eyes, he was in a classroom at the academy. He had returned to his younger form. It was a familiar classroom. Sakura, Chouji, Shikamaru, and everyone else appeared as they had at that time.
Sakura-chan suddenly shrunk dattebayo!
Iruka-sensei began to speak.
“If the end of the world was coming tomorrow, who would you want to be with?”
“There’s no way the end of the world is coming!” Naruto responded the same way he had in the past.
Huh? I… feel like I’ve said the same thing before…
“Say for instance… if the moon was falling.”
“If it was the last day on earth, it would be nice if meat was falling instead of the moon.”
Everyone laughed at Chouji’s words.
“Haha, no, no. Like the moon would…”
Shikamaru stuck his head out the window and looked up at the sky. He suddenly turned pale.
“It’s-it’s-it’s the moon!”
Outside the window, a moon with a diameter of less than five hundred meters was suddenly falling.
“Aaaaaaaahhhh!”
A huge panic started inside the classroom. In the next instant, the moon fell and the school building collapsed. There was a tremendous cloud of dust. Naruto coughed violently and closed his eyes.
Is this a dream? Have I gone back to the past? No, it’s not the past… the moon didn’t fall back then!
When he opened his eyes, Naruto was standing in an open room. All around, his comrades were watching over him from a distance.
“Mn?”
His arms and legs were longer than before. Before his eye was—Inuzuka Kiba!
“Naruto… prepare yourself!”
Kiba was fully ready to fight Naruto.
This is the… ch-ch-chuunin exams dattebayo!
“Hey Kiba… wait a sec!”
“Idiot! There’s no ‘wait’ in an actual fight! Gijuu ninpou: shikyaku no jutsu!”
On all fours, Kiba attacked with raging force.
“Uwaa… wait –ttebayo!”
The fleeing Naruto ran into the wall, but there was no impact. He went straight through to the other side of the wall. Waiting on the other side was—the battlefield with Pain!
Th-this time it’s Pain?
“Banshou ten’in!”
Without warning, Pain form a hand seal, and Naruto was drawn in, caught, and slammed into the ground. His hands were then impaled by a black pole.
“Gah!”
It was there that Hinata entered, standing up to Pain to protect Naruto, who was unable to move.
“I won’t let you hurt Naruto-kun anymore!”
“Hi-Hinata… why did you come here dattebayo!”
“I’m not afraid to die if it means I can protect you! Because… I love you Naruto-kun!”
Hi-Hinata… it’s impossible for you… we’ll both end up dying like this!
-
There was a zero gravity space within the giant bubble. The five members of Shikamaru’s team were asleep while lightly floating.
This isn’t normal sleepiness… We’ve been caught in some kind of jutsu!
Only Sakura was trying not to sleep and desperately resisting, but her eyelids closed on their own.
“Sa-Sasuke-kun…?” Sakura murmured with her eyes closed.
Sasuke stood before Sakura, gently smiling.
“It is Sasuke-kun!”
Sakura stood up to run to the beckoning Sasuke, but lightly shook her head.
No, this can’t be! This isn’t Sasuke-kun!
In an instant, the scenery around her warped.
This is no ordinary dream… It’s genjutsu!
Sasuke, Naruto, Ino, Tsunade, and others appeared, clinging around Sakura as if to test her.
When trapped in genjutsu, the chakra in the victim’s head is controlled by the enemy. However, Sakura narrowly retained her consciousness. In the past, Kakashi had told her she was the genjutsu type.
Her teacher had taught her a method to deal with being caught in genjutsu—
I’ve got to stop the flow of chakra for a second and get back my own chakra!
Shaking off idle thoughts, she cleared her mind in meditation. The flow of chakra stopped, and the illusion of Sasuke and the others disappeared in an instant.
-
Inside the giant bubble, Sakura frantically opened her eyes.
“Hey, everyone… wake up! This is… genjutsu!”
Nearby, her comrades were drifting in a hypnotic state.
“Everyone… please! Wake up!” Sakura cried, but no one woke up.
Naruto and Hinata were next to each other, touching forehead to forehead as they slept. When Hinata had turned over in her sleep, the red scarf had spilled out of her backpack and wrapped itself around Naruto’s chest.
-
Naruto had returned to the scene of Iruka’s lesson.
“Alright, it’s the last day on Earth. If the world was ending tomorrow, who would you want to spend time with… write down that person’s name!”
All at once, the students began to write. Naruto bent forward in curiosity to see whose name everyone wrote.
Sakura wrote “Uchiha Sasuke-kun.”
Daaamn! That really was it!
Suddenly, Hinata’s form came into view.
He peered over to find that she was writing “Uzumaki Naruto-kun.”
Eh? Why did Hinata say me?
Naruto pondered over this.
Sakura-chan wrote Sasuke. It’s because Sakura-chan is that way about Sasuke… so that means that Hinata’s? Eh?
Hinata turned to Naruto and smiled sweetly.
“…Eh?”
Suddenly the scene changed to the battlefield with Pain. Hinata was standing up to Pain to protect the injured Naruto.
“I’m not afraid to die if it means I can protect you! Because… I love you Naruto-kun!”
She loves me? Love… Speaking of love, there’s ramen. I love ramen…
“I love you, Naruto-kun!”
No, Hinata’s “love” isn’t that “love”!
Hinata launched her juuho soushiken, but was mercilessly taken down by Pain’s Shinra Tensei.
“Hi-Hinata!”
In an instant, all of Naruto’s memories of Hinata ran through his mind like revolving lanterns.
So this means, the way Hinata feels about me… this means she… lo-lo-lo-
“Naruto! Wake up!”
It was Sakura’s voice. Sakura was somewhere calling Naruto.
“Sakura-chan?”
When he looked around, Sakura came running from the distance of the smoke-filled battlefield.
-
Naruto received a strong slap to the face.
“Owww!”
“This is genjutsu… a genjutsu space! It’s not real!” Sakura called while transmitting chakra into Naruto.
He was vaguely conscious, but it somehow seemed like they were still asleep inside the giant bubble.
The sleepy-eyed Naruto suddenly looked up.
Nearby were Shikamaru and Sai, along with Hinata, gazing worriedly at him.
“You finally woke up,” Sakura said with relief.
Shikamaru’s team had escaped the genjutsu bubble and was once again slowly descending through the darkness. Many spheres were floating around them. Upon closer inspection, there appeared to be two types of spheres.
One type was glowing bubbles like the one with which Naruto and his friends had previously collided—everyone’s past memories projected on the surface. If they touched them, they would be dragged into the genjutsu space again.
The other type was like knots of sand. Nothing happened when these were touched.
Naruto and the others avoided the bubbles, and jumped on the lumps of sand, stepping on them like stones as they continued descending.
“Using genjutsu to trap us in a world of memories… Confined in a memory prison,” Shikamaru explained while falling.
The enemy having gone as far as to set a genjutsu trap meant that there definitely had to be something beyond this darkness.
At that time, Naruto was thinking of something else entirely.
That was genjutsu… Then, what was that stuff with Hinata? Were those my memories? No, they weren’t regular memories… It was like dreams mixed with memories… So does this mean that for Hinata, I also…
His face reflexively turned red. He briefly glanced at Hinata. She jumped by kicking off of a sand lump.
Shikamaru stopped on a large lump of sand. The others landed next to him. Far below, they could once again see a water surface.
“Hinata, how is it?”
Prompted by Shikamaru, Hinata tried to inspect the water surface with her byakugan, but her field of vision was again distorted, and she couldn’t see through it.
“The enemy might be waiting to ambush us on the other side… Be prepared to fight!”
At Shikamaru’s command, the team members jumped one by one into the water. However, only Naruto hesitated, and stood on the ball of sand fidgeting. Seeing this, Hinata stopped herself from jumping.
“What’s wrong, Naruto-kun?”
“Well… about what happened in that weird bubble just now.”
“Yeah…”
Naruto was silent for a little while, gazing at Hinata.
“…It’s nothing. Sorry… Let’s go,” he said, then dove from the ball of sand and disappeared into the water.
“?”
As Hinata took a few steps forward to follow Naruto—
“Hinata…”
“!”
Surprised at the voice, she turned to find a man standing there. Hinata reflexively drew her kunai.
“I said I would come for you, but you were the one to come here… I’m happy.”
It was Toneri, the ringleader in Hanabi’s kidnapping, and the enemy who, with a smiling face, had also tried to abduct Hinata.
“Where is Hanabi?”
“Relax… She is quietly sleeping in my castle.”
“Give back Hanabi!”
“That depends upon your answer… Byakugan Princess.”
Byakugan Princess?”
“Hinata… Let us get married!”
“M-married?”
-
Swimming after Shikamaru and the others, Naruto turned to look behind him. Hinata was not following. This was enemy territory. He didn’t know if something had happened. Naruto decided to turn around and go back. When Naruto approached the surface of the water, Hinata and Toneri were facing each other atop the ball of sand.
That bastard again…
Hinata had her kunai drawn. Even in the dimness, Hinata’s face looked pale.
“…This is fate!” Toneri took a step closing to Hinata as he said this.
Naruto leapt out of the water. He jumped between the two of them, protecting Hinata with his back towards her.
“Hinata!”
“Naruto-kun!”
“Stay away from Hinata! You bastard, give back Hanabi right now!”
“Hmph, you again…”
Being mocked, Naruto became outraged.
“Youuu… You’re seriously pissing me off –ttebayo!”
Indignant, Naruto launched a punch. Toneri dodged and jumped to a neighboring ball of sand, but he was not very fast. Seeing his movements, Naruto hurried after and immediately shortened the distance between them. Struck by Naruto, Toneri went flying into the surrounding stone wall. However, a feeling of unease was left in Naruto’s hand. It felt like he had hit an object, rather than a person. Having been thrown into the wall, Toneri stood up awkwardly. His joints moved at square angles—this was a doll!
“A puppet…”
Just then, the broken puppet’s mouth clattered as it began to move.
“Naruto, your fists… won’t… reach me… they’ll never… reach.”
Leaving only these words, the puppet collapsed as if its strings had been cut.
“Don’t screw with me! If you’re so confident you won’t get hit, stop hiding in your puppet’s shadow and come fight me out in the open!” Naruto yelled into the darkness.
-
The water’s surface came into view above the heads of Shikamaru and the others who had gone ahead through the water. When the three of them rose to the surface and stuck their heads out of the water, they found themselves in a limestone cave like the one where they had jumped into the spring. The three got out of the water, and stood back to back, being cautious of their surroundings.
“What is this place?”
Countless bubbles and balls of sand of various sizes were scattered around on the ground. This might be where those spheres were being made.
“Where’s Naruto?”
“He was following behind me for part of the way…”
“I have a bad feeling. It’s as if we’re being watched…”
There was a sign of something in the darkness ahead. Two large eyes glowed.
“Prepare to fight!”
Shikamaru drew a kunai and put himself on guard. What appeared was a giant crab monster.
“A crab!?”
Several long, sharp, spines were sticking out of its scraggy, rock-like shell. With its right claw ten times as large as its left claw, it looked like it could cut even a giant tree in half.
And then the bubbles. The crab rushed at the three of them while shooting a mass number of bubbles.
“Disperse!”
At Shikamaru’s command, the group scattered in all directions and avoided the crab’s first attack.
“Watch out for the bubbles! We’ll get caught in genjutsu again!”
It was certain that the enemy this time was a “bubble-using shinobi.”
I guess this is… awaton (bubble release)?
Next to the mentally murmuring Shikamaru, Sai opened his scroll and smoothly ran his paintbrush.
“Ninpou, choujuu giga!”
The three lions that appeared plunged into the crab’s abdomen, but one by one, they were chopped up by its claws.
“Fuujin, Raijin!”
This time, two god statues appeared and wrestled with the crab—a pushing match of power against power.
The god statues caught the crab by the underside, swung it around and flung it upwards. The crab’s giant body slammed into the ceiling, making a large hole. Light shined in through the hole—seeing that he could make shadows, Shikamaru formed a hand seal.
“Ninpou, kage nui!”
The shadows wrapped around multiple times, preventing the crab from moving.
“Sakura!”
“Shaaaaannaroooooo!”
With her superhuman fist raised overhead, Sakura leapt at the crab.
-
Shikamaru, Sai, and Sakura were looking down at the remains of the defeated giant crab.
“That was quite impressive…”
“Y-yeah…”
The two men had a newfound fear of Sakura’s super strength.
Right at that time, Naruto and Hinata finally caught up, and jumped out of the spring.
“You’re late, Naruto!”
“Don’t say that… I was punching out the enemy’s boss!”
“What kind of guy was he?”
“He was… a puppet.”
Naruto said the last part in a small voice.
“A puppet?”
“Yeah, he said the real Toneri’s stronger and would never get hit… He’s definitely a sore loser –ttebayo!”
“That’s all?”
“Yeah, that’s all!”
There was still a lack of information, but Shikamaru tried to reason.
A strong enemy who had kidnapped Hanabi, tried to kidnap Hinata, and controlled bubbles and puppets—
Could it be that he needs live Hyuuga clan members? Speaking of the Hyuuga, there’s the byakugan… does he want to have them search for something?
Then why was the enemy only using puppets and holograms? Toneri was reading their movements. Rather than the puppet and the crab and such, it would be better to invest in a more powerful main force.
“Could it be that the enemies are few in number and they rely on puppets for fighting power?”
“Perhaps there may be a reason why Toneri cannot move.”
Sakura and Sai made guesses.
“Or maybe, it’s both of those things…” Shikamaru replied with a thoughtful expression.
*****
In a certain room of the castle:
Countless puppets were hanging on the walls, and a fire burned bright red in the fireplace. A man—Toneri was sitting in a chair, being illuminated by the fire. Both of his eyes were heavily wrapped in bandages. Beside him knelt a tall man with half of his face covered in bandages. It was the man that Naruto had supposedly beaten in Konoha.
“Leave Hinata alone until I am able to go for her… leave them alone for now, including that Naruto.”
At Toneri’s command, the tall man bowed, and promptly disappeared.
“Ungh!”
In an instant, he grabbed the bandages on his eyes and got up. He painfully shook his shoulder.
“Hehehe, the eyes are moving again… wonderful. This is an incredibly pure byakugan,” he contently murmured, then sat back down in the chair.
There was no other entrance or exit in the cave aside from the spring from which Naruto and the others had come. However, there was a hole open in the ceiling where the crab had crashed into it.
If we’re going to advance, that’s the only way…
Shikamaru decided.
Giant crystal pillars extending the height of the cave continued up to the hole. The group continued through a strange space with heaps of hundreds of transparent pillars. Wind was blowing from up ahead. The sound of waves could be heard. When they escaped the cave, the sun was shining on an ocean-like waterfront.
“What is this place? The sun’s shining when we should be underground?”
Not only that, but when they gazed into the distance, the surface warped with no horizon in sight. Rather than a blue sky, forests and lakes were blurrily visible overhead. It was as if the ground was upside down in the sky.
Maybe we’ve been hit with genjutsu again… Or thrown into another dimension…
Shikamaru was filled with unease.
First comes gathering information.
Shikamaru and the others soared through the air on Sai’s birds.
“So, Shikamaru… What is that?” Sakura asked from the back of a bird while pointing at the shining sun-like object overhead.
“Probably some kind of artificial sun… I think this an artificial space created underground.”
If this enemy possessed the power to move the moon, he may also be able to easily create an underground space and an artificial sun.
“A puppet, and then an artificial sun? He’s an obnoxious bastard just using fakes –ttebayo!” Naruto said as if spitting out the words.
“Hinata, any sign of the enemy?”
“It’s ok. They’re not here,” Hinata answered, investigating the forest below with her byakugan.
“But the enemy must have noticed our activity, right? Why wouldn’t they come to attack us?”
“Yeah, I don’t like that. It’s strangely quiet…” Shikamaru looked around at the dense forest spread over the ground as he said this.
-
In the forest, three puppet shinobi were looking up at the sky, peering through the giant treetops. From inside glowing bubbles, they watched Naruto and the others riding on the birds. Even the Hyuuga clan’s byakugan couldn’t see into these particular bubbles. Once the birds had passed them, the puppet shinobi once again began to follow Naruto and the others.
-
Nighttime arrived even in the underground space. Without setting, the artificial sun was releasing a cold light, similar to moonlight. It served the role of the sun during the day, and the moon at night—they didn’t know if this was a machine or some kind of energy source, but it was quite an ingenious device.
Shikamaru’s team ate their dinner around an open fire in their campsite in the forest.
“It really is quiet…” Sai murmured.
“Even though meteorites might be raining down on the surface right now…”
“I bet everyone in the village is destroying them without leaving a single piece –ttebayo!”
Shikamaru quietly looked at the clock in his palm. The time of the destruction of humanity was certainly approaching.
*****
“Don’t panic!” Tsunade yelled from atop a hill.
The road below her was overflowing with the people of the Fire Country carrying their household belongings.
“This bomb shelter was built to house every citizen of the Fire Country! Proceed in an orderly fashion! Don’t quarrel!”
After the previous Shinobi World War, Tsunade, the Fifth Hokage, had passed the position of Hokage on to Hatake Kakashi. For the safety of the entirety of the Fire Country, she was currently commanding everyone as the one in charge of guiding the evacuation, and as the leader in healing the injured.
“A meteorite! It’s huge!”
The crowd screamed, and began to rampage. They rushed to the entrance of the bomb shelter. Dragging a deep red trail, a giant meteorite plunged down from the sky. It was heading towards the village of Konohagakure. No matter what Tsunade yelled, she couldn’t stop the panic.
-
“Fifth gate, open!”
Standing up to the crisis in the village of Konohagakure was Rock Lee. He stuck out his fist, and leapt at the meteorite, prepared to give his life. He steadily rose, and approached the meteorite.
“Even if it costs my life, I will protect the village!”
Gradually, his whole body flared crimson, and his eyes widened, revealing the whites. It was approaching. The giant meteorite was before his eyes.
“Uryaaaa!”
Just like that he plunged into the meteorite and broke through. The meteorite cracked, rumbled, and finally exploded and scattered in all directions.
“Magnificent!”
Might Guy was sitting in a wheelchair, watching over Lee’s efforts from the window of a hospital room. Without even trying to wipe away his tears of excitement, he gave a thumbs-up, congratulating the heroic act of his favorite student. On his cast were the two characters meaning “youth.” His white teeth sparkled.
*****
Naruto spotted Hinata’s form from the shadow of the thicket. Hinata was sitting alone in the forest, mending a scarf. It was the red scarf that had torn lengthwise when she had fallen from the roof.
That scarf is really for me…?
Since the genjutsu incident in the bubble, he had been so conscious of Hinata that he couldn’t conduct himself naturally. When his eyes met Hinata’s, he was nervous, and his smile became stiff.
Hinata had always smiled for him, but when her eyes went to the bordered scarf wrapped around his neck, for some reason she would avert her gaze and look down.
Is it that she’s upset by this scarf? That’s a problem… I really don’t get girls’ feelings… Well, I’ll take this off for now.
Naruto quietly removed his scarf and put it inside his jacket.
-
The next morning, the members of Shikamaru’s team were soaring above the forest, riding individually on four ink birds. Naruto and Hinata rode on the same bird. Naruto was controlling the bird while Hinata focused on observing with her byakugan.
“Shikamaru-kun! I see a village twenty kilometers ahead.”
“Alright, let’s go check it out.”
Shikamaru waved his hand, signaling Sai and Sakura as well.
“……”
Hinata had noticed that the scarf wasn’t wrapped around Naruto’s neck. He had already taken it off when she saw him that morning.
Why…
As she looked at Naruto, he noticed her gaze and smiled—but his smile seemed a little bit stiff.
-
Along the hillside of a slightly elevated mountain, there was a town. It may have been a very beautiful town long ago. Cave residences made by carefully digging into the rock extended from the base of the mountain to the summit. Overgrowing with ivy and weeds, there was no sign that people lived there. It was a town that seemed to have been abandoned for hundreds of years. Rusted ninja tools and such were scattered about. They didn’t know what kind of traps had been set, but at least it felt like it wasn’t an illusion.
“…It looks like this was a shinobi village long ago,” Sai murmured.
In the afternoon, once it had been confirmed that it was more or less safe, it was decided that they would split into two teams, one with Naruto and Hinata and the other team with Shikamaru and the others, to gather information. At the place where they arrived at the town, black burn marks could be seen.
“There was a fire…”
“Maybe there was a war?”
In an abandoned house, a multitude of human bones were piled up to the ceiling.
“At any rate, this isn’t normal…” Shikamaru murmured as the light of the lantern illuminated the mountain of skulls.
-
Naruto insisted to Hinata that they take a break. Hinata was acting cheerfully, but she seemed exhausted. When they came to a resting spot, she sat down dizzily.
Hinata’s… worrying about Hanabi and pushing herself too hard.
“When you’re worn out, it’s important to eat something –ttebayo!”
“…But I’m not hungry.”
“You have to eat! I’ll eat half, too.”
Naruto offered his rations to Hinata.
“I really don’t want to eat.”
It was silent for a while.
“No matter how exhausted I am, if I eat ‘til I’m full and sleep, I go back to normal…”
Hinata lifted her face and stared at Naruto.
“Well, maybe it’s just that simple for me, hahaha.”
Hinata let out a quick burst of laughter, and took the rations from Naruto’s hand.
“Thank you Naruto-kun… I’ll eat.”
Naruto and Hinata walked side by side through sunlight filtered by trees. Naruto brushed off a spider web that was caught on Hinata’s head. He scooped up spring water from an old drinking fountain in the palms of his hands, and they drank it together. Hinata was smiling like a flower. To Naruto, it was a kind of happiness he was feeling for the first time.
He would never lie and say that he had been unhappy up until then. After forming bonds of mutual trust with his comrades and eating his favorite ramen, both his stomach and his heart were filled with a sense of happiness. He was blessed with Iruka, Kakashi, and Jiraiya as teachers. The existence of Kurama, the nine-tailed fox who had been bound to him at risk of life and death, was also important. It wasn’t that he had never cursed his fate as an orphan and a jinchuuriki when he was young, but all of these obstacles fueled his growth.
Naruto felt that he was happy. These were his true feelings.
But the sense of happiness he experienced in the hours of that afternoon—it was like a sweet and sour, light-headed overjoyed feeling that Naruto had never known until now. It wasn’t like the sense of accomplishment after finishing a mission, having friendly conversations with his comrades, or the instant that he slurped up the broth of Ichiraku’s ramen. It was a special happiness.
Naruto and Hinata took a break. They sat next to each other on the stone floor. Naruto was in awe of Hinata’s face in profile. He felt the impulse to trace that beautiful outline with his fingers.
Hinata suddenly turned her head. Naruto became flustered and averted his gaze.
“N-Naruto-kun… what happened to that scarf?”
“Th-that… It’s warm here underground… so I took it off.”
It was actually almost a little cold. Their breath was even a little bit visible.
“…You must be cold dressed like that.”
Naruto glanced at Hinata’s bare arms. Her skin was white, and had a sense of transparency.
“……”
“Don’t look too much… These are mission clothes… so it can’t be helped…”
Hinata shyly hid her exposed arms, and her expression as she blushed and looked down caused Naruto’s chest to tighten.
A-anything is fine… I have to say something! I’ve got to say something! Naruto thought.
He had to put his current feelings, his emotions, his thoughts, all into honest words and tell Hinata.
The moment Naruto opened his mouth—
Clang!
Hinata’s backpack fell over, and Hanabi’s kunai fell onto the ground, making noise. Suddenly coming to his senses, he sat up and made some distance. He felt like Hanabi’s kunai was scolding him for forgetting the mission and being in such high spirits.
It was silent.
“Naruto-kun, there’s something I need to talk to you about…”
“?”
“It’s about Toneri…”
“Hinata-san!” Sai’s voice broke in.
It seemed that Shikamaru had found an old building that had been converted into a shrine on the outskirts of the town, and wanted to examine it with the byakugan.
“…We’ll go now!”
Hinata recovered her kunoichi face, and giving a small nod to Naruto, walked out with Sai.
“……”
Naruto felt like he wanted more time. If the world ended like this, he would lose his chance to confess to Hinata. He just couldn’t bear to die with these feelings hidden in his heart. Naruto clenched his fist and made his decision.
-
The team set foot inside the shrine. The enshrined statues were cracked at the front, and the walls and pillars were beginning to crumble. The entire place was ornamented with an “eye” design drawn with a characteristic pattern on the pupil area. It was a pattern of light extending in eight directions from a circle in the center, like two crossed shuriken overlapping. A verse of poetry was engraved in ancient shinobi characters on a stone monument nearby.
“It’s an ancient oath. In the case that the path of mankind is in error…” Shikamaru began to read the verse aloud.
“The eye of reincarnation (tensei) will be resurrected, and the moon’s fist shall destroy mankind… I guess.”
“…What does this mean?” Sakura asked Shikamaru.
“Maybe it means this thing called the eye of reincarnation… is what’s moving the moon?”
“So maybe, Kakashi-sensei’s gut instinct about the moon and Hanabi’s kidnapping being related…”
“Well, that guy’s tends to be right on… in a bad way,” Shikamaru smiled bitterly.
For a moment, Hinata heard a strange voice.
“Byakugan Princess…”
She looked at Naruto and the others, but they didn’t seem to have heard it.
Rumble-rumble-rumble!
Making a strange sound, part of the stone floor at their feet crumbled, and they were enshrouded in thick clouds of dust. After the dust clouds cleared, a hidden level revealed itself. It seemed to continue underground.
-
The group descended to the lower level, carrying lanterns. In the lower level was a wide room with several thousand “stone boxes” neatly arranged in rows.
“Could these be coffins… is this a cemetery?” Shikamaru asked in a serious voice.
“Someone’s here!”
Hearing Hinata’s voice, Shikamaru turned his lantern, shining it on an old man. The old man’s eyes were closed. His form was shabby, but there was a quality about his appearance that made it feel like he had been someone in a position of responsibility in the past.
“The byakugan… I sense the byakugan.”
The old man turned to Hinata and held out his hand.
“Yes, there’s no mistake… Byakugan Princess!”
The old man took a step closer to Hinata.
“Stay away from Hinata!”
Jumping between the two, Naruto stuck out the hand that was holding the lantern.
The old man slowly opened his eyes—he had no eyeballs.
“!”
As he did so, the old man began to groan. He sat down on the floor, and spat up something from his mouth. It was a glowing bubble. The bubble immediately expanded, making its light stronger. Hinata’s byakugan reacted to the bubble’s light. Passing through the byakugan, images were projected into Hinata’s mind.
—A great number of soldiers began a war. A battle flag with a crescent moon and sun was being waved.
—In the center of their position, a giant orb was being prepared like a weapon.
—The next moment, the orb emitted a strong light, and she couldn’t see anything.
—The next thing she saw was the sight of countless people having collapsed. The heaps of corpses—this was certainly a depiction of Hell.
It was there that the images were cut off, and Hinata lost consciousness.
“Hinata!”
Naruto hurried to catch Hinata as she fell over.
“Bastard! What did you do to Hinata?”
The old man whom he asked got up.
“…The tenseigan… has been revived…”
At that time, the old man’s head fell from his neck. His hands and feet also crumbled as if they had lost their strength.
“!”
The severed head rolled onto the floor, and the mouth narrowly moved.
“You must stop… the Ootsutsuki’s… the Ootsutsuki’s…”
The old man completely stopped moving.
The group came out of the underground cemetery and returned to the middle of town. Shikamaru and Sai were on the balcony of a particular building discussing what had just happened.
“That man was saying Ootsutsuki, but isn’t Ootsutsuki the former surname of the Rikudou Sennin?” Shikamaru recalled.
“Ootsutsuki Hagoromo… that was the Rikudou Sennin’s name before he entered priesthood.”
The fact that he had called Hinata “Byakugan Princess” was also concerning.
“It seems like this is related to Toneri kidnapping Hanabi.”
After that, Shikamaru tried to check with Hinata about it, but she said that she couldn’t recall anything. Shikamaru became concerned at Hinata’s pale expression when she answered.
Was what happened in the underground cemetery really that much of a shock to her?
However, Hinata was a well-experienced shinobi. There was something a bit unsettling about the way she was so exhausted.
In Shikamaru’s line of sight was Hinata kneeling at a drinking fountain, and Naruto, who wouldn’t leave her side. Even Shikamaru had noticed that Naruto and Hinata were rapidly getting closer. Naruto falling in love was fine, but they were on a mission right now. It would be a problem if the strongest member of the team couldn’t use his full power.
Maybe I should reprimand Naruto…
But romance problems were delicate. Relationships of mutual trust could be harmed or completely lost because of rash words.
This is a tough one…
Shikamaru mentally expressed his discomfort.
-
That night, they decided to stay in an abandoned building that seemed useable. While everyone was settling down to go to sleep, Naruto, who was on lookout duty, stopped in the hallway in front of Hinata’s room. Light from a lantern was shining out of the room. When he peeked inside, Hinata was knitting.
Knitting just goes on and on… It takes time.
Sensing someone’s presence, Hinata turned her head. Hinata always smiled at him when their eyes met, but tonight she looked down.
“That thing you started to say this afternoon… what was it?”
“……”
“Something about Toneri…”
“It’s nothing.”
“Nothing… what do you mean?
“……”
“Hinata?”
“I’m sorry. Leave me alone…”
There was nothing Naruto could do but leave. He thought about it as he returned to his own room. Hinata was definitely acting weird. It probably wasn’t that she hated Naruto or that she was mad at him. Naruto got the sense that she was carrying some kind of heavy burden and suffering by herself.
*****
In the room of the castle where the fire burned in the fireplace, Toneri slowly got up and removed the bandages from his eyes. In his previously hollow eye sockets were glowing white eyeballs. It was the Hyuuga clan’s byakugan.
After blinking several times as though it was bright, he opened both eyes wide, and stared at the palm of his hand. Finally it came into focus, and he let out a satisfied smile.
“I can see… I can really see!”
Toneri suddenly grabbed a nearby puppet shinobi by the neck, and roughly drew it closer. Their faces close, he fixed his gaze on the emotionless puppet’s face.
“So this is what it means… to see things!”
His life had not been hindered up to this point. Although his fate as a member of the Ootsutsuki clan was to have his eyeballs taken from him at birth, he could perceive his surroundings by gathering chakra in his mind’s eye, and was able to act more quickly and precisely than he could by seeing with eyes. However, there was definitely a big difference between “sensing” and “seeing.” It was on this day that Toneri first knew the joy and excitement of seeing things.
“I wanted to… show you, too, Father…” Toneri murmured in a small voice.
Long ago, when his father was still alive—
Toneri and his father lived together, just the two of them. Many puppets worked for them, but they were really just dolls. Toneri wanted human friends. Going through the cave, Toneri’s father took him to the village of Konohagakure a number of times. The two would often spy on their distant blood relatives, the Hyuuga clan, from a hiding place.
—Look, that girl. Her name is Hyuuga Hinata. Focus and sense her well.
The eyeball-less father and son gathered their chakra in their foreheads, and observed the young girl playing in the garden.
—Yes, she’s a very cute girl.
—In ten years, let’s come for her. We’ll make her your bride!
His father, who had smiled happily when he said that, was no longer there.
Coming to his senses after reminiscing about his father, Toneri gazed at the flames in the fireplace.
“I want to see you! Hinata… I want to see your beautiful face with these eyes,” Toneri said as if he was possessed.
-
Naruto and the other left the abandoned cave dwellings and headed towards the next town in search of new information. The day grew dark during their traveling, so it was decided that they would make camp in the woods. The artificial sun was coldly glowing like the moon.
Naruto, who was dozing near the campfire, abruptly woke up. Hinata was gone. Naruto quietly crawled out of his sleeping bag.
Hinata was mending the red scarf by a spring. Giving up on greeting her, Naruto decided to watch over her from the shadows of the trees. He had worked so well with Hinata until the previous afternoon, but now she was acting distant. No matter what Naruto said, Hinata would vaguely answer and leave. Here, rather than calling to her, he thought he would watch her for a bit. Stitch by stitch, Hinata twisted the red yarn with her knitting needles. Her expression was still not so great. Occasionally, she would look like she was pondering over something.
The knitting needles sliced through the air. Her knitting hands stopped moving. She sighed deeply.
Hinata really is acting strange…
Without having been seen, Naruto stepped out of the shadows. When Hinata noticed Naruto, she stopped knitting.
“To be knitting when my little sister is in trouble… I’m a terrible older sister.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself! You’re the one who’s worried about Hanabi more than anyone else… Everyone knows that.”
If she hadn’t left the mansion that night, Hanabi wouldn’t have been kidnapped—Hinata deeply regretted this, being the one responsible in the absence of her father Hiashi.
It was quiet in the forest. Several glowing butterflies were fluttering around Hinata.
“I’ll definitely save Hanabi, so don’t worry!”
“Thank you… You really are kind, Naruto-kun.”
A glowing butterfly suddenly lit up Hinata’s face. Hinata was smiling sadly. Naruto got a little flustered.
“…It-it’s not like I’m just being kind because I love you. I’m really worried about Hanabi…”
“!”
Hinata was shocked. Her eyes widened, and she peered at Naruto.
“Wh-what did you say just now?”
“I said I’m worried about Hanabi…”
“Be… before that…”
“Before that…”
Naruto’s stomach tightened. What he ought to say as a man, he ought to say properly.
He looked into Hinata’s eyes. Her pure white pupils were wavering. He took a breath, and all at once, he said it.
“Hinata… I love you…”
“……”
As Hinata stared at Naruto, joy came into her eyes for just a moment, then it quickly changed to deep sadness. She looked down without saying anything.
“Hinata…?”
“……”
The moonlight that illuminated Hinata’s face as she looked down was suddenly obstructed. The butterflies fled. When the two looked up, an extravagantly ornamented circular stand was floating through the night sky, and atop it stood Toneri.
“Hinata… I’ve come for you.”
Toneri smiled at Hinata.
“Toneri! Are you a puppet again!? Where’s Hanabi!?”
“Shut up… I came to hear Hinata’s answer.”
Toneri held out his right hand as if to invite Hinata.
“Answer? Hinata doesn’t have any business with you! Anyway Hanabi…? Hinata…?”
At that time, Hinata bowed deeply in response to Toneri.
“!”
Hinata turned around, and pushed the red scarf against Naruto’s chest to give it to him.
“Wh-what is this?”
“Naruto-kun… goodbye,” Hinata whispered in a small voice, then walked of her own accord to Toneri’s side.
“Hey, Hinata… what are you doing?”
Hinata got onto the circular stand alongside Toneri, and they floated up into the sky.
Naruto clutched the red scarf. He couldn’t comprehend what was happening.
“Hinataaaaaaa!”
Naruto began to desperately chase after the circular stand as it flew away.
What is this, Hinata… why would you go with a guy like him?
Naruto asked Hinata over and over in his head, full of confusion.
Noticing Naruto’s screaming voice, Shikamaru, Sai, and Sakura chased after Toneri on ink birds.
The enemy’s eagle beasts appeared, and began a mid-air battle. Sai threw exploding kunai, shooting several of them down.
Sakura couldn’t believe what she saw with her own eyes. Toneri had his arm around Hinata’s shoulders.
Hinata, why?
“What a minute!”
It was Naruto’s voice. Riding on a bird, he caught up to the circular stand while forming a rasengan.
“Give back Hinata!”
“Give her back? Hinata came to me of her own free will.”
Toneri also began to form an eerily glowing sphere.
“It has been fated since ancient times. Hinata and I will be married.”
“M-married? Hinata, that’s a lie, right?”
“……”
“Hinata! Say something!”
“……”
Without answering, Hinata cast her eyes downward.
Holding his rasengan, Naruto was dumbfounded.
Naruto had first noticed Hinata’s feelings when they had fallen into genjutsu. He had known since long ago that Hinata had said she loved him. However, Naruto had confused Hinata’s love with the kind of “love” as in “I love ramen” or “I love shogi.” He must have caused her so much pain. Perhaps now he was receiving his punishment for the long years of being dense—that was how Naruto felt.
Toneri threw the glowing sphere. Naruto reflexively thrusted his rasengan at it. The glowing sphere and the rasengan collided head-on. However, there was no explosion or anything. The glowing sphere engulfed the rasengan, and intruded into Naruto’s body.
“Guh…”
For a moment, Naruto’s movement was stopped. His widely opened eyes lost their vitality. Forced out by the glowing sphere, Naruto’s chakra shot out of his body. The separated chakra took on a round form, and fell, drifting slowly. Naruto also began to fall. The scarf left Naruto’s hand, and the moment it came into contact with the chakra ball, it violently burst into flames.
“Na-Naruto-kun!”
Hinata turned to Toneri and glared at him.
“Terrible! That’s terrible!”
Toneri stayed quiet and put his hand over Hinata’s shoulder.
“What are you trying to do!?” Hinata yelled as she pushed Toneri’s arm aside.
“It was so that you wouldn’t get hurt in a pointless fight.”
Toneri made a small bubble explode in front of Hinata’s face. Breathing in the vapor that burst out, Hinata lost consciousness, and Toneri held her in his arms.
Toneri’s round stand ascended towards the artificial sun.
As the slowly floating ball of chakra lost altitude, it disappeared into the woods. Nothing happened for awhile, and then—
Kaboom!
Light burst out, and a mushroom-shaped cloud rose up. The trees were cut down, and a huge hole opened up in the ground. A jet-black darkness could be seen through the deep hole—it was outer space. A blue celestial body was floating in that darkness. A blue, shining, beautiful planet.
“C-could that be… E-Earth?”
Riding on a bird, Sai looked down at the planet through the hole in silent amazement.
As Naruto was falling, the flaming scarf floated in the air, and burned up.
“Hinata…”
He fell into a deep unconsciousness.
