In the darkness beneath the earth, Black Zetsu felt an unprecedented unease and distress.
A thousand years of planning, and the dawn was at hand. This was its closest to success, to freeing its mother, Ōtsutsuki Kaguya, from her moon Seal.
Its most successful and powerful pawn—Uchiha Madara—had successfully awakened the Rinnegan! According to the plan, as long as the Akatsuki systematically gathered all the Tailed Beasts to form the Ten-Tails, and then Madara became the Ten-Tails Jinchuriki and cast the Infinite Tsukuyomi... its mother's path to revival would be unimpeded.
It no longer needed to meticulously instigate and guide the confrontations between each generation's Indra Chakra Reincarnation and Ashura Chakra Reincarnation, as it had for the past thousand years.
However—what was going on with this generation's Ashura Chakra Reincarnation?!
Although for a thousand years, Indra's Reincarnation had never once defeated Ashura's Reincarnation.
But this time, the Ashura Reincarnation's strength had completely surpassed the scope of 'balance'.
One must know that in the long years after the Six Paths Sage's death, Senju Hashirama was the strongest Ninja Black Zetsu had ever seen, but Uzumaki Naruto, at the same age, had already eclipsed Senju Hashirama's glory.
Therefore, after Orochimaru's "Konoha Crush Plan" failed not long ago, Black Zetsu, having initially learned about Naruto's terrifying power through the White Zetsu intelligence network, immediately raised its guard. It secretly arranged for a large number of White Zetsu to lie in wait around Konoha, conducting round-the-clock, strict surveillance, attempting to uncover the truth about this variable.
However, everything witnessed today still far exceeded Black Zetsu's expectations, leaving it feeling a helpless bewilderment.
Why did two "Indra Chakra Reincarnations" suddenly appear?
Why did the Ōtsutsuki, the threat from distant stars that its mother worried about, descend so much earlier? Those guys should only pose a threat in the far distant future!
Why was the new "Indra Reincarnation" so incredibly powerful? Black Zetsu could assert that even Uchiha Madara at his peak could absolutely not contend with the black-clad man seen today.
Why? And most importantly, the point that made Black Zetsu's blood run cold—what exactly happened to this generation's Ashura Reincarnation?!
When Naruto finally opened that strange right eye with a black sclera and golden iris, and casually activated the Bloodline Trait, Yomotsu Hirasaka, which only the Ōtsutsuki Clan could master... Black Zetsu sensed a pure, dense, and even faintly superior Ōtsutsuki Origin aura, surpassing even its mother, Ōtsutsuki Kaguya!
——————
"How is it? Where exactly does this space lead?" Sasuke asked, watching Naruto manipulate the black portal, opening and closing it, eventually returning to its original spot, with an expression mixed with novelty and strangeness.
Naruto replied somewhat uncertainly, "It seems... the exit is determined by my intention at the time? I just thought 'home' just now, and the other side of the portal was the inside of my apartment."
Sasuke nodded thoughtfully. Spacetime Ninjutsu that transcends space, this was indeed one of the many high-level abilities of the Rinnegan.
Although the outward appearance of Naruto's new eye was closer to Boruto's special "Jōgan," its functional performance seemed to lean more towards the Rinnegan's Domain?
The reason Naruto's expression was strange was that he quickly realized the subtle relationship between this "new ability" and his existing skills.
The Flying Thunder God Technique, as his signature Ninjutsu that he had already mastered proficiently, had the advantage of not requiring hand Seals, instantaneous activation, and precise coordinates, allowing for extremely flexible instantaneous displacement and tactical penetration in combat.
In contrast, while Yomotsu Hirasaka could also cross space, it required actively opening a fixed portal, a process with a brief gap. In rapidly changing, high-speed battles, it was difficult to achieve a "no-warning" surprise attack or evasion like the Flying Thunder God, making its tactical flexibility seem slightly inferior.
"It seems... a bit redundant," Naruto mumbled softly, but then, a crucial distinction was caught by him!
The Flying Thunder God Technique required a Flying Thunder God Mark to be left at the target location beforehand for teleportation.
But Yomotsu Hirasaka... based on the test just now, seemed to only require a clear "intention" or "cognition" as a coordinate?!
Wait... Naruto's eyes widened slightly, and a bold hypothesis emerged, "Does that mean... as long as I want to, even places I've never been to and had no chance to leave a Flying Thunder God Mark, as long as I can 'imagine' or 'know' its approximate location or characteristics... I can open a door directly there?!
Wouldn't this become... an "Anywhere Door"?!
This discovery made Naruto's heart beat a little faster. Although this eye, "gifted" by Urashiki, seemed to contain another ability yet to be explored, for now, he decided to thoroughly understand the characteristics of this "Anywhere Door."
Naruto once again focused his intention on his right eye, and a new black portal silently opened before him.
This time, he didn't step in immediately but first created a Shadow Clone.
"Be careful," Satsuki couldn't help but whisper a reminder.
The Shadow Clone nodded to its main body, then stepped into the profound darkness without hesitation.
A moment later, the Shadow Clone's memories were transmitted back to the main body—no danger, no abnormal spatial turbulence, only a peculiar... sense of vastness.
Receiving the safety confirmation, Naruto took a deep breath, calmed his slightly accelerated heartbeat from the novelty, nodded to Sasuke, Boruto, and Satsuki beside him, and then stepped forward, his entire figure disappearing into the black doorway.
Om... like passing through a cool, frictionless curtain of water, after an instant of weightlessness—all surrounding sounds instantly vanished.
Not silence, but absolute soundlessness. Only the faint hum of his own blood flowing remained in his ears, and... an increasingly clear heartbeat.
"...Am I... flying?"
Naruto moved his limbs in surprise. His body felt unusually light and free, completely without the sluggishness of drifting in water, and he didn't need Chakra to maintain it.
He could adjust his posture in the Void Realm as he pleased, with movements as fluid as on the ground.
He took a breath—his breathing was smooth, unhindered. His lungs worked normally, without the expected feeling of suffocation.
"Can I breathe normally in a place like this? Is this probably... one of the Ōtsutsuki Clan's basic survival abilities?" Naruto thought with mixed feelings, "Should I... be happy about this?"
His physical capabilities, after fusing with Urashiki's power, seemed to have quietly crossed into the "inhuman" realm in some aspects.
While this was certainly exciting, signifying new possibilities and powerful adaptability, it also brought an indescribable sense of detachment and unease, as he was moving beyond the scope of "ordinary people."
He looked up and surveyed his surroundings.
As far as his eyes could see, there was an endless, profoundly unsettling black Void Realm, dotted with countless bright and dim, eternally twinkling points of starlight.
And in the incredibly distant beyond, a massive, intensely white orb of light, radiating endless light and heat, hung silently—was that the sun?
He looked down, towards the "bottom."
A planet covered with vast expanses of azure and mottled land-white, slowly rotating against the black curtain, hung quietly there. That familiar outline, that cloud-shrouded atmosphere, those vaguely visible continental plates... "Is this... the Universe?"
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