Yakumo was rushed to the hospital. Her constitution was already fragile, and after this recent ordeal, she grew visibly weaker by the minute.
The worst part was that the medical-nin couldn't find the underlying cause. That peculiar chakra lingering within her system clearly did not belong to Yakumo herself. The sudden crisis threw Konoha into a flurry of activity.
Inside the hospital ward, Kurenai sat by the bed, her face etched with worry. When she saw Masahiko walk in from the hallway, she quietly stood up and escorted him outside.
"They can't detect exactly what's wrong with her yet," Kurenai whispered, her tone laced with anxiety. "What do we do?"
Masahiko shook his head. After pondering for a moment, he replied, "It's definitely related to that foreign chakra. Let's wait and observe for now."
As he spoke, he reached out and took Kurenai's hand. Instinctively, she tried to pull away, but out of absolute trust in him, she yielded and let him hold it. Masahiko slowly traced words against her palm with his finger.
Wait for it to emerge again. We will seal it then.
Kurenai instantly understood his caution. The monster residing within Yakumo shared her senses; it could see and hear everything the girl did, making verbal communication too risky. For a brief, fleeting second, she had actually thought he just wanted to hold her hand. She quickly masked her embarrassment, feigning absolute composure.
Finishing his invisible message, Masahiko asked aloud, "Have Murakumo-senpai and the others been notified?"
"Yes. You should head back and get some rest," Kurenai reminded him gently. "Didn't I hear you still need to work on the prosthetic limb for Kosuke-senpai?"
Masahiko nodded. "I'll head back first, then."
"Mhm."
Later that night, at exactly eight o'clock, Masahiko set his pen down and summoned the System's holographic screen on schedule.
He had already drafted several versions of the blueprints for Kosuke Maruboshi's prosthetic limb. By utilizing the System's training space to simulate them via Puppet Jutsu, he had successfully narrowed down the most suitable design. All that remained was gathering the materials and actually manufacturing the arm—a task that didn't need to be rushed tonight.
Checking the new episode update of "Naruto: The Prequel" was far more important!
Soon, the light on the screen dimmed, and mere moments later, the flickering glow of candlelight illuminated the frame.
Orochimaru and Kabuto Yakushi were shown conversing in a dimly lit, secret chamber. However, there was no audible dialogue; the scene lasted only two or three seconds before Masahiko himself made his on-screen debut. He had originally assumed the broadcast would dedicate a significant chunk of runtime to this encounter. Instead, his entire conversation with Orochimaru had been aggressively edited down. It only retained the few brief lines exchanged during their transaction, along with their final discussion regarding the Kaguya and Hyuga clans.
Even the ominous "Main House Destruction Plan" had been left on the cutting room floor.
But even so—
"? What organization does he have?" "He's got Shisui, Kazuma, and Karin. Ranging from S-Rank rogue ninjas down to literal kids. Are you scared yet?""Is there any actual possibility that the Old Thief really does have some massive backing behind the scenes?""Impossible! Absolutely impossible!"
Masahiko's performance since the broadcast began had been that of a lone wolf; it was hard for the audience to believe he had a legitimate organization supporting him. However, the ambiguity certainly drove up the discussion engagement.
The scene quickly shifted. The next shot plunged straight into the heart of the Hyuga clan compound.
Neji was in a courtyard, relentlessly practicing the Gentle Fist. However, the visual effects animating his chakra made his current state look notably distinct.
Suddenly—
From several tenketsu points across his body, distinct threads of chakra erupted, shooting out in all directions.
The camera then tilted upward, panning over to a larger, far more luxurious courtyard in the distance. Hiashi Hyuga stood on the veranda, his gaze initially resting on Hinata as she trained inside the room. Activating his Byakugan, his vision pierced through the walls, catching sight of Neji's explosive chakra display.
A profound look of disappointment flashed through Hiashi's eyes before he turned and walked away. Considering it was Hiashi himself who had insisted on looking after Neji, how could he possibly not keep a close, private eye on his nephew's progress?
Masahiko dragged the progress bar forward, barely glancing at the resulting flood of bullet comments.
And then came the pivotal scene.
Nighttime at the Kurama residence. Inside Yakumo's bedroom, a sinister, dark mist coiled through the air.
Cold sweat beaded on Yakumo's forehead as she thrashed frantically on her bed, trapped in a terrifying nightmare she simply couldn't wake up from.
Masahiko's brow furrowed tightly as he scrutinized the footage.
In the next second.
On the screen, the black mist began to rapidly condense, coalescing into a distinct, ghostly silhouette. At this moment, the entity retained the exact same hideous, demonic appearance that Masahiko remembered from the original canon timeline in his past life. This stood in stark contrast to what he had actually witnessed today. The "Ido" he had faced earlier merely looked like a far more sinister, twisted version of Yakumo herself wearing a demonic mask—not this grotesque, pure monster.
The implication was clear.
Thanks to Masahiko's continuous interventions, the original Ido festering within Yakumo had indeed been steadily worn down and neutralized. It was the introduction of this foreign black mist that had drastically caused her condition to deteriorate once more.
With Ido's manifestation, Yakumo's terror only spiked.
If his deduction was correct, the entity was actively hijacking her dreamscape! As Yakumo's fear and negative emotions violently fluctuated, Ido's form grew increasingly dense and tangible. Simultaneously, the monster was hungrily absorbing the surrounding black mist. Slowly, its monstrous visage began to morph into a hardened mask, and upon its forehead, a blurred, indistinct character began to form.
"WTF!!! What the hell is that thing?""How can such a cute little girl have something that horrific living inside her?""Holy sh*t, I completely missed the signs... What exactly is going on here? Is this another Kekkei Genkai gone wrong?""Probably. Kekkei Genkai might be incredibly powerful, but they seriously ruin people's lives!"
The demonic appearance was genuinely unsettling. The bullet comments flew by so fast they completely covered the monster's face.
Masahiko had to toggle the comments off. He dragged the progress bar back, pausing repeatedly to examine the character on the forehead.
Through the blurred shape, his mind reconstructed the kanji.
'The top radical is Rain (雨). The bottom is blurry...'
"It's Zero (零)!"
A spark of realization flashed in Masahiko's mind.
Zero-Tails (Reibi)!
It wasn't a true Tailed Beast, but a monster that fed on dark chakra. And Ido? Ido was the literal manifestation of Yakumo's darkness.
'No wonder!'
He unpaused the video. On the screen, a dark silhouette flashed past the window outside and vanished into the night.
While Masahiko had no way of knowing exactly what the shadowy figure was thinking, he was absolutely certain of one thing: this entire situation had most likely blown far past the culprit's original expectations. Judging by the current state of affairs, there was an eighty percent chance that Ido had forcefully mutated.
The perpetrator had likely never anticipated that the reservoir of darkness within Yakumo's heart would be so overwhelming—primarily because her body was actively gestating a psychic monster of its own. Consequently, the small sliver of implanted Zero Tails chakra failed to establish roots and siphon her negative emotions to grow stronger. Instead, it was violently plundered and assimilated by Ido itself.
Masahiko continued watching the broadcast.
The subsequent shots remained focused on Yakumo Kurama, but the camera angles had grown incredibly eerie. The footage was fragmented and voyeuristic, perfectly mimicking the perspective of someone secretly spying on her from the shadows.
"Is it just me, or are these camera angles feeling a bit weird?""They were already weird earlier. Plus, did you guys catch that black shadow outside her window a minute ago?""Wait, is someone actively trying to hurt Yakumo?""Blind guess here, but I bet my life Danzō is behind this!"
The bullet comments rolled across the screen in rapid succession. As the prequel's plot systematically unfolded, Danzō's image as the ultimate, sinister mastermind was cementing itself deeply into the audience's minds—he was rapidly evolving into the fandom's designated "Pot Kage," the universal scapegoat left holding the pot for every single tragedy in Konoha.
Masahiko, naturally, knew perfectly well that Danzō wasn't the one pulling the strings here.
'To be capable of slipping past the Anbu patrols and completely bypassing Konoha's sensory barrier… out of everyone associated with the Zero Tails, only Shinnō has the means to pull that off.'
Judging purely from the voyeuristic camera framing, Masahiko grew even more convinced that the situation had severely backfired on Shinnō. The man was almost certainly racking his brain out in the dark, desperately trying to figure out a way to reclaim his lost chakra.
He hit fast-forward again.
The broadcast swiftly arrived at the scene where Masahiko had personally delivered the experimental Puppet Exoskeleton. The camera's perspective slowly pulled further and further back into the distance, eventually fading to black entirely.
The spy had retreated.
Afterward, the timeline skipped ahead to the following night.
Yakumo lay peacefully in her bed. She wasn't plagued by nightmares this time, but the insidious black mist crept into her room once again. Immediately, the monster lurking within her soul flared to life, ruthlessly devouring and absorbing the invading dark chakra.
By feeding on it, Ido's physical manifestation finally achieved a much more complete and stable form. Although the lower half of the Kanji for "Zero" remained a blurred mess on its mask, the upper radical for "Rain" was now glaringly distinct.
Sporting a remarkably savage and malevolent visage, Ido slowly turned its head, its terrifying gaze locking directly onto the world outside the window.
After that chilling encounter, those strange, voyeuristic camera angles never appeared in the episode again.
Following a brief montage of the hospital scenes, the localized chaos at the Ninja Academy was shown being swiftly and decisively quelled.
The final shot lingered on a quiet street just outside the Academy. A middle-aged man with graying temples, carrying a woven herbalist's basket on his back, could be seen slowly walking down Tea Street, making his way toward the gates leading out of Konoha.
"This episode… the sheer amount of information dumped on us is insane!""That Kurama Kekkei Genkai is ridiculously overpowered. No wonder a mind as fragile as hers ended up birthing a literal psychic monster.""Did you guys notice? The cinematic language in this episode, and that guy at the end… doesn't it give off heavy villain vibes?""Yes, yes, yes! The framing was definitely super weird!""Wait, so does that mean Yakumo's underlying condition was actually successfully cured by the Old Thief initially, and it was this random guy's outside interference that caused her powers to go completely berserk?"
The bullet comments exploded into a flurry of wild theories and frantic speculation.
As the familiar ending theme song began to play, the viewers—who usually spammed the chat with casual farewells and goodnights—remained glued to their screens, passionately and relentlessly debating the implications of the plot.