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Was it tragic, or pathetic?
Or maybe it deserved praise?
If Menma had once genuinely liked Naruto as a character, he now despised him with equal intensity. Menma certainly didn't believe he was absolutely in the right, nor did he ever spout grand speeches championing "justice."
Maybe his path was flawed.
Maybe his failure would lead to a far worse outcome.
But at least Menma never shouted meaningless slogans. He never tried to forcefully ram his own convictions down someone else's throat.
And exactly because of that...
Menma found Naruto utterly intolerable.
"Never going back on your word? What a pathetic joke. Naruto, you can't accomplish anything. You can't solve anything. Everything you do is just talk. Whether in that world or this one, you are always so painfully naive. It makes me sick."
Menma stared coldly at Naruto. Memories of scenes from the original manga flashed through his mind, bleeding into the reality of the boy lying helpless before him. At this moment, Menma didn't bother hiding his utter disgust.
"What?"
Naruto just stared at him, completely bewildered.
What did he mean by "that world" and "this world"?
A profound look of confusion filled Naruto's eyes.
He stared blankly at Menma standing right above him.
"Menma, you..." he asked instinctively.
But Menma had absolutely no interest in listening to Naruto's nonsense.
Squelch!
He violently yanked the Sword of the Thunder God free.
Without a shred of gentleness, the brutally abrupt motion tore another cry of pain from Naruto.
Blood splattered.
The intensified agony forced a muffled groan from his throat.
The next second.
Menma raised the glowing blade high. The sinister killing intent in his eyes perfectly mirrored the cold, crackling light of the lightning sword.
The blinding glare of the blade...
The unrestrained, absolute murderous intent...
It felt as though Menma truly intended to butcher his own brother right there and then. After a brief moment of shock, Naruto closed his eyes in quiet resignation.
He sighed softly in his heart.
I just hope my blood can extinguish even a tiny fraction of the hatred in Menma's heart...
That was the final thought that echoed in his mind.
Swish!
The Sword of the Thunder God swung down in a vicious arc.
"No!"
Suddenly...
Another golden chain, glowing with a brilliant, distinct light, shot out.
Clang!
It erupted from just over Menma's right shoulder and completely blocked the path of the descending blade.
The strike was parried perfectly.
A sharp, ear-piercing metallic screech tore through the air.
Violent sparks showered down.
It was exactly the same sound as that one time before. But unlike that blurry encounter, this time, a figure was gradually materializing, growing clearer by the second.
!?
While Menma froze in shock...
Naruto, who had already accepted his death and closed his eyes, snapped them open.
Their gazes met. The space around them began to waver and distort. In an instant, pale gold and crimson light intertwined.
The battlefield around them slowly faded away.
It felt like an eternity, yet it happened in the blink of an eye.
Through the shifting, overlapping scenery, a new landscape rapidly snapped into sharp focus. The next moment, both Menma and Naruto felt a tug in their minds. They turned their heads simultaneously.
A figure with fiery red hair entered both brothers' vision.
Looking at the beautiful face that shared striking similarities with Naruto's...
Both Naruto...
And Menma...
Completely froze.
This was their first time seeing her "in person."
Yet the face was undeniably familiar, radiating a long-lost, profound warmth. At that moment, tears began to stream silently down Naruto's face.
Even Menma's usually stoic expression cracked, replaced by a look of unimaginable complexity.
Kushina Uzumaki.
Minato Namikaze's wife. The mother of both brothers.
She was one of the only two people in this world Menma truly didn't want to face. It wasn't him being melodramatic. Whether it was Minato or Kushina, they had genuinely given him his life in this world. The only reason they hadn't raised him was because they had sacrificed themselves to protect him. They weren't deadbeat parents who had abandoned him.
Menma couldn't hate them. He owed them the ultimate debt: the gift of life itself.
"Is it... Mom? Is it really you, Mom?"
Naruto stared at the beautiful red-haired woman standing a short distance away, his voice trembling violently, his face completely drenched in tears.
Seeing Naruto in this state, an expression of infinite, profound tenderness washed over Kushina's face. She smiled gently and nodded. "It's me, Naruto."
In the vast, empty mental landscape...
The Adamantine Sealing Chains binding him were gone.
Unable to suppress the overwhelming surge of emotion, Naruto moved almost entirely on instinct, breaking into a desperate run toward Kushina.
Thump!
He threw himself into her arms, hugging her tightly.
"Mom! Mom!"
It was a tidal wave of unleashed emotion. In this exact moment, Naruto truly looked like nothing more than a child.
And truthfully, he was just a child.
Thirteen years old.
In Menma's previous life, he would have barely been in middle school.
Thirteen years of longing and loneliness exploded out of him all at once. Kushina, brimming with endless gentleness, softly stroked Naruto's back and head.
But Menma remained rooted to the spot. He just watched Kushina and Naruto embracing, his face perfectly calm.
She was indeed his mother in this life.
And compared to Naruto...
Menma carried a deeper imprint of her. It didn't just stem from his "knowledge" from his previous life; it came from their very first meeting thirteen years ago, on the night of his birth.
Yet, deep inside Menma's heart, an impassable barrier still existed.
It had been the same when he faced Minato.
And it was the same now, facing Kushina.
Ultimately, he wasn't a native soul of this world. He had reincarnated here with the memories of an entirely different life.
Menma was genuinely grateful to Minato and Kushina for giving him life. Intellectually, he acknowledged them as his parents in this world.
But that was where it stopped: intellectually.
To emotionally accept them as his mother and father?
Honestly, he just couldn't do it.
The crushing sense of distance created by this emotional disconnect wasn't something easily bridged.
Occasionally, in fleeting moments...
Menma's heart would whisper to him that he truly didn't belong here.
Was it melodramatic?
Maybe a little.
But that was simply human nature.
Because of this, he had treated Minato with freezing indifference. And now, seeing Kushina again, he remained standing where he was, refusing to take a single step forward.
The short physical distance between them...
Felt like an eternal, impassable abyss.
It aggressively completely separated them. It felt as though their world fundamentally rejected his existence.
It ensured Menma would never take that step.
He could only stand firmly in his own place, watching them from afar.