"Guy-sensei, don't be scared. It was me."
"Kakashi-sensei, I succeeded too!"
Konohamaru's voice came from the side.
Everyone turned.
Konohamaru stood there with a little toad perched on one shoulder and a small monkey on the other.
"Konohamaru? That was you? Were you trying to use One Thousand Years of Death on me too? Wait, that still doesn't explain anything. Why were you touching me?" Guy was baffled.
He thought it was a ghost, only to discover it was Konohamaru, who had also mastered Sage Mode.
"Uh, sorry." Konohamaru scratched his head and apologized. "I heard how Kakashi-sensei used Frog Kata, and my hands got itchy, so I wanted to try it too! But you're my elder, Guy-sensei. I stopped right before using the technique, so it ended up as nothing more than a poke."
"...Alright." Guy had a good temper.
Once Konohamaru explained, he brushed it off.
"Wait, Konohamaru. Can your Frog Kata really reach that far?" Kakashi noticed something strange.
Frog Kata acted as an invisible, intangible coat wrapped around the user's entire body.
Kakashi only managed to land Frog Kata: One Thousand Years of Death because he was fighting Guy at close range.
Konohamaru wasn't even on the battlefield.
In fact, everyone deliberately moved further away to avoid disturbing his meditation.
How did he manage to reach Guy?
"I don't know either. Maybe it's because Enra can transform into an extending staff, so my reach can stretch too?" Konohamaru grew just as confused.
He scratched his head, unable to explain the mechanics.
"...Forget it. Naruto, it's time for you to work." Kakashi dropped the issue.
He knew even less about Sage Mode than Naruto. If Konohamaru himself had no idea, how was Kakashi supposed to figure it out?
"Huh?" Naruto didn't expect his break to end so quickly.
He dragged himself over with a miserable expression and pulled a blank scroll from his pouch.
It was time to start drafting the Sage Mode manual and its techniques.
"Guy, Lee, come over too. You might as well listen." Kakashi called them over.
The group huddled together and began their Sage Mode conference.
To better establish himself as an author in the shinobi world—and perhaps one day write an original book—Kakashi studied plenty of writing theory.
Now was the perfect time to teach Naruto how to structure a manual.
Under Kakashi's guidance, Naruto recorded everything.
He started with his own physical experiences, then added Kakashi's and Konohamaru's methods.
After Guy and Lee learned about Naruto's shortcut, the older and younger eternal bachelors—neither of whom had ever even held a girl's hand—both turned bright red.
When Naruto finally finished writing, he tossed the brush into the air and collapsed backward, looking utterly exhausted.
He possessed the constitution of the Uzumaki clan and could spawn thousands of shadow clones without breaking a sweat, yet after writing for only an hour, Naruto felt like he was dying!
He wanted to take a break after ten minutes, but Kakashi shut him down with a single sentence.
"You can't even endure this minor inconvenience? Naruto, do you still want to become Hokage? A Hokage has far more paperwork to study than this."
In the original timeline, after the final battle at the Valley of the End, Iruka forced Naruto to read countless textbooks and absorb massive amounts of knowledge to qualify for a jōnin promotion.
But clearly, Naruto slacked off and escaped the grind.
Because in the Boruto era, Naruto personally told the younger generation that he remained a genin right up until he became Hokage.
That meant he never received a jōnin promotion at all!
He and Sasuke continued holding Konoha's strongest combat rank—Genin.
Unfortunately, once Naruto became Hokage and Sasuke became the Supporting Kage, they lost the qualification to remain members of that overpowered rank.
That was why they were later defeated, leaving one without eyes and the other without a tail.
Perfectly reasonable logic.
Fortunately, the current Naruto still had one stubborn goal keeping him going.
For the sake of becoming Hokage, he endured.
At long last, he completed an epic masterpiece comparable to Konoha's Scroll of Seals: Uzumaki Naruto's Secret Sage Mode Ultimate Technique!
The next mission was to pass this secret art to the other ninja villages.
Kakashi and Konohamaru volunteered to serve as Naruto's guards.
They decided to accompany him as he spread his teachings across the globe, retracing the path once walked by the Sage of Six Paths.
Long ago, the Sage of Six Paths traveled across the shinobi world, spreading chakra to every corner.
Now Naruto, the reincarnation of his son Asura, was about to repeat that cycle and spread senjutsu chakra to every corner as well!
What a fateful, magnificent, epic story!
The real reason Kakashi wanted to tag along was that his desire to write his own novel grew stronger by the day.
He intended to record the entire journey.
The passage above would serve as the opening prologue. After writing it, he planned to take it to a publisher and test the feedback.
...
Guy and Lee returned to Konoha with copies of Naruto's secret manual, their faces still flushed bright red.
When Tenten and Neji came over to ask what happened, neither of them dared to speak.
After they finally managed to trick Tenten into leaving, Lee reluctantly shared the manual with Neji.
"What?! I knew Naruto was a pervert! I'm reporting him to Lady Hokage!"
After reading the methods written in the manual, Neji went from shock to sudden realization, then straight into sheer fury.
After all, he had personally witnessed the bizarre incident between Naruto and Boruto in the past.
"Neji, don't go! Lady Hokage approved this!" Guy stopped him.
"W-What?" Only now was Neji truly shocked.
The Hokage approved it? Approved this?
Neji could not describe his current feelings.
If he had to summarize them in one sentence: Had the Hokage also been corrupted by the will of heaven?
If he had to summarize them in three words: Konoha was finished.
"Neji, you need to understand that Lord Third and Asuma both died at the hands of the Ōtsutsuki. Even with their elite strength, when facing an Ōtsutsuki capable of using only a fraction of his power, they were completely helpless. If we wish to protect the people we care about, sacrifices must be made. Neji, would you be willing to offer your life to protect someone important to you?"
Guy stared at Neji solemnly and asked a question that struck straight at the soul.
"Of course I would!"
This didn't necessarily count as Neji raising a death flag.
Most shinobi would say yes in this situation.
You couldn't shoot the arrow first and paint the target around it afterward.
"Exactly. If you're willing to offer your life, then surely you can offer a little..." Guy paused. "...dignity?"
"That..." Neji hesitated.
...
Elsewhere, Kakashi brought his written prologue to a local publishing house.
Naruto and Konohamaru went to prepare supplies for the journey and were currently shopping at a convenience store.
Although the Flying Raijin Formation could teleport them across the continent, it only reduced their travel time.
Once they reached another ninja village, they still needed to stay there for an extended period.
"Hello, boss. A friend of mine wrote this. Could you take a look and tell me what you think?" Kakashi handed his manuscript to the familiar publishing house owner.
To avoid damaging the reputation of his existing Vigorous Paradise series and the Limited Tsukuyomi series, Kakashi specifically claimed a friend wrote the draft.
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