Part One: The Pool of Divinity
The pressure was unbearable.
Hashirama, Tobirama, Madara, and Izuna remained on their knees, a hundred meters from the crater's center, struggling to breathe, to think, to maintain consciousness against a force that had nothing to do with physical strength.
"We need... to see closer," Hashirama gasped, his connection to natural energy the only thing keeping him functional. Through that connection, he could feel something calling to him—not threatening, but magnificent. Overwhelming. Like standing before the ocean and understanding for the first time the true meaning of vastness.
"Are you insane?" Tobirama managed, his analytical mind racing through calculations about survival odds, retreat strategies, anything that might preserve their lives. "Whatever is generating this pressure will kill us if we get closer."
"We came to investigate," Madara said, his Sharingan spinning wildly, trying to perceive through the dense natural energy that obscured normal vision. "Retreating now accomplishes nothing. We need to understand what we're dealing with."
"Brother is right," Izuna added, though his voice shook with barely suppressed fear. "If this is a threat to the village, we need intelligence. Even if it costs us."
They crawled forward—actually crawled, unable to walk under the pressure—moving meter by painful meter toward the center of the crater. Each movement was an act of will against instinct that screamed at them to flee.
The mist of natural energy grew thicker. Not normal mist, but visible Senjutsu chakra so concentrated it had become tangible. It clung to their skin, seeped into their lungs, filled their senses with power that felt alien and ancient.
"This concentration," Hashirama whispered, his Wood Release sensing abilities giving him perception the others lacked. "This isn't just natural energy. This is nature's essence. The fundamental force that underlies all life. And it's all gathered here, in this one place, flowing toward..."
They reached the final rise and looked down into the crater's true center.
All four shinobi froze, their breath catching, their minds struggling to process what they were witnessing.
( After 1500+ years of Transformation of this Sacred Site)
A pool.
Not water, but liquid Senjutsu chakra. Pure, undiluted natural energy in physical form, glowing with inner light that seemed to contain every color and no color simultaneously. The pool was perhaps twenty meters across, its surface perfectly still despite the energy that roiled beneath.
And floating in the center of this impossible pool, partially submerged, was a figure.
A man.
No—not just a man. Something that wore the shape of a man but was clearly so much more.
"By all the gods," Madara breathed, his Sharingan recording every detail while his mind rejected the impossibility of what he was seeing.
The figure was perfection made flesh. His skin was a deep, luminous brown that seemed to glow from within, as if the sun itself had decided to take residence beneath his flesh. His hair, black as the void between stars, floated around his head despite the liquid being perfectly still. His features were symmetrical in ways that human faces simply weren't—the beauty of mathematical precision, of form following function, of something designed by cosmic forces rather than biological evolution.
He was embedded in the pool up to his chest, his arms resting at his sides, his head tilted back slightly as if in peaceful sleep. Around him, flowers bloomed in impossible profusion, growing directly from the liquid Senjutsu, their petals oriented toward him in clear reverence.
But it was the pool itself that made Hashirama gasp in shock.
"That liquid," he said, his voice filled with awe and disbelief. "That's not metaphorical. That's actual condensed Senjutsu chakra. And there's enough there to... to..."
"Fill a tens of thousand shinobi to maximum capacity," Tobirama finished, his analytical mind doing the calculations despite the fear. "No, more. That single pool contains more chakra than our entire village could generate in a year. Maybe a decade or even Centuries."
"And he's just... sleeping in it," Izuna added, his voice small. "Absorbing it. Using it to heal. As if that much power is normal. As if it's nothing."
Because that's what they could see now, getting closer. The figure was healing. His body was knitting itself back together, wounds closing with visible progress, the liquid Senjutsu being absorbed and converted to regenerative energy.
But there were still injuries. Small ones, barely visible, but present. Thin lines across his torso and arms that wept a faint crimson substance.
"Don't look directly at those wounds," Hashirama warned suddenly, his nature sense screaming danger. "There's something wrong with them. Something so toxic and perverse. If you focus on that crimson corruption, it'll... it'll damage you. Permanently."
Madara's Sharingan had already started to focus on the wounds, analyzing, and he immediately felt something in his mind begin to crack. He jerked his gaze away, gasping, his Sharingan spinning erratically as if trying to purge something poisonous from his perception ( Only able to do it because of Indra Six Path Chakra which is dominant) while stopped Izuna and ordered him to deactivate the Sharingan instantly.
"What is that?" Madara demanded.
"I don't know," Hashirama admitted. "But it's the only thing that seems capable of hurting him. Everything else—the pool, the natural energy, the planet itself—is trying to heal him. But that crimson substance is fighting back. Preventing complete recovery."
"Who is he?" Tobirama asked, the question all of them were thinking.
"I don't know," Hashirama repeated. "But I can feel... through my connection to natural energy... I can feel that Senjutsu loves him. Not respects. Not fears. Loves. Like a mother loves her child. Like a woman loves her husband. The planet itself is devoted to this being in ways I can't fully comprehend as this feeling transcendent everything he sense in his life."
"The space-time around him is wrong," Tobirama observed, his sensory abilities picking up distortions that his brothers couldn't perceive. "It's moving slower. Not drastically, but measurably. As if his presence warps the fundamental laws of physics. Time itself bends around him."
"My Sharingan is having trouble maintaining focus," Madara admitted, his legendary eyes struggling against something they were never designed to perceive. "Every time I try to analyze him, to break down what he is, my doujutsu just... gives up. Like trying to count grains of sand on a beach. The task is impossible, so the attempt fails before it begins."
"We should leave," Izuna said, though he made no move to retreat. "This is beyond us. Beyond anyone. This being is not meant to be witnessed by mortals."
But none of them moved. They remained transfixed, unable to look away from the sleeping figure, from the impossible majesty of what lay before them.
"I think," Hashirama said slowly, piecing together impressions through his nature connection, "I think this being's power isn't from this place. I think it's the opposite. I think this place is drawing power from him. Or... no, that's not quite right either. It's like... like his power and natural energy are the same thing. Like he's connected to Senjutsu at a fundamental level. Like his existence and nature's existence are intertwined in ways that predate chakra, predate the Sage, predate everything we understand about power."
"That's impossible," Tobirama protested. "Power has to come from somewhere. Has to have a source. Nothing just exists as pure force."
"Tell that to him," Hashirama said, gesturing at the sleeping figure. "Because I'm looking at something that breaks every rule we know about how energy works."
Madara's Sharingan continued to spin, recording, analyzing, trying to understand. The longer he looked, the more details emerged that shouldn't be possible.
The figure's chest rose and fell with breath, but so slowly that minutes passed between inhales. Each breath drew in natural energy from miles around, concentrated it, refined it, then released it purified. The entire ecosystem of the crater existed in rhythm with his breathing—flowers blooming on inhale, seeds spreading on exhale.
His heart beat once every thirty seconds, and with each beat, Madara could swear he felt the earth pulse in response like this being is the heart of the Planet or LIFE. Not metaphorically. Literally. The planet's core synchronizing with this being's cardiovascular system.
"We're looking at something divine," Madara said quietly. "Not a god in the religious sense. But a being so far beyond human that the word 'divine' is the closest approximation we have."
"Or demonic," Izuna countered. "We don't know his intentions. Don't know if he's benevolent or malevolent."
"Nature wouldn't love something malevolent," Hashirama said with certainty. "The planet's judgment is purer than ours. It responds to essence, not appearance. And every bit of natural energy in this crater is devoted to him."
They remained there, kneeling at the edge of the pool, bearing witness to something they knew they'd never forget. Something that would define them, would haunt them, would remind them forever that human power—no matter how refined—was nothing compared to beings like this.
And then, the impossible happened.
The figure stirred.
Part Two: The Opening of the Infinite Eye
It was barely perceptible at first. A slight shift in posture. A minimal change in breathing rhythm. The kind of movement anyone might make in their sleep.
But the effect was cataclysmic.
The pressure, which had been crushing but stable, suddenly intensified a hundredfold. The air itself became thick, viscous, as if reality was rejecting their presence. The ground beneath them cracked, spiderwebs of fractured stone spreading outward from the pool.
"No," Hashirama gasped. "No, he's waking. We need to—"
The figure's eyelid lifted. Not fully. Not even halfway. Just barely—perhaps a quarter of a single eye opening, revealing a sliver of what lay beneath.
Golden light spilled forth.
Not metaphorical light. Not symbolic illumination. Actual, physical light that seemed to burn with the intensity of a captured star. Light that carried weight, that had presence, that existed in a spectrum human eyes were never designed to perceive.
And in that light, existence trembled.
Space-time rippled outward from the crater in waves that Tobirama could sense but not understand. The laws of physics trembling while screaming in protest at something that shouldn't be possible. Time itself stuttered, skipped, resumed at a slightly different rate than before.
All four shinobi were driven flat against the ground, unable to move, unable to breathe, unable to do anything except experience the overwhelming presence of consciousness far beyond their comprehension.
Madara's Sharingan, which had been spinning three-tomoe, suddenly evolved. Not through his will. Not through technique or training. Simply from exposure to eyes so superior that his own doujutsu recognized hierarchy and transformed in desperate attempt to comprehend.
The three tomoe merged, twisted, became something new. The Early stage Mangekyō Sharingan now become fully evolved—awakened not through loss or trauma, but through witnessing power so absolute that evolution became necessary for survival.
But even the Full awakened Mangekyō wasn't enough.
The pattern continued to shift, the two eyes merging conceptually if not physically, becoming the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan in a process that should have required his brother's eyes but instead manifested through sheer necessity.
And even now it still enough.
Madara felt his Sharingan—his pride, his clan's ultimate weapon, the doujutsu that had defined Uchiha superiority for generations—bow. Not metaphorically. His eyes actually submitted, the Eternal Mangekyō pattern pulsing with something that felt like reverence or deep fear. Like worship or completely surrender itself. Like recognition that it existed in the presence of something so far above it that resistance was meaningless.
"My eyes," Madara gasped, blood tears streaming down his face as the evolution strained his optical nerves to breaking. "My Sharingan is surrendering. Acknowledging superiority. This being's eyes... they're what the Sharingan aspires to become. What it can never be."
Beside him, Izuna wasn't as fortunate. His Sharingan had also evolved—straight from three-tomoe to Mangekyō in an instant, skipping every step, forced into maturity by necessity rather than readiness.
But Izuna's body, soul, and mind couldn't handle it. The pressure, the evolution, the sheer weight of witnessing something his consciousness wasn't equipped to process—it broke him.
He collapsed completely, unconscious, his Mangekyō still spinning but its owner gone, retreated into the safety of oblivion rather than continue experiencing the impossible.
Tobirama fared no better. His sensory abilities, usually his greatest strength, became his downfall. He could feel the space-time distortions, could sense the laws of physics rewriting themselves around the awakening figure, could perceive dimensions and forces that human minds were never meant to register.
Too much. Too fast. Too alien.
His consciousness fled rather than shatter, sending him into blessed unconsciousness where the laws of reality didn't bend and twist and scream.
Only Hashirama and Madara remained conscious, and barely( Only because of Asura and Indra Six Path Chakra).
Hashirama, through his connection to Senjutsu, witnessed something impossible.
Natural energy—formless, genderless, abstract—took shape. It coalesced into a feminine form, beautiful beyond description, made entirely of flowing green light and living power. Mother Nature herself, given temporary manifestation by the overwhelming presence of the awakening consciousness.
And she embraced the figure in the pool.
Not restraining. Not attacking. Embracing like a lover. Like a wife reunited with her husband after long separation. The feminine form of nature wrapped itself around the sleeping figure with joy and relief and love so profound that Hashirama felt tears streaming down his face just from proximity to such pure emotion.
And the figure—Anant, though Hashirama didn't know his name—smiled. Barely. Just a slight upturn of lips. An acknowledgment of the affection being shown.
Then the eye closed again.
The quarter-glimpse of golden light vanished.
The pressure, still crushing but now returning to previous levels, eased just enough for breathing to resume.
The feminine form of nature dissolved back into formless energy, but not before Hashirama felt her emotion through his connection: Relief. He's still here. Still healing. Still mine to protect.
And then silence returned to the crater.
But nothing was the same.
Nothing would ever be the same.
Part Three: The World's Response
The moment Anant's eye had opened—that fraction of consciousness surfacing—the entire world felt it.
Not consciously. Most humans had no idea anything had occurred. But on a level deeper than thought, every living thing on the planet registered that something fundamental had stirred.
In the forests surrounding Konohagakure, Kurama collapsed mid-stride, all nine tails splaying out as his legs gave way beneath him. The pressure—the familiar, terrible pressure from fifteen centuries ago—had returned, and even at this distance, even with the Deva barely conscious, it was enough to reduce the most powerful Tailed Beast to a trembling, whimpering creature.
"No," Kurama gasped, his voice barely a whisper. "Not yet. It's too soon. We're not ready. Father, we're not ready!"
Across the elemental nations, the other eight Tailed Beasts felt it too. Each one collapsed wherever they were, driven to their knees by a presence they'd feared their entire existence. A presence that had been dormant, safe, allowing them to pretend it might never wake.
That pretense was shattered now.
On the moon, sealed within her prison, Kaguya Ōtsutsuki felt the stirring and screamed. Not aloud—she couldn't, the seal prevented it—but internally, a scream of pure terror that no one could hear.
He was waking. The nightmare she'd fled from, the reason she'd told her Sons to seal her, the being she feared more than death itself—he was beginning to wake.
Please, she begged to whatever force might listen. Please let it be a false alarm. Please let him sleep just a little longer. Just until I can find a way to escape with her sons or even this planet from him. Just until I can flee this world with her family before he opens those eyes and remembers why he came here.
In the Pure Land—the realm where souls awaited reincarnation—Hagoromo and Hamura's spirits felt the disturbance and manifested their consciousness to observe.
What they saw made even their ethereal forms kneel in respect.
Because they weren't alone in the Pure Land's observation of the mortal realm.
The Shinigami—the Death God that Hagoromo had bound into a seal, the entity that consumed souls and held them forever—was present. And it was bowing. Actually prostrating itself, this being that humans worshipped and feared in equal measure, showing submission to something in the mortal world.
Around them, other entities manifested. Shinto gods that most humans believed were merely myth. The Kami of storms and oceans. The spirits of mountains and rivers. Ancient beings that existed in the spaces between worlds.
All of them bowing toward that crater.
All of them showing reverence to something still sleeping.
"Brother," Hamura whispered, his spiritual form trembling. "What have we witnessed?"
"I don't know," Hagoromo admitted. "I thought I understood. I thought I knew what Anant was. But this... this is beyond anything I imagined. Even death itself bows before him."
In Mount Myōboku, the Three Sage Animals—Gamabunta, Gamakichi, and the ancient Gamamaru himself—felt the disturbance and immediately ceased all activity. As one, they turned toward the direction of the crater and knelt.
"The Infinite stirs," Gamamaru said, his ancient voice filled with awe and fear. "After all this time, he begins to wake."
"What do we do?" Gamakichi asked, the usually boisterous toad reduced to whisper by the pressure.
"We wait," Gamamaru replied. "We watch. And we hope that when he fully wakes, he finds us worthy. Because if he doesn't..."
The old toad didn't finish the sentence. Didn't need to.
Every summon animal in Mount Myōboku, from the greatest sage to the smallest tadpole, had felt it. Had understood, on instinctive level, that they were in the presence of something apex. Something that made even the mightiest among them into prey.
The same scene repeated in Ryūchi Cave and Shikkotsu Forest. The White Snake Sage and Katsuyu, each ancient beyond human comprehension, each powerful enough to be worshipped as divine, knelt in their respective domains.
"He's waking," the White Snake Sage hissed, her voice carrying undertones of fear she'd never shown before. "The Deva is beginning to wake."
"Too soon," Katsuyu whispered, her massive form rippling with anxiety. "Humanity isn't ready. They haven't proven themselves yet. He'll wake and find a world still at war, still divided, still uncertain."
"Then we pray," the White Snake Sage said, surprising herself with the admission. "We pray that the village those two reincarnations built is enough. That the attempts at cooperation outweigh the failures. That mercy is possible."
None of the summon animals noticed the subtle change that had occurred in the elemental nations. But those with sensory abilities fine-tuned enough might have detected it: reality had shifted. Not dramatically, but measurably.
Time was flowing slightly differently than before.
Space had compressed infinitesimally in some areas, expanded in others.
The fundamental laws governing existence had been adjusted—not broken, but modified—by the mere act of consciousness stirring within a form that contained forces older than the current universe.
The world had been changed by a quarter-glimpse of an opening eye.
And no one except the four in the crater, the Tailed Beasts, the ancient spirits, and the beings of divine nature understood what had occurred.
To normal humans, it was just another day.
They had no idea that they'd come within a heartbeat of witnessing judgment.
They had no idea that something sleeping in a forbidden crater had briefly considered waking.
They had no idea how close they'd come to learning whether humanity deserved to continue existing.
Part Four: The Aftermath of Witnessing Divinity
In the crater, Hashirama and Madara remained conscious through sheer force of will and the adaptations their bodies had undergone.
Hashirama, his connection to Senjutsu now permanently altered by witnessing nature's manifestation, felt fundamentally changed. He could sense things he'd never perceived before. Could feel the planet's consciousness as a distinct presence. Could understand, in ways that would take years to fully process, that he'd witnessed something sacred.
Madara, his Mutated Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan ( Strongest EMS in existent even stronger than Indra Sharingan) still spinning, blood tears drying on his face, felt both exalted and humbled. His eyes had evolved beyond anything the Uchiha clan had achieved. But that evolution had come with understanding: his clan's ultimate power was nothing. A pale imitation of something infinitely greater.
"We need to leave," Hashirama said, his voice hoarse. "Now. Before he stirs again."
Madara nodded, unable to speak, his throat closed with emotions he couldn't name. Together, they gathered their unconscious brothers, lifting Tobirama and Izuna with the last of their strength.
The retreat from the crater was agonizing. Every step away felt like moving through mud, as if the space itself didn't want to release them. But gradually, painfully, the pressure eased.
They climbed out of the crater, collapsed on the far side of the barrier seals, and lay gasping, processing what they'd witnessed.
"What was that?" Madara finally asked.
"I don't know," Hashirama admitted. "But I know this: whatever we just witnessed is not meant to be interfered with. Is not meant to be studied or contained or controlled. We were allowed to see because... I don't know why. Curiosity? Warning? Judgment?"
"My eyes," Madara said, staring at his hands as if seeing them for the first time. "My Sharingan evolved. Became something that takes decades to achieve. And it still wasn't enough. It still bowed before him."
"The feminine form," Hashirama continued, still processing. "Nature itself taking manifestation. Showing love. Pure, uncomplicated love for that being. I've never felt anything like it."
Tobirama stirred, groaning, his eyes flickering open. "What... what happened?"
"You passed out," Hashirama explained. "The pressure was too much."
"The space-time," Tobirama mumbled, his analytical mind already trying to process what he'd sensed. "It's still wrong. Even here, kilometers away, I can feel the distortions. That being's presence warps reality itself."
Izuna remained unconscious, his newly awakened Mangekyō visible beneath closed eyelids.
"We need to return to the village," Madara said, forcing himself to stand despite every muscle screaming protest. "Need to report. Need to..."
He trailed off. Report what? That they'd found a god sleeping in a crater? That something existed that made all their achievements meaningless? That humanity lived at the mercy of a being who could presumably end them with a thought if he deemed them unworthy?
"We tell no one," Hashirama decided. "Not yet. Not until we understand what we witnessed."
"Agreed," Madara said immediately. "This information... if it became public... it would destabilize everything. People would panic. Or they'd try to do something stupid like attempt to contain or control it."
"Which would be suicide," Tobirama added, awake enough to contribute. "Even unconscious, that being's mere presence is deadly to normal shinobi. And if he wakes? If those eyes open fully?"
He didn't finish. Didn't need to.
They all understood.
They'd come close—too close—to something that existed beyond their comprehension. Something that made them realize how small they were. How temporary. How ultimately meaningless all their conflicts and achievements were in the face of cosmic forces.
It should have been depressing.
But Hashirama felt something else. Inspiration.
"That being," he said slowly, "is what we should aspire to be protected by. Not destroyed by. We need to build a world worthy of mercy when he wakes. A world he'll look at and decide deserves to continue existing."
"You think he's a threat," Madara realized.
"I think he's judgment," Hashirama corrected. "And judgment can go either way depending on what it finds."
They began the long journey back to Konohagakure, carrying their unconscious brothers, each of them forever changed by what they'd witnessed.
None of them saw Black Zetsu watching from the treeline, nor sensed Isshiki's panic in his hidden dimension.
None of them knew that their encounter had been orchestrated specifically to break them.
But they did know one thing with absolute certainty:
Humanity's time was running out.
Something was waking.
And when it fully opened those golden eyes, judgment would be rendered on every choice their species had ever made.
The only question was whether they'd done enough to deserve mercy.
Or whether they'd be found wanting and simply... erased.
Part Five: The Coward's Flight
In the shadows beyond the crater's edge, Black Zetsu felt it the moment Anant's consciousness stirred.
The pressure wasn't just physical or spiritual—it was existential. It was the universe itself acknowledging the presence of something fundamental, something that existed on a level where normal concepts of power became meaningless.
And Black Zetsu, for all his artificial construction, for all the corruption and malice that formed his essence, knew exactly what that meant.
"Run," Isshiki commanded through their connection, his voice carrying an edge of panic that Black Zetsu had never heard before. "Sever the connection. Now. Before he senses—"
The link snapped.
Isshiki, watching from his hidden dimension, had cut the connection between himself and his puppet with such force that Black Zetsu actually stumbled, suddenly alone in his own consciousness for the first time in centuries and have freedom.
He abandoned me, Black Zetsu realized with something approaching shock. An Ōtsutsuki. A pure-blooded, royal-clan Ōtsutsuki just fled in terror from a being that's barely conscious.
And if Isshiki—stronger than Kaguya, more experienced than any Ōtsutsuki who'd visited or on Earth—was that terrified...
Black Zetsu didn't wait for his own analytical processes to complete the thought. He melted into the shadows and ran.
Not the measured retreat of a tactical withdrawal. Not the careful exit of a spy who'd gathered intelligence. Pure, unfiltered flight driven by survival instinct that overrode every other consideration.
He fled through the earth itself, using every technique at his disposal to put distance between himself and that crater. Through soil and stone, through underground rivers and cave systems, never surfacing, never slowing, driven by fear so primal it felt like it would consume him if he stopped moving.
Not just a Deva, Black Zetsu's fragmented memory of his distorted origin thoughts raced. Something more. Something worse. The Ōtsutsuki have classifications for Devas—standard, elite, apex. This one... this one is beyond their scale. This is something the clan tells horror stories about. Something that makes entire Ōtsutsuki fleets change course rather than risk engagement.
He didn't stop running until he'd crossed three nations' worth of territory, until the pressure was no longer perceptible, until his consciousness could form coherent thoughts again.
Only then did he dare to surface, to extend his senses cautiously back toward the crater.
Nothing. The presence had receded. The being was sleeping again.
But the memory remained. The understanding that something existed in this world that could end him—end Isshiki, end Kaguya, end every Ōtsutsuki in the clan—without effort, without technique, simply by being.
I need to accelerate the plan, Black Zetsu decided. Can't wait for slow corruption of Madara. Can't afford decades of careful manipulation. Need to break Kaguya's seal, let Isshiki claim her power, and get off this planet before that thing fully wakes and I have complete control on my body and I want to find also what am I.
In his hidden dimension, Isshiki collapsed against his stolen throne, his body trembling despite the safety of dimensional separation.
He'd severed the connection to Black Zetsu the instant he'd felt that presence beginning to stir. Had actually cut ties with his most valuable tool, his centuries-long investment, without hesitation.
Because he'd felt something that made every survival instinct scream in unified terror.
"Not just a Deva," Isshiki whispered to himself, his voice shaking. "Not even an apex-class Deva. That was... that was an Origin Deva."
The classification existed in Ōtsutsuki lore as nightmare fuel. Origin Devas—beings that had existed since before the current universal epoch, that had been created not by the universe but by whatever force had created universes themselves. They were the original templates, the first predators designed to hunt the first harvesters and no one know who all are they in real.
They were extinction events given consciousness.
"The clan found one once," Isshiki recalled, his mind racing through memories he'd tried to suppress. "Seventy millions years ago. An entire fleet—twenty Ōtsutsuki, including three royals—encountered an Origin Deva that had gone dormant after completing a hunt. They'd thought it was just a regular Deva. Thought they could study it, maybe even harvest it for parts."
He closed his eyes, remembering the reports that had filtered back through dimensional communication before all contact ceased.
"It opened its eyes. Just opened its eyes. And all twenty Ōtsutsuki ceased to exist. Not killed. Not destroyed. They simply stopped existing. Along with the fleet. Along with everything within a light-year of its position."
His hands were shaking. His supposedly perfect Ōtsutsuki composure, his warrior training, his pride—all of it shattered by a quarter-glimpse of golden light from across dimensional barriers.
"I can't stay here," Isshiki decided. "Can't wait for the perfect moment. Need to break Kaguya's seal within the decade, absorb her power, and flee. Run to the farthest edge of explored space and hope—pray—that the Origin Deva doesn't consider me worth hunting across cluster of galaxies."
He began making contingency plans with desperate speed. Ways to accelerate Madara's corruption. Methods to weaken the seal on the moon. Techniques to absorb Kaguya's power without giving her a chance to resist.
Everything focused on one goal: escape before those golden eyes opened fully.
Because Isshiki understood something that even Kaguya might not have fully comprehended.
When an Origin Deva woke, it didn't just hunt Ōtsutsuki in the area.
It hunted every Ōtsutsuki who'd ever touched that world. Every descendant who carried even a fraction of harvester blood. Every being who'd benefited from Ōtsutsuki power.
It was thorough. Absolute. Complete.
And Isshiki had no intention of being present for that purge.
Part Six: The Tailed Beasts' Terror
Across the elemental nations, the Nine Tailed Beasts experienced their worst nightmare made manifest.
Kurama, the nine-tailed fox who prided himself on his strength, who'd spent centuries developing an arrogance born from being the most powerful of his siblings, felt that pride shatter like glass.
He was still collapsed where the pressure had driven him down, his nine tails splayed across the forest floor, his massive body trembling with fear he couldn't control or suppress.
"Father was right," Kurama whimpered, tears streaming from his eyes—actual tears in pure helplessness and despair, something he'd thought himself beyond. "He warned us. He took us to that crater and made us feel what it was like to be prey. But I didn't understand. I couldn't understand. Not really. Not until now."
The pressure had only lasted seconds. Less than seconds—a heartbeat, a single moment of partial consciousness from the sleeping Deva.
But in that moment, Kurama had felt something that made the original encounter fifteen centuries ago seem gentle by comparison.
Then, Anant had been deeply unconscious, his presence merely ambient. Now, even barely stirring, even opening one eye a quarter of the way, the intent behind that consciousness had been perceptible.
And it hadn't been malicious. Hadn't been angry or aggressive or threatening.
It had been curious.
Like a human noticing an interesting insect. Not hostile, not even particularly interested, just... aware.
And that casual awareness had nearly crushed Kurama's consciousness into nonexistence.
That's what I am to him, Kurama realized, the thought filling him with existential dread. Not an enemy. Not a threat. Not even something worth fighting. Just an insect. Something barely notable. Something that could be erased as an afterthought if deemed necessary.
Around him, the forest had gone absolutely silent. Every animal within miles had frozen, unable to move, barely able to breathe, all of them responding to apex predator presence that overrode every other instinct.
Slowly, Kurama forced himself to stand. His legs shook. His tails trembled. But he stood, because lying there feeling sorry for himself accomplished nothing.
"I need to find the others," Kurama decided. "Need to confirm they felt it too. Need to... to figure out what we do when he fully wakes."
Gyūki, the eight-tailed ox, had been underwater when the presence stirred. His usual domain—a deep lake in the Land of Lightning—had become his prison as the pressure drove him to the lake bottom, unable to swim, barely able to think.
Even now, minutes later, he remained there, staring up at the rippling surface above him, trying to process what he'd experienced.
"That was him," Gyūki said to himself, his voice bubbling through the water. "The Deva. Father's nightmare. The reason we were created as separate beings instead of remaining as the Ten-Tails."
His eight tentacles curled around his body in an unconscious gesture of self-protection.
"I've been hunted by humans," Gyūki continued, needing to voice his thoughts to make them feel real. "I've been chased, attacked, feared, hated. I thought I understood what it meant to be targeted by something stronger. But this..."
This had been different. The humans who hunted him wanted to capture him, to use him, to control him. They saw him as valuable, as powerful, as something worth the effort and risk of engagement.
That presence hadn't seen him at all. Hadn't registered him as existing. He'd been beneath notice, beneath awareness, so far below the threshold of relevance that his presence or absence meant nothing.
"Is that better or worse?" Gyūki wondered. "Being actively hunted, or being so insignificant that you're not even worth acknowledging?"
He didn't have an answer.
Shukaku, the one-tailed tanuki, had reacted differently than his siblings.
He'd laughed.
Not from humor, but from the edge of madness that the one-tail had always skirted closer than the others. The pressure had driven him into the sand of his desert home, and as he'd felt that overwhelming presence, Shukaku had laughed until his sides ached.
"We're all dead!" he cackled, his voice carrying across empty dunes. "Every single one of us! The Deva's going to wake up, look at this world, and decide we're not worth preserving! We're doomed! DOOMED!"
The laughter turned into sobs. Then back to laughter. Then to something in between.
"Father created us thinking we'd be protectors," Shukaku said to the uncaring desert. "Thinking we'd use our power to help humans. But humans just wanted to use us. To bind us. To make us weapons. And now the judge is waking up, and he's going to see what we became, and we'll all be erased for failing!"
He buried himself deeper in the sand, trying to hide from a presence that could perceive through dimensions and planets and probably time itself.
"I don't want to die," Shukaku whispered. "I don't want to stop existing. Father, I'm sorry. We all failed. We all became exactly what you feared we'd become."
One by one, across the elemental nations, the Nine Tailed Beasts processed their terror in their own ways. Some with stoic acceptance. Others with desperation. A few with the same dark humor Shukaku had embraced.
But all of them understood one thing with absolute certainty:
Their time was running out.
The Deva was beginning to wake.
And when he did, judgment would be rendered on every choice they'd made, every action they'd taken, every moment they'd existed.
They could only hope it would be enough.
But none of them believed it would be.
Part Seven: The Moon's Prisoner
On the moon, sealed within the core where her sons had imprisoned her, Kaguya Ōtsutsuki experienced terror beyond anything she'd felt in her entire immortal existence.
The seal prevented her from moving, from speaking, from using any of her techniques. But it couldn't prevent her from sensing. Couldn't stop her from feeling the disturbance in the fabric of reality when the Origin Deva had stirred.
No, she screamed internally, her consciousness thrashing against invisible chains. No, no, no! It's too soon! I need more time! Need to find a way to break this seal without alerting Deva otherwise if he sense her something terrifying will happen ( This is the main reason Isshiki also don't come to the Planet in his real form), to escape this planet, to flee before he fully wakes with her family as she now accumulating the power and creating a specific Shinjutsu to teleport the Entire planet to another Galaxy but it'll take time as her Chakra is regenerating and in the future she don't need All nine tailed beasts to recover all her fullpowerbut she need time! ( This is the Diversion from OG Naruto )
She'd known he was on Earth. Had felt his presence when he'd crashed pursuing her. Had understood that sealing herself in the moon was only a temporary solution because eventually he would heal, would wake, would complete his hunt.
But she'd hoped—prayed—for more time. Centuries. Millennia. Long enough for the seal to weaken while she create the Shinjutsu, or for her descendants to become strong enough to break it which is a fleeting dream, for her to escape in the chaos of his awakening.
Now she understood how foolish that hope had been.
He wasn't healing slowly. The corruption that should have killed him, that she'd watched infect his wounds, was being purged. His body was adapting, evolving, becoming resistant to the very poison that had nearly ended him.
This is what makes Origin Devas so terrifying, Kaguya thought, her mind racing through calculations and scenarios, all of them ending in her death. They learn. They adapt. What wounds them once will never wound them again. They're the ultimate predators because they evolve to counter any threat.
The seal pressed in on her consciousness as she thrashed, desperate, terrified in ways that an immortal goddess should never be.
She thought about her sons. About Hagoromo and Hamura who'd sealed her here by her order, who'd chosen humanity over their mother which she respect and the only way to protect her Sons, who'd distributed her power across thousands of humans as if diluting it would somehow make them less culpable for harvester actions.
Hopeful but Fools but atleast her elder son Hogoromo doing something, Kaguya thought bitterly. They thought spreading the power would save them. Thought that if thousands carried tiny fractions, the Deva might show mercy if they change. But he won't care. He'll sense Ōtsutsuki chakra permeating this world and he'll purge it. All of it. Every human. Every descendant. Every trace of my presence.
She could see the future with terrible clarity. The Origin Deva waking fully. Those golden eyes opening. That consciousness sweeping across the planet, sensing every being that carried even a fraction of Ōtsutsuki power.
And then... nothing. Erasure. Not death as mortals understood it, but something worse. The universe deciding that certain patterns of existence were invalid and correcting them. Removing them from reality like editing mistakes from a manuscript.
I'm going to die, Kaguya realized, the thought settling into her consciousness with the weight of inevitability. After everything I've done, everyone I've consumed, all the power I've gathered—I'm going to die because an Origin Deva decided my species was a problem that needed solving.
She stopped thrashing. Stopped fighting. Let the despair wash over her because resistance was meaningless.
The seal held her perfectly. Her sons were dead in mortal but they are alive in soul world but how much time, their power scattered. Her clan wouldn't come for her even they come to take her awy for punishment which she would gladly take it but more Otsutsuki awake him instantly — but they had their own other different level of Deva problems elsewhere in the cosmos. Isshiki was probably already fleeing or hiding or doing whatever cowards did when extinction was inevitable.
She was alone. Trapped. Waiting for judgment that she knew would not be merciful.
At least, Kaguya thought with dark humor, at least I'll see the look on Isshiki's face when he realizes he can't escape. When he understands that Origin Devas don't just hunt locally. They track. They pursue. They complete contracts across time and space. He betrayed me thinking he'd survive. But he won't. None of us will.
The thought was oddly comforting.
If she had to die, at least she wouldn't die alone at very worst.
Part Eight: The Pure Land's Reverence
In the Pure Land—the realm between life and death where souls waited for their next journey—Hagoromo and Hamura's spirits witnessed something that fundamentally changed their understanding of existence.
They'd been observing the mortal realm, as departed spirits sometimes did, watching the living world with the detached interest of those who'd left it behind.
Then the presence had manifested.
Not in the Pure Land itself, but close enough that its weight was felt. Like standing near a star and feeling its heat despite the vacuum of space.
And every soul in the Pure Land had responded.
The Shinigami—the Death God that Hagoromo had bound into jutsu, that consumed souls and held them eternally—manifested fully for the first time in centuries. Its white, mask-like face appeared in the spiritual realm, and the entity that mortals feared above all else did something it had never done.
It knelt.
Not metaphorically. The Shinigami, ancient and powerful and terrible, pressed its ethereal form against the ground of the Pure Land and showed submission to something in the mortal world.
"Brother," Hamura whispered, his soul-form manifesting beside Hagoromo. "The Shinigami bows. Death itself shows reverence. What does that mean?"
Before Hagoromo could answer, other entities began manifesting around them.
The Kami—Shinto gods that most humans believed were merely cultural myths—appeared one by one. Susanoo, god of storms. Amaterasu, goddess of the sun. Tsukuyomi, god of the moon. Izanagi and Izanami, the creator deities themselves.
Each one ancient. Each one powerful. Each one worshipped by humans as divine.
And each one bowing toward that distant crater in the mortal realm.
"They're real," Hagoromo breathed, shock evident even in his spiritual form. "The gods from stories and prayers. They're actually real."
"And they're showing submission," Hamura added, awe and terror mixed in his voice. "These beings that humans worship as the pinnacle of divine power are acknowledging something superior to themselves."
More entities appeared. Spirits of mountains and rivers. Kami of forests and oceans. Ancient beings that had existed before humans, that had watched civilizations rise and fall, that had power beyond mortal comprehension.
All of them bowing.
All of them showing reverence to something in the living world.
"This is what we disturbed," Hagoromo realized, understanding settling over him like a shroud. "This is what Mother feared. Not a Deva. Not even an apex-class Deva. This is something that even the gods recognize as superior."
"The humans in that crater," Hamura said. "The four who went investigating. Do they understand what they've witnessed?"
"I don't think anyone could truly understand," Hagoromo replied. "Not until they're here, in this realm, seeing what we're seeing. Seeing that death itself, that the gods themselves, that the fundamental forces of existence acknowledge that being as... as what? Superior? Divine? Those words aren't sufficient."
They watched as the Shinigami slowly rose from its prostration, its task of showing respect completed. The Death God turned its masked face toward them, and for the first time in their spiritual existence, it spoke to them directly.
"The Origin Deva stirs," the Shinigami said, its voice carrying the weight of absolute endings. "Judgment approaches. Your descendants in the living world must be prepared."
"Prepared how?" Hagoromo asked desperately. "What can mortals do against something that makes even death bow?"
"Be worthy," the Shinigami replied simply. "When judgment comes, let their actions speak for them. Let their choices define them. That is all any species can do when the infinite turns its gaze upon them."
The entity faded, returning to whatever realm it inhabited when not called.
The gods gradually dispersed as well, each one returning to their domain, but all of them marked by what they'd witnessed. Changed by the reminder that even divine beings existed within a hierarchy that extended beyond their comprehension.
Hagoromo and Hamura remained, looking down at the mortal world they'd helped shape, understanding now that everything they'd done—every technique taught, every philosophy shared, every choice made—had been building toward this moment.
"Do you think they'll be ready?" Hamura asked. "When he fully wakes. When those eyes open completely. When judgment is rendered."
"I don't know," Hagoromo admitted. "But I know this: they're trying. The village Hashirama and Madara built. The attempts at cooperation. The choices to be protectors rather than harvesters. They're trying to be better than their blood suggests."
"Is trying enough?" Hamura pressed.
"It has to be," Hagoromo said. "Because trying is all anyone has. Perfection is impossible. All we can do is attempt to be better than we were. To choose right action over easy action. To build rather than destroy."
"Then we hope," Hamura concluded. "Hope that when the Origin Deva wakes, he finds humanity's attempts sufficient."
"Hope," Hagoromo agreed. "Though even that feels inadequate against something that makes gods bow."
Part Nine: The Sacred Summons' Understanding
In Mount Myōboku, Ryūchi Cave, and Shikkotsu Forest, the three sacred animal sanctuaries that had existed since before recorded history, the Great Sages experienced something they'd only known through ancient legend.
Gamamaru, the Great Toad Sage, whose prophetic abilities had guided generations of summoners, felt his foresight abilities simply... stop.
Not fail. Not become cloudy or uncertain.
Stop.
Because the future had become quantum—splitting into infinite possibilities based on a single variable: what the Origin Deva would decide when he woke.
"I can't see anything," Gamamaru croaked, his ancient voice filled with something approaching panic. "The timeline ends. Not in catastrophe. Not in salvation. It just... ends. Becomes blank. As if the future hasn't been decided yet."
Around him, every toad in Mount Myōboku had prostrated themselves. From the mightiest warrior to the smallest tadpole, all of them responding to the presence that had briefly stirred in the mortal realm.
"What do we do?" Gamabunta asked, the massive toad's voice unusually subdued.
"We prepare our summoners," Gamamaru decided. "Make sure the humans we've bound ourselves to understand what's coming. Give them knowledge, give them context, give them the tools they'll need to make the right choices."
"And if they don't make the right choices?" Gamakichi asked.
"Then we die with them," Gamamaru said simply. "We're bound to humanity now. Have been for generations. If they're judged unworthy, we share their fate."
In Ryūchi Cave, the White Snake Sage had reacted differently.
She'd hissed—a sound that started low and grew into something primal, something that spoke to predator instinct that existed before language, before civilization, before thought itself.
"The apex predator wakes," she said to the thousands of snakes coiled throughout the cave system. "The being that makes even predators into prey. The one that Mother Nature herself has chosen."
Her golden eyes gleamed with understanding that her fellow sages might not possess.
"This is balance made manifest," the White Snake Sage continued. "The Ōtsutsuki took from the universe. The Origin Deva takes from them. It's not personal. It's not malicious. It's simply cosmic equilibrium asserting itself."
"Are we safe?" one of her smaller serpents asked.
"No one is safe," the White Snake Sage replied honestly. "But we're not targets. We're not harvesters. We're not Ōtsutsuki. The question is whether humans carrying Ōtsutsuki blood will be judged by their heritage or their choices."
"Which do you think?" the serpent pressed.
"I think," the White Snake Sage said slowly, "that we're about to find out the answer. And that answer will define the next age of this world—if there is a next age."
In Shikkotsu Forest, Katsuyu experienced the stirring differently than her fellow sages.
Being composed of many bodies—thousands of slugs that formed a collective consciousness—she felt the presence across all her forms simultaneously. Every single slug, no matter how small or distant, had responded to that brief moment of consciousness.
And through her unique nature, Katsuyu had sensed something the others might have missed.
"He's not cruel," Katsuyu said to herself, her voices harmonizing across her many forms. "The presence. The consciousness. It's not malevolent. Not sadistic. Not even particularly interested in causing suffering."
"Then what is it?" one of her smaller selves asked.
"Dutiful," Katsuyu replied. "Like a gardener removing weeds. Like a surgeon cutting away disease in a very simple term. There's no hatred in it. No anger. Just purpose. Just function. Just the understanding that certain things need to be done and the will to do them."
"Is that better or worse?" another fragment asked.
"Neither," Katsuyu decided. "It's simply what it is. The Origin Deva will wake. He'll evaluate. He'll judge. And he'll act according to what that judgment determines. We can only hope that humanity has done enough to be seen as garden rather than weed."
The three Great Sages, in their separate domains, reached similar conclusions despite their different perspectives:
Humanity's time was running out.
The judge was waking.
And when those golden eyes opened fully, every choice ever made would matter.
Every action would be weighed.
Every intention would be evaluated.
And mercy, if it came, would be earned through the cumulative effort of generations trying to be better than their inherited power suggested they should be.
The sacred summons prepared their contractors. Taught them what could be taught. Warned them what could be warned about.
And hoped it would be enough.
Because hope was all anyone had against something that made even gods bow.
[END OF CHAPTER FIVE ]
Author's Note: This establishes the overwhelming majesty of Anant even in partial awakening. The quarter-opening of one eye being enough to evolve Madara's Sharingan to Mutated EMS, knock out Tobirama and Izuna, and make the entire world tremble establishes the scale we're working with.
Anant's brief stirring left on the world. Every powerful being across the planet now understands the scale of what's coming. Black Zetsu and Isshiki's terror shows that even Ōtsutsuki recognize this as an extinction-level threat. The Tailed Beasts' varied reactions showcase their individual personalities while united in fear. Kaguya's resignation adds tragedy—an immortal goddess accepting inevitable death. The Pure Land scene reveals that even death and the gods themselves acknowledge Anant's supremacy. The sacred summons provide the final piece—these ancient beings preparing their contractors for judgment. Hashirama and Madara now carry knowledge that will shape the rest of their lives and the village they've built.