Deep within the moon, in a space between reality and illusion.
Kaguya Otsutsuki expressionlessly withdrew her gaze. To be honest, she had not understood at all the long string of words spoken by that tiny mortal who had sohow caused a slight ripple within her.
Those discussions about essence, mission, connection, and peace failed to stir even the slightest aningful ripple within her long and lonely consciousness.
Like the buzzing of mosquitoes, they could neither be understood nor needed to be understood.
However... whether she understood or not, this mortal ant sohow gave rise to an extrely rare and difficult-to-explain sense of favorability within her.
Truly... Strange.
She once again closed those pure white eyes and the Rinne Sharingan on her forehead, throwing that insignificant and incomprehensible sense of favorability, together with the incomprehensible noise from earlier, deep into the recesses of her consciousness.
On the moon, in another mysterious and unknowable space.
Hamura Otsutsuki, dressed in ancient garnts, slowly withdrew his gaze with a faint smile at the corner of his mouth.
"Shinichi Higashino?"
Hamura Otsutsuki softly murmured: "Brother, it seems that after a thousand years have passed, upon this land where we once placed great hopes yet repeatedly faced disappointnt, the Shinobi World has ultimately once again produced a descendant capable of understanding, and even attempting to reclaim, your original ideal. Though he is still immature and the road ahead remains unclear, this heart of his is already a rare glimr of light upon this land that has been soaked in hatred for far too long."
"It’s just... I wonder whether he can truly continue walking this path in the end, and whether he can carve out a road that even we ourselves failed to walk..."
Before Hamura Otsutsuki could finish speaking, he suddenly frowned and let out a sowhat helpless sigh.
He lifted his eyes, his gaze seemingly piercing through layer upon layer of spatial barriers toward the direction of the Hamura Temple on the moon’s surface.
There, the disputes and divisions between the two branches of his descendants had already beco increasingly sharp, nearly reaching an irreconcilable point.
On the moon’s surface, Hamura Temple.
The atmosphere, which had temporarily eased earlier because of the disturbance of the Tenseigan (Energy Vessel), had now beco tense once more, even sharper than before.
"Nobunaga! I think you’ve truly lost your mind! Were you really fooled senseless by a few pretty words? Don’t tell you actually believed that kid’s nonsense?!"
The face of Nobuhiro Otsutsuki, sowhat similar to Nobunaga’s but far gloomier and colder, was filled with undisguised mockery and disdain.
"Don’t be fooled by how beautifully he speaks now, peace? Returning to one’s essence? Didn’t you see it? During this war alone, how much blood of the Village Hidden in the Sand and Village Hidden by Clouds has stained the hands of this Shinichi Higashino?! A blood-soaked executioner is now talking about peace and salvation? How hypocritical! How laughable!"
"I already said this long ago! You, Nobunaga! And all of you stubborn mbers of the main house! You are fundantally wrong! This Shinobi World, created by the Sage of Six Paths, after a thousand years, has proven nothing except its complete failure! Other than endless hatred, slaughter, and tragic cycles, what else does it contain? It should have long ago been completely purified and reshaped according to the ideals of our branch house!"
It turned out that the conflict between the main house and branch house of the moon’s Otsutsuki Clan had existed for a very long ti, though in the past, they had still been able to maintain a superficial balance and shared mission.
However, since the mysterious disappearance of the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path more than ten years ago, they had been forced to repeatedly use the Tenseigan (Energy Vessel) to search the Shinobi World, coincidentally witnessing the brutal slaughter and endless hatred among ninja during the Second Shinobi World War.
As a result, the ideological division between the two sides rapidly widened and intensified.
And now, during this Third Shinobi World War, after personally witnessing the flas of war below grow increasingly fierce and the slaughter beco ever more cruel, the differing ideals upheld by both sides, the main house tended toward continuing observation and fulfilling their ancient duty of guardianship and guidance, while the branch house beca increasingly convinced that the world created by the Sage of Six Paths had completely failed and must be purified!
The conflict between the two sides had already reached a dangerous critical point.
Facing Nobuhiro’s intense accusations, the main house head, Nobunaga Otsutsuki, remained calm and slowly spoke: "He may indeed have blood on his hands and be caught within the vortex of war. That cannot be denied. But the direction he is contemplating, the alternative possibility he is attempting to point toward, perhaps it is precisely that which proves this world is not entirely as you see it, a path leading only toward degeneration and destruction."
"If soone is willing, amid blood and fire, to still try to think, to try to carve out a different path, perhaps it is not yet mature, perhaps it may even be full of uncertainties, but he has at least proposed a possibility! Before we have tried every possibility for peace, what right do we have to casually sentence a world to death?! At the very least, we should also give him, give that world..."
"Another chance?! We already gave this world a thousand years! And what was the result?"
Nobuhiro Otsutsuki let out a sneer and interrupted him, cold light flashing through his eyes: "This world is already beyond saving! We should carry out ancestor Hamura’s true will and completely purify this world filled with mistakes and..."
"Enough! Nobuhiro!"
Nobunaga Otsutsuki suddenly swept his sleeve and cut him off: "I am the Clan Head!"
"You will regret this!"
Hearing this, Nobuhiro Otsutsuki’s face completely darkened. After deeply looking at him once, he spoke in an icy voice.
Bang!
After speaking, he said no more. He violently flung his sleeve, turned around with the branch house mbers behind him who likewise wore unwilling and radical expressions, and left at once, slamming the door heavily behind them, leaving only the massive echo of the temple doors reverberating through the empty shrine.
At the sa ti, in the Pure Land.
"Returning to one’s original form and mission?" Hagoromo Otsutsuki, sitting cross-legged, clad in ancient white robes and holding a shakujō staff, slowly withdrew his gaze from Konoha.
Within those eyes that seed to hold endless tis, an extrely complex and indescribable emotion flashed by. The corners of his mouth slightly twitched, revealing an expression that was impossible to tell whether it was bitterness, self-mockery, or relief.
During the thousand years, he had personally watched the ideals of the Ninja Creed he had founded and placed great hopes upon beca continuously distorted.
He had watched chakra, from a bridge connecting hearts, gradually turn into a tool for dividing classes, creating hatred, and refining slaughter.
He watched wars repeat endlessly, watched peace bloom only briefly like an epiphyllum flower, and watched the profession of Ninja beco firmly locked within a cycle of blood and fire.
Countless tis, he had sighed deep within the Pure Land. He had also attempted to leave behind guidance and warnings through various thods, yet they often sank like stones into the sea, swallowed by the tides of the era and deeply rooted hatred.
Could he truly accomplish it? Or was it rely another fleeting, idealistic bubble?
With this complicated and indescribable curiosity, and also with an instinctive scrutiny toward the possibilities of the future, the Sage of Six Paths subconsciously activated his divination technique.
He wanted to see where the destiny of this boy, who spoke of returning to the essence and seed to resonate subtly with his thousand-years-younger self, would ultimately extend.
In an instant, what appeared before the Sage of Six Paths were countless fragnted images and streams of information interwoven with light and shadow, filled with chaotic noise, yet containing an unprecedented and imnse power that even made his soul tremble!
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