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Chapter 210 The Rune That Calls to the Age of Ancients
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[ Na: Naruto Uzumaki ]
[ Level: 53 →103 ]
[ Souls: 2,129 ]
[ Required Souls: 16,820 → 82,135 ]
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[ Attributes ]
[ Vitality: 12 → 30 ]
[ Attunent: 12 ]
[ Endurance: 11 → 40 ]
[ Strength: 30 ]
[ Dexterity: 20 ]
[ Resistance: 12 → 15 ]
[ Intelligence: 20 ]
[ Faith: 25 ]
[ Humanity: 1 ]
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[ Stats ]
[ HP: 616 → 1100 ]
[ Stamina: 93 → 160 ]
[ Equip Load: 51.0 → 80.0 ]
[ Poise: 46 ]
[ Bleed Resist: 98 → 160 ]
[ Poison Resist: 79 → 109 ]
[ Curse Resist: 30 → 50 ]
[ Item Discovery: 100 → 158 ]
[ Attunent Slots: 2 ]
[ Defenses ]
[ Physical DEF: 217 → 268 ]
[ VS Strike: 213 → 264 ]
[ VS Slash: 238 → 268 ]
[ VS Thrust: 217 → 268 ]
[ Magic DEF: 165 → 200 ]
[ Fla DEF: 146 → 201 ]
[ Lightning DEF: 139 → 189 ]
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Naruto stared at the glowing screen only he could see, rereading the numbers for what felt like the dozen ti. I know the Uzumaki were famous for their life force but fifty levels is ridiculous. His fingers trembled slightly. Vitality, endurance, resistance… all of them had skyrocketed beyond anything he had ever imagined possible.
And yet the gift had a price. His other stats, the ones he needed to grow as a fighter, now stretched behind an impossible wall of eighty thousand souls. Each point so far away it might as well be unreachable.
How am I supposed to level anything now, eighty thousand for one point…
Oscar flicked him sharply with his tail, a silent reminder that now was not the mont to complain. Naruto winced and nodded. They were sitting on Gamabunta's broad back, riding toward the camp. The morning air was quiet, broken only by the heavy rhythm of the toad's footsteps.
No one had spoken to him since they found him on the altar.
Naruto lifted a lock of his hair. Red. A deep, clear, unmistakable Uzumaki red. It caught the sunlight like burning silk. He swallowed, then tried to break the silence.
"Kakashi sensei, why did my hair turn red?"
"I dunno."
"Really? You usually know everything..."
Before Kakashi could answer, Sakura's voice cut through the air with a sharp edge. "Naruto. Please do not do that."
"Do what…?"
"Act like nothing happened," she whispered. Her hands were clenched tightly in her lap. "Not after what you put us through."
Naruto opened his mouth, then closed it.
Jiraiya spoke from the front, his tone quieter than usual, stripped of humor. "You are not that dense, kid. You can feel the tension just as well as I can."
"You are right," Naruto said softly. "I get it. I know I scared you. All of you. I should not have disappeared. I should not have lied. I should have trusted you." His throat tightened, but he pushed the words out. "I am sorry. Truly."
Oscar bowed his head with a soft sound of agreent.
Kakashi finally looked at him over his shoulder. "You have always kept secrets. I accepted that. But the scale of what you hid from us… it is larger than anything I imagined."
"I did not want to drag you into my ss."
"And you think we are not already in it," Sakura whispered, her voice cracking. "When we saw you hanging from that tree… bleeding like that… I really thought…" She swallowed hard. "I thought you were gone."
Jiraiya's voice ca next. "Your actions forced us into a situation we did not understand. You could have died, brat. And none of us would have known why."
Naruto nodded slowly.
A silence followed.
It was Sasuke who finally broke it. "You are stronger."
"What?"
Sasuke's sharingan spun slowly as he studied Naruto's chakra network. "Stronger than yesterday. Stronger than last night. Your chakra is dense."
"That is the result of the Uzumaki rite. It changed my body and my chakra."
He raised his hand and ford a Rasengan. Except this ti the sphere swelled, unrestrained, the chakra compressing and folding on itself like a storm. It grew to the size of a football, humming with dangerous intensity.
Jiraiya's breath caught. "That is… that is the scale of an Odama Rasengan."
The Rasengan shattered suddenly. A violent burst of wind tore outward. Kakashi grabbed Sakura and anchored Sasuke to keep them from flying off Gamabunta's back. Oscar was not so lucky. The blast sent him flying.
Naruto reacted instantly. His palm eye snapped open, and invisible force rippled from it. Oscar froze mid fall, suspended in the air before being drawn safely into Naruto's arms. The boy held Oscar close, then spoke, "I know I owe you more than apologies. And I will give you answers. All of them. But right now… please… let have a mont to breathe."
Everyone had agreed to let the boy rest.
It was quiet for a few minutes until Naruto said, "Sakura, you are staring at a little too much."
"It is not fair."
"What is not fair?"
She motioned wildly at his hair. "This. Every ti sothing big happens, you co out looking even prettier. Your hair gets longer, shinier and softer. anwhile mine gets frizzy if the wind sneezes at ."
Naruto blinked at her, then a small, sheepish grin tugged at his lips. Before Sakura could react, he leaned forward and pulled her into a hug. Unfortunately, he forgot one tiny detail.
"Gah Naruto. Spine. Spine," Sakura wheezed as her arms flailed helplessly.
"Sorry. Sorry. I forgot. I keep forgetting I am stronger now."
Sakura coughed, straightened her back with a wince, then glared at him through watery eyes. "You think. You nearly folded like a futon."
"My bad… so, um… will you still fix my hair?"
"Yes, you big oaf. Just sit down before you break sothing else. Or soone."
Oscar chirped in agreent.
Naruto obediently shuffled forward and sat in front of her. Sakura moved behind him, lifting his hair with gentle fingers, combing through the new red strands with practiced ease.
Sasuke suggested, "Give him pigtails."
"That would actually be adorable."
"Red haired pigtails would be very stylish," Kakashi said from behind his book.
"And throw in so bangs while you are at it," Jiraiya said proudly. "Trust , I know these things. Won love a good bang..."
Jiraiya dodged a kunai to the head. anwhile Naruto turned scarlet from the teasing. He grabbed Oscar and squeezed him like a stress ball, burying his face in the lizard's side for emotional support as the teasing continued.
Oscar chirped sympathetically.
Sakura laughed softly, her voice warm. "Relax, Naruto. I am not actually giving you pigtails." She brushed through the strands with careful, soothing motions. Then she paused. "Oh. Naruto, look here."
She gently pulled a small section forward.
A thin streak of gold.
Naruto froze completely.
His hand reached up, trembling just slightly, and brushed against the lingering blonde. His breath caught. The red felt right… it felt like Mito, like Kushina, like ho. But the blonde… that was his father. That was warmth. That was mory.
"You still have so of your old color hiding in here."
"Sakura… can you make the blonde more visible?"
"Do you want a streak of blonde in your red hair?"
"I want… both. I want the red and the yellow together. I might be an Uzumaki, but I am also my father's son. I want both sides of to be there. I want… all of to count."
Sakura's expression softened at Naruto's words, her hands pausing in his hair. Sasuke allowed himself the faintest hint of a smile. But the adults exchanged quiet, uneasy glances.
His father's son…? Does he know?!
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After breakfast, Naruto let out a loud burp before clearing his throat. "With my belly full, I want to sleep for a week, but I will not be able to close my eyes until we talk this through. So… let us get these questions out of the way."
The morning light did nothing to dispel the underlying tension.
Sasuke asked, "What exactly happened to you in the center of the island."
Naruto inhaled slowly, gathering his thoughts. "The Uzumaki have a rite of passage passed down from the founder of the clan."
Sakura frowned. "So... you hang yourself to prove that you are a man?"
"No, the hanging just pushes you into a state between life and death. That state lets you et the Shinigami. He seals special chakra onto your soul. That awakens your potential." Naruto paused. "It is not sothing ant to be spoken about lightly. I am telling you because you deserve to know why everything went insane last night."
Despite everything he had shared, everyone could tell Naruto was still holding back the deeper parts. And none of them were shaless enough to expect otherwise. Clan techniques, rites, the inner workings of a bloodline… those were not things freely given. They all understood that what he had told them was already more than most would ever reveal.
Sakura raised her hand slightly. "Then… how did you even know how to do this? You said before you did not know anything about your clan."
Naruto looked down at his hands for a mont. "You rember that illusion graveyard Kakashi sensei showed us?"
They nodded.
"Well… Mito Uzumaki left a piece of her soul there. A guide for any Uzumaki who ever found the place. She helped understand just enough to attempt the rite. The rest… I figured out along the way."
Kakashi leaned forward slightly, serious now. "Naruto. If you had no guidance until then… why keep all of this quiet. You could have told us sothing. Anything."
"The reason I did not tell you… the reason I lied," Naruto said slowly, "I am sorry for that. Truly. But I made a promise. Soone ca to after we beca Team Seven. He told he knew my parents. He said he could tell about my mother… about the Uzumaki… if I proved I could keep a secret for a month."
He exhaled, shoulders easing as if a weight slid off them.
"I trusted him. Back then, I wanted answers so badly that I held onto anything that might lead to them. That is why I kept quiet."
Jiraiya asked in such a serious tone that everyone straightened their back. "Who?"
Naruto reached into his pouch and pulled out the worn journal, turning it once in his hand before offering it to Kakashi. "I do not really know who that guy is. He said he was a friend of my parents."
"Is this man from Lordran?"
"I do not know," Naruto answered honestly. "Said they trusted him with their legacy, so I trusted him too. But with Gran Gran Gran Mito's help, I figured out he was trying to steer sowhere. Maybe even use . I still have no idea who he actually is."
Naruto's voice tightened as he finished, "He only gave an alias. He called himself the Hawk."
Kakashi and Jiraiya exchanged a long, dark look.
Danzo.
Naruto gave a weary smile. "We can deal with it when we return to the village. There are… a lot of things involving we need to talk about."
Nobody argued.
The silence that followed felt like it stretched for miles.
Naruto rubbed his face. "If any of you have more questions, ask them now. The mont my head hits sothing soft, I am out."
Oscar yawned in agreent.
Sasuke opened his mouth, then shook his head.
"Is Minato truly connected to Lordran?" Jiraiya finally asked, unable to hold the question in any longer.
Naruto nodded. "Yeah. That part was true. I found the Fourth's kunai on Artorias's grave. And Alvina told that Minato Namikaze and a redhead ca to Lordran." He shrugged slightly. "But everything else about the Nine Tails and Uzushio was a lie."
"What?"
Kakashi stopped mid step. Every answer they got only seed to open five new questions. The word Lordran hung over them like a curse.
Sasuke crossed his arms, brow furrowed. "What exactly happened to the Nine Tails then?"
"It is probably sowhere in Lordran," Naruto replied.
Everyone froze.
"WHAT?!"
Naruto winced at the collective scream. Oscar chittered irritably and flicked his tail, so Naruto scratched the little lizard's head to calm him. "Why are you all surprised?" he said. "You told yourselves the Nine Tails escapes when its jinchuriki dies."
Another wave of silence hit, then…
"Huh?"
Naruto's eye twitched. "Do not ask how because I do not know. But Lordran is covered in the curse of the undead. You die, then respawn at the bonfire. I died in Lordran and probably released the Nine Tails sowhere."
This ti the silence was so absolute that even the wind seed unsure if it should move.
Team Seven had long since adapted to Naruto saying outrageous things. But this… this was on a different level. Even they found themselves holding their heads, trying to understand the sheer weight of what they had heard.
"How many tis have you died?" Sasuke asked. He imdiately regretted asking the mont the words left his mouth.
"Stopped counting after the first twenty deaths," Naruto answered casually.
Everyone froze again.
"At least this explains why you are so insane," Sakura muttered, half incredulous, half joking.
"Hey, I would argue the Uzumaki clan was just as insane as ," Naruto said, puffing his chest a little.
Kakashi rubbed the side of his head. Everything Naruto said kept repeating in his mind, looping like a broken genjutsu. Each detail was absurd, impossible, unbelievable… yet Naruto said it with such casual sincerity that Kakashi found himself asking a terrifying question.
Has he been telling the truth every single ti we asked?
A few minutes of stunned silence passed before Naruto finally spoke. "Kakashi sensei… do you have any chakra paper?"
"Why?"
"Well, I figured I might as well check if anything changed. You know… while you all try to process everything I just told you."
Kakashi sighed in that tired, resigned way only he could manage. He pulled out a stack of chakra paper and handed it over. Everyone leaned in just a little, grateful for the distraction.
Naruto pressed the first sheet between his fingers.
The paper split cleanly down the middle.
"Wind," Kakashi noted calmly.
One half burst into fla, but the fire burned dark inky black with faint flecks of gold twisting inside the flas like embers of twilight.
"Fire," Jiraiya murmured. His brows furrowed as he watched the strange coloration. That was not normal fire nature chakra.
The remaining paper reacted all at once as one side crumbled into dirt and the other side beca damp and soggy.
Sakura gasped. "Earth and water? At the sa ti?"
Kakashi frowned thoughtfully. Two changes in one paper… that is usually the sign of a kekkei genkai.
Naruto grinned wide, pumping a fist triumphantly. "Yes. I have four. Four chakra natures." He pointed at Sasuke and Sakura, absolutely glowing with pride. "I have more chakra natures than you guys."
"Real mature, Naruto."
"Oh please," Naruto shot back, "you totally teased when you learned you had two and I had one."
Sakura crossed her arms and looked away, cheeks puffed out. She did not deny it.
Sasuke asked, "What about lightning?"
"Huh. I guess… I did not get that one for so reason."
Kakashi said in a tone that suggested he was already done for the day, "You say that as if there is a reason that you awakened four other natures without issue."
"I can think of a few reasons."
"But still no lightning," Sasuke said with the kind of smug calm that made Naruto's left eye twitch.
"Who even needs lightning? I already have my Sun Bro lightning spear."
Sakura questioned, "Wait… how can you use a lightning jutsu if you do not have a lightning chakra nature?"
"You can use a jutsu without matching the nature," Sasuke answered flatly.
"It is not a jutsu," Naruto said, wagging the talisman at them. "It is a miracle from the god of war."
Sasuke gave him a pointed look. "Why can nothing in your life ever be simple?"
Oscar was the first to turn away from the conversation. His tail twitched with visible irritation as he waddled toward the tents, exhausted and done with all the human drama. He only wanted sleep, warmth, and maybe a kiss on the head. Preferably in that order.
As he passed the leftover chakra paper, sothing made him pause.
Naruto's dried blood, streaked across the discarded sheet, began to glow and shimr like silver.
Oscar froze, pupils narrowing to slits. A low, uneasy chirr trembled in his throat. Sothing about that glow felt ancient, older even than Lordran's first fla.
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anwhile, the adults were having their own thoughts about the morning's chaos.
"What do you think of all this, Jiraiya sama?"
Jiraiya's brows were knit tightly. "Honestly… we do not have enough information to say anything definitive. Minato never ntioned Lordran. Not to , not to Ma and Pa, not to anyone. But at least now we have so idea of what happened to the Nine Tails. If Naruto is right, we have ti before the fox reforms."
"And Danzo? His attempt to tamper with Naruto's heritage?"
Jiraiya's expression darkened. "Danzo is a tricky man to read. Could be manipulation. Could be recruitnt. Could be sothing even worse. Either way, we cannot handle it here. We will need the Third's counsel once we return."
Kakashi's gaze drifted to Naruto and Sasuke, who were bickering half heartedly with Sakura diating. "Should we tell Naruto about Danzo then?"
"Eventually," Jiraiya said. "But not now. The boy is exhausted. Let him have so peace."
"All right… and Minato sensei? Will you tell him?"
"Yes, he is ready to know."
Kakashi glanced sideways. "But… what if he already knows?"
Before Jiraiya could answer, a pressure rolled through the camp.
It was subtle at first… then impossible to ignore.
Everyone froze.
The sensation that washed over them made no sense as contradictions layered on contradictions.
Cold, yet strangely warm. Silent, yet thrumming like a distant roar. Dangerous enough to raise every instinct… yet comforting in a way that made the skin prickle.
Then ca the sound.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
Like water falling onto earth, but each drop echoed deeper than the physical world should allow, like it fell into sothing vast and hollow. All eyes swung toward the chakra paper Naruto had tossed aside.
The halves of paper warped and twisted together, earth and water chakra reacting in a way none of them had ever seen… spiraling inward, weaving, reshaping.
"Is that… wood chakra?" Kakashi whispered as he saw the tree form.
Its bark was the color of ash, etched with sharp, angular lines that resembled weathered stone. The trunk and limbs looked less like sothing grown and more like mineral rock molded into the shape of a tree.
Sakura swallowed hard. "Kakashi sensei… earth and water chakra combine to form Wood Release, right? That is how it works?"
Kakashi did not answer imdiately. Because yes, that was the basic theory. Because no, this should not be happening. Because absolutely not, chakra paper was not supposed to behave like this. A thin sheen of sweat gathered on his temple. He forced himself to nod, but even that felt uncertain.
Sasuke scowled, jaw tight enough to crack. "This cannot be happening. Naruto should not have Wood Release."
Everyone turned to look at him.
"He should have Scorch Release."
Everyone decided to ignore him.
"How… how is this still possible?" Jiraiya muttered. "Only the Senju had Wood Release."
"The Uzumaki and Senju are still cousin clans," Kakashi reminded him.
"Na one Senju besides Hashirama who actually had it," Naruto challenged.
There was not one.
Sakura sat down. "So… why did Naruto unlock sothing only the First Hokage ever had?"
"Because Hashirama awakened it with the Uzumaki Clan's rite of passage as his soul had the potential for it." Naruto placed his palm against the mineral tree. A soft ripple of energy passed through it, and the wood flickered before disappearing into his inventory in a quiet wash of light.
[ Item: Archtree ]
[ Description: Titanic, ash colored tree of stone. Said to be neither fully alive nor fully dead, but a creature of the age of ancient.
These monoliths were kin to the Everlasting Dragons. Dragons nested within their hollows, slept beneath their roots, and wandered their endless canopies as if the trees and beasts were one lineage of the sa primordial world.
Be warned that the blood of the abyss shall be the soil to these trees, and ho to the everlasting. ]
Did I awaken Wood Release because of my dragon scale?
The question sat in Naruto's mind like a stone in still water, sending ripples through every thought as he lay awake in the dark. He had slept for almost an entire day after the Rite of Passage, but now his eyes refused to close.
The Rune awakens the potential of the soul.
And his soul… bore a dragon's scale, making it a part of him. So logically, the Rune would affect the scale as well.
Was that why he awakened Wood Release? Was it even Wood Release? Or was it sothing closer to the dragons than to Hashirama? Archtree Release? Archwood Release?
Naruto pushed open the tent flap and stepped outside, the long strands of hair catching moonlight like crimson threads.
"Going sowhere?"
Naruto reacted on instinct. In one breath, he spun with the Zweihander materializing into his grip in a shimr of light and swung downward with enough force to cut a horse in half.
Jiraiya deflected the flat of the blade with the back of his hand. "Easy there, brat. I know you have been through a lot, but I prefer to keep my limbs."
Naruto exhaled shakily and dismissed the sword. "Do not sneak up on like that, Lustmolch."
"What does that even an?"
"In the language of Catarina, it ans dirty old man."
Jiraiya stared at him. "Hey now. I stopped peeping after the whole Tsunami incident."
"You are absolutely planning sothing."
"Oh, absolutely. I am going to master genjutsu," Jiraiya declared with far too much enthusiasm, "and then I will have a shadow clone cast illusions on . Pure, uninterrupted… research."
He broke into gleeful cackling at the thought.
"Good luck with that, Pervy Sage."
"So. Really. Where are you going at this hour?"
"I want to check the genjutsu graveyard. After everything that happened… I need to see if it is still there."
Naruto ford the first hand seal. His chakra surged like a tidal wave and lost control instantly, crackling violently in his system. He hissed and dropped the seal.
"That," Jiraiya said, pointing, "is what happens when you go from a lake to an ocean overnight. Your chakra pool has multiplied several tis over. Your control needs ti to catch up. Skip the big techniques for now."
Naruto clicked his tongue and stared down at his trembling hand. The veins under his skin pulsed with chakra so dense it felt like a physical weight.
"I guess I will walk then. Might as well… take it slow."
"Hold up. You are not going alone."
"You do not have to follow , you know."
"Oh, I absolutely do," Jiraiya replied without hesitation. "Last ti I let you wander off on your own, you hanged yourself."
"…Fair."
The two walked in silence for a long while. Not awkward, exactly, but heavy. They did not know each other well, and both could feel the quiet tension hanging between them. By the ti they reached the ruins, the moon hung high.
"As expected of Mito sama. The craftsmanship in her fuinjutsu is flawless. Beautiful."
"Good. If you had said anything weird about my Gran Gran Gran, I would have hit you in the boingloings."
"…Boingloings?" Jiraiya repeated slowly.
"It is the Catarina word for…" Naruto stopped halfway, seeing Jiraiya's look.
"No it is not. You just made that up."
"And you fell for it."
Jiraiya snorted and shook his head. "Brat."
Naruto stepped forward, staring at the broken temple with a strange mix of pride and sadness. "Pervy Sage… I am not good enough at fuinjutsu yet. Can you check if everything is still working?"
"Sure," Jiraiya said. He crouched down and spent several long minutes examining the stonework, the lingering lines, and the stabilizing seals carved into the earth. His brows furrowed, then relaxed. "It all seems intact. Nothing collapsed after Mito sama passed on."
Naruto let out a shaky breath of relief. "Good. I was worried the whole thing might fall apart when her soul left."
"So what now?"
Naruto hesitated, then asked, "Is there any way I can take this fuinjutsu back with ?"
"This fuinjutsu is not sothing you can just copy onto paper. It is woven into the very foundation of the ruins. If you want to bring it with you, the only way is to seal the entire temple itself into a scroll."
"Let us do that."
"No way. That would take too long and too much chakra."
Naruto straightened, eyes serious. "I have the ti. And I have the chakra."
Jiraiya looked at him for a long mont, gauging him, then sighed. "Fine. I will inscribe the sealing array. You will provide the chakra."
Naruto nodded.
"Alright then. Give a mont."
Jiraiya reached into his sleeve. Naruto expected a normal brush. Instead, Jiraiya pulled out a brush taller than he was, a massive ink bottle the size of a bed, and an absurdly large scroll that unrolled for what felt like several hundred feet.
Naruto sweatdropped. "Where did you even get all of that?"
"These are for when Boss Bunta wants to write poetry."
Naruto blinked… then Jiraiya casually tossed him a smaller scroll.
"And here is my attempt at it."
Naruto opened it.
Inside was the most unhinged poetry he had ever seen.
"The moon glistens bright
Upon her damp lily pads
Oh hop, hop, my love."
"Her croak calls to
Beneath the sacred wetlands
I long for her sli."
"Two frogs in the mud
Bound by destiny's ribbit
Clutch , tadpole queen."
"How did you even write this?" Naruto asked, half horrified, half impressed. "What does this even an? Her croaks echo across my lonely pond, stirring my tadpole heart? What possessed you?"
"Ah, that one is a personal favorite. I imagined myself as a frog serenading Tsunade… who was also a frog. Very poetic, very symbolic."
"…That explains too much and not enough at the sa ti."
Naruto dropped the scroll onto his lap like it had personally offended him. After a mont of silence, he sighed and asked, "Oi, Pervy Sage… can I ask you sothing serious?"
Jiraiya paused mid brushstroke, eyebrow twitching at the sudden shift in tone. "…Sure, kid. What is on your mind?"
Naruto fiddled with the edge of the scroll. "When do you think soone should reveal a secret? Like… a big one."
Jiraiya's brush froze.
Naruto did not miss it.
"…Oh?" Jiraiya said after a beat, forcing a teasing lilt into his voice. "That the kind of question a boy asks when he has a crush on a girl? Planning to confess? Want this old sage to give you so romance tips?"
Naruto gave him the most deadpan expression a human could muster. "No. This is not about a girl. And you are the last person I would go to for romantic advice."
Jiraiya clutched his chest dramatically. "Ouch. My pride."
"Your pride is not real. Anyways, answer my question."
"A secret should be told when you are ready to give the whole truth. Not just the parts that are convenient. Not because soone asks, not because you feel cornered, but because you are ready to share everything that cos with it."
Silence.
Naruto waited for Jiraiya to say sothing… anything… to take this chance. To explain their relationship. To say sothing about his father. Even a flimsy excuse like I will tell you in Konoha would have been sothing.
But Jiraiya said nothing.
And Naruto knew the spymaster had already put the pieces together. So why not say it? Why keep pretending?
In a fit of anger, Naruto's chakra rippled, cracking the stone beneath his feet as everything he had been holding in finally snapped.
"ENOUGH!"
Jiraiya whipped around.
Naruto's voice shook. "Jiraiya… tell about my parents. Tell why every answer I get cos from ghosts and strangers instead of you."
His breathing hitched.
"Tell … what… I am to you."
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Author Note: And with that, I leave you on a cliffhanger. First, I want to apologize for the late update. This chapter was supposed to co out on November 12, but I ended up getting sick and then had so real life things to deal with. I hope the wait was worth it. Now let us get into the Q and A.
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Q: Is the fifty level stat buff sothing everyone gets when they obtain a Rune?
Answer: Normally, no. The Rune on average gives around a twenty point boost. The reason Naruto received such an absurd jump is because his astral form, the dragon, literally drank from the senjutsu well. I think it is pretty obvious why a giant hundred ter dragon can hold far more chakra than a human.
Since this topic has popped up a few tis, I will address it here: So people are concerned that Naruto is becoming too overpowered for the Chunin Exams, or that the exams will not be a challenge anymore.
This concern cos from thinking too strictly in canon terms. My fanfic is going in its own direction after the exams. Even the exams themselves will be different from canon. The fact that multiple villages, major and minor, are participating should be hint enough. And Naruto is not going to be facing average genin or chunin. The exams will involve big threats, political sches from Danzo, Orochimaru's interference, and unique challenges.
Characters like Gaara are not going to be nerfed for the plot.
Konoha eleven will also get their own power ups in ways that make sense for this version of the story.
Point is: do not worry about Naruto getting stronger. The story is planned out, and I know exactly how I want everything to unfold. Just enjoy the ride.
And also yes, this is an OP Naruto story. While Naruto will have a lot of obstacles in the exam and outside of it, he will still be OP.
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Q: Why does Naruto have blonde hair in the seals instead of pure red?
So I want to clear sothing up right away because I have seen a few comnts worried that I am removing Minato's side of Naruto. Trust , I am not doing that at all.
Yes, Naruto getting red hair is a big visual shift, but it does not an Minato's legacy suddenly vanished. Naruto still has Minato's blue eyes, he still uses the Rasengan, and in the story Minato is still the benchmark that people compare DS Naruto to. In fact, Minato's connection to Lordran is a bigger piece of the plot than so of you realize, and that will be explored later.
So no, I am not removing anything about Minato just because Naruto's hair changed color.
So of you suggested the idea of Naruto having blonde tips or streaks, and I sat with that for a bit. I ended up liking the idea, but not the fla like blonde tips. They looked way too tacky for what I wanted. So I decided Naruto would still have so blonde mixed into his red hair. Normally you cannot see it at a glance, but if you comb through it or if the light hits right, the blonde is there.
It is subtle, but it is important to the the. Naruto will embrace both sides of his heritage.
Hope you guys like that direction.
Edit: A lot of you brought this up, so I want to confirm it clearly. Yes, DS Naruto will learn the Flying Thunder God. Yes, he will learn Uzumaki clan fuinjutsu. And yes, he will get even more techniques tied to both sides of his heritage. I have said before that I want Naruto's character in this story to reflect both where he cos from and what he has beco.
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Q: How does Naruto have Wood Release?
Alright, this is probably the biggest talking point of the chapter. A lot of you were confused about Naruto's wood release. So let clarify.
First of all, it is not technically Wood Release. Not in the Hashirama sense.
Canon Wood Release converts chakra into life. It makes trees, vines, plants, and in Hashirama's case entire forests. So users make smaller vegetation or binding techniques. At its highest level, it is a life giving force that controls natural growth.
Naruto's version is not that.
His wood is stone wood. It is more like the archtrees of Dark Souls than normal vegetation. These archtrees predate the cycle of life and death. They existed in the Age of Ancients. They are closer to primordial formations than plant growth.
And yes, there were hints to this throughout the story:
When Haku first found Naruto naked in the forest, there was a stone wood flower beside him. That was the very first hint.
When Naruto t the mushroom people of Oolacile, they described his presence as being like that of a tree. In Dark Souls, the mushroom people live inside or near archtrees, so that comparison was deliberate.
The description of Naruto's Rune is based on the Yggdrasil Rune from Norse mythology. And since there are theories that archtrees can hold up or connect entire worlds, you could say that Naruto's Rune was another hint toward his Archtree Release.
I retconned Hashirama's Wood Release to co from the Rune. Since Hashirama's lineage is tied to Ashura, and since Naruto was once an Ashura reincarnation before Lordran changed his soul, this made Wood Release a potential trait lurking in his soul.
But because Naruto's soul has the dragon scale fused into it, the Rune awakened that part in a very different direction. Instead of regular Wood Release, Naruto developed the ancient version. The primordial form.
So his wood does not function like the Senju's. It is older and weirder. And stronger in so ways.
Now the real question: what should I officially na it?
Do we go with Archtree Release, which sounds more mystical and Dark Souls aligned? Or Archwood Release, which sounds more like a kekkei genkai na?
I am honestly torn, so I want to hear your opinions.
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Q: Can you explain the lore of Archtrees?
So, first things first: we actually do not know much about archtrees. Shocker, I know.
Archtrees are one of the oldest mysteries in the franchise. There are many theories about them, including the idea that they hold up or connect entire worlds. And honestly, if you look across FromSoft's gas, so variant of an archtree or a giant world tree keeps showing up. That is why so fans believe every FromSoft world is secretly connected.
It also does not help that Elden Ring Nightreign exists, which makes people go, Oh, so the Dark Souls multiverse is real after all. Whether you believe that theory or not, or whether you think archtrees are literal world pillars or just ancient lifeforms, let us get into what we actually know about them in Dark Souls.
Archtrees are enormously tall and wide primordial trees that tower up to the skies and reach deep into the earth.
The archtrees were entities that existed in the Age of Ancients, alongside the Archdragons. In this state, before the First Fla brought any form of life and diversity, the world was undistinguished and consequently everything was made of ash colored rocks. Like dragons, archtrees were also made of stone and were half living, half mineral and simply existed without any changes. They covered the surface of the world, their roots kiloters deep with trunks reaching the sky. The rock wood of the archtrees was imnsely capable of resisting magic.
Izalith and her daughters burned down the archtrees.
At so point the creatures that found the Lord Souls near the First Fla underground and developed their powers erged to the surface with the intention of exterminating the dragons and conquering the world for themselves. During the war that followed, Izalith and her daughters used sorcery and their powers to manipulate flas and weaved great firestorms that scorched the very earth, destroying the archtrees and burning the dragons while Nito unleashed a miasma of death, rotting the archtrees and infecting the dragons, and Gwyn and his knights battled the dragons with their mighty lightning bolts. After the long struggle the Lords erged victorious, exterminating most of the archdragons and archtrees, thus conquering the surface world for themselves.
The remnants of a forest of archtrees in the Ash Lake.
Despite the brutal conflict, several specins of archtrees continued to survive, and in particular in the Ash Lake, an imnse underground cave, many of them are still intact, offering shelter to one of the last examples of archdragon descendants, the Stone Dragon. Additionally, following the war against the dragons, Izalith developed her civilization underground, building the city bearing her na around the frawork of a surviving archtree. The demons created by Izalith's Bed of Chaos would have used the tree's stone bark to forge their great hamrs. The few archtrees that survived evolved into the giant trees found in Lordran, considered their distant offspring, and their wood still inherited the magic resistant properties of their ancestors.
The remnants of an archtree in the north of Drangleic. In the region of Drangleic, the lower remains of an archtree can be found in the north. Under the imnse structures of the tree's roots the Shrine of Amana was built and it was inhabited by the maidens of Amana, while even deeper under the roots the Undead Crypt was located. Here the Fenito and Milfanito took care of the sleep of the undead and alleviated their suffering.
The remnants of an archtree at the end of the world.
At the end of the world, when the First Fla has reached the last crumbs of its power, the entire world has co to converge around its kiln. The last sparks of the First Fla are located inside an imnse dead archtree, cleanly sliced in half and now empty inside. The Demon Prince took refuge inside this hollow tree after being defeated by Lorian and retreating beneath the earth.
It is also possible to theorize that the First Fla ignited itself within an archtree. In fact, the Kiln of the First Fla, which in Dark Souls was covered by the layers of structures in Dark Souls Three appears clearly, revealing that the First Fla was stored exactly in the center of an ancient archtree. Additionally, Izalith created her own copy of the First Fla within the archtree at the center of her city, thus likely attempting to replicate the original conditions in which the Fla had manifested itself for her experint.
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Q: What does Archtree or Archwood Release actually do?
Alright, so this is the big one. And the honest answer right now is… I do not fully know yet.
Dark Souls barely explains archtrees outside of they are ancient, they are magic resistant, and they are connected to world geotry in weird ways.
For now, the only confird thing is that Naruto woke sothing up, and that sothing is not traditional Wood Release.
But the full set of abilities is still flexible, and I actually want your ideas for how it should evolve.
I have so possible directions, but I want this to be a community brainstorm. Throw your ideas, no matter how weird or dumb they sound. I love reading them, and so of the best concepts in this fic ca from comnt sections.
To help get your imagination going, here are a few starter concepts:
Idea A: Archtrees absorb the nature of the soil they grow from. Example: if Naruto uses it in a silver mine, the archtree sprouts as silver wood with tallic properties.
Idea B: Archtrees are naturally resistant to magic or chakra. This ans Naruto could go full ch mode and make stone wood constructs, wooden golems, or even armor that cannot be burned or cut by ninjutsu.
Idea C: Archtrees produce mushrooms instead of flowers. You know how Hashirama uses flowering trees and pollen to knock people out?
Naruto could create a forest of giant mushrooms that release spores based on mushroom resins.
Imagine spores that burn you from inside, or electrify your nerves, or poison your chakra.
Those are just a few ideas to help kickstart your creativity. I would love to hear what you all co up with. Anything goes. If you have a cool, insane, broken, or funny idea for Archtree Release, toss it in the comnts.
I will read everything.
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That's It… For Now.
As always, I want to thank you all for taking the ti to read, comnt, and follow along with this story. Your feedback ans more than you know, and it helps push to make each chapter bigger, sharper, and more true to the worlds of Naruto and Dark Souls.
Until next ti, Praise the Sun.
—Adam
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[ Personal Note: First off, thanks a ton to all of you for sticking with this story. Seriously, you guys are aweso. Now, if you're interested in supporting on P@treon, let just say that over there, I post these massive 5k-word chapters. But heads up, if you're jumping to P@treon, you'll need to start from Chapter 96, since that's where this chapter lines up with the content there.
To everyone here just reading along, please don't forget to leave a comnt! Honestly, your comnts make my day, and they let know you're as invested in this story as I am. So yeah, thanks again, and I hope you have an amazing rest of your day!
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