HSU: Ch. 298

Retracting his Susanoo, Masashi didn't say anything more. He felt that he had already responded sincerely enough.

This wasn't how business should be negotiated.

It was completely unequal. Not to mention whether he would obediently comply or not, the terms of exchange were utterly unbalanced.

Just deleting some data in the Pure Land in exchange for sending Madara back? Who would agree to that?

Hagoromo hesitated.

Clearly, if he didn't make things clear, Masashi wouldn't give up the Rinnegan. And that made sense. He knew, more or less, how much this child had sacrificed for his power.

But if he told Masashi about his mother… Masashi was extremely bold in his pursuit of power, he even dared to mess with Black Zetsu. Hagoromo didn't believe Masashi would have much fear or reverence for his mother. And if it came to that, she would end up in control again. A person who chases after power, how could they resist someone who was practically power itself?

It was an addiction.

Hagoromo really couldn't understand Masashi's mindset of always feeling like he didn't have enough power.

Just what was he so afraid of?

"If you have nothing more to say, I'll take my leave. I still have matters to attend to outside," Masashi said.

He still had to bomb Valley of Clouds and Lightning and destroy the Kumo ninjas.

"You really don't need to kill so many people," Hagoromo said. "They could become your allies, you could trust them."

"No, that's the one thing I absolutely don't believe in," Masashi shook his head. "This world isn't like yours was. It didn't grow from ruins."

In the original timeline, the Kumo ninjas were a major force in resisting Obito during the Fourth Great Ninja War. In that world, due to years of effort, Kumo had become the largest village in terms of power and the richest financially in the shinobi world. But in this timeline, unable to siphon resources from Konoha and instead being constantly suppressed, Kumo's predatory culture had turned it into the village most hostile toward Konoha. Yet, like in the original world, it still remained the only village capable of challenging Konoha.

Its ambition matched its capability.

In Masashi's plans, Kumo was the most unstable factor. To destroy its ambition, he had to destroy the village itself. Then, he could joyfully start planning his retirement.

Playing with his kids at home, teasing tailed beasts outside, enjoying romantic moments with his wife in between, what a successful life that would be. At most, he'd fight Madara again, but without tailed beasts, there wouldn't be much Madara could do anyway.

The more he imagined it, the happier he felt. Masashi's expression softened.

"…"

Looking at Masashi's expression, Hagoromo felt like the man was already acting smug, like he was basking in glory atop a tree, even though he wasn't up there yet. It seemed he had to say more.

In the end, he still didn't dare reveal that chakra was already connected to Kaguya.

"There's no other choice. I must tell you one more thing," Hagoromo said. "It's about your Rinnegan and chakra."

"Oh?" Masashi paused his beautiful daydreams about the future. Though he didn't think Hagoromo would reveal anything too groundbreaking, the man was the architect of an era.

So he made a show of listening attentively.

"You possess the Rinnegan because of the Ten-Tails' chakra. Therefore, your chakra is already connected to the Ten-Tails. I hope you're aware of this."

"The Ten-Tails' chakra may have altered mine, but it's still my chakra," Masashi disagreed with this notion.

After all, he had studied chakra for a long time. In his use of the Rinnegan, it was his own chakra that played the core role.

"Whether it's my Rinnegan or the Sharingan inherited from Indra, both of these eye techniques are projections of chakra."

His rebuttal was within Hagoromo's expectations.

But Hagoromo said, "Yes, but in this world, from the beginning, the Rinnegan has always been limited in number, and they all originate from the Ten-Tails. I obtained part of its power through my mother. Because she acted as an intermediary, the Ten-Tails didn't influence me directly. But you are different. You took it directly from the source. As long as you use the Rinnegan, your chakra and its chakra are connected, it will know everything about you."

Masashi's expression finally changed.

Damn that Ten-Tails. No wonder Hagoromo wanted him to stop using the Rinnegan.

"And what gives you the authority to make that judgment?" Masashi asked.

Without solid evidence, he wouldn't believe it. Of course, even if he did believe it, it didn't mean he'd stop using the Rinnegan altogether. He would still use it when necessary, but he'd be more cautious.

"Because of the previous reincarnate," Hagoromo said. "His Rinnegan came from me. For a period of time, I was able to observe many things through him. And through his chakra, I could even access the memories most deeply etched into his mind."

Since he couldn't outright say it was his mother's ability, he cleverly changed the subject. But upon hearing this, Masashi sucked in a sharp breath.

Forget his life as Muzo, just thinking about his life before the shinobi world… Wasn't his most deeply etched memory all that "resource" he accumulated in terabytes?

He couldn't even remember the OG plot as clearly!

Back then, in his original life, he had high-definition OCD. From early AVI files with external subs to MKV containers and eventually REMUX, he never missed a single mainstream HD format. In the end, he realized that raw Blu-ray discs were the true romance of manhood.

It started with chasing anime (2D), but evolved into chasing live-action (3D). The 2D stuff had clear intent and was relatively wholesome. But the 3D… not only was it unwholesome, it was practically a global expo.

From early curiosity, to technical analysis, and eventually minor fetishes, he had gone from a naive teen to a refined connoisseur, lewd but not vulgar, a gentlemanly pervert. To be honest, even after reincarnating, he would sometimes revisit those "classics."

If Kaguya could spy on his memories through chakra, and happened to catch a glimpse of his original life…

Spoilers would be the least of his concerns, there wasn't even a plot to spoil anymore. But if she saw those materials? That would be disastrous.

He remembered that she was an ascetic. Would she, upon being unsealed, immediately come after him as some kind of depraved heretic?

That would be so unfair.

What man doesn't have at least 10 terabytes of youth, right... right? A single raw disc could be dozens or even hundreds of gigabytes!

Was this reality just compensating for the social death he never experienced in his original life?

Too evil.

This had to be stopped!

"I see…" Masashi's expression turned unusually serious. "I didn't expect it to be this bad. Do you have any suggestions? Just avoiding active use of the Rinnegan might not be enough. You can ask Matatabi, back then, it sensed danger and gave me chakra on its own because it didn't understand the situation."

Hagoromo was stunned for a moment. He could tell Masashi wasn't pretending, he was really considering it seriously.

His expression became a little odd.

Had his descendant done something so shameful that even letting the Ten-Tails see it was unacceptable?

Though the reasoning was strange, he still felt comforted by the result.

"Matatabi, is that true?"

"Yes! But I wasn't the only one," Matatabi quickly replied. To be fair, it wasn't like it acted alone. Everyone else in the 'group' sensed it too.

"Kurama and the others also sent him chakra," it said, selling out its tailed beast friends.

"…" Hagoromo felt emotionally exhausted.

You guys… didn't even treat Asura this well, did you?

He didn't summon the other three tailed beasts just because Matatabi had told on his friends again.

This wasn't his own turf.

This was a chakra-linked space created by curse mark techniques, and it belonged to Masashi, who had the authority to kick him out.

"At the moment, there might not be a better solution than trying not to use the power of the Rinnegan too much," Hagoromo got back to the point. "Of course, now that you've awakened these eyes, they are your power. But the Ten-Tails can perceive everything around you through chakra, you already know that, so I won't go into detail."

"Alright then."

Masashi thought to himself that this advice wasn't all that helpful, but he'd just try to be more careful going forward. Other things were fine, but when it came to certain preparations of his, he'd definitely have to avoid exposing them, in case Kaguya found out. Even though she probably wouldn't care, it was still better if she didn't know.

In the original timeline, she got blasted into space by Naruto and Sasuke, who had chakra leagues beyond hers.

That just showed she had basically zero combat experience. And there was no shame in that, Masashi told himself that if he'd had that kind of power when he crossed over, his battle experience would've been in the negatives.

It was time for him to head back.

Originally, he'd wanted to ask Matatabi what kind of danger it had sensed, but now the result was clear: Kaguya wasn't that easy to take advantage of. Who was really using whom, it wouldn't be clear until the end.

The cockiness he'd had after obtaining the Rinnegan had vanished; he was a lot more clear-headed now.

This Rinnegan wasn't something he got for free.

"Matatabi, you two go ahead and chat. I'm heading back."

"When will you be back?" Matatabi asked. "That Madara is really scary, you know."

"Has he done anything?"

"Well, no… but he's just really scary, okay? Oh right…" Matatabi suddenly remembered something. "He's living with that guy of yours who likes to play with dark stuff."

Play with dark stuff?

"Oh, I mean Sasuke. He's being trained super hard right now," Matatabi added. "He complains to me about it all the time. He wants to know when you're coming back, too."

Masashi felt like he finally understood what Matatabi meant by "dark stuff."

This time, most of Konoha's forces had been sent to the frontlines, but there was still a reserve defense force left in the village, including a Kage-level powerhouse.

Not the elderly and declining Hiruzen.

But Fugaku.

Madara had gone to live with Fugaku?

That made sense. Fugaku was the current clan head. It would've been stranger if Madara had just ignored him and not paid a visit.

But why was he training Sasuke?

Glancing at Hagoromo beside him, he didn't continue the conversation. He just replied to Matatabi with a simple "I'll be back soon" and exited the space.

Right now, Madara was the least likely person to harm Sasuke. Even in the original timeline, he had specifically spared Sasuke at the beginning.

After all, Sasuke and Izuna really did look incredibly alike, even their voices were similar. And Madara was the kind of big brother with an overwhelming sense of responsibility. Losing all his younger brothers was something he could never truly get over.

Who knew what he was training Sasuke for, but still…

Sasuke! Good job!

Hearing this news, Masashi felt relieved.

---

Back on Kuro, the Rinnegan in Masashi's eyes faded, returning to the Sharingan.

As his consciousness returned, he instantly became aware of everything that had happened there. The same train of thought immediately resurfaced in his main consciousness.

"Looks like I've been targeted…"

His eyelids twitched, he felt very unsettled. He hated being watched the most. And now, this meant Kaguya would fully understand his secrets. But it probably wouldn't have much impact.

Even if it felt like social death, if it were just Kaguya who knew… well, she wasn't even part of this society. At this moment, the foreign legion had already chased the Kumo ninja army out of the river valley.

The giant snakes had officially entered the heart of the Land of Lightning.

He looked down at the Kumo ninjas scattering in panic as they were pursued by the snake horde. He picked one and leapt down.

The fleeing Kumo ninja was immediately hit with a genjutsu. After extracting all the information he wanted from the man's mind, Masashi used a wind jutsu to slice him cleanly in half. Stomping the ground with his foot and pushing both hands forward, golden sand rose once more.

The sand quickly surged to several dozen meters high and swept across the plains like a tsunami, transforming the once-lush green lands into a world of yellow sand. Boundless sand spread across the earth, extending to the distant horizon. Not a trace of greenery remained. The towering mountains were still there, but the once-babbling streams had vanished,buried beneath sand dunes folded like frozen waves.

He jumped back onto Kuro's head and directed it to change course, heading toward the fortress along the coastal road.

There, he would rendezvous with the Konoha ninja army.

---

Meanwhile, someone else was also advancing toward the Land of Lightning. Along the long coastline of the Land of Hot Water, another unit of Kumo ninjas had launched a full-scale attack.

This group hadn't yet received the bad news that their homeland had already been invaded by Masashi, but they had begun to suspect that they were merely being used as a decoy by the other unit.

It's well-known that when Hashirama created the title "Hokage," he originally intended for Madara to be the First Hokage, but things hadn't turned out that way at all. As a result, none of the Hokage through history had specialized in Fire Release.

Even Hiruzen didn't count, he didn't specialize in fire; he specialized in all five elements. The biggest mismatch with the title, though, was none other than Tobirama.

On a certain coastline, Konoha ninjas were intercepting the Kumo ninjas attempting to land.

The interception was easy.

Tsunamis rose on the sea, but their direction was the complete opposite of normal.

When the Konoha ninjas saw the tsunami, they all cheered.

The massive waves easily overturned the Kumo ninjas' large ships, turning them into floating debris scattered across the sea.

With white hair and blue armor, known throughout his life for unparalleled Water Release prowess, Tobirama appeared on the shore, and casually killed several Kumo ninjas.

"No need to leave survivors. Wipe out all enemies," he instructed the Konoha ninjas in front of him. "Your first priority is to protect your own lives."

"Yes!"

The lecture from the Second Hokage filled the Konoha ninjas with excitement. They immediately rushed off to support their comrades elsewhere in the battle.

Tobirama looked to the north. He had just destroyed all of the Kumo ninjas ships in this area with Water Release.

The eastern warfront was easier than he'd expected, Kiri was no match for Konoha. The presence of the Fourth Hokage couple alone was enough to completely suppress the enemy.

So, he decided to head north.

After all… Muzo was there. And as always, overly reckless. This time, he wouldn't let him get hurt again.