Kentaro had never felt more alive.
The wind brushed gently against his face, the scent of dry soil and medicine filled his lungs, and above all else, he could hear her voice—Asami's voice—calling his name, not in desperation, but in relief. Being held in the arms of the one he loved, surrounded by the scent of her sweat and tears, was better than any dream he could've imagined.
Moments ago, he had been walking the edge of death. Now, he was alive.
"Thank you, Mirai-sama… I've never felt better than I do now."
Kentaro's voice was still hoarse, but it carried none of the helplessness from before. Blood was returning to his face, faint color blooming again on his previously pallid skin. His breath no longer rasped. The pain that once lanced through his chest with every heartbeat had faded into a dull throb.
Asami wiped her tears away and clasped his hand. "Mirai-sama, I… I don't even have the words. If it weren't for you, Kentaro would have…"
Her voice broke with emotion.
Nearby, Shizune was frozen stiff like a lightning-struck deer.
Mouth wide open, hands hovering awkwardly in mid-air, her mind refused to accept what she had just witnessed. Even if someone stuffed a rice dumpling or a live squirrel into her mouth at this moment, she probably wouldn't have reacted.
'This defies everything we know about medicine.'
After what felt like an eternity, Shizune finally blinked back to awareness. She looked straight at Namikaze Mirai, expression complicated.
"Mirai-sama… do you still have more of those… leg-stretching pills? If Konoha could mass-produce them, it would revolutionize our medical system. The Hokage would spare no effort to support you."
Even Tsunade, the pinnacle of medical ninjutsu, had been paralyzed in the face of this injury due to her incapability caused by her hemophobia. Yet a single pill from Mirai reversed it all.
Shizune's eyes burned with hope.
"Five million ryō per piece." Mirai replied calmly.
Shizune's jaw nearly hit the floor.
"Five… Five million?!"
Five million for a pill?
That was more than the bounty for five S-rank missions combined! A good amount even by Daimyō standards!
But as outrageous as it sounded, she couldn't entirely refute it.
The results spoke for themselves.
Even so, the price stunned her. "That's... exorbitant." she murmured.
Mirai chuckled. "Relax. I'm not actually selling them."
"What?"
"This isn't some pill you can mass-produce. It's not medicine—it's my jutsu."
He raised his hand and made a slow gesture in the air, as if tracing invisible lines.
"That silver sphere? It's not what you think. It's a construct of electromagnetic nanofluid, a swarm of nano-scale medical agents controlled by my chakra. They aren't pills. They're me."
Shizune was speechless.
The "pill" he had fed Kentaro was no more than a shell—an impossibly tiny army of nanomachines, each programmed to scan, repair, and restore biological tissue with terrifying precision.
The moment it entered Kentaro's bloodstream, the nanomachines had burst into action—clearing thrombi, repairing torn capillaries, disinfecting tissue, removing necrotic cells, and restoring airflow in collapsed bronchioles.
Shizune knew the concept.
She had heard theories of it, even read about similar ideas in fringe scrolls of ancient war medicine.
But no one had ever managed to manifest it.
Until now.
'He made it real… using chakra alone?'
And this man—this arrogant, mysterious man—had called it "leg-stretching pill".
Suddenly, five million didn't sound that bad.
"…You really don't plan to share this with anyone?" she asked quietly.
Mirai's blue eyes softened as he looked down. "No. Not yet."
Because it wasn't something just anyone could wield. Without his Electromagnetic-style, it was just silver sludge.
"I understand." Shizune said with a nod, shoulders slumping slightly in resignation.
Then, from within the camp, a familiar voice called out.
"Shizune, what's going on outside?"
Tsunade's tone was weary but curious.
Shizune turned to the tent and responded, "Tsunade-sama, the injured ninja is healed. It was Mirai-sama who did it."
A beat of silence.
"…Namikaze Mirai?!"
Tsunade's astonishment echoed beyond the tent flaps.
Minato's younger brother? Healing someone that even she had deemed hopeless?
Just what was this man?
"Tsunade-sama." Mirai called gently, "I'd like to come inside and speak with you. I have something important to discuss."
Inside the camp, Tsunade hesitated.
A long silence followed, until finally she said, "…Come in."
Mirai entered quietly, followed by Shizune.
Inside the tent, Tsunade sat propped against a pillow, her frame wrapped in nothing but a thin blanket. She looked haggard. Her golden hair was disheveled, and dark circles framed her eyes.
Still, her voice carried its old sharpness.
"You're not here to gloat, are you?"
Mirai raised an eyebrow.
"You've shocked me again, Mirai. First tailed beasts, now medical miracles… What's next? You going to bring back the dead?"
Mirai didn't respond to the sarcasm. Instead, he lowered his head slightly and said in a quiet, sincere tone, "I'm here to treat your hemophobia."
Tsunade froze.
So did Shizune.
For a long moment, neither of them spoke.
Then, Tsunade gave a dry chuckle.
"Mirai… do you have any idea what hemophobia is?"
She looked at him as if he were naive.
"I am the most advanced medical ninja in the world. I've dissected diseases that no scroll even describes. And yet, I couldn't cure myself. You think you can do what I couldn't?"
Her voice was calm, but the weight behind it was crushing.
Shizune stepped forward too. "Hemophobia isn't a wound, Mirai-sama. It's trauma. It's… memory buried in the flesh. Emotional feedback loops. We've studied it for years with no results."
"I know." Mirai said quietly.
"But let me try."
Tsunade narrowed her eyes. "Why? What's in it for you? If I stay like this, the elders can't pressure me into being Hokage. That benefits you."
A reasonable question.
Mirai smiled, but his eyes gleamed with something deeper.
"Because you're not my enemy, Tsunade-sama."
She blinked.
"I have no rivals on the road to Hokage."
His words were arrogant, but they didn't come from hubris—they came from certainty.
"If I wanted the title, I could take it by force. Right now. No one could stop me."
The words fell like thunder inside the tent.
Tsunade bit her lip. She couldn't refute it.
With Uchiha support behind him, and Sarutobi Hiruzen aging, there was no one left who could challenge Mirai.
"Then why help me?"
Mirai turned toward the flap of the tent and gazed at the stars through the gap.
"Because my ambition doesn't end with Konoha."
His voice was low and distant.
"This world… is only the beginning."
He looked back at her with that same, starry gaze.
"I want to reform the shinobi system, unify the nations, and reach the unknown. Explore the worlds beyond the stars. To do that, Konoha must be strong—and that means you must be whole again."
The weight of those words sank into the silence.
Shizune's hand trembled.
Tsunade stared at Mirai.
He continued.
"After this war is over… stay in Konoha, Tsunade-sama. I'll bring back Jiraiya. I'll even bring back Orochimaru. All three of you—the Legendary Sannin—will bear witness to the dawn of a new world."
*****
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