Uchiha Madara carried a war fan on his back, wore armor, and let his long hair fall loosely behind him. With his arms crossed over his chest, he gave Ryosuke a slight nod as a greeting.
Nearby, staff members were carrying box after box of supplies into Ryosuke's Ghost Room.
From the most basic food, drinking water, and gold, to healing potions, explosive tags, ninjutsu scrolls, and even hazmat suits and spacesuits prepared for extreme situations.
If the Ghost Room hadn't been too small, they would have wanted to stuff a planet-destroying cannon in there as well, so that if they really ran into Dio, Ryosuke could blast him to death from hundreds of miles away with a single shot.
After all, when going out, the more you bring, the better.
The Ghost Room was packed to the brim, and only then did Samui, who was in charge of supplies, have to stop.
Golden light was still pouring out of the fissure in the ground. Ryosuke, Uchiha Madara, and Hot Pants stepped into the golden glow and waved goodbye to everyone.
In the next moment, the golden light swallowed their figures. When it faded, they were already gone without a trace.
Rei had rushed over from Kirigakure after hearing the news. The worry in her eyes was impossible to hide as she spoke softly, "Brother Ryosuke… he'll come back, right?"
She naturally had confidence in Ryosuke.
But the words "going to another world" inevitably made people think of bad things.
"He definitely will."
Terumi Mei said quietly. Standing behind Rei, she placed a hand on her shoulder. "We already agreed, he owes me one."
———
Unlike the imagined kind of travel where you blink once and arrive immediately.
The three of them were wrapped in a mass of golden light, traveling through a void-like fog. Outside the golden glow was a gray, hazy space, where flashes of "scenes" could occasionally be seen.
Those were entrances to different parallel worlds, but they all passed by in an instant.
As time went on, the parallel worlds gradually shifted from the Naruto world to the JOJO world.
The connection between Ryosuke and the Saint's Corpse grew closer and closer, and he vaguely became aware of the first stop of this journey.
"It will first take us to nineteenth-century England," Ryosuke said.
"Why?"
The moment Hot Pants heard that they weren't returning to the Steel Ball Run world, she immediately became anxious.
She had no choice but to be anxious.
It had already been five days since she fled New York. Johnny, Gyro, Lucy, Mr. Steel… many of her friends were in grave danger.
Hot Pants really didn't want to detour and waste time anymore.
Ryosuke lifted the Saint's Corpse and said, "According to its probability theory, if we just go back like this and face Dio and Father Pucci… we'll be defeated for sure."
"Dio has already obtained all the remaining parts of the Saint's Corpse and distributed them to different subordinates, sending them to erode other worlds."
"The Corpse's suggestion is to first reclaim the other parts of the Saint's Corpse, seal Dio's subordinates, unite all the forces we can unite, and then challenge Dio in one decisive move."
Hot Pants thought of the book she had been reading earlier in the lounge. "Surrounding the cities from the countryside?"
Ryosuke was taken aback, not expecting those words to come out of her mouth. He froze for two or three seconds before laughing. "You really apply what you learn… It's more or less that idea. As for the time issue, "
Ryosuke's smile faded.
"Then we'll just have to kill faster."
There were nine pieces of the Saint's Corpse in total.
They had one piece, which meant there were still eight left. Killing their way through, killing until blood flowed like rivers, killing cleanly and thoroughly, carrying the enemies' tainted souls all the way to Dio.
This was the method with the highest probability of victory in the Saint's calculations.
Hot Pants nodded, accepting Ryosuke's reasoning. She took out the custom firearm given to her by the research institute and continued studying it.
On the other side, Uchiha Madara rested his chin on one hand, held a book in the other, and silently listened to the conversation between Ryosuke and Hot Pants.
He wasn't particularly interested in where they went first, where they went next, or who they killed.
Snap!
Madara closed the book, looked up at Ryosuke, and asked the question that had been weighing on his mind, "Why did you choose me to come with you?"
His relationship with Ryosuke wasn't good enough for him to entrust his back to him without reservation.
Ryosuke, who was opening the system and flipping through manga again, planning to review and refresh his memory, heard Madara's question. He didn't answer directly, but instead asked, "What about you?"
"You had the right to refuse. Why did you choose to act together with me?"
Uchiha Madara let out a light chuckle, one filled with far too many complicated emotions.
"Then what else could I do?"
After the war ended, Uchiha Madara chose self-imprisonment.
The failure of the Infinite Tsukuyomi had hit him hard.
Ryosuke's success made Madara realize there were possibilities beyond his own understanding.
Familiar friends, enemies, and strangers were either dead or growing old and frail.
Uchiha Madara didn't have Ryosuke's ideals, didn't have Oda Ieyasu's or Takeda Shingen's administrative talent, and certainly didn't have the research abilities of the institute's experts.
He was a ninja.
Ninjas exist to kill people.
But the world was at peace.
Rationally, Madara naturally liked an age of peace and prosperity.
Yet emotionally, he was a ninja, a warrior who reveled in blood-soaked battles.
Now, Uchiha Madara's skills had nowhere to be used, and there was no need to use them.
Reason told him this was a good thing.
But emotion told him, "You've already been eliminated by the times."
At that moment, he received Ryosuke's invitation, to go beyond the world, kill powerful enemies, and protect the ninja world… Madara had no reason to refuse.
"Why agree?"
Madara pointed in the direction they were traveling.
"Because the road that belongs to me is right there."
"Only there, fighting enemies to the death, does my rebirth have meaning."
"Besides, this journey is extremely dangerous. I'm just someone who should already be lying in a grave. Even if I die out there, it doesn't matter… Isn't that why you brought me along?"
Madara spoke very frankly. There was no need for evasiveness.
He truly did not care about life or death.
Ryosuke did not avoid his gaze and said calmly, "It's not as complicated as you say. I chose you to come with me for only one reason..."
"Among everyone I know, you are the only one with no shortcomings at all. No matter what enemy we face, you're the only teammate I don't need to divert my attention to protect."
The unexpected answer made Uchiha Madara fall silent for a moment. He then picked up his book again and continued reading, not pursuing the topic further.
But the slight smile curling at the corner of his mouth showed that he was genuinely in a very good mood.
Hot Pants, who was studying her firearm, glanced back at Uchiha Madara and muttered to herself, "He's not even a Stand user, doesn't look especially sturdy, doesn't carry a sword, and instead brings a fan… can he really do it?"
Shaking her head, she went back to studying the weapon.
No one knew how much time passed.
Whoosh!
A smell drifted in from ahead, coal smoke, stone moss, the dampness of old houses, and a strong stench of blood.
They had arrived.
The three of them, each with their own thoughts, gathered their minds and saw an entrance ahead.
Ahead lay nineteenth-century England.
A world belonging to vampires and Hamon warriors.
Rumble! Rumble!
At that moment, a violent roaring sound came from behind.
Ryosuke turned around and saw a surging black torrent chasing after them.
Before they could react, it slammed straight into the golden bubble created by the Saint's Corpse.
The instant it made contact, Ryosuke, as the controller of the Saint's Corpse, was the first to realize... the black torrent… was the symbol of calamity.
The triple calamity that had locked onto Ryosuke appeared at this moment.
Like a lone boat swallowed by the sea in the middle of a storm, the torrent of calamity completely engulfed them, sweeping them along as it surged into another world.