"You really went that hard on a kid, huh?"
Before long, Tsunade took Uchiha Hikari from Yorin's arms. She checked her over, still a little tense. Only after confirming Hikari was fine did she finally exhale, then complain at Yorin with a resentful sigh.
What could Yorin say in a situation like this? He just smiled.
No matter what, Tsunade caring about—and even liking—Hikari was way better than the two of them constantly sniping at each other. So fine. Let her scold him. He could "educate" her later when they got home.
Thinking that, Yorin—at an angle no one else could see—gave Tsunade a firm pinch on the hip. Tsunade's cheeks flushed a warm, happy red; she shot him a look that was half glare, half flirtation, and immediately looked like she wanted to go home with him as soon as possible.
Unfortunately… not yet.
They couldn't go back yet, because there was still one thing Yorin hadn't dealt with.
The massive natural energy.
Before, whenever he gathered natural energy into the Primordial Titan, he didn't bother with what came after. Once he released the technique, he simply let that enormous power scatter into the wind and vanish.
But now he'd thought of a "what if."
What if he could use all that natural energy to do something more meaningful—rather than letting it be wasted?
As for what "meaningful" meant…
Yorin actually had an answer.
The Sand—more broadly, the Land of Wind.
It was the poorest, most barren stretch of the shinobi world—practically the planet's open wound.
Yorin wanted to heal that wound, to make the planet's natural-energy circulation smoother, more complete.
Part of it was… call it goodwill, a karmic down payment for the future—something to "earn merit" for the sake of his future wife, Kaguya.
And part of it was practical: it would strengthen him.
Once he could sense the world's natural energy, he began to feel the planet's "veins" and "pulse" too.
For the Ōtsutsuki to have chosen this world at all meant it was special—blessed with an unusual vitality.
To drain all of that natural energy in a brutal, extractive way, to strip a living world into a wasteland like the Land of Wind… all just to grow a Divine Tree and harvest a fruit.
Even imagining it made him sick.
And it was exactly why Kaguya—who killed her superior and interrupted the tree-planting—ended up with two "heaven-sent" children.
Yorin didn't know whether this world truly had something like "Gaia," a planetary will, or not.
But if Kaguya being "granted" Hagoromo and Hamura meant anything, then maybe there was something like that.
And if there really was a planetary will…
Then it also explained something unsettling: those two children ultimately chose the world over their mother.
From the perspective of the people of this world, that was touching—heroic, even.
From Kaguya's perspective… it was terrifying.
Yorin thought to himself:
"So the planet's will 'gave' Kaguya two sons. Those sons were influenced, their stance pulled toward the shinobi world itself, and that led to their eventual break with their mother. After that, they each protected the world in their own way—one in the afterlife, one on the moon—right up to now."
It made a strange kind of sense.
How true was it? He didn't know.
Maybe the Great Toad Sage knew more—but Yorin was certain if he asked, the old toad would either play dumb or be dumb.
Either way, he'd get nothing.
So he didn't bother.
The Ōtsutsuki brothers still had plenty of "filial" weirdness you could argue about. Yorin didn't. He and Kaguya were so far removed from each other that "five degrees of kinship" didn't even begin to cover it.
They were pureblood Ōtsutsuki.
He was born and raised in Konoha.
So if anyone had the right to act for this world's sake, it was him.
The Sage of Six Paths might have been unrivaled, but Yorin didn't think he could "open a Pure Land" of his own yet.
Maybe even that had something to do with the world's will.
Call it "Gaia," call it "heaven's intent"—same difference.
Yorin laughed under his breath at his own theatrics, then shook it off.
He didn't need to meet the Sage of Six Paths right now.
If anything, with how much he'd used Edo Tensei, he suspected he'd already earned himself a spot on somebody's blacklist.
And if the Ōtsutsuki brothers had heard his jokes about becoming their "new dad," they were probably itching to beat him up for it.
But none of that mattered yet.
If he could fix the Land of Wind, the world itself would be pleased.
Maybe it would even reward him.
And if it was feeling generous… who knew?
Maybe it wouldn't just give him a "Pure Land to manage."
Maybe it would give him something even more ridiculous.
Yorin grinned.
"Alright. Let's do it."
So he piloted the Primordial Titan south, toward the endless desert.
The Primordial Titan could fly—fast, too. Not as absurd as Flying Thunder God, but still better than ninety-nine percent of anything else on the planet.
Before long, he reached the skies above Sunagakure, and saw it: an ocean of yellow sand with only a tiny, struggling smear of green.
In the old days, the Sand Village didn't even have that—everything was gray-yellow, dusty and bleak, the kind of sight that made your mood sink.
They'd wanted to change it. Desperately.
But they didn't know how. And even if they did, they'd never had the money or stability to try.
So they'd watched their home slide deeper and deeper into ruin, scraping by day to day.
That wasn't living.
It was surviving.
But in the past few years, with Konoha dragging Suna along—"fly with me and we'll get rich together"—things had improved.
Their finances recovered.
And the desert-governance plan Yorin spearheaded finally showed them a path forward.
Grid planting, hardy trees, stabilizing water and soil… all of it took time, money, and a stable society.
That was why Suna now hated war and chaos more than anyone.
They were firm believers in Konoha's new order.
And fervent supporters of Uchiha Yorin.
Still—
Not enough.
Yorin's main goal was the planet.
But if he could also make Suna worship him a little harder along the way… he wasn't going to complain.
So he appeared above the Sand Village.
A good deed should have a name attached to it.
He spoke, his voice carrying down to the people below:
"Friends of Sunagakure. Allies of Konoha. Companions of the Shinobi Sect. My shinobi—this is Uchiha Yorin.
Today, I bring you nature… and green."
With that declaration, the Primordial Titan dissolved. The vast natural energy it contained poured down over Suna like a flood.
Where it passed, sky and earth changed.
Dead, desertified soil regained vitality—turning into rich, dark earth packed with nutrients.
Below it, groundwater that had long since vanished surged back. Dry springs erupted, forming ponds and small lakes.
Even Suna's deep wells began bubbling—those wells that were close to dying now looked like fountains.
Seeds that had lost all life in the sand—seeds no one even knew were still there—were reawakened by natural energy. They sprouted, rooted, and rose.
Vegetation exploded outward—more than Suna had managed to cultivate in two or three years, denser and more alive.
Grass. Bushes. Trees.
In front of stunned shinobi and civilians, forests rose from the sand, encircling the village. A living oasis was born.
This was a miracle.
This was godlike power.
But unlike his "godlike power" before—power used to kill—this was creation.
Restoration.
Repair.
As the people stared at the green world forming around them, many of them broke down in tears.
And at that moment, Yorin's prestige in Suna hit its peak.
Cheers erupted. Faith ignited. The desire to follow him surged through the crowd—so strongly that even the Kazekage, Rasa, felt it.
He even thought, for a fleeting moment, that handing Suna's future to Yorin… might not be a bad thing.
"I don't know about the other villages," Rasa thought, "but after this… Sunagakure will become just like Kirigakure—completely, utterly on Uchiha Yorin's side."
He steadied himself.
"And… maybe that's not a tragedy."
He made his decision.
"Yes," he thought. "That's a good thing."