"Have Sakura give you a complete physical examination immediately!"
"But I only had my routine checkup not long ago, dattebayo."
"Shikamaru, where's Sakura right now?"
Thirty-two-year-old Uncle Sasuke looked so tense that even Young Sakura didn't dare speak. Still, this concerned the life and safety of the future Naruto, the Seventh Hokage-sama.
So far, she still hadn't seen what her future self looked like, and naturally, she was curious about what kind of person she would become.
Shikamaru sighed. "What a pain. She is, after all..."
He had been about to say, "She's your wife, after all," but after glancing at the children from the mission scroll world, Shikamaru realized that if he took the conversation in that direction, it would never end.
Whoever wanted to deal with that kind of hassle could do it themselves. He certainly had no intention of explaining such complicated relationship problems.
"Why are you even asking me something like this?" Shikamaru complained, but he still dutifully told Sasuke the schedule of Konoha's Head of the Medical Corps. "She was invited to Sunagakure to give a lecture. The earliest she can get back is tomorrow morning."
"Contact her. Tell her to return to Konoha before tonight."
"Hey, handle that troublesome stuff yourself. I'm staying out of it."
"Fine. I'll contact her myself."
Naruto, despite being the Hokage, shrank back to one side and swallowed nervously, not daring to say a word.
Meanwhile, everyone from the mission scroll world shared the exact same thought.
The Hokage's Uchiha...
He's so overbearing!!!
Even Madara Uchiha couldn't bear to watch. With his keen intuition, he somehow felt as if he himself had been indirectly included in that criticism.
"Um..."
Sarada spoke softly at that moment.
"Doesn't the Seventh Hokage-sama have a powerful Tailed Beast inside him? Maybe we could ask it first if it's noticed anything unusual?"
Uncle Sasuke immediately took the hint. "Naruto, ask the Nine-Tails. Never mind. I'll ask it myself."
"Hey! Sasuke..."
Before Naruto could stop him, Uncle Sasuke had already used his Sharingan ability to enter the depths of Naruto's mind.
Hashirama Senju sighed. "The Sharingan sure is convenient..."
"You can do it too."
As soon as Madara Uchiha finished speaking, he used his Rinnegan to bring everyone into the depths of Naruto's mind.
The strange thing was that the inner worlds of the Seventh Hokage Naruto and Young Naruto were connected.
And so, the situation became…
Kaguya, Hamura, Indra, Asura, Hashirama, Madara, Izuna, Tobirama, Obito, Kakashi, Uncle Sasuke, Uncle Naruto, the Sixth Hokage, Shikamaru, Sai, Amado, Young Naruto, Young Sasuke, Young Sakura, Young Obito, Young Kakashi, Rin, Minato Namikaze, and the children from this world all appeared in front of Kurama at once...
And even the Kurama inside Young Naruto appeared in front of Kurama?!
"Th-this... is the one inside Dad's body...?!!"
Boruto Uzumaki and the others, seeing the Nine-Tails for the first time and seeing two of them at once, were completely dumbfounded!!
"The legendary Nine-Tailed Demon Fox that helped the Seventh Hokage-sama grow stronger all these years, and once tried to destroy Konoha twice?!"
"It's huge!!!"
"It looks terrifying! I've got goosebumps! This is incredible!!!"
The children were beside themselves with excitement, and even Amado looked surprised.
Kawaki had once seen the Nine-Tails' chakra spilling out of Naruto's body and had even spoken with it. But seeing Kurama's true form here, within the depths of Naruto's mind, was completely different.
Its enormous body, ferocious eyes, sharp fangs and claws, and the crushing pressure produced by its vast chakra left him stunned and instinctively afraid.
["Damn Uchiha! Do you think this place is some kind of reception room?!!"]
["It's strange seeing myself standing right in front of me for the first time. It's like looking into a mirror, except your eyes look a little too fierce."]
["Your eyes are the fierce ones! If you don't believe me, go look in a mirror yourself!!"]
The two foxes immediately started arguing the moment they met, leaving everyone unsure what to say.
The shock and fear from earlier vanished without a trace.
They didn't seem all that different from the ninken at Uncle Kiba's house, did they?
Hmm...
Actually, maybe not.
And everyone secretly wanted to point out that both of them had pretty intimidating eyes.
Was this stubborn, tsundere personality supposed to count as gap moe?!
Uncle Sasuke cut them off. "Enough with the irrelevant nonsense. Nine-Tails, I'm asking you something. Has there been anything unusual about Naruto's body lately? Why is his health bar down to only thirty percent?"
Whenever Naruto was involved, Sasuke just couldn't stay calm. The guy practically went insane.
What a pain.
Shikamaru Nara complained inwardly.
He completely ignored the fact that, just moments ago, he himself had flown into a rage after hearing Amado say Naruto and the others had less than a twenty percent chance of defeating Isshiki Ōtsutsuki. He had slammed his foot onto the table, grabbed Amado by the collar, and cursed him out.
Young Naruto noticed all of this.
The thought that he had such great friends as Sasuke and Shikamaru made him feel incredibly proud.
Sasuke saw the look on his face and took a deep breath, reminding himself that this was not the right time to poke that idiot in the forehead.
He'd save it for later...
After hearing Sasuke's question, the Nine-Tails' expression suddenly became unusually grave.
The atmosphere immediately grew tense.
"Is something wrong with Dad?!" Boruto anxiously stepped forward.
Although he constantly went against Naruto's wishes and pulled pranks to get his attention, it was fundamentally the same as Naruto once causing trouble because he desperately wanted the villagers to acknowledge him.
At the heart of it all, Boruto simply cared too much about Naruto.
["Hey, other me, if you've got something to say, spit it out. Stop dragging it out!"]
["There's nothing wrong with Naruto's body or his life. At least from what I can tell, he's perfectly healthy and energetic."]
Hearing that, Uncle Sasuke, Minato Namikaze, and the others finally breathed a sigh of relief.
The Kurama inside Young Naruto complained.
["Have you been inside this brat so long that you've picked up his habit of playing pranks? If there's nothing wrong with his body or his life, why were you making such a serious face?"]
Sarada also relaxed after learning that the Seventh Hokage-sama she admired was fine. She even had enough composure left to joke with the two Nine-Tails.
"Maybe that's just what his face normally looks like? He does look pretty fierce~"
"Sarada, you're not afraid of it?" Chōchō was still a little nervous.
"But he protects Konoha just like the Seventh Hokage-sama does. He looks completely different from all the merchandise, though. Hehe."
The Seventh Hokage Naruto laughed. "Hahaha! Kurama merchandise sells out every single time. Even I can't get any, and I'm the Hokage, dattebayo."
The Kurama inside Young Naruto listened to their casual conversation.
["I never imagined that after so much time, Tailed Beasts and humans would become this close."]
While feeling gratified, he looked toward the Seventh Hokage Naruto's Kurama.
Jokes aside, this was still another version of himself from a different world.
And something was definitely wrong with him.
["Is there something suspicious going on, other me?"]
The Kurama inside the Seventh Hokage Naruto pondered for a moment.
["I heard what you were saying earlier about the mission scrolls. If you're asking whether anything is unusual, then yes. There are two things."]
["Go on."]
["The first is your chakra reserves, your own combat instincts, and your Senjutsu. I once thought your decline in combat strength was simply because becoming Hokage left you with too little time to train and dulled your sense of danger. But after the appearances of Momoshiki Ōtsutsuki and Isshiki Ōtsutsuki, I gradually began to think it wasn't that simple."]
["Especially after seeing you and Sasuke fight Isshiki Ōtsutsuki alongside Madara Uchiha this time. Didn't any of you notice that your seventeen-year-old selves were far stronger than you are now?"]
Madara Uchiha put down the french fry in his hand and gave an impartial assessment.
"You really are much weaker than Hashirama and I were."
Uncle Sasuke wasn't pleased to hear it, but their combat strength had indeed declined over the years.
Unlike Naruto, he hadn't spent his days sitting in an office. He had always remained vigilant and kept his combat instincts sharp.
Because of that, Sasuke had simply assumed that his decline in strength was an inevitable consequence of losing the darkness and hatred that had once driven him.
"What's the second problem?" he asked the Nine-Tails.
["Strictly speaking, the second problem isn't with Naruto. It seems there's something wrong with me."]
"Kurama?!" This time, the Seventh Hokage Naruto immediately became nervous.
"But aren't you made of chakra? You shouldn't be able to get injured or get an upset stomach or anything like that, right?"
["Shut up and listen carefully, Naruto. The Tailed Beasts were created by the Six Paths Old Man using Yang Release to give us physical form, Yin Release to create our consciousness, or rather, our souls, and then filling us with a vast amount of the Ten-Tails' chakra."]
["As long as the soul still exists, even if the physical body disperses, after enough years pass and enough chakra is absorbed from nature, the body will eventually reform while retaining all its previous memories."]
["But..."]
Kurama paused.
["The problem lately seems to be with my consciousness, the part of me the Six Paths Old Man created using Yin Release."]
Everyone froze and waited for Kurama to continue.
["It's difficult even for me to explain exactly what the feeling is. It's as though there's constantly a voice in my head reminding me that it's time for me to leave you."]
Everyone's expression changed instantly!
They understood all too well what the Nine-Tails meant to Naruto.
It represented Konoha's greatest combat strength.
It was one of the greatest safeguards of Naruto's life.
His combat power, defense, speed, and so much more were inseparable from Kurama. Naruto and the Nine-Tails had spent nearly his entire life existing together as one.
More importantly, if a Tailed Beast left its Jinchūriki, the Jinchūriki's life would come to an end as well.
And beyond all of that, deep within Naruto's heart, Kurama held an even more important place.
He was a companion even more special than Sasuke.
He was family in a way even more unique than parents, wife, or children.
He was the other member of their two-person team.
He was family who would always remain by Naruto's side.
The Seventh Hokage Naruto couldn't even keep his emotions or his tone under control.
"What kind of nonsense are you thinking about, Kurama?!"
["I'm not the one choosing to think about leaving. It's pretty comfortable living here, after all."]
The Nine-Tails cracked a joke before continuing.
["I've had several Jinchūriki. Mito, Kushina, and you. There's one last-resort technique I've kept hidden away. I'd almost forgotten it existed, and I never once intended to use it for the sake of a Jinchūriki."]
A last-resort technique?
…
A world where the Nine-Tails leaves Naruto is false.
***
…
If you'd like to support my work and unlock advanced chapters, you can follow me on p-@-treon.
[email protected]/PinkSnake (100 Chapters Ahead).
You can also follow as a free member to read a few advanced chapters.
***