"I am not here to lecture you, and I am not here to ask for forgiveness. I have come for what is mine. The Tenseigan," I stated, making my intentions clear.
The ghostly form of Hamura hardened, a flicker of the son who had sealed me away a thousand years ago appearing in front of me.
"No," he said, his voice firm. "You can't. You will just use it to continue what you started a thousand years ago."
"Still as foolish as ever. I won't do something as pointless as making such a weak army as what I tried back then. Turning humans into soldiers was pointless, but the point remains: the Clan remains, and they are coming. Do you think those shinobi down there can stop them on their own?" I asked him.
There was regret in his eyes.
He had seen his mother make an army, and suspected she was evil, yet he had never asked why... never asked why I, the invincible ruler of the world, needed an army.
It wasn't until later, when he started to think about it, that he realized what he had done, but by then, it was too late, and he couldn't possibly go down the same road as I had.
Even if he wanted to undo everything, he couldn't.
"The Ōtsutsuki clan from the stars is coming," I continued. "I am all that stands between them and the world."
It was a truth he didn't want to hear, but one he could not deny.
"You can't stop them, not when your only concern is getting back your power," Hamura said, but he had lost his conviction.
"I am not asking for your permission," I said, my tone cold and final. "I am taking it. It is mine to begin with, a gift for a son who should have known better."
And with that, I turned my back on him, my attention now fully on the Giant Tenseigan.
I reached out, my hand hovering just above its shimmering surface. The chakra within it was immense, a swirling vortex of power that called to me, a siren's song of promise and potential.
I could feel it. A thousand years ago, I had given Hamura a full quarter of my chakra, an amount that was inconceivable to any shinobi today. Even a Tailed Beast would pale before that amount of chakra.
And after countless Byakugan, all belonging to his bloodline, had been added, their most potent chakra feeding his own eyes and the chakra he left behind, it had only grown even stronger.
"Hamura, you have always known this day would come, when I would be free. Don't repeat your mistake from back then... Don't fight your mother any longer. The war of the past is over," I spoke to him, my words not loud, yet they carried the weight of ages.
He was silent, a conflict of emotions raging within him.
He could no longer deny the truth of my words, but a thousand years of conviction, of believing he had done the right thing, could not be erased so easily.
"I don't want to fight you, Mother," he finally said, his voice filled with a sadness that was almost palpable. "But I can't let you take the Tenseigan. I can't let you risk destroying everything we've tried to build."
I let out a small, bitter laugh. "You call what you have built everything? A world torn by war, a world where children are sent to die, a world where the strong prey on the weak? That is your legacy?"
"It's not perfect," he admitted. "But it's better than the alternative."
"The alternative? A world at peace, a world without war, a world where I, your mother, rule with an iron fist and a just heart? Yes, what a terrible alternative," I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm.
"We gave them freedom, Mother. We gave them the chance to choose their own destiny," he said, a hint of defiance in his tone.
"And clearly, that was a mistake; you gave them too much freedom. Were the people not free under me? People farmed, laughed, cooked, told stories; the only freedom they didn't have was the freedom to wage wars. Freedom is a privilege, not a right," I shot back.
He was silent, a clear sign that he had no answer to that.
Because he knew I was right.
Even if he didn't want to admit it, I had never been a tyrant. I had always cared for humanity, even if I hadn't shown it in the way they might have wanted.
I was a mother, and a mother knows what is best for her children, even if they don't like it.
"You have always been so stubborn, Mother," he finally said, a small, sad smile on his face. "Always been so sure you were right in everything."
I couldn't help but smile at that. "A mother knows best," I said, as I placed my hand on the surface of the Tenseigan.
The chakra within it surged, a tidal wave of power that washed over me, threatening to overwhelm me, to consume me.
But I was Kaguya Ōtsutsuki, the progenitor of all chakra. I wasn't here to fight against it, to control it. I was here to claim it. To make it mine once more.
All chakra belonged to me, and I would start right here, with the chakra of my son.
The Tenseigan pulsed, its light growing brighter and brighter, the room filling with a blinding white light. And then, the light retreated, flowing into me, a river of pure, unadulterated power that filled me to the brim, a feeling I hadn't experienced in a thousand years.
But more importantly, the chakra within the Tenseigan was a key, the key to the Tenseigan itself. My Byakugan was beyond pure; no member within the Hyūga clan had had eyes as pure as mine for centuries, maybe forever.
Yet, no matter how pure, they would never become more, never become the Tenseigan, not without a key, a key I now had.
I could feel the change, a shift in my very being, a transformation that was both painful and exhilarating. My Byakugan, already powerful, was evolving, ascending to a higher plane of existence.
The pure white of the Byakugan began to turn blue as the glowing light of the Giant Tenseigan faded.
Bit by bit, my eyes changed; first, the white turned a soft pale blue, then the original pupilless eyes gained a darker blue pupil.
Finally, around the pupil, a flower-like pattern of golden lines formed, overlaying again and again, forming a beautiful eye of blue and gold. The Tenseigan.
The power surged through me, a tidal wave of energy that made me feel alive, truly alive, for the first time in a thousand years.
I could feel it, the raw, untamed power of the Tenseigan, a power that reached the same level as the Rinnegan, though it fell short of the Rinne Sharingan.
Still, it allowed me to take the final step, from a powerful shinobi to the realm of a god; my power, which had been the greatest under Nagato, now eclipsed his.
I was now as strong as the reborn Madara, even stronger than Hashirama.
Only my true self still eclipsed my current self.
"So this is the Tenseigan. They are... impressive," I muttered as I pulled my hand from the now dim container of drained eyeballs.
Instead, I turned my hand over, palm up, and willed a Truth-Seeking Ball into being.
The flawless combination of all seven chakra natures.
Hamura watched, his ghostly form a silent, unmoving statue, a witness to my rebirth. His face was a mask of pain and regret, a silent acknowledgment of his failure.
"Mother..." he whispered, at a loss for words.
I turned around to face him, and there I stood, Kaguya Ōtsutsuki, still a clone, but finally, I had fully recovered my old appearance.
Skin so pale that it seemed to never have been touched by the sun, long pale silver hair nearly reaching the ground. The classic black with red clouds Akatsuki robe, and a pair of horns on my head.
All I was lacking was the Rinne Sharingan.
Even with just my Byakugan, I was a demoness on the battlefield, but with the Tenseigan?
Now I was so much more.
A single thought, and my Tenseigan pulsed. I could feel it, the gravitational pull. Countless times stronger than with just the Byakugan.
Back then, I used pure force, pushing and pulling with my chakra, but now?
I could effortlessly lift myself up from the ground, controlling gravity like the Deva Path of the Rinnegan.
The Rinnegan came from the Sharingan, yet the Sharingan came from me, as did the Byakugan and therefore, the Tenseigan.
Naturally, I possessed the baseline abilities of the Rinnegan, the Paths... they were like ninjutsu, merely a way to use chakra to cause an effect.
A shortcut; the key was having a pair of eyes that could challenge and handle that level of chakra.
My Byakugan, despite being as pure as it had been, had lacked the ability, but the Tenseigan?
It had no such limit; it could do anything the Rinnegan could, though it too had its own shortcut abilities.
The Tenseigan Chakra Mode, which granted enhanced physical abilities, flight, and the ability to easily control the Truth-Seeking Balls.
Gravity and space manipulation.
Chakra absorption, allowing me to deal with all elemental ninjutsu effortlessly.
Puppet control, which wasn't limited to just controlling puppets, just like Toneri would have done in canon; I too could animate massive golems strong enough to fight the Bijū.
Projection Technique, allowing me to create holograms of myself and project them around the world, or even project myself into someone's dreams to communicate with them.
And then there were the big three: Golden Wheel Reincarnation Explosion, Silver Wheel Reincarnation Explosion, and Localized Reincarnation Explosion.
"Mother, please... stop," Hamura pleaded. "The power you hold... no one should hold this much power," he said, truly believing in what he said.
"And yet, you trusted some puny shinobi down there, and left the Tenseigan for them to use? Do you still trust others more than your own mother?"
Hamura had nothing to say to that. He had left this power to his descendants, and what had happened? Over time, they started to believe they were meant to use it to destroy the world...
Had it not been for his mother appearing here today, they might have done it one day. That child, Toneri, had every intention of doing it.
Indeed, it seemed, compared to his mother, others were even more extreme.
Not to mention, he was already dead. He couldn't do much, much less fight his mother... even if he had the ability to do it, he lacked the heart... He couldn't bring himself to fight her again.
"I see you are silent," I said. "You have no right to tell me what I can and cannot do. You chose your path, and I have chosen mine."
"Mother, I am sorry, I truly am... If I could do it all over again, I..." he said, but I cut him off.
"None of that matters now. What matters is the future. I hope you will not try to stop me again."
I turned around, my new Tenseigan flaring with power, and with a single thought, I created a portal, a swirling vortex of purple energy that hovered in the air before me.
"Goodbye, Hamura," I said, my voice soft, yet firm. "I hope you find the peace you were so desperately seeking."
I stepped through the portal, leaving him alone in the now-empty shrine, a ghost in the ruins of a fallen empire, a silent witness to the dawn of a new era.
(End of chapter)
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