The battlefield reeked of scorched earth and spattered blood.
Charred trees clawed at the sky like blackened bones. Crimson rivers snaked through shattered villages where laughter and life had once thrived. Bodies lay strewn like fallen leaves, faces frozen in horror. Above it all, a lone figure stood amid swirling ash and embers, cloak torn, eyes hollow as a void.
Uzumaki Naruto.
Once the Hero of Konoha. Once the hope of the shinobi world.
Long ago, an old toad sage had spoken of a prophecy: He shall bring either great salvation or great destruction to the world.
Naruto believed he'd fulfilled the first half of that prophecy. He'd ended wars, united nations, and brought peace where hatred once festered. He'd been called savior. Hero. Hokage.
But war stole everything from him. And in the end, he became destruction.
First, Kurama—his oldest companion, whose snarls and searing chakra had been part of him for as long as he could remember. The Otsutsuki assault struck like a thunderclap, and Kurama sacrificed himself to shield Naruto from a fatal blow. The bond that had once burned like a sun was snuffed out, leaving emptiness and silence.
Then came Hinata.
She fell in his arms, blood warm upon trembling fingers. Her gentle eyes—so filled with unwavering love—grew glassy as she whispered his name one final time.
And after that, his children.
Boruto, defiant to the end, fell alongside Himawari, who never let go of her brother's hand even as death claimed her. Naruto's screams echoed across the ruins, a sound that tore through the heart of the world.
Rage consumed him. Grief twisted his mind until reason shattered.
No shinobi could stand against him. Not even Sasuke, who tried to halt his rampage with a trembling sword and tear-streaked face. When Naruto unleashed a cataclysm of power that split valleys and razed entire cities, not even the combined forces of the Five Great Nations could slow him.
He became a storm. A calamity.
When he finally stopped, he stood upon a mountain of corpses, the rivers below dyed red. Smoke veiled the sun, leaving only a blood-colored glow over the devastation he had wrought.
And there, in the silence of ruin, he heard it.
A voice. Soft as wind through leaves.
"Naruto-kun…"
Hinata's voice.
It could not be. It should not be. But it was enough. Enough to pry open the iron bars around his grief-choked heart. His knees gave out, and he fell among the corpses, sobs racking his body.
When dawn rose, he stood alone. Blood stained his hands, sinking into his skin, impossible to wash away.
So he chose penance.
Naruto ended his own life atop the Hokage Monument, facing the rising sun. The blade sank deep. Warm blood spilled. He welcomed the darkness.
But the cold never came.
---
When he opened his eyes, he felt sun on his face and the sharp bite of cold air.
The cries of a newborn tore through the morning quiet. He couldn't move nor see clearly, as though the world lay behind a pane of fogged glass.
"Easy… there we go," murmured a gentle voice in a tongue rough and clipped, bearing the cadence of the North.
Blurry shapes loomed overhead. A young woman with honey-brown hair and green eyes leaned close, smiling, breath fogging in the chill. A man, tall and broad-shouldered beneath a cloak of roughspun wool, gazed down with awe.
"Look at his hair," the man whispered. "Bright as gold, and eyes blue as the summer sky."
Snowflakes drifted through the open door. The scents of pine, hearth smoke, and damp stone filled the air.
He felt no chakra flowing through him. No comforting rumble of Kurama. Only the helpless wail of a newborn—and the crushing weight of memories he could neither flee nor forget.
But deep within, where Kurama's presence had once blazed like a sun, Naruto found something else. A tiny, glowing bead pulsed there, radiating a familiar, wild energy.
Senjutsu chakra.
The same potent force he'd once gathered atop silent mountaintops. It was the lone remnant of the world he'd left behind, slowly merging with this new body.
"You'll be Naros," the woman whispered. "A good Northern name."
Naruto—now Naros—felt tears prick the corners of his impossibly small eyes. A soul battered by war and loss trembled within a fragile new body.
Upon hearing the name, he accepted it.
Naruto. That name once filled him with pride and purpose. But it also bore the weight of everything he had destroyed. It belonged to the man who had failed his family and murdered the world they built.
He no longer deserved to carry it.
And perhaps, he thought bitterly, he'd been denied death because he didn't deserve the peace of reunion with those he had lost.
Then… Naros it is.
Snow fell softly outside as the woman held him close. He closed his eyes and let the warmth swallow him.
A new life had begun.