The Great Toad Sage had touched absolute darkness.
In other words, in the battle right in front of them, the entire ninja world would truly fall into darkness.
'Who would it be?'
'Momoshiki?'
'Isshiki?'
'Or Obito?'
Ryosuke thought about it.
He had already arrived at Shikkotsu Forest and was receiving the Slug Sage's senjutsu chakra.
"Don't take the Great Toad Sage's words too seriously."
The Slug Sage's gentle voice drifted down. "People who always look toward the future sometimes end up overly anxious."
"Only after you've actually lived through it, after turning the future into the past, will you realize that many things that once seemed impossibly difficult might not even qualify as shadows of the past."
"Compared to the prophecy of 'absolute darkness,' I'm more concerned about something else..."
"Did you reverse, overwrite the timeline?"
Ryosuke looked at the Slug Sage in shock.
"Don't look at me like that. The Great Toad Sage is always staring into the distance. What he sees in the distance is just a mass of darkness, so he might not notice what's happening right at his feet."
"For me, reversals and overwrites of history can still be seen from certain subtle traces."
Although she didn't know exactly what had happened, the Slug Sage knew very well that Ryosuke was an extremely strong person. For something to push him to the point where he couldn't accept it and chose to overwrite reality…
How painful must that have been?
The Slug Sage leaned in and gave Ryosuke a warm, gentle hug with her massive body, speaking softly. "I need to remind you, I can sense the differences. The White Snake Sage, who walks in the 'present,' can see even more. You need to be extra careful."
"I understand."
Ryosuke had already treated "Obito will make a move" as a given premise, so whether the White Snake Sage remembered the events before Bites the Dust, or how much he remembered, didn't matter.
———
[Land of Wind]
A desert region with no sign of human presence for hundreds of kilometers.
After using Bites the Dust, Ryosuke took Otsutsuki Isshiki out of the Ghost Room for the first time.
"You're actually someone from another world!"
"Yes."
Ryosuke answered casually, carrying Isshiki's head as he strode forward.
Isshiki asked, "If that's the case, then why are you still helping humans?!"
Ryosuke listened to the question and laughed. "Because I'm human. Besides, who I want to help…"
"That's none of your damn business."
As he spoke, Ryosuke gently placed Isshiki's head on the ground.
Feeling something hard and scorching hot beneath him, Isshiki lowered his gaze and realized that in the vast desert, there was an enormous metal plate laid out.
The metal plate was square, five meters long and wide, covered in thick black-and-white stripes, standing out starkly in the desert.
Ryosuke first summoned White Snake and gave Isshiki a solid slap.
Zzzzt… Click!
Two discs popped out.
One was Jigen's miserable life memories.
The other was Jigen's chanting ability.
"So it really isn't that simple."
Isshiki wasn't possessing a body, he was parasitizing it. Ownership of this body always belonged to Jigen; Isshiki only had the right to use it.
That meant the discs could only be pulled from Jigen.
If he wanted to extract Isshiki's discs, he'd have to wait until Isshiki completed reincarnation.
But with Isshiki's speed and reaction time, trying to complete the sequence of "touch, eject, pull disc" under normal conditions was basically impossible.
It could only be done in battle, by finding a fleeting, perfect opportunity.
"One step at a time."
Ryosuke plopped down beside Isshiki, took a can of iced black tea out of the Ghost Room, drank it while rereading the Stone Ocean manga, and thought about how to use Dragon's Dream.
Dragon's Dream was made up of two parts.
One was the compass, which could survey lucky positions. You needed some knowledge of feng shui to understand it, but after reaching max level, the requirement was lowered a bit and it could give a general direction.
The other was the dragon-head arrow. The direction it pointed to was the unlucky position.
The traitorous info-leaker was this dragon-head arrow.
So-called unlucky and lucky positions subtly shifted over time, constantly flowing. To truly master them still required practice.
Besides surveying fortune and misfortune, when the dragon-head arrow detected an unlucky position, a transparent bubble would appear.
As long as someone launched a close-range attack on the bubble, the corresponding body part would be "intercepted" and teleported to the unlucky position to attack.
For example, if Ryosuke punched the bubble, his arm would be intercepted and sent to strike the unlucky position, then return after the attack was completed.
However, this ability could only be used once. The second time, the enemy would react, avoid it in advance, or even counterattack.
"The core ability is still fortune and misfortune detection."
As Ryosuke thought this, his gaze fell on Isshiki's head.
Isshiki felt his scalp tingle. "Why are you looking at me? Ryosuke, from beginning to end, I never provoked you. Don't push me! If you push me too far..."
"What if I push you too far?"
Ryosuke chuckled softly. Isshiki only remembered Ryosuke saying "I'm from another world." He knew nothing about the details of what had happened during the overwritten time.
He didn't remember.
But Ryosuke remembered everything clearly.
How Isshiki slaughtered the villagers of Kirigakure. How he used black rods, one after another, to kill Ryosuke's many companions.
Ryosuke stared at Isshiki. In his calm eyes was an absolutely unshakable killing intent.
"Dragon's Dream."
Ryosuke summoned his Stand. He first spent some time following the compass's guidance to find a lucky position, then took an apple out of the Ghost Room and placed it there.
Then he looked at the dragon-head arrow.
The bronze dragon head pointed in a certain direction and, while pointing, chattered nonstop at Isshiki, "Hey, kid, I suggest you leave quickly… uh, looks like you can't leave either. Anyway, this is a position of great misfortune. Misfortune as in bad luck, not boobs. It's very dangerous."
Isshiki stared wide-eyed, saying nothing.
What could he even say?
Ryosuke grabbed Isshiki's head, walked to the unlucky position, took an "X"-shaped reflective plate out of the Ghost Room, placed it on the ground, then set Isshiki's head right at the center of the "X."
"What exactly are you trying to do?!" Isshiki growled.
Ryosuke didn't answer.
He had considered leaving Isshiki's head in Mount Myoboku or Shikkotsu Forest, but in the previous round of slaughter, Isshiki had erupted with hidden power to save the idiotically panicking Momoshiki and almost tore open the seal.
For a loosened seal, Ryosuke could fix it with a single slap.
But the Great Toad Sage and the Slug Sage couldn't.
It wasn't that the two sages were weak.
It was simply a difference in power systems.
If Ryosuke left Isshiki behind, the moment he left, Isshiki would try to break free of the seal.
Momoshiki, Kinshiki, and Obito were all at unknown locations.
If he wanted to seize the initiative, he had to strike Isshiki first, inflicting as much damage as possible before the other enemies arrived.
Killing him would be best.
If not, then at least injure him, cripple him.
Ryosuke glanced at his watch. "The timing's about right."
He put an ID badge on Isshiki as a final touch, took two steps back, summoned a mount with a scroll, and flicked the reins. The horse began to run.
What… about right?
Isshiki lowered his head in confusion and saw that the badge had his photo on it, with a job title printed below, [Planet-Destroying Cannon: Close-Range Observer]
A sharp whistling sound came from overhead.
Isshiki looked up.
In the clear, cloudless sky, a point of light brighter than the sun itself was falling straight toward Isshiki's position.
Isshiki's hair stood on end as he screamed hoarsely, "RYOSUKE!"
The next second...
Ryosuke detonated the seal and killed Jigen's physical body.
Isshiki triggered reincarnation and stood on the unlucky position in his true form.
The planet-destroying cannon came crashing down.
And Ryosuke…
He rode his horse to the lucky position. The horse entered the Golden Rectangle.
Cavalry spin shot.