Chapter 427: The Future
"...Before that, let me talk about something else first."
Menma didn't immediately answer Nagato's question about his "objective," instead choosing to begin with a topic closer to Nagato's starting point of understanding.
"Your plan was to capture all the Tailed Beasts and create an ultimate weapon capable of destroying nations. Then, not use it to directly conquer, but launch a controlled yet sufficiently devastating war. Let the world taste enough pain through tangible sacrifice and destruction, thereby developing a soul-deep fear of war itself. Use that fear as deterrence to forcibly suppress each nation's ambitions and conflicts, buying a period of... relatively peaceful breathing room."
"This is the answer you arrived at after personally experiencing your parents' tragic deaths, your dear friend's demise, and your country being ravaged by war. Using greater pain to cover and suppress those scattered, continuous pains."
Nagato wasn't surprised that his opponent knew his plan, but having it so clearly and calmly recounted still made him feel the cold of being completely dissected.
"True peace... doesn't exist at all."
Nagato's voice was hoarse. "As long as humans as a species still exist—desire, greed, fear, misunderstanding... these will continuously breed the soil for hatred. In this cursed, endlessly cycling world, pursuing permanent peace is itself an illusion."
"Yes, exactly."
Contrary to Nagato and Konan's expectations, Menma not only didn't refute but nodded in agreement with Nagato's pessimistic conclusion.
"It cannot be achieved." He repeated, his tone holding no mockery, only calm. "So what you've truly sought in your heart's depths was never some eternal utopia, but merely... one hundred years. Using divine power to forcibly extort from this world one hundred years without major war."
"As for after those hundred years... when deterrence fades with time's passage, when new hatreds quietly accumulate in peace's cradle, when future generations gradually forget the fear of 'divine punishment'... what will the world become?"
"Unless humanity completely abandons the desires and selfishness inherent to biological instinct, the cycle of war is almost inevitable. No one can guarantee what comes after."
Nagato fell silent. This was precisely his heart's deepest recognition—something he hadn't fully articulated even to Konan—of his path's ultimate limitations.
He could only be responsible for "now," for securing a period of "time." He couldn't promise "forever."
"However," Menma's tone shifted, refocusing attention on himself, "I can't guarantee the distant future, but there's one thing that, at least within my capability, might be achievable."
As he spoke, he raised his hand, fingers grasping the edge of that fox mask symbolizing mystery and intimidation.
This action made both Nagato and Konan unconsciously hold their breath.
The mask was slowly removed.
The chamber's dim light illuminated, for the first time without obstruction, the face hidden beneath.
Golden, somewhat disheveled short hair. A face still carrying youthful features. Azure eyes. Deep within those pupils, star-like points of light faintly flowed.
This face...
This face!!
Nagato's sunken Rinnegan eyes—their pupils contracted to pinpoints in an instant! His body, withered from prolonged consumption, shuddered violently.
Konan's usually cold face was written with undisguisable shock and confusion. She stared fixedly at that excessively young face.
"You... you're...!!"
Nagato's voice was filled with extreme disbelief. This was more overwhelming than his defeat, more than the Six Paths of Pain's annihilation—this shook the very foundation of his understanding.
Uzumaki Naruto.
Son of Fourth Hokage Namikaze Minato and Uzumaki Kushina. Nine-Tails jinchuriki. Another disciple of Master Jiraiya... and the Nine-Tails container the Akatsuki organization planned to capture.
"No... this is impossible... it doesn't add up at all!" Nagato's voice trembled as he tried finding logical flaws. "The timing, the strength, the identity... you can't be him!"
Facing their nearly overflowing shock and doubt, Naruto's expression remained calm. He didn't rush to explain how he could be both "Naruto" and "Menma," instead directing the topic toward a different direction.
"The Sage of Six Paths spread the concept of chakra and cultivation methods throughout the world. His original wish was that people could use this energy called chakra to deepen their connections, understanding, and communication, thereby eliminating conflict and achieving peace."
"A beautiful ideal, isn't it?" Naruto's tone was neither praise nor criticism, merely stating facts. "But chakra, this power that changed the entire world... the Sage of Six Paths wasn't its source, nor was he the first to possess it."
He paused slightly, allowing time for information to digest, then dropped the term sufficient to overturn all common knowledge.
"The Otsutsuki Clan."
"This is the true source of the Sage of Six Paths' bloodline, the race to which he... and these Rinnegan eyes truly belong." Naruto's gaze swept meaningfully across Nagato's purple Rinnegan. "A race... from the distant stars."
"...Wh-what?!" Nagato forced out a few words, his thoughts nearly frozen. Stars? A race? This had completely exceeded all his understanding of shinobi world history and the source of his own power.
"Turn back time several thousand years. At that time, this world had no chakra, no ninja, no ninjutsu. All chakra in the world—except for the 'foreign' energy I've absorbed and stored from other planets these past years—their source points to the same person."
"Otsutsuki Kaguya."
"Wait!" Konan couldn't help interrupting, her face written with "absurd." "What are you even talking about?! Otsutsuki Kaguya... isn't that the Rabbit Goddess from mythology?! That's just a story!"
"If that were merely myth, then why does Nagato possess the Rinnegan called the 'Sage's Eyes'?"
"!!!"
Konan was struck as if by lightning, freezing in place. Yes... if the Rinnegan were only legend, then what were these eyes in Nagato's head?
Master Jiraiya had once wondered why Nagato could awaken these eyes that existed only in legend as a child... They'd thought it was fate's choice, proof of being the "Child of Prophecy."
"...I'll just get to the point." Seeing both fall into shocked silence, Naruto decided to stop circling.
"In that distant era, Otsutsuki Kaguya possessed and controlled all chakra on this planet, ruling the world with absolute power. Her two children—Otsutsuki Hagoromo, this is the Sage of Six Paths' true name, and his brother Otsutsuki Hamura—because they couldn't accept their mother's methods, ultimately joined forces and sealed their mother, Otsutsuki Kaguya."
"And the reason Kaguya was sealed..." Naruto's voice deepened. "Was precisely because she tried to activate the Infinite Tsukuyomi, dragging all humanity into eternal illusion, and ultimately... transforming them into creatures called 'White Zetsu'—monster soldiers with no self-awareness who only obeyed commands."
"Infinite Tsukuyomi... Moon's Eye Plan..." Nagato murmured, repeating these two terms. Uchiha Obito had once described the Moon's Eye blueprint to him—a dream of making the whole world fall into illusion, achieving "permanent peace." But...
"Did Obito and Zetsu ever tell you... no, Obito doesn't even know himself."
Nagato and Konan were completely stunned, all color draining from their faces. The "Moon's Eye" Uchiha Obito described was a perfect world without suffering, only happiness—the ultimate peace.
He'd never mentioned... transformation, much less anything about "White Zetsu"!
What Naruto described wasn't "the plan has flaws" level—it was a thorough... world-ending deception!
The information was too shocking, too bizarre, already beyond what "evidence" could prove. Logically, they had absolutely no reason to believe an enemy of mysterious identity who'd just destroyed everything they had.
But... combined with the power level Naruto displayed that completely exceeded common understanding, combined with his thorough knowledge of their plan's details, combined with those Rinnegan's unreasonable appearance... a cold chill crawled from the base of the spine, instantly spreading throughout their bodies.
He had no reason to deceive two prisoners already trapped with no escape on such matters. It would only make subsequent "negotiations" or "disposal" more complicated.
"Strange, isn't it?" Naruto continued his narrative. "Why would Otsutsuki Kaguya, as chakra's progenitor with near-invincible power, suddenly decide to transform all the humans under her rule into those creatures called White Zetsu?"
He didn't wait for an answer, instead providing an even more chilling inference himself.
"Perhaps... we should feel 'fortunate'?"
His gaze swept across Nagato and Konan, still in tremendous shock.
"You know, humanity as a species, though constantly in internal conflict, has historically seen one situation that could make them temporarily set aside hatred and unite."
Nagato's withered body trembled slightly as a terrible conjecture gradually surfaced in his chaotic mind. "You mean..."
Naruto, seeing his reaction, slowly nodded, confirming his guess.
"Correct."
"That is—when facing a common enemy threatening the entire species' survival."
Naruto dropped the final, most impactful information.
"The Otsutsuki Clan is an invasive race rooted in the stars, constantly traveling between different planets, plundering life energy and Chakra Fruits."
"Otsutsuki Kaguya was originally one of those sent to this planet to plant the Divine Tree and harvest its fruit. But she betrayed her clan, privately consumed the Chakra Fruit, obtained power, and tried to claim this place as her own."
"Her clan will never forgive a traitor, nor will they abandon this planet that's already borne abundant Chakra Fruit."
"...About twenty years from now."
"Those true Otsutsuki from beyond the stars will arrive on this planet."