Rain fell softly over the border between minor nations, where official maps ended and only ruins remained.
Here, far from the great villages, war never truly ended — it merely changed its name.
Kuro Senji stood atop a broken structure, motionless, as if he were part of the night itself. At sixteen years old, his body no longer carried traces of childhood, yet his eyes… those did not belong to someone his age.
Five years had passed since he left Konoha.
Five years since the system fully awakened.
He wore no forehead protector.Carried no symbols.Belonged to no village.
To the ninja world, he did not exist.
Below him, a group of armed mercenaries occupied the abandoned military outpost. Rogue ninjas, accustomed to extorting small villages and defenseless civilians.
They believed they were safe.
Their shadows disagreed.
— Boss… — one of the men muttered uneasily. — You feel that?
— Feel what? — the leader scoffed. — No sensor picked up any strange chakra. Stop being paranoid.
Kuro looked away.
Chakra-based sensing had never worked on him.
His power did not originate from the ninja world.
He stepped forward.
The shadow beneath his feet opened, silent like black water.
There were no screams.
The first man fell without understanding what killed him. The second tried to form hand seals, but his own shadow rose and slammed him into the ground with enough force to shatter bones.
In less than ten seconds, the camp became a graveyard.
Kuro walked among the bodies with calm steps, as if this were routine.
— Extraction.
The shadows rose one by one, twisting and reshaping into humanoid forms. There was no hatred in them. No will of their own.
Only absolute obedience.
[Active Shadows: 12]
Kuro made a simple gesture.
— Perimeter.
The shadows spread out, merging with the ruins and surrounding terrain, forming an invisible field of surveillance.
That was when he felt it.
Three presences.
Different from the mercenaries.Denser.Broken.
…So you've already begun walking this path.
The red-haired boy appeared first, his eyes carrying a pain far too old for his age. Behind him came a blue-haired girl, her expression firm despite invisible scars. Finally, a man with a tired smile, trying to hold onto a hope that was already starting to crack.
They stopped the moment they sensed the strange field.
— This isn't chakra… — the red-haired one murmured.
Kuro stepped out of the shadow.
Not with hostility.Not with theatrics.
He simply appeared.
— It isn't — he replied calmly.
The man in front frowned.
— Who are you?
Kuro observed him a moment longer than the others.
Yahiko.
— Someone who knows what's going to happen to you.
The blue-haired girl stepped forward.
— Is that a threat?
— No — Kuro answered. — It's a warning.
The red-haired boy stepped forward, pressure building around him.
— Then speak.
Kuro did not avert his gaze.
— You will lose everything.— She will survive, but she will never be the same.
The rain seemed to grow heavier.
He turned his eyes to the man with the tired smile.
— And you… will die believing it was the only possible choice.
Silence fell heavily between them.
Kuro took a slow breath.
— You want to change the world — he continued. — I can provide the means.— You want to end unjust wars — I can provide the power.
He stepped back as the shadows began to envelop him.
— But if you continue down your current path… you will become exactly what you hate.
No one answered.
Because deep down, all of them knew he was right.
— Think carefully — Kuro said, disappearing completely. — The next time we meet… you will have made your choice.
And then he was gone.
Leaving behind three people who, for the first time, realized the future was not inevitable.
And that perhaps someone…was rewriting the world.