"Hey, Kurama…"
"Kurama? Can you hear me?"
"Hey…"
In a daze, an exceptionally familiar voice came from the endless darkness surrounding the Nine-Tails, Kurama. It knocked against its sea of consciousness, awakening it from its slow sinking and slow dissipation.
Who?
Who is… calling my name?
So noisy… Can't you let me sleep properly for a while?
The moment those irritated thoughts arose, the memories before it had fallen into darkness surged into Kurama's consciousness like a tide.
Jigen. Isshiki Otsutsuki. Naruto. Baryon Mode…
"Naruto?"
Remembering that fragment in which it had exchanged its life for incomparable power, Kurama unconsciously called the name of the boy who had completely gained its acknowledgment, the boy for whom it had been willing to bear that terrible price in his place.
Then the darkness surrounding Kurama shattered from above.
A pair of hands filled with warmth and excitement tore the darkness apart. They scooped up Kurama, who had yet to react, from the depths of the darkness and hugged it tightly.
"Kurama… Thank goodness, Kurama. I really… brought you back…"
"Hmph! Disgusting! Sickening! Fake and sentimental!"
Before Kurama could react to Naruto Uzumaki's actions, it heard an extremely familiar voice nearby viciously enter its ears.
Immediately afterward, Naruto Uzumaki, who was holding it in his arms, launched a new counterattack against that voice.
"Are you jealous, other Kurama?"
"What am I jealous of!? Jealous that the 'me' stupid enough to believe in an idiot like you can be hugged by you!? Or jealous that it recovered from the state of nearly dying forever!?"
Kurama rubbed its eyes and focused on the fellow whose voice and tone were identical to its own.
It saw a Nine-Tailed fox as huge as a small mountain bristling with all its tails standing upright, staring fiercely in this direction. Beside it were the Six-Tails Saiken, who was blowing highly acidic bubbles with a bored expression, as well as the Three-Tails Isobu and Four-Tails Son Goku, who had been allowed to take their complete Tailed Beast forms and come out of their Jinchuriki's bodies to bicker with the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox.
"I must still be half-asleep… How can something like this happen?"
Kurama shook its inexplicably small head hard.
Then, from the corner of its eye, it saw two more things that, according to its understanding, absolutely should not have appeared again.
Red hair. Rinnegan. A completely healthy Nagato.
And the Gedo Statue, which was unwillingly retreating step by step from its Ten-Tails state back into an empty shell that could barely move.
"Kurama, don't start shaking your head yet. First tell me, has any part of your memory gone completely blank?"
Naruto Uzumaki looked at Kurama, who had already opened its eyes and was shaking its head with furrowed brows. He let out a long breath, then asked nervously.
"Memory… blank?"
Kurama swayed its fluffy tail and asked in confusion,
"Naruto, what kind of nonsense are you asking… about?"
As it spoke, a strange sense of disharmony began welling up in Kurama's heart.
It discovered that its originally continuous and long memories had suddenly developed several abrupt gaps. Although judging from the surrounding portions, those missing memories were basically from the period when it had been regarded as a natural disaster by humans, watching humans wage war and endless conflict against each other, this unprecedented situation still made it feel considerably uneasy.
"How can this be… Why did my memories suddenly break apart?"
"Hm. As expected. For chakra aggregates like you Tailed Beasts, the only thing that can be burned as life is memory, an information-type existence… It seems that for the Otsutsuki clan, information truly is more important than pure chakra."
An unfamiliar voice came from very close by.
Kurama subconsciously looked in that direction. Then, an Otsutsuki clansman with two horns growing from his head, wearing the same white magatama-patterned robe as the Sage of Six Paths, and possessing a pair of Tenseigan shining with a blue radiance like brilliant stars, entered Kurama's vision.
"Old Man Six Paths!? No, Hamura Otsutsuki!?"
"Wrong."
Rei Kaguya shook his head. He grabbed the Nine-Tails, which had already rushed forward in anger to wrestle with the Six-Tails Saiken, and pulled it back. One hand pressed down on its huge head, while the other reached through the air and pulled over Kurama, who had shrunk to a size similar to when the Sage of Six Paths had first divided the Ten-Tails' chakra. The light in his eyes brightened greatly as he began comparing the differences between the two.
"Heh. You're quite lucky, Kurama… Those dull and meaningless stretches occupy most of your long memories. So when your 'life' was burned, those memories that did not matter whether they existed or not helped you avoid losing the truly important information… But with this, your strength will also weaken quite a bit."
Rei tossed the plush-toy-like little Kurama back to Naruto Uzumaki, who still had black rods stuck in his back. Then he looked thoughtfully at the mountain-sized Nine-Tails and asked,
"Do you mind if I take a portion of your chakra and see whether I can use it to replenish the chakra and information that this Nine-Tails burned away, Kurama?"
"If you dare do that, I'll self-destruct right now!"
The Nine-Tails gave an extremely firm answer, leaving no room for compromise.
"Then forget it."
Rei Kaguya shrugged.
Then he turned toward Kabuto Yakushi, who had just crawled out of the mouth of a summoning snake Rei had summoned in advance, and said calmly,
"You're late, Kabuto."
"Sorry, sorry. When Sasuke Uchiha suddenly ran out of Konoha, I was exchanging some things with Ranzuki, Aotsuki, and the others, so I didn't notice immediately…"
Kabuto Yakushi controlled his body to give a slight shake, flinging off all the slime attached to him. Then he pushed up his glasses and, glowing with vigor and satisfaction, asked Rei Kaguya, who shook his head speechlessly,
"Then, Lord Mizukage, where exactly is my dear patient?"
"He followed Orochimaru to the Hashirama cell cultivation area. Go work with Orochimaru first and prepare a prosthetic arm suitable for him. Make sure that arm can properly integrate into his body. As for the Rinnegan, we'll discuss that after I return."
Rei Kaguya briefly assigned Kabuto Yakushi his task. Then he turned and extended a hand toward Naruto Uzumaki.
"Let's go, Naruto Uzumaki."
"Where?"
Naruto Uzumaki let the still-confused Kurama return to his body and asked curiously.
"Do you even need to ask?"
Rei Kaguya raised an eyebrow.
"Of course, we're going to find our old friend, Isshiki Otsutsuki."