The days of endless drowsiness were finally over.
Akio felt awake again, properly awake for the first time in a long while.
After hastily eating lunch and spending some time playing with the little princess, who had now grown a soft layer of red hair; he returned to his room alone to examine what he'd gained from pushing his Yin attribute to Level Ten.
Kushina, meanwhile, let out a quiet sigh of relief.
Minato, unusually, looked helplessly resigned.
"Kushina… why did you pull out the Elder's leg hair?"
She scratched her cheek awkwardly.
"Because it was really tough. Like, really tough. I had to use almost my full strength just to snap one."
Minato blinked.
"Then…?"
Kushina shot him a sharp look.
"Think about it! We could braid it into armor. It might actually save someone's life in an emergency!"
Minato's mouth twitched.
For the first time, he realized his wife had a frighteningly practical streak.
"Too bad Great-Grandfather destroyed the rest," Kushina muttered regretfully.
"I didn't collect much… I'll think of something to make for little Tsukika, I guess."
Minato: "…Right."
Inside the bedroom, Akio had already finished reviewing the changes in his status panel.
There were two main differences.
First, his 'Nin' value had increased from 20,000 to 30,000.
Second, his combat rating had risen from SSS- to a clean SSS.
Previously, he'd needed Sage Mode just to scrape into SSS. Now, he could maintain that level in his normal state, though even Sage Mode still couldn't push him into SSS+.
"The raw power increase isn't dramatic," he muttered.
"Bloodline techniques and Yin–Yang Release are a bit stronger, sure. But losing the First Gate means I'm officially done with the Eight Gates Technique."
"Which means…"
"The real prize is the mental space."
Akio focused.
To his surprise, his consciousness split cleanly in two, one part continuing to control his body, the other slipping smoothly into the mental space.
"So it really is consciousness-only," he observed calmly.
"No physical entry. But the real surprise is that my body can still move freely while my mind's in here."
"That's insanely convenient."
Within the mental space, his consciousness slowly took shape.
The environment was nothing like the familiar Eight Trigrams Space.
In fact, it barely had an environment at all, everything was submerged in thick, endless white mist.
Akio willed a change.
The fog rolled back, revealing a familiar structure.
Kushina's house.
He walked inside and found that everything matched reality perfectly, the furniture, the layout, even Minato, Kushina, and the baby were "there."
But they were motionless.
Dead still.
No matter how much he focused, they wouldn't respond.
"Constructs," he murmured.
"Shells made from my memories. Forms without souls."
His expression changed.
He hurried outside and realized that beyond this single building, the world vanished back into fog.
With deliberate intent, he projected outward.
Faces appeared.
Buildings followed.
One by one, familiar figures and places emerged until the mist was forced several kilometers back. Only then did exhaustion hit him.
"So the limit is literally my imagination," he exhaled.
"The farther my thoughts reach, the farther the space expands."
He looked around at the many familiar faces beside him, most of whom were already long dead in reality.
After a moment, he closed his eyes.
The entire scene shattered and dissolved, returning everything to formless white mist.
"I create everything here," he said quietly.
"Life and death are mine to define, though all of this is appearance only. No souls."
"…But what if I bring someone else's soul in?"
A dangerous idea took root.
Outside.
Akio's physical body received the message from his mental self.
Without hesitation, he moved, flashing through a Bagua-space node and reappearing in a desolate mountain region.
"Let's start with animals."
Half a day later, Akio left the mountains, rubbing his swollen stomach.
He wasn't someone who killed needlessly.
If he used animals for experiments, he made sure to eat them afterward.
Waste was disrespectful.
At the moment, his mood was excellent.
Four living beings now existed in his mental space.
A rabbit.
A bird.
A snake.
And a brown bear.
"…The bear was rough," he admitted.
"So souls can survive inside the mental space," he said softly.
"That means this thing is absurdly powerful."
Next came the harder part.
Human testing.
Since he obviously couldn't eat people, Akio searched for those already at death's door, waiting patiently for them to pass before guiding their souls into his space.
The process took half a month.
The results left him exhilarated.
Whether civilian or shinobi, every soul could persist inside his mental space after death. As long as he didn't erase them, they could exist there indefinitely until even the soul itself reached its natural limit.
And that limit was long.
From the rate of dissipation, Akio estimated that even an ordinary civilian soul could last over five hundred years.
Stronger shinobi?
Much longer.
"A different kind of immortality…" he murmured, eyes dimming slightly.
"If I'd reached Yin Level Ten earlier, maybe I wouldn't have had to watch so many of them disappear."
He shook his head.
"No. This is only a holding place for souls. I still need a way to revive them."
With a focused thought, the mental space reacted.
All animals and humans inside felt a sudden pull, like being expelled from paradise.
Moments later, a dozen souls hovered before Akio.
"Go where you're meant to go," he said calmly.
"My space isn't a long-term shelter."
Maintaining separate living zones was mentally taxing.
At most, he could support free activity for thirty to fifty souls.
These test subjects weren't worth the slots.
Then
His expression changed.
Among the dozen souls, the shinobi were abruptly pulled away by an unseen force and vanished.
The civilian and animal souls, however, began to collapse, breaking apart until nothing remained.
"…Only shinobi get collected?" Akio froze.
After a long pause, he exhaled slowly.
"So that's how it works, Sage of Six Paths," he muttered.
"The afterlife is basically your own mental space, isn't it?"
Once he connected the dots, everything fell into place.
The so-called Pure Land was likely the Sage's mental domain.
It only accepted shinobi souls, and those souls lacked awareness because even the Sage's control had limits.
"That explains why the afterlife stores souls but doesn't handle reincarnation," Akio scoffed.
"And why I can't use Edo Tensei, but others can."
"You're guarding your supply."
His eyes sharpened.
"In that case… anyone I want to revive goes into my 'afterlife' instead."
"When Hashirama and Mito's bodies finally break down, their souls come straight to me."
"And if anyone dares summon them through my chakra connection
I'll trace it back and beat them into the ground."
With such a massive breakthrough, Akio returned to Konoha in high spirits.
Then reality hit him square in the face.
"Uchiha Kagami is critically ill."