His spiritual force trembled as he shot the boy a strange look.
Through a single [Transparent World], he sensed that the "father" Roy meant was not this father—at the very least, it was not the Tanjiro before him.
Yoriichi shook his head, gave a faint, helpless laugh, and fell silent.
This mysterious boy may have been, like him, "born toward the sun," but his understanding of the sword, of the sun, and of life itself was entirely different.
At times, it was enough to make even a man long dead want to crawl back up from hell just to take another look—to see how far this boy would go, and what kind of person he would become in the future…
A cool wind stirred, setting Roy's flame-red hair swaying in the night.
The hour grew later.
This homecoming felt like it could go on forever, as though he had endless things to say to his parents, endless warmth still left to share.
But every meeting ends in parting. That was simply life.
Sensing Tanjuro's growing weariness, hearing his cough grow heavier and heavier as he forced himself to stay awake, Roy finally chose to say goodbye.
He rose, bowed deeply and solemnly to Tanjuro and Kie, then turned to leave.
Footsteps sounded out…
Then suddenly Kie's trembling voice called after his retreating back:
"Rōichirō… will you come back again?"
Roy stopped.
He reached out and caught a strand of moonlight between his fingers, as though he had seized a thread of homesickness itself. He stood there in silence for a moment, then turned his head and gave her a warm smile.
"Of course. This is my home too."
And in his heart, he silently added, And my cognitive world as well.
He sighed inwardly.
"It's as if I've never come here… and never left."
Then he lifted his head and looked at the bright moon climbing higher into the sky. He loosened his fingers and let the moonlight drift away.
He gave Tanjuro and Kie one last long look.
Then, with a thought, he activated [Light Release]. In an instant, he melted into the moonlight itself and shot deeper into the forest…
Whoosh—
The wind howled past his ears.
The night was deep and still.
As Roy flew onward, Yoriichi's voice echoed faintly beside him.
"They can't bear to part with you," he said.
"Just like I couldn't bear to part with Uta and Ryota."
Roy froze for a moment, then understood.
Ryota must have been the child Yoriichi had lost to demons before the boy had even reached his first birthday.
Bathed in moonlight, Roy stood high in the sky, his flame-red hair streaming upside down in the rushing air. He truly looked like the god people had called him that day—only now the sun behind him had been replaced by the moon.
His voice was slightly lower, slightly heavier, as he answered:
"I know."
"I've always known."
"But I don't have a choice."
"The enemy is that strong?" Yoriichi sounded surprised. "Muzan is dead. There's no one left in this world who can stand against you… Kamado Rōichirō, why rush? Why worry?"
"Because beyond the heavens, there are still greater heavens."
Roy sent a layer of warm Nen into Yoriichi, whose last remnant of true spirit was lodged within Roy's understanding of the sword, keeping it from being scattered by the violent wind.
Then Roy narrowed his eyes and looked ahead.
Deep within the vast, black forest, there was a faint patch of proud, blue light, swaying gently—buds not yet fully opened.
He accelerated and dove down.
Then, in the middle of Yoriichi's quietly stirring emotions, Roy stepped out of the moonlight and appeared beside a very ordinary little mound of earth.
The mound was covered in green weeds. It had clearly been there for years, weathered by sun and rain, frost and snow.
But the instant Roy landed, Yoriichi recognized it at a glance.
It was the grave of Uta and Ryota.
Drawing on the last bit of strength left in his spirit, Yoriichi unfolded his figure and slipped out of Roy's body. He drifted lightly down beside the boy, then stood there in silence, staring at the grave.
He said nothing.
He seemed lost in memory… or perhaps savoring the beauty of what once was.
After a moment, he said calmly:
"Can you clear away the grass for me?"
"Uta liked flowers. She didn't like grass."
"She always said flowers might not fill your stomach, but at least they were beautiful."
"Grass serves no purpose at all. It just crowds out the crops…"
He rambled on quietly, then turned to Roy with something like a gentle plea in his eyes.
Roy nodded.
With a casual motion, he picked up a stick from beside the grave and gave the mound a light sweep through the air.
[Breath of Wind] roared out, countless tiny wind blades spiraling over the grave in an instant.
Grass clippings flew everywhere.
In a blink, the weeds were gone.
Yoriichi's gaze shifted. He recognized the roots of [Breath of Wind] immediately.
"Thank you," he said softly.
His long red hair hung loose behind him, his presence gentle and restrained, all sharpness hidden away.
He lifted a hand and pointed toward the flowers blooming in front of the grave—those dark blossoms glowing with a faint,幽蓝 radiance, their buds already open and hovering on the verge of full bloom.
"This," he said, his voice carrying a depth of feeling too complicated to name, "is the Blue Spider Lily. The flower Kibutsuji Muzan spent a thousand years desperately searching for."
On the day Muzan died, Yoriichi had learned everything through the man's final reel of memories.
And for a time, he simply didn't know what to feel when looking at that patch of blue before him.
So many people had died because of these flowers.
So many had died because Muzan, openly and in secret, created demons and searched for them like a madman.
And yet the flowers themselves knew nothing.
They bloomed quietly here in this nameless forest, beautiful and alone.
It was the cruelest irony.
Another hard gust of wind blew through, shaking Yoriichi's spirit force and making his form unstable.
Roy studied the flowers along with him, then lifted a hand and sent Yoriichi another layer of Nen to steady him.
But Yoriichi raised a hand and stopped him.
"I'm already dead," he said. "The sooner I disappear, the sooner I can go down and reunite with Uta and Ryota."
He lowered his eyes.
They were filled, to the depths, with gentleness.
"I swore I would kill Muzan and avenge them. But in the end… I made them wait for me for centuries."
He gave a bitter smile.
"What shame."
Only a few minutes remained before midnight, before the spider lilies would fully bloom.
A strange fragrance began to spread through the air, slipping quietly into their noses.
Roy listened in silence and didn't interrupt.
But the instant that fragrance touched him, he heard a notification sound.
Without changing expression, the boy glanced at his panel.
[Notice: …Detected plant-type monster cluster… [Monster Index] has been opened…]
[Monster: Blue Spider Lily]
[Rank: S]
[A "world-class" monster born from the combined influence of the Demon Slayer world's "world will" and the "power of the sun"… Normally remains buried underground, absorbing "world power" and "solar power." Once that accumulation is complete, it will bloom on a full-moon night when yin energy is at its peak.]
[Bloom duration: One minute (It blooms only once each year at midnight, and its blooming state lasts for one minute only, after which it withers.)]
[Because, during its bloom, it releases all the "world power" and "solar power" it has gathered over the entire year… Recommendation: Collect!]
S-rank?!
The notification ended.
The [Monster Index] finished recording it, and a small blue flower appeared in the entry, blooming alone in proud solitude.
Roy froze.
He couldn't suppress the jolt in his heart, and the Nen naturally spilling from above his head trembled with it—enough to catch Yoriichi's attention.
He truly was a natural-born prodigy of the sword: marked from birth, transparent from birth.
His long red hair swayed in the wind as he waited silently for the spider lilies to bloom. Then he glanced at Roy and asked:
"Rōichirō… what happened?"
With effort, Roy pulled his thoughts free from words like S-rank, world power, and solar power. He stared deeply at the cluster of Blue Spider Lilies before him, their buds opening further, petals beginning to stretch—
then slowly shook his head.
Yoriichi's gaze shifted slightly.
Then Roy crouched down, took hold of one of the lilies, and gently stroked it from stem to bud.
In a soft voice, he asked:
"Teacher… do you think there really is a shore beyond life?"
"And if there is… what would it look like?"
Would it be like the spider lily—blooming and withering, withering and blooming, endlessly swallowing and releasing the power of the world and the sun, cycling forever, never reaching the far shore?
Or was it like death itself—
when a person dies, the flame simply goes out, and that is the end of everything?
In that moment, Roy—as Kamado Rōichirō—spoke those words while holding the flower.
They reflected deeply in Yoriichi's eyes, eyes steeped in the weight of ages.
And the man froze.
Silence followed.
Only the wind and the fragrance of the flowers brushed against their senses.
A long while passed before Yoriichi finally came back to himself.
Then, for once, he gave Roy a playful blink—so uncharacteristic of him that it felt less like Yoriichi and more like his son Ryota, who had died before he was even one, yet had already started crawling everywhere.
"I don't know," he said. "But I'll know very soon."
"It's just a shame… I won't be able to tell you."
That was right.
Yoriichi was about to die.
To go down and meet his wife and child again.
In the end, he would definitely learn the answer.
But just as he said, he would never be able to tell Roy.
Wait.
Edo Tensei?!
Roy suddenly thought of something. Inspiration struck, and he smiled.
He let go of the flower, straightened up, and inclined his head toward Yoriichi.
"Teacher, go ahead and die without worries. I have my own way of learning the answer."
Yoriichi: "?!"
For an instant, it felt as though ten thousand fleas were crawling over both his body and his soul. He couldn't stop the unbearable itch.
He opened his mouth, about to ask what Roy meant by that, but Roy cut him off with a wave of the hand.
"Teacher," Roy said, "the flowers have opened. Goodbye."
Yoriichi: "..."
At that final midnight moment, with the moon at its highest point in the sky and the vast blue radiance blooming all at once with a faint cry, Yoriichi's form gradually faded…
Faded…
And faded again…
At last, he could only give a helpless smile, cast Roy one deep final look—
and vanish into the endless blue glow.
Pop—
The last thread of his true spirit shattered like a mirror of water.
In the dark, ancient forest, only one or two birds occasionally cut across the night with a thin cry, singing a moonlit elegy for Yoriichi.
Roy stood there among the cluster of Blue Spider Lilies, watching him disappear.
Then he lowered his hand, bent down, coated both hands in Nen like butterflies moving through blossoms, and seized that one narrow interval of blooming time to harvest the spider lilies in a frenzy.
One flower… two flowers… ten… a hundred…
Afterimages appeared in front of every single blossom.
Very soon, the minute was over.
Roy stopped, opened [Sumeru Mustard Seed], coated every Blue Spider Lily in [Shu], and stored them all inside.
All except one, which he kept turning between his fingers.
Then he straightened and looked around.
The grave was bare now.
"Good," he said with a small smile.
"Not a single one wasted."
Satisfied, he withdrew his gaze.
Then he turned his attention to the spider lily in his hand.
With a thought, he opened one aura node, split off a strand of Nen, and converted it into [Scorching True Intent], forming a small flame imbued with the [meaning of the sun].
Whoosh—
The flame swallowed the Blue Spider Lily whole.
At once, a pure stream of solar power, together with a line of insight into the world—filled with thoughts on space, time, life, and other dimensions—surged into Roy's brow.
The panel displayed:
[Yang Release: +1000]
[Nen property transformation: Yang: lv4 (49451/100000) → lv4 (50451/100000)]
[Space-Time Ninjutsu Talent: +100]
[Space-Time Ninjutsu Talent: lv3 (742/10000) → lv3 (842/10000) (Reference: Minato Namikaze)]
[Minato Namikaze, Space-Time Ninjutsu Talent: lv3 (5000/100000)]
[Remaining Blue Spider Lilies: 1745]
Roy closed his eyes and quietly savored it.
Gradually, he sank into deep thought and comprehension, becoming like a stone statue—motionless, absorbed entirely within it…
…
Naruto world.
It was dusk.
The evening glow filled the sky, staining half the heavens a mournful red.
At the center of Konoha stood the Hokage building.
Inside that spacious Hokage office—
amid swirling smoke—
Hiruzen Sarutobi sat with his back to the window as usual, able to see the Hokage Rock at a glance beyond the commercial district. He was seated behind his desk, smoking his pipe.
On the broad desk in front of him, one corner held the Hokage hat. Another lay open with a long scroll.
On the scroll, the name Uchiha Jin could just barely be seen, followed by densely packed intelligence reports, along with passages roughly blacked out by a brush…
It was clear—
Hiruzen Sarutobi had been deeply troubled lately.
Troubled by the war. Troubled by the village. Troubled by his disciples—some too careless, some too eager, and one in particular who had simply given up on life altogether and spent every day either gambling in casinos or drowning herself in drink.
And more than anything…
troubled by how to handle the matter of Uchiha Jin.
The Uchiha clan had produced a Wood Release ninja?!
If Hiruzen hadn't already confirmed that Roy had nothing to do with Orochimaru's First Hokage cell research, he might even have suspected that his student's defection had something to do with the Uchiha behind the scenes.
But over the past few days, the reason for Orochimaru's defection had already been investigated thoroughly.
The bastard had simply disobeyed orders and conducted human experiments in secret. Fearing exposure, he had fled to escape punishment.
Which meant—
Uchiha Jin had developed Wood Release through his own talent.
In Konoha, that was unprecedented since the First Hokage, Senju Hashirama.
Add in his status as the young Uchiha clan head, and those unmistakable Sharingan eyes…
Hiruzen furrowed his brows and, with no choice left, picked up his brush and wrote two large characters across the scroll:
Top Secret.
Then he forcibly ordered Shizune to drag Tsunade back from Tanzaku Town, where she was drunk out of her mind, and question her properly about [Wood Release] and [Yang Release].
At the same time, he wanted her opinion on promoting the [Arm Regeneration Technique].
After all—
since Uzumaki Mito's death and Nawaki's fall, Tsunade was the only remaining "Senju descendant" left in the world.
What's more, Hiruzen had already consulted Konoha's elite medical ninja and studied the matter himself in depth.
This [Arm Regeneration Technique] developed by Uchiha Jin and presented by Fugaku bore an extremely high resemblance, in some respects, to Tsunade's own research.
Or rather—
it might as well be said to share the same underlying principles as the [Strength of a Hundred Technique].
And with the Third Great Ninja War still raging,
if properly developed and promoted, it would undoubtedly become a tremendous boon for Konoha.
As Hiruzen sat there frowning in thought…
the office door was pushed open from the outside.
"Hic—old man, you wanted me?"
~~~
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