"So you were aware of even that."
Obito's gaze did not waver.
The process was already nearing its halfway point, yet there was no trace of panic in his eyes.
Instead, a faint glimmer of understanding surfaced there, as though the final missing piece had finally fallen into place.
"So that's why you didn't try to save Boruto, huh? You already had a far greater prize in sight."
"…"
Obito let out a quiet sigh at Shibai's silence and shook his head. Then, seeing that the process was already half complete, he smiled and said,
"Shibai… your plan was impressive. Cruel, too. I'll give you that. But did it ever occur to you? That you weren't the only one waiting for this moment?"
Shibai Ōtsutsuki, who had already been certain of his victory and had not cared that Obito had uncovered the truth, suddenly felt a subtle discordance in the situation.
He knew Obito too well. The way he was speaking right now… it was not the tone of a man cornered by fate. It was as if…
"What exactly are you implying, Obito?"
Facing the countless narrowed Jōgan eyes fixed upon him, Obito's voice remained steady, while a sharp, ferocious light burned in his gaze.
"You misunderstood one thing, Shibai."
"It wasn't you who wanted to become one with me. No… from the very beginning, I was the one who intended to become one with you."
Shibai's voice finally returned, but the detached calm from before had already faded.
"You believe you arranged this? Do you even understand what you are saying? Or has desperation finally broken what little reason you had left?"
"Don't give me too much credit," Obito said, his voice dry. "Not everything went according to plan."
Then his eyes turned cold.
"But enough of it did."
He did not bother explaining further.
The Devouring Coffin stirred.
Not to devour Shibai, because that function had already been halted, and at this point, Obito could no longer force it to activate.
However, the Devouring Coffin still had another function left, one that could not be sealed, blocked, or interfered with no matter what.
Even if he were dragged into an illusion or restrained by some supernatural power, this final failsafe would still remain available to him.
The space around them shifted, and in the next instant, they were no longer within the domain that belonged to Shibai Ōtsutsuki.
The sudden shift in location was something Shibai had not anticipated. In that instant, the faint unease within him sharpened into something far colder. He may have already stepped into a trap. A trap laid by the very person he had been looking down on all this time.
"This place… what have you dragged me into?"
"You still haven't understood."
Obito's voice was calm, almost devoid of emotion.
"The coffin was never just a mouth."
The truth was that after completing the plot in this world, Obito had already unlocked the path to another world. However, he had never crossed over, because the world that had opened was none other than the world of A Certain Magical Index.
Worse still, both the location and the timeline were completely random. He could not afford to treat such a thing lightly.
If it had been any other world, Obito would have used that option long ago. He would not even have needed to risk clashing with Shibai Ōtsutsuki. He could have simply taken his family and friends and left.
But the world of A Certain Magical Index was different. The danger there was immense, perhaps even greater than the world he was standing in now.
That was why he had devised this plan. If he truly entered the world of A Certain Magical Index, there was no doubt that the Magic Gods there would notice him.
And once they did, what would happen?
Naturally, they would use him until there was nothing left. By that point, Obito was completely certain that he would be reduced to nothing more than a tool, someone who could no longer distinguish reality from illusion, a plaything twisted between their hands until even his own existence became uncertain.
The mystery of someone who could travel between worlds would be irresistible to beings who had grown bored and trapped within a single universe. That kind of hunger was something worthy of fear.
But if he refused to enter that world, then the next world option would never open. So Obito had created a plan that could resolve his current predicament while also forcing open the door to a different world worth exploring.
It was an absurdly dangerous gamble, but it was still worth attempting. Otherwise, he had already been prepared to risk everything from the beginning.
So he allowed Shibai Ōtsutsuki to fuse with him halfway. Through that half-completed soul fusion, Shibai was recognized by the Devouring Coffin as "Obito," allowing Obito to send Shibai Ōtsutsuki into the world of A Certain Magical Index in his place.
Since half of his soul had already been sacrificed, the Devouring Coffin would treat that portion as himself and permit the transfer.
Because the Devouring Coffin could only allow "Obito" to travel to another world.
The problem was that this meant he would lose half of his soul, an extremely devastating price.
Since the damage reached the very origin of his existence, recovery would be nearly impossible in another world. But here, things were different.
The system of this world, along with his own ability, made it possible. And the method was crude, simple, and direct.
"You would cripple your own soul for a gamble like this?"
Shibai's countless Jōgan narrowed, as though he were looking at something no longer worth calling rational.
"Obito… has your defiance finally turned into madness?"
"Yeah," Obito said. "It would hurt like hell, by the way."
His tone was dry, almost careless, but the weight beneath it could not be mistaken.
"But I've lost enough pieces of myself over the years. What's one more?"
Shibai's expression twisted.
"You will not recover from that. A soul divided at its origin cannot be restored so easily. Not even across worlds."
"I know."
Of course, that was precisely why Obito had never devoured the ninja world where he had been reincarnated, and had only devoured a parallel timeline of the ninja world instead. That reason had always led to this exact step.
That world had recorded his data from the moment he was born, from the instant he had reincarnated there. It contained everything about him. If he had merely transmigrated into that world, this plan might not have worked.
But Obito had truly been reborn there, growing from a young boy all the way to the person he was now. That world held his complete record.
By devouring it, he could certainly make up for the half of his soul he had lost and complete himself again.
That was also why, before traveling, he had prepared a spare body capable of bearing all of his data, along with a teleportation move that would prevent him from devouring everyone by accident.
When Shibai realized that he had been calculated to this extent, the shock and fury in his heart could no longer remain hidden.
His lips curled, but there was not the slightest trace of amusement in that expression.
"At what point did you begin to see through me?"
"When did I start suspecting you?" Obito repeated.
"From the very beginning. But if you want to know when suspicion became certainty… it was the moment I managed to devour Boruto."
His gaze grew colder.
"I knew how important he was to you. With the state I was in back then, you could have easily prevented it. But you didn't."
"I deliberately left countless openings in my plans, making it look as though I was confident and eager to proceed. But with Sasuke and the others involved, there were plenty of chances for the plan to fail. And yet, none of those failures ever happened."
"You ask what was suspicious? Everything went too smoothly. If you truly had plans for Boruto, yet still refused to help him, then that meant you had already found another goal. Something better."
Obito looked straight at him.
"That was me, wasn't it?"
"I was the better option in your eyes. A chance to reach even higher. The hope of crossing into other worlds… you saw that possibility in me."
"But you were cautious. Maybe even afraid."
"Because no matter how far you looked, you couldn't see my future. So you stayed back and watched. You let everything move on its own, waiting to see whether the key was really me… or whether something else was standing behind me."
"The fear of the unknown made you hesitate."
Obito's expression remained unchanged and continued in that same calm tone.
"You Ōtsutsuki have always been like that. You wait for the tree to grow, let it bear fruit… then steal everything at the very end."
"So I assumed you wouldn't be any different."
"Once you confirmed that I could be used to reach other realities, you made your decision. But the me back then couldn't withstand your power. So you waited. You watched me grow stronger, step by step… until the vessel you wanted was finally ready."
Shibai fell silent for a moment.
For a being who had always stood far above others, who had grown used to seeing every life beneath him as something to observe, harvest, or discard, this feeling was unfamiliar.
Regret.
If he had acted a little sooner… if he had been a little less certain…
That thought alone was enough to darken his gaze.
Then, driven by a question he despised even as it rose within him, Shibai finally spoke.
"Then tell me, Obito… if I had reached for you before you were ready, would the result have changed?"
"I had contingencies," Obito replied.
"Long before this, I placed a condition inside the Devouring Coffin. If anything tried to take over my body and altered my soul, the Coffin would activate on its own and absorb me. After that, it would vanish into the vortex of time until another world opened."
"Then it would find a new body and implant that vessel with my memories. My original soul would become nourishment for it and be absorbed… the same way I absorbed so many others."
Obito's voice remained calm.
"Although, technically, that would have meant I died as well."
"To me, memories and the self are what define a person. Without them, even if the body continues to exist, it is no longer the same individual."
"Obito Uchiha would have died, but at the very least, I would have survived in another form."
"So in the end, you never had a true chance."
Obito's gaze remained cold and unwavering.
"It was only ever a question of whether I won… or whether I lost everything."
The moment those words fell, Shibai's killing intent erupted. Yet even with that overwhelming malice flooding the space around them, he found it difficult to halt the process. Bypassing the Devouring Coffin a second time was impossible.
Once the transfer had begun, it could not simply be stopped by force.
And within this strange space Obito had dragged him into, Shibai could no longer harm him.
Countless tiny bubbles drifted around them, stretching endlessly in every direction. Their number was impossible to measure, and with a single glance, Shibai understood what they were.
These were the different realities Obito had spoken of.
To see them before his eyes, yet be unable to touch even one, nearly drove him into a rage beyond reason. For the first time in his existence, Shibai felt emotions so foreign that even he could barely recognize them.
"You…"
For the first time, Shibai's voice lost its distance. What remained was something ancient, inhuman, and murderous.
"A soul that merely reincarnated into this world… dared to scheme against me?"
He even considered splitting himself in two.
Although doing so would be no different from handing Obito half of his power, at the very least, he would still survive.
"Do not mistake this moment for victory, Obito. This is not the end."
But Obito, of course, would never give him that chance.
The instant that thought crossed Shibai's mind, Obito immediately initiated the transfer process.
Although he would have loved to devour him whole, in this place, he truly could not use the Devouring Coffin. This vast space was something even beyond the Devouring Coffin.
His only option was to send this bastard as far from his sight as possible.
"World Transfer."
The countless bubbles around them trembled.
One of them, faint and distant, suddenly lit up.
A world filled with magic, science, monsters wearing human faces, and gods who had long since grown bored of their own omnipotence.
The world of A Certain Magical Index.
The half of Obito's soul already fused with Shibai was dragged toward it.
Shibai's countless Jōgan contracted all at once.
"You dare—!"
Obito looked at him through the agony tearing him apart, his soul already severed in two.
"Don't act surprised. You wanted to use me as a door. So I opened it for you... Have fun~"
Even as Shibai's form began to collapse into light, the god's voice remained cold and condescending.
"Obito Uchiha…"
"Do not think you have escaped me. Across worlds, across time, across every law that separates one reality from another… I will find my way back."
"And when I do, I will make you regret ever daring to shame me like this."
Obito gave him a faint, cold smile and raised his middle finger.
"Don't bother saying you'll come find me. I'll be the one paying you a visit. You took half my soul, Shibai."
His lips curved with a trace of bloody mockery.
"And I don't take losses."
The world-bubble began to close.
Obito's voice followed Shibai into the fading light, cold and unwavering.
"Remember that... I'm Obito Uchiha, after all!"
After speaking those cold words and watching Shibai vanish for good, Obito finally let out a quiet sigh.
Only then did he lower his gaze to his own hands.
His body was slowly cracking apart.
Thin fractures spread across his skin, widening little by little as unimaginable pain tore through him. It was not the pain of flesh or bone, but something far deeper, as if the very foundation of his existence was being split open.
And then, in the next instant, his body exploded into countless particles.
In the ninja world.
Inside an underground laboratory, within a white room, a container stood at the center, filled with liquid. Within it, a body floated in silence.
The body seemed peaceful, almost lifeless, until it suddenly twitched.
A black dot appeared, resembling the mark of a Kāma, and from that single point, dark lines spread across his entire body.
Then the boy opened his eyes.
Crescent-blue eyes shone through the liquid.
Boom!
The container exploded.
Liquid and shattered glass scattered across the white room as the boy stepped forward, his presence powerful despite the weakness still clinging to him. He flexed his body, as though confirming it still belonged to him.
Until
Plop.
He collapsed face-first onto the floor, weakness flooding every part of his body.
Obito lay there, one hand pressed against the cold floor, his expression dark enough to kill.
Then he clicked his tongue.
"…I'm just not used to this body yet."
The Devouring Coffin manifested behind him.
This time, it appeared with countless black tentacles, spreading wildly through the laboratory before burrowing deep into the ground.
Then, the devouring process began.
The world itself became its target.
Obito, completely exhausted, lost consciousness and fell into a coma as the process started.
"After paying half my soul… this had better work out."
Time continued to flow.
The ninja world, now bound by the Devouring Coffin, began to decay little by little. Forests withered, oceans dimmed, and the laws supporting the world itself slowly peeled away.
But this time, the devouring was far slower than before.
Obito's soul had been torn in half. His body was incomplete, his consciousness had fallen into a deep coma, and even the Devouring Coffin could no longer act with its former efficiency.
At the same time, in another world...
Shibai Ōtsutsuki opened his countless Jōgan.
A world of magic and science unfolded before him.
For the first time in ages, something close to fascination appeared in his gaze. This reality was different. Its laws were layered with mysteries that did not belong to the world he had known.
This world was far more interesting than he had expected.
However, Shibai did not realize one thing.
The moment he arrived, his presence had already been noticed.
Beyond the normal boundaries of the world, beings who had long since stepped beyond mortality turned their attention toward him.
The Magic Gods.
At first, they were perplexed.
Then, almost immediately, that confusion turned into interest.
An unknown existence had appeared from outside their world.
A god from another reality.
And for beings who had long since grown bored of omnipotence, such a thing was far too fascinating to ignore.
And then, with eyes bright with greed and fascination, the Magic Gods began to move.
Like starving beasts that had finally smelled something new.
PS: The Next Chapter is the Last...
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