"What happened?!"
Sasuke anxiously stepped forward, grabbing Hashirama Senju and demanding to know why he had told Minato Namikaze to bring Naruto back as quickly as possible.
At that very moment, Minato Namikaze had already activated the Flying Thunder God mark he had left on Naruto!
"Sword of Love!"
A golden flash appeared behind Naruto.
Almost immediately, Minato Namikaze felt a pulling force so terrifying that there was no other way to describe it.
It wasn't like Nagato's Banshō Ten'in, which physically dragged objects toward him. This was more like a pump, forcibly sucking away his life force, vitality, and chakra all at once.
Obito was inside Kamui's Dimension, while Naruto and the Nine-Tails were already locked in a struggle with the God Tree, drawing huge amounts of chakra from it, so neither of them had noticed this force...
While they were absorbing chakra from the God Tree, the God Tree, driven into desperation, had also increased both the range and speed at which it devoured the life force of nearby humans, villages, birds, and beasts!!
As a result, the instant Minato Namikaze appeared beside Naruto, the God Tree began draining his strength. Even his breathing became difficult!
Minato made a hand signal.
Adult Obito and Rin, watching from nearby inside Kamui's Dimension, immediately pulled the two of them into Kamui's Dimension and brought them back to the wooden house.
After gorging itself on chakra, the Nine-Tails looked full of energy, and Naruto seemed just as refreshed.
Rin was the same, practically glowing with vitality.
That only made Minato, who looked like he had been sucked dry, stand out even more.
The Senju brothers, the Uchiha brothers, Indra and Ashura, along with everyone from Team Minato and Team Kakashi, immediately noticed how haggard Minato Namikaze looked.
"Whoa?! Minato-sensei, what happened to you? Did you go to some kind of crash weight-loss camp?"
But Minato-sensei was already slender to begin with. He didn't need to lose weight, did he?
Adult Obito had barely finished speaking when Young Obito smacked him.
"Put away your Tobi persona and act normal!!"
Don't embarrass me along with you!
Adult Obito coughed belatedly.
After all, he had spent more than ten years wearing masks while using Madara's identity and Spiral White Zetsu's persona. Sometimes a bit of that atmosphere slipping out was unavoidable.
Naruto, of course, was immediately worried.
The expression on his little face was enough to nearly break the Yellow Flash's composure.
"Dad, are you okay?!"
He stared anxiously at his father, who had clearly grown much thinner, and felt as though he had seen something like this before.
After thinking about it carefully, wasn't this exactly what Shikamaru, Chōji, and the others had looked like after being drained by the God Tree during his life experience as "Naruto Uzumaki" in the main storyline?!
Naruto hurriedly asked the Nine-Tails to share some chakra with Minato.
Only then did Minato Namikaze, who had traveled here from the Kannabi Bridge era, recover his usual appearance as Konoha's Yellow Flash.
Afterward, Minato turned to Hashirama Senju with a grave expression.
"First Hokage, while Naruto, Rin, and the others were absorbing the God Tree's chakra, the God Tree began accelerating the rate at which it devoured the life force of humans and other living creatures in order to protect itself."
It was almost exactly what Hashirama Senju had suspected.
"Its absorption range must be expanding too."
Rin blamed herself. The method she had thought of had not worked as intended and might even have caused harm to this world.
Obito immediately reassured her that they would definitely find another solution.
Time was running short. The longer this continued, the greater the danger to the people, villages, plants, animals, birds, and beasts of this world.
Naruto, Sasuke, Young Obito, Young Kakashi, Sakura, Rin, and the others all racked their brains, trying to figure out how to stop the God Tree.
The God Tree...
The God Tree...
Naruto, whose brain had never been particularly suited to deep thought, stared at the enormous tree.
Watching its branches and leaves sway, he somehow found himself thinking of Konohagakure.
At the same time, the tremors caused by the God Tree shook a leaf loose, sending it drifting into Madara Uchiha's hand.
Just like all those years ago, when Hashirama had asked him to name their village.
One tree... one leaf...
How about Konohagakure?
Naruto loved his village deeply, yet he was also someone who had been hurt by that village more deeply than almost anyone.
Madara Uchiha and Hashirama Senju had founded that village with their own hands, yet in the end, one of them had chosen another path and tried to destroy it.
"Cut the roots."
While everyone was still thinking, Tobirama Senju suddenly spoke.
Because the phrase sounded somewhat suggestive, and because it came from Tobirama Senju's cold, stern mouth, several people inexplicably felt a chill below the waist.
Those people included Hashirama, the somewhat unreliable older brother, Madara Uchiha, who never got along with him, and his sworn rival Izuna Uchiha.
As though he could tell exactly what his older brother was thinking, Tobirama Senju shot him a sideways glance.
"I meant sever the God Tree's roots, Aniija."
Madara and Izuna relaxed.
Hashirama, whom Kaguya had described as a walking, human-shaped miniature God Tree, somehow felt even colder.
Ignoring his idiotic older brother, Tobirama Senju continued, "Almost all plants absorb nutrients through their roots. Barring something unusual, the God Tree should be no exception. For something that large, its root system has probably already spread several thousand meters underground."
The Second Hokage's words immediately gave Minato Namikaze an idea.
He thought for a moment before saying, "And after what we just did, if the God Tree possesses consciousness, it would naturally accelerate the growth of its roots. That would explain why it's now draining life force and vitality faster and across a wider area!"
Naruto understood what his dad meant and immediately turned toward Kaguya.
"Auntie Kaguya... no, Grandma Kaguya? Sister Kaguya? Ah, whatever! It doesn't matter what I call you. It's okay if we only cut off some of the God Tree's roots, right, dattebayo?!"
Once again confronted with Naruto's unique method of sorting out family seniority, Sasuke and Sakura both broke into exasperated sweat.
Kaguya's ethereal expression remained still for several seconds.
"You may."
These people had already convinced her that if the fruit matured too quickly, it would draw the attention of the other members of the Ōtsutsuki Clan throughout the universe and bring them here.
She was not fully prepared yet, nor was she confident that she could protect the children who were about to be born.
Her goal was for the God Tree to grow more slowly and eventually produce a "good fruit."
Hashirama immediately became eager.
"Then how exactly do we cut the God Tree's roots properly?"
They couldn't exactly dig them all up like some giant tilling machine.
"Leave that to me."
When Hamura Ōtsutsuki spoke, everyone suddenly remembered.
They had the ancestor of the Byakugan right here!
"Byakugan!"
As veins bulged around Hamura's eyes, the roots buried deep underground became perfectly visible to him.
"They're growing extremely fast!"
The speed was so great that the growth could practically be seen with the naked eye.
As the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju immediately began assigning roles.
Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura, Obito, Kakashi, Rin, Adult Obito, Adult Kakashi, Minato Namikaze, Hashirama, Tobirama, Madara, and Izuna all joined the operation to prune the God Tree's roots.
But they soon discovered that the God Tree's roots also possessed a will of their own.
Just like during the Fourth Shinobi World War, the moment anyone approached, the roots would immediately attack and try to steal that person's chakra!
"It's more dangerous than we expected."
Rin said, "Naruto and I have Isobu and Kurama. Comparatively speaking, it's still faster for the Tailed Beasts to tug chakra away from the God Tree."
"Yeah."
Naruto nodded, but his eyes kept drifting toward Hashirama Senju.
"Hey," he said, pointing at Hashirama. "Why does it feel like none of those roots want to go anywhere near Uncle First Hokage?"
Huh?
Now that he mentioned it, everyone else noticed too.
Madara Uchiha and Tobirama Senju were practically receiving special attention from the God Tree. Dozens of roots whipped around them from every direction, making the whole scene look like some kind of whip play.
Hashirama Senju, on the other hand...
The God Tree's roots acted as though they couldn't even see him.
In fact, they seemed to be actively avoiding him.
"Don't tell me they think you're one of them?!"
Madara Uchiha was growing irritated by the roots and used Great Fire Annihilation to burn away the ones constantly lashing at him.
Tobirama Senju said, "Based on what we know so far, if this God Tree does not consider Big Brother part of its own body, then two God Trees competing for resources should be even more hostile toward one another."
It was the same reason farmers removed weeds or used herbicides.
They wanted to prevent weeds from stealing nutrients from their crops.
Many species of trees in nature had also evolved specialized methods of competing with their own kind for resources.
If Hashirama truly belonged to a separate God Tree, there was no reason this God Tree wouldn't attack him.
Izuna cut through a root whipping toward him.
"What does that mean? Say it simply."
"Simply put, if the God Tree doesn't consider Big Brother part of itself, then there's only one other explanation..."
Tobirama Senju's expression grew serious.
"It may think Big Brother is more dangerous than it is, so it's deliberately avoiding him."
It was like facing a solid wall covered in thorns.
Only an idiot would run straight into it. A normal person would naturally go around.
Feeling completely safe, Hashirama helped clear the roots around his younger brother, Madara, and Izuna.
"Tobirama, the way you say that makes me sound even less human."
He pouted.
With the nearby roots cleared away, Izuna Uchiha looked at Tobirama, then at Hashirama.
"Come to think of it, I've always thought you two brothers look nothing alike. You weren't created by the Senju through some special method, were you?"
Thud!!
"Madara, your little brother is so mean..."
Now that Madara had resolved the knot in his heart, he gave Hashirama the same smile he had worn back in their youth.
"Izuna has a point. You brothers really don't resemble each other at all. You should go back and ask your father about it. Maybe you'll get a surprise."
Naruto said, "I think Uncle Hashirama and Uncle Butsuma look pretty similar. Isn't Brother Tobirama the one who doesn't look like them?"
Having finally had enough of being used as entertainment, Tobirama Senju snapped at them.
"Take this seriously! Be careful, or the God Tree will drain every last bit of your life force!"
"Right!"
Naruto went all out, joining forces with the Nine-Tails to engage the God Tree in another chakra tug-of-war.
Minato Namikaze and Sasuke Uchiha guarded him, while everyone else cut through the tree roots according to Hamura Ōtsutsuki's directions.
Before they had even set out, Naruto had tapped each of them once, authorizing a constant flow of Nine-Tails chakra to them.
For once, they all got to experience something close to Hashirama's seemingly bottomless chakra reserves.
At last, the rate at which they were cutting the roots surpassed the speed at which the God Tree could regrow them.
Combined with Naruto and the Nine-Tails frantically dragging away its chakra, the God Tree was having a miserable time.
Adult Obito, taking a brief rest, laughed and cursed.
"If chakra could be measured numerically, Naruto's current chakra reserves would probably be over six hundred billion."
Adult Kakashi said nothing.
His attention was fixed on Naruto.
Naruto's face was much redder than usual, almost as though he had a fever.
Sasuke and Minato Namikaze noticed it too.
"Hey! That's enough, isn't it, dead last?!"
Whenever Sasuke grew anxious, he seemed to unconsciously fall back on calling Naruto "dead last."
Naruto himself felt painfully swollen with chakra, as though he might burst at any moment.
But he was afraid that the instant he stopped drawing chakra, the God Tree would strike back.
Minato said, "Use Shadow Clones. Spread the chakra out among them."
Now that was Naruto's specialty!
He immediately used the Multiple Shadow Clone Technique.
***
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