Chapter 468 - 468: Changes and Time Travel

"Deep within the ocean depths, we have discovered an exceptionally precious artifact. It resembles a turtle and contains an immense concentration of internal chakra..."

The Artifact Museum Channel was currently broadcasting a breaking news report.

Urashiki Otsutsuki, watching the news broadcast and staring at the turtle on the screen, finally perked up with renewed energy.

"That's the space-time treasure... Karasuki!"

"Wonderful! With this artifact, I can travel back to the past and eliminate these lower lifeforms in the Shinobi World before they grow!"

An expression of sheer excitement flushed across Urashiki's face.

How long had it been? As an Otsutsuki, how long had it been since he had felt such overwhelming humiliation?

At the same time, utilizing the power of his Rinnegan, he had gathered more than enough intelligence throughout the Shinobi World.

Specifically, the high-end combat power of the Shinobi World was nowhere near this absurd in the past—back then, the peak display of force was merely destroying a single village.

And that was limited to only a select handful of individuals.

Unlike what he had witnessed earlier at the fighting arena, where a collection of shinobi pulverized Momoshiki and Kinshiki to the point of complete helplessness.

All of that was because the Shinobi Alliance had developed high-tech training facilities, scientific ninja tools, and advanced training regimes, allowing them to become this terrifyingly powerful.

In other words, as long as he traveled back to the past, he could collect all the Tailed Beasts, consume the Divine Tree's Fruit, and avoid getting effortlessly humiliated like Momoshiki and the others.

He could even wipe out all of these critical high-end combatants while they were still in their past, vulnerable forms.

SWISH!

Fueled by overwhelming excitement, Urashiki opened a spatial portal and stepped inside.

...

"Spiralling Twin Spheres!"

Out in an open clearing, Boruto executed the Shadow Clone Jutsu, blasting a massive crater directly into the ground.

Sasuke nodded with a look of quiet approval.

Just then, he suddenly picked up a strange sensory ping.

Grabbing the bewildered Boruto by the collar, he vanished from the spot in an instant.

...

Tonbo Tobitake was currently conducting research into deeper, high-level ninjutsu when his senses suddenly picked up the anomaly.

He glanced down at the unconscious Urashiki already lying on his lab table in the present.

"So it's time, huh? Time to go deliver some fresh research material!"

He had already sensed the arrival of Boruto and Sasuke at Konoha's museum.

Choosing not to intervene, Tonbo silently uploaded the lingering information package into Boruto's mind that he had previously embedded within him.

"The loop of time."

It really is a closed temporal loop...

I knew it. Given how powerful I am, there was no way I wouldn't have noticed Urashiki's presence in the future. It turns out I deliberately let him go back in time all along... just so he could become a prime research subject.

Everything has come full circle.

Time truly is an unfathomable domain.

...

Inside the museum.

Urashiki grinned wickedly as he looked at the turtle artifact resting on its pedestal.

He picked up Karasuki and poured a massive wave of chakra into it.

A space-time rift slowly tore open before his eyes.

"I will annihilate the Shinobi World and ensure none of you ever get the chance to grow up," Urashiki declared with a cruel, malicious smile.

CLANG!

The Kusanagi Sword unsheathed in a flash. Just as Urashiki was about to step into the space-time wormhole, the turtle artifact was snatched cleanly out of his grip.

It landed squarely in Sasuke's hand.

"Rasengan!"

Boruto's incoming strike caught him off guard.

Seeing his attack, Urashiki abandoned the artifact for the moment, dodged Boruto's strike, and dived headfirst into the open wormhole.

Sasuke charged straight in after him without a moment's hesitation.

Boruto followed right behind.

"Curse you annoying pests... Looks like I'll have to shake this guy off first."

Urashiki's face darkened with irritation.

However, the thought of returning to the past to wipe out the Shinobi World brought the cruel smile back to his face.

Inside the space-time wormhole, Sasuke locked eyes with Boruto and immediately grabbed his hand.

His Rinnegan flared to life.

Amenotejikara!

Refusing to be outdone, Urashiki deployed his own Rinnegan power in response.

As the two divine forces clashed, the space-time wormhole began to fracture and fluctuate violently.

Urashiki was sucked down into one spatial rift.

Sasuke and Boruto tumbled into another separate rift altogether.

...

It wasn't just Boruto who was pushing his limits in training.

Everyone else was undergoing intense, rigorous preparation as well—especially the young shinobi who had witnessed the staggering display of high-level power at the fighting arena.

Shikadai, Chocho Akimichi, Inojin Yamanaka, Mitsuki, Tonbo Hyuga, and the other genin...

No—many of them had already been officially promoted to Chunin by now.

Their overall combat capabilities and strategic mindsets were more than qualified for the rank of Chunin.

The advanced educational system had elevated their raw strength and foundational shinobi discipline to extraordinary heights.

"Dragon Breath!"

Mitsuki channeled his chakra to command a translucent spirit dragon, which exhaled a violent beam of compressed energy, leveling an entire mountain peak to flat ground in a fraction of a second.

Kabuto Yakushi stood nearby watching the display.

A proud smile touched his face.

Combining a summoning beast's raw power with high-density chakra ninjutsu... Excellent.

...

"Super Expansion Jutsu!"

Chocho Akimichi towered like a colossal giant amidst the dense forest, locking hands in a fierce battle of pure physical force against her father, Choji.

BANG! BANG!

The sheer weight of the two giant combatants made the ground sink three feet deep with every impact.

Flocks of birds and wild beasts fled far into the distance, completely terrified.

Any wild creature catching sight of these titans would be permanently traumatized.

How could humans possibly be this insanely strong?!

...

At the Hyuga Training Grounds.

Neji Hyuga and his son, Tonbo Hyuga, stood facing each other with their Byakugan flared open simultaneously.

"Domain!"

Two overlapping Eight Trigrams formations materialized beneath their feet, intertwining as each tried to read and encompass every shift in the other's posture.

"Here I come!" Tonbo Hyuga declared.

...

"Sarada..."

Sakura completed her hand seals and stared at Sarada's eyes in complete shock.

Sarada's Sharingan had evolved into a fully matured Three-Tomoe pattern.

She had merely been putting Sarada through routine genjutsu training...

How on earth had her eyes jumped directly from a Single-Tomoe to a Three-Tomoe in a single instant?

Did she experience such a massive surge of emotional upheaval?

"Where are you looking, Mom?! HYAH!"

Sarada was thoroughly annoyed. Just a moment ago, while caught inside the genjutsu, she had hallucinated Boruto being mistaken for a village enemy—which triggered the sudden completion of her Sharingan's evolution and broke Sakura's illusion.

BOOM!

Sakura leaped backward to dodge the strike, but the terrain beneath them wasn't so fortunate.

The earth suffered catastrophic damage.

Her physique—already reinforced by the Taijutsu Training System—combined with her family's trademark chakra-enhanced strength, caused the ground within a hundred-meter radius to collapse into a jagged crater.

...

"Shikadai, you've done exceptionally well. Your development of the Shadow Mode is growing stronger by the day. There's really nothing left for me to teach you. Since you're so smart anyway, figure out how to get stronger on your own," Shikamaru said to his son.

Having a son who was too intelligent had its own drawbacks.

Shikadai had already mastered every single shadow secret technique the Nara Clan possessed.

On top of that, he had created his own personalized combat system.

With his progress on the Shadow Mode, Shikamaru truly had nothing more to pass down.

Shikadai nodded in understanding. "Got it. Don't worry, I won't hold anyone back."

Having witnessed true, high-tier cosmic power, he knew that even if training was a hassle, he had to keep pace.

Otherwise, if the power gap grew too wide, he wouldn't even be able to lend a hand when it mattered most.

...

"I hope the day never comes when we actually have to use this technique..."

Deep within an isolated space, Naruto spoke quietly to Kurama.

Kurama replied in a heavy voice, "Yeah... If we ever have to pull this move out, it means we're truly at the end of the line."

Relying on recent rapid scientific and technological breakthroughs, the two of them had co-developed an ultimate, catastrophic technique.

However, activating it meant absolute death for both of them.

Naruto sighed softly, "Still, it's good to have an absolute trump card hidden away. At least we won't be left entirely helpless if push comes to shove."

...

Inside the Technology Development Bureau.

Orochimaru stared at the bubbling, chemically reacting liquid in a sealed glass vat in the distance, the smile on his face growing increasingly twisted and excited.

"I wonder how this round of experiments will turn out... If it succeeds, this might very well be the most critical piece of the puzzle."

Orochimaru was immensely satisfied with his current line of research.

He truly was a genius beyond measure.

At the same time, he meticulously checked every sealing barrier surrounding his laboratory for any potential breaches.

If a leak in the sealing barrier allowed sensitive intelligence to spill out, it would ruin everything.

They had worked so hard to seal off and obscure the future from external perception.

To achieve this state of total containment, he hadn't stepped outside his laboratory in a very long time.

If only I could permanently bind that ninjutsu to my body like Tonbo Tobitake does...

Unfortunately, mastering a technique of that caliber isn't something that can be done overnight.

Full Story Finished in Patreon

Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/MistaQuartz

On Patreon, you can explore Extra Chapters in advance!