Dawn had barely stained the sky when Boruto, cheeks hollowed by barely any sleep, sat at the kitchen table with dark circles under his eyes. He had spent the night poring over sealing scrolls until the ink blurred.
"Nii-san, why do you look like a panda?" Himawari teased, peering across the table.
Hinata glanced up from the sink, concern softening her voice. "Boruto, did you stay up all night again?"
How could he tell them the truth? He only managed a guilty smile. "Tough level. Couldn't stop until I cleared it."
Hinata frowned, drying a pot. "Games in moderation, okay? What will you do in class today?"
Boruto shrugged, playing the part of the insolent student. "If the lesson's trivial, isn't sitting through it a waste of time?"
Hinata opened her mouth, then closed it, unsure how to scold this new, sharper child. Himawari munched her sandwich and giggled. "Nii-san's silly."
Boruto let the family warmth ground him for a heartbeat. He'd be fine—today was the day he expected his teacher to falter. Helping Shino back from that edge would be a useful step.
—
The tram's wind whipped Boruto's hair into a spiky halo. Mitsuki sat beside him in his wide-sleeved robe, quiet and composed as ever.
"We might have bad luck today," Boruto said, eyes on the horizon. "We'll probably run into trouble."
Mitsuki's head tilted slightly. "What kind of trouble?"
Boruto met Mitsuki's calm gaze and spoke evenly. "Shino-sensei's been affected. And the source isn't ordinary chakra — it clings to people when their emotions spiral and drives them toward madness. I can sense it with my other eye. It attaches, it feeds, and then it amplifies. Yesterday morning's berserk incidents — the same thing."
Mitsuki didn't flinch. He listened, then asked, "Do you have a plan?"
"I do. First wake Shino, then deal with whoever's behind this. But I'm a clone today — if I take heavy damage, it'll complicate things. I'll need you to hold the line when it gets messy."
Mitsuki nodded, steady. "Understood."
—
They waited at the forested training range behind the school, the pines pressing close like silent witnesses. A heavy weight hung in the air, as if the trees themselves strained under some invisible pressure.
Shino appeared from the path, shoulders slumped, eyes distant. Standing behind him was a faint, shadowy echo — something like a ghost that trailed his steps. The sight prickled at Boruto's skin.
Shino's voice came out low and broken. "I'm going to… kill you all."
Boruto and Mitsuki exchanged a look and immediately moved. Shino's technique used insects and parasitic swarms that devoured chakra — if they gave him time, he could consume an entire shinobi's reserves. They had to act fast.
Shino surged forward with sudden speed; he was far faster than his pensive gait suggested. From his body spilled a torrent of insects, thick as a river of shadows, and they dove for the two of them.
"Wind Release — Break!" Mitsuki exhaled and sent a gust to scatter the front lines. The wind threw the insects off course for a moment, but more swarmed out like a tide.
Boruto and Mitsuki split, darting through trunks and leaping between roots. Shino split his swarm in two and struck for Boruto, the insects forming a living curtain as they flowed.
Boruto's other eye — that private vision no one could name — tracked every micro-movement. He saw the faint currents of intent in the swarm, the way they clustered, the path Shino's will carved through them. It let him anticipate and react a half-breath faster.
He vaulted onto a low branch and turned, facing the oncoming flood. The insects closed in until the buzz filled his ears like a thousand whispered sutras. He threw a kunai with an explosive tag as a feint, then sealed his hands.
"Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
From a thicket, a cluster of wooden kunai rained into the swarm, and his detonators flared. The explosion rose in a mushroom of light that swallowed the insects whole. For a moment, the forest glowed like a strange sunrise.
Shino hissed, furious. "My bugs!"
But he was not finished. As the smoke cleared, a new threat emerged — a Sage-tainted clone burst from the underbrush, its Rasengan forming into gn enormous and perfect. The sudden size and force stunned even Shino for a heartbeat.
Boruto's clone slammed the oversized Rasengan into the insect-wall and cleaved a path through. The spinning sphere pushed forward, scattering the crawling mass in its wake — and then, as if obeying Shino's will, the insects reformed into a writhing carpet that surged up from the soil.
Shino's lips curved into a cold laugh as the swarm took Boruto like countless grasping hands. The Rasengan began to waver; the insects' absorption ate at its chakra until the blue core sputtered and fell apart.
Shino believed the battle was done. He expected the clone's chakra to be siphoned dry and vanish. But then a soft thud sounded in the clearing — subtle as a bell, yet impossible to ignore.
The insects, momentarily disoriented, continued their search as Boruto, in a blink, slipped away. The fact that Boruto had vanished confirmed what Shino had already suspected: the Boruto he'd been fighting was a clone. Defeating a clone felt like humiliation; the real thing still lived and fled.
A chill ran through Shino's expression. His defeat, his bewilderment, his exhaustion — it curdled into something colder.
Then the forest seemed to inhale. The insects, now furious and bereft of their target, converged into a roaring maelstrom. They poured through every gap in the undergrowth with a single, terrible purpose.
They would find Boruto.
They would not stop until they killed him.