"A purple one appeared?!"
Naruto's eyes widened. The self-selection treasure chest in front of him was exactly like the kind of reward selection found in games, and the options inside, as the name suggested, were all special items from the Naruto movies!
Naruto's gaze locked onto the second option.
[Menma Uzumaki (Template Experience Card × 3)]
[Instructions for Use: Upon activation, you will gain all the strength and abilities of the BOSS Menma Uzumaki from "Naruto Shippuden the Movie: Road to Ninja." Duration: 1 hour. Can be used 3 times.]
Menma Uzumaki...!
Naruto was very familiar with this character—the "dark version of Uzumaki Naruto" from the Limited Tsukuyomi world. Menma Uzumaki's personality and experiences were completely opposite to his. But what was most appealing was his terrifying strength.
Nine-Headed Snakes... Great Spiraling Ring...
From his memory, Menma's summoning jutsu, "Nine-Headed Snakes," could summon nine different summoning beasts, and his ultimate jutsu, "Great Spiraling Ring," possessed destructive power capable of destroying the entire Konoha Village. Furthermore, he also harbored the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox within him and could perfectly control the power of full Tailed Beast Mode.
His strength definitely far exceeded that of an ordinary Kage-level ninja.
Based on the anime's portrayal, Menma's strength was at least on par with Naruto in Nine-Tails Chakra Mode, or Sasuke with the Mangekyo Sharingan—perhaps even stronger!
Rather than calling it a template experience card, it was more like an ultimate trump card prepared for his un-grown self—the most crucial part was that using it didn't require him to risk going berserk like with Nine-Tails Chakra leakage; there were no side effects whatsoever.
As for the other two options?
Naruto frowned and recalled. The so-called "Zero-Tails Dark Chakra" seemed to be an artificial Tailed Beast concocted by that guy named Shinno in the movie "Bonds." Although it sounded powerful, for him, it wasn't an enhancement but purely superfluous.
Dark Chakra... he remembered it seemed to trigger negative emotions? ...What a joke! He had the Nine-Tails, known as the strongest Tailed Beast, living inside his body!
Ignoring the ready-made tsundere big fox at home and not building a good relationship with it, only to go for some artificial Tailed Beast's Dark Chakra? This was simply like...
Having a top-spec computer at home but insisting on playing on an old-fashioned big-screen computer at a retro general store.
And the last option made Naruto even more speechless.
Jackal? Wasn't that just a minor summoning beast from "The Will of Fire Inheritors"?
Naruto even suspected the system was just making up numbers—this thing wasn't even the main summoning beast of the movie's final BOSS, Hiruko; it was just a synthetic beast belonging to one of his underlings.
Moreover... if he chose Menma Uzumaki's experience card, Naruto might be able to do some things that were originally impossible. For Naruto, who had lived an unremarkable previous life, this was undoubtedly an opportunity to change some tragedies.
Hizashi's death.
This thought flashed through his mind; this event was very likely to happen soon—definitely within this year. Hyuga Hizashi, Neji Hyuga's father, the most tragic father among the Konoha 12 Genin in the original story, was about to meet his end.
Because not long after the Third Great Shinobi War ended, the Hidden Cloud Village, under the guise of "signing a peace treaty," sent envoys to visit Konoha, but in reality, they were secretly plotting to steal the Hyuga clan's Byakugan.
They even stooped to attacking the three-year-old Hyuga Hinata, attempting to kidnap her. Subsequently, the Hyuga clan head, Hyuga Hiashi, discovered and killed the kidnapper in time.
However, the most infuriating part was the subsequent development—the Hidden Cloud Village actually turned the tables, threatening to wage war on the grounds that "Konoha ninjas killed an envoy." To hand over Hyuga Hiashi, who killed the kidnapper, Konoha had just suffered heavy losses from the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox Incident and the Third Great Shinobi War, and the higher-ups ultimately chose to compromise.
To prevent the secret of the Byakugan from leaking.
The Hyuga Main Family proposed that Hizashi, Hiashi's twin brother, be a scapegoat. And Hizashi... actually accepted this fate, even saying words like "I am dying to protect my brother," beautifying his sacrifice as a "feat of resisting the shackles of fate."
...No justice, no fairness. A living person was thus completely devoured by this world. Young Neji thus lost his father forever.
As for those high-sounding excuses of "for the greater good" and "to avoid war"? The calculations and considerations of those higher-ups?
Naruto didn't want to try to understand. He only knew one thing: he didn't want to stand by and watch a living person be swallowed whole by this world, and that was all.
Moreover, Neji's tragic end later...
Thinking of this, as for whether the Hidden Cloud Village would really wage war? If Hizashi was saved, and if that guy Raikage dared to suspect that Konoha orchestrated it... Naruto wouldn't mind using an experience card again to fight Raikage.
"System, I choose the Menma Uzumaki Experience Card."
[Congratulations, Host, you have obtained: Menma Uzumaki (Template Experience Card × 3)!]
This was a precious item that could temporarily elevate one to the peak of Kage-level! Naruto couldn't wait to see its true form. With a slight thought, a card glowing with purple light slowly appeared before his eyes.
He reached out and took the card, carefully examining the pattern on it—wasn't this the official art from the 'Head-Pat Village' (a nickname for a certain game)?!
As another thought flashed, the card transformed into a stream of light and disappeared from his palm, returning to the system space.