Sakura asked,
"Is the Third Hokage alright?"
Naruto Uzumaki and the others froze for a moment, not quite understanding what the long-haired Sakura meant.
Sasuke from the mission scroll world reminded them,
"At that time, the objective was to assassinate the Third Hokage and install someone else as Hokage."
Thinking of the person Orochimaru might have pushed forward, and remembering Danzō's arm and how he had sidelined the Uchiha clan on the night of the Nine-Tails incident, Sasuke felt like he could throw up everything he'd eaten in the past month.
"What?!"
Naruto Uzumaki, Sasuke Uchiha, Sakura Haruno, Shikamaru Nara, and Shino Aburame immediately rushed back.
Gaara was being supported by Kankurō and Temari.
Now that he knew the truth, he apologized to them. Startled, the two of them accepted their younger brother's apology and agreed to tell him about Yashamaru and their mother.
Naruto Uzumaki ran for part of the way on his own, but his stamina soon gave out, and he started to lag behind the group.
Seeing him drenched in sweat and stubbornly forcing himself to keep going, Sasuke Uchiha and Sakura Haruno both wanted to help.
But Naruto Uzumaki, still traumatized by being carried bridal-style by the Sakura from another world, didn't dare let Sakura help. He waved his hands frantically.
"What are you trying to prove? Or do you want to keep being dead last?" Sasuke Uchiha reached out.
"Come here."
Naruto Uzumaki understood immediately. He slung an arm over Sasuke's shoulder and let half his weight lean onto him.
That feeling of having a companion at his side made him unconsciously want to cling to it.
Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the cursed seal on Sasuke's skin beneath his collar and asked the Kakashi from the other world what it was.
Naruto said,
"In our world, there's something called a mission scroll. It keeps assigning us missions, and when we complete them, we get mission rewards. The reason we can travel to your parallel world is also because of those rewards."
It sounded far too unbelievable.
Even Shikamaru Nara gave him a look full of complicated thoughts.
"But just you showing up in our world is already shocking enough," Shikamaru said. "So you're saying that knowing Orochimaru's objective and stopping the Third Hokage's assassination were also part of your mission?"
Sasuke replied,
"In our world, the A-rank mission to stop Orochimaru from killing his teacher has already been completed. Coming here was the mission reward for that."
Naruto Uzumaki, who was half-supported by Sasuke Uchiha, asked his counterpart,
"You don't have Orochimaru's cursed seal either. Is that because of the mission scroll too?"
"Yeah," Naruto replied. "An SS-rank mission: stopping Orochimaru from placing the cursed seal on Sasuke Uchiha."
As soon as he said that, the Konoha ninja of this world and the Suna siblings all froze.
"You're telling us that stopping a Hokage from dying is only an A-rank mission, but preventing Sasuke Uchiha from getting a cursed seal is an SS-rank mission?"
Temari frowned.
"I don't know how your village sets its mission standards, but an SS-rank mission sounds a bit… outrageous, doesn't it?"
"Exactly," Kankurō agreed. "The highest-level missions in our village only go up to S-rank."
Shino Aburame's small black sunglasses caught a glint of light.
"Then what's the lowest-level mission in that scroll? And what's the mission reward?"
His question was reasonable. Knowing the lowest and highest tiers would give a rough idea of how the rewards were distributed in between.
Shikamaru Nara, however, suspected that if the reward for an A-rank mission wasn't money but something like sending people to another era, then guessing the value distribution would be nearly impossible.
"The lowest is a D-rank mission," Naruto answered. "The mission reward is the equivalent of one million ryō in gold coins."
Naruto Uzumaki sucked in a sharp breath and excitedly asked how many D-rank missions he had completed.
"Between Obito and me, only three or four," Naruto said. "Most of our missions were A-rank."
"So every A-rank mission is like this one?" Naruto Uzumaki asked.
"Yeah, all of them involve time travel," Naruto replied. "That's why we know everything we just told you."
He then talked about traveling back to the time of Gaara's birth and the moment Yashamaru was ordered to test Gaara.
The Naruto of this world listened, completely stunned.
The distance wasn't that far. As they drew closer to Konoha, Naruto suddenly felt a strange sense of nervous anticipation and hesitantly asked about his father…
…
Meanwhile, time rewound to shortly after the Sand and Sound ninja forces began their joint assault on Konoha.
Minato Namikaze arranged for Rin and Kakashi to head to the spectator stands to rescue civilians and defend against the attacking Sound and Sand ninja.
He himself, together with Obito Uchiha, went to stop Orochimaru and rescue the Third Hokage.
The moment the two arrived outside the Four Violet Flames Formation, Konoha's Hokage ANBU immediately blocked their path.
When they clearly saw who it was, the ANBU members froze in unison.
"F-Fourth… Fourth Hokage…?"
"Hokage-sama?!"
After a brief moment of shock, they snapped back to their senses.
"Wait! Don't fall for the enemy's trick!"
"That's right! The Fourth Hokage died sealing the Nine-Tails!"
"This man can't possibly be the Fourth Hokage!"
Minato Namikaze knew that if he didn't explain himself immediately, the ANBU would attack without hesitation.
"I'm sorry, everyone. There's no time to explain everything in detail right now. But I really am Minato Namikaze. I'm just not the Fourth Hokage of this world. I'm Minato from another parallel world who traveled here from the Third Shinobi World War."
The ANBU exchanged uncertain glances, unable to decide whether they should let the two pass.
The man before them looked exactly like the Fourth Hokage, yet the origin he described was simply too unbelievable.
Minato continued,
"This is the barrier technique known as the Four Violet Flames Formation. Under normal circumstances, the only way to break it is to kill the four ninja maintaining the formation from inside."
He looked toward the four corners of the barrier—the spider-like Kidōmaru, the only female ninja Tayuya, the symbiotic brothers Sakon and Ukon, and the largest of them all, Jirōbō.
At the center stood the leader of the Sound ninja, Orochimaru, confronting the Third Hokage.
"The situation is extremely unfavorable for the Third Hokage. Orochimaru clearly came prepared."
As he finished speaking…
The Sound Four at the corners of the barrier began forming hand seals from inside.
This was clearly part of Orochimaru's prearranged plan, meant to prevent the Third Hokage from targeting any one of them and collapsing the barrier.
"Ninja Art: Tile Shuriken!"
"Hidden Shadow Snake Hands!"
"Earth Release: Earth Substitution!"
Immediately followed by—
"Earth Release: Earth Flow River!"
And then—
"Earth Release: Earth Dragon Bullet! Fire Release: Fire Dragon Bullet!!"
In less than half a minute, the two Kage had already exchanged five or six different ninjutsu.
While the ANBU were still hesitating over whether to allow the man claiming to be Minato Namikaze from the Third Shinobi World War to approach, the Third Hokage and Orochimaru had already begun fighting.
The ANBU, along with Minato and Obito, were instantly drawn to the battle.
They saw the Third Hokage rip roof tiles free and hurl them like shuriken at Orochimaru. After dodging, Orochimaru countered with Hidden Shadow Snake Hands, biting into the Third Hokage.
The bitten Hokage instantly turned into black mud. His real body had already appeared beside Orochimaru, unleashing two Earth Release techniques and a Fire Release technique in rapid succession.
This was the first time Obito had ever seen the Third Hokage fight.
He asked Minato,
"Is the Third Hokage like Kakashi, someone who's proficient in two chakra natures?"
"No," Minato replied. "The Sarutobi clan's chakra is very well balanced. They usually train all five elemental nature transformations at the same time. The Third Hokage became famous precisely because he mastered all five."
Inside the barrier, Orochimaru appeared to be completely suppressed, unable to fight back.
Several ANBU couldn't help thinking that he truly lived up to the title of Hokage-sama.
Yet Minato Namikaze's expression showed no hint of relief.
"Orochimaru is an extremely cunning man. There's no way he'd be subdued by the Third Hokage so easily…"
Just as Minato suspected, the Third Hokage also knew Orochimaru wouldn't be dealt with that simply.
"Enough of this pointless performance," the Third Hokage said.
"So you saw through it," Orochimaru replied. "But using this kind of technique against me… aren't you underestimating me a bit?"
At the same time, both of them shed their outer disguises, revealing their battle-ready forms.
It was a clear signal that the real fight was about to begin.
Obito asked, "Minato-sensei, should I go in now?"
"We can wait a bit longer," Minato Namikaze said, watching the duel.
The Third Hokage and Orochimaru flared their chakra against each other. The tiles beneath their feet creaked and cracked, shattered fragments trembling until they actually floated up against gravity.
The ANBU ninja who had been guarding Minato and Obito were no longer focused on vigilance. Staring at the two figures, they murmured without realizing it.
"That's incredible…"
"Yeah, that chakra is on another level."
"It feels like even the air here is under pressure."
Obito Uchiha swallowed hard. Although his dōjutsu and Wood Release had greatly boosted his strength, when it came to combat experience, he was still inferior even to the younger Kakashi. Watching two Kage-level shinobi clash made him instinctively tense.
Hiruzen Sarutobi unleashed Shuriken Shadow Clone Jutsu, while Orochimaru—
"Summoning Jutsu: Edo Tensei!!"
"What?!" Obito blurted out. "He's already using Edo Tensei?!!"
One of the ANBU couldn't help turning back. "You know what Edo Tensei is?!"
But Obito had no time to explain.
If Orochimaru really summoned Minato-sensei of this world, along with the First and Second Hokage, it would be a nightmare to deal with.
Having gone through a similar battle before, he knew all too well how fast those Hokage were. With his current dōjutsu, he wouldn't even be able to track their movements.
"Obito!" Minato called.
"Got it!"
The young Obito Uchiha grabbed Minato Namikaze, instantly turning both of them intangible.
Under the stunned gazes of the three ANBU, the two passed straight through their bodies and charged toward the Four Violet Flames Formation created by the Sound Four.
At the same time, the three coffins that had begun rising were stopped by the Third Hokage. The coffin engraved with the character "four" was forcibly pressed back down.
Minato Namikaze took all of this in at a glance. He realized that aside from the Third Hokage's intervention, there was another reason. This world lacked that eerie photograph. The Fourth Hokage's soul, trapped within the Shinigami due to the Reaper Death Seal, was likely the true reason Orochimaru could not summon him with Edo Tensei.
Obito pulled Minato along, using the Mangekyō Sharingan's intangibility to pass straight through the Four Violet Flames Formation.
"Who's there?!" Kidōmaru shouted.
"Bastards! How did you get in?!" Tayuya snapped.
"They passed straight through the barrier from outside?!" Sakon and Ukon yelled. "Ghosts?!"
"Be careful!" Jirōbō warned.
Orochimaru and the Third Hokage both noticed them, their pupils shrinking sharply.
"Minato Namikaze?!"
"Minato?!"
At that moment, two coffin lids opened.
Creak… creak… bang!
Just like the scene they had experienced in their own era.
Standing inside one coffin was a man clad in red armor with long black hair, the shinobi revered as the God of Ninja—the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju.
Beside him stood the Second Hokage, Tobirama Senju, famed as the fastest shinobi in history, wearing blue armor with a large fur collar.
But unlike their world—
Orochimaru had never imagined that someone could break the rules of the barrier and appear directly inside the Four Violet Flames Formation.
He had certainly never expected to see Minato Namikaze, who had died twelve years ago.
As a result, the two Hokage had not yet had their wills stripped away.