"The noodles are too perfect."
Naruto pointed at the bowl.
"The texture of the noodles—perfect. Not too firm, not too soft. Exactly right. The fat-to-lean ratio of the chashu is a textbook-perfect fifty-fifty. The saltiness of the broth is measured down to the milligram. Did you use calipers to measure the thickness of the narutomaki?"
"Isn't that a good thing?"
"Of course not!"
Naruto slammed the table.
"This isn't Ichiraku Ramen at all!"
He stood up and pointed at Teuchi's illusion.
"The real Old Man Teuchi sometimes gets back pain when he kneads noodles because he's getting older! And when that happens, the noodles end up a little softer!"
"He cuts the chashu entirely by feel! Sometimes it's thick, sometimes it's thin! It's like opening a mystery box every time—that's the fun of it!"
"And when Ayame is helping at the shop, he's always in a good mood, so the broth ends up a little saltier because he adds an extra spoonful of soy sauce!"
"But if Ayame goes out on a date with somebody, he gets depressed, and the soup tastes so bland it's practically water!"
"Ramen isn't just a bunch of perfect data!"
"It's made by people!"
"It has feelings!"
"The flavor changes because of all sorts of random, ridiculous reasons!"
"You... you..."
Naruto scratched his head for several seconds, trying to find the right words.
"You ramen idiot!"
The entire illusion froze.
The smiles on the villagers' faces stiffened.
Even Minato and Kushina froze in place.
"I don't understand."
Kai's voice carried a level of confusion that had never existed before.
"I created a world without a single flaw for you. Yet you rejected it because of a ramen shop's imperfections. That is illogical."
"Logic?"
Naruto laughed.
It was the bright, foolish smile that only he could make.
"I don't know anything about logic!"
He pointed at the perfect world around him.
"Yeah, there's no pain here. No sadness. My parents are alive. Pervy Sage never died. Sasuke never left."
"But..."
The smile slowly faded from his face.
His eyes became serious.
"If I had never experienced the loneliness of being hated by the whole village, I never would have understood how warm it felt when Iruka-sensei bought me that first bowl of ramen."
"If I had never experienced the pain of losing Pervy Sage, I never would have understood how important his lesson of never giving up really was."
"If I hadn't fought that idiot Sasuke with everything I had, I never would have understood how precious our bond truly is!"
"Pain. Sadness. Failure."
"Yeah, they suck."
"They hurt."
"But it's because those things exist that we fight so hard to find happiness."
"It's because of them that we learn to treasure the people beside us!"
Naruto took a deep breath.
Golden Sage Mode exploded around him.
"A world without flaws."
"A world without pain."
"A world where everyone smiles like puppets."
He grinned.
Showing all his teeth.
"That sounds boring as hell!"
BOOM!
The perfect world shattered instantly.
Naruto returned to the battlefield.
But his presence was completely different now.
He was no longer defending.
He was challenging.
"Hey, you."
Naruto pointed straight at Kai's bewildered face.
"Have you ever fought with your friends over the last piece of meat?"
"Have you ever gotten yelled at after pulling a prank?"
"Have you ever eaten a bowl of ramen that tastes different every single day?"
"Your life sounds pretty pathetic."
"Pathetic?"
Kai slowly repeated the word.
As though trying to decode an entirely foreign language.
For the first time, cracks appeared in his eternally calm expression.
Not anger.
Not surprise.
But something closer to a computer freezing when confronted with an impossible command.
"My existence transcends every concept within your dimension."
"I am law."
"I am eternity."
"And you describe me as pathetic?"
"Yep. Totally pathetic."
Naruto planted his hands on his hips.
"Just look at yourself."
"You're all alone."
"You don't even have a single friend you can argue with."
"The worlds you create are so perfect they feel fake."
"You don't understand the best thing about this world."
"You don't understand that it's imperfect."
"Imperfection..."
Kai murmured.
"That's right!"
Naruto grew more excited with every word.
"Sasuke acts cool all the time, but he's actually awkward as hell inside!"
"Kakashi-sensei is lazy most of the time, but when it matters, he's unbelievably cool!"
"And Sakura—"
Naruto hesitated.
"Okay, sometimes she's terrifying... but she's reliable too!"
In the distance, both Sakura and Sasuke developed matching veins on their foreheads.
"And Pervy Sage was a shameless peeping tom, but he was still the teacher I respected most!"
"Granny Tsunade loses every bet she makes, but she was the best Hokage ever!"
"All those weird flaws and strengths mixed together!"
"That's what makes people human!"
"Those perfect dolls you created aren't alive at all!"
Naruto's voice grew louder and louder.
The golden chakra around him shone brighter and brighter.
This wasn't merely power.
It was his will.
Through the Six Paths Yang Power, his will resonated with the natural energy of the entire world.
The wind danced around him happily.
The earth pulsed beneath his feet.
Even the loose energy floating through the air began gathering toward him.
"Enough."
Kai interrupted.
"Your argument is filled with contradictions and fallacies."
"Imperfection creates suffering."
"Suffering creates conflict."
"Conflict creates destruction."
"That chain is inevitable."
"All I have done is sever it at its source."
"You're wrong!"
Naruto shouted back.
"Imperfection makes people want to become better!"
"Pain teaches people how to cherish what they have!"
"And conflict..."
"After conflict, if people can understand each other..."
"The bonds that come from it become even stronger!"
He raised his hand.
The golden sun mark on his palm blazed brilliantly.
"You're like some terrible programmer who only knows how to write 'Hello World'!"
Naruto proudly reused a term he had learned from Kai.
"You only understand simple things like zeroes and ones!"
"You don't understand that a messy world built out of countless bugs and patches is the toughest thing there is!"
"Because..."
Naruto grinned.
"We're our own administrators!"
"Sage Art: Universal Pull: Talk-no-Jutsu!"
He shouted the most ridiculous technique name imaginable.
But this time, he wasn't speaking reason.
He was releasing a call.
A call carrying every ounce of his will.
"Sasuke!"
"Yeah."
Sasuke understood immediately.
"Sakura! Kakashi-sensei!"
"We're here!"
"Gaara! Killer B! Everyone!"
Across the battlefield, every survivor—shinobi and samurai alike—turned toward Naruto.
"Lend me your strength!"
It wasn't an order.
It was a request.
The most sincere request one comrade could make to another.
Nobody hesitated.
Everyone's chakra.
Everyone's will.
Flowed through their bonds with Naruto and poured into the sun mark in his palm.
The golden sun was no longer Naruto's power alone.
It became a galaxy formed from countless lights.
Within it existed every person's hopes.
Every dream.
Every imperfection.
Every unique will.
"This is..."
The data-like distortions flickering across Kai's body became even more violent.
He couldn't understand it.
Why would these people willingly hand their power to an individual filled with so many "logical flaws"?
It violated the principle of maximum benefit.
It violated the law of energy conservation.
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