Chapter 489: Even If It Costs Your Life… Then What?
"Kakashi-sensei, don't be scared, it's me."
"I did it too, Kakashi-sensei!"
Konohamaru's voice came from the side.
Everyone turned to look. Konohamaru had stood up, with a toad on one shoulder and a small monkey on the other.
"Konohamaru? It's you? Are you trying to use the Thousand Years of Death on me too? Wait, that's not right—why are you touching me?"
Guy froze completely.
He had thought it was a ghost, but it turned out to be Konohamaru, who had also somehow mastered Sage Mode.
"Uh… sorry."
Konohamaru scratched his head awkwardly and apologized.
"I heard Kakashi-sensei explain how Frog Kata works, and I got curious, so I tried it too."
"But since Guy-sensei is an elder, I stopped halfway. So it ended up just becoming a touch."
"..."
"Alright."
Guy had a very good temper, so after Konohamaru explained, he didn't mind it anymore.
"Wait a second, Konohamaru… is your Frog Kata range really that long?"
Kakashi suddenly noticed something was off.
Frog Kata could be thought of as an invisible layer wrapped around the whole body.
Kakashi had only used Frog Kata's "Thousand Years of Death" during close combat with Guy.
But Konohamaru wasn't even on the battlefield. In fact, they had deliberately moved farther away so as not to disturb him.
So how did he even reach them?
"I don't know either. Maybe because Enra can turn into an Adamantine Staff, it can extend?"
Konohamaru tilted his head in confusion as well.
"…Forget it. Naruto, your turn to work."
After thinking for a moment, Kakashi gave up.
He didn't even have more knowledge about Sage Mode than Naruto did. If Konohamaru himself didn't know, how could he?
"Eh?"
Naruto didn't expect his happy break time to end so quickly. With a bitter face, he shuffled over and pulled out a blank scroll from behind him.
He was about to start writing down the Sage Mode manual and techniques.
"Come on, Guy, Lee, you two come here too and listen."
Kakashi called Guy and Rock Lee over.
A group of them gathered together and began a Sage Mode meeting.
Kakashi, in order to better become a "writer" in the ninja world—and maybe even write a proper book one day—had studied a lot in this area. Now he was using the opportunity to teach Naruto how to write it down properly.
Under Kakashi's guidance, Naruto began recording everything.
From his own experiences, to Kakashi's, to Konohamaru's.
Guy and Rock Lee, upon hearing Naruto's "shortcut method", both blushed deeply. Two grown men—one big, one small—who had never even held a girl's hand.
After finishing, Naruto tossed the pen into the air and collapsed backward, looking completely exhausted.
With the body of the Uzumaki clan, he could make thousands of shadow clones without issue, but after just one hour of writing, he felt like he was about to die.
At first, he wanted to rest after ten minutes, but Kakashi shut him down with a single sentence: "Can't even handle this little inconvenience? Naruto, do you still want to become Hokage? A Hokage has to learn far more than this."
After the end of the Valley of the End, Naruto had been forced by Iruka to study countless boring books in order to become a chūnin, learning all kinds of knowledge.
But clearly, Naruto eventually slipped away from it.
Because in the Boruto era, Naruto personally told the younger generation that before becoming Hokage, he was still a genin.
Meaning he never actually made it to jōnin.
He remained, along with Sasuke, at the highest combat rank of Konoha—Genin.
Unfortunately, once Naruto became Hokage and Sasuke became the Shadow Hokage, they lost the status of "strongest genin", and were defeated accordingly—one without eyes, the other without a tail. Very normal.
Luckily, Naruto's stubborn determination was still holding strong right now. He endured it for the sake of becoming Hokage.
At last, he completed an epic work on par with Konoha's sealing techniques:
"The Naruto Sage Mode Secret Grand Manual."
The next task was to spread this secret manual to the other ninja villages.
Kakashi and Konohamaru volunteered to act as Naruto's escorts, accompanying him to spread the teachings across the ninja world—essentially retracing the path of the Sage of Six Paths.
Long ago, the Sage of Six Paths traveled the world, spreading chakra to every corner.
Now, Naruto—as the reincarnation of Asura, son of the Sage of Six Paths—would once again embark on this journey, spreading senjutsu chakra everywhere.
What a fated, epic story!
Kakashi wanted to follow not only because of that, but because his urge to write a novel had grown stronger. He decided to record everything.
Starting with that very opening line.
He planned to take it to a publisher later and see what kind of response he would get.
Guy and Lee took copies of Naruto's secret manual and returned to Konoha, both red-faced.
Tenten and Neji came to ask them about it, but neither of them dared to say much.
After finally managing to fool Tenten away, Rock Lee reluctantly shared the manual with Neji.
"What?! That perverted Naruto—I knew he was a creep! I'm going to report him to the Hokage!"
Neji was shocked at first, then suddenly understood, and then became furious.
After all, he had once personally witnessed what Naruto and Boruto had done.
"Neji, don't go! The Hokage approved this!"
Guy quickly stopped him.
"W-What?"
Neji was truly stunned this time.
The Hokage… approved?
Approved this?
Neji couldn't describe how he felt.
If he had to summarize it in one sentence—Has even the Hokage been corrupted by fate?
In Three words—Konoha is finished.
"Neji, you should understand. The Third Hokage and Asuma both died at the hands of the Ōtsutsuki. Against even a weakened Ōtsutsuki, they had no ability to resist."
"If we want to protect what we care about, we must make sacrifices."
"Neji… are you willing to give your life to protect the people you care about?"
Guy asked him solemnly, delivering a soul-piercing question.
"Of course I am!"
Neji answered without hesitation. This wasn't even really setting a flag—most people would say the same. You can't aim after shooting the arrow.
"Then that's right. If you can give up your life, can't you also give up a little… dignity?"
"Th-this…"
Neji hesitated.
——
Meanwhile, Kakashi took the written opening and went to the publishing house.
Naruto and Konohamaru were shopping for travel supplies, preparing for their journey.
Although they could use the Flying Thunder Formation to teleport, that only reduced travel time—they would still need to stay in other villages for a while.
"Hello, sir. This is something a friend of mine wrote. Could you take a look?"
Kakashi handed the manuscript to the familiar publishing house owner.
To avoid damaging his existing reputation from the "Buff Man" series and the Infinite Tsukuyomi series, Kakashi made sure to say it was written by a friend.
(End of this chapter)