Chapter 421: A Shattered Timeline
"But before that, Boruto, put your headband away," Sasuke ordered, his voice dropping to a low, cautious murmur.
"In this time and space, we are undocumented ghosts. Once our identities are exposed, it will invite unnecessary trouble."
Boruto, usually prone to careless outbursts, swallowed his complaints. He recognized the grave edge in his mentor's tone. Without a word, he unknotted the Konoha headband from his forehead, the metal plate clinking softly as he shoved it deep into the folds of his jacket.
Pulling the hoods of their worn cloaks over their heads, the two disguised themselves as ordinary, road-weary travelers. They handled the dirt path leading out of the dense woods, making their way toward the hidden village.
However.
The moment they broke through the tree line and crested a high slope, the sprawling expanse of Konoha Village revealed itself in the distance.
Both of them froze. Their boots ground to a halt in the dirt.
"This..." Boruto's eyes stretched wide, reflecting the distant cliff face. He raised a trembling finger toward the village's most iconic landmark. "Uncle Sasuke..."
His voice wavered, thick with disbelief. "Is that... the Hokage Rock from my dad's time?"
Sasuke did not answer immediately. The shock paralyzing his chest was no less severe than his student's. In fact, it was infinitely deeper.
His lone visible eye locked onto the massive stone faces carved into the mountain, his mind plunging into a brief, violent state of cognitive dissonance.
First Hokage, Hashirama Senju.
Second Hokage, Tobirama Senju.
Fourth Hokage, Minato Namikaze.
Those three were perfectly normal. But the space between the Second and the Fourth—the space where the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, should have been immortalized in stone—was completely blank. It was smooth, untouched rock.
And right beside the Fourth Hokage's head...
There was a brand new face. It was young, yet its carved features radiated an unmistakable, majestic authority.
Where was Tsunade?
Where was the old man, the Third?
"Something is not right..." Sasuke's heart hammered against his ribs. A suffocating sense of wrongness enveloped him, prickling his skin. "The history here is completely different from what I know!"
"Uncle Sasuke, who is that Fifth Hokage?" Boruto scratched the back of his head, his brow furrowed in utter confusion. "I remember Dad saying that the Fifth Hokage was supposed to be Granny Tsunade. But why is there a man on the Hokage Rock?"
Sasuke drew in a slow, sharp breath, forcing the stormy waves of panic in his chest to settle. His jaw locked.
"Do not ask too many questions right now," he muttered, his gaze still fixed on that unfamiliar stone face. "The situation is far more complicated than I anticipated. We need to be absolutely invisible."
While Sasuke and Boruto grappled with the impossible monument, a few kilometers away in another stretch of dense forest, the fabric of reality tore open.
A jagged spatial crack hovered in the air, quietly healing as a figure stepped through.
Urashiki Otsutsuki floated effortlessly above the canopy. He wore a pristine white robe, a red fishing rod resting casually over his shoulder, and a matching red fishing basket strapped to his hip.
"Oh my..." Urashiki chuckled, his tone dripping with flippant amusement. "It seems that under the influence of that little toy, we have deviated slightly from the intended track."
He adjusted his grip on the rod, entirely unbothered. "But it hardly matters. As long as I can extract the Nine-Tails' chakra, I could not care less which era this is."
With a lazy smirk, Urashiki activated his Byakugan. The veins around his pale eyes bulged, his vision piercing through the forest, sweeping across the landscape to pinpoint the Jinchuriki's location.
However.
The very next second, the arrogant smirk vanished from his face.
"This... what is this?"
His Byakugan, capable of seeing the complex flow of all chakra, snapped toward the Hokage Building in the absolute center of Konoha Village.
There, dormant but pulsing like a caged, scorching sun, lay a chakra so unimaginably terrifying that Urashiki's own heart skipped a beat.
The sheer density and quality of that energy...
"This feeling..." Urashiki's breath hitched. "Six Paths Power?"
It was not just any Six Paths Power. It was overwhelmingly pure, suffocatingly domineering, and violently absolute.
A cold bead of sweat slid down Urashiki's pale forehead. As a high-ranking member of the Otsutsuki Clan, he was naturally arrogant, but he was far from stupid.
"How could a lower life form of this primitive era possess such monstrous power?"
Every trace of his previous flippancy evaporated, instantly replaced by a deep, primal wariness. His knuckles turned white around his fishing rod.
"It seems I cannot act rashly," he muttered to himself, his eyes darting around the forest. "I need to conceal myself and observe the situation first."
Urashiki's figure began to blur.
"Yomotsu Hirasaka."
A pitch-black spatial portal ripped open behind him. Without a second of hesitation, Urashiki dove into the void, completely erasing his presence from the world.
Inside Konoha Village.
The bustling streets were a cacophony of life. Merchants shouted their daily deals, children laughed as they ran past stalls, and the scent of grilled meat and sweet dango filled the air.
Sasuke and Boruto walked with their heads bowed, their worn cloaks swallowing their figures. They stuck to the edges of the thoroughfare, trying desperately to lower their presence and blend into the vibrant crowd.
But every step they took challenged their fundamental understanding of reality.
This Konoha was far too prosperous.
The avenues were wide, paved, and immaculately clean, flanked by towering, well-maintained shops. The faces of the pedestrians were not just happy; they radiated a deep sense of security, confidence, and pride.
"Make way, make way!"
"Do not block the road!"
Suddenly, the dense crowd ahead parted like the sea, villagers stepping aside with respectful urgency.
A squad of shinobi marched down the center of the street. Their steps were orderly, sharp, and carried an air of absolute authority. They wore deep blue, high-collared uniforms. Emblazoned proudly on their backs was a crest—a red and white fan.
The Uchiha Military Police Force.
Seeing that painfully familiar clan crest, Sasuke's body jerked. Beneath the heavy fabric of his cloak, he began to tremble.
'Uchiha... Military Police Force!'Sasuke's lone eye widened, his pupils contracting into pinpricks.'How is this possible...?'
In his memory, the Uchiha Clan of this era had been slaughtered. Reduced to corpses in the dead of night. Aside from himself and Itachi, there should not have been a single survivor walking these streets.
Yet, right before his eyes, an entire squad of living, breathing Uchiha clansmen patrolled the village.
Every single one of them exuded vitality. Their dark eyes reflected an innate, unshakeable pride. And the surrounding villagers? When they looked at the patrol, there was no hidden disgust, no whispered fear, no underlying suspicion.
Instead, their eyes held genuine awe and... admiration?
This relentless barrage of impossible information threw Sasuke's mind into absolute chaos.
What on earth had happened to this world?
"Uncle Sasuke, what is wrong?" Boruto noticed the older man's rigid posture and tugged worriedly at his sleeve. "Your face looks terrible. You are completely pale."
Sasuke took a ragged breath, forcing his lungs to work, forcing his racing mind to anchor itself.
"It is nothing," he lied, his voice strained. "It is just... some things are far beyond my expectations."
Right then, a bright, childish voice rang out from the side of the street.
"Daddy! I want a piggyback ride!"
Sasuke turned his head instinctively.
A few paces away, a middle-aged Uchiha clansman, fully dressed in the Military Police uniform, laughed warmly. He reached down and hoisted his young son up, swinging the boy over his shoulders with practiced ease.
"Alright, alright, up you go!" the man cheered, adjusting the boy on his back. "In the future, Kosuke must also be just like Daddy and become an elite of the Military Police to guard Konoha!"
"Yeah!" the boy cheered, throwing his small hands into the air. "I want to become a great Uchiha, just like Hokage-sama!"
The middle-aged man laughed heartily, his dark eyes crinkling with deep affection and a bright longing for the future.
Watching this mundane, beautiful scene, a trace of indescribable bitterness clawed at Sasuke's throat. His lone eye softened, reflecting a pain he had buried decades ago.
Living Uchihas.
Happy Uchihas.
No massacre. No festering hatred. No bloody night under a full moon.
"This world..." Sasuke murmured to himself, the words barely escaping his lips. "What exactly happened here?"
That man carved onto the Hokage Rock. That Fifth Hokage of the Uchiha Clan.
Who exactly was he?
Was he the one who had changed all of this?
While Sasuke stood frozen, lost in the turbulent sea of his own thoughts, the crowd further down the street suddenly parted once more.
Footsteps approached. Slow, deliberate, and heavy with an icy arrogance.
A black-haired youth stepped into view. He wore a high-collared, short-sleeved black shirt, a long blade strapped securely across his back. His face was a mask of absolute coldness.
The youth's dark eyes were sharp as daggers, and his entire being exuded a chilling, unapproachable aura that silently warned everyone around him to keep their distance.
The moment Boruto laid eyes on the approaching figure, his jaw dropped. He inhaled sharply, ready to yell.
"That is—!"
Before the sound could even leave the boy's throat, Sasuke's hand clamped down hard over Boruto's mouth. In one fluid motion, the older ninja dragged his student backward, melting into the deep shadows of a nearby alleyway.
Sasuke's heart pounded against his ribs as he watched the youth walk past.
That was... his younger self.
The Uchiha Sasuke of this world.
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