A patch of marshy ground spread out beneath his feet….
A familiar spatial rhythm rippled into the air….
Minato's vision flickered. The boy beside him gave him a small smile. With a hook of the Nen line in his hand, Roy abruptly dragged Rin underground—then reappeared…
…already a full hundred meters ahead!
"Space-time ninjutsu?!" Minato kept running to chase, but his mind froze. He stared blankly at Roy pulling Rin farther and farther away, leaving him behind.
"Yellow Flash" was a title built on one thing: speed. Minato's two signature trump cards were the Rasengan, and—
space-time ninjutsu, the Flying Thunder God.
That technique, originally developed by the Second Hokage, had crushed the dreams of countless elite shinobi. In all of Konoha, the number of people who could truly use it could be counted on one hand. That was how absurdly high the talent requirement was.
"F…Flying Thunder God?"
Thump, thump… Because Minato had hesitated, Kakashi and Obito finally seized a sliver of opportunity and caught up. They ran side by side, still clearly divided… yet both sets of eyes were locked on the same target—
The boy who kept slipping into and out of the surface and underground, or crawling out of a boulder, a tree trunk, even a stream.
Kakashi blurted the thought aloud—then immediately rejected it.
No kunai. No markings. This wasn't his teacher's Flying Thunder God at all.
This was some other unknown space-time technique.
The white-haired boy's throat bobbed. He swallowed hard behind his dark-blue mask.
His eyes stayed glued to Roy pulling farther away. Then he tilted his head toward Obito and asked, "Are you two really from the same Uchiha clan?"
Obito—already furious because Rin was being dragged away—snapped, "What's that supposed to mean?!"
Kakashi didn't answer. He only flicked Obito a quick look and looked forward again.
That silent contempt would normally hit Obito like a clay bomb tossed straight into his heart—instant detonation.
But today, in this gentle morning deep in the lush Southern Forest, Obito—goggles on—didn't react at all. If anything, he was even quieter than Kakashi. He only poured more strength into his legs and chased forward—chasing Rin, and also, somehow, chasing Uchiha Ren.
"…What is wrong with him?" Kakashi was stunned by Obito's abnormal calm.
Where did the usual idiot go—who exploded at the smallest insult?
Why did Obito become so docile whenever that boy appeared—like some sheep whose back had been stroked smooth?
Confusion hit Kakashi like a wave.
Even worse was the one watching from behind the curtain—
Sarutobi Hiruzen.
Or rather—
"I'm not 'snooping.' I'm openly observing."
In the Hokage's office, Hiruzen sat behind his massive desk. He remembered the moment Ren had met Shisui unexpectedly and thrown him that warning look. His old eyes gleamed as he locked onto the crystal ball.
He watched Roy sink, surface, sink again, surface again—and his pipe seemed forgotten in his mouth. After a long while, he finally took a slow puff and exhaled a heavy cloud of smoke.
"Is he doing this on purpose… for me to see?"
"What a space-time technique…."
If Hiruzen had still harbored even the smallest doubt that Fugaku might be "training" this child into what he was, that doubt was gone now.
A child who could wield space-time ninjutsu this naturally wasn't something even Hiruzen the "Professor" could teach.
Not to mention: space-time techniques were precious. Across the entire shinobi world there were only a handful—if you excluded common "summoning" techniques.
A gust of wind lifted the edge of the scroll spread across his desk. On the back, in bold characters, Roy's name stood out:
Uchiha Ren.
Hiruzen stared, pen in hand, ink drying at the tip. He wanted to add another line to the dossier—and yet, for once, he didn't know what to write.
A normal seven-year-old was still learning the Transformation Technique and practicing shuriken throws in the academy.
But that boy—carrying Rin—was slipping through stone, trees, water, paths like it was flat ground, while also inventing space-time ninjutsu.
If Tobirama were resurrected and sat in this very chair, he probably wouldn't believe it.
That was genius.
Genius on the level of the Senju—an Uchiha genius.
Whoosh—whoosh…
Deep in the Southern Forest, as Kakashi and Obito sprinted with logs on their shoulders and shot past a blond man like a gust of wind—
Minato finally snapped out of his shock.
He had always thought space-time ninjutsu was his domain. More than once, he'd imagined passing it down to a student.
But Kakashi couldn't. Obito couldn't. Rin couldn't.
And now—
Minato raised his chin and watched Roy hauling Rin through the forest until their silhouettes were nearly gone.
Then he smiled—wide, bright, and genuinely happy.
He slapped his hip pouch and flicked out a kunai etched with the Flying Thunder God formula, sending it whistling forward!
Blond hair swayed. Minato vanished—
And reappeared at the kunai's mark.
Then another throw, another flash.
Throw. Flash.
Throw. Flash.
A thousand meters became a few steps.
In the span of a breath, Minato caught up and appeared beside Roy again.
Green flak jacket, blue headband, lake-blue eyes shining with interest—
Minato felt the space rhythm around Roy and praised him openly:
"Amazing space-time technique."
"Using objects as your 'entrances' and 'exits,' skipping the need for a marker… that's a genius-level idea."
It was exactly as Minato said: compared to Flying Thunder God's targeted "instant body technique," Swamp Space skipped chakra marking entirely. It was far simpler.
But—just like the "equivalent exchange" principle in the Hunter world—power always came with risk, restriction, and trade-offs.
Swamp Space was freer, yes…
…but its distance was shorter too. Your line of sight was the limit. It couldn't match Flying Thunder God's long-range relocation.
"This is my fastest right now," Roy admitted. "Three hundred meters is my limit."
(And also the limit of what his En could reliably cover,) he added silently.
Minato stepped with Roy through another "jump." He glanced at Rin—still bound at the waist by that line, her face faintly dazed—and smiled.
"That's already very impressive—especially since you're carrying someone."
Am I even still a person…? Rin's head buzzed.
Wind in her ears, clouds in the sky, sunlight on her skin—
Her short brown hair was damp, pearls of water still dripping from where she'd been dragged through a stream. Listening to Roy and her teacher chatting casually, Rin felt less like a human being and more like—
A worm.
A worm that burrowed through earth, swam through water, chewed through trees and stones.
It was surreal. And strangely exhilarating.
So this was what "earth" felt like.
So this was what "water" felt like.
So this was what "wood" felt like—
I'm done being human, Rin's brain declared.
The brief space-time slips flooded her with a kind of thrill she'd never felt before. For the first time, she truly understood:
Uchiha Ren wasn't normal.
Pff—
The line at her waist twitched. Rin yelped as Roy dragged her underground again—soil roaring past like air—
Then she surfaced, and Roy hauled her forward another hundred meters. He shook his head at Minato.
"You overpraise me. I'm just taking shortcuts."
He was borrowing the "shortcut" of the Swamp Demon's blood art—copied through the Monster Codex. It wasn't truly his original creation, so he didn't see it as something to boast about.
Minato's eyes rippled with thought. He caught the sincerity in Roy's voice and asked, probing gently:
"Then… you're not satisfied?"
Satisfied?
Roy thought of his great-grandfather's words: imagination leads to imitation, then surpassing, then creation.
But Roy was still at the "imitating the Swamp Demon" stage. Not creation. Not even true surpassing—just enhancing it with En.
So what was there to be satisfied about?
Roy didn't answer. He just kept running—log on his shoulder, Rin on the line—through the endless Southern Forest.
One lap. Two. Three.
For someone whose physique had broken 1000, whose potential aura had reached B-rank, this was barely more than a breath.
Roy kept quiet, leaving Minato frowning in thought.
They crossed a stream. Water rushed and babbled around their calves.
Minato looked at Roy and said, as if testing a theory:
"Maybe the problem isn't the technique."
"Maybe it's the person."
Person… technique…?
Roy froze. His timing slipped. The "door" opened a fraction too slowly.
Rin was still half underground—her head popped out into the stream, and she swallowed a huge mouthful of water.
"Cough—cough—cough!"
Roy snapped back, sped up, and yanked her fully out of the water.
"Sorry."
Both boys stopped. Roy pulled out a cloth—his mother Mikoto had packed it for him—and offered it.
Rin, flustered and drenched, lowered her eyes and refused softly. "It's okay… I have one."
She wiped herself, cheeks burning. Minato watched and, for a second, felt like he'd been thrown back to the day he first met Kushina—beating up classmates with terrifying confidence.
"Ha… I never said you could stop," Minato teased, shamelessly blinking at them.
Roy gave Rin a helpless look and said gently, "Let's go."
Rin's voice was tiny. "Mm."
She shouldered the log again, and Roy dragged her into motion—up, down, in, out—as they ran.
Four laps. Five. Six.
Wind screamed past their ears. Roy kept thinking about Minato's words.
Finally, he asked, "Sensei… what's 'the person,' and what's 'the technique'?"
Minato gave him a smile that felt deeper than the joke on his lips.
"A person is a person."
"But a technique… isn't always just a technique."
"Or rather—techniques are also people."
"They're what people imagine, then solidify through chakra."
Chakra solidify? ✗
Nen manifestation? ✓
Roy's brows knit. Something—faint and slippery—started to form in his mind.
He remembered debating "heart" with Silva. Late-night stargazing with Wutong. His great-grandfather's lectures about "the person's visualization."
A familiar, half-forgotten answer rose from deep inside.
"It's the sun," Roy murmured, eyes suddenly bright.
"The sun—everywhere."
Just like the Swamp Demon used "swamp" to enable "teleportation," reflecting mud and filth—
Roy's teleportation should be the sun.
My shifting should be the sun.
A stronger space rhythm exploded outward.
Minato's eyes widened.
Roy lifted a foot—
And in that instant his body turned to light.
A breeze scattered him into glittering motes that blended into sunlight itself. Was he sunlight? Was sunlight him?
Minato tried to track him—
And then Roy stepped out of sunlight a full thousand meters away.
"This—"
Minato stopped dead, squinting hard.
Rin followed as well, turning into a small flare of light that appeared behind Roy. She froze, blinking, suddenly feeling unreal—as if her body had lost weight.
"L-light…?" she whispered, dazed.
"Did I just turn into… a beam of light?"
She stared at Roy up ahead, who had stopped too—eyes closed, quietly tasting whatever he'd just done.
In that moment, punishment and laps stopped mattering.
Only light remained.
Blinding light.
Overwhelming light.
Light that felt eternal—
And like a blade.
A blade that crossed time itself and, through the Telescope Technique, stabbed Sarutobi Hiruzen straight through the heart.
~~~
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