"There's no need to feel awkward about it,"
Link said with a smile. How could he let them work for free just to consume his own favors? A little bit of contribution is irrelevant to someone at his level, outside the normal system of contribution points.
And now that the Frog House has effectively become a gathering place for members of Akatsuki, who knows if more three-man squads will join in the future—it's definitely a force worth drawing in.
"Whatever reward you're owed, you should get. After all, if you don't come, I'd be paying someone else anyway."
He persuaded them.
"Besides, the faster you gather enough contribution points, the sooner you can resurrect the Second Parallel World's Nagato, right?"
Little Yahiko looked uneasy. Since the Main World's Nagato had given up his Rinnegan and earned a fair amount of contribution in return, Frog House wasn't too far off from reaching the Reincarnation quota. Otherwise, they wouldn't all be working so intently to rack up points.
And the closer you are to your goal, the more you want to reach it as soon as possible.
"All settled. You come help first; once the others return, call them all over too," Link cut straight to the point.
"How can we accept that…?"
Little Yahiko, reduced in size by his Reincarnated body, revealed a slightly childlike bashfulness like someone receiving a New Year's gift, sounding more and more embarrassed as he spoke in a small voice.
In fact, Link wanted to reach out and pat Yahiko's shoulder, but looking at their relative heights, he might not even be able to reach him.
Hmph, it's all because this little Yahiko is too short!
Link changed the topic:
"Oh, right. I recently explored a new parallel world which I'm calling 'World #4.' This morning, on my way back, I 'invited' that world's Nagato and Konan to come here."
"They're both resting in the hospital now. If you're interested, maybe you'd like to go talk with them."
Little Yahiko hesitated a moment at his phrasing "invited," but thought: No point quibbling over small details with a benefactor.
"Alright, I'll go speak with them," he answered quickly. Given his experiences and the role he plays in Frog House, his main concern is straightforward: as long as everyone can live happily, that's good enough.
As for the matter of achieving peace, well, frankly speaking, their small group at the moment can't really sway the situation on a grand scale.
"Sounds good. In that case, we won't bother you. There's still plenty to do in the Main World's village," Link rose to his feet and, seeing Jiraiya's lingering look at his disciple, added:
"Once you're ready, just go find him at the Hokage's office."
Jiraiya let out a wry smile. In just a few days, he'd plunged into a living hell called "work," where there was no time left for collecting research materials… or writing his novel. Practically no breaks at all.
Indeed, using the Network for official tasks had improved efficiency, so he couldn't find any excuse to sneak away—he had to stay available at all times. Presently, he was nominally the Hokage's assistant, but functionally the Hokage in all but name.
Because the Sixth Hokage spent every day acting more like a hands-off boss; he even gave Jiraiya the official seal to sign documents.
After stepping outside, Link took out the scroll for the Funa-tsū and brought Jiraiya back to the Main World. The second they landed, Link's shadow rose to support his feet, allowing him to put on a dignified "Hokage" look and pat Jiraiya on the shoulder encouragingly:
"Hang in there. In two years, when I retire, I'll hand the position over to you."
After saying that, he strolled away at an unhurried pace.
Jiraiya recalled the Sixth Hokage's pretense of maturity and felt an urge to laugh, but then remembered his own fate—forced to labor as an assistant for who knows how long, and likely coerced into becoming Hokage in the future—so the laughter wouldn't come.
He glanced around: no one else was present. Maybe there's time to slip away for some fun…? But just then, a flood of messages came pouring in on the Network, all at once.
"Sigh, so that's the 'superior efficiency' of the Network at work."
He ground his teeth slightly. Such is the advancement of the era; it leaves no room for the Fifth Hokage Tsunade's frequent absentee style.
Meanwhile, Link thought:
There's no way I'll be the one putting in hours and hours of desk work.
A short while later, he walked leisurely, scroll in hand, to the Seventh Training Ground.
The threat in World #4 had been dealt with so smoothly that many backup plans weren't even used. And since not everyone can go without sleep day and night, the Inter-World Exploration Squad had not departed again after that day.
All the other timeline worlds were still in their pre-Shippūden phase. Even if time were flowing in sync, there was still a long way to go before the Fourth Great Ninja War. No need to rush.
After more than a dozen prior crossings, he'd visited many iconic timeline points and made some changes. For example, the timeline where the Uchiha Massacre was approaching got adjusted when Itachi and Shisui never died, and Danzō was conveniently taken out by Link.
During the Nine-Tails incident, he harvested large chunks of the beast's chakra.
During the Konoha Crush, Orochimaru never got the chance to proceed—Link sealed him with the Five Elements Seal plus Body Pathway Derangement Jutsu, captured him, and transferred him to another world. Hard to say whether Orochimaru could resurrect through Anko's curse mark.
In many worlds where tragedies were about to happen, he intervened. Without letting events reach the Shippūden timeline, there's a time buffer of a few years. No need to go over right away.
Reflecting on it, the mutated Impure World Reincarnation can send people to other worlds, but evidently only certain Naruto parallels. Once he's done exploring all the major tragic "time points," if he wanted to see entirely new Naruto parallels, there's no telling where he'd end up. That could be dangerous, he thought.
For now, it can all proceed slowly—take it one step at a time.
He checked his watch. The group from the Final Chapter World would come to pick him up in about an hour. In principle, everything should go through a proper procedure under the Allied Force system. Even Link isn't exempt from the rules.
They'll come for me, he mused, then we'll do some stuff over there, so I've got to wait a bit.
He found a boulder, used Replacement to swallow one chunk of the leftover tailed beast chakra block. His skin reddened and steam rose off his body as he resumed reading his own handwritten notes.
Given how strong his body has become, he doesn't need any special cooling jutsu to withstand swallowing tailed beast chakra's side effects. But that also means the effect of strengthening each time is weakening. Perhaps soon enough it will no longer work at all.
In any case, that was all in the future. For now, he just had to wait for the Final Chapter allied squad to arrive.
~~~
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