The wind didn't follow them this time.It knew better.
Naruto and Fū vanished from the Land of Iron like ghosts through smoke—leaving behind collapsed pillars, broken stone, and a silence no Kage dared to disturb.
No pursuit.
Only fear.
Naruto's chakra had marked the world again. And this time, no one could pretend not to feel it.
They reached the base two days later.
A carved fortress built into the spine of a dead mountain, hidden between borders—never mapped, never spoken of.
Naruto called it "The Hollow."
Fū had never seen it before.
It wasn't just a hideout.It was a grave.A sanctuary.A forge.
Walls made of obsidian plates layered with sealing arrays. Aether-script burned into stone. Storage vaults housing scrolls, chakra constructs, lost Uzumaki relics. The air buzzed faintly—alive with spiritual energy. At the core, a room of silence—his chamber.
Where he went to bleed.To heal.To remember.
Fū followed him in silence, eyes wide. She had seen many things in her life—Chōmei had shown her distant peaks, strange realms—but nothing like this.
"This is yours?" she whispered.
Naruto didn't respond at first. He pulled off his cloak, letting it fall onto a rune-inscribed chair.
"I built it. From stone. From hate. From purpose."
Fū stood behind him quietly.
"Did you build it alone?"
"…Kurama helped."
That night, Naruto lit a single chakra flame in the center of the base's inner chamber. Fū knelt across from him, pulling out her med-nin scroll kit.
Between them: a small obsidian box, wrapped in seals.
Inside it: Shisui Uchiha's Sharingan.
It glowed softly, the tomoe swirling faintly even outside of a body—preserved in stasis.
Naruto didn't flinch.
He sat cross-legged, body steady, expression cold.
Fū's hands trembled slightly as she activated her chakra threads.
"Are you sure?" she asked.
"Yes."
"This will hurt."
"I know."
The surgery wasn't easy.
The nerves around the eye had to be carefully connected to his existing chakra network. But Naruto's regeneration was enhanced by his Uzumaki lineage and years of customized training. His chakra adapted fast. The seal Fū crafted stabilized the connection.
His right eye was bandaged by the end of it.
Sweat coated his neck.But he didn't collapse.Didn't even hiss.
Fū tied the last band and sat back.
"You're done."
Naruto nodded slowly.
The seal on his hand pulsed once—accepting the chakra of the transplanted eye.
"It's… quiet," he said. "Like it's waiting."
They spent the night in silence.
Naruto sat cross-legged near the wall, eyes closed, meditating.
Kurama stirred inside him.
"So you took it."
"I needed it."
"You always think you need more."
Naruto opened his eye.
"Wouldn't you?"
Kurama didn't answer.
But the silence that followed wasn't angry.
Across the chamber, Fū curled in her makeshift bedding, watching him.
Something had changed in Naruto since Gaara.
Since her.
He wasn't soft.Not even close.
But something inside him had stopped sinking.
He no longer looked like he wanted to disappear.
And she… didn't want to be alone anymore.
Not if this was what companionship could feel like.
She whispered before sleep took her:
"If I become a monster too… will you still keep me close?"
Naruto, eyes still closed, replied:
"Yes."
The next morning, Naruto stood at the altar of the Hollow, eyes closed. The bandage around his right eye still held.
But the chakra beneath it stirred—like a tide building beneath glass.
The power wasn't awake yet.
It needed a moment.
A trigger.
Soon, it would come.
Her name was Konan.
And her mind would be the first to test the eye.
And from it—
His true evolution would begin.