Chapter 580: One and a Half Years, Speculations on Time
[Current Research Subject: The Origin of Time]
[Research Progress: 3%]
"Hiss..."
Kenichi stared at the research interface in front of him and scratched his head.
"It's been a full year and a half, and I've only reached three percent?"
"Is the power of time really that difficult to study?"
He genuinely had not expected progress to be this slow.
After spending a year and a half researching the fundamental nature of time, his progress had only reached three percent.
That averaged out to roughly two percent per year.
At that rate, completely researching the origin of time would require around fifty years.
Fifty years.
How many periods of fifty years did a person even have in one lifetime?
More importantly, even if Kenichi was willing to patiently conduct research for another fifty years, he did not necessarily have that much time available.
Judging by what he remembered from Boruto, Isshiki would probably begin making serious moves within another thirty or forty years.
Perhaps even sooner.
Kenichi simply did not have the luxury of spending half a century researching time at a leisurely pace.
Unless...
He abandoned everything else.
He could hide on the Moon, quietly observe the passage and changes of time, and refuse to interfere with anything until he fully understood its essence.
Then, once he completely mastered time, he could go back and change the past.
But Kenichi had a vague feeling that there was a fundamental problem with that idea.
For example, when he had been thrown through time and arrived in this world, it appeared that he had traveled toward the future.
But in reality, he had arrived in a completely different future.
A future belonging to another version of the Naruto world.
That made Kenichi suspect that even if he eventually mastered the power of time, truly reversing time might still be impossible.
Perhaps what appeared to be traveling into the past was actually nothing more than moving into another universe on a different timeline.
And that universe would likely become a completely new world line rather than the original one.
Kenichi's conclusion was not entirely baseless speculation.
He had several theoretical reasons for thinking so.
First:
He currently possessed a time machine, and his research ability had already begun analyzing the essence of time.
Second:
The future unquestionably existed.
But returning to the past might be a false proposition.
Kenichi had already begun researching the essence of time, yet no future version of himself had ever appeared in this timeline.
Nor had any future Kenichi left behind research notes, papers, experimental records, or other materials for his present self.
Third:
His research ability would neither become interrupted nor arbitrarily fail.
Therefore, since his future self had never appeared here and handed over completed research, Kenichi could draw several possible conclusions.
The first possibility was that his future self never succeeded in fully researching the essence of time.
Perhaps the research eventually became stuck at a certain stage and could no longer advance.
As a result, his future self never gained the ability to freely jump backward through time and appear before his current self.
The second possibility was much more interesting.
Returning to the past simply could not be done.
After all, even if his future self failed to fully master the essence of time, he would still possess two time machines.
With those machines available, an unlimited number of attempts should eventually allow a future Kenichi to travel back to this exact point.
Yet no such person had ever appeared.
Kenichi looked at the research data in front of him and fell into deep thought.
His strongest argument against true backward time travel came from the existence of the time machines themselves.
If his current self possessed a functioning time machine, then after enough future experimentation, at least one future version of himself should eventually arrive in this timeline.
Yet the current result was obvious.
No future Kenichi existed here.
If that observation was correct, then perhaps returning to one's own past was impossible.
A person might only be able to move forward through time.
Or perhaps traveling into what appeared to be the past actually created or entered an entirely new timeline.
Of course, there was another possibility.
Perhaps Kenichi himself was unique.
Because of his special ability, maybe he could never enter a timeline in which another version of himself already existed.
That possibility could not be ruled out either.
Regardless, Kenichi had no intention of abandoning the research.
If he truly managed to master time, that would naturally be ideal.
Such power would give him an enormous advantage against the Otsutsuki Clan.
If he encountered an enemy he could not defeat, he could simply escape to another timeline, continue developing there, and return only after becoming stronger.
Of course...
That assumed the Otsutsuki Clan had no method of anchoring or restricting time.
Kenichi was particularly wary of that possibility.
The Otsutsuki Clan had created a genuine time machine.
There was no way they had built something like that while knowing absolutely nothing about the nature of time.
Nor did Kenichi believe the machine had been created entirely by accident.
If the Otsutsuki possessed technology capable of traveling through time, then they might also possess techniques capable of fixing a target to a particular point in time and preventing escape.
Still, no matter what the final answer turned out to be, researching time was unquestionably beneficial.
If Kenichi could develop and personally master temporal abilities, then it would be a tremendous gain.
For now, he had entrusted most of that research to his Shadow Clones.
Kenichi himself was concentrating on another project.
The Tenseigan.
As one of the Shinobi World's highest-level dojutsu, the Tenseigan possessed terrifying power.
Toneri splitting the Moon with a single attack in the movie was proof enough.
And that might not even have represented the Tenseigan's full potential.
Toneri had never completely integrated the Byakugan he took, and those eyes were eventually removed from him.
Even so, his strength had been extraordinary.
Kenichi was extremely curious.
If he obtained a complete Tenseigan and fully mastered it...
How strong would he become?
"But this research isn't going particularly smoothly either."
Kenichi scratched his head while looking at the clone in front of him.
Originally, he had assumed that studying the Tenseigan would progress much faster than researching time.
Only after beginning the experiments did he realize how difficult the process truly was.
And the biggest problem was the Byakugan fusion.
Every previous attempt had failed.
The transplanted Byakugan would eventually rupture, dissolving into a thick fluid.
Then the experimental subject would die.
Kenichi suspected that the problem lay in the purity of the Byakugan.
Toneri's obsession with marrying the Byakugan Princess could not have been completely meaningless.
There had to be some underlying requirement.
Kenichi still had not figured out exactly what that requirement was.
Fortunately, that did not matter too much.
He had already cultivated several Hinata clones.
Through accelerated growth, they had nearly reached full maturity.
They were ready to be used for the next stage of testing.
Kenichi intended to determine whether Hinata's Byakugan could perfectly fuse with Toneri's Otsutsuki bloodline and eventually evolve into the Tenseigan.
He looked toward one of the cloning tanks.
Inside floated a clone of Hinata.
Kenichi was quite satisfied with the result.
The clone had already matured to roughly the age Hinata had been when she married Naruto.
Her Byakugan had also developed considerably.
Kenichi released the restraints securing the clone.
He removed her from the tank and placed her on the operating table.
Then he picked up a scalpel.
With practiced precision, he extracted the clone's Byakugan.
Afterward, Kenichi carefully placed the eyes inside a preservation container.
"Is it my turn, Teacher?"
A calm voice sounded behind him.
Kenichi turned.
A young man stood there.
Toneri.
More precisely, a clone of Toneri.
Kenichi smiled and nodded.
"Yes."
"It's your turn, Number One."
This Toneri was not the original.
He was an artificially created clone whose growth Kenichi had deliberately accelerated.
Unlike an empty biological specimen, Number One had already awakened full self-awareness and intelligence.
However, he did not possess a true name.
His current designation was simply Number One.
Kenichi had already decided that if Number One successfully awakened the Tenseigan, he would grant him a proper name.
At the same time, Kenichi wanted to see whether awakening the Tenseigan could eliminate the rapid-aging defect associated with accelerated clone growth.
If it could, that would be an extremely useful discovery.
"If you successfully awaken the Tenseigan, you'll gain genuine personal freedom."
Kenichi smiled.
Number One remained expressionless.
"I'll do my best, Teacher."
He quietly lay down on the operating table.
Kenichi did not waste time.
He immediately began transplanting Hinata's cloned Byakugan into Number One.
As for the Hinata clone whose eyes had just been extracted, her usefulness for this particular experiment had ended.
Kenichi transferred her into another research program focused on solving the accelerated-aging problem of rapidly matured clones.
He also maintained extremely strict security around this laboratory.
Kenichi had absolutely no intention of letting Naruto, Sasuke, or the real Hinata see what happened inside.
He did not want the image they held of him to collapse.
Ever since Kenichi had overturned the entire board a year and a half earlier, the Shinobi World had entered a very strange stage of development.
On the surface, little seemed to have changed.
Small clashes and localized conflicts still occurred from time to time.
But beneath that familiar exterior, the balance of the world had shifted dramatically.
Akatsuki had become considerably more restrained.
Publicly, the organization claimed that it needed more time to accumulate strength and that the present circumstances were unsuitable for major operations.
The truth was very different.
Nagato had already learned the truth.
After discovering the real origin of his eyes, he gave up the Rinnegan that had never truly belonged to him and returned them to Madara.
Nagato later transplanted a pair of Mangekyo Sharingan instead.
Everyone was now preparing for the future war against Isshiki.
And only one and a half years remained.
During the previous eighteen months, Kenichi had done almost nothing unrelated to research.
Every day had been devoted to experiments, scientific study, and finding new methods of increasing his strength.
Now...
It was finally time to see whether all that work would produce results.
The Byakugan transplantation proceeded perfectly.
Number One showed no obvious discomfort.
Kenichi watched carefully, resting his chin on one hand.
According to his previous experimental records, a failed fusion would begin showing abnormalities within three days.
After that, the eyes would rupture.
The resulting damage would usually lead to severe bacterial infection and eventually kill the test subject.
Every earlier experiment had ended that way.
But this time, Kenichi felt the chances of success were extremely high.
Toneri's genetic structure truly was different from the others he had studied.
It even differed from Naruto and Sasuke.
Toneri's Otsutsuki genes belonged to another lineage.
The lineage of Hamura Otsutsuki.
Kenichi had already isolated and extracted Toneri's unique genetic traits.
He was simply waiting for this experiment to succeed.
Once it did, he planned to integrate those traits into his own body and attempt to awaken the Tenseigan personally.
There was still one thing Kenichi was uncertain about.
Could the Rinnegan and Tenseigan coexist?
He suspected the answer was yes.
The Tenseigan was, at its core, another special dojutsu connected to Otsutsuki bloodlines.
Kenichi even suspected that the Tenseigan might have some deeper connection to the Divine Tree.
Whether that hypothesis was correct still required experimentation.
For now, everything depended on Number One.
If Number One successfully completed the fusion and awakened the Tenseigan, Kenichi would have found the path he needed.
If the experiment failed...
Then he would have to continue searching for the missing condition.
As for the enormous Tenseigan on the Moon, Kenichi had already obtained the relevant information from the original Toneri.
The giant Tenseigan required someone possessing Tenseigan-related power to properly control it.
It also depended on extremely pure Byakugan.
That was another reason Toneri had wanted to marry Hinata.
"But speaking of Hinata..."
Kenichi suddenly remembered something.
"Her relationship with Naruto has been getting interesting lately."
Although Kenichi had spent most of his time buried in experiments, he had not completely ignored the outside world.
He continued monitoring developments throughout the Shinobi World.
And recently, he had noticed clear progress between Naruto and Hinata.
Most of it could be traced back to one particular person.
Kushina Uzumaki.
...
"Oh, Hinata!"
Inside Konoha, the home where the Fourth Hokage and his wife had once lived had become lively again.
Kushina smiled brightly when she saw the shy girl standing outside.
"Did you come to see Naruto?"
Hinata immediately flushed.
Kushina's smile grew wider.
She looked at the young girl in front of her with increasing satisfaction.
Kushina could clearly see Hinata's feelings for Naruto.
But what pleased her most was how long those feelings had existed.
Hinata had liked Naruto long before his true identity became public knowledge.
Back then, Naruto had not been known as the son of the Fourth Hokage.
He had not been treated as an important figure.
He had simply been Naruto.
And Hinata had still liked him.
That mattered greatly to Kushina.
In her view, mutual affection between husband and wife was one of the most important foundations for a happy marriage.
If the person you loved also loved you, that was naturally the ideal outcome.
But if that was impossible, then when choosing someone to marry, many people would rather choose the person who genuinely loved them.
At least that offered a better chance of creating a stable and happy family.
Kushina herself had been fortunate.
She had met someone she loved.
And Minato had loved her just as deeply.
Because of that, their married life had been genuinely happy.
Of course, they occasionally had minor disagreements.
Every family did.
But those conflicts were usually resolved quickly.
Most of their life together had been warm and fulfilling.
Naturally, Kushina wanted the same kind of future for Naruto.
And the little Hinata standing in front of her seemed like an excellent candidate.
She was Naruto's classmate.
After graduation, they had even been assigned to the same team.
She came from the Hyuga Clan.
Her upbringing was excellent.
Her personality was gentle.
And most importantly...
Whenever Hinata looked at Naruto, her eyes were filled with unmistakable affection and hope.
The sight made Kushina happier every time she noticed it.
"Yes, Aunt Kushina."
Hinata lowered her head shyly.
"I came to find Naruto."
The blush spreading across her face only made Kushina's smile become more affectionate.
"Oh dear."
Kushina leaned closer.
"Naruto isn't home right now."
"Minato took him out for training."
Then she gently pinched Hinata's cheek.
"But they should be back soon."
Kushina smiled.
"Why don't you stay and have dinner with us tonight?"
Hinata's face became even redder.
After a brief hesitation, she quietly agreed.
Since Minato and Kushina had been brought back through Edo Tensei, Naruto's true identity was no longer a secret.
He was not the so-called Child of the Nine-Tails.
He was Konoha's hero.
The only son of the Fourth Hokage and his wife.
And the Jinchuriki who carried Konoha's Nine-Tails.
Once that truth spread throughout the village, Naruto's treatment changed almost overnight.
Even Hiashi, who had previously held reservations about Naruto, no longer objected to Hinata becoming close to him.
If anything, he was now happy to see their relationship develop.
Of course, that did not mean Hiashi relaxed in other areas.
Hanabi's training remained just as strict as ever.
....
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