Chapter 132: Looks Like the Same Type of Ability
Shiromo already knew that Momoshiki was capable of stopping time.
It was just that the timing of Momoshiki's use of this time-stop ability was always strangely chosen.
He never used it during actual combat.
Logically speaking, a bug-level ability like Time Stop should be enough to turn the tide of battle with a single use.
Jōtarō had the excuse that his physical body was still that of an ordinary human (was it, really?), and that Star Platinum itself was a close-range Stand. If the enemy was too far away, he might not be able to reach them in time to attack, which was why there was such a thing as "time-stop range."
Momoshiki was different. With his movement speed, even if he could only stop time for two or three seconds, that would be more than enough for him to reach Naruto or Sasuke and penetrate straight through their chests.
What's more, because Naruto and Sasuke knew that ninjutsu was ineffective against the Ōtsutsuki, most of the time they fought at close range anyway. Distance was even less of a concern.
And yet, Momoshiki stubbornly didn't use it.
Not until the very end, after losing the Rasengan clash and being smashed to death by the Rasengan, did something like a montage-style Time Stop appear.
From this, one could infer three possible reasons why Momoshiki didn't use Time Stop in battle.
First: Momoshiki's Time Stop was a semi-passive skill, similar to 'Bites the Dust', which could only be activated in moments of absolute desperation between life and death.
Second: Momoshiki's Time Stop was like Shiromo's King Crimson, unable to directly interfere with the battle itself, or else interfering would cause temporal chaos and backlash that would affect him, which was why he didn't use it during combat.
The third possibility was that using Time Stop required paying an extremely heavy price, so he wouldn't use it unless absolutely necessary.
In fact, this last possibility also partially overlapped with the second.
That price might be something like consuming an enormous amount of chakra, making all the pills he had taken beforehand essentially wasted.
Or it might be consuming the thing the Ōtsutsuki clan treasured most: "lifespan."
If that were the case, then it would be completely understandable that Momoshiki wouldn't use Time Stop unless he was truly facing a life-or-death crisis.
Being killed by a Rasengan posed the biggest problem of all: he hadn't left behind a Kāma, so he had no way to resurrect.
So all he needed was to open a Time Stop and leave a Kāma inside Boruto.
Later on, when Time Stop reactivated during Boruto's fight with Code, it was also because Code was about to sacrifice both him and Boruto to the God Tree. Boruto wasn't a match for him, so Momoshiki had no choice but to appear.
With that in mind, Momoshiki using Time Stop now, no matter which of the above scenarios applied, was entirely reasonable.
For Momoshiki, being on the verge of disappearing from this spacetime together with Boruto truly meant reaching a critical moment of life and death. He could not afford to hold back.
"Looks like it's the same type of ability."
Shiromo looked at Momoshiki, floating in midair, and spoke calmly.
"The same type? Lower lifeform, do you think you're worthy? What kind of delusional nonsense are you spouting…?"
Momoshiki placed his hand on Urashiki, and Urashiki's body twisted violently.
Just like Kinshiki back then, he was refined into a fruit.
The next second, Momoshiki did not make any motion of eating the fruit. The fruit in his hand vanished directly, and black markings, similar to Urashiki's crane-like sage form, began to surge across Boruto's body.
Good grief. Momoshiki really was smarter than Urashiki.
This was a direct time-stop fruit consumption, preventing Sasuke from secretly swapping it with a pile of crap using Amenotejikara.
Still, Shiromo felt puzzled.
With Epitaph active, he looked into the future scenes ahead. For quite some time, he still didn't see any sign of Momoshiki using Time Stop to launch an attack.
Was it that Momoshiki didn't want to?
"Don't attack recklessly. Ninjutsu is ineffective against him. Only taijutsu and senjutsu work. Naruto, get to the back, you absolutely cannot let him absorb your chakra."
Sasuke stopped Naruto and shielded him behind himself.
"Senjutsu?"
"In that case, it's time for me, Jiraiya of Mount Myōboku, the Toad Sage, to take the stage."
Jiraiya clasped his hands together, beginning to gather natural energy and summon the two toad sages.
Thus, this master-and-student pair, Jiraiya and Naruto, withdrew from the battlefield.
One hiding, the other charging up.
"Fire Release: Great Dragon Flame Jutsu!"
Sasuke spewed flames toward Momoshiki in the sky.
Momoshiki merely tilted his body slightly and dodged it.
"I can't even be bothered to absorb such low-level ninjutsu."
Momoshiki glanced back with disdain.
Sasuke looked at the dark clouds gradually gathering in the sky, his heart feeling heavy.
The fact that Momoshiki could now appear and say something like "can't be bothered to absorb" indicated one thing.
Boruto had already reached a cooperation with Momoshiki.
Otherwise, given Boruto's current condition, Momoshiki would have had no way to seize control of his consciousness while Boruto was awake and full of chakra.
He never imagined that in his entire life, having used Kirin only a handful of times, one had been used on his brother, one on Naruto, and now he would be using it on Naruto's son.
He respected Boruto's will and his choices. He understood Boruto's desire to save the future at any cost, to save his sister, his family, and his friends.
But Uchiha Sasuke also had his own will and his own choices.
He, too, would stop at nothing to protect the present.
In that case, there was only one way to settle it.
It was with fists.
"Kirin!"
A bolt of lightning surged down from the sky.
The Lightning Release Kirin, infused with vast natural energy, tore toward Momoshiki in the air like a divine beast.
Aside from a small amount of chakra used for guidance, everything within Kirin was the power of nature itself, something Momoshiki could not absorb at all.
After using this move, Sasuke was left gasping for breath.
The chakra that had been transferred to him had been depleted after several attacks.
Sasuke felt a headache coming on. Every single time, it was only when his chakra was almost gone that he remembered to use Kirin. All these years, he'd never thought to develop any new "natural ninjutsu" specifically to deal with the Ōtsutsuki.
"Leave the rest to me."
Shiromo suddenly appeared in front of Sasuke, catching a black rod that shot toward them.
A single Kirin really wasn't enough to take down Momoshiki.
Even in the original timeline, when Urashiki transformed after eating his own Rinnegan, Kirin and Jiraiya's Rasengan had only been used as interference, allowing Naruto and Boruto to win the final clash.
Sure enough, a figure burst out from within the lightning, hurling black rods toward Sasuke.
These black rods weren't the advanced Truth-Seeking Orbs, but a lower-tier chakra rod.
Even Pain could create them.
"Are you sure you're okay? In your current state…"
Sasuke frowned deeply.
At such close range, and after having just commanded the natural lightning, Sasuke could sense that the natural energy inside Shiromo was nearly depleted.
It was completely different from the vast, overflowing feeling he'd had when they first met.
Though he didn't know what had happened to Shiromo, this was undoubtedly dangerous.
"Leave it to you? Lower lifeform, do you enjoy showing off that much? Recklessly altering the past, trying to destroy the future of the Ōtsutsuki clan, don't get so arrogant!"
"Natural energy? With that pitiful residue left inside you? You don't understand what true power even is!"
Momoshiki, perhaps after eating Urashiki, had somehow caught Urashiki's "idiocy" as well, and began mocking Shiromo.
Even so, Momoshiki's hands never stopped moving.
A dark purple chakra poured out from his palm, forming the phantom of a massive oarfish.
This was Urashiki's ability,
Amenosubaruboshinomikoto: Ryūgū (Heavenly Essential Wave Current Star Lord: Dragon Palace)
(End of this chapter)