Asunder

Chapter Twenty Six

Judgment

"Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing."

― John Stuart Mill

Defeat was no option, but the vexing fact remained that victory just seemed to be impossible. The grey-white colored 'Naruto'- she could see it wasn't Naruto himself who was in control- was too fast and too strong for her to have any hope of victory. There was only one real reason why she was still alive, and that was because this Jūbi-addled Naruto was exceedingly stupid.

'No, stupid isn't the right word. It is more as if he is acting on instinct, like an animal,' Ajisai corrected herself. While she was hardly talented in the area of taijutsu herself, even Ajisai had little difficulty to discern that 'Naruto' lacked any form or stance in his combat style. It made him unpredictable, yes, but also very sloppy, leaving plenty of opportunities for her to exploit. Not that it did much more than even the odds a little.

"Shinra Tensei!" she counterattacked, just in time.

With him moving at speeds where her rinnegan could barely keep up, it was only at the last second that she managed to divert his punch. There was no time to distract herself with analyzing the situation, if a fatal attack could be expected every possible second.

His lack of form or style gave her bit of reprieve, but that would have meant little if he had continued to attack her at full force. Yet, for some reason beyond her understanding, he didn't seem to be able to fully use those black orbs, although she wondered how they had been able to dispel each of her summons- even the multi-headed dog, that was supposed to keep splitting in two each time one was damaged significantly enough. In addition, nearly none of her jutsu worked against the orbs, the sole exception being the chakra absorption by Preta Path.

However, if she switched to Preta Path and he decided to attack with taijutsu, she'd be left wide open. It only took a fraction of a second to switch to the abilities of Deva Path, but that was time she couldn't spare in this situation. So yes, she counted herself lucky that 'Naruto' was so mindless.

She didn't want to think about what would happen if he became intelligent, though. Deep down, she knew very well that she'd be a dead woman that same moment.

'Naruto' roared out in frustration, before crashing down to the ground after he tried to get to his feet again. Once more he tried to get up, but Ajisai could see that something was going horribly wrong. The amounts of chakra that accumulated in his legs was massive, which led to his midsection bloating up like a balloon.

"W-what?"

"…?" Surprisingly, the mindless form of the Jūbi-possessed Naruto didn't seem to have any clue about what happened to him either.

Not willing to waste the chance given to her, Ajisai leapt back. Finally, she had some time to catch her breath. Only now did she realize how far they had strayed from where the Jūbi had spawned that gigantic tree. Only now did she see how little was left of the entire area where once a village had been hidden. The very surface of this country had been altered by the events that had transpired here.

Without any word or sign of warning, the upper half of Naruto's body suddenly extended. Like some kind of twisted from of snake, a scenario pulled right out of nightmares. Or, one that would induce nightmares.

"Gah!" she dodged. "Thank the heavens that he's slowed down by the bulk of his body," she muttered to no one in particular.

"Fu…ture…" 'Naruto' suddenly mumbled, almost causing Ajisai, in her surprise, to be caught off guard by the swipe of his claw-like hand. She still managed to evade, leaving him wide open for a counterattack.

"Rasengan!" the attack bounced off his skin like usual, destroying her hopes that perhaps his 'bloated' form had weakened him.

In fact, 'Naruto' could just as well have been stung by a mosquito, as he didn't notice the attack at all- even though Ajisai knew all too well that her rasengan could easily pierce boulders.

His lips kept moving, as he turned to her again. Vaguely, she heard him say "Sha…re…", although she had to hurry to create distance again.

'Just in time,' she sighed. "Shinra Tensei!"

The attack, the only one in her repertoire that had some effect on him, forced him back. At least, the snake-like, extended upper half of his body. The bloated midsection and legs remained unmoved. The chakra inside him kept struggling, though more and more of Naruto's chakra started seeping through. The battle for dominance that Ajisai had thought that he had lost, didn't seem to have ended just yet.

"Fu…ture… A… ji… chan…"

The shards of the illusionary world fell, leaving him once again stranded in the familiar darkness.

For a moment, for only the tiniest and shortest of moments, the return to the dark and illusion-less realm was a relief. The sight of his son, illusion or not, was still burned into his mind's eye. Such a pure and innocent child… it was hard to fathom that someone with as much blood at his hands as he could potentially give life to such an innocent and cheerful child.

Alas, that momentary bitter-tasting sense of relief was immediately eradicated by an overwhelming amount of pain. His arms were only barely attached, only a few strands of white… white stuff. His torso was mostly torn apart too, only a few of those white wire-like things that still kept his upper torso connected to his hips.

He screamed. It was maddening. As if the mental pain of what he had just seen hadn't been enough, especially following the way he knew he had been defeated by Zetsu, he now felt as if his very soul was torn apart. Scratch that, it didn't just 'feel like' it happened… it actually was what was going on. Only a very remote part of his brains registered that piece of information. The vast majority of his attention was consumed by the pain and the desperation that it brought along.

The light was dying now. His sight faded when he felt his face crack. The tears that had spread through his body now reached up there too. He had lost. The Jūbi would break into the seal and consume Kurama, and then the world would depend on what little mercy that monster was capable of feeling. He had failed them all.

No amount of pain inflicted by his torn soul could match the sorrow and regret he felt due to that failure. He had failed everyone: Tsunade, who had nearly destroyed herself in her grief, would perish due to his weakness; Ino, even if he had given up the idea of chasing her romantically, was still too important a friend to lose to his foolish mistake; Kurama would suffer a fate worse than death, only because he had failed to see through Zetsu's schemes; and Ajisai…

As his head started to split in two, stifling his cries of pain, he still felt the tears running down his cheeks. Ajisai. She had been through so much. She had died, literally, and her corpse had been desecrated for Nagato's deranged plans. She had come back to life, and trained harder than anyone could have expected her, grown stronger than she could have ever dreamt of becoming, because of him. He could not allow his beloved to die. His current state brought hellish pain, but that sensation paled in comparison to the idea of losing her. He had failed Guren, grown apart from Ino, and sacrificed the innocent Fū for a pointless cause, but the thought of losing Ajisai once more… No.

All he could see was the image of Ajisai, sitting on the edge of their tree house, beaming with a content smile as if she was the happiest person alive. It was a smile he'd give everything for, a smile for which he'd sacrifice himself, in order to protect it. For she had been the one who truly brought him back to life, she had been the one who rescued him from a state worse than death: being an aimless and emotionless tool to Zetsu and Kakuzu. The Jūbi no doubt wanted to turn him into such a tool once again. He would not allow himself to be reduced to that horrid empty state of existence.

NO.

He had had enough of the schemes, the backstabbing, the hidden enemies that preyed on the power he held within him, and those who wished to obtain Kurama for their own ends. This was the end. No more.

"NO!"

He roared, with all his might, until he could see nothing but a blinding amount of chakra. Everything he had, everything he could get from the vast sea of energy that nature offered, he used to overthrow the power that was invading him.

"Outrageous."

It was the one and only word that existed for such blasphemous audacity. She had traveled, further than any of these little upstarts could imagine, to get to this place, only to have her efforts thwarted time and time again by this greedy and violent species. Humans. In hindsight, she wondered how she had ever considered mating with one of them.

"My naivety was staggering," she quietly accepted. She had just been liberated from a thousand years of solitude, and she still voiced her thoughts aloud. Adjusting to an environment where she wasn't completely alone would take some time. "But all these setbacks will soon be undone."

Her infant child had worked tirelessly for nearly a thousand years to undo the damage that its elder brothers had inflicted upon her. With her power scattered, her body sealed, and her essence locked away in a different dimension… the child had done good work to get her this far. It was regrettable that it had died in the process, laying down its life just before its plans came to fruition.

Did she really care, though? No. That mongrel was something she had created in the tiny window of opportunity she had been given, shortly after she began to realize that her traitorous sons had found a way to defeat her. Demi-gods they might have been due to her blood, but still… the notion that she had suffered defeat seemed ludicrous to her. The creation of her Zetsu army had left her weakened, as the power of the Shinju had been exhausted in the process. The two had exploited that moment, fought valiantly, and eventually gotten the upper hand. Then, she was condemned to a fate worse than death, by her beloved children…

"It must have been their human blood which led to their repulsive behavior. This is clear, as my third child behaved itself far better, although it had only a sliver of my might."

Now she stood in this sewer-like hallway. The damp and dirty environment was below her standard, to the point where her mere presence here felt like an insult. Yet, it had to be done. The last of nine fragments of her power rested behind this place. It irritated her how slowly she could seep its power from the self-aware fragment. The Kyūbi, a mere beast, given shape by her son, dared to slow her down to this extent… no, that wasn't entirely true.

The knowledge that she had inherited from her youngest child, the mongrel that had been the herald of her return, showed her how inadequate she was at the art of sealing. The 'ninjutsu' that the violent human species had created was easily countered, but fūinjutsu was something different, especially the otherworldly power she felt emanating from the seal that contained the Kyūbi. Not even she, a matriarch of the Ōtsutsuki clan, would dare to underestimate the God of Death. While time held less of a claim on her kind than it did on the human race, she too was ultimately a mortal being. Although, after she had united her power with that of the Shinju, she was fairly sure she now stood outside the reason of time.

Still, she had lost many centuries due to the insolence of her sons. It left her impatient.

Annoyed as she was, she almost missed the sudden shift in the atmosphere. "How can a single human be so tenacious?" she asked herself, slightly impressed that the child had managed to break free from the various restraints she had placed on him. "For a simple human, it should have been impossible. Unless… his will is even stronger than my child thought. The potential of his genes seems to be greater than Tenji's was," she idly remarked. "Alas, he'll still have to perish."

She abandoned the door which led to Kurama's jail, although from his perspective, words such as 'bunker' or 'fortress' would be more appropriate for the seal right now. Had it not been for the seal, Kaguya would have completely absorbed Kurama already.

Down through the damp sewer-like hallway the pale beauty walked, until she reached the door to the hall from where the boy's energy emanated. It was peculiar how a mere human had such a complex mindscape, a subject she intended to look into at a later time. "I will have to explore it, because each of the fragments still holds their annoying personalities hidden, deep down. I suppose I will have to break them, one by one, until they are truly dissolved into the combined power of me and the Shinju."

The fact that there were minor changes in the boy's mindscape as his mood changed didn't elude her. It had been rather dark, only minutes ago, as if his consciousness had been on the verge of collapsing. In fact, it should have collapsed already. None had ever escaped the illusion of the perfect world. The dream which is rooted deepest within one's soul was something no living soul had ever wanted to escape from seeing fulfilled, in Kaguya's experience.

"Still… his soul is strange. Twisted," Kaguya mused. "The mental damage I saw was extensive. Perhaps… perhaps he did not truly become whole, despite having regained his old memories? I wonder how my Tsukuyomi would affect someone who holds two dreams in their heart. The illusion should have been perfect."

She moved into the room, where the gentle glow had been replaced by a cold and clear light. The tropical forest which had once stood within this hall had apparently perished. It amused her. "Your power is abandoning you, child," she stated loudly. Kaguya knew he was out there, somewhere, although she had yet had to see her opponent. "You were in luck that I underestimated the consequences of your broken existence. Still… it is all futile. Why don't you yield, and end your torment? We may be adversaries, but I do admire the strength of your heart."

"Why don't you fuck off," she heard him utter in a low growl, after a few moments of silence.

"You are merely human," she chuckled. "An insect cannot hope to overcome a goddess."

"You're no god of mine," Naruto bit back. "You, Zetsu, Pein… I've had enough of you delusional nutcases. You think yourself higher than anyone, yet all that you and your haughty ilk bring to the world is ruination."

The chuckle died in her throat. The audacity of this human! Kaguya's eyes narrowed- all three of them- when Uzumaki Naruto stepped out of the lifeless forest that had previously obscured him from her vision. Had she not been enraged, Kaguya might have considered why she hadn't been able to see him sooner- she had her byakugan activated, after all- but alas.

Extending her arm, she shot out a bone. He'd be turned to dust for his words.

"Hmm, unexpected," she mumbled to herself, seeing how Naruto raised a wall of wood without any sort of movement from his arms. Considering how she knew- through the knowledge distilled from the dark Zetsu- that shinobi needed to channel their chakra and guide it through gestures with their hands. Hand seals, they called it. How primitive they still were…

"You think I'd just stand still and let you kill me? You must be even a greater idiot than I thought," Naruto taunted her. Quite successfully as well, as her hair shot up and strangled him. "You know… there were a lot of reasons why I despised Kakuzu, but even after I've slain him I still have the feeling that I should have thanked him."

"…?" Kaguya cocked her head sideways, wondering what the human was rambling about. Was it asphyxiation that addled his thoughts?

"A shinobi should never lose control of his emotions, or his enemy may exploit them as a weakness," Naruto gave her a shit-eating grin, before flipping her off. The action made Kaguya tighten the leash, until her snappe and broke into… pieces of wood?

"Shin-rin," Naruto hissed, from somewhere behind her. Kaguya saw pale-white branches shoot up around her, thick thorns growing from them. Each of the thorns was dripping with venom that seemed intent on only one thing: her death.

Without a word, she pushed the branches aside, with nothing more than the power of her third eye. Manipulating the gravitational field worked, even within his mindscape. To rid herself of her stubborn enemy, she launched a barrage of hair-needles.

This time, she saw she had hit her mark.

"Is this supposed to be the power of a goddess?" Naruto wondered aloud. His flak jacket was torn to shreds, and he tore its remnants off himself. The long-sleeved shirt underneath was, obviously, in no better condition, and joined the flak jacket on the ground. "Or is this why you needed those cowardly illusions?"

"You truly seem to be enraged by what you saw," Kaguya was mildly curious as to why. It was supposed to show a world in which all his dreams were granted. Nothing about that should elicit such a response, should it?

"You made me denounce a family I could have had. You made me leave a child that could have been real. That felt real. He… You toyed with my heart and my soul," Naruto growled. "You and Zetsu have treated me as some kind of convenient tool, one that was yours to use and throw away. But guess what, you bitch… this tool will bring about your end!"

"Only a fool would grow too attached to her children," Kaguya smiled wistfully.

"Only a fool would say such a thing," he bit back in barely contained rage.

She watched her opponent carefully. His power seemed to keep increasing without end. Red pigmentation surrounded his eyes, and a dot-within-a-circle was seen on his forehead. But, now that his torso was bare, Kaguya could also see three similar dots on his chest, in front of his spinal cord. These last three were connected to an intricate pattern of crimson lines that covered his entire upper body.

"Such big words about emotions…"

"They can be a weakness, yes, but also a strength. Emotions can make a person fight harder and endure more pain than should be possible. But it could also lead to defeat. Your arrogance, for instance, gave me the chance to gather enough natural energy to completely fill out my reserves."

"It matters little, hu-"

Before she could finish her line she saw how he threw a few chakra-laden red peppers at her. The flying objects changed into small clouds of biting red dust. Caught completely off guard, as she had expected him to launch some kind of big attack after all the chakra he had amassed, Kaguya dumbly looked at the small clouds.

Until the dust reached her eyes, that was.

Regardless of the difference in power, even she, a self-proclaimed goddess, was not able to stop herself from blinking. The burning sensation disrupted her sight, the irritation forcing her to rub her eyes and clean them of the offending matter.

Time was not at his side. He knew that, yet at the same time he was acutely aware that he shouldn't rush himself. While he could feel how Kurama was weakening at a steady rate, the enemy that had just entered the forest-hall within Naruto's mindscape was far too powerful to act hastily against. One slip, and all would be lost.

The woman was pale and had pure white hair. In a sense, she was quite beautiful, Naruto had to reluctantly admit, as she seemed to shine- as if the moonlight was trying to make her delicate facial features even more visible. Yet, in all her cold beauty, Naruto couldn't escape the thought that she seemed incredibly arrogant. The distant and detached expression shifted to mild annoyance once in a while, but generally just seemed dead-set on looking down on all living things around her. Aside from her haughty demeanor, Naruto thought that the freaky third eye and the horns were detracting from her beauty as well.

Beyond appearances, this woman made him cautious for the simple reason that she was strong- overwhelmingly strong, in fact. It was what had left him surprised to the extent that he, even in his rage, had stopped and kept himself hidden, when she entered the hall. From the power he had sensed, he had anticipated her to be some kind of monstrous creature. To see this deceptively normal woman being the manifestation of the Jūbi's power was… confusing.

This state of confusion was short-lived, though, as Naruto still had the vibrant memory of his son in his mind: little Minato-chan held within Ino's arms, looking at him, pleading with him to stay. That bitter memory filled the jinchūriki with rage, the idea that someone had played with his heart in such a cruel way was unforgivable.

Still, he had to thread with caution. Carefully stalling her, throwing her off balance with deliberate taunts, while gathering more and more natural energy. In this realm it seemed as if there was no limit to the amount he could gather. There was no corporeal body that had to sustain the immense strain of this energy, only his soul.

'Or is it because the Jūbi is sealed within me that I can gather so much more energy?' he wondered. He couldn't tell. He knew, however, that it would take time to gather the energy he needed, so he kept stalling her.

"Such big words about emotions…" she seemed amused, clearly seeing how he tried to rein in his temper.

"They can be a weakness, yes, but also a strength," Naruto glared back. "Emotions can make a person fight harder and endure more pain than should be possible. But it could also lead to defeat. Your arrogance, for instance, gave me the chance to gather enough natural energy to completely fill out my reserves."

"It matters little, hu-"

"Akai Chishio no Habanero (Red-Hot Habanero)" he whispered the moment she spoke up. The resulting cloud of pepper-dust blinded her. It offered the perfect window of opportunity for him, so that he could put all his weight on offense without having to worry about defense.

"Shinra Banshō! (All-Covering Forests and Ten Thousand Things)" He couldn't tell if she had noticed how he had infested the entire place with fungi, but he did know that it was too late for her. Whether she was stronger or not mattered little at this point. The deadly cloud of chakra-laden corrosive spores already enveloped Kaguya.

"DIE!" Naruto snarled, forcing the majority of his chakra into the cloud, releasing all his pent-up hatred.

The forest of pale and lifeless thorned trees decayed until only dust remained. The cloud of corrosive fungi swallowed up everything, turning and swirling around Kaguya. Beads of sweat ran down Naruto's head, but he was too focused to notice them. All that mattered now was her destruction. This woman, this manifestation of the Jūbi, she needed to die. She needed to get out of his mind.

"My, my, such ferocity," Naruto paled when he heard the amused voice from the center of the fungi cloud. "Yasogami Kūgeki (Eighty Gods Vacuum Fists)," she laughed hollowly.

The cloud of spores burst apart as a multitude of giant fist-shaped chakra manifestations rushed at him. Before he had the chance to even consider his options, the attack struck.

"And again you stand up… if you keep this up, I might truly be impressed," the white woman said with a maddening mirth in her voice. "Can you not sense the difference between you and me?

"You are powerful. Overwhelmingly so. But regardless of the extent of your power, it is finite," Naruto stated calmly, ignoring his aching body. "You might exceed me in ability, but that matters relatively little in this place. You arrogantly waltzed in here, not knowing that this is the exact spot where I connect to nature."

"Nature," Kaguya scoffed. "Plants and animals should grovel at my feet, yet you speak of it as if it is more powerful than-"

"There is no limit to the energy of nature, not that I can sense at least." Naruto interrupted. "That is why I have been able to endure each of your attacks. And being in this place, I could increase my sage mode far beyond my usual limits."

"Yet I still say that this petty power-up is pointless. Against the might of an Ōtsutsuki, it matters little how much raw power you might gather, child." The woman chuckled when she saw the slight look of confusion in his eyes. "You must wonder how I survived that earlier attack of yours."

"…"

"I possess the ability to absorb chakra, rendering every attack of yours pointless. Now, why don't you give up? There is no shame in admitting defeat, not when facing the strongest being that ever resided on this pathetic planet."

"You speak as if you are not from this planet…"

"Correct. My name is Kaguya from the Ōtsutsuki clan. My clan is not from this planet. Is that so hard to comprehend?" Kaguya smirked. "My sons tricked me and sealed me away, and scattered my power over your pathetic kind, but my youngest child set everything up for my inevitable return."

"So chakra… it is derived from you?" Naruto's eyes widened. "The bijū are-"

"Nine parts of the combined chakra of me and the Shinju," Kaguya nodded- set on completely demoralizing the young man who had persisted and resisted far beyond anything she had ever seen before. She wanted- needed- to break his will. "Of course, my wayward son decided to split that vast quantity of chakra up over even more targets. Where did you think all those bloodlines started, boy? You humans never had such power before it was stolen from me. So… do you honestly think you could ever hope to defeat me when your sole weapon is a power that belongs to me?"

"Giving up isn't exactly my forte," Naruto growled lowly.

"Perhaps I should explain to you what the true history of this world is," she smirked back at the agitated Uzumaki. "Do you even know that the Shinju and I are not one and the same?"

"What is that supposed to mean?" Naruto eventually asked- the reluctance in his voice making Kaguya smirk even wider.

"My clan, the Ōtsutsuki clan, planted the Shinju on this planet. Its sole purpose, contrary to popular belief, is merely the gathering of energy. Me and my kin use its fruit as nourishment. Fruit for the gods should grow on the God Tree, don't you agree?" she chuckled at her own 'joke'. "Naturally, the Shinju derives its energy at the cost of the planet and its inhabitants, but its effects are barely noticeable. It takes a full millennium to grow one fruit, so the drain hardly affects the living beings on a planet."

"So you came here to eat the fruit of the Shinju," Naruto deduced. "Then why did you unleash the Jūbi upon the world? Kurama told me about the damage it did, about how mankind had been on the edge of extinction."

"But of course I did that. As I journeyed, I saw what mankind did to itself and to the planet. What could I do, but draw the right conclusion?" Kaguya frowned lightly, as if Naruto had made a stupid remark. "I saw how humans pillaged the villages and cities of their enemies, how they enslaved, raped, and annihilated entire populations. I saw them drench entire battlefields with blood… and why? For imaginary gods, for valuables, for power, for… their greed was their undoing. There were entire societies built on inequality between social positions- where slaves and nobles continued an endless cycle of revolution and repression. Tell me, child, don't you agree that the world would be better off without your despicable species?"

"I… no, but-"

"So, even its last defender hesitates to call humanity 'good'," the woman laughed cruelly. "Priceless! Even my own sons, my flesh and blood, were blind to that truth. They refused to accept their divine heritage, opting to see themselves as humans instead. They thought I had succumbed to madness, and fought against me with all their might… and yet here you are. You don't have a drop of Ōtsutsuki blood within your veins, yet you see the truth they were blind to. Alas, if only I hadn't needed your body…"

"Or?"

"I'd have made you my servant, boy," Kaguya smiled at him. It was probably meant seductively, but by now, Naruto couldn't feel any sense of physical attraction to this woman. "Even a goddess is not without desires of the flesh. But that matters little. My sons have shown me that half-breeds are unstable. Why else would they have maintained that the Shinju's fruit had corrupted their mother? Their human blood made them violent and treasonous, and it clearly addled their mental capacities as well."

"Mankind isn't all bad, you know."

"Oh? Why would you think that they are not undeserving of life?"

"Mankind has its excesses in violence and cruelty, yes," Naruto admitted. "But to balance out our bad qualities, we also have the capacity to do good. We create, care, love, and believe- with proper guidance, we are capable of overcoming our shortcomings," Naruto silently thanked Kurama for the long conversations they had shared.

"Tsk, idealism," Kaguya uttered the word as if it was a curse. "Hopes and dreams change nothing, child. How disappointing that you'd-"

"Humanity will never be without conflicts. But that is how nature works. Trees grow tall, yet in doing so they put smaller plants in the shadow, their roots dig deeper and drink the water before the weaker plants can reach it. Nature itself is designed to rest on a foundation of competition. Without competition, in the complete absence of conflict, nothing would perish and nothing would grow or be born. The world would be stale, until it would finally begin to rot and wither away. Without change, how would we improve? Without making mistakes, how would we learn? You said yourself to be a goddess, so answer me that."

"It is barely an excuse for all the horrible acts I've seen mankind commit."

"I agree. Humanity must grow past this violence. It must be forced to see reason, and to abandon the never-ending spiral of hatred. In our desire to avenge the wrong-doings committed to us, we constantly create more strife. But if that cycle was broken, if our kind would see the errors of our ways, we would have a chance to evolve," Naruto reasoned. "I've met a man who fancied himself a god, and he lectured that pain would force people to grow. He was only partly right. Pain does teach us valuable lessons. But without love, pain would be meaningless. We can't close ourselves off from the world because we suffer, as it would make us cruel and violent. But we can't completely open ourselves up either. Blind trust is too easily exploited, and a naïve faith in the good of people would only prolong the cycle of conflict, as no problem would ever truly be dealt with."

"As eloquent as you may speak, you barely present an answer," Kaguya frowned.

"Balance, is my answer," Naruto inclined his head slowly. "Mankind is out of balance, has lost its connection to nature, and as such they can be more cruel and violent than any animal. The majority is simply blind, never realizing the truth about the world in which they live. They never see what nature truly entails, and are not constrained by those who do."

"Again about nature?" the woman shook her head, disappointed. "You wield so much power for a human, yet you still mean to say that you don't accept that you are superior to the rest? By right of power, you should have ruled this world, forced everything into peace."

"What am I but yet another little part of this world?" Naruto asked rhetorically. "I would not have been able to wield the power I possess if I had not accepted how limited I truly am. My power, my understanding, my heart… I am imperfect."

"Perfection is impossible for a mere human."

"Do you fancy yourself perfect, Ōtsutsuki Kaguya?" Naruto chuckled. "Because you are not. You do not comprehend nature, and just as many of my kind, you make the mistake of seeing yourself as superior to the world around you. You think you are somehow elevated above it all, separated, even though in truth you are just as much a part of the system as any other. You asked me why I persisted for so long… it is because, even if my power is greatly inferior to yours, I accepted that I am part of something far greater than myself. And that is what I want to show mankind: a lesson in humility and understanding, that we are not better than the world around us. It is also why I managed to withstand you for so long… and why I will win."

"You honestly believe that you can still be victorious?" Kaguya was knocked slightly off balance because of that statement. "I told you: your power cannot best mine. Even if you amass enough raw chakra to compete with me, it is still merely power that was stolen from me."

"Every jutsu requires chakra, yes," Naruto nodded. "But chakra differs in structure and density. Some of my jutsu require the chakra that I naturally possess, while some need to be purely fueled with the chakra that Kurama gave me- such as the Shinra Banshō jutsu."

Kaguya laughed at this. Naruto tried to remain calm and composed, even though his seething temper desperately wished to lash out against the woman. But he knew he'd have to be patient. 'My chakra is ineffective. What little I still have of Kurama's chakra is also ineffective, as she just showed me. So… there's only one gamble left. And if what she just told me is true… but I need more. If I try to solely do that jutsu with that, I need more. I can't rely on Kurama's chakra this time.'

"You were so interesting," Kaguya finally uttered, having stopped herself from laughing at the jinchūriki. "But it turns out that you have no answers and no power. You follow a philosophy belonging to the weak; even if you are far above all other humans… you have disappointed me, Uzumaki Naruto. I even decided to be merciful and not end this fight the instant I entered this hall, as I thought that your stubbornness entertained me while I drained the beast of its remaining power."

"What's wrong, can't find the words to refute my point of view?" Naruto tried to stall her for a little longer. "Can't handle the fact that there are no easy answers, and that solutions involve more than just forcing it with your power?"

"A proper discussion would presume that we are equal, at some level. We are not," Kaguya smirked. "Your life already belongs to me. I thought it would be entertaining to break you, but it turned out to be boring."

Suddenly Naruto felt as if he was tied down by invisible and unbreakable ropes. 'Kanashibari no Jutsu (Temporary Paralysis Technique)?' he wondered. A powerful pulse of senjutsu chakra broke the jutsu, just in time to evade a spike of bone which Kaguya had just fired at him. Naruto gulped when he saw how the bone disintegrated the tree in which it landed. 'She really stopped beating around the bush… damn.'

"You broke free?" she seemed mildly surprised. "Very well," she dismissed what had occurred and summoned ten black orbs of chakra. "There will be no more evasion, boy."

"You seem in a hurry, all of a sudden."

"I have wasted enough of my time toying with you. It is time to retrieve my chakra. I might not be able to use Mugen Tsukuyomi, as I already ensnared everyone with the Shinju, but that is of no consequence now," her previous smirk now settled for a more neutral expression. A cold and indifference expression, to be precise. "I had intended to replace mankind with a more useful species, but after all that has happened it would be more fitting if I just wiped out everything. This miserable world needs to pay the price for what was done to me!"

'She'll murder everyone if I don't act quickly,' Naruto grimaced. 'Dammit. If she used the power of the Shinju to trap everyone, and has the ability to drain chakra… it would only be a matter of time until every living thing in the world will die of chakra exhaustion. Hopefully I have gathered enough chakra now.'

The ten black orbs which Kaguya had created flew with break-neck speeds at Naruto. She didn't even bother to attack him from various angles, believing he would not be able to evade an attack this fast. And if he were foolish enough to try to block… well, there was nothing a Gudōdama (Truth-Seeking Ball) could not pierce.

Or so she thought.

"Senpō Mokuton: Kan'on Ryote (Sage Art Wood Release: Kanon's hands)," Naruto muttered in relief, seeing that he had literally dodged the bullet. If he had been a fraction of a second later…

"Impossible," Kaguya glared- with all three of her eyes- at Naruto. "Those orbs cannot be blocked."

"You revealed your own weakness, blabbering like an idiot," the Uzumaki chuckled. "You wanted to end this… let me show you the complete version of this jutsu! Senpō Mokuton: Shin Jūichimen Kan'on (Sage Art Wood Release: the True Eleven-Headed Kan'on)," he shouted.

The massive wooden hands which he had previously spawned now grew arms. The hands took hold of the ground, and from the very soil under Naruto's feet an enormous wooden Buddha rose up. Now was the time to see if his gambit would pay off.

'If all chakra originates from her, why does she not understand the power of natural energy? It would mean that she does not comprehend senjutsu,' had been his train of thought. 'And if she does not understand senjutsu, a jutsu purely fueled by natural energy might stand a chance, right? Aside from that, I still have no idea why I knew how to exactly create the Jūichimen Kan'on, or how I was able to use it with such specific abilities. So… where do the senpō jutsu come from, if not from her? And if it is not from her, might she be vulnerable against it?'

It was a shaky line of reasoning, but it was the last line of defense he could depend on. The palm of the left hand that brought death, while the palm of the right hand that negated all jutsu; the Jūichimen Kan'on had powers, which Naruto still hadn't completely figured out how and why it had gotten it. The notes made by Uchiha Madara regarding Hashirama's 'ultimate jutsu' had been quite different.

The giant wooden Buddha statue sat in lotus position, seemingly perfectly at peace, but lashed out at Kaguya when Naruto directed it. As if swatting a fly, the two massive hands descended upon the Ōtsutsuki, the two palms aiming to crush her in-between.

"…what?" Naruto blinked. He looked again, but no, she wasn't there. 'Behind,' he grunted.

Kaguya launched a barrage of bones at the wooden giant, but was caught off guard when the two hands of the Kan'on burst from the ground and captured her.

"I got her," Naruto gasped. "She didn't… wait… what the…"

The dozens of bones which Kaguya had shot out earlier had landed all over the torso of the Jūichimen Kan'on. Due to the sheer size of the animated statue, it took some time until the effects of the corrosive bone became visible.

With his eyes wide open, Uzumaki Naruto could only watch in horror as his last hope literally began to crumble away from underneath his feet.

"That… was unexpected," a blood-covered Kaguya mumbled. The shoulders of the Kan'on had rotted away, and its mighty arms fell with a thundering clap onto the ground. It revealed that the Ōtsutsuki was harmed, with multiple cuts and her right arm dangling at an odd angle, but still very much alive.

For a moment the self-proclaimed goddess needed to focus on her own body, healing the damage that Naruto had inflicted. She idly wondered what could have happened to her if not for her All-Killing Ash Bones. Never would she have expected a mere human to be able to harm her. Her sons had been of her divine blood, thus it was to be expected that they had been able to seal her. But even they had only managed to inflict bodily harm when they used the Gudōdama.

"That was a dangerous little trick, boy," all of Kaguya's three eyes were now directed at Naruto. The extent of her displeasure was painfully obvious. Not even a hint of amusement at Naruto's panicked expression could be seen or heard. The prey that she had been toying with all this time had just managed to harm her. Her earlier annoyance turned into a murderous determination.

"Not dangerous enough," Naruto spat, embittered by the loss of the Kan'on.

In an instant, the woman lunged forwards and planted a fist in his stomach. With no laughter, no taunts, but rather in complete silence, she walked towards his slumped down form. In the background, Naruto heard another part of the now immobilized Kan'on fall down, as the bones continued to turn the giant mass of wood into ash. Still, at this rate, it would take another few minutes before the giant would be completely scattered in the winds.

"To think that I had to resort to the Tomogoroshi no Haikotsu (All-Killing Ash Bones), and still had to depend on luck for my survival… ludicrous," Kaguya shook her head, now standing in front of Naruto.

"Not so divine after all?" Naruto smirked weakly. No matter the odds, he didn't lose his defiant streak.

"It changes nothing about the outcome. You are spent."

"Yeah, but if I die now, my inner world would collapse," Naruto, out of nowhere, drew a wooden kunai.

"An inner world requires but one ego to sustain it," Kaguya swatted away the kunai before he could plunge it in his own throat. "All the power you possess, as well as your body, will belong to me. But that does not imply that I will let you kill yourself, child. You have annoyed me, so I will personally end your existence. But before you die, you should know that I am going to pluck the rinnegan from the corpse of that little girlfriend of yours; I am done with you."

As she uttered that last threat, with more venom than Naruto had ever heard her speak, she drew one of her bones out of her own arm. So she wished to turn him to ashes… not a pleasant prospect.

"Die," she hissed in his ear, driving the bone, as a thrusting weapon, right into his chest. The corners of her mouth tugged up slightly when she heard him groan out in pain, and she cruelly drove the bone even deeper.

"I thought… I told you… I don't…" he glared up, ignoring the excruciating feeling of his chest slowly being turned to ash. "I don't give… up… easily…"

Much to her surprise, he suddenly grabbed her by her wrists. As his sage mode had yet to run out, his physical power was still far beyond any other mortal man she had ever faced before. He had survived the impact of her Yasogami Kūgeki (Eighty Gods Vacuum Fists), what had already proven his strength to her. But why would he smirk with such defiance in his expression, when his body had already started to disintegrate? She didn't know.

Not until she heard a voice behind her, rising up from the rotting remains of the Jūichimen Kan'on.

"Senpō Mokuton: Kan'on Ryote (Sage Art Wood Release: Kanon's hands)!"

Unlike the statue itself, which was slow and cumbersome in spite of its overwhelming power, if Naruto merely created the hands of the Kan'on, the attack was as swift as it was lethal.

In spite of his exhaustion and the horror he had felt when Kaguya had started to turn his trump card into dust, Naruto had not lost the ability that Kakuzu had hammered into him above all other: using his mind. From the moment Naruto had woken up from the near-death that Zetsu and Kakuzu had put him in, from the moment he had basically lost his first life, they had put him through a horrendous cycle of training- what was basically just another name for attempted murder- and recovery. From the very first moment, 'Kūnomori' of Akatsuki had been forced to adapt, as he constantly fought opponents who were superior in power.

With all that training, being able to constantly adapt his strategy was a basic skill he had nearly instinctively mastered. So when Naruto saw that he was losing his Jūichimen Kan'on, he knew he only had one alternative. He lacked the reserves to recreate the Kan'on, and lacked the time to refill his reserves. He couldn't fight her head-on, so the only way out was deception.

It was a dangerous gamble against someone who wielded both byakugan and, as far he could see, a mutated form of the rinnegan. If she had been on her guard, if she had kept her eyes on him as any proper shinobi would have done, she would have seen how he had sunken into the decaying statue. She would have seen that he had left a Moku Bunshin behind.

But she didn't see any of it.

"I told you that you revealed your own weakness," Naruto glared at the two enormous hands that were clasped together- with Kaguya in between. "And I wasn't just pointing to the possibility that my Senpō jutsu might work against you. It was your arrogance that blinded you, that made you fail to see me coming."

The hands of the Kan'on clenched tightly, with the deadly thorns of the left palm piercing the white flesh of the haughty Ōtsutsuki, injecting the chakra that would bloom into a poison that would end her life, while the right hand's influence kept her from diverting her chakra into any form of counterattack. The hand even prevented her from draining the chakra out of the wooden appendages, the chakra through which Naruto controlled the hands.

"I hope the true gods will take pity when they judge your soul," Naruto growled. "Not that you will receive any pity from me."

He forced the hands so close to each other that Kaguya began to feel her bones break under the pressure. She cried out, not merely due to the pain, but due to the frustration she felt. Unlike her, Naruto did not play with his prey. A sickening squelch ended her torment in a manner that would have made Kakuzu proud.

If these past years had taught him one thing, a lesson that his naïve former self would never have accepted, it was that some people simply did not deserve mercy. Some had done things that put them beyond redemption. Sacrificing a large part of mankind and turning them into the living husks that were the Zetsu was one of those irredeemable things. And above all…

"You really should not have threatened Aji-chan, you three-eyed bitch."

Author's notes

This chapter took a somewhat philosophical turn when the conflict between Kaguya and Naruto turned into a clash of ideas, a debate rather than a mere fistfight. It was an aspect of the battle between Naruto and Nagato that I really liked in the manga, and I hope I managed to pull off something comparable in this chapter!

To recap: Kaguya arrogantly believes herself to be elevated above all other things, as a goddess who has the power to render 'divine judgment' over the lesser species. Even when she doesn't even realize that she barely understands those 'lesser species'. At the same time, Naruto accepts that he is but a small cog in a boundless nature, though he doesn't let his wishful thinking stand in the way of a healthy dose of realism. He knows his understanding is limited, yet at the same time he believes that Kaguya is a monster who deserves nothing but death, for the threat she poses to the world is too great.

I know; many will disagree with Naruto's view on the world. A more extremist point of view would have been easier to convey and easier to understand. But I truly do not believe that the extremes of a spectrum can ever be the right answer- even if it is the easy answer. And the world has shown us that easy answers are hardly ever the 'right' answers. The best things are usually achieved the hard way, after all. Sadly, lazy as we are, we still prefer the easy answers…

Now, please leave reviews, thank Illuminated for his continued efforts, and I hope you can muster the patience to wait for the extra-long last chapter of Asunder!

(There's going to be an epilogue after that too!)

-Ziltoid-