War was merciless and brutal. It was all-consuming and left no one unscathed. It brought out the best in men who were meant to be great and the worst in most of everyone else. People saw everything only in black and white if only to spare themselves the trouble and anguish of looking further beyond. There are no winners or losers but survivors who come out of it with scars on their bodies to remind them of their deeds for life, and new demons that come to light in the darkness of their minds.
The soil is soaked red with blood and the grass burned to dust by the clashing of weapons, battle cries of men spilled the blood of the dead. Villages are razed to the ground, pillaged by scavengers and deserters who harvest the farms and slaughter the livestock to fill own bellies rather than the villagers. Bandits kill the husbands while their wives and children are tortured and raped to sate the perverted desires and fetishes of bandits. Some are killed to satisfy their battle craze, and others are tortured to calm their bloodlust. The unlucky few are sold into slavery once they reach beyond the border.
Men are forcibly enlisted to join the war, to become cannon fodder in a war they want to part in, to damn their families to poverty and suffering. For the greater good, they said when they weren't the ones who were forced to fight in a war over pride and greed. Women have little choice but to sell their bodies to feed themselves and their children. The selfish abandon their children, unwilling to put up with the burden of feeding extra mouths when they know their husband won't come back. Children are thrown out on the streets to fend for themselves and resort to dumpster diving, thievery, and pick-pocketing to survive. Some band together to form the illusion of strength with numbers to rob the rich.
The people who fight in war have their body and mind poisoned alike. Great men and cowards alike are born out of the war for they are two sides of the same coin. Through war, great men are born out of the desire to end it once and for all, to improve the standards of living for their people, to see through it spilled blood no longer. At the same time, cowards are born, men who choose to take the easy way out and abandon their morals for the sake of living to see another day; fearful of all things painful and harsh, unwilling to live through hardship and suffering.
War brings the best and worst out of people. Some fight in a war to protect their families and for those who cannot. Others give their lives up to ensure their families a better future. Most, however, would sacrifice others if it meant they could continue to live in the lap of luxury. Many would trip the person behind them if it meant they would gain something out of it in some way or form. War strips people of their exterior appearances and gives way to the beauty of the soul or the lack thereof.
There is to justification to war for it's a tragedy in itself. The end of the war doesn't equate to the beginning of peace. It's merely a stall for time until the next war. With each war comes a wave of hate, for it's far easier to hate than it is to love. The cycle of hate thus restarted by the first of spilled blood never ceases to exist so long as people continue to hate and clash against each other.
The Fourth Great Shinobi War was a fool's war. Those who fought in it died in vain yet were envied by the remaining survivors. The deceased were resting in peace, undisturbed by the calamity that was Madara and later, Kaguya. No longer did they experience pain and suffering, fear and despair, emptiness and utter hopelessness. Dying wasn't an option for the survivors when they managed to survive for so long. It would be an insult to those who died so that they could live for even a day longer.
One by one, the people he cherished from the beginning, and the people he grew to care for left him alone eventually. Kaguya could track them down if they stayed in one location for too long, so they were always on the move. White Zetsu were always on their trail as well. With practically the world against them, the survivors were always either sleep-deprived, hungry, chakra-exhausted, injured, or all of the above. The White Zetsu tended to target survivors that weren't from Konoha and the only explanation he could think of what that Black Zetsu and White Zetsu wanted to make him suffer and save the "best" for last, namely his friends.
Iruka, Omoi, and Tsume were the first among them to die, buying time for everyone else to escape. Darui took on five White Zetsu to protect them when they were exhausted and drained of chakra to do any damage. Mei, Chojuro, C, Omoi, and Samui teamed up to fight Kaguya when they lingered in the Land of Hot Springs so that Tsunade, Shizune, and Sakura could heal serious injuries. Hinata died of chakra exhaustion while Kiba and Shino died from blood loss and the shock of losing his entire colony respectively. Kurenai went into labor but died halfway through the cesarean section, as did her unborn baby. Tenten bodily shielded Lee, out of commission after opening five of the Gates, from a wooden pike and Lee later died from internal bleeding and brain hemorrhage. Kankuro and Temari made Sakura drain them dry of chakra so that she could heal Gaara from the brink of death. Konohamaru bit his tongue when White Zetsu attempted to hold him hostage to kill off the stronger and abler survivors. Gai, A, Choji, and Shizune grew infections from their wounds and made everyone leave them behind. Gai opened the sixth gate and took on thirty White Zetsu. Sakura and Tsunade died trying to heal Kurotsuchi.
The last remaining survivors were Kakashi, Gaara, Sasuke, Shikamaru, Sai, and Genma. The Fourth Great Shinobi War lasted a year and a half, and the survivors knew it would be coming to an end soon. They just barely managed to survive Kaguya and her army of White Zetsu from completely wiping them out. They only needed to wait for another hour until the stars fully aligned with the seal he drew up with his blood since he was going to be the one to activate the seal. Anko, Ao, Onoki, and Yamato stayed behind to stall Kaguya and White Zetsu.
With his lips pressed into a thin line, he eyed the remaining survivors with unshed tears. There was nothing to say; everyone had already gone over the semantics of the seal and the aftermath of it all. Genma gave him the idea of devising a seal that would go back in time. The Flying Thunder God seal loosely inspired him since it was also a space-time seal; the user entered a dimensional void where time was invalid and exited into a designated endpoint in an instant. He designed his seal so that the user entered and exited through multiple dimensional voids until he was at least twenty years back in time, somewhere around the Third Great Shinobi War. While Shikamaru wanted him to go further back to the Warring States period to nip the root of the problem, if he tried to go any further, then he risked erasing his entire existence.
The chakra needed to activate the seal was unmeasurable, even when he combined his chakra with Kurama. The remaining survivors came to the decision to give up their chakra for him to use. The sixteen-year-old him would've vehemently denied that option, but he was eighteen now and knew better. He was jaded and broken, paranoid and cynical, bitter and exhausted; he could look beneath the underneath, and he saw how utterly exhausted they looked.
Kakashi smiled at him warmly. His single eye didn't quite close and curve when he smiled as it did when he was still a Genin. "I'm proud of you. Make sure you give me a good slap over the head when I become your teacher again."
"It's probably gonna more troublesome than it's worth, but I could've used a lot more training back then," Shikamaru said with a trembling voice.
He laughed slightly, but it came out as a raspy wheeze. "Don't worry, Kakashi-sensei. You were a great teacher when it mattered. Shikamaru, I just have to throw a bone at you, and you'll train if it means unraveling the puzzle I'll become."
Sai said nothing. He merely walked up to him and hugged him tightly, conveying what his words couldn't. "I'll get you two out of Root. Danzo won't stand a chance." Sai smiled genuinely and released him from the embrace.
Gaara stepped forward to grasp his shoulder. "You changed my life for the better. I know you'll do it again. The younger me would've done at lot better against the Akatsuki if he didn't just focus on his sand."
"We weren't that close when you were younger, huh. I just remember being part of the guard rotation the Third created until you entered the Academy. Well, don't be too much of a brat to younger me," Genma snarked good-naturedly. "Save Hayato, will ya? He didn't deserve what was coming."
"Naruto, don't let Itachi do everything on his own. And make sure I don't become too arrogant." Sasuke said with an undercurrent of regret in his voice.
"Gaara, no need to worry. It won't be too hard to send tiny you a seal so we can be pen pals. And Genma, I guess I'll tone it down, so you only get pranked once a week. It'll be good training for you." To Sasuke, he solemnly replied, "I won't let Itachi damn himself if it's the last thing I do."
He gathered his chakra and sent six chakra chains to his friends. His chains impaled each of them in the abdomen, where their chakra was centered. He braced himself for the influx of chakra and began drawing chakra from Kurama as well. He unraveled the scroll and set it down in front of him, adjusting it slightly so that it aligned with the stars.
How much longer until we have enough chakra?
Fifteen minutes at most. I've been saving up chakra for half a year, thinking we would go out fighting Kaguya.
Shikamaru's lifeless body hit the ground after two minutes. Sai followed at the three-minute mark and Genma joined him. At five minutes, Gaara was dead before he hit the ground. Kakashi managed until six minutes and Sasuke lasted seven minutes. Kaguya arrived at his hiding spot in three minutes with Black Zetsu and the army of White Zetsu trailing behind her. Two White Zetsu were dragging bodies with them. They tossed the mutilated bodies of Anko, Ao, Onoki, and Yamato in front of him. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to gather more chakra.
Kurama! With everyone's chakra, I should almost have enough chakra to power the seal! How much more chakra do we have to have?
We still need another five minutes to gather chakra! Damn it! Kaguya isn't just going to sit around and wait for us.
Forget it! It's all or nothing!
Naruto! Your body won't be able to keep up with the rate of chakra you're taking in!
He ignored Kurama. Blood gushed out from his eyes, ears, and nose and he began coughing up blood. His lungs burned for air, and his limbs began to shake as though it were under enormous pressure. It wasn't an exaggeration that he was probably one of the last few shinobi left. Even if activating the seal would end in a failure, it was a better alternative than getting killed at Kaguya's hand. While Kaguya might not derive any satisfaction from killing him, Black Zetsu definitely would. Given how much of a pest he was in the face of Black Zetsu's plans to revive Kaguya, Black Zetsu was itching to see him dead. Black Zetsu would revel in his death. He wasn't going to let Kaguya kill him when former enemies threw everything at him in hopes of killing him. He was going to die on his terms. He always thought he would die sacrificing himself for another, not unlike how Neji shielded himself for a better future.
Kurama, we don't have any more time. I'm going to activate the seal as it is.
Idiot! Five minutes of chakra is too big of a margin to forsake!
We don't have that kind of time! If we fail and die, then so be it! It's better than dying at Kaguya's hands!
Kurama fell silent at that. With a silent prayer to the Sage of Six Paths, he slammed his palm so that it rested on the center of the seal and gritted his teeth when he felt a pull on his navel. His vision went dark, and Kurama's voice was drowned out by the rushing of blood in his ears and an ear-splitting screech that burst his ear drums.
His body deconstructed with every dimensional void he entered and reconstructed with every dimensional void he exited. His body was stripped of the skin and bone, muscle and blood, chakra and pathways. His skin was peeled off in thick flakes, similarly to how Kurama's unstable cloak of chakra tore at his skin. His fingernails and toenails were ripped off from the nailbeds and then his muscles were torn away like string cheese. His blood vessels, nerves, and pathways unraveled from their respective systems. The process was agonizingly painful and not even getting hit by Mei's lava release, or Itachi's Amaterasu could compare.
His vision returned to him and the world cleared so that it wasn't black anymore. The pull of his navel returned, and he found himself screaming his throat raw at the sight of destruction, an unleashed Kurama, and his parents both impaled by Kurama's claw to protect his infant body.