Sasuke slipped back into sleep soon afterwards, sedated by the doctors for 'the final part of the mind healing process' or something. I wasn't entirely sure what that was about, for good reason since my visits to Sasuke were the only times I'd ever been in in the Genjutsu Recovery Ward.
I had other things to do than watch over the kid while he was sleeping, and, more importantly, there was something I was curious about.
It occurs to me that if I wasn't pretty much immortal, my curiosity would be much more life threatening.
I slipped into a Corridor of Darkness and popped up inside the Physical Trauma Ward.
Unlike Sasuke, this one didn't have any ANBU guarding the room. Mostly because the person inside was many times stronger and skilled than any given ANBU, being a Kage level ninja in his own right.
And, to be honest, the only reason he was still in the hospital was because of the fact that most of the nurses in said hospital happened to be... well, I'll just say 'his type'. Not that there was any such thing as his 'type'.
Jiraiya was rather legendary in his perversity. As the man himself went out of his way to brag about.
I slipped underneath the door, completely disregarding the small flows on the Chakra on the floor. I gave only a cursory glance at the seal, and noted that it actually was one that I had seen before.
A... remote viewing seal, actually. The Yamanaka clan actually made rather extensive use of it in their compounds.
Why would he have a remote viewing...
Oh.
Remote viewing seal. On the floor. Pointed upwards.
Jiraiya really is a shameless pervert.
I disturbed the seal as I passed it, my claw scraping across the seal and rending it apart it in a single neat movement, the Chakra briefly surging before dispelling harmlessly.
I shot a disapproving glare towards Jiraiya, though I was well aware of the fact that it would probably only encourage him.
"You ruin all my fun."
I shrugged, and he sighed, his hand slapping against the floor.
The ink shifted slightly, and then promptly lifted off the ground and flowed into an ink bottle next to his bed. It was a water natured technique (The Liquid Manipulation Jutsu, if I remembered correctly. And I did.), though one he could only really accomplish because the ink had been practically bathed in his Chakra, almost completely suffused with it. It was easier when dealing with liquids that weren't suffused in Chakra, or liquids that weren't too heavy, but in the case of Chakra Ink, it was pretty hard. Hard enough that not even Shikaku would do it casually.
Unlike Jiraiya, who'd mastered it to the point of not even needing to use hand seals to do it.
Fucking Kage level ninja.
Didn't matter that he wasn't as bullshit as, say, the Sandaime, each and every single one of them was bullshit somehow.
Of course, some where more bullshit than the others. Like the Sandaime.
There was a reason that guy was called the God of Shinobi.
"I know."
His eyes widened, and I took a moment of vindictive pleasure.
"You can talk?" He asked, incredulous.
"No, you're just imagining things. The voice you're hearing inside your head is just the sign if your impending insanity."
He ignored me entirely, still staring at me with a look of curiosity.
"Regardless, I came because I have a few questions for you. Specifically, questions related to Summoning."
Summoning was... interesting, to say the least. I hadn't seen it in action before, mostly because there were very few ninja actually capable of Summoning in Konoha, and absolutely none of them ever Summoned for trivial reasons.
The reason I was interested in it was because it could transport beings across dimensions, apparently without exposing them to Darkness. I wasn't entirely sure about that last part, since it was only an assumption, but I figured it was an assumption that was well placed.
The Summoning Realm itself was also rather weird. It was another, separate, dimension. I could sense it, smell it, see it -how couldn't I, when there were so many beings with so many Hearts living within?-.
The weird part was simple; it was possible to get to the Summoning Realm without the use of the Summoning technique. The reason for that was equally simple; there were certain areas where the Summoning Realm and the Elemental Nations were connected. Physical locations where one could travel to, and end up in the Summoning Realm. Or travel from, and end up in the Elemental nations.
Mount Myoboku was an example of this. It huge, grandiose, and one might even go as far as to say extravagant, inhabited by the utterly massive Toads, yet, for some reason, its location was still actually, legitimately hidden. Instead of 'hidden', like any of the five Villages. Fukasaku had once said that it was a month long trip to get to the place where it connected with the Elemental Nations, from Konoha, travelling along 'secret pathways', or something like that.
I hadn't attempted to actually go there yet.
Partly because because I had no idea where any of those places actually were, but mostly because there was a Dimensional Barrier quite reminiscent of the one surrounding this World and, up until fairly recently, I hadn't had the capacity to pass through them.
'Quite reminiscent' were key words, there. The Dimension Barrier that separated the Elemental Nations from the Summoning Realm was not the same as the one that separated this World from all others. It was... different. Weaker, limited. I probably could have breached it under my own power if I had really wanted to, while I never would have stood a chance of breaching the the one that separated Worlds.
I had no idea why it was so much weaker, though I could guess, could hypothesize, theorize. I had done so, actually, and so far, I believed it was simply because the Elemental Nations -this dimension-, and the Summoning Realm -another dimension-, were not separate Worlds.
Oh, no, both of them were a part of this World. Two dimensions existing in tandem, two 'Bodies' for a single Heart, the Soul of this World connecting them together.
This World, then, was composed of those two dimensions; the first dimension -which I had taken to calling the 'Elemental Nations'-, which in turn was composed of this planet, the moon that orbits this planet, the star that this planet orbits, and every other celestial body inside this stellar system.
The second dimension -the Summoning Realm-, which also had a planet, and, assuming there wasn't some weird cosmology involved, also had a Star, potentially a moon, and quite possibly its own entire stellar system.
Worlds could be rather complicated, that way. I often found that the best way to think of Worlds was to think of them as their own, separate universes, which alternate universes and dimensions contained within. To travel between Worlds was to travel between universes, which are separate, but connected.
In turn, that would make The World the omniverse.
I... can only imagine what such a thing must have been like, looked like, before the Keyblade War shattered it into infinite pieces. It must have been grand.
Or, so I thought anyway.
But, back to the original point.
How was it that they had managed to bypass the Barrier in the first place? How could they Summon from anywhere, instead of just at those points?
Who the hell had invented all this time-space manipulation?
That particular question was one that I believed I already had an answer to. Though that particular answer didn't have any supporting evidence aside from the fact that it all came back to him in the end, didn't it?
"Summoning? Sure, fire away."
"Who developed it?"
Jiraiya exhaled, leaning back into his bed. "Well, I can't actually answer that. A lot of people have claimed to have made it, and nobody's actually sure who first developed it. According to most, however, they'll say that it was the Sage of Six Paths who first made it, and what I've dug up over the years seems to support that."
Of course it did.
Everything came back to the Sage of Six Paths, didn't it.
Regardless, "Thank you for answering." He waved it away.
"My second question; how do you manage to get past the Dimensional Barrier when you Summon?"
Jiraiya straightened up, his eyes opening to stare at me.
"That," He started, slowly, "has a much more complicated answer. One that I can't actually give, because I have no idea how it works."
Damn it.
"Though, I have a question of my own now. How do you know that the Summoning Realm is a different dimension? It's not exactly a secret, but it also isn't the most well known thing to... well, anybody. Most just believe its in this world, just really, really well hidden."
"I am a multidimensional creature by my very nature. It was rather hard for me to not notice it. Plus, the name is rather indicative."
"Interesting." Jiraiya noted. "You can travel between them?"
"I am capable of doing so, yes."
Jiraiya grinned, before the grin turned into a reminiscing sigh. "Minato would have just loved to have you around."
His eyes drifted for a moment, and I couldn't help but notice the flare of sadness in his Heart.
"Minato Namikaze, the Fourth Hokage. Your student."
"Yep. Brilliant kid, skilled, powerful. Heart of gold, too. All too rare, these days." He sighed, then shook his head and grinned. "Ever seen the Summoning Technique?"
"I haven't, actually. Would you be willing to demonstrate?"
"Sure." He gave me a thumbs up, before biting down on his thumb and drawing a small amount of blood. A few hand seals later, and Jiraiya's hand slamming into the desk beside his bed, and I was watching as seals spread across the table.
I watched as space warped slightly, Jiraiya's Chakra moving sideways, flowing into the Dimensional Barrier. Space warped slightly more-
And a seal appeared on the Dimensional Barrier itself. I saw it for only a brief instant, but that moment seemed to stretch for an eternity.
The seal was complex, almost impossibly so. It warped in on itself, stretching and changing, accounting for the most minute of changes in Space and Time, shifting as the World itself shifted slightly, self-adapting and ever-changing. It was written in three dimensions, across Up and Down, Left and Right, Forwards and Backwards, between Space.
Everything I knew about seals -which was basically not much more than the average ninja- told me that it was impossible.
And yet, here it was.
The Chakra interacted with the seal, and it was recognized. The seal shifted, and for the briefest of moments, opened a tiny, infinitesimal hole within. In that singular moment, in that tiny period of time, Space twisted to connect the two dimensions, and a Being was drawn through the connection.
The connection severed, releasing a puff of smoke into the air; wasted energy from the Summoning. The seal, its task done, warped again, closing the breach in the Dimensional Barrier and fading away as it became inactive.
Somebody had written a seal into a Dimensional Barrier.
...
What.
What?