Though it was said to be an abridged version, this memory...
Glancing once more at the young man, who still seemed unable to process it, Chiba could not help but draw a slight breath as that memory resurfaced in his mind.
That cruel memory—a memory he had gone through more than a dozen times, one that had completely merged into his own memories and been thoroughly digested and absorbed. Yet even recalling it now, he still found it hard to let go.
At first, there did not seem to have been such a scene, so he had not thought of it right away.
Then, unconsciously, he looked behind him—at the floating Light Orb, the blue brick paving of the square, and the two doors behind it.
After voluntarily accepting that memory, Chiba opened his eyes—though he did not know when they had closed—after a stretch of darkness. Before him stood a wooden cabin, the kind often seen in foreign horror films, hidden deep in the woods in some isolated place far from any town, surrounded by dense forest.
There were about six others beside him, all roughly his age.
The instant he opened his eyes, he knew he had fallen into some kind of dangerous scenario. He even felt a sense of déjà vu, the kind associated with a certain type of novel. Only this time, there was no swaying train carriage, nor any scarred young man carrying a Desert Eagle.
With the eyes of someone who had experienced life-and-death dangers in the Naruto World, Chiba could tell that everyone in the room was an ordinary person.
Of course, in the memory, he—or rather, another version of himself—was also an ordinary person. He had nothing, and was even somewhat withdrawn. The first thing he did upon waking was move into