Tsunade did not know where the road ahead led. She simply walked numbly, walking onward without pause toward the unknown.
The iron chains around her clattered, and the seal remained in place. Wrapped in a simple, tattered cloak of rags, she wandered like an exile.
Tsunade let her thoughts run wild while also pondering deeply.
The Sage of Six Paths had many things he wanted to say to Tsunade, but it seemed he could not bring himself to say even one of them.
After deliberating for a long while, he finally spoke.
"Tsunade."
Tsunade had no interest in responding. She turned a deaf ear and ignored the Sage of Six Paths.
He was a rotten seed. The chaos of the Shinobi World and all its tragedies had been caused by him.
No. The only thing worthy of gratitude was that, driven by hatred over his lover's death, he had liberated humanity from Kaguya's terrifying rule, at the cost of a shattered earth and countless dead and wounded.
"I know you're wary of me and suspicious of me."
"That's a good thing."
The Sage of Six Paths said this.
"I don't have much else to say."
"There's nothing more I can accomplish."
"Now that things have come to this, you must decide the road ahead for yourself."
"And I've reached the time to say goodbye to you, human."
"You know that I'm an alien, a member of the Ōtsutsuki Clan."
"But I love humanity. Perhaps that love wasn't entirely pure—I merely loved a few people, and overthrew my own mother for them."
"I returned humanity's homeland to humanity. That was my decision."
"My descendant, Otsutsuki Tsunade, what you do and what fate you choose will be decided by you."
"And I'll leave you one final gift. Consider it a blessing from