A Timeline Analysis

(This timeline is just my personal reasoning and may differ from everyone else's understanding, especially regarding the First and Second Shinobi World Wars, whose dates are heavily disputed. However, my story takes place in the late Third Shinobi World War, so there's no need to overthink my account of the First and Second Wars.)

Some people like to refer to the years of Konoha, but personally, I don't really like bringing that up.

After all, those dates were compiled and summarized by netizens themselves, not taken from official material. I've always felt they weren't entirely accurate.

Naruto's story spans the entire Naruto series, so I chose Naruto's age as the basis for calculating the timeline.

Therefore, the accuracy should be quite high. Surely no one doubts the accuracy of this timeline, right?

First Shinobi World War: There doesn't seem to have been any specific campaign associated with this war. Some people say it refers to the war in which Hashirama and Madara pacified the chaotic world. Personally, I don't think that's quite accurate. I believe it refers to all the years of war before Konoha was founded.

Second Shinobi World War: This war had many landmark events. The first was the death of the Second Hokage and Second Raikage after they were surrounded and attacked by Ginkaku, Kinkaku, and their men.

Although the Second Hokage looked quite young before his death in the anime, judging from the timeline, he was actually already advanced in age by then.

After all, by the time the chaos had been pacified and Konoha was founded, the Second Hokage was already at least forty.

There should have been at least a ten-year buffer between that period and the Second Shinobi World War, right? After all, the Third Hokage grew up during that time.

Therefore, when the Second Shinobi World War broke out, the Second Hokage was already old. It wasn't difficult to understand how he died at the hands of Ginkaku and Kinkaku.

As for why he looked so young after Impure World Reincarnation, that's the artists' fault. After all, they wouldn't pay much attention to the age details of a supporting character like him.

Otherwise, if the Second Hokage had still been in his prime, there was no way he should have died so pathetically.

Another landmark battle of the Second Shinobi World War was the mutual deaths of the Second Tsuchikage, Mū, and the Second Mizukage, Hozuki Gengetsu.

This also allows us to deduce something interesting: Madara disappeared and Hashirama died not long before the Second Shinobi World War.

First, we know that Ōnoki and Mū once went to Konoha to request an alliance, but Madara rejected them.

At that time, Mū was still alive, which meant the Second Shinobi World War had not yet begun.

Also, the Second Hokage took office after the First Hokage's death, and Tobirama died as Hokage during the Second Shinobi World War. Therefore, the First Hokage must have died before the Second War.

Before Hashirama died, he fought Madara once. Madara took some of his flesh, faked his death, and escaped while waiting for the Rinnegan to awaken.

Therefore, Madara and Hashirama disappeared before the Second Shinobi World War.

The Third Shinobi World War was also the war most closely connected to the plot of Naruto.

The Legendary Three Ninja, Shisui, Kakashi, Sakumo, and Minato all became famous during the Third War.

Some people say the Legendary Three Ninja became famous during the Second War, but that's incorrect. Although the three of them were older than Minato, they truly rose to fame during the Third War.

The war began because the Third Kazekage disappeared—he was assassinated by Sasori—and Sunagakure descended into chaos. Konoha and Iwagakure saw an opportunity and launched the war.

At first, Konoha and Iwagakure targeted Sunagakure. But Konoha was located in the middle of the Great Nations, and no one wanted to see it expand. Thus, when Konoha sent out its forces, Kirigakure stabbed it in the side.

Incidentally, Kirigakure and Iwagakure were allies at the time.

Iwagakure wanted to take advantage of Sunagakure, but it also didn't want Konoha to grow too powerful. Therefore, the three villages fought one another in the Land of Grass and the Land of Rain.

This was the main battlefield. Kakashi's battle that made him famous, Minato's title of Golden Flash—Yellow Flash doesn't sound as good, so I changed it to Golden. I hope no one minds—and the battle that made the Legendary Three Ninja famous all took place here.

Who gave the Legendary Three Ninja their title?

It was Hanzō. The Land of Rain, where Hanzō was based, bordered all three countries, so the fighting there was even more brutal than in the Land of Grass.

After fighting the Legendary Three Ninja, Hanzō bestowed the title upon them. Yahiko and the others happened to witness the scene, so they chased after the three of them, hoping to become their disciples.

Then, after Jiraiya left, Yahiko died and Nagato changed sides, leading to the events that followed.

Therefore, the Legendary Three Ninja became famous during the Third War.

That was the western front. There was also the eastern front.

There wasn't much information about the eastern front, so many details could only be inferred.

Ao, the Byakugan Killer of Kirigakure, was older than Mei Terumi, while Mei Terumi was the same age as Kakashi.

When Kakashi was active during the Third War, it was actually already late in the war. Ao, who was older than him, was in his prime and belonged to the same generation as Shisui and Minato.

His Byakugan was a war trophy. Judging from the timeline, it could only have been obtained during the Third Shinobi World War.

Among the Hyuga, only the Main Family's Byakugan could be taken. A Branch Family member's Byakugan would be ruined when removed.

In Naruto's generation, Hiashi was the head of the Hyuga Main Family. He looked to be about the same age as Ao, and both of his eyes were intact. Therefore, Ao's Byakugan could only have come from the previous head of the Main Family—Hiashi's father.

On the eastern front, the Hyuga and Uchiha were the main forces resisting Kirigakure. This also happened to confirm my theory.

Ao obtained the Byakugan during that war.

According to the available information, Naruto was twelve when he first appeared, while Kakashi was twenty-six.

Naruto was born during the Nine-Tails' Rampage, when he was zero years old. Therefore, Kakashi was fourteen during the Nine-Tails' Rampage, meaning the Third War had already ended.

The Battle of Kannabi Bridge was a turning point in the Third War. From that point onward, the war gradually came to an end.

At the time of that battle, Kakashi was exactly twelve years old and had just become a jōnin. It was also his carelessness that led to Obito's "death."

Therefore, only about two years passed between the Nine-Tails' Rampage and the Battle of Kannabi Bridge.

Minato's marriage seemed to have taken place after the war. Subtracting the ten months of pregnancy, along with the other miscellaneous periods of time, it was probably about a year later.

The Third War ended when Kakashi was around thirteen.

Because the western battlefield involved fighting Kirigakure, Rin Nohara being captured and Kirigakure's plan to use the Three-Tails to disrupt Konoha followed naturally.

This happened after Obito's "death" but before the end of the war. Therefore, it should have taken place when Kakashi was around thirteen, near the end of the war.

As for how the Three-Tails later returned to Kirigakure, that's something of a plot hole.

Given Obito's love for Rin, he couldn't possibly have casually abandoned her corpse. I simply can't figure out how Kirigakure recovered the Three-Tails and then gave it to Yagura.

Yagura had already become a Jinchuriki before Obito took control of him. He was even a perfect Jinchuriki.

Therefore, the Three-Tails inside him couldn't have been given to him by Obito.

Later, when Obito wanted to collect the Tailed Beasts, there was no way he would hand over Rin's corpse. If he knew the Three-Tails was in his own possession, he certainly wouldn't hand it over either.

Furthermore, he didn't learn until the Fourth Shinobi World War that Rin had died at Kakashi's hands to prevent the Tailed Beast from destroying Konoha.

Therefore, he had no idea that Rin had a Tailed Beast inside her.

There was another issue: when Kishimoto first established the setting, there was a rule that when a Jinchuriki died, the Tailed Beast died as well.

That rule created a plot hole here.

No matter how I try to patch it, I can't make it work.

Therefore, if my book later says that a Jinchuriki's death causes the Tailed Beast to escape, don't blame me for making things up. Otherwise, I really can't explain it.

There was also the question of why Kumogakure continued holding back and refused to act during the Third War.

The Third Raikage died during the Third War.

However, looking at the war as a whole, Kumogakure didn't seem to participate much. It only tried to act near the end, when Killer B and A were intercepted halfway by Minato and retreated after realizing the situation was unfavorable.

At first, I wondered whether Kumogakure had held back too much.

They didn't act earlier, and by the time they wanted to act, they had discovered that they had missed their opportunity.

Later, I realized it was because the Third Raikage had died, throwing Kumogakure into internal turmoil and causing it to miss the best opportunity to enter the war. It wasn't that they didn't want to act—their leader had died.

From this, we can deduce that the Third Raikage died near the beginning of the Third War.

His death left Kumogakure without a leader, which was why it failed to participate in the war.

If he had died in the middle or near the end of the war, Kumogakure would have had plenty of opportunities to send troops to attack Konoha from the flank.

As for Killer B and A appearing later just to tag along, they were simply building political credentials and laying the groundwork for A to take power.

The Third Kazekage also disappeared—and died—around the same period. His death threw Sunagakure into chaos, allowing Konoha and Iwagakure to see an opportunity and ignite the Third War.

Why did the deaths of one Kage produce such different results for Sunagakure and Kumogakure?

Actually, Sunagakure had no intention of fighting a war at all. From beginning to end, it was the side being attacked.

Looking at the map, the Land of Wind shared a land border with the Land of Fire and the Land of Earth, making it the easiest target. The Land of Lightning was far to the northeast, in a remote location. Only the Land of Fire was relatively close, while the Land of Water was separated by the sea and difficult to attack.

Therefore, the Land of Wind had no way to avoid the war.

Furthermore, the Third Kazekage's disappearance ignited the conflict first. Konoha, Sunagakure, and Iwagakure began fighting, tying up a large portion of their forces. With Kirigakure stabbing them in the back, they had no energy left to deal with Kumogakure's subsequent turmoil after the Third Raikage died.

That was why Kumogakure escaped the disaster.

However, there is one thing I find very puzzling: the Third Raikage died at the hands of Iwagakure.

The Land of Lightning and the Land of Earth were so far apart that, logically speaking, the former shouldn't have posed a direct threat to Iwagakure. So what exactly was Ōnoki, who was in power at the time, thinking when he ground the Third Raikage to death?

Was that strategy thought up with his feet? Hahaha...

There is also the matter of the Second Tsuchikage and Second Mizukage dying together during the Second War. The two countries were on opposite ends of the map, so how did they even start fighting? They fought until their village leaders died together...

I simply can't figure it out. Did they not understand the strategy of allying with distant powers to attack nearby ones? Hahaha...

All right, that's the chronological order of the three great Shinobi Wars as I have summarized it.

In my book, Qi Shuang appears at the same time as Zabuza—they are both nine years old. When Zabuza encounters Kakashi in the Land of Waves, he is the same age as Kakashi, so we can conclude that Qi Shuang and Kakashi are the same age.

As I analyzed earlier, the Third War ended when Kakashi was around thirteen, so this point in time was only four years after the end of the Third War.

The Third War was at its most intense stage.