A Game Within a Game

The Guardian fell silent. It was the first time Boruto had felt it "pause"—if a being like this could pause at all. The question seemed to touch some boundary, some threshold of understanding that even it could not easily cross.

[Yes. But that's not what you really want to ask.]

Boruto did have another question. One he had avoided ever since learning the truth, one he'd taken the long way around only to find himself facing at last.

"My birth," he said, feeling his voice tremble. "Does it have anything to do with God?"

"Your birth was the result of a design."

"Who designed it?"

The Guardian did not answer directly. It pressed a kind of "image" into Boruto's mind—not a clear picture, but more like an overly compressed memory, incomplete and fragmented, riddled with noise. Boruto saw a space where the planets were arranged too neatly, like pieces on a chessboard. He saw something moving, precise and indifferent, like a chess player making a move. He saw familiar Chakra Waves, the Runes of the Ōtsutsuki Clan, and finally, a name—but its characters blurred the instant he tried to read them, like ink spreading in water.

Shiki spoke softly in his mind. "The Ōtsutsuki God left a piece on the board before falling asleep."

"Me."

"Not just you. The entire Shinobi World is the board."

Boruto stood there for a long time without speaking. Anger came first—he felt it burning in his chest like a suppressed flame. But anger needed a target, something concrete to point at. A God who was already asleep or dead? A consciousness that had long since shattered? He clenched his fist, then slowly let it relax.

"Then what was God's goal?" he asked Shiki, his voice dry.

"Resurrection, or continuation." For once, Shiki gave an