Shi Xiu looked at Minato in disbelief and said coolly.
"Watching your closest friend brutally kill the person you love is a blow anyone would struggle to bear, let alone someone from the Uchiha Clan. Pain, despair, and rage all tangled together—emotions like those are enough to shatter a person's entire mind. Otherwise, where do you think Kakashi's Mangekyo came from? Without Uchiha blood, he couldn't have awakened the Mangekyo on his own."
Minato froze at those words, memories of his time with Obito and the others flooding his mind.
In the end, Minato let out a long, heavy sigh. When he learned that Obito was the one who had indirectly caused his and Kushina's deaths, his feelings were a tangled mess. For a moment, he couldn't even begin to describe them.
After a while, Minato seemed to come back to himself. He abruptly raised his head and stared straight at Shi Xiu. "Lord Shi Xiu, why are you telling me all this? I'm already dead, and I can't do much to affect the world of the living. Why not tell Lord Sarutobi instead?"
Shi Xiu was momentarily taken aback by the question, but quickly composed himself. Turning to Minato, he replied, "What good would telling Monkey do? You're different, Minato. Before long, I intend to bring you and Kushina back to this world with the Impure World Reincarnation Jutsu."
Minato furrowed his brow. "But my soul was sealed by the Reaper Death Seal. By all rights, the Impure World Reincarnation shouldn't be able to summon it from the seal!"
Shi Xiu's lips curled into a confident smile. "You don't need to worry about that. I have a way to break the Dead Demon Consuming Seal's hold. And I can avoid becoming the sacrifice for performing it."
Minato still looked hesitant. But when Shi Xiu followed up with his next words, the last trace of doubt vanished from Minato's heart.
"Don't you want to witness Naruto Uzumaki's growth with your own eyes?" That simple question struck Minato like a mighty hammer, right in the heart.
Minato let out a deep sigh and slowly replied, "Since you've already made your decision, Lord Shi Xiu, I have no objections."
Just then, Minato's body began to blur and fade. He looked down at his vanishing form, then smiled. "I'm sorry, Lord Shi Xiu. It seems my time is almost up."
Before he could say more, a flash of light appeared before Shi Xiu's eyes. When his vision cleared, he found himself back in the mysterious space where the Nine-Tails was sealed.
Shi Xiu watched the Nine-Tails look around in bewilderment and couldn't help chuckling. "Hey, Kurama, you look so adorably dumbfounded right now. It's hilarious!"
The Nine-Tails haughtily turned its head away. But a moment later, as if suddenly remembering something, it quickly turned back and cautiously eyed Shi Xiu.
"How did you know Minato had left some of his chakra in this seal?" the Nine-Tails asked, full of suspicion.
Shi Xiu only smiled mysteriously at its question. "Ha, there's a lot more I know than that!"
The Nine-Tails felt utterly frustrated, but what could it do? It couldn't beat Shi Xiu.
Shi Xiu waved at the Nine-Tails. "Kurama, I'll come see you again in a while."
With that, Shi Xiu left the sealed space. The Nine-Tails let out a heavy sigh of relief.
"How strange. How can a human live for so long? Good thing he never became a Jinchuriki, or I'd have had a miserable time."
After leaving the sealed space, Shi Xiu returned to his room and looked out the window at the thick, ink-black night.
Stars glittered across the sky like precious gems, but the beautiful night held Shi Xiu's attention only briefly.
Shi Xiu narrowed his eyes and took a deep breath. His figure flickered like a ghost, and in the blink of an eye, he was gone.
Under the perfect cover of darkness, Shi Xiu raced toward the medical ward where Minato and Kushina's bodies were kept.
But before he could reach the ward, his heart suddenly tightened. He had the distinct feeling that someone was watching him.
Shi Xiu stopped at once and looked up, his sharp gaze fixed on a certain direction.
There was no doubt about it: the feeling came from the mysterious crystal ball in Hiruzen Sarutobi's possession. At that moment, in the Hokage Building, Hiruzen Sarutobi's eyes met Shi Xiu's through the crystal ball. In an instant, Hiruzen Sarutobi realized Shi Xiu had noticed he was monitoring him.
Hiruzen Sarutobi shook his head and sighed softly. He had already guessed, more or less, what Shi Xiu intended to do.
After a moment's thought, Sarutobi promptly ordered all the Anbu stationed around the medical ward to withdraw.
When Shi Xiu finally arrived at the medical ward, he found it completely empty. There should have been Anbu guards there, but not a soul remained.
Shi Xiu paused for a moment, then raised an eyebrow with a slight smile. He quickly understood: Hiruzen Sarutobi had withdrawn all the Anbu himself.
Shi Xiu went straight to the room where Minato and Kushina's bodies were kept.
Looking at Minato and Kushina, lifeless and still, Shi Xiu sighed.
Then he stepped forward and plucked a strand of hair from each of them before vanishing on the spot.
When Shi Xiu appeared again, he was at the ruins of the Uzumaki Clan. He had lived for countless years and had left Flying Thunder God marks just about everywhere.
Shi Xiu went straight to the Uzumaki Clan's Mask Storage Temple and took down a Death God Mask. He had wanted to revive Rin with the Impure World Reincarnation, too, but her body wasn't in Konoha's cemetery, so there was nothing he could do.
Just as Shi Xiu was about to head to another village to capture a few nobodies as sacrifices for the Impure World Reincarnation, an arrow suddenly appeared before his eyes.
"What's going on?"
Shi Xiu froze for a moment and rubbed his eyes, but the arrow was still there.
"Could it be the system? Where's it taking me?" Shi Xiu wondered. In the past, the system had only been able to copy jutsu, but now it seemed to have other functions.
"Host, there's no need to worry!"
An electronic voice sounded in his mind. The sudden development startled Shi Xiu. In the nearly hundred years since he'd crossed over, the system had only spoken once, when it introduced its function at the start. After that, the only sounds had been notifications when he copied jutsu. Shi Xiu hurriedly asked the system,
"System, what's going on with you?"
But all he got in response was a long silence. Shi Xiu sighed and hurried after the arrow.
When he reached the place it pointed to, the sight before him left him astonished.