Ancient Secrets

Shaye grasped the fundamentals of sealing techniques with astonishing speed. Runes and principles that others found obscure and incomprehensible became systematic and traceable under his powerful memory and analogical thinking. Bunpuku's teachings grew increasingly profound, and his feelings increasingly complicated—he was pleased to have found such a gifted student, yet also held a faint concern for where such talent might lead.

That day, Shaye was using a branch to copy a complex composite sealing formula onto the ground, trying to understand the conversion logic of several energy nodes within it. Bunpuku watched quietly from the side, offering a few pointers now and then.

"Here, the energy's backflow is too fast. It will impact the main structure. You need to add a buffering 'vortex' rune," Bunpuku said softly.

Shaye suddenly understood and immediately altered his design.

"Tch, a vortex rune? That's far too inefficient!" Shukaku's unmistakably hoarse voice cut in impatiently again. "Why not just use a reverse repulsion field to push the energy back? Simple and brutal! You humans always like making simple things complicated!"

Shaye paused, branch in hand, and asked curiously, "A repulsion field? What kind of rune structure is that? Grandpa Bunpuku never taught me."

"Hmph! That's because your current sealing techniques are far too backward! So much has been lost!" Shukaku's tone carried disdain and a certain ancient sense of superiority. "Back in ancient times, those people had far more ways to play with energy than you do now!"

"Ancient times?" Shaye caught the phrase. He knew very little about this world's history, and Shukaku's words stirred immense interest within him. "What were ancient times like?"

Bunpuku opened his eyes slightly, as though he wanted to say something, but in the end, he merely sighed softly and did not stop him. Perhaps some history was more truthful when told by someone who had lived through it, though this witness's perspective was bound to be full of bias.

"Ancient times?" It was as if Shukaku had finally opened the floodgates, or as if it had long harbored grievances and had at last found a chance to pour them out—even if the listener was just a brat. Its voice suddenly became distant and filled with resentment. "Back then, this world wasn't the godforsaken wasteland it is now! Especially this place!"

It seemed to point with an invisible force toward the Land of Wind beyond the temple.

"This place?" Shaye looked at the endless wind and sand outside the door. "But it's all desert now."

"Desert?! Pah!" As though struck on a sore spot, Shukaku became even more agitated. "Before I was even born, this place might not have been the most fertile, but it sure as hell wasn't like this! There were trees! There was water! It couldn't compare to Isobu and Nine-Tails' home, but people could definitely live here!"

Shaye froze. The Land of Wind... had not always been a desert?

"Then... how did it become this way?" he pressed.

"It was all because of that damned woman!" Shukaku's voice was filled with primal terror and fury. "That woman who came from beyond the heavens! Kaguya Otsutsuki!"

Kaguya Otsutsuki!

The name struck like lightning, instantly cleaving through vague fragments of memory buried deep in Shaye's mind! Scattered short video recommendations from his previous life, snippets of novels he had happened to glimpse... This name was the origin of chakra in the Naruto story? The final boss?

He held his breath, his heart beginning to pound uncontrollably.

"That woman!" Shukaku continued roaring, as if venting a thousand years of pent-up fury. "She planted a damned tree on this land! That tree crazily absorbed the energy of the entire world! The earth withered, the rivers dried up! All life was stolen by that tree! This land was the first to suffer!"

Shaye's pupils abruptly contracted.

Planting a tree? Absorbing the world's energy? The land withering?

He suddenly recalled the fragments of information he had seen in his previous life: the God Tree, the Chakra Fruit, devouring a planet's energy...

A terrifying, coherent speculation exploded in his mind!

"That tree... what happened to it afterward?" Shaye's voice was somewhat dry.

"Afterward? She ate the fruit it bore and gained unimaginable power! Hmph, but that also brought greater trouble!" Shukaku snorted, seemingly quite disdainful of Kaguya as well. "Then came her two 'good sons'..."

"The Sage of Six Paths... Hagoromo Otsutsuki?" Shaye blurted out instinctively. That name had left a deeper impression on him.

"Oh? You brat actually know that old man's name?" Shukaku sounded somewhat surprised, but his resentment quickly swallowed it again. "That's right! That old man and his younger brother! They fought their mother until heaven and earth were turned upside down! That was true world-destroying power!"

Shukaku's voice carried a barely perceptible reverence and fear for power of that level.

"How the hell would I know exactly how they fought? I hadn't even been born yet—after the Sage of Six Paths split the Ten-Tails into the nine great tailed beasts! I only heard the Sage of Six Paths mention it casually later," it said vaguely. "Anyway, mountains and rivers shattered, and the land sank! This region had already been nearly drained dry by that damned tree, and after that mother-and-sons battle, it was completely finished! The terrain was utterly changed, the water sources completely cut off, and nothing remained but this endless sand! Pah! It was all those bastards' doing!"

A brief, deathly silence fell over the temple.

Only the flame of the oil lamp continued to flicker, illuminating Shaye's utterly stunned little face.

So that was it! So that was how it happened!

The vast, boundless desert of the Land of Wind had not formed naturally. Its origin lay in a world-shaking calamity from ancient times! The ancestor of chakra had planted the God Tree to plunder energy, followed by the sealing battle between the Sage of Six Paths and his mother. The two disasters had compounded, turning this land completely barren!

That explained why the Land of Wind's environment was so harsh and why the Hidden Sand Village was so impoverished. The source of it all could actually be traced back to the mythic age of antiquity!

Shaye felt an inexplicable shudder. The sand beneath his feet carried such weighty and cruel history. The wounds of war could alter the landscape of an entire continent so profoundly—and endure for thousands of years!

Bunpuku had listened in silence all along. Only now did he slowly speak, his voice carrying endless weariness. "Dust returns to dust, earth returns to earth. The sins and conflicts of the past have become today's wind and sand. Though Shukaku's words are extreme, they are mostly true. This desert is a... scar left behind by the God Tree's plunder and the war of gods."

Shaye lowered his head and looked at the half-finished sealing formula he had drawn on the ground. These exquisite arts, used to restrain energy, seemed so small compared to that near world-destroying abuse of energy—yet also so important.

Once again, he came to deeply understand that chakra was both the foundation of this world and a power that concealed the seeds of destruction.

At the same time, a thought surfaced beyond his control: if the desert had been created by energy being plundered and used destructively, then was it possible... through precise control and guidance of energy... to change this desert in reverse?

The thought was too bold, even somewhat arrogant, yet like a seed, it quietly fell into his heart.

Shukaku seemed tired of talking, or perhaps it had recalled unpleasant memories. It grunted a few times and fell silent.

Yet Shaye could not calm down for a long time. He gazed beyond the temple, his eyes seeming to pierce through the thick stone walls and see the ancient secrets and eternal pain buried beneath the endless yellow sands.

(End of chapter)