Winning Minato over

Pero touched a finger to Minato Namikaze's forehead, undoing the formula Minato had once placed on himself.

In that instant, the world before Minato's eyes shattered, and countless fragmented yet real glimpses of the future flashed before him.

He saw a blond boy who bore a seventy- or eighty-percent resemblance to him, sitting alone on a swing.

Watching longingly as other children his age laughed in the distance, holding their parents' hands.

He saw that boy open the refrigerator, take out a carton of milk that had expired several days ago, and gulp it down without a care, as though he had long since grown used to it.

He saw the villagers looking at that boy with a mixture of fear, disgust, and hatred, pointing and whispering about him as though he were some ominous plague.

"Demon fox..."

"Stay away from him..."

Those vicious words stabbed deep into Minato's heart.

He saw the night the Uchiha Clan was massacred, blood flowing in rivers, Sharingan collected like trophies.

He saw the Third Hokage he respected most, Hiruzen Sarutobi, sitting in the Hokage's office, tacitly permitting it all under the righteous banner of "for the village."

After receiving the memories, Minato sighed and rubbed between his brows, his expression somewhat melancholy.

"Mr. Pero, I can't judge whether what you showed me is real."

"These things... if Kushina found out." Minato closed his eyes. The image of Kushina flying into a rage and chasing down the entire Konoha High Command with a frying pan had already surfaced in his mind. "I'm a Konoha ninja... I can't."

At that, Pero raised his brows and looked at Minato with amusement.

"I haven't even said what I want you to do, and you're already trying to refuse? I wasn't planning to make you a rogue ninja.

"You should know that after you died, all your assets were confiscated. The Third demolished your house and built a bathhouse to support his Sarutobi Clan."

"Your son was assigned a shabby apartment, eating expired instant noodles and drinking expired milk every day. Even when he had money, the people on the street refused to sell him anything because of the Nine-Tails. And that's not even mentioning how the Third Hokage gave Naruto practically no financial support."

Pero patted Minato on the shoulder.

"I don't need you to do anything, either. Just go back and report as usual."

Minato nodded helplessly.

Pero glanced back at the trio of Obito and the others hurrying toward them in the distance.

Pero rubbed his chin and looked up at Minato. "Those three are in a bit of a tricky situation right now. In your Konoha's records, Obito already counts as a dead man. Bringing him back would be hard to explain."

"As for Rin..."

"I actually extracted the Tailed Beast inside her by replacing it with my chakra. I'm taking her back for research, so just treat it as though her suicide succeeded."

"Then Kakashi..." Minato glanced at Isobu on Pero's shoulder.

Pero took an eye out of his clothes. "Don't worry. Haven't I got the perfect remedy right here?"

Minato's pupils contracted.

"A Sharingan! How did you get it?"

Minato was on good terms with Uchiha Fugaku, the Uchiha Clan's leader. Seeing the Sharingan in Pero's hand, he instinctively asked where it had come from.

"A gift from a friend. You might not believe this, but you probably even know the person who gave me this eye."

Pero gave Minato a meaningful smile.

"?"

Puzzled, Minato opened his mouth and was just about to ask for details when Obito's voice came from the distance.

"Minato-sensei... Uncle Pero!!!"

Pero arched a brow, leaving Minato with a knowing look. Then he vanished in a burst of high-speed movement.

"How could I go along with someone like this and mess around? Aaargh, Kushina's going to beat me up again if she finds out."

"I... how could I go along with someone like this and mess around..." Watching the direction Pero had vanished in, Minato vigorously scratched his blond hair and let out an agonized groan.

"Aaargh, if Kushina finds out, she'll definitely kill me!"

Pero suddenly appeared before Kakashi, holding up the scarlet Sharingan in his hand.

It met the gaze of the Sharingan Kakashi had received from Obito.

Kakashi's eyes instantly went blank. Beside him, Obito and Rin stopped and looked at Pero in surprise.

"A Sharingan!! Uncle Pero, what are you doing to Kakashi?" Seeing this, Obito and Rin both stopped and looked at Pero in surprise.

Pero raised a finger to his lips.

"I'll tell you later. For now, your Minato-sensei said that the two of you are to follow me for a while, for a secret training program that could change the world."

With that, Pero crouched down and grabbed Obito and Rin by their collars, casually wrapping them in a layer of bio-electric field. Then he shot into the sky, leaving Kakashi standing blankly in place, swaying on his feet.

A blue light flashed, and Minato appeared beside Kakashi. He bent down to support his student, whose mind was already on the verge of collapse, and looked up at the black dot gradually disappearing into the sky after a sonic boom.

"Now things have really gotten interesting."

Clarity gradually returned to Kakashi's eyes. His pupils contracted sharply, and he raised his right hand, staring fixedly at his palm. With false memories implanted in him, the last image in his mind was of his Lightning Blade piercing Rin's chest. He felt as though her blood still lingered on his hand, warm but slowly cooling.

He slowly turned to Minato and choked out, "Sensei, Rin..."

Then his eyes rolled back, and he fainted, slumping against Minato.

"Ah... we'll take it one step at a time." Minato brushed a hand over Kakashi. Blue light flashed, and both of them vanished.

Elsewhere.

Dangling from Pero's hands, Obito and Rin felt their adrenaline surge at the visual impact of their ever-increasing speed. With sonic booms ringing in their ears as they continued accelerating, their faces gradually turned ashen, their brains starved of oxygen.

Boom!

With one final burst of acceleration, Pero carried them out of the atmosphere, trailing a plume behind him, and stopped outside the planet.

He released them both and saw that they were so frightened they could barely breathe, their faces ashen and their bodies trembling.

Pero scratched his head, feeling that he might have gone a little too far.

"Are you two all right?"

"You... you... hah..." Even after several gasping breaths, Obito still had not recovered.

Rin seemed to handle the stress much better than Obito. By now, she was already observing the planet beneath her feet.

With Rin soothing him, Obito finally recovered.

"Uncle, where are we? This feels so strange."

Discovering the wonders of weightlessness, Obito began making all sorts of swimming motions in the air.

Pero was just about to speak when he noticed movement on his shoulder.

"Hey, human. Who are you?"

A deep voice sounded beside Pero's ear.

Isobu had awakened.

"And you drained all my chakra."

"Can't you Tailed Beasts recover endlessly? Just take your time recovering."

"Our chakra isn't infinite. We have to replenish it by absorbing natural energy."

After hearing that, Pero reached up and took the little turtle off his shoulder, holding him in his hand and meeting his three compound eyes.

"In all my long years in this world, you're the first since the old man to make me feel such overwhelming pressure."

"The old man? The Sage of Six Paths?"

As Pero spoke, he gently stroked Isobu's head with a finger.

"Faking his death and hiding in the Pure Land to keep watch? Doesn't sound like a respectable old man."

Isobu shook his head to dodge Pero's finger and said in a muffled voice, "After he died, we couldn't sense his chakra."

"Forget it, then. Once Kaguya comes out, he should show up too."