Sojourn

At this moment, not only the Kumogakure Ninja and Konoha, but ninjas from every hidden village and ordinary civilians alike were all discussing the mirage in the sky and the Genjutsu Space, coming up with all kinds of theories.

Yet the only ones bold enough to speculate that the Genjutsu Space had turned the false into the real and become an actual space were Hinata Hyuga, who had some connection to the Giant Tenseigan; the Akatsuki, who possessed certain permissions within the Genjutsu Space; and Kumogakure, which had developed radio telescopes because of the Fourth Raikage’s experience.

No matter how boldly everyone else speculated, they could never have imagined that the Genjutsu Space would actually become real.

But soon, after Red Queen completely absorbed and digested the Book-Book Fruit’s power, the Genjutsu Space stabilized as well. When it connected with everyone again, it already had the option of entering with one’s physical body!

Not only that, Yota placed the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path—the God Tree’s husk—at the very center of the Genjutsu Space.

The Genjutsu Space that appeared in the void—no, it should now be called the Book-Book Space—no longer needed the Infinite Tsukuyomi genjutsu to sustain it. That alone saved at least seventy to eighty percent of its Chakra.

Combined with the Chakra Red Queen had accumulated beforehand, Yota believed the God Tree should bear fruit in another year or two.

However, Red Queen also sent Yota a message. According to her analysis, although the God Tree would bear a Chakra Fruit, the power of Chakra Fruits varied.

If he wanted the Chakra Fruit’s power to reach its peak, he would need to wait another four or five years at minimum.

Yota had no objections to that. After all, four or five years was nothing more than a few trips back and forth for him.

With nothing better to do, Yota returned to the Shinobi World and stayed for a while. For instance, he went to see the resentment-filled Mei Terumī—because Yota often skipped along the timeline, Mei saw him as the sort of scumbag who only came back once or twice a year.

Fortunately, Mei Terumī was also a career-driven strong woman. Otherwise, Yota suspected he might have ended up wearing a green hat.

After spending some lovey-dovey time with Mei Terumī, she was utterly exhausted by Yota’s extraordinary stamina and kicked him away, telling him to go wherever he wanted and stop tormenting her.

According to Mei Terumī, it was fortunate that she had undergone Sage Body modification. Otherwise, she might have died in bed.

After leaving the Land of Water, Yota went to take a look around the present-day Shinobi World Research Institute to see whether they had invented anything new.

The Shinobi World Research Institute was the Shinobi World’s foremost research institution, jointly built in the Genjutsu Space and reality by researchers such as Sasori of the Red Sand, Orochimaru, and the soul of the deceased Second Hokage.

Compared to the outside world, its research delved far deeper into fundamentals. Rather than merely studying ninjutsu, it directly investigated the nature of Chakra, the relationship between human bloodlines and Chakra, the connection between souls and Chakra, and other subjects that sounded impressively high-level at a glance.

On the surface, these things seemed useless to Yota. In reality, once results were achieved, they would be what truly allowed the entire Shinobi World to make a tremendous leap forward.

After making a round through the institute, Yota was used as labor by Orochimaru and the others, who had him fuse quite a few things with the Munch-Munch Fruit. He was then given an Improved Ōtsutsuki Gene Fusion Diagram before being driven out by the group.

The consequence of skipping through time was that Yota’s research was now far behind that bunch of freaks. The Munch-Munch Fruit’s power was the only thing he could still help with; otherwise, they would not even bother acknowledging him.

Fortunately, Yota no longer needed to conduct research himself—he had Red Queen. She could simply input the research results directly into his Brain Chip.

After that, Yota went to Konoha and stayed with Hinata Hyuga for a while. Hinata happily accepted another round of Yota’s training.

"Hinata, it feels like your eyes aren’t far from becoming Tenseigan now. At most, in another year or two, you’ll complete the third gestational evolution of the Tenseigan."

Yota placed a hand on Hinata’s head and quietly sensed the ocular power within her eyes.

Hinata’s little face turned bright red as she nodded twice.

After lowering his hand, Yota was quite surprised by Hinata’s progress. "I never expected your talent with the Tenseigan to be this great, Hinata. Maybe in the future, you can try using the Infinite Tsukuyomi too, creating a small local network."

"Really? Then it should be able to help you, Brother Yota?" Hinata asked happily.

"Of course. A local network can divert some of the load from the overall network and reduce Red Queen’s burden somewhat."

Naturally, Yota did not mention that, with the current processing capacity, Red Queen was under no pressure whatsoever. This was merely a small tactic to encourage Hinata.

"Then I’ll work hard!" Hinata said with a smile.

After staying with Hinata for a while, Yota wandered around Konoha again, wanting to see its current state.

He had to admit that the Naruto World was changing far too quickly. Yota could barely recognize any of Konoha’s original appearance anymore. Even the Konoha 12 had stopped attending Ninja Academy—studying directly in the Genjutsu Space offered far greater learning speed and efficiency than the academy ever could.

Moreover, the prevailing trend in the Shinobi World was now peace and development. Even the common people of the Shinobi World now possessed Chakra themselves, so all kinds of missions had greatly decreased.

The major hidden villages had now become something close to a combination of research institutions, schools, and standing military forces. Training still took place, but missions had become scarce.

Fortunately, the hidden villages were now fully supported by their respective nations. Otherwise, under such circumstances, another so-called Ninja World War would probably have broken out.

After staying in Konoha for some time, Yota tried out the Book-Book World, which had now become completely real.

Honestly, a world created with the entire Genjutsu Space as its foundation was far stronger than the prison created by that Charlotte Family member in the original work. Almost the instant this world took shape, Red Queen’s Book-Book Fruit power completely awakened.

The awakened Book-Book Fruit could directly project monsters from books, which had originally been illusory, into the outside world. Its nature was somewhat similar to a Shadow Clone.

The strength and various abilities of these monsters were naturally set by the Book-Book Fruit user herself. In theory, she could create Super Saiyans, Gold Saints, Superman, or Thanos without any issue.

In practice, however, the stronger the book character she set and the more overpowered its abilities were, the greater the stamina cost of summoning it. Even if she exhausted all her physical strength, she could at most summon combat power roughly equal to her own.

Even so, that was already incredibly overpowered. Their strength might be roughly equal to hers, but their abilities could be set separately. Fire could be turned into ice, lightning could become flashes of light—in short, she could always create abilities that countered her opponents.