Chapter 7: The Final Flame
Naruto stood alone on the mountain's peak, the last echoes of lightning humming in the rocks beneath his feet. The wind tugged at his coat, white and long like an old page from a forgotten book, fluttering with whispers of stories untold.
The silence pressed in — but not unkindly.
For a moment, he closed his eyes. And memory answered.
It was spring.
The village had been dressed in the soft pink of cherry blossoms, petals floating like tiny paper lanterns through the streets of Konoha. Children darted between trees, laughing, playing, throwing kunai with more enthusiasm than aim.
But one child — his child — stood stiffly on the training grounds, his fists clenched, his eyes burning.
Boruto Uzumaki, barely taller than a scroll cabinet, with wild golden hair and a scowl that tried too hard to be serious.
"I challenge you to a duel, Aunt Hanabi!" he had said, voice cracking at just the wrong syllable, which ruined the effect a bit.
Hanabi Hyūga — graceful, lethal, and entirely unbothered — had blinked at him. "A duel?"
"I need to prove myself!" he shouted, already bouncing on the balls of his feet. "I'm more than just... just his son!"
Naruto had watched from a distance, hidden behind the Hokage monument with Konohamaru peering beside him, both munching on dango.
"You gonna stop him?" Konohamaru asked with a snort, licking syrup off his fingers.
Naruto had shaken his head. "Nope. Let him burn a little. That's how you light your own fire."
On the field, Boruto had already charged.
He fought with heart — clumsy but spirited — spinning too wide, punching too hard. Hanabi, to her credit, didn't mock him. She moved like water, graceful and firm, redirecting him again and again until he landed flat on his back with a huff and an embarrassing squeak.
But the boy had grit.
He stood up.
And again.
And again.
Face bruised, pride frayed, but never defeated.
Eventually, Hanabi called it. "Enough, Boruto. You've got spirit. But you're not there yet."
He had panted, sweat sticking his fringe to his forehead. "I will be. One day, you'll see me... not as his son, but as me."
Hanabi had offered him a hand. "Then make me the first to see it."
He didn't take her hand.
He shook it.
That memory flickered and faded like candlelight in the wind. Naruto's eyes reopened, and the smile on his face was softer now — touched with sorrow, warmed by pride.
"That boy... always chasing my shadow."
He let out a quiet laugh, brushing a hand through his hair.
"I wish I told him sooner. That he didn't have to run... I would've stepped aside if he just asked."
The wind answered with a gentle rustle — as if Boruto himself were listening from somewhere beyond the veil of time, arms crossed, smirking.
"Stubborn little rascal," Naruto muttered fondly.
Above, the clouds rolled onward, and the sky turned its page once again.
----------------
"Ark, it's time to go. Don't get lost in the show," Naruto called, his voice warm with mischief, the kind that curled like steam from a cup of tea on a rainy day.
The hulking Arcanine, his red-and-cream mane tousled by the stormy wind, clambered up the muddy ledge with the ease of a mountain goat in disguise. He landed beside Naruto with a satisfied huff, eyes gleaming like twin embers beneath a thick brow of fur.
The mountain behind them, split in half by lightning's fury, crackled faintly with leftover tension — a monument now to another meeting, another lesson, another soul sparked with potential.
But the world was moving on.
Ark glanced at his master. His thoughts were quieter than his growl, thoughtful as rain on a temple roof.
'What is he?' he mused. 'So many strong ones have come and gone… and yet none speak his name. None remember. And yet, he stands — always walking forward.'
Naruto scratched behind Ark's ear absently, as though he'd read the thought right off his snout.
"You're thinking too loud again, big guy," Naruto said with a wink. "Come on. You'll burn a hole in your fur with all that brooding."
Ark grumbled something unintelligible and bumped his head against Naruto's hip. The blond man laughed, brushing his fingers through Ark's thick coat. It was warm, crackling with faint embers — the elemental fire within him purring like a cat.
Behind them, the white lightning — once wild and roaring — fizzled into gentle wisps and floated up into the starless sky.
Naruto turned his gaze ahead once more.
Each step he took now echoed a little deeper in the ground. He was slower these days, not from lack of strength, but from the weight of memory — a burden he wore with grace.
His elementals — flickering sparks of wind, fire, water, earth, and that mischievous bolt of lightning — hovered and danced behind him, giggling in voices only he could hear. They were like children, his own in a way, born not from flesh but from the heart of creation.
He adored them.
They weren't bound by duty or legacy. They were curious. Innocent. And they made him smile when nothing else did.
"My real children…" he thought, a shadow crossing his eyes.
So many faces, so many voices — all gone. Children. Grandchildren. Whole generations laid to rest while he wandered, unchanged. The pain had been gentle at first, like the cold. Then it became sharp — unbearable.
One night, beneath the Wishing Tree on the Cliff of the First Flame, he had made a choice.
To trade eternity for an ending.
He had woven a seal so ancient it made time itself blink. His immortality — the divine thread that tethered him above the mortal plane — unraveled, strand by golden strand.
In its place, a new thread formed.
It was frayed.
It would break.
And he welcomed it.
"Everything must end," he whispered as Ark trotted beside him. "Even stars."
A quiet chuckle escaped him. "Especially stars."
The path ahead was long, winding through whispering forests and across sleeping lakes. And though his power still spilled around him like an ocean in a teacup, it no longer defined him. It would last until his story's final chapter — just long enough to teach, to smile, to feel again.
He looked up at the sky where no stars dared shine that night.
"Let's go, Ark. The world isn't done showing us wonders yet."
And with his flame-shaped shadow stretching behind him, the man who had once been a immortal — walked, for the first time in eons, as a man again.
----------------
"Hop on, Naruto!" Ark the Arcanine barked with a mischievous grin, his fiery mane gleaming despite the dim mountain light. "I've been watching you. I think I can carry you down this slippery slope without turning us into a pair of squashed berries."
Naruto chuckled and obliged, sliding onto Ark's broad back with the ease of an old friend. The mighty elemental shook his massive paws, sending tiny sparks crackling from the rocks below.
As they began their careful descent through the rain-soaked path, Ark glanced up at Naruto, curiosity sparkling in his amber eyes. "Tell me, master—how did you get so strong? It's not just the lightning, is it? You're… different."
Naruto's lips twitched into a wry smile, his gaze momentarily distant as if peering through the veil of time. "Well, it's a bit of everything," he began vaguely, his voice soft and almost amused. "Training, lots and lots of fighting. Physical conditioning, energy control, mastering skills, upgrading equipment…"
Ark's ears perked, hanging on every word as if it were the secret recipe to an ancient stew.
"And," Naruto added with a slow, almost conspiratorial nod, "I devoured an immortal to reach my peak."
At the sudden weight of those words, Naruto's mind flickered to a distant battlefield — a memory cloaked in lightning and shadow.
The battle with Ishiki…
Where Kurama's power had surged beyond the mortal coil, glowing with the brilliance of countless stars. The Baryon Mode, a furious dance of energy and life itself, had granted Naruto strength beyond comprehension. A power so intense it blurred the lines between man and myth, mortal and divine.
That power had been tempered, harnessed alongside the endless, nurturing flow of nature energy — infinite, eternal, the very breath of the universe itself.
But, as with all great power, there was a price.
That battle, that moment of transcendence, had echoed far beyond their world. News — or perhaps the scent — had traveled through the cosmos, reaching ears and eyes of other Otstutsuki.
Hungry eyes.
Curious predators sensing a feast.
Thus began the greatest conflict the universe had ever witnessed — the War of Immortals.
The cosmos trembled as ancient beings, born of stars and shadows, converged on Naruto's world. Drawn by the promise of boundless power, they sought to claim it all for themselves, to devour the very essence of life's new shining beacon.
Naruto shook his head, dismissing the weight of those memories as Ark's paws found a steadier footing.
"But that's a story for another day," Naruto said with a chuckle. "Right now, we just need to get down this mountain without turning into a lightning rod ourselves."
Ark laughed, a deep, rumbling sound like distant thunder. "That sounds like a plan, master."
And with that, they sped down the mountain, a streak of fire and lightning racing through the twilight, ready for whatever adventures lay ahead.