Sixteen years old, the Fourth Mizukage

Naruto Uzumaki considered this question in a daze, a thought that had never occurred to him before.

And Rei Kaguya also quietly gazed at Naruto Uzumaki, who had been made somewhat dazed by his words, while the information he had gathered across his previous and current lives regarding Naruto's life trajectory and the changes in his fate likewise flowed through his mind.

After defeating Kaguya Otsutsuki, who had broken through her seal, and saving the shinobi world from Sasuke Uchiha, who had fallen into obsession and extremism, Naruto Uzumaki's life had already reached its prime and peak.

And after defeating Toneri Otsutsuki, who had attempted to guide the moon into crashing into the shinobi world and reshape the world, after confirming his feelings with Hinata Hyuga, building his own family, and proudly becoming the Seventh Hokage of Konoha, thereby realizing the dream he had held since childhood, his life had also reached completion.

But the moon waxed and waned, and tides rose and fell. When Naruto Uzumaki's life reached the peak and completion of his role as the Child of Prophecy and savior at a speed difficult for others to imagine or reach, it was destined to inevitably enter a predicament of continuous decline.

The earliest and most obvious manifestation of that decline lay in Naruto Uzumaki's difficulty with the work of Hokage.

At that time, Naruto Uzumaki was indeed the undisputed strongest ninja in Konoha and even the entire shinobi world, but that did not mean he was a qualified leader.

As an idealist, Naruto Uzumaki possessed a personal charm that could infect others' emotions, as well as the unpredictability and possibility that made people believe he could create miracles. But his thoughts were still trapped within the framework of traditional shinobi values. He had not achieved a breakthrough, nor had he raised a great reform capable of changing the ideological core of the shinobi as a group.

And so, the idealistic Naruto Uzumaki became trapped to death within the real dilemmas left behind by generation after generation of shinobi.

His heart told him that he should work constantly for the sake of world peace, that he should carry through the dream and nindo entrusted to him by his teacher Jiraiya, and that he should work hard so that everyone in the shinobi world who had believed he could change the world could live better lives because of his efforts.

But the reality he came into contact with after becoming Hokage told him again and again with facts that his ideals could neither change Konoha's fundamental nature as a shinobi group, nor solve the reality that Konoha's economy was rooted in a pillar industry like shinobi commissions, something that could not be separated from violence.

Jiraiya's thinking might have allowed Naruto Uzumaki to learn how to realize communication and peace by letting go of hatred, and through his own personal charm, allow more people who had fought by his side to be touched and changed…

But when it came to the question of how to solve the natural opposition and contradiction between the profession of shinobi and peace, Jiraiya did not know the answer. Naturally, Naruto Uzumaki did not know it either.

In Rei Kaguya's view, someone like Naruto Uzumaki, an orphan who had grown up isolated and distanced by those around him, who clearly understood loneliness very well and yearned for familial affection, becoming a workaholic who personally handled everything after becoming Hokage, obsessing too much over Hokage work to the point that even after his behavior caused disappointment and dissatisfaction from his children, he still did not change, should partly be because of this problem.

He had no way to reconcile with this version of himself that had become compromised and bound hand and foot, that could no longer rely on sheer passion to break prejudice and rotten old rules, and no longer believed he could truly change the world completely.

And so he could only throw his energy without regard for cost into those inconspicuous matters that could not change the world, numbing his heart and consuming his enormous energy until he no longer lost sleep over the increasingly prominent and sharp contradiction between ideals and reality.

Perhaps he himself had never seriously reflected on the logic within it, but there was no doubt that he was avoiding the version of himself from his youth, the one full of youthful spirit, who dared to face the embodiment of hatred and the fallen goddess head-on.

From that angle, Naruto Uzumaki had indeed become unconfident.

And what further aggravated that lack of confidence was the renewed descent of the Otsutsuki clan.

Those cold monsters who could cross the starry sky and traverse astronomical distances displayed absolute power that surpassed even him, the savior, in direct confrontation with Naruto Uzumaki.

Although Momoshiki Otsutsuki was ultimately defeated by Naruto Uzumaki and Sasuke Uchiha, the Karma that Momoshiki Otsutsuki left on Boruto Uzumaki to realize his resurrection, along with the overwhelming power he displayed, made Naruto Uzumaki, who had once been invincible beneath the heavens, feel his own powerlessness with incomparable clarity.

And so, Naruto Uzumaki's confidence dissipated even further.

What replaced it was anxiety, unease, doubt, and even some thoughts so cold that they seemed unlike something Naruto Uzumaki could possibly have.

Looking at Naruto Uzumaki's confused appearance as he racked his mind but still could not reach an answer, Rei Kaguya sighed softly, took his hand, and once again flew into the sky.

Naruto Uzumaki, who had come back to himself, did not resist much. He merely looked somewhat absentmindedly at Rei Kaguya's side profile and asked almost as if talking to himself,

"Is your Tenseigan's ocular technique seeing through people's hearts, Rei Kaguya?"

"No. My Tenseigan's ocular technique is spatial lockdown. It is a power born so that I can directly confront enemies who excel at space-time ninjutsu."

Rei Kaguya glanced from the corner of his eye at Naruto Uzumaki's expression, which was as complicated as a spilled seasoning tray, and shook his head.

"Besides, for someone like you, whose thoughts are simple and who is not good at hiding your true feelings, knowing what you are thinking is not difficult enough to require a unique ocular technique."

"Then can you tell me why I really feel that I have become less confident?"

The corner of Naruto Uzumaki's mouth curved into a bitter arc. Fatigue and confusion rippled through his blue eyes. He looked down at the desert scenery rushing past below, which never seemed to change much, and murmured to himself,

"After you pointed out this problem, I suddenly realized that I really do seem to have become somewhat unfamiliar… But how exactly did I become like this? And why… did I not notice that I had become this way?"

"Probably because the destiny that kept urging you onward from behind, telling you to keep moving forward, keep growing stronger, and not stop until you reached the end point fate had drawn for you, was gone."

Rei Kaguya blinked and said with a relaxed expression,

"But the thing that can make a man break the restraints placed upon him and strive with all his might to grow stronger has never been limited to destiny alone."

"If fate can no longer continue acting as the force that pushes you forward when you are lost, then try replacing it with responsibility."

"Although to this day, I still think that on your worldline, Minato Namikaze choosing to entrust the responsibility and possibility of defeating Obito Uchiha to you, a newborn infant, was quite ridiculous, that sentence of his is still very suitable for enlightening the current you."

As his words fell, the Six Paths robe on Rei Kaguya's body began changing under the effect of chakra, gradually transforming into the Hokage cloak that Naruto Uzumaki knew so well. The blue-and-white cloak fluttered and rose high in the fierce wind, setting off Rei Kaguya's proud and confident side profile as he gave a declaration that made Naruto Uzumaki feel as if he had crossed time and space:

"Bearing the name of Kage, savior, and father, I cannot lose."