"Old lady, what did you say? Great Elder has woken up?" Fukasaku asked in surprise, then quickly realized his mistake and corrected himself, "Old lady, you need to show more respect to the Great Elder."
"What's the big deal? He's just an old fool." Shima replied dismissively.
Fukasaku tugged at the corner of his mouth but didn't argue further.
"By the way, are you going to take little Natsuro to see the Great Elder?" Shima asked.
"Of course." Fukasaku nodded. Although it was unlikely, he still wanted to see if Natsuro might be the prophesied Child of Prophecy. After all, he had many of the qualities mentioned in the prophecy, and Fukasaku had been repeatedly amazed by his talent. In his view, no one else could match his overall abilities. Maybe someone could surpass him in a specific area, but in terms of comprehensive talent, Natsuro was the strongest he had ever seen.
"The Great Toad Sage, huh?" Natsuro was curious about this figure too. He was the only toad in Mount Myoboku that he hadn't met yet. This toad was said to have existed even before the Sage of Six Paths!
He wondered if the Great Toad Sage would give him a prophecy. He was quite curious about his own appearance in this world.
"Yes, little Natsuro, follow me." Fukasaku said seriously as he led him to a towering door. Slowly pushing it open, they entered a vast and grand hall. At the far end, seated on a majestic throne, was an enormous and ancient toad.
"Great Elder, it's Fukasaku. I've brought little Jiraiya's disciple." Fukasaku called out.
"Who's there?" The Great Toad Sage asked in a foggy voice, squinting his eyes.
Fukasaku sighed internally. It was always the same routine. But he repeated himself, "It's Fukasaku, and I've brought little Jiraiya's disciple to meet you."
"Who is little Jiraiya?" The Great Toad Sage's question left both Fukasaku and Natsuro momentarily speechless. Natsuro recalled a scene like this from his memories, which he had almost forgotten.
"That old fool! Little Jiraiya is the one you gave a prophecy to!" Shima couldn't hold back any longer and shouted loudly.
"Oh, right, little Jiraiya..." The Great Toad Sage murmured as his eyes moved slightly. Not seeing anyone familiar, he muttered, "But little Jiraiya doesn't seem to be here?"
"It's not little Jiraiya, it's little Jiraiya's disciple! Little Natsuro!!" Shima clarified, her patience wearing thin. If Fukasaku hadn't been holding her back, she might have thrown a punch in frustration. Talking to the Great Toad Sage was exhausting.
"Little... Natsuro?" The Great Toad Sage repeated, puzzled. Eventually, his half-closed eyes focused on him. The next moment, the Great Toad Sage's eyes widened slightly, and he spoke with a tone of confusion.
"Aren't you supposed to be dead?"
Suddenly, the faces of Natsuro, Fukasaku, and Shima changed drastically.
"That old fool, truly senile! He's standing right in front of you, how could he be dead?!" Shima retorted bluntly. From her perspective, if he were dead, who would be there to praise her cooking every day? For the past three years, she had been thrilled to hear his endless compliments on her culinary skills, unlike others who ate in silence.
"Oh... right, not dead, is he?" The Great Toad Sage mumbled as his eyes drifted shut again.
After a while, it became clear that the Great Toad Sage had fallen asleep again. Shima was on the verge of losing her temper, but Fukasaku quickly intervened to stop her. "Don't be impulsive."
It seemed this wasn't the first time Shima had wanted to take action, and Fukasaku had evidently stopped her many times before, given how practiced he was in his restraint.
Natsuro, on the other hand, couldn't help but be affected by the Great Toad Sage's earlier words. However, after thinking it over, he realized there was some truth to it. If he hadn't been reincarnated into this world and into his mother's womb, would the original Natsuro and his mother have survived?
Finally, the Great Toad Sage opened his eyes again, this time looking at Natsuro with a slightly more serious expression.
"Little Natsuro, is it?"
"Yes, Great Toad Sage."
"Although I can't fully comprehend your fate, it seems that your destiny was severed once at birth. How was it reconnected...?" The Great Toad Sage mused, looking puzzled.
Natsuro sighed internally. It was as he thought—his existence was indeed a case of two lives in one body.
Shima muttered something about the Great Toad Sage being senile, while Fukasaku tried to calm her down, though he was equally puzzled by the Great Toad Sage's words.
After a moment of confusion, the Great Toad Sage seemed to let it go and continued, "I can see very little of your future, just a few vague fragments, but in each of them, the background remains the same."
Natsuro looked at the Great Toad Sage with curiosity, eager to know what fragments the sage had seen.
This time, perhaps because of his own curiosity about him, the Great Toad Sage didn't drift back to sleep. Instead, he said, "Little Natsuro, you are destined to stir up a storm across the entire ninja world. However, I cannot tell whether this will be a good thing... or a bad thing."
Despite the ambiguity of the Great Toad Sage's words, Fukasaku felt a sinking feeling in his heart. After all, no matter how you looked at it, a storm of that magnitude was rarely a good thing.
At the same time, Fukasaku found it hard to believe. In the three years he had spent with him, he had come to see him as a gentle person who rarely let anything shake him.
Well, except for eating bugs. Shima had tried several times to replace his fruit with insects, but it never worked.
So, how could someone like Natsuro be associated with something as tumultuous as a storm across the ninja world?
Fukasaku sighed, finding it hard to believe. Since the Great Elder hadn't mentioned anything about the Child of Prophecy, it seemed he wasn't the prophesied one after all.
It was a bit disappointing.
As for Natsuro, he was surprised by the Great Toad Sage's prophecy but not entirely. He knew himself well enough to understand that if the situation called for it, he wouldn't shy away from creating chaos.
However, he wasn't about to place blind faith in the prophecy. Prophecies could fail, even if they were usually accurate. And he didn't like the idea of a predetermined destiny.
Child of Prophecy? A storm across the ninja world? He smiled to himself. He would walk his own path, regardless of what others said. Why should he let a prophecy dictate his life? Should he end up like his teacher Jiraiya, who spent years being misled by a prophecy? Besides, did Jiraiya even fully believe in it from the start? His path might have been influenced by the prophecy, but it wasn't entirely defined by it.
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