Episode 37: The Pivotal Decision

The beginning of the last vision showed him going back to The Leaf, instead of going to the Namikaze village. Then, it jumped to showing how he grabbed Mina’s hand. It didn’t show what happened in between. And, it only showed their hands, not their faces or what was happening at that moment…

After that, it showed the day when Hiruzen chose the Fourth Hokage, but this time the chosen was not Orochimaru; the new Hokage was a young blonde man.

Another jump occurred on the sky and it showed the day when The Leaf was attacked by Madara Uchiha and the eight beasts, but that event changed drastically as well. This time, the attacker was not Madara, and only one beast was attacking The Leaf: the Nine-Tails fox—the most powerful one out of the nine. Everything seemed different from what happened before…

The new attacker was the Uchiha man of the orange mask that could do strange space-time techniques with his mangekyou sharingan. (Remember chapter 6?)
(In the alternate timeline, Zet and Su never got their hands on the powerful masked Uchiha. However, because of the change of events brought by Jim Namikaze, they found this guy in the actual timeline, and he became their most powerful ally, before they revived Madara Uchiha. In the actual timeline, Madara’s revival happened much later because Zet and Su believed that they could make the plan happen if they could make the masked man awaken the rinnegan first, but that failed. Nonetheless, they began their attack at The Leaf without Madara Uchiha in the actual timeline. The masked Uchiha initiated it for them, thinking that he was the one in charge, just like Madara thought in a past that never happened.)

The new Fourth Hokage used his amazing sealing and teleportation techniques to take the giant fox and the masked Uchiha enemy out of the town of Konoha. By doing so, he simultaneously saved The Leaf and its people. What he did that day led him to become the legendary hero that Jim had heard about at The Leaf. However, he had to fight the masked man and his mangekyou sharingan, and he had to keep the Nine-Tails beast at bay as well.

In a battle of speed, the Fourth outclassed and defeated the unknown Uchiha, but controlling the violent Nine-Tails proved too difficult, even with the help of its previous jinchuuriki (Kushina). He and his wife, Kushina Uzumaki, sacrificed themselves to stop the entire threat. However, during their great feat, they had no choice but to seal half of the monster’s astronomic chakra and its consciousness in the body of a baby, named Naruto. The baby was their own new-born son. Minato and Kushina passed away and the baby became the new jinchuuriki of the Nine-Tails fox…

Even Jim Namikaze felt totally heartbroken when he saw what the blonde Fourth Hokage went through to save The Leaf. He sacrificed everything to save The Leaf and his newborn son. Unfortunately, Jim didn’t hear the final words that Minato and Kushina said, so he still didn’t know that their infant was Naruto or that the Fourth was Minato—named after his mother, of course.

After the Fourth Hokage’s feat and before the final vision ended, it showed the guy of the black cloak again. Apparently, he was also in the actual timeline…

The mysterious man was at the basement where Jim Namikaze had found the first of the two Uchiha stones. There were four other people with him and one of them was Sasuke, the Uchiha kid from Naruto’s team. Sasuke Uchiha looked much older—about ten years older—and taller. He was a young adult now.

The man of the cloak was also preparing some sort of strange summoning technique. It surely wasn’t anything good…
What Jim didn’t like seeing, however, was that Naruto’s friend was with that guy.
Was Sasuke in the good side or the bad side? It was hard to tell for Jim, based on the few times that he had seen Sasuke.

It didn’t matter though. The visions stopped completely at that point because Jim’s mangekyou sharingan went away and the eye returned to its initial form. He had used it for far too long.

The Dark Realm began to disappear as it had done before. He was going to go back…

When he opened his eyes, he was still on the ground, beyond the broken bridge. It was already morning-time of the next day and he had not rested well at all, but he quickly forgot about it, as soon as he remembered what he saw at the Dark Realm. He stood up in a hurry and his instant reaction was to look towards The Land of Fire, at the other side. His first thoughts were Mina and The Leaf. He knew that Mina was going to die hours later that same day. There was a good chance that even if he returned to save her, he would not make it on time. On the other hand, delivering the information to the Namikaze village that same day, and not later, had been crucial to stopping the conflict that led to the village’s destruction in his timeline.

The sharingan had also returned, so he knew that even if he had the normal green eye now—due to heavy use of the mangekyou form—it would come back to the way it was eventually. Therefore, leaving the past was also a third option for him; but, after what he had seen, he disregarded this option. He was not going to leave both sides, knowing that he could change everything for the better.

Jim looked at The Land of Earth, in the direction of the future central village for the Namikaze Alliance. He knew that with his current knowledge of the future, he could make things even better than before. He could start his alliance with Hiruzen and The Leaf much earlier. He would be a better First Namikage that didn’t give vibes of being more interested in giving speeches and having a good time, than in bringing the good changes for the people sooner. He also thought that if they could identify who the man of the cloak was, they would be able to stop him before he became unstoppable. He was sure that thanks to having this knowledge from the very beginning, The Leaf would be saved and both he and Hiruzen would be able to survive. They would also be able to stop all the threats from the future. It really seemed like a smart path to take to maximize their chances…

However, Mina was not going to be in this future…

He remembered the first time he saw her among his first visions. The person that she was taking care of at her house was him. He also remembered his talks with her and how much he liked seeing her serious ninja face smile for the first time. Meeting her had been the best thing about falling in the past. He didn’t want to leave Mina to end as he saw she would end. He would never forgive himself for not trying to save her. And he felt that if he had any chance to save her, he had to do it.

He had to choose between letting Mina die and ensuring that he would become the great Namikage that would create the Namikaze Alliance (and, potentially, eradicate all evil in the realm), or going back to The Leaf’s territory to save Mina, while risking the destruction of the Namikaze village—since he didn’t warn them on time about the imminent dangers for them. Saving Mina meant putting the entire future of the Namikaze Alliance on jeopardy, but ensuring that future was a certain death for Mina.

Despite the amount of things that were at stake, he already knew what he wanted to do. He knew his right path…

As he gave a last deep look towards the direction of his birthplace, he remembered what his grandfather’s last words had been, when he and his brother fled from the Namikaze village to the Clan of the Stone, many years ago:

“Don’t look back and get as far from here as possible! Join the Clan of the Stone. Remember all the things I taught you and follow a good path! No matter what happens, I will always be with you. Take this with you and escape!”

That day was the day when he and his brother received their two equal Namikaze swords, but it was also the last day that they saw the Namikaze village and its ninjas. The sword was a secondary memento; those words were what truly marked him forever:

“… follow a good path … I will always be with you …”

While he looked back at The Leaf, the green eye turned into a normal sharingan. The path back to The Leaf felt right, but it also felt like it was a one-way path with no return. That realization saddened him. His eyes got wet because he knew there would be few or no chances to help his grandfather if he made that decision. Yet, that was the good path. The Leaf was the right path for him. He could feel it now and the sharingan’s vision confirmed that feeling too…

“Thank you for those words grandpa. Unlike the First Namikage, I will continue following the right path always. I am going to save her and I am returning to The Leaf. Forgive me if I don’t make it back in time to save our village.”

He was ready to rush back—every minute counted. However, going back was going to be a problem because the broken bridge was the only path to return quickly.

He looked at his surroundings and he found how he could go back: he would make the path himself. On the sides and beneath the broken bridge, there were rocks only; but, where he was standing, there was plenty of earth and no rocks. He started the process of reaching sage mode and once he did it, he moved tons of earth from his side to make a new natural bridge on the rocky path. He ended up making a path of earth that united the two lands and eliminated the previous man-made boundary.

When he ran over it and reached the other side again, he realized that the path that he walked through (when he left the Clan of the Stone to go to The Leaf, at the very beginning) had been created by him in the past. None of this may have happened if this return path had not been taken. Everything would have been different if it wasn’t for Jim’s pivotal decision, which changed the balance towards The Leaf’s side…

He didn’t waste any time there though. The decision had already been made. He decided to save Mina, instead of going back to the Namikaze village and becoming the Namikage of the great alliance (that never existed because he didn’t choose that path).

NEXT— EPISODE 38: Caught!