This lullaby, which he was singing to his little granddaughter.
Waves of power shimmered faintly through its horizonless skies, pulled not from chakra, but from soul and memory—woven with threads of silver.
Michel stood atop a low hill of mist-wrapped stone. For the first time, he was whole.
Not anchored. Not torn in three.
Unbound.
And with that feeling the chains of his memory were also broken, bringing back a memory that had been suppressed for a long time.
<<<< o >>>>
The space was broken. Shattered.
Fragments of what once had been a moon floated in a silent orbit around her. Kaguya hovered at the heart of it—hair flowing like rivers of broken light, her silhouette suspended in the void.
Beyond, in the distance, a world lay in pieces. Continents torn apart. Oceans spilled into the stars. A corpse of a planet, still spinning, still dying.
Michel didn't know how he had come here. Only that he must listen.
Kaguya's voice drifted across the ruin:
"The world is dead," she said, voice soft as drifting ash.
"My sons... my blood... my world..." Kaguya whispered. "All gone. Even the stars forgot our names."
He clenched his fists. "Why me?"
Kaguya turned, her gaze piercing. "Because you are not bound by their chains. Your soul still remembers freedom."
"What do you want from me?"
"Live," she said simply. "Walk among them. Be a ripple. Change what must be changed."
Michel felt the weight of it before he understood the words.
"If the course remains unchanged..." Kaguya's voice dimmed, "I will be devoured. And Shikashi will consume the last threads of this Reality."
The light around them trembled.
"You are my third try."
Michel took a step forward—but something dark brushed against him. A shadow hidden among the fragments.
Kaguya's final words chased him as the world cracked apart:
"I pray you succeed.
Because if you do,
I may yet hold them again—
and tell them how much I loved them,
before the stars forget us too."
The memory shattered.
And Michel, in the present, wept silently, guarding Hinata's sleeping form.
Because now he knew why he had been called.
And what was at stake.
<<<< o >>>>
Seeing that memory, and holding the little girl he watched grow up in his arms, helped him focus on the now.
It helped him see things differently. Questioning whether the decisions that brought him here, were the right ones
Thoughts he had never dared form before, suppressed by distractions too subtle to notice—until now.
His senses moved once again. To where it all began. To himself.
In this place, he could see it. A piece of something feels like… Shikashi… like a parasite in my soul. Here an invisible force suppresses it.
Of course.
My little Hinata was suppressed by him for so long, that now her soul has evolved too… and now he is the one being suppressed.
My actions have always been my own… it's not control… it's influence… he's watched over me… and given suggestions that I have thoughtlessly followed… he's cut off ideas before they bear fruit… but some have passed… my protective instincts over her have shattered some of his plans.
He now sees how the parasite has black ties beyond his soul. They try to get out without result, when they come out, the Silver World itself is like when Shikashi's influence eroded all ties with everyone in Hinata's family.
If what I see is true... I'm not the first one who's done this... two more people...
Surely other symbiotes or similar. One has to be Ren, that young man from Konoha. The other, if my memories don't fail me, it should be that Jiren from Takigakure. I never thought about it, not really. Another manipulation by that damm parasite.
Here, with Hinata's Silver World shielding me, I see you at last.
I can do something against you.
I see you now, little parasite. And I will tear your whispers from my soul.
<<<< o >>>>
After a while, Michel noticed two things…
First, I can't completely destroy the parasite without further damaging my own soul, possibly fatally. But I can truncate the part that was influencing me, removing it completely with my power. It's impossible, though. I can prevent it from communicating with its other parts, using a fragment of Hinata's Silver World as a protective layer.
Even so, I only have a limited time to get out of here before that fragment is claimed by the Silver World.
Second, now that I'm inside, my mind is free of outside influences. I can see that the Silver World and the Grey World are traces of my own soul that merged with Hinata and created their own spheres within her consciousness. They now belong to her. I think it's a way to store the power she couldn't truly use to nourish her soul, perhaps a feat achieved by my own unconscious despite the influence of the cursed parasite. It's a world apart, its rules defined by her, like when she herself allowed trees to grow, chakra to be used here, gravity, everything.
Kuro may be special, but she's not alone. There will be others… forged by trust, by bond, by need.
I know it's possible to bring others here, similar to what happened with me and Kuro. Only their consciousnesses. In this place, time flows faster naturally, but it is possible to increase it. The cost is that it requires spiritual energy to do so, energy that only a 'Silver Soul' can provide. Something Hinata doesn't have, not on her own, not yet. She advanced to the state I had when I came into this world, a 'grey soul' and before that she had a 'spiritual soul', another one I hadn't consciously considered.
Including my imminent death. Another thing, every time I considered this, my mind was easily diverted to my little granddaughter. That parasite really knew which strings to pull. But now I have a plan, or at least the skeleton of one. I hope my little granddaughter can forgive me for a few days of waste.
His mind turned to the Silver World.
And the ability to increase the flow of time there.
A smile—small, but real—broke across Michel's face, as he spoke aloud for the first time in what felt like lifetimes.
"Maybe more than a few days."