[Name: Fate Ink]
[Ability: Ink condensed from extracting the world's power of fate. It can give a Stand that has reached its limit a chance to surpass that limit.]
[Note 1: Since it's ink, it must be used together with a "pen."]
[Note 2: Using the power of fate will, at some point in the future, require paying the price of fate.]
A very simple introduction.
Ryosuke lowered his head and looked at the broken Divine Tree in his hand, or rather…
A pen that writes fate.
He had come to this world for nearly five years. From being utterly confused at the beginning, knowing nothing about the structure of the ninja world, to now standing on the moon and reading through the secret historical documents stored by various countries.
Ryosuke already had a clear understanding of the historical context of the ninja world.
Tracing it back little by little.
Nagato's Akatsuki…
The various ninja world wars…
The founding of the Five Great Ninja Villages…
The emergence of ninjas…
At the source of everything was this Divine Tree.
Vertically speaking, it was the origin of history.
Horizontally speaking, it had absorbed the chakra of nearly everyone in the world.
"Generation after generation, everyone's karma has a line, thick or thin, tied to the Divine Tree. If there's anything in this world that qualifies to write fate…"
Ryosuke slowly raised the pen.
"Then it's this."
[Pen detected. Use Fate Ink?]
The system prompt sounded again.
Ryosuke closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
After going in circles, it had finally come to this moment.
"Use it."
A drop of semi-transparent Fate Ink, shimmering with starlight, appeared in midair.
Ryosuke held the pen and gently touched the ink with the tip.
In the next second, five Stands appeared before his eyes.
They were the Stands that could surpass their own limits through Fate Ink.
And unlike the dimensional ascension Star Core, Fate Ink did not require trial missions.
The power of fate would complete the corresponding evolution.
Of course, just as Note 2 said, "Using the power of fate will, at some point in the future, require paying the price of fate."
As for the price…
He'd deal with it when it came.
Also, when using Fate Ink, the corresponding enhancement effects were clearly marked on each evolvable Stand's panel, making it easier for him to choose.
Ryosuke checked the evolution paths one by one.
[Killer Queen Requiem]
A Stand born specifically to kill.
Kira Yoshikage's core desire was to hide himself in darkness, live a peaceful life, and avoid being tracked by anyone. But repeated exposure pushed the despair and grief in his heart to the limit.
If darkness would expose him, then hide in the light.
After Killer Queen advances to Requiem, it gains the Fourth Bomb: Backlight Indulgence, hiding itself within "light." All those who exist in the light and know Ryosuke's secret of being a transmigrator will die.
If one explosion doesn't kill them, then two, three, four, unceasingly.
Only by staying in darkness will the explosions stop.
Once illuminated by light, candlelight, sunlight, lamplight, the explosions will resume, until death.
———
The description wasn't long, but after reading it, Ryosuke swallowed hard.
This ability was terrifyingly powerful.
However, there were still several Stands left. Ryosuke didn't rush to choose and continued to the second one, "Weather Report: Heavy Weather"
Its influence over weather expanded to a global scale.
Moreover, it could change the refraction rate of sunlight in the atmosphere, creating "subliminal rainbows."
Whether outdoors or hiding indoors, everyone would be affected, and their subconscious would be altered.
Overly strong cognition could even cause physical changes. For example, if one subconsciously believed they were a snail, they would turn into a snail; if they believed they were a Walmart shopping bag, they would become a shopping bag.
It truly used hallucinations to rewrite reality, an illusion-type ability even more terrifying than Kotoamatsukami.
Unlike in the original work, where blind people could resist this ability, the Fate Ink–enhanced Heavy Weather could influence through all five senses. Vision, hearing, touch, smell, taste, if even one sense was affected, the subconscious would be rewritten.
———
Although "Heavy Weather" wasn't marked as Requiem, there was no doubt that this was a Requiem-level Stand.
The third Stand, "Made in Heaven" evolved from C-Moon.
This one needed little introduction. Its ability could be summed up in two words, 'accelerate time'.
The time of all non-living things would be accelerated, until the old universe was annihilated and a new universe was born. And when the speed of Made in Heaven reached its limit, the one who controlled it could even surpass the speed of light.
The fourth Stand, "Silver Chariot Requiem"
It possessed the power to control all "souls" and "spirits."
First Movement: Soul Exchange. It could manipulate targets' souls to swap with each other, even animals were no exception.
Second Movement: Species Evolution. It could compress the long evolutionary time of various species into just a few seconds. If Made in Heaven accelerated the time of non-living things, then Silver Chariot · Requiem accelerated the time of living beings.
Third Movement: Life Unification. Souls undergo large-scale exchanges, bodies undergo ultra-high-speed evolution, and all living beings' souls would connect with each other, becoming a single collective controlled by Silver Chariot Requiem.
The fifth Stand, "Star Platinum Requiem"
Ability: Turning effect into cause.
As long as Ryosuke wished it, he could create the "fact of injury" out of nothing, directly giving any enemy an almost dying "effect." Then, while they were near death, he could use Star Platinum to heavily injure them, filling in the "cause."
Compared to the above Stands that rewrote time or controlled souls, Star Platinum's causality ability looked somewhat "simple."
In actual combat, the effect was that any enemy who showed hostility toward Star Platinum Requiem could only fight at critical health.
However…
[Note: Once the Requiem evolution path is chosen, no other evolution paths can be selected.]
'What does this 'other' evolution path mean?'
'Could there be evolution paths besides Requiem?'
Ryosuke was a bit confused.
In any case, he had now looked through all five Stands.
Ryosuke fell into a dilemma.
Before, he complained that the system always made him draw cards and open blind boxes.
Now that there were no blind boxes, and all the information was laid out clearly, another problem appeared.
He wanted them all.
But there was only one drop of Fate Ink.
He had to choose one Stand to evolve.
"This really is a difficult multiple-choice question."
Ryosuke let out a light sigh.
'My core objective is to kill Isshiki & Madara, Kaguya, and Momoshiki. All choices must be based on that.'
'On top of achieving that, if I can also defend against potential future enemies, like other Otsutsuki who may arrive later, or new alien races, then even better.'
Choosing backward from the answer made things much easier.
The first to be eliminated were Killer Queen Requiem and Weather Report: Heavy Weather.
The former focused on killing, but given the physical toughness of the Otsutsuki trio, killing them would require at least three or four rounds of explosions.
During that process, they, especially Isshiki, with his combat intelligence, would very likely find a flaw in the ability and hide in an environment without light.
They might even open a portal and leave the ninja world, going to the pitch-black universe, then return later.
Although the Fourth Bomb was permanent, the premise was that Ryosuke had to keep Killer Queen in the Stand slot forever. Once it was withdrawn, the explosions would not activate.
Weather Report: Heavy Weather was similar.
From the generation of subliminal hallucinations, to activation, to full influence, there was a short window of time.
Once something felt off, Momoshiki might stubbornly continue fighting, but Isshiki, with a new body, and Kaguya, who was already obsessed with escaping, would definitely open a portal and flee immediately.
"No one is allowed to leave. Everyone dies here today."
That was Ryosuke's bottom line.
The second round eliminated was Silver Chariot Requiem.
Controlling souls, evolving bodies, it was indeed extremely powerful.
The problem was the Otsutsuki clan's divine technique, Karma.
Their power existed in the form of data streams. Changing bodies was, to them, nothing more than releasing Karma in another body.
Their power would definitely weaken.
But again, at least one of the three would escape.
That left a final choice.
Star Platinum Requiem.
Made in Heaven.
After long contemplation, Ryosuke made his decision. He tightened his grip on the pen and looked at the three enemies frozen in midair.
Buzz!
Time stop ended.
Kaguya, Isshiki, and Momoshiki saw the Divine Tree in Ryosuke's hand and were about to rush forward when they suddenly sensed an indescribable danger, freezing in midair.
Ryosuke slowly raised the pen.
The stars at the tip of the pen shone brilliantly.
His gaze swept across their faces as he spoke softly, "Time is about to accelerate."
His arm swung down, and the pen tip pierced C-Moon's chest.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
C-Moon's chest shattered, fragments falling away as infinite radiance burst forth from within. The light spread along winding cracks, reaching its eyes, nose, mouth, and ears, until the final moment... C-Moon's body turned into countless beams of light.
The beams overlapped and aligned, reflecting beneath Ryosuke's feet, like... A staircase leading to heaven.
C-Moon disappeared.
Appearing beside Ryosuke was a centaur holding reins.
Its upper body was human, with a white face, a speedometer at its center, green ribbons wrapped around its forehead, and large amounts of pink feather decorations from shoulders to collarbone.
Its lower body was the front half of a horse, with no hind half. The horse's head and joints were decorated with clock-like ornaments, and a golden pipe connected its upper and lower body along its back.
It floated quietly beside Ryosuke, like a medieval knight.
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
[Made In Heaven]
[User: Enrico Pucci]
[Ability 1: Time Acceleration]
[Accelerates the time of all non-living objects in the universe. Vast changes of sea and land, the shifting of worlds, all in an instant]
[Ability 2: Super-Speed Movement]
[Along with time acceleration, the Stand user can use Made in Heaven to accelerate together with non-living objects, without being affected by aging. The faster the universe accelerates, the faster the Stand user becomes.]
[Ability 3: Creation of a New Universe]
[Starting from 30× time flow, continuously stacking multipliers until acceleration reaches infinity, time becomes a singularity. Afterward, the singularity explodes again, acceleration slows, and a brand-new universe is formed]
[Note: What ushers you into heaven is the bloodline of the Otsutsuki, fate ends here]
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
No star rating.
No level.
Made in Heaven itself did not need such things to mark it.
And this was Ryosuke's final choice.
The power of Star Platinum Requiem was undeniable. In terms of direct combat power, even Made in Heaven could not compare.
But the same problem remained, if he couldn't kill all three within a single time stop, the survivors would definitely escape.
Only Made in Heaven's speed could kill all enemies, leaving none behind. And in the future, if there were still enemies coming from the universe, Ryosuke would be able to deal with them better.
Hoo~
The wind rose.
"Then let's begin, no…"
Ryosuke's gaze swept over the three of them.
"Let's end all of this."
Gulp!
Kaguya swallowed.
She felt like she had misjudged the situation.
When she had just been revived, Kaguya thought it was Isshiki and Momoshiki fighting over ownership of the ninja world, with Ryosuke caught between them, barely surviving and seeking a slim chance at life.
That was why he had racked his brain to revive her, begging for her mercy.
But now it seemed...
'It's clearly the human in front of me who's suppressing Momoshiki and Isshiki… and now…'
Kaguya took half a step back.
She saw the Divine Tree in Ryosuke's hand gradually withering and disappearing, then looked at the eerie centaur-like evil spirit hovering beside him.
A pitch-black spatial portal suddenly opened.
Kaguya turned and tried to flee.
She no longer wanted the broken Divine Tree.
The remaining humans… she could find a chance to kill and absorb them later.
Right now, Kaguya just wanted to leave this place of trouble immediately.
Perhaps it was a woman's intuition, Kaguya felt a rope tightening around her neck... it wasn't intuition!
A hand tightly gripped her throat, forcibly pulling her out of the portal and slamming her heavily onto the sand.
BOOM!
The deafening roar snapped everyone out of their shock.
'What kind of speed was this?!'
Isshiki and Momoshiki turned their heads sharply.
Aside from special spacetime techniques like time stop, their speeds when fighting Ryosuke had basically been on par.
But they were sure that the attack just now was not a spacetime technique.
They saw an afterimage flash past, and Ryosuke had already grabbed Kaguya, smashing her to the ground like beating a dog.
And it wasn't over.
Buzz!
A sharp whistling sound appeared in Ryosuke's palm.
It was just a Lesson 4 steel ball.
But the moment it left Ryosuke's control, its speed skyrocketed, smashing into Kaguya's chest with a thunderous impact.
It couldn't fold space.
But the power it unleashed at that moment was no weaker than a cavalry spin.
Because of acceleration.
As a non-living object, the steel ball accelerated dozens of times the instant it left his hand, and its power naturally increased dozens of times as well.
"Ahhh!!"
Kaguya, slammed into the sand and struck heavily, involuntarily widened her eyes and opened her mouth, letting out a painful scream. She wanted to get up, to escape, to counterattack.
The constantly spinning steel ball was like a steel nail, pinning Kaguya firmly to the ground. No matter how much strength she used, she couldn't move an inch.
At that moment, reflected in her pupils was a streak of light cutting across the sky.
'A line?'
Kaguya's pupils shrank.
'What line?'
It was the sun, racing wildly along a trajectory.
Night fell and vanished.
The sun set in the west and rose again in the east.
The crystallized sand dunes from earlier explosions and impacts weathered back into grains of sand once more.
At this moment, Kaguya finally understood what Ryosuke meant by "time acceleration."
She couldn't comprehend it.
'Is this really a power humans could wield?'
If this was humanity… Then what was she?
Kaguya had never felt so lost, and... So terrified.
Seeing Ryosuke raise his fist again, Kaguya couldn't move, couldn't fight. She could only open her mouth and spit out two words, "Save me!"
Isshiki and Momoshiki heard this and both tensed, exchanged a glance, as if making up their minds. Their power erupted, and then... they turned around and ran.