After handling official matters, Minato's deepest concern always remained with his family.
The Nine-Tails chakra that Naruto had forcibly drawn out was incredibly violent, leaving shocking burns on his body.
And it wasn't just in one or two places—it was everywhere!
These scars were no ordinary injuries; they contained the erosion of the Tailed Beast's untamable power.
Not only was the recovery process exceptionally slow, but it also required a vast amount of life energy. Every treatment was a massive drain on Naruto himself.
Until Naruto truly mastered the control of the Nine-Tails' power, he absolutely must not use this force by force again.
Otherwise, the backlash from that violent chakra would do more than just leave scars; it would directly damage his life force, with unimaginable consequences.
Compared to Naruto's situation, fortunately, Kushina's physical recovery was extremely ideal.
After a detailed examination, no obvious lingering effects were found on her body.
Minato's brow was furrowed.
Even though the Medical Shinobi had given this opinion, and that mysterious "Collector" had also indicated Kushina's life was safe.
But a sense of worry still entwined around his heart.
Because having a Tailed Beast forcibly extracted from a Jinchuriki's body invariably resulted in death.
In the long history of the Shinobi World, this was a taboo with absolutely no precedent for survival...
The latest report from the medical team showed Kushina's vital signs were stable, but did that prove everything was foolproof?
Minato let out a sigh. His greatest worry was not that Kushina was truly unharmed, but that the current level of Medical Ninjutsu in the Village might not be sufficient to detect deeper hidden dangers.
The Nine-Tails chakra had been entangled with Kushina's life source for decades; the damage caused by its extraction might far exceed the boundaries of existing technology.
Unfortunately, the two most excellent Medical Shinobi in the Village were currently away...
So he could only push this doubt deep into his heart for now, letting it turn into a silent sigh.
"At this point, perhaps I really have no choice but to believe The Collector's words..." he whispered to himself.
After a long while, Minato suddenly realized something.
His eyes suddenly lit up. Inside Kushina, the Nine-Tails that had once existed like a time bomb had now completely vanished!
This meant... the Nine-Tails riot would never happen again!
He and Kushina... they were in their prime, and their bodies remained resilient after enduring hardships.
Back when Naruto was born, they had decided not to have more children.
This stemmed from the deepest sense of responsibility and protection.
They absolutely could not allow a repeat of the Nine-Tails Riot for the sake of personal desires.
But now... Minato's heartbeat involuntarily quickened a bit.
That core obstacle no longer existed!
The thought left Minato in a brief daze.
But he quickly snapped back to reality, shaking his head to temporarily dispel this vision.
This wasn't just a matter between husband and wife; it concerned the entire family.
Naruto—would he long for a younger brother or sister? How would he view this decision by his parents?
And Kushina—after undergoing such a massive upheaval, could her body handle it? What were her wishes?
The blueprint for the family's future could not be decided by him alone.
This possibility had to be discussed and decided together by him, Kushina, and Naruto.
He stood up, his gaze casting toward the Konoha outside the window once more, his eyes flickering with uncertainty.
...
As time passed, the tranquility of the moon enveloped Takuno in his seclusion.
He focused on his training, completely unaware that his act of safely extracting the Nine-Tails from Kushina's body had actually given Minato the idea of having another child.
Finally, Takuno opened his eyes, ending his seclusion.
This period of isolation had lasted longer than he had anticipated.
And while he was in seclusion, the dormant Akatsuki had already begun their plan to capture the Tailed Beasts ahead of schedule.
Compared to the "original work" Minato knew, this storm had swept across more than a year early.
Regarding Akatsuki's movements, Takuno had no intention of interfering.
In his view, except for the Eight-Tails Jinchuriki Killer Bee, whose superior strength might make the capture process a bit tricky, the other Tailed Beasts should pose no great threat to the Akatsuki...
He paused for a moment, then reconsidered; it seemed a few of them were not easy targets either.
First and foremost, One-Tail Shukaku was, in his view, almost within easy reach.
The current situation of Sunagakure could be described as "feeble" without exaggeration.
This Shinobi Village, already situated in a desert land with extremely scarce resources, faced even worse conditions after the Fourth Kazekage Rasa was assassinated by Orochimaru.
The young Gaara had taken over the position of Fifth Kazekage in a time of crisis.
Though he barely maintained order in the Village with his methods, Sunagakure's overall strength was indeed worrying.
Capturing the One-Tail should be a breeze for Akatsuki.
Matatabi's Jinchuriki, Yugito Nii, though an elite in terms of strength, seemed far inferior when compared to the perfect Jinchuriki of the same Village, Killer Bee.
Capturing her, by Takuno's estimation, wouldn't be any real difficulty for the Akatsuki as long as Yugito didn't stay inside Kumogakure the whole time.
As for the Three-Tails Isobu, its fate was already sealed; it was currently in the hands of the Akatsuki.
Since Itachi had not joined Akatsuki as in the "original work," the movements of his partner Hoshigaki Kisame had also changed.
Kisame had long been entrenched in the Hidden Mist Village, nominally assisting but actually monitoring the Fourth Mizukage Yagura Karatachi, who was controlled by Obito.
Although Mei Terumī later successfully launched a coup to oust Yagura and take over as Mizukage, this internal strife had left the Hidden Mist severely weakened.
More importantly, Hoshigaki Kisame had managed to take the disgraced Fourth Mizukage himself out of the Hidden Mist alive during the chaos of the coup.
Yagura was essentially being held in secret by the Akatsuki, serving as their bargaining chip for controlling the Three-Tails.
One could say the current state of the Hidden Mist Village was no better than Sunagakure's.
Perhaps the internal trauma was even deeper due to the lingering poison of the long and cruel "Village of the Bloody Mist" policy.
However, for the Akatsuki, there were no more Tailed Beasts to be gained from the Hidden Mist.
The Three-Tails was already in their pocket, and the Six-Tails Saiken's Jinchuriki, Utakata, had long since defected from the Village and vanished.
The Four-Tails and Five-Tails Jinchuriki should have been relatively easy targets, but under Takuno's influence, they did not leave Iwagakure as they had in the original timeline; instead, the Village had taken strict protective measures.
Given that Iwagakure's powerful comprehensive strength far exceeded that of Sunagakure or the Hidden Mist, Akatsuki would have to pay a significant price to forcibly take those two Tailed Beasts unless the core leader Nagato or the mastermind Obito personally intervened.
The Six-Tails Jinchuriki had chosen to live in seclusion, showing no trace for many years.
For the Akatsuki, the greatest obstacle to obtaining the Six-Tails was not combat, but how to accurately locate his hiding place.
This arduous reconnaissance task would largely depend on White Zetsu's omnipresent infiltration and search capabilities.
In contrast, the prospects for capturing the Seven-Tails appeared much clearer.
Thanks to the detailed internal intelligence held by organization member Kakuzu, who was a rogue Shinobi from Takigakure Village, there were basically no obstacles to pinpointing the Seven-Tails' location.
As for the strength of Takigakure Village, its strongest Shinobi was... Kakuzu. So, one could say it was a piece of cake.
Capturing the Eight-Tails was the number one problem facing the Akatsuki.
The Jinchuriki Killer Bee was extremely powerful himself, and his home, Kumogakure, was renowned for its military might.
With these two factors combined, as long as Killer Bee didn't make a major mistake himself, the difficulty for Akatsuki to successfully seize the Eight-Tails was indeed extremely high.
As for the final Nine-Tails... Takuno cast his gaze toward the half of the Nine-Tails his Wood Clone had brought back earlier.
He had already fulfilled his promise to Nagato and successfully obtained this portion of power.
Now, he only needed to wait for the Akatsuki to gather the first eight Tailed Beasts, and then he would deliver this half of the Nine-Tails to Nagato as a key component to complete the plan.
Takuno had no intention of interfering with the Akatsuki's capture of the other Tailed Beasts.
Although his intervention had increased the difficulty for Akatsuki to obtain some Tailed Beasts, it had not shaken the organization's fundamental ability to capture all the remaining ones.
The real reason that prompted Takuno to personally seize the Nine-Tails was, ultimately, the extraordinary strength of the current Konogakure.
Take the previous Chunin Exams incident as an example.
On the surface, the attack carefully planned by Orochimaru caused great chaos; however, a closer look revealed that Konoha's actual losses were minimal.
In fact, the most significant loss Konoha suffered in that incident was precisely when Takuno himself took advantage of the chaos to seize half of the Nine-Tails chakra.
If Orochimaru hadn't used a "human bomb" tactic that completely exceeded normal expectations, catching Konoha off guard, Konoha's losses under normal defensive conditions would likely have been far lower.
Notably, Orochimaru had deliberately chosen the optimal timing for this operation—during the Chunin Exams.
At this time, Konoha found it difficult to effectively limit the entry of observers from other Shinobi Villages due to political and diplomatic factors, which provided Orochimaru with an opportunity to secretly transport human bombs.
He also successfully used Sunagakure to tie down a significant portion of Konoha's active combat forces.
Furthermore, Orochimaru had pre-deployed specific interception plans for Konoha's top experts, Shisui and Kakashi...
Even with such painstaking efforts that could be called exhaustive calculation, Orochimaru's final gains were still meager.
Had it not been for the fact that the Uchiha Clan had never faced extinction, he might have gained nothing at all from this operation.
And this was already the "best" result Orochimaru could achieve with his utmost effort, yet the outcome was still so unsatisfactory.
This showed the resilience of Konoha's defensive forces.
It could be said that even if Nagato, with his superior Rinnegan strength, personally led the Six Paths of Pain to attack Konoha.
With his power alone, trying to simultaneously face the Yellow Flash Minato and the "Body Flicker" Shisui in his prime, he would very likely return in defeat.
It wasn't even impossible for him to be directly left behind.
Based on this, Takuno finally reached a conclusion.
To piece together the complete Ten-Tails, the task of seizing the Nine-Tails was something he had to do personally; he could not leave it to others.
At this moment, his Wood Clone still quietly remained in the Shinobi World, waiting for the Akatsuki to launch the final operation to capture the Tailed Beasts.
Although he would not personally step onto the field to interfere in this dispute over the Tailed Beasts.
However, he didn't intend to stay out of it completely.
He planned to contribute his own strength when the Akatsuki executed the key step of sealing the captured Tailed Beast chakra into the Ten-Tails' body using the "Phantom Dragon Nine Seals."
And this, of course, had Takuno's own considerations, the core reason being... Kekkei Mora!
This ultimate and most powerful bloodline, its mysteries were something he still hadn't fully mastered.
This actually didn't come as a surprise to him.
After all, this was the supreme power above all Kekkei Genkai and Kekkei Tota; it was only natural that exploring it would be difficult.
Looking back, the moment he made the most significant progress in his research on Kekkei Mora was precisely when he "fed" the chakra of the nine Tailed Beasts one by one to the young Ten-Tails.
That process of inducing the deep fusion of nine differently-natured Tailed Beast Chakras within its body.
This experience also confirmed that the essence of Kekkei Mora's power was inextricably linked to the God Tree.
Takuno believed that even without being the Ten-Tails Jinchuriki, one could figure out Kekkei Mora, but if one were, it would definitely save a vast amount of time spent searching.
Therefore, the process carried out by the Akatsuki to re-gather and seal the scattered Tailed Beast chakra into one was of extraordinary significance to him.
This was not just an observation; it was another learning opportunity.
He believed that observing the complete scene of these nine types of chakra merging into one under the effect of the "Phantom Dragon Nine Seals" once again in detail.
It was very likely to be the final push, revealing the ultimate secret to him and helping him truly fuse and master the Kekkei Mora power that was uniquely his own!
However, this was actually not the biggest reason for Takuno's emergence from seclusion.
After all, this matter didn't require his true self to do; letting the Wood Clone do it was already completely sufficient.
The decisive factor for his true emergence lay in the changes in his own training process.
During that critical period when he first became the Ten-Tails Jinchuriki, Takuno experienced a stage of rapid leaps in strength.
At that time, the new Ten-Tails power filled his body, whether it was the vast energy itself or the startling potential released by this body that had just fused with the God Tree's power.
They were like vast secret realms waiting to be explored, waiting for him to deeply perceive, excavate, and master them.
This process of exploring the boundaries and possibilities of his own power became the powerful engine for his rapid advancement in strength, pushing him to continuously move toward deeper levels on the path of the Six Paths realm.
However, like any high-speed advancement phase, there was an end; this "high-growth bonus period" brought by the initial fusion with the Ten-Tails had already been exhausted.
Although Takuno's path of training was far from reaching its end, as long as he continued his seclusion and bitter training, his strength could still steadily improve.
But the speed of progress at this moment, compared to the meteoric momentum he had experienced before, was already worlds apart.
This relatively "slow" accumulation process was, in Takuno's view, too inefficient.
Based on this profound consideration of efficiency, Takuno made the decision to emerge from seclusion.
And in his heart, there was one more thing that could continue to make him stronger, which his true self had to do!