Kawaki Arc

The is an arc of Boruto: Naruto Next Generations. It covers chapters 24 to current. It is preceded by the Ao Arc.

The Vessel
In the base of Kara, Jigen and Delta eat a meal where Delta expressed her exasperation at Koji's lack of progress and kicked the meal table hard enough to destroy it completely. Jigen simply recreated the table and its food and calmly allowed her to leave and work with Koji to report to him about any troubles as long as she obey Koji's way of doing the mission. As Boruto and the rest of Konohamaru's Team observe the unconscious Kawaki, suddenly Boruto's seal hurt, also irritating Kawaki, who after being furiously reminded of his adoption at Jigen's hands unleashed a repelling shockwave before engaging in an uncooperative discussion with the Konoha ninja, unaware that Koji and Delta are watching. When Garō arrives, Kawaki fought him and after being overpowered, activated his seal and effortlessly killed him and nearly killed Boruto and the others had Boruto not activated his own seal. Although Kawaki made it clear he saw them as Kara members, he collapsed due to overexerting himself and after Katasuke inspected Kawaki, he revealed that Kawaki's body had been significantly modified by microscopic Scientific Ninja Tools that have altered his body down to the level of his nervous and circulatory systems and his level of advanced Shinobi Ware was even greater than Naruto's own prosthetic. Team 7 and Katasuke decided to take him back to Konohagakure, with Koji allowing it much to Delta's angry surprise.

Integrating Into Konoha
Once back in Konoha, having decided to allow Kawaki to experience a normal life in Konoha, Naruto tried to befriend him but Kawaki remained guarded and hostile, trying to escape before he reached Naruto's house until Naruto foiled it and dismissing his value to Naruto as he couldn't provide much intel on Kara, and once he broke the vase Himawari had given to Hinata and tried to escape from his home, Naruto finally snapped and unleashed his power, terrifying Kawaki who believed he may be even more powerful than Jigen. Soon Boruto came home and was furious over Kawaki having broken the vase Himawari made. Kawaki coldly told him off and hardly apologised to Himawari, which only made Boruto angrier and after Kawaki introduced himself vulgarly, Boruto responded in kind. Although Hinata and Himawari were fine with the vase broken as the most important thing was her feelings conveyed to Hinata, Boruto and Kawaki soon had a violent altercation when they wanted to go to the toilet only to have to go outside the house, only being stopped by Naruto.

Eventually, Kawaki revealed his past to Boruto and how he obtained Kāma: he had obtained it from Jigen, who had experimented on many other children, causing their deaths, before succeeding with him. Boruto, who could not help but feel somewhat sorry and impressed by Kawaki's harsh treatment that even he himself noted was worse than death and yet he still survived for so long, agreed to consider working with Kawaki but still insisted he repair Himawari's vase before leaving for a mission. Naruto offered to help him as he couldn't let Kawaki steal money to buy another vase and the two went out and Kawaki's little regard for social manners and lack of knowledge of simple joys quickly showed themselves as he rudely ignored Sarada's advice on buying the custard snack and expressed quick infatuation with it and refused to share Sarada his snack, annoying Sarada. Even Naruto's tolerance was soon pushed to the limits when Kawaki ruthlessly attacked a child just because he bumped into him, which would have certainly killed the boy had Naruto not stopped him, and openly showed a lack of remorse for it. When he went to Ino's shop to buy a vase to replace the original, however, Kawaki displayed his vulnerable and traumatised side as just seeing the flowers caused him to remember Jigen, which Naruto comforted him for, and Sarada softened up to Kawaki and offered him help anytime but Kawaki did not acknowledge her as a friend. However, Boruto coldly refused it and told him to repair the original, frustrating Kawaki. Meanwhile, Koji entered Konoha undetected while leaving Delta behind, angering her as she could no longer watch him.

Delta's Assault
When Naruto sparred with Boruto, effortlessly overpowering him, Kawaki activated his seal to make Boruto use his own to begin studying Kāma, at which point Boruto quickly became significantly stronger but was still defeated easily. Nevertheless, Naruto applauded Boruto and the two mutually shared a seal of reconciliation, which surprised Kawaki who remembered how harsh Jigen was with him whenever training him as he could never remember being praised and was only ridiculed for his lack of appreciation for the Kāma and physically beaten whenever he questioned Jigen. Naruto then offered to have Kawaki spar with Boruto but Kawaki declined as he couldn't use chakra and unmoved by Naruto's explanation of chakra being a power that connects to others, which is the key to happiness, only expressed interest in the Shadow Clone Technique just because he could use it to beat himself up in a melancholic and self-bitter tone, which Naruto advised him against as he told him that self-hatred would mean nothing and that with friends, he could change for the better, which affected Kawaki enough that he bitterly decided to repair the vase despite struggling, unaware that Koji has found him but decided to not try to capture him as he would not win against Naruto and chose to watch him and Boruto to gather information, which caused Boruto open up to Kawaki and offered to train with him to better use Kāma. During the spar, Kawaki easily handled Boruto's attacks before proceeding to unleash a blast that Boruto could not absorb and was injured in process. When the two made a seal of reconciliation, suddenly Boruto's hand healed as he and Kawaki felt a reaction from their seals, which worried Koji as he felt that meant Boruto could have the same power as Jigen.

Meanwhile, the livid Delta had found Kawaki using a drone and proceeded to enter Konoha to bring him back herself. A fierce fight quickly ensued between Naruto and Delta, with Naruto successfully overwhelming and wearing down his opponent while holding back to not harm his watching children as Kawaki noted how far Naruto surpassed Delta and that it was obvious as a dance that Naruto was leading the fight. However, when Delta revealed her trump card, that of a destructive beam that not even Naruto could heal from, Naruto began to be pressured enough that Boruto tried to help only to make Delta attack Himawari, causing Naruto to shield her only for Kawaki to take the attack, infuriating Delta and Naruto, with Delta being angry that Kawaki had damaged his valuable body and Naruto being infuriated with her tactics. Now angered, Naruto decisively pummeled Delta and soon overloaded her absorbing eyes and defeated her. However, the drone Delta used exploded Delta's body and fled as Koji expressed that Naruto's power, while terrifying, still could not defeat Jigen and only the Kāma could do it. At the base of Kara, Delta raged at her defeat as the other Inners mocked and made it clear that the next time they try to retrieve Kawaki, they will send in someone stronger than her. Jigen swiftly silenced the argument, noting on how Delta had defied his orders and questioning about Koji's whereabouts. As Boro is perplexed by how Koji is disobeying the order of retrieving Kawaki before Konoha came in, Jigen, interested when Delta said Koji was gathering information, asked Delta about it and Delta told the other Inners about Boruto having Kāma, surprising all of them, even Jigen, as Corde noted that he had searched Naruto and Sasuke but found neither of them had the seal, along with also noting that Boruto wields a real Kāma as his could increase in strength with Kawaki's upon resonating, which caused Jigen to smirk as he knew that Momoshiki chose Boruto as a vessel therefore.

Jigen Defeats Naruto and Sasuke
Meanwhile, Kawaki, inspired by Naruto giving a prosthetic hand to him despite it inhibiting his chakra, asked to learn ninjutsu from him and gradually opened up to others. He was eventually moved to tears when Kurama reveals just how similar Naruto's childhood was to his own when he was searching for the last piece of the vase and was confronted by Kurama. However, as Boruto and Mitsuki left to ask Tsunade about the similarities of the Strength of a Hundred Seal to that of the Kāma, Sasuke, in his investigation of a location from the coordinates retrieved from Kara, discovered two terrifying revelations: Kaguya had came to Earth with a partner and that another Ten Tails was imprisoned in the location. To further his concern, he saw Jigen came and absorb chakra from the Ten Tails to transform into Kaguya's partner, the power of the resulting form being such that it caused Sasuke to sweat and Sasuke decided to retreat and warn Naruto rather than face him.

After gaining a significant amount of chakra, Jigen decided to personally retrieve Kawaki and forcibly synchronised Kawaki's Kāma to make it open a portal for him, a process that alerted Boruto, and arrived on Konoha himself right in front of Kawaki as Naruto was just worried about him. Koji, who had been watching all along and had been anticipating Jigen making a move, was astonished and perplexed at Jigen's ability to just so easily appear before Kawaki, as he wouldn't have needed to order the vessel retrieval mission, only to be soon caught by Jigen, forcing him to stop watching the events, as he came to the realisation Jigen was never fooled by him and had been merely baiting him to know his motives. His immense power being instantly sensed by Ino, terrified by the level of darkness she sensed from him, Ino immediately contacted Naruto who had her station the Police Force as backup but not to intervene immediately in his one-on-one fight with Jigen. Jigen voiced his lack of interest in fighting the Seventh Hokage and even apologised for his rude arrival and when Naruto coldly rebuked his civility and attacked him, Jigen easily overpowered and subdued him with a kick and several black rods impaling his person. Jigen then turned his sights on Kawaki and commanded him to prepare to return and effortlessly restrained his adopted son when he tried to punch him, expressing disgust and exasperation at his prosthetic arm and on how Kawaki favoured it over the Kāma he gave him, noting it was just a tracking device no different than Kāma, and Kawaki's defiance only caused Jigen to tighten his grip on his hand, twisting it, as he continued to degrade Naruto and Konoha as a whole, berating Kawaki for believing that he wasn't anything more but a bait for Kara and dismissing the Hokage as being a mere peace-obsessed foolish coward who cares only for the peace of his village, but Kawaki resisted him and in his anger, his Kāma progressed to the point a horn came out of it, shocking Jigen on how much Kawaki had progressed. Naruto, now freed, kicked Jigen aside and Jigen, seeing Naruto won't stop interfering, finally decided to engage the Seventh Hokage and activated his Kāma. Before they could begin fighting, Kawaki decided to surrender to Jigen, fearing Jigen could kill Naruto in their battle, in exchange for no fights between him and the Seventh Hokage. Although Jigen agreed to the terms, Naruto refused to cooperate so Jigen teleported him to another dimension but was stopped from leaving by Sasuke, who along with Naruto decided to face Jigen there as they could fight fully, which merely caused Jigen to laugh at them.

While Sarada arrived on Naruto's house to find the despondent Kawaki, who believed Jigen would defeat and kill Naruto and he was powerless to stop it, and Boruto and Mitsuki closed in, with Boruto's Kāma receding, Naruto and Sasuke fought Jigen only to quickly be pressured by the Kara leader's overwhelming might as they were not only unable to land any meaningful hits due to Jigen's Kāma easily handling their attacks that did connect with both sheer physical prowess and the ability to absorb jutsu but was also unable to anticipate his pattern of attacks as he somehow caused black rods to appear in their person to stab them and vanished whenever about to be attacked to dodge their attacks before swiftly retaliating with the rods. Eventually Sasuke realised that Jigen's true ability was to manipulate matter to a molecular level to shrink objects and himself to a microscopic level and just as easily return to normal, which caused Jigen to deem Sasuke the more dangerous foe and declare him as the first one he will kill. With Jigen's ability revealed, Naruto and Sasuke managed to anticipate his patterns and began cornering him, with Naruto distracting Jigen while Sasuke attacked him with his sword and though Jigen repelled the attack and escaped using his shrinking technique, Naruto managed to trick him into revealing himself by having him absorb his jutsu for Sasuke to attack but Jigen managed to escape using his Space-Time Ninjutsu and after praising them for their abilities and having revealed to him his weakness, calmly activated the transformed state he was in when he absorbed the Ten-Tails' chakra, leaving even Naruto and Sasuke nervous at the power of the form.

As Sasuke revealed his knowledge of Jigen's mysterious form, earning him Jigen's ire who angrily questioned how he was able to find the dimension he trapped his Ten Tails in, and deduced Jigen's goals, he and Naruto activated Complete Body Susanoo and Tailed Beast Mode only to be swiftly outmatched by Jigen's drastically greater power as he easily dodged their attacks and plunged through their avatar forms, even when Sasuke managed to catch him off-guard with his Rinnengan's Amenotejikara to have Naruto to attack him which he easily dodged and countered with large black stakes to impale Kurama's tails for him to punch Naruto out of the form, and even Sasuke's attempt to switch place with Naruto when Jigen tried to absorb his Rasengan doesn't work as he simply summoned rods around his neck to block it and downed Sasuke with a single kick and soon overpowered Naruto and downed him as well. However, despite Jigen's dominance, he soon found that he was at his limits and his body couldn't keep pace with his power and to end things quickly, he restrained them using black rods and intended to seal Naruto while killing Sasuke. Realising they were outmatched, Naruto ordered Sasuke to flee and with a heavy heart, Sasuke teleported back to Konoha at his home, surprising Sakura who had just arrived, as he could only weakly pray that Naruto would survive. Jigen, having no interest in killing Naruto, ignored his insults, revealing he was only after Boruto for his Kāma and as he sealed him away in a large coffin, Jigen promised to kill Naruto if he escaped, which Naruto swore to return back to Jigen. As Jigen shrunk the coffin to normal size, he collapsed from the strain of using the form, even shedding a tear of pain, it is revealed that Isshiki Ōtsutsuki had been possessing him all along and the mysterious enemy cursed Jigen's limits before teleporting away. The Kara leader, heavily weakened, was forced to return back to the base and rest for 2 days, but Jigen is unconcerned as Kawaki and Boruto have both grew tremendously and he could now see that they will become a "perfect Otsutsuki". Meanwhile, Koji, realising that Jigen had been weakened even though he believed that Naruto, even aided by Sasuke, would be no match for Jigen, returned to the base to kill Jigen himself.

Team 7 Rescues Naruto
As Kawaki was left to realise in horror that Naruto had lost to Jigen, Boruto, Sarada and Mitsuki came in and soon Shikamaru and Konoha Shinobi arrived and as Kawaki let them on the situation, Shikamaru was left perplexed with the situation as if Jigen had only planned to strand Naruto in another dimension, he could just come back for Kawaki and as he hasn't, the only possibilities are that either Jigen had defeated Naruto but had been left weakened so couldn't come back or they're still fighting. The best possibility would be that Naruto had defeated Jigen but cannot come back on his own but with him unable to contact Sasuke, they have no choice but to wait for his return and Shikamaru allowed Kawaki to remain free but refused to let him wander around as he never trusted him while they wait for Sasuke to retrieve Naruto. Eventually, Kawaki was able to open a portal to Naruto's location along with Boruto and easily absorbing Shikamaru's attempt to paralyse him, left with Team 7 to rescue Naruto. The worried Shikamaru was soon even more concerned when it turned out that Sasuke had returned with severe injuries and a massive loss of chakra that effectively meant Konoha won't be able to retrieve Naruto or Team 7 anytime soon, leaving the Hokage advisor only able to pray that Boruto and the others survive until they could rescue them.

Once arriving, they meet Boro, who Kawaki described as being in some ways even worse than Jigen. As Boro and Kawaki bantered on Kawaki's change and Kawaki's question on Naruto's situation, Boro revealed that Naruto had been sealed inside the coffin as he then threw it down at Team 7 before cautioning that they don't break it as it would kill Naruto and only Jigen could undo the seal. Team 7 soon got attacked by Boro, who nearly killed Naruto with his Lava Release: Planet-Branding Blast before he managed to easily shrug off Boruto and Kawaki's attacks with his Self-Healing Technique and soon paralyse them with Dark Cloud, expressing joy on how he could bring them both back, and even Mitsuki's intervention proved to be ineffective as Boro's dark mist wasn't blown away by Mitsuki's Wind Release and he swiftly overpowered his efforts, purging the snake's venom with his regeneration technique. Only Sarada's intervention kept them from being defeated as they fell back. They were able to figure out that the origins of the mist were physical matter and with the substance inside Mitsuki's snake, Sarada managed to figure out they were viruses and Boro used Scientific Ninja Tools to project them. After Sarada was made the leader of the new Team 7, she confronted Boro alone and though no match for him, Sarada was able to trick him into getting close and use her Fire Ball Technique to damage him before Boruto and Kawaki unleashed their Rasengan: "Unison" on him. However, Boro was still able to recover even after his body was blown apart with his healing technique and proceeded to attack Naruto to break their team-work.

Despite the virus being neutralised, Boro quickly compensated for this by using gunpowder to detonate them, managing to injure Kawaki who was shielding Naruto, as he voiced his desire to take him back as soon as possible along with Boruto to train them from scratch. Even with the virus neutralised, Boro's regeneration technique swiftly overwhelmed Team 7 as he regenerated every damage and landed punishing blows on them. Kawaki revealed that all members of Kara had been modified with Shinobi Ware by Amado but even Amado's genius skills have limits and that there must be a giant core with Boro's abnormal regeneration before he had Sarada search for it and joined Boruto and Mitsuki. Although their attacks failed to do any effect on Boro, Sarada was able to deduce Boro's core's location and that he could move it with hand-signs and managed to blitz him with Chidori. However, while succeeding in destroying the core, Team 7 were faced with a new trouble as Boro lost control of the scientific ninja tools in his body and began mutating in a wild rampage. Unable to handle Boro in their exhausted state, Team 7 free Naruto using Boruto and Kawaki's collaborated Space-Time Ninjutsu in the hopes he may kill Boro once and for all only to find Naruto unconscious. As Boro attacked and overpowered them all, Boruto was taken over by Momoshiki and easily defeated and killed Boro before returning control, stating that the time where Boruto will lose everything is still far away.

Koji Kashin vs Jigen
Meanwhile Koji arrived on Kara's base intent on killing Jigen as with Boro and Code gone, no one is there to defend Jigen and Amado doesn't seem to be about to stop him and even tells him that Jigen is only back to 10% power.

Chapters
Kawaki Arc pt-br:Arco de Kawaki