At this moment...
How could Black Zetsu possibly allow Emiya Shihara to sit quietly and think!
Having lived for thousands of years, how could Black Zetsu possibly not know what to do?
When someone is hit by unacceptable and overwhelming information, it is exceptionally easy for them to let their imagination run wild, even conjuring up some kind of world-destroying conspiracy!
At a time like that...
No matter what corroborating information this person might receive in the future, that world-destroying conspiracy would remain lingering in their mind, impossible to shake!
Black Zetsu was well aware of one thing...
It genuinely *did* have a world-destroying conspiracy!
Especially since Emiya Shihara had lived in the ancient era and already knew many things; if he were left to let his imagination run wild, there was no telling if he might actually deduce the truth behind the disappearance of Otsutsuki Kaguya!
It had to seize this opportunity to instill its own narrative into Emiya Shihara, making him willingly accept his identity, thoroughly embrace the so-called truth it was feeding him, and completely brainwash him with the fabricated reality it constructed!
"Listen to me finish."
Black Zetsu felt that what it had just said sounded somewhat familiar.
Indeed, it sounded rather familiar.
Because it seemed Emiya Shihara had just said that exact line a moment ago.
Black Zetsu felt this was truly the wheel of destiny coming full circle, leaving it no choice but to imitate Emiya Shihara and begin telling a slightly fabricated and embellished story of its own.
"Back in our era..."
"You must have heard the legend of the God Tree."
"In ancient times, the God Tree appeared in this world and became an object of human faith. And Kaguya, who descended alongside the God Tree, became the Goddess of the Rabbit worshipped by humanity."
"However..."
"What you don't know is..."
"The humans of that era were also locked in endless strife."
Black Zetsu racked its brain to the absolute limit, striving to paint a more positive image of its mother: "The suffering humans of that era prayed to Kaguya to quell the wars. Kaguya heard their prayers and used the power of the God Tree to put an end to the conflicts of that time..."
"Yet..."
"This was not the end."
"Even though Kaguya possessed god-like power..."
"Even though Kaguya's power was as immense as your own wisdom in human physiological research, she ultimately encountered a helpless dilemma..."
Black Zetsu had not spent its time in vain; it had learned a few tricks for communicating with humans—for instance, casually pulling Emiya Shihara into the narrative while fabricating the story, making it easier for its words to resonate with his empathy.
"Could it be..."
Emiya Shihara frowned and fell into deep thought.
"Precisely."
"There were simply too many humans in the world."
Without even waiting for Emiya Shihara to supply the answer, Black Zetsu hurriedly spun the next part of the story: "Kaguya wished to distribute her own power—the Chakra within her body—and seek out individuals of noble character like yourself, so that they could help her rescue the suffering people of the world..."
"Me?"
Emiya Shihara shook his head, refusing to accept Black Zetsu's flattery: "I possess no such noble character. I am merely a lucky survivor who happened to obtain the power of the God Tree Remnant, and I simply didn't want to let that power go to waste, which is why I desired to rescue the suffering people just like the Goddess of the Rabbit..."
"Do not be modest."
Determined not to let Emiya Shihara brush off the compliment, Black Zetsu continued to praise him: "In all my millennium of walking this world, I have never seen another soul quite like you..."
"In this world..."
"People like you are altogether too rare."
Black Zetsu sighed, smoothly steering the topic back to the story: "However, Kaguya knew that the influence of Chakra was far too immense. She believed that the power of Chakra could not be casually bestowed upon mortals, lest humanity use it to commit evil deeds..."
"Naturally."
"Humans of noble character have always been scarce..."
"Therefore, Kaguya's plan never proceeded very smoothly..."
"However..."
"This posed no great obstacle for Kaguya."
"Because Kaguya possessed a boundless lifespan; she could live through endless ages in this world, and she had ample time to find those to whom she could entrust her Chakra..."
"Indeed, caution was necessary."
Emiya Shihara nodded, appearing to thoroughly approve of the Kaguya in Black Zetsu's story: "If Chakra were distributed indiscriminately..."
"Ah, yes..."
Black Zetsu let out a hollow sigh and earnestly continued fabricating the tale: "However, Kaguya's two sons did not see it that way..."
"Two sons!"
Emiya Shihara looked as though he had just heard a brand-new edition of the tale.
"Indeed!"
Black Zetsu's voice grew chillingly dark: "Aside from the Sage of Six Paths Otsutsuki Hagoromo whom we all know, Kaguya had another son, Otsutsuki Hamura..."
"Because both of Kaguya's sons possessed Chakra within their bodies from the moment they were born, they did not view Chakra as a precious power. Instead, they believed their mother should proactively distribute Chakra to all mortals and guide them to determine their own destinies..."
Black Zetsu was being extremely subtle.
It did not speak too many ill words about the Sage of Six Paths.
After all, the Sage of Six Paths and Emiya Shihara belonged to the same era.
Yet Black Zetsu knew that the words it had just uttered were already enough to plant the seeds of discontent within Emiya Shihara regarding the Sage of Six Paths!
"This..."
Emiya Shihara furrowed his brow once more, seemingly somewhat displeased with the approach proposed by Kaguya's two sons: "To rashly distribute a power capable of harming the world... such a notion is somewhat naive, to say the least..."
"Indeed..."
Black Zetsu nodded in agreement, speaking in a haunting tone: "And now we have witnessed the ultimate outcome of distributing Chakra to the masses..."
"Such a naive idea..."
"Naturally met with Kaguya's rejection."
"Kaguya was more powerful than anyone else in the world, and she had lived longer than anyone else. Her extraordinary insight and vast perspective allowed her to foresee the outcome we see today long before her two sons ever could."
"..."
The Goddess of the Rabbit?
Extraordinary insight, vast perspective?
Could this fellow Black Zetsu possibly be serious?
Emiya Shihara harbored a sliver of suspicion that Black Zetsu was smuggling way too much of its own private agenda into the narrative.
However, Emiya Shihara certainly wasn't going to pull down the stage curtains at a time like this; instead, he even feigned an expression of deep yearning for the Goddess of the Rabbit, Kaguya: "No wonder the people of our era could never bring themselves to forget the God Tree and the Goddess of the Rabbit who tended to it..."
"..."
Black Zetsu was momentarily at a loss for how to respond, so it smoothly picked up the thread of the story: "What a pity that her naive sons could not comprehend their mother's greatness. Revered as she was by the world, Kaguya rarely interacted with others and did not know how to make her two sons obey. In particular, her excessive pampering of them robbed her of much of a mother's stern dignity..."
"Her naive sons came to believe they understood how to rescue the suffering world better than their mother did. Using the power bestowed upon them by her, they stirred up a war of rebellion against their mother..."
"That great calamity that nearly destroyed the world?"
Emiya Shihara's expression shifted abruptly, as though he had recalled something.
In ancient times, humanity had endured a massive catastrophe. Even up until the time Emiya Shihara transmigrated into this world, he could still hear the lingering fear people whispered of that world-destroying disaster.
"Indeed."
"It was a war that nearly destroyed the world."
Black Zetsu nodded, conveniently dumping all the blame squarely onto the shoulders of Otsutsuki Hagoromo and his brother: "The two brothers, now grown, wielded the power within their bodies for the very first time..."
"They had never realized just how terrifying the true outbreak of Chakra's power could be. A single casual strike from them was enough to slaughter countless human beings..."
"It was a genuine catastrophe."
"And that was precisely why Kaguya had never wished for the power of Chakra to spread in the first place."
"Once humanity obtained Chakra, they would inevitably use its power to vie for supremacy and seize interests, bringing nothing but greater suffering upon the world..."
"Kaguya originally had no desire to use force to defeat her sons, but when she saw this world on the verge of being torn apart by battle, and watched the mortals who worshipped her die in the aftermath of their clashes..."
"This was a painful ordeal for Kaguya."
"The mortals whose homes were destroyed, the innocent mortals who perished in the collateral damage of the war, coupled with the fact that those opposing her were her most beloved sons..."
"In the end, the Goddess of the Rabbit's heart softened..."
"As a mother, she finally chose to yield in the midst of war."
Black Zetsu paused for a moment. Watching Emiya Shihara, who was completely absorbed in the story, it nodded with a sense of profound satisfaction before delivering the final conclusion of the tale.
"Ultimately..."
"The war came to an end."
"Kaguya, whose actual strength was far greater, was sealed away by her own sons."
At this point, Black Zetsu once again fabricated an excuse for the Sage of Six Paths brothers, neatly slapping yet another fabricated accusation onto them.
"Because the lifespans of those two brothers were finite, they feared that their mother would take back the distributed Chakra after they died..."
"From that day forth..."
"The Goddess of the Rabbit vanished..."
Monday, time to beg for monthly votes!
In the anime version...
Black Zetsu frequently refers to Kaguya by her name...
When Black Zetsu tells stories to Naruto and Sasuke, it also frequently uses Kaguya's name directly. Basically, it is only when Black Zetsu is communicating with Kaguya face-to-face that it addresses her as mother.