"The history you're watching is a lie," the boy whispered, his voice a glitchy rasp. "In my timeline, the seventh never woke up. And the thing that killed him just followed me through your signal."
The glowing blue link on the forum was titled "Boruto: Naruto Next Generations - Unreleased Director’s Cut."
The figure that stepped out of the monitor wasn't the heroic Boruto from the posters. This version was older, his cloak tattered, his right eye a milky, terrifying white. He looked around the cramped apartment with a thousand-yard stare, his sword dripping with a pixelated, glowing ink.
Behind the boy, the laptop screen turned deep, abyssal black. A massive, pale eye opened in the center of the desktop.