Birth and Death

Naruto tries to step outside the shell of Sasuke's Susanoo, but Sasuke stops him, warning that the light of the Infinite Tsukuyomi would snare him too. From afar, Minato watches Konoha and the other great villages fall under the same spell, while Tobirama fails to wrench any shinobi loose from the roots of the God Tree. Black Zetsu notes how the barrier keeps out the moonlight. Both Sakura and Kakashi try to ask what is happening beyond it, and each is cut off, until Sasuke lays it plain: as long as that glow endures, resistance is meaningless, and the group is likely alone in staying awake.

To pass the time, Sasuke revisits the memories Itachi pressed into him when the reincarnation jutsu released his brother. In them, a boy Itachi meets the cruelty of war firsthand, handing water to a wounded Iwa shinobi who then turns on him, forcing Itachi to cut the man down and ask his father what such fighting means. Fugaku answers with the hard truth of conflict. Later scenes show the Uchiha whispering about Kakashi's stolen Sharingan at a memorial, and a young Itachi trading quiet words with Orochimaru about life and death.

The flashback follows Itachi as he leaps from a cliff, spots a crow, and slows his fall with kunai to befriend the birds, then hears from Mikoto that a sibling is on the way. Sasuke is born, and Itachi trades play with other children for shuriken drills, deflecting the stones they throw with one of their own, before a night watching over his infant brother leaves him uneasy at an ominous wind. The episode adapts chapters 677 and 678, carries a handful of animation errors, and first aired in Japan on 3 March 2016.