Time Braid Q & A

Responses to some of the questions I've seen in reviews:

Q: If even chakra reinforcement cannot help against lave heat, how can Sakura hold her lava weapons?
A: She’s using a heat-resistance technique, the one she "burned her arms off a few times" developing. Of course, even if she only makes her hands resistant this is still a major chakra drain.

Q: Will your Naruto soon awaken the Rinnegan?
A: I plotted this story out not long after the Pein Invasion Arc, so major plot twists that were introduced after that in cannon probably won’t be included. Besides, looping!Naruto really doesn’t need any more powerups.

Q: How does this new body / flesh clone thing work?
A: Just like the first one. It’s a perfectly normal, completely real human body, just like the original.

Q: Ok, but what does that do to her mind / chakra / training / etc?
A: Essentially Sakura splits her soul in half and gives each piece a body. Her aspects share chakra, they can trade memories without merging, and there’s no particular limit on how long they can stay split.

Q: Wait, splitting her soul? That sounds really, really, insanely dangerous.
A: That’s why it’s a bloodline ability, and people like the Yamanaka can’t duplicate it. When Sakura splits her aspects still share a psychic connection, and she can merge and re-split at will. But yes, there’s clearly a risk of damaging her own mind if she’s careless about it, and the wrong kind of damage could make her too crazy to fix herself.

Q: How many copies can she make?
A: She can only split herself into two aspects at a time, so that’s how many bodies she can inhabit. She could make extra bodies at a rate of several per day, but since they’re mindless and won’t live long without the kind of care you’d give a comatose person there isn’t much point.

Q: I’m confused about how the loops work.
A: So is Sakura. So far she’s discovered three things that cause her to reset: her own death, Konoha getting devastated in the invasion, and anything that prevents her from getting promoted during the chuunin exam. So she was able to get a long loop by avoiding the first two triggers, but she’s pretty sure dying will still cause a reset.

Q: Will we see looping!Sasuke and looping!Hinata again?
A: Definitely. They both have major parts to play before we reach the end of the story.

Q: Is anyone else going to loop?
A: Since we’re halfway through the story now, the odds of another major character being introduced are low.