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NEW Naruto SEQUEL Manga by Masashi Kishimoto Officially Announced

This could be the biggest manga news of 2026 as the Naruto author returns to illustrate and write a Naruto sequel after 12 years.

NARUTO © 1999-2014 by Masashi Kishimoto/SHUEISHA Inc.

On October 10, 2026, during the “Naruto What’s Next?” event in New York Comic Con, at the very last moment, we get the trailer for a new manga by author Masashi Kishimoto.

After 12 years, Masashi Kishimoto returns to write a sequel to the Naruto series, serving as a bridge between his original manga and the Boruto manga written by his assistant Mikio Ikemoto.

Titled, “Shadow Rising”, this manga takes place immediately after Chapter 699: “The Seal of Reconciliation” of the original manga.

The title suggests that the manga will cover Naruto’s rise to becoming Hokage, as Kage means “shadow”.

Preview Images

In the trailer, we see Kishimoto’s sketches of what will take place during the new work.

We see Kakashi and Sarada giving birth to her and Sasuke’s daughter, Sarada.

Most notably, we see Naruto and Sasuke clash in their adult selves.

Not the First Kishimoto-led Sequel

This is not the first time Kishimoto has returned to make Naruto material.

As part of the Naruto Project to celebrate the manga’s 15th anniversary from 2014 to 2015, Kishimoto wrote the miniseries “Naruto Gaiden: The Seventh Hokage and the Scarlet Spring”, which was serialised from April 27 to July 6, 2015 for a total of 10 chapters or a single volume of content.

This covers Sarada Uchiha going on a mission with the Seventh Hokage Naruto Uzumaki, forming her dream to become Hokage, and later meeting her father Sasuke Uchiha for the first time

It received an anime adaption called the “Sarada Uchiha Arc” as part of the Boruto: Naruto Next Generations anime, which covers episodes 19 to 24, before the first arc, the anime-original “Academy Entrance Arc”.

Furthermore on July 18, 2023, a spin-off prequel one-shot (totalling 55 pages) was written and illustrated by Kishimoto titled “Naruto Gaiden: Whirlwind in the Vortex”, featuring Minato Namikaze, who was the winner of the NARUTOP99 poll out of 488 characters from the original series, with 792,257 votes.

Taking place before Minato marrying Kushina or becoming Hokage, this covered the origin of the Rasengan as Minato, from witnessing the Tailed Beast Ball for the first time in his encounter with both Roshi and Han, the Hidden Stone’s Jinchuriki for the Four and Five Tails respectively to Minato inventing the Rasengan to help seal away the Nine Tailed Fox inside Kushina.

The Real Fight?

Another preview shows an adult Naruto and Sasuke clashing, as shown with Naruto’s outfit resembling the one he wore from the Last: Naruto the Movie at age 19 while Sasuke’s is from when he left the Leaf Village in Chapter 699.

Their clash perfectly mimics every initial clash they made throughout all of their fights, from the first Final Valley fight to the one under Samurai Bridge and to the final battle in the original manga.

We could be seeing the real peak of Naruto and Sasuke’s powers, fulfilling a fantasy left unfulfilled in the wake of the Boruto manga’s disappointing approach to its legacy characters.

Length?

While there is no word on the length of this particular story, given the amount of events taking place, this will likely not be a one-shot.

However, the previous sequel works were a shorter length, with the Sarada one-shot being ten chapters with a total of 216 pages.

For a more hopeful prediction, it is also possible it will follow the example of Jujutsu Kaisen: Modulo, which serialized for six months from September 8, 2025 to March 9, 2026 for a total of 25 chapters.

This would see the return of the Big Three of Shonen Jump after 12 years since the end of Naruto and 10 years since the end of Bleach, as Tite Kubo also plans to return with the Bleach: Hell Arc.

Some fans remark that the return of Kishimoto and Kubo to Weekly Shonen Jump could be a Hail Mary to bring back the magazine’s popularity back with this year’s decrease in magazine sales.

Source: Twitter

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