Chapter 110: The Nine-Tailed Pig
Black Zetsu slithered through the damp, root-choked earth far beneath the bustling streets of Konoha, his shadowy form blending smoothly into the subterranean darkness. He was searching everywhere for a single, viable thread of information.
He had infiltrated the Hidden Leaf Village countless times over the decades. He knew the layout of its underground pipes and hidden bunkers better than the Hokage himself. Yet, after scouring every conceivable restricted archive and hidden compound, he still found absolutely zero clues regarding the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan.
A dark, boiling frustration roiled within his inky mass. If he possessed the raw power, Black Zetsu would have gladly wiped Konoha off the map in a single cataclysmic strike just to spare himself this endless headache.
Was his only option to wait in the shadows until Ida Mutzuki simply withered away and died of old age?
No, don't panic, he chided himself, forcing his amorphous form to stabilize. Konoha still has the massive Uchiha Clan.
The current head of the Uchiha, Uchiha Kagami, possessed the Mangekyo Sharingan. And who did Kagami care about more than anyone else in the world? Ida Mutzuki. As long as Black Zetsu could get his hands on Mutzuki...
He paused, a metaphorical vein throbbing in his head. Right. He couldn't handle Mutzuki. To make matters worse, ever since he had absorbed the residual memories from Uchiha Setsuna's corpse, Mutzuki had been on high alert against his presence.
Why did Mutzuki have to be the most important person in Kagami's heart? Couldn't the clan head obsess over a pet dog or a shiny sword instead?
Black Zetsu found himself trapped in a maddening, vicious cycle. He considered grooming other promising Uchiha talents, but they already had a ready-made Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan sitting right there, not to mention a certain Fengye running around wielding Wood Release. Just one step further, and the Rinnegan could be within his grasp. The thought of abandoning all this progress to start training a new pawn from scratch made him physically ill.
He forced his shadowy mass to cool down against the subterranean rocks. He had lived for a millennium; this was merely a temporary roadblock. There had to be another angle.
Shifting his trajectory, he glided toward the highly classified cavern where the Nine-Tails was sealed. If he couldn't manipulate the Uchiha right now, perhaps unsealing the ultimate Tailed Beast could deliver a devastating, chaotic blow to Konoha.
He phased his eyes through the thick stone floor of the sealing chamber, peering into the massive cage. The sight that greeted him nearly caused his shadowy form to dissipate from sheer shock.
What in the world is that?
Lying in the center of the grand seal was a gigantic, perfectly round ball of orange fur. It was so impossibly fat that Black Zetsu had to squint just to locate its head buried beneath folds of thick, plush blubber. Was this the legendary Nine-Tails?
If one didn't know the terrifying lore of the demon fox, they would assume they were looking at a Nine-Tailed Pig.
At that exact moment, the great beast was taking a mid-day nap. It smacked its massive lips, drool pooling on the floor, clearly deep in a pleasant dream. Its nine chubby, sausage-like tails swished lazily through the air.
"Ida Mutzuki..." the beast mumbled in its sleep, its booming voice muffled by its own fat. "Stop always feeding me chicken... I'm a Tailed Beast, not a normal fox... I want dumplings. I want cake. I want grilled fish... Do you hear me?"
One of its fiery red, overly plump tails lazily slammed against the sealing barrier, causing the thin, glowing runes to ripple as if they were about to shatter. Yet, the Nine-Tails didn't even open its eyes. It simply rolled over—a monumental effort that shook the cavern—and continued snoring, occasionally muttering, "Delicious... so delicious..."
Black Zetsu stared in absolute silence.
This... this is the Nine-Tails? Where is its dignity as an apocalyptic force of nature?
After hesitating for a grand total of three seconds, Black Zetsu decisively abandoned his sabotage plan. Mutzuki's current trump card could obliterate four Kage in a single breath. If she unleashed that power here, this obese, domesticated furball would only get beaten into a bloody pulp. It had clearly been pampered and fed to the point of absolute docility.
He needed to find more reliable allies.
Refusing to risk getting anywhere near Mutzuki's sensory range, Black Zetsu altered his route and infiltrated Konoha's primary research and development sector. The laboratories belonging to Mutzuki and Senju Tobirama had recently been made public, drawing his suspicion.
Unfortunately, as he phased through the filing cabinets and read the blueprints, he found nothing of value. There were no forbidden techniques, no Hashirama cell cultivation, and no artificial human cloning projects. It was all just... mundane scientific research aimed at improving civilian infrastructure and agriculture.
Black Zetsu was so desperately stressed about finding a pair of suitable eyes that he felt his hair would have fallen out—if he had any hair to begin with.
He realized he had been far too impatient lately, losing the cold, calculating composure that had kept him alive for centuries. Ever since the Warring States Period, when that lunatic claiming to be the Chakra Ancestor from ten thousand years ago appeared in the sky, the entire timeline had gone completely off the rails. Nothing was going smoothly anymore.
This frantic state of mind was a liability. He had to calm down and dismantle Konoha step by step.
Right, he schemed, his yellow eyes narrowing in the dark. First, I'll leak the classified medical reports regarding Mutzuki's failing health to the other major shinobi nations.
The surrounding countries had been brutally suppressed by Mutzuki's overwhelming might, forced to watch helplessly as Konoha grew wealthier and stronger by the day. Their greatest collective desire was for Mutzuki to drop dead. If they caught wind of her physical weakness, they would undoubtedly mobilize their hidden forces to test the waters.
It was always easier to fish in troubled waters.
, the Daimyo couldn't be left out of this equation. The Daimyo of the Land of Fire had been hiding away in the capital, living a life of idle luxury while the shinobi handled the borders. But Black Zetsu knew human greed. He refused to believe the Daimyo would obediently remain a powerless figurehead forever. The Land of Fire's nobility secretly hoarded private armies of rogue shinobi with considerable strength.
If the Daimyo learned that Mutzuki had a fatal weakness, he would absolutely fund an assassination attempt to reclaim total political control.
Later that night, Black Zetsu slipped into the Hokage's Office. Bypassing the sensory barriers, he carefully unsealed a highly classified scroll wrapped in multiple layers of restrictive jutsu. As he read the contents, his ancient brain stalled.
Shinobi from a Parallel Dimension?
Could there truly be countless parallel dimensions branching off from this world? Had the other versions of himself in those alternate realities already managed to rescue Mother?
Shaking off the existential dread, he quickly flipped through the attached documents. The network of connections surrounding this anomaly—a woman named Uchiha Kou—immediately became clear.
It was a surprisingly simple social web. Her former Genin teammates were Jiraiya, Orochimaru, and Tsunade. Her Anbu subordinate was Sakumo Hatake, and she maintained a close friendship with an Anbu operative named Tsukiki.
According to the psychological profiles, she was closest to Jiraiya. That was a glaring vulnerability just waiting to be exploited.
Black Zetsu melted back into the floorboards, vanishing silently from the office. His new target was set. He would start with the shinobi from this parallel dimension.
"Hey, Tsunade, come look at this! Notice anything special about my arm today? No? How could you miss it? Look at the size of this wrist guard! Haha! Kou gave this to me. You don't have one, do you?"
Under the bright afternoon sun of the training grounds, Jiraiya was parading around like a peacock in mating season.
"Orochimaru, my good buddy, tell me—is this thing I just casually dropped a gold wrist guard, a silver wrist guard, or the custom-made wrist guard Kou gave me?"
Ever since receiving the gift from Kou, Jiraiya seemed to have unlocked some obnoxious new mode of existence. The briefly steady, quiet young man had completely vanished, replaced once again by his old, boisterous, loud-mouthed self. He took every possible opportunity to shove his wrist guard into the faces of his teammates.
With his confidence restored, his notorious peeping activities had also been put back on the official agenda. Kou had already caught him scaling the bathhouse wall once this week. Old habits truly died hard.
Tsunade and Orochimaru stood side-by-side, staring at him with matching expressions of absolute, unfiltered disgust.
After a recent, traumatic incident, Jiraiya had changed rapidly, looking constantly preoccupied and introverted. He had spent all his free time reading in the library, and his speech had even become polite and refined—a shift that had been downright terrifying for everyone who knew him.
Initially, they were relieved that he had returned to normal. But dealing with his current level of noise, they were rapidly beginning to regret that relief.
"While I admit he looks slightly less creepy when he's not quoting poetry, he's really asking for a beating right now," Tsunade muttered, her knuckles popping loudly as she clenched her fists. "Can I go punch him?"
"A highly logical proposition," Orochimaru replied, his voice taking on that familiar, hoarse rasp. "How about I assist you by binding his legs? If we coordinate our strikes, he won't stand a chance of escaping."
When a subject caught Orochimaru's interest, he had a habit of slowly licking the corner of his mouth. The subtle gesture already carried the chilling undertones of the mad scientist he was destined to become.
Standing a few paces away, Kou awkwardly waved her single hand, trying to defuse the rising killing intent.
"Please don't murder him. I think Jiraiya is much better off being lively," Kou reasoned with a nervous smile. "As for the gifts, that was my oversight. I didn't think it through. Next time, I'll make sure to get something for both of you to make up for it. Since I have a rare day off tomorrow, how about I treat you all to barbecue as an apology?"
"Really?" Tsunade's dark aura vanished instantly, replaced by a radiant grin. She stepped forward and casually hooked her arm around Kou's neck, pulling her close. "You're in trouble now, Kou. I'm ordering the most expensive cuts of beef on the menu, hehe."
Kou chuckled, leaning into the embrace. Who could possibly resist such a sweet, energetic girl?
Looking at Kou's relaxed, smiling face, Tsunade had to silently hand it to Jiraiya. The idiot had somehow managed to drag this deeply traumatized, odd woman back into the world of normalcy. It was genuinely impressive. After hitting so many emotional walls trying to help Kou herself, Tsunade had almost lost her motivation. It seemed that noisy people really did have noisy solutions.
Jiraiya, lacking any sense of self-preservation, chimed in again. "Hey, after we stuff ourselves with barbecue, want to go hit the hot springs? My treat!"
It was a perfectly normal suggestion for teammates to unwind, but coming from Jiraiya, it sounded incredibly suspicious. This was especially true because, right after suggesting it, his cheeks flushed red and he flashed a deeply creepy, perverted grin.
Tsunade's patience snapped. She crossed the distance in a blur of motion and delivered a devastating right hook to Jiraiya's jaw, sending him flying across the training field like a skipped stone.
Kou winced as a cloud of dust erupted where Jiraiya crash-landed. Couldn't the man tone it down for even five minutes? Being so blatantly unrestrained was a guaranteed way to fail at winning Tsunade's heart.
Sighing, Kou walked over, hauled the groaning Jiraiya out of his personal crater, and activated her Medical Ninjutsu. A soft green glow enveloped her hand as she began treating his scraped face and bruised jaw.
Jiraiya visibly melted under her gentle care. Then, completely ignoring the fact that the person who punched him was standing right there, he started complaining.
"Look at Kou, and then look at yourself, Tsunade," he grumbled, pointing an accusing finger. "You're like a female tyrant! Seriously. You're so rough and violent, you'd better be careful, or absolutely no one is going to want to marry you."
Could you just shut up? Kou screamed internally.
A suffocating, dark aura exploded from Tsunade. Her hair seemed to float around her face, and her eyes promised nothing short of total annihilation.
Kou and Orochimaru exchanged a rapid glance, both seeing the exact same primal fear reflected in each other's eyes. Jiraiya truly was a master at dancing on active landmines.
Without a single word exchanged, Kou and Orochimaru simultaneously formed the hand seal for the Body Flicker Technique. They vanished from the clearing in a swirl of leaves, absolutely terrified of being caught in the impending crossfire.
Three seconds later, the agonizing, high-pitched screams of Jiraiya getting beaten to a bloody pulp echoed across the training grounds.
"Really, does that idiot possess negative emotional intelligence? That is absolutely not how you chase a girl," Kou complained bitterly as she reappeared on a quiet rooftop a safe distance away.
Orochimaru materialized beside her. He held little to no interest in trivial topics like romance or emotions. He simply stood calmly at the edge of the eaves, the wind tugging at his dark hair, offering no response to her critique.
A moment later, his golden, snake-like gaze drifted downward, sweeping over the empty space beneath Kou's cloak where her right arm should have been. When he spoke, his low voice carried the unique, intense obsession of a dedicated researcher.
"The laboratory's progress is proceeding smoothly," Orochimaru noted, his eyes gleaming. "The electrical appliances you conceptualized will gradually begin appearing in Konoha's markets soon. Although our current metallurgical craftsmanship is still far from what is required to construct a fully functional mechanical arm, we have made significant headway regarding the theoretical neural-link knowledge."
Kou blinked, slightly taken aback by the sudden shift in topic, before a warm smile touched her lips. "Don't worry about rushing it. Once the experiment succeeds, I'll gladly let you custom-make an arm for me."
"Then I shall thank you in advance for the opportunity, Kou."
Orochimaru at this stage in his life, Kou realized, was a remarkably reliable and supportive companion.
After officially parting ways with the remaining two members of her team, Kou turned and began the leisurely walk back to her apartment.
Along the way, she ran into several of her neighbors. Because Kou made a habit of helping the locals with heavy lifting and minor repairs, they all greeted her with genuine warmth.
"Welcome back, Kou!" an elderly shopkeeper called out.
"You look full of energy today, Kou! You must have just finished up a really tough mission, right?" a passing merchant laughed.
"I'm frying up some tempura chicken tonight! Make sure you stop by for a plate, Kou!" a motherly woman yelled from her window.
Kou smiled brightly, waving and returning their greetings one by one. She felt a rare sense of peace settling over her as her foot finally touched the wooden doorstep of her home.
SCREEECH!
High in the distant, orange-tinted sky, a Ninja Hawk circled aggressively, emitting a series of sharp, rhythmic cries.
It was the Anbu emergency assembly signal.
Kou froze on her doorstep. She slowly looked up at the circling bird, let out a long, soul-weary sigh, and turned her back on her front door, redirecting her steps toward the Anbu headquarters.
Anbu shinobi truly were nothing more than glorified workhorses. There was always another black-ops mission, no matter the time of day or night. It was no wonder Sakumo Hatake, serving as the Anbu Captain, constantly looked like he was on the verge of collapsing from sheer exhaustion. He was purely enslaved by this miserable, workhorse lifestyle, and now, it seemed she was too.
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