Chapter 57– Orochimaru!

“So, that Kusa-nin really took action.” Anko with three Chūnin entered the forest. For Anko, this place was her home, she could walk around the whole forest with blindfolds on.

At first, they wanted to go to Sasuke’s group’s location thanks to the Hyūga on the team, who had already pinpointed their location. But in the middle of their journey, Anko stumbled and fell from the tree, which was really, really rare.

“Anko-sama.” One of the Chūnin quickly reacted jumping downwards and catching her on time. It was the glasses-wearing Chūnin who had given Chōji a glare earlier.

“Anko-sama, what happened to you?” he asked while tapping her shoulders. It had never happened before so he was quite frantic.

Anko’s body started trembling and her breathing started becoming heavy. With a grunt, she opened her eyes and pushed the Chūnin hard, making him tumble a couple of steps back.

Anko was trying to stand up and fight against this sudden pain but the mark on her shoulder had already activated and working against her. She crouched stabilizing herself with a hand and clawed her left shoulder, making several nail markings. Beads of sweat rolled from her forehead followed by chills running to her spine. She beat her chest a couple of tries trying to relieve some pain.

“Anko-sama, what’s happening?” that Chūnin asked again, worried. He had never seen Anko, this weak before. She was the most hardcore person he had knew, outgoing and friendly to her friends and ruthless to her enemy, never showing her weak face to anyone. It was either her smiling face or her expressionless mask that they would ever see.

The purple poison refinement symbol appeared on the back of her palm then her condition started improving. Anko stood up and took a deep breath in, trying to control her breathing and chakra. After feeling the ‘Curse Seal’ calming down, she released the seal on her hand.

“Damn.” She cursed and spat. From her sleeves, a small white snake came out transforming into a giant snake.

“Anko-sama… I can sense him too.” Midori reported to Anko her head pointing towards a direction. Midori could vaguely sense Orochimaru, the only other contractor of the snake summons.

“Of course, it had to be that bastard.” Anko murmured then jumped to ride on Midori’s head.

She looked back looking at the three Chūnin subordinates then started ordering.

“Glasses, report to Hokage-sama and ANBU about the presence of S-Rank criminal in the forest of death. Tell them to send HORSE and BOAR as soon as possible.”

“Hyūga, with me. Find them and tell me as soon as possible.” She threw the pictures of the Kusa-Genins to the Hyūga in the team.

“Goatee, you will go back to the gates. Get some Chūnin and tighten the security, circle in groups”

“Hai, Anko-sama.” The Chūnins accepted their order and started working on it immediately.

The Hyūga landed on Midori’s head and started scouting. After a long time of scouting, a frown started appearing in his face. “Anko-sama, I can’t find them at all. I have checked all the hidden areas too.”

“Then go to the tower. Ask all the squads on patrol to be vigilant.” Anko bit her lips and contemplated for a while before asking him to leave. His presence will only make things harder for her… and one more life will be lost in his pursuit.

“Anko-sama.” The Hyūga tried to speak up but Anko’s chilly snake-like glare froze him.

“That’s an order,” Anko shouted at the Hyūga, with a little chakra mixed the Hyūga didn’t dare disobey.

“Hai.” He jumped and disappeared towards the tower.

“Bastard…” Anko cursed for a while, rubbing the seal on her shoulder.

“Midori, let’s go,” Anko shouted balling her hands into a fist.

Anko and Midori changed direction several times in the past hours. Due to the presence of ‘Curse Seal’ Anko could also vaguely lock onto him and Midori could point through the snake summoning contract.

While there was only one summoning scroll to the snakes, there were different groups of snakes a summoner could be contracted to. Orochimaru made a contract with the purple snakes whereas Anko made a contract with the white snakes. Usually, the snake summoner would never fight amongst one another because the scroll was passed from one to another, usually in a master-disciple relationship but the case right now was a bit different.

This fight between snake summoner led to in-fighting among snake clans, creating a turmoil among them. The in-fighting became so big that it caused the always dreaming old ancestor of snakes to act and end this small war.

The snake ancestor placed a restriction upon them for calling the snake summons until their enmity was resolved and that was (drumroll) human sacrifice. He also forbade them to cross territories until the enmity was resolved.

While Orochimaru had no qualms about the human sacrifices Anko did. So, she made a special request with the snake ancestor to only call for Midori and no human sacrifice. And the snake ancestor also agreed easily, Anko always felt downcast when she remembered it.

Midori stopped for a while and said, “Anko-sama… Raito killed a purple snake, just now.”

“Hm… he is nearby,” Anko said and started looking everywhere. She had already ignored what Midori had said.

“Up!” Midori screamed and slithered quickly, dodging the attacks of a giant snake. It couldn’t be called attack as it was just falling on the ground.

“Kukuku isn’t this my precious disciple, Anko.” The Kusa-kunoichi rode on the purple snake and smiled, looking at Anko.

“You… Orochimaru! It’s you, I know it. I can never forget you!” Anko gripped her kunai and patted Midori’s head.

“Orochimaru, I need that sacrifice anyway.” With that, the purple snake under him disappeared. Orochimaru looked at Anko with the same small smile.

“Anko-sama…” Midori called.

“I know… don’t worry.” Anko made a half ram seal making Midori disappear in a cloud of chakra smoke.

“Cute disciple, let’s see how much have you learned in these past years.” He stood like a statue, signaling Anko to come.

Taking out small pellets from her coat, Anko threw it towards Orochimaru. Then kunai added with explosive talisman was thrown. The pellets itself were explosives and coming in contact with the explosion talisman made quite an impact. She was ready for the next step, her left foot taking a step forward and right foot ready to push through.

“I am gonna kill you whatever the cost!!” Anko dashed into the fire with palms ready to strike, the symbols brightening up on the back of her palm.

“She is near! Orochimaru is also there. Wait for me! Anko-nee!” Raito finally found them using his ‘Chakra Sense’. As expected from an S-Rank ninja, he was just so fast, already traversing few kilometer.

Raito took out a talisman from his inventory and stuck it on his chest.

[Talisman of Speed]

Type – One-time Consumable.

Effect – Decreases the wind resistance around the user. Hence increasing the overall speed of the user.

Duration – 30 minutes

Upon its activation, Raito felt the invisible wind pushing him disappear.

Lightness Technique. Body Flicker.

Whoosh

“I’m coming, Anko-nee. Please wait for me. I know I can’t beat that Snake-Sannin but I can definitely escape with you.” Raito cried in his heart and sped up, easily crossing all the obstacles.

Orochimaru still had that disgusting smile on his face. His hand caught by Anko which turned into a specific hand seal.

“Tut. Tut. Tut.”

“You want to use ‘Twin Snakes Mutual Death Technique’ on a mere earth clone, how wasteful.” Anko heard Orochimaru call her from behind and froze. The half activated jutsu was immediately stopped as the ‘Orochimaru’ in front of her turned into mud.

With a half ram seal, Orochimaru activated the seal on Anko’s body. “Weaken!”

“Argh!” Anko cried in anguish as chakra went out of control inside her body, causing damage to herself. Not anything serious like broken bones and muscle tearing but just pain, excruciating pain.

Swaying, she tried to maintain her position at least but even that failed under the effects of excruciating pain. She could not control her body nor her chakra. As a result, she fell from the tree branch.

“What a foolish disciple!” Orochimaru smiled then disappeared from the branch appearing next to Anko.

Pushing her to the tree, he coiled around the tree enclosing Anko.

“You have grown weak, my precious disciple.” Orochimaru caught her neck, choking her.

The ‘Curse Seal’ was still activated, weakening her but now she could somewhat withstand the pain. May be Orochimaru had something to say thought Anko.

“Why are you here? What do you want?” Anko had regained some strength and while she was still unable to use her chakra nor move her body, she had enough strength to talk.

“Still stupidly loyal to that old fool, huh?” He pressured her neck with a little bit of force, making her cry out in pain then released her, crash on the ground.

Orochimaru turned to a direction and smiled, “Somewhat familiar…”

Turning around, he looked back at Anko and said, “I have my eyes on a boy… very useful for me… in the future.”

“Don’t stop this exam or I will create havoc in this pitiful leaf village.” Orochimaru released Anko, letting her fall on the ground.

Raito who was just a few hundred meters away took out a few items from his inventory.

“My mission is to escape with Anko-nee. Not to fight with Orochimaru.” Taking a deep breath, Raito disappeared in thin air. People must know now what he used.

Orochimaru turned to the previous direction with a somewhat surprised expression. His smile deepened as he swept the area, “That chakra really disappeared.”

“You want to destroy Konoha?” Anko grasped her neck and asked after controlling her breathing.

“Destroy Konoha? Hm… I don’t have that much power but…” Orochimaru looked at Anko with even a bigger smile on his face.

“But I want that boy…”

“Which boy are you talking about?”

“Take a guess… my precious disciple. Think…and use your barbarian brain… Kukuku.”

“… No way. Uchiha?” While Anko didn’t care for Sasuke, the village needed him to show-off to the Daimyō. The only odd thing from Konoha this year was the forceful presentation on Uchiha Sasuke in the Chūnin exams. She heard Hokage himself that several Daimyō wanted to once again see Uchiha in action, good or bad.

“Remember my words, don’t cancel this Chūnin exam.” Orochimaru felt good as he looked at Anko.

“I gave him a gift just like I did to you.” Anko’s face paled and she gritted her teeth in anger.

“You want to kill him?” Anko shouted, pressing her hands on the cursed seal. She looked at Anko with deep hatred and a growl coming from deep within her.

“Evil Suppression Seal. Just a useless seal, nothing more.” Orochimaru’s hand glowed with pale bluish chakra with inscription forming on his palms. “Let me remove that useless seal and-”

She took out a kunai from her pocket, aiming at her heart. “I would rather kill myself.”

“Kukuku… I loved that about you, my precious disciple…” Orochimaru stopped then looked behind Anko. From his perspective, it looked like someone was using Genjutsu to conceal himself and was performing a long chain of hand seals. What he found ridiculous was that he couldn’t sense whoever was hiding behind Anko and how he got there

“No, you don’t!” Orochimaru raised his other hand from where snakes came out targeting Anko and the person behind her.

“Hiden Technique - Earth Needle Forest”

Raito’s hand slammed to the ground, making earth below tremble. Earth needles formed from below threatening to make everyone in its range a pin cushion. Within seconds the snakes from Orochimaru’s hand were shredded into tiny pieces and were continuing forward.

Orochimaru stepped on the needle and jumped high into the air and hovered using ‘Earth Release: Light-Weight Rock Technique’ to keep himself afloat and looked below at the wonderful scenery of destruction.

Looking down, he saw a sea of needles, made up of earth with range of around three hundred meters and in the middle, there was a bud-like rock, covered in black and shiny rocks.

“I can’t sense Anko anymore.” Orochimaru looked at the bud-like rock and appeared in front of it.

“Nothing inside this chamber.” Orochimaru came to a conclusion. After a final look, he disappeared from the area.

Inside the dungeon, Anko and Raito laid on the grass.

“He is very much real,” Raito spoke up.

“Definitely real.” Anko nodded then stood up. She raised her hand above her brows and looked at the sea of needles.

“You did this?” Anko asked again patting Raito’s head.

“Of course I did,” Raito answered smugly then looked at her shoulder, changing his expression into serious mode in an instant, “Anko-nee, Orochimaru is really powerful. You couldn’t stand a minute against him if he was serious, right?”

“Sorry, I am no match against one of the Sannin and my former master, who taught me everything.” Anko replied sarcastically and at the same time massaging her shoulders.

“That thing needs to go.” Raito pointed at the cursed mark and said seriously. With the help of gamer powers, he had already completed the seal-work needed for the completion of the ‘Evil Suppression Seal’. The only thing left to do was join the seal work with Anko and her cursed seal.

“Then shall we call another Sannin, Jiraiya-sama and even call Hokage-sama to do help us? Just because I can’t-” Anko asked even more sarcastic than before.

“Anko-nee, I can do it.” Raito took out a Fuinjutsu set with a big scroll. His eyes had an odd shine to it, showing eagerness to do it.

“…”

“Anko-nee?” Raito probed the silent Anko.

“… Hah! Raito it’s not like I am not believing you but it is a very, very, very complex seal-work.” Anko gestured with her hands.

“Will you even have enough chakra for it? Last time it was Jiraiya-sama and Hokage-sama, combined, who used all their chakra and sealed it with difficulty and even, they could only do it partially.”

“I already made all the seal for it. You just have to sit and… withstand some pain.” Raito tried to voice out his own part but it didn’t seem to have much effect.

“… Are you for real?” Anko looked at the big scroll Raito held and questioned. She really felt disbelief, just pure disbelief.

“Of course I can. Even Jichan gave me a secret scroll to research, telling me that it was absolutely a very, very important Fuinjutsu.” There was a big smile on Raito’s face. Even his nose was pointed high towards the sky, aiming to poke a hole.

“Well… Midori what do you say? Should we believe in this foolish little brother?” Midori poked her head out of Anko’s jacket and looked at Raito.

Then there was a long silence. Raito waited for anyone of them to say anything, anything at all. He just couldn’t withstand the silence by his close person right now whereas Anko and Midori were communicating on their head, how to reject Raito as gently as possible.

“Ah! Shit! I have to inform Hokage-sama about Orochimaru.” Anko hurriedly stood up and slapped her head.

“And that Uchiha guy is in danger. Damn, I am not going to become the proctor next time. It’s just too troublesome.” Anko spat and lamented.

Raito nodded his head, agreeing to her thought. It was better not to be the proctor or whatever in this exam.

Hearing about Sasuke, Raito looked at Anko, who was rubbing her hair in distress and said out loud, “Right, right… Oh! How could I forget to tell you? Anko-nee, Sasuke also has that cursed seal on him.”

“What!?” Anko glared at Raito and shouted, “And you are telling me just now?”

“Why are you shouting? He will just have to get that seal-”

“Stupid…” Anko bit her lips, contemplated for a while before finally deciding to say it, “Even if he wants to have the seal, he can only do it after he survives that hell.”

After a small silence, Anko added one sentence, “Only one in hundred people will survive under this cursed mark.”

“…Say what?” Thinking about a hundred people dying made Raito pale for a moment, a shiver running down his spine.

“One in hundred will live and everyone else will…just die. Sometime even thousands will not survive.”

Simply thinking about it, beads of sweat rolled down Raito’s forehead but then a blue icy line passes Raito eye calming him down.

“… So what? If I try to interfere in whatever the process that is… he will die. And I don’t want to kill an important ‘asset’ of the village.” Raito replied after some contemplation. He just said what he had gotten from ‘Observe’.

“He only has himself.” Raito shrugged taking out a sandwich and eating it in front of Anko.

“Plus he is an Uchiha, Uchiha genes or whatever should be able to help him… to not die. Don’t you think?” Raito said in a bored tone. Clearly, he was fed up with Sasuke.

Anko sighed hearing Raito speak. She looked at Raito and had a small smile on her face, “Let’s do it like this. If you can seal his cursed seal then I will also try it out.”

“Deal, we have a deal.” Raito slapped her hand hurriedly, sealing the deal. It was like he didn’t even care about Sasuke, who was going to be his guinea pig.

“If you go back on your words I will burn all your plush toys.” Raito threatened with a smile.

“I never go back on my words, if I ever did then I will burn all your games and books.” She threatened back. Threatening on your face!!

“…”

“Now let’s go back. I have to report back to Hokage-sama.” Anko pulled his arm and punched the air.

“… Anko-nee before that I want a jutsu from your library.” Raito asked after a while.

“Which one?” Anko asked rubbing Midori’s head.

“Medical.” Raito didn’t hesitate. He must fill his holes as soon as possible.

“Okay.” She tapped at Midori’s head making her spit out an extra-small size scroll.

Raito looked at the scroll which returned to its normal size.

Anko opened the scroll letting Raito choose. Raito looked at the column of jutsu names and quickly he found what he was looking for. ‘Bone Mending Jutsu’

“This one.” Raito pointed while Anko looked at him.

Anko traced her chakra over the jutsu name from where another scroll popped out.

“Here you go.” She threw the scroll towards Raito then sealed the scroll back. With everything clear, her next job was to alert Hokage and others of Orochimaru.

[You have got the ‘Bone Mending technique’ scroll. Would you like to learn it?]

[Would you like to fuse the ‘Bone Mending technique’ with ‘Heal’?]

Raito closed all the pop-ups with his thought.

“Then I will go back.” Raito hummed a tune, turning away.

Anko grabbed Raito’s hand pulling him back. She had a serious face as she ordered, “Even if you have to pull him through or have to throw him to the doors of the tower, you must make sure that he passes.”

Raito looked dumbfounded at Anko then pulled his hand back, “Are you serious?”

Anko nodded and explained, “Not only Daimyō wants it, but even Orochimaru wants it now. The whole village needs it right now.”

“What if he doesn’t pass?” Raito asked.

“… Then everyone will have to pay the price. Orochimaru will cause trouble and many Daimyō will be disappointed.” Anko answered him and sighed. “If it was anytime else, I won’t have care shit… but it is Orochimaru. He is dangerous, very dangerous. Even Kakashi’s chances are less than 30% of killing him. Combined Gai and Kakashi they have… (Sigh).”

“… (Gulp) What the hell?” Raito punched a tree in frustration then continued doing so until the tree fell down.

“Then what will happen if…” Raito mumbled but didn’t complete it. Dark thoughts swirling in his mind.

Calming down, he caught Anko’s hand then exited from the dungeon.

“How bad is the situation? Want my help?” Anko asked. She had a lot to do, from reporting to Hokage to plan further. There was much to be done. And if she was seen helping a team, then the situation may turn for worse.

“Not that bad. I can handle it.” Raito nodded then took a bento box to Anko.

“What is it today?” Anko looked at the box excitedly then at Raito. His bento boxes always held surprises and the food was too good to be true.

The mood had turned for good as Raito brought out couple of different varieties of food. Of course, her favorite choice was dango. So, before leaving, she took a small basket of dango and happily left for the tower in the center. Hiruzen and most of the important members must have arrived at the tower is what she guessed.

“Raito!! Raito!!” Shouts came calling for Raito.

Naruto was feeling really unwell remembering Raito’s face leaving the area. So he created a clone army and went searching for him.

Raito looked dumbfounded at the Naruto clones and sucked in a deep breath.

Jealousy, intense jealousy.

Raito felt depressed thinking about his own shadow clone technique then looking at Naruto’s clone, the depression was multiplied by a hundred fold. It was just like looking at your crush talking with a handsome dude in the class. It was just a one-sided crush dude…

Stomping the ground, Raito dashed towards the original and caught him. Hooking his arm around Naruto’s neck, Raito rubbed Naruto’s hair intensely.

“I can compensate with quality alright.” Raito sniffled.

“Did ya find what you were looking for, Raito?” Naruto asked in concern.

“I did.” Raito nodded then turned to face Naruto. “We need to help Sasuke’s group pass.”

“…Why?” Naruto frowned for a second then smiled happily.

“Anko-nee said so,” Raito answered simply.

Naruto froze and his smile stiffened. Punching the air he shouted loudly, “Then we must do it, definitely!”

The clones started disappearing and Raito and Naruto started going back.

Dragging Naruto to dungeon Raito immediately learned the ‘Bone Mending Technique’ then added it to the ‘Heal’

There was not much difference as compared to before but there was now an additional line to ‘Connect Bones’ which was different from ‘Mend Bones’. If it was ‘Mend’, it would have meant that it would be completely healed but because it was just ‘Connect’, which meant that the bones will be joined by a callus.

Raito ignored the CP cost increase by 100 points because it was already 500 before. ‘What difference would it make?’ thought Raito.

“Hush.” Raito stopped a few hundred meters where Hinata and Team 8 were.

Seeing his serious face, Naruto looked at the direction but with his poor view, he couldn’t see anything.

Raito pointed towards their direction and faced Naruto, “There are shinobi from Otogakure, hiding in the bushes. What do you think we should do?”

“Let’s beat them.” Naruto punched his palm, ready to fight.