Riiing, riiing, riiing!
The shrill class bell rang through the Ninja Academy. The little "radishes" who'd been fooling around in every corner of the room dragged themselves back to their seats, faces full of reluctance.
Naruto lowered his head and stuffed an entire box of strawberry heart cookies into his mouth in a single furious burst. Then, with the practiced ease of a veteran, he fished out the love letter hidden inside, now smeared with crumbs and frosting, and tossed it into the plastic bag tucked in his desk.
This was one of those "brilliant" tricks Konome Taketori's admirers had come up with.
Once they realized she only accepted food and never accepted confessions, they started getting sneaky, stuffing letter after letter into snack boxes.
Which made life miserable for Naruto, who liked chewing with big bites.
Every time he helped Konome clean up her mountain of snacks, he had to be painfully careful. Those people didn't just hide letters in the food. Sometimes they hid little gifts and toys too.
Like…
Pfft.
Naruto puffed out his cheeks and spat a tiny kunai onto the desk.
The thing was only as long as his pinky, yet it still clinked against the wood with a very real metallic ring. He had no idea which genius thought this was a good idea.
Even if Konome was a training maniac, who gives a kunai as a gift?
Naruto turned his head toward her.
Konome Taketori was bent over a massive tome, flipping pages with calm focus. Every so often she'd tap her pen against a scratch sheet and jot down symbols he couldn't make sense of.
She'd been like this for days, supposedly studying curse marks.
So what happened to "I'm blind so I can't see words, you have to help me copy notes"?
Hah. I got scammed.
Naruto converted his grief into appetite, quietly cracking open another snack box under the desk.
Rustle.
Academy Konome flipped through the introductory texts on curse marks and sealing techniques she'd borrowed from Hiruzen Sarutobi.
To ease the pressure brought by the Dead Bone Pulse, her Yang Release clone had gone into Root to seek Hashirama's cells. Meanwhile, she was hunting for another path.
If she carved a powerful sealing technique into the Dead Bone itself, in the form of a mantra, could she temporarily suppress the bone's devouring nature and buy her Yang Release clone more time?
Her fingertips pressed lightly to the page as she searched line by line for a breakthrough.
The bell's ringing softened and faded.
The "little strong ones" snapped into their seats. Iruka walked in with a textbook under his arm, rapped the blackboard with his pointer, and the last buzzing chatter died out.
"Today's lesson is Shinobi History. Turn to page forty three. We'll cover the beginning of the First Shinobi World War."
Chalk scratched across the board as Iruka sketched and wrote, narrating that dull stretch of history.
"Two years after the Battle of the Valley of the End, the First Hokage, Senju Hashirama, passed away. In March of that same year, the Second Hokage, Senju Tobirama, inherited the title. Kumogakure and Konoha…"
Iruka's sleep-inducing voice rolled on as usual. Konome kept her head down and continued teaching herself curse marks, as if she hadn't heard a thing.
At the same time.
Experimental Division, Underground Base No. 3.
A Sage Body could have Bloodline Disease too?
Konome's eyebrow lifted when she heard Chihaya Tōru say it.
The Bloodline Disease caused by her Dead Bone Pulse evolution already had her drowning. She'd infiltrated Root specifically to find Hashirama's cells as a cure.
But now, from Chihaya Tōru's tone, it sounded like Hashirama's cells carried their own problem.
"Bloodline Disease, as the name implies," Chihaya Tōru explained, assuming Konome didn't understand, "is the collective term for illnesses caused by mutations in a shinobi's kekkei genkai."
"This is a terminal condition only shinobi who awaken a bloodline limit can even be eligible to suffer from. Not only that, they have to be outstanding among them, geniuses with powerful blood."
He even thought he was being funny and used her as an example.
"Oh, and someone like you is exactly the type most likely to catch this genius disease."
Konome stared at him without speaking.
"Haha…" The silence made Chihaya Tōru awkward. He forced a dry laugh. "Relax, you're not that easy to…"
"Talk about Hashirama's cells," Konome cut in.
Her voice was cold, echoing through the underground chamber. For the first time, she understood why Aburame Ryūma looked the way he did.
"Sorry." Chihaya Tōru apologized quickly and continued.
"When I taught you medical ninjutsu, I told you before. Life force is the most corrosive, most dangerous power in the world.
Too much life force causes terrifying mutations in a patient's wounds. It can even alter their genetics. Their descendants can drown in that pain too."
He paused, eyes fixed on the glass pillar.
"And Hashirama's cells can't even be described as 'too much' anymore."
The life force was so powerful it couldn't be restrained. A super cell born from that kind of strength didn't discriminate between enemy and ally when it fed.
It would destroy everything around it without control, expanding, splitting, converting chakra, endlessly.
Until even it could no longer bear its own might.
At that point, it could only vent the overflow through Wood Release, disgorging power until it turned itself into a giant tree.
Cellular woodification.
The infinite reproductive ability vanished, completely.
Hashirama's body died.
"That's the truth of how the First Hokage died."
The chamber fell abruptly silent.
Konome stared at the great tree.
Dying because your power is too great to contain. What a rich way to die.
She'd devoured the Three Tails and the Nine Tails and still felt her chakra was lacking. She couldn't even imagine what it meant to be killed by your own chakra going berserk.
Still, it had to be better than being drained dry by the Dead Bone.
The Sharingan, the Dead Bone Pulse, even the Sage Body, all carried their own forms of Bloodline Disease once they evolved far enough.
And now that she thought about it, the Byakugan was the one bloodline limit she'd never heard of producing such a sickness.
Fortune and disaster leaned on each other like twins.
The Byakugan was hard to raise, its ceiling was brutally difficult to reach, its floor was low, but it was stable. No strange diseases. That alone made it a premium kekkei genkai.
Konome found herself more satisfied with her Byakugan than ever.
"A power even Senju Hashirama couldn't control," Chihaya Tōru continued, "is even harder for anyone else to manage.
And that's exactly what happened.
We transplanted Hashirama's cells into many people. Aside from one lucky child, no one could withstand the erosion."
"Then isn't there a successful case?" Konome asked.
She recalled the original plotline.
The one child Chihaya Tōru meant should be Yamato. The only survivor of Orochimaru's human experiments, registered in Root under the codename Kinoe. Later, during the attempt on Hiruzen Sarutobi's life, he was defeated by Kakashi Hatake and eventually entered the ANBU.
The only Wood Release user Konoha had left.
"That child used some method to fuse his cells with Hashirama's," Chihaya Tōru said. "The new cells no longer had that terrifying life force. They couldn't break the human limit. All he gained was the Wood Release bloodline limit.
That's nowhere near success."
His expression carried regret.
"One of my most talented partners gave up on Hashirama cell transplantation after that failed experiment and parted ways with me."
"That partner was Orochimaru," Konome guessed.
"Yeah." Chihaya Tōru nodded. "You probably haven't heard his name. You could call him your… senior."
"Why did you split?" Konome asked.
"Incompatible beliefs." He hesitated, then waved it away. "Forget it. We're not talking about him."
He clearly didn't want Konome learning too much about Orochimaru and messing up Danzo Shimura's plans, so he forced the topic back.
"Hashirama cell transplantation has gone on for decades.
Recipients ranged from people at death's door to newborn infants.
From ordinary shinobi with no talent, to those with bloodlines, to elite jōnin level powerhouses. Even members of the Senju, who share Hashirama's blood, couldn't bear that abnormal power."
His hand slid along the glass.
Beneath his palm, the flesh base, bodies twisted together, and the limbs clawing for survival spoke silently of the outcome.
"You used the Senju for experiments too?" Konome said, genuinely shocked. Chihaya Tōru's madness had exceeded even her expectations.
"Not me," Chihaya Tōru corrected calmly.
"Hashirama cell experiments have a history of several decades. When you and I were still just trainees in medical ninjutsu, Danzo, the Third Hokage, and the Senju themselves were already secretly conducting transplantation trials.
We simply inherited their data and results."
Konome exhaled slowly.
The power of the so-called "God of Shinobi" was indeed irresistible. She had joined Root for that very reason. Orochimaru had broken with his teacher and severed ties with his lifelong friends. The Senju making such a decision was, in its own way, inevitable.
They had seen Hashirama's power with their own eyes. Their obsession would be more desperate than anyone else's.
Konome stared again at the enormous base built from pale bodies and felt a horrifying thought rise in her chest.
"The Senju's experimental results… what happened?"
"Didn't I say? They all failed." Chihaya Tōru leaned close to the glass pillar. Under the white lights, his face reflected perfectly in the smooth surface, overlapping with the pleading faces trapped in the flesh below.
"I mean the Senju…"
"They're all here."
"What?" Konome's lashes trembled.
"The Senju who once dominated the Warring States Era, allied with the Uchiha to end the chaos and found Konoha, and then vanished for no clear reason."
His gaze fixed on the flesh base beneath the tree. His black eyes looked like two deep holes.
Terrifyingly calm.
"Most of them are here."
Gurgle. Gurgle.
The meat shifted in the nutrient fluid with an ugly, wet sound, like a beast chewing its prey.
Konome slowly lifted her head.
Her Byakugan looked up at the giant tree inside the glass.
Faces of countless expressions grew from the trunk. The lush canopy swayed gently. Emerald motes surged and churned, forming a tide of life force like waves of the sea.
This is… too much.
Above ground, black clouds gathered in a crushing mass. Wind stirred the darkness, and faint light leaked through now and then.
Crackle.
Lightning split the sky.
At home, Konome's main body was cultivating Lightning Release chakra mode when she suddenly stopped, standing in the center of her training yard. She closed her eyes and pressed two fingers to her heart.
In the void, a double-helix chain linked one end to her heart and stretched the other end outward without limit.
Two streams of chakra spiraled within it. Memories, knowledge, images, countless pieces of information surged between the main body and the clone.
Hashirama's cells.
Bloodline Disease.
The Senju.
The giant tree.
They flooded her mind until the transfer finished, leaving even her with a faint sense of fatigue.
The information density was explosive.
Hashirama had died from a Bloodline Disease of the Sage Body.
The Senju's disappearance wasn't because they "followed Hashirama's will and merged into Konoha."
It was because brutal human experimentation killed eighty percent of the clan's shinobi. The remaining old, weak, and injured had no choice but to bury the Senju's glory.
From Chihaya Tōru's description, Hiruzen Sarutobi, Danzo Shimura, and the Senju leadership had all been involved.
Back then, Konoha was under siege pressure from multiple great villages. Under that strain, the three sides launched a massive human experimentation campaign to recreate Hashirama's godlike power.
In that era, medical ninja training wasn't as developed. Skilled hands were rare.
Chihaya Tōru had been a child then, and the teacher who taught him medical ninjutsu had been one of the researchers. That was why he knew so many of the buried details.
At first the Senju were restrained, using only elders as subjects.
Then came adults, then adolescents.
The sunk cost climbed higher and higher. Those who had tasted the power of Hashirama's cells grew more and more insane.
Finally, unwilling to accept defeat, they dragged infants and toddlers into the trials.
That decision severed the Senju's roots completely.
In the end, aside from that giant tree of near-infinite life force, there was nothing.
The famed Senju destroyed themselves.
Konome's feelings were difficult to name.
Part of her mourned the clan's reckless extinction. Another part of her realized that her own desire to transplant Hashirama's cells was not so different from theirs.
The transplant route was likely blocked.
Afterward, Chihaya Tōru gave Konome stacks of medical ninjutsu materials, experimental reports, research directions on Hashirama's cells, the countless issues that arose during transplantation, and more.
The more she read, the more her resolve crumbled.
It was brutal.
Truly brutal.
Thick reports filled with lists of the dead. Even the rare survivors became half-human, half-tree monsters with no research value, and were thrown beneath the giant tree as new "nutrients" to grow more Hashirama cells.
With a death rate that high, she didn't want to gamble on the one-in-a-thousand chance.
Gambling never ends well. That was not an empty saying. The Senju's fate had already demonstrated it.
Most importantly, even if she won the gamble, she still might not obtain a Sage Body overflowing with life force.
Yamato had Wood Release but not Hashirama's level of vitality.
Others who received Hashirama cells in the original story also never gained life force comparable to Senju Hashirama.
Danzo and Obito Uchiha treated Hashirama cells like a battery for the Mangekyō Sharingan and a Wood Release launcher.
Madara Uchiha used Hashirama's chakra to awaken the Rinnegan.
White Zetsu were mass-produced plantlike puppets, weak to the point of being laughable.
No one ever truly obtained life force on Senju Hashirama's level.
Not a single one.
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