Naruto: Sasuke Uchiha Returns from Soul Society

"Pfft."

A sound like cloth being torn rang out.

Kimimaro's bone spur pierced Sasuke's chest without any resistance.

But his face showed no joy at his success; instead, it revealed an incredulous astonishment.

There is no tactile sensation.

There was no real sensation of piercing flesh, nor did I feel even the slightest resistance.

It was as if... a void of shadows had been pierced.

Kimimaro's pupils contracted sharply, and he almost instinctively pulled his hand away and stepped back.

The "Sasuke" in front of him, who had been pierced through, did not spurt blood and fall down as he had expected.

Instead, like a painting being set ablaze, it silently twisted and turned into a sky full of black flames, dissipating into the air.

"what?!"

Kimimaro retreated abruptly, his mind blank.

Is it a shadow clone?

But why can't I detect any fluctuations in chakra?!

While he was still in shock at the illogical scene before him, a cold voice suddenly rang out from behind him.

"qualifications?"

Kimimaro's hair stood on end. He wanted to turn around and use his hardest bones to defend himself.

But it was too late.

A hand pressed down lightly on the back of his neck.

Sasuke's figure had appeared behind him without him even noticing.

"On the contrary, it is up to me to determine whether he deserves to live on."

The moment the words fell, an immense pressure erupted.

"Uh......"

Kimimaro groaned, feeling as if his soul was being gripped tightly by an invisible hand, and even his breath stopped for a moment.

His body wouldn't obey his commands, and his prized "Corpse Bone Meridian" didn't even have a chance to activate.

"boom."

A muffled thud.

Kimimaro's knees could no longer support him, and he collapsed heavily to the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust.

"..."

"Your loyalty has been misplaced."

A calm voice remained in the deathly silent laboratory.

"To die for someone who sees you as a 'tool' is the most foolish thing to do."

After saying that, he disappeared into the darkness at the end of the passage without pausing.

Only Kimimaro remained, kneeling on the ground, his body trembling violently, yet remaining silent.

For a long, long time.

"Lord Orochimaru..."

Kimimaro let out a suppressed roar, "They need me."

Chapter 124 Sage Techniques and the Rinnegan

Uchiha Sasuke stepped along the long shadow cast by the dim lamplight, walking step by step towards another direction underground.

From the moment he stepped into this underground place, a faint but strange fluctuation had been drawing his senses in.

That was not spiritual pressure, nor was it the same as chakra; it was difficult to summarize its characteristics for a moment.

Sasuke has an almost instinctive desire to explore unknown powers.

He followed the scent into a deeper passage and finally stopped in front of a door.

The door was made of some unknown alloy, and it was even engraved with several sealing formulas to suppress the leakage of chakra. Clearly, some extremely dangerous being was imprisoned here.

Sasuke's gaze fell on the small observation window on the door, and he stepped forward to look inside.

The room was very simple, with only a stone bed.

A tall man with short orange hair was sitting cross-legged on the ground with his back to the door. He looked older than me.

His muscles were well-defined and powerful, yet his overall demeanor was unusually gentle.

Several sparrows flew in from nowhere, chirping as they landed on his shoulders and palms, affectionately pecking at the grains of rice in his hands.

The man, meanwhile, kept his head down, intently watching the sparrows chirping on him. He made soft, bird-like sounds to communicate with these little creatures, occasionally stroking their fluffy feathers with his fingertips.

The tranquility, so out of place in this filthy land, caused a flicker of surprise to cross Sasuke's eyes.

That strange yet vibrant aura emanated from him.

Sasuke frowned slightly.

This strong sense of incongruity only intensified his curiosity.

Without further hesitation, he raised his hand and gently placed his palm on the heavy alloy door.

A thin arc of black and white electricity flashed and disappeared from his palm.

The door lock, along with the complex sealing spells on it, was completely destroyed by the electric current in an instant.

"Squeak-"

He slowly pushed open the heavy alloy door.

Startled by the noise, the sparrows in the room fluttered their wings and flew away in all directions.

"......who?!"

The orange-haired youth inside the stone chamber also turned around abruptly.

The moment he saw Sasuke's unfamiliar face, his once gentle eyes were suddenly replaced by a violent, blood-red glare.

Immediately afterwards, an uncontrollable urge began to grow wildly within him.

"Uh...ha..."

A hoarse, inhuman voice squeezed out of his throat.

Immediately afterwards, his tall body began to convulse and swell violently in an extremely bizarre way.

A layer of grayish-black, rock-like keratin grew wildly from beneath his skin, covering half of his body, and even a grotesque bone spur resembling a cannon barrel grew from his elbow.

That once handsome face was now contorted and twisted, filled with undisguised bloodlust.

In just a few breaths, the gentle young man had vanished.

Instead, there was a monster whose body was half covered by grayish-white bone armor, and whose arm had been mutated into a giant hammer.

"Roar--!!!"

With a final, utterly irrational roar, the ground beneath his feet cracked violently, and the figure, accompanied by a foul stench, charged fiercely towards Sasuke.

However, Sasuke remained unmoved in the face of this violent attack. He simply raised his right hand, put two fingers together, and held it upright in front of his chest.

"The Sixty-First Path of Binding".

A calm voice rang out.

"Six staffs of light prison".

Six condensed, tangible light fragments appeared out of thin air without warning.

Without giving the rampaging figure any time to react, the arrows pierced his body precisely from six different directions, pinning him to the spot and preventing him from moving forward even an inch.

"Roar... Hoo..."

The monstrous body was still struggling frantically, letting out unwilling roars, but all in vain.

Sasuke stepped forward slowly, his Sharingan calmly examining the rampaging body.

He could clearly see that beneath that body, there was an energy completely different from chakra surging wildly.

This energy did not originate from him, but rather...

It was continuously drawn into his body from the outside world, from this land, from this air.

"This is......"

Sasuke murmured to himself, a hint of doubt flashing in his eyes.

"The source of the curse seal is a most primal power, one with nature."

A hoarse voice suddenly rang out from behind him.

However, we are more used to calling it...

Orochimaru stared at the figure still struggling frantically, his vertical pupils flashing with an uncontrollable fervor.

"Celestial Arts".

Sasuke slowly turned his head to the side, his gaze falling on Orochimaru, and he repeated the name in a low voice.

"Celestial arts?"

"Hehe...that's right, magic."

Orochimaru seemed quite pleased with Sasuke's curiosity, a delighted smile spreading across his pale face as he began to explain.

"Beyond the 'chakra' that we ninjas are familiar with, which is a combination of mental and physical energy, there exists another, more unique power."

He slowly walked to Jugo, who was still bound by the Six Staffs of Light Prison, but whose physical abnormalities had begun to fade away. His voice was full of longing.

"That is 'natural energy,' the energy that permeates the air, the earth, and even the entire natural world."