Kabuto Yakushi's Transformation

(I posted the wrong chapter. Chapter 604 will be posted later. Please pay attention to the order.)

"What... did you inject?" Sakura Uchiha frowned, looked down, and asked in a deep voice.

From Sakura's perception, Kabuto seemed to have undergone some strange changes.

For a moment, she suddenly felt a chill run down her spine.

"Hehehehe..." Dou Yin chuckled, his shoulders shaking as he replied, "Didn't you already guess?"

The changes in the man gradually became clear.

Soon, Sakura Uchiha realized what had happened to him, and her expression turned grim.

"You injected Orochimaru's cells into your body, didn't you!?" She stared at Kabuto and asked sharply.

"As expected of Sakura Haruno, she reacted so quickly..." Kabuto sneered repeatedly, and visible changes gradually appeared on his body.

Scales, snake eyes, eyeshadow.

And there's Orochimaru's unique, wicked, and greasy smell.

These traits gradually appeared on this unassuming ninja.

A unique Chakra belonging to Orochimaru arose spontaneously from Kabuto's body and rapidly grew stronger!

Kabuto is gradually turning into Orochimaru!

"Nausea!"

Sakura snorted coldly, and with a thought, without warning, the green giant suddenly raised his greatsword and slashed fiercely at Kabuto Yakushi!

Whoosh!!!

The roar was like thunder, a deafening boom.

Wherever the sword pointed, nothing could stop it! This time, Kabuto could no longer block such a fierce and ruthless sword strike, and was cleanly and neatly cut in two!

However, Chakra did not disappear or weaken significantly.

He's not dead!

Sakura Uchiha stared at the upper half of Kabuto's corpse with a livid face. Suddenly, the latter split open—at an exaggeratedly large angle—and a new Kabuto, covered in slippery slime, crawled out.

Orochimaru-Style Substitution Technique.

"This Substitution Technique..." The girl stared at Kabuto as if he were some kind of extremely foul filth, her brows furrowed, and she demanded in a deep voice, "Are you Kabuto Yakushi or Orochimaru?"

"Maybe it's Kabuto, maybe it's Orochimaru, who knows?" The man licked his lips, extending his long forked tongue, and said softly, "I don't care about these things..."

"It doesn't matter?" Sakura's tone rose, looking at him incredulously. "Even the existence of one's own self has disappeared, and this is something that doesn't matter?!"

Kabuto Yakushi took off his glasses and grinned sinisterly.

His once ordinary black eyes had somehow transformed into murky, orange-yellow, snake-like vertical pupils.

The elongated purple eyeshadow, almost extending to the sides of the nose, awkwardly added a touch of sinister charm to Dou's overall look.

The exposed skin cracked in patches and slowly dried, turning into hard scales.

Several long snakes emerged from his waist and behind him, their bodies appearing to be connected to his torso.

He seemed to have undergone a transformation, and gradually even his smile began to resemble Orochimaru's. It was no longer the fake smile of the past, but rather the cold, sinister smile unique to Orochimaru.

"If I didn't do this, I would have died long ago. Only by absorbing Lord Orochimaru's power can I contend with you!"

As for 'who am I'?

"The glasses are a prop, and the name is just a code..." he said slowly. "From the very beginning, I was nobody. I was just a useful tool."

"Self? That thing... I lost it a long time ago!"

Sakura Uchiha was speechless for a moment.

"To meet someone like you is a surprise, or perhaps a shock," she said helplessly after a long while.

She suddenly remembered that after Root's destruction, the Anbu discovered a lot of new information during their interrogations, one of which was that Kabuto had been a Root spy. After being brainwashed by Danzo's habitually inhumane methods, most of Root's members exhibited this kind of mindset without a sense of self.

Getting up, Dou is just a more extreme case.

But what exactly is "self"?

A simple definition is the difference between "I" and "others," which outlines the existence of the "self." Sakura Haruno herself is a person with a strong sense of self. She is so dazzling, so different from others, like a sun that radiates light and heat at all times, dazzling in the crowd.

Sakura Uchiha, who was initially just Clone Duplicate, had a simpler self.

Her self is more about characteristics that distinguish her from the original. It was precisely because she didn't want to exist simply as a replica of "Sakura Haruno" that the first self-awareness was born in this body, and she eventually became "Sakura Uchiha".

There's no need to search deliberately; the difference between the original and the clone is obvious.

If it were the real Kabuto here, he wouldn't even have a chance to say a second word before being utterly killed by her. Sakura Haruno wouldn't give him any time to display such a bizarre state. She was like a phoenix high above, disdainful of the ugly state of an ant in the mud beneath her feet.

But out of curiosity, out of the resonance between two individuals who were also searching for their "self", or perhaps because of the familiar confusion in Kabuto's eyes, Sakura Uchiha talked a lot with Kabuto, which led him to complete this transformation.

To some extent, Sakura Uchiha and Kabuto Yakushi share subtle similarities but face diametrically opposed circumstances.

Both Sakura Uchiha had a strong desire to find their "self," but Sakura was born as a clone without a self, yet she successfully found her place in the world. Kabuto Yakushi, on the other hand, was born as a natural being with a self, but he lost the meaning of his own self and ultimately went to extremes.

The person before you deserves pity, but not sympathy.

With that thought, Sakura Uchiha sighed, "What kind of being are you now... it doesn't matter anymore."

"To thank you for showing me the pathetic end of a loser, I will kill you cleanly and decisively, and not let such a monster live in this world."

The white-haired youth—a hybrid of Kabuto and Orochimaru —shaked his head. "My surprises are far from over. You'll soon find out why I had the courage to stand before you!"

Sakura Uchiha's face was ashen.

"Yeah?"

"But I... am not interested!"

The girl's murderous intent was like a knife, sharp and cold as frost.

Accompanying her murderous intent was Susanoo's furious attack!

Bang--!

"Summoning Technique - Quintuple Rashomon!"

Almost at the same time the girl drew her sword, Kabuto reacted, unleashing Orochimaru's signature technique!

Having absorbed Orochimaru's power, his Chakra surged, and his combat strength rapidly rose from the level of Elite Jonin to the level of a Kage.

He lavishly used his Chakra, summoning a massive gate to hell, which stood firmly against Susanoo shadow, actually managing to block the giant's devastating strike!

Rumble!

The first four Rashomon collapsed with a crash, leaving only the last door, cracked and trembling, on the verge of collapse.

The spiraling giant sword stopped dozens of meters in front of the door, its blade cold and sharp, its chilling aura penetrating to the bone.

Kabuto leaped onto the doorframe, standing at roughly the same height as Sakura, still shaken. He gazed at the snow-white frost gradually spreading across Rashomon, feeling a chill run down his spine: even from such a distance, the cold air could still reach him... She actually imbued her sword with such terrifying ice- Nature Transformation Chakra!

Luckily, he chose to stop it! If he had been hit, his soul would probably have been frozen.

No amount of survival tricks can escape the brutal and unparalleled power of Ice Release!

"My surprise isn't over yet, how can you leave so soon?" Dou let out a long sigh and said coldly.

As he spoke, the five giant pythons that had emerged from his waist—each coiled around one of the five corpses—simultaneously expanded their snouts and swallowed the entire corpse whole!

The snake's body swelled up from the swallowed corpse, but soon, with the snake's undulating movements, the swelling subsided, as if it had digested it all!

At the same time, his chest pocket suddenly swelled up, and fleshy growths appeared, bursting through his clothes and exposing him to the air.

As the cold wind blew, the tumor rapidly transformed, growing eyes, nose, mouth, and ears, Tayuya, Sakon, and others!

It seemed slow, but it actually happened very quickly. In just two or three seconds, Dou completely transformed into a monster with a head hanging from his chest and a giant python around his waist!

Seeing this, Sakura Uchiha's face turned pale, her teeth clenched, and an uncontrollable killing intent spread through the air.

"You... you disgust me!"