The largest one-the one between the shoulder blades-pulsed the slowest, fewer than twenty times a minute. With each pulse, the entire gland briefly expanded by roughly five percent, then slowly contracted to its original size. The interval between expansion and contraction lasted three seconds. During those three seconds, the vascular network on its surface shifted from dark red to pale red and back again. Blood was being pumped into and out of the gland in a rhythm Chisen had never seen before.
"The largest one secretes a T-cell suppressor.
The smallest secretes an antigen-presentation blocker.
The four in between handle B-cell suppression, complement-system blockade, macrophage-activity suppression, and cytotoxic-factor neutralization." Chisen's voice reflected off the dome in the cavernous workshop. He wasn't speaking loudly, but the echoes were clear. "Each corresponds to an attack pathway in the immune system.
With all six working together, a recipient could accept any tissue transplanted from this vessel without any rejection whatsoever.
This isn't organ transplantation. This is redefining the entire immune system."
Tenten stood at another face of the hexagonal prism, studying the specimen's calves through the culture fluid and transparent wall.
Its leg muscles were already fully developed-not muscles built through training, but muscle-fiber structures directly encoded through gene editing.
Their density was far greater than that of a normal person's muscles, but the fibers weren't arranged in the functional pattern found in humans. Instead, they formed a layered, crisscrossing structure closer to that of reptiles.
Kabuto hadn't just edited its immune system. He was rewriting every system in the vessel's body.
"If this vessel were activated, what level of combat strength would it have?" Tenten asked.
Behind her, Neji scanned the specimen's entire body with his Byakugan.
"Its muscle density is more than three times that of an ordinary Jonin.
Its bone