Tailed Beast Chakra State

Inside the interrogation room.

When Inoichi Yamanaka saw Li Yao again, his heart jolted. Looking at Li Yao, who seemed to have aged several decades, he felt alarmed and secretly troubled.

Clearly, the Third had tortured Li Yao like this because Li Yao possessed a secret the Third cared deeply about.

And clearly, the Third had no intention of sharing that secret with anyone else.

Yet the Third neither knew nor had the talent to learn the secret technique for probing another person's brain memories. It was truly frustrating.

If possible, Inoichi Yamanaka genuinely did not want to get involved in this mess.

He did not act immediately. Instead, he turned to the Third, intending to suggest that the Third find someone else.

But before he could say it, the Third patted him on the shoulder and said heavily, "You are the person I trust most."

Well then.

With those words, Inoichi Yamanaka had no way out and could only grit his teeth and proceed.

He immediately formed hand seals, then placed his right hand over Li Yao's head and began probing Li Yao's brain.

This time, it went smoothly.

With no Chakra protecting Li Yao's brain, Inoichi Yamanaka's Chakra quickly invaded the cerebral region and began reading the memories recorded within the brain cells.

Kimura Yao's physical memories only extended to nearly seven years of age.

The entire probing process was not long.

Starting from birth, Li Yao's—or rather, this body's—memories began to unfold in Inoichi Yamanaka's mind. He watched everything Kimura Yao had experienced from a first-person perspective.

One year old, two years old...!

There was nothing unusual in the earlier memories. It was not until the night Kimura Yao received news of his parents' deaths half a year ago that something abnormal appeared.

In the memories, on the night he learned of his parents' deaths, Kimura Yao had been exceptionally heartbroken. He sat on the sofa clutching a family photo until late into the night, before eventually falling asleep there.

Then, something strange happened.

When Kimura Yao woke up the next day, he was like a different person. He was somewhat excited and somewhat frightened, too afraid to leave the house. The occasional words he muttered were also utterly baffling.

The phrase that appeared most often was "holy shit." Inoichi Yamanaka did not know what it meant, but it seemed to be used to express shock.

A boy who had learned of his parents' deaths the night before and been so grief-stricken that he did not fall asleep until late—what could have happened overnight, during a single night's sleep, to leave him so shocked?

Inoichi Yamanaka did not know, but he had already roughly guessed that there might be something wrong with Kimura Yao—and it was a major problem that greatly interested the Third.

He did not think of reincarnation through Soul Possession.

He did not know much about the Spirit Transformation Technique and was unaware that it could be used for reincarnation through Soul Possession.

In fact, not many people in the entire ninja world knew that the Spirit Transformation Technique also possessed the ability to reincarnate through Soul Possession. At present, perhaps only the Third and Danzo knew, while the Third Tsuchikage of Iwagakure might also know.

"I'm finished, Lord Hokage."

After seeing the memory of Kimura Yao being taken away by the Anbu, Inoichi Yamanaka stopped on his own and withdrew his hand. There was no need to examine the later memories; the Third already knew them.

"Did you find any useful intelligence?"

The Third asked with apparent calm but hidden excitement, his eyes fixed firmly on Inoichi Yamanaka.

This made Inoichi Yamanaka somewhat nervous. But after instantly reviewing everything carefully, he confirmed there were no gaps in Kimura Yao's memories, and his heart settled. He then told the Third, point by point, about the abnormalities in Kimura Yao's memories.

"Nothing else?" the Third asked with a frown. His eyes abruptly sharpened as he stared at Inoichi Yamanaka. "For example, did he ever perform any special ninjutsu?"

"No, Lord Hokage."

Inoichi Yamanaka hurriedly shook his head in nervousness, then remembered something and said uneasily, "But he did read the ninjutsu research notes his father left behind on the Perfect Transformation Jutsu. I don't know if that counts as a special ninjutsu."

After saying that, Inoichi Yamanaka lowered his head slightly. Cold sweat began to form on his back. He sensed the Third's dissatisfaction with his answer; evidently, he had not provided the answer the Third wanted. But that was all Kimura Yao's brain memories contained, and there was nothing he could do.

"Perfect Transformation Jutsu?"

Upon hearing the name of that ninjutsu, the Third paused. He quickly recalled that it was a ninjutsu Kimura Takuya had researched, but had ultimately failed to complete, producing only the Shadow Clone.

That was not the perfect Spirit Transformation Technique he wanted.

However... seeing that Inoichi Yamanaka did not appear to be lying—and had neither reason nor courage to lie to him—the Third's frown deepened.

That made no sense.

Once the Soul Possession Technique was used, the user would definitely form hand seals and use the Spirit Transformation Technique again to stabilize the soul. It was an essential step. No matter how much the perfect Spirit Transformation Technique had been improved, that step could not possibly be omitted.

The Third could not understand it.

Could it be that the perfect Spirit Transformation Technique did not require that step?

If that was true, then the only way to learn the improved perfect Spirit Transformation Technique was to invade this fellow's Chakra.

There were two ways to probe memories: through brain cells and through Chakra.

By probing the memories within Chakra, one could obtain all the memories of Li Yao, who had possessed Kimura Yao's body.

But Li Yao's Chakra simply could not be invaded.

After half a year of torture, the Third had thought that once Li Yao's body and spirit broke down, he would be able to invade Li Yao's Chakra. Instead, it had become even harder to invade.

The Third knew in his heart that if even this did not work—if he could not invade Li Yao's Chakra—then there was basically nothing he could do.

At least, he could not think of any way to invade Li Yao's Chakra.

"Sigh!"

The Third Hokage let out a deeply disappointed sigh, then patted Inoichi Yamanaka on the shoulder and said, "Inoichi, go back for now. Remember, I do not want anyone besides you and me to know about what happened tonight."

"Yes, Lord Hokage. I understand."

Inoichi Yamanaka breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that he would no longer have to endure the pressure from the Third Hokage. He then respectfully left the interrogation room.

After Inoichi Yamanaka left, the Third Hokage used a long needle to test Li Yao several times. Once he confirmed that Li Yao had truly become an insensate vegetable, he completely gave up on wasting any more time on him.

The only question left was whether to kill Li Yao... or keep him alive.

After all, the secrets Li Yao carried were also worth investigating.

Why had Li Yao's spiritual will fused so thoroughly with his Chakra? It was practically like a tailed beast.

Tailed beasts were, in essence, creatures formed from conglomerations of Chakra. They did not possess flesh-and-blood bodies like humans.

Their consciousness was born from Chakra and fused with it as one.

This was also why extracting a tailed beast would kill its Jinchuriki.

The reason was that the tailed beast's Chakra, once sealed within a Jinchuriki, fused with the Jinchuriki's own Chakra.

That also meant the tailed beast's soul and will had likewise merged with part of the human's soul.

Once a tailed beast was extracted from a Jinchuriki, it would also take away most of the Jinchuriki's soul.

Having lost most of their soul, the Jinchuriki would generally die within a few hours.

Thus, tailed beasts, whose wills were likewise deeply fused with their Chakra, were generally difficult to control with genjutsu. Like Li Yao, they were hard for another person's genjutsu Chakra to invade.

Throughout the entire ninja world, aside from the genjutsu cast through the Uchiha Clan's Mangekyō Sharingan, which could control tailed beasts, other ninja's genjutsu had little effect on them.

This was also what made the Uchiha Clan's Sharingan so terrifying and deeply feared.

At the thought of the Uchiha, the Third Hokage's gaze flickered.

Over the past half year, his attention had been focused on researching how to invade Li Yao's Chakra, and he had not paid as much attention to the Uchiha Clan as before.

That had led the Uchiha Clan to believe that he had grown timid and afraid.

Over the past six months, the Uchiha Clan had become increasingly outrageous. They actually wanted to get their hands on the annual financial appropriation the Feudal Lord's Mansion granted Konoha.

This was the greatest proof of why the Hokage was the Hokage: recognition from the feudal lord.

Now that the Uchiha wanted to interfere with the funding, their intentions were truly unforgivable.

"Looks like it is time to make proper use of Root!"

With that thought, the Third Hokage gave Li Yao, lying motionless on the bed, one last look before turning and leaving.

Li Yao was still useful alive.

Although obtaining a perfect Soul Possession Technique would be difficult, if he could study Li Yao's unique tailed-beast-like Chakra state and use it to develop corresponding ninjutsu, it would certainly be a technique that restrained the Uchiha Clan even more than the Bringer-of-Darkness Technique.

When that time came... hmph!

He would definitely make the Uchiha Clan pay a painful price.

"Was that... the Third Hokage?"