Snake, Coercion, Training

"Huh?"

Hiroki had anticipated what Orochimaru might do to him after finding the man in his own home.

This included threats to force him to surrender secrets, tying him up like a frog for dissection, or using some unspeakable, mysterious curse to control him.

Yet, he had never imagined that Orochimaru would actually ask him to hand over the knowledge of the Second Hokage.

He knew jack-all about the knowledge of the Second Hokage!

...Well, that wasn't entirely true.

Hiroki carefully counted it out: he knew that the Second Hokage created the Shadow Clone, created the Flying Thunder God, was the founder of the Konoha Ninja Academy, the creator of the Three Basic Jutsu, the founder of the Eight Inner Gates, and the guy in the entire ninja world most likely to be a transmigrator.

But were these really the things Orochimaru needed to know?

Hiroki dared not deny Orochimaru's answer, but he had no way to confess his own truth either.

After all, in the vast majority of Naruto fanfiction he had read, almost no one confessed their status as a transmigrator to others. Or, if they did confess, very few met a good end.

Hiroki considered himself just an ordinary programmer—someone average, neither particularly clever nor especially cautious. After all, his daily life consisted of writing code at work and fixing bugs after hours, with no social life to speak of; before transmigrating, he didn't even have a girlfriend. Under these circumstances, it was impossible for him to possess the political acumen and experience of those old veterans to deal with someone like Orochimaru, a man capable of independently founding a village and trafficking children.

So, what should he do?

Hiroki once again terminated the "fear" process. This time, the period it took to calm down was longer than ever before.

Perhaps it was Orochimaru's flawed deduction that finally allowed Hiroki to settle down and carefully consider the situation he was currently facing.

Known condition one: the Second Hokage, Senju Tobirama, that master of forbidden jutsu, the infrastructure fanatic of Konoha, and a severe sufferer of Uchiha PTSD, was the source Orochimaru believed his current knowledge and cheat ability originated from.

From this, it could be deduced that Orochimaru mistakenly believed his techniques and cheat ability were inherently part of Konoha, which was why he was being relatively lenient toward him.

Extrapolating further, perhaps this was also why the Third Hokage hadn't asked him for more information after his assessment ended. After all, as the leader of Konoha, the Third Hokage possessed the most intelligence.

Known condition two: Orochimaru wanted to obtain the information and knowledge he held. This was the other party's demand, but Orochimaru hadn't let the Yamanaka clan or other interrogation ninjas directly read his mind, which meant either they feared he had the potential to lock away his information, or he was afraid of the information being known by others.

They wanted to be the sole possessors of the Second Hokage's knowledge and intelligence.

So, the next step was conditional judgment—

Could he agree?

Hiroki pondered, taking the opportunity to look up at Orochimaru.

Orochimaru waited with interest; he was in no rush. Since Hiroki had fallen into thought, it meant he was leaning toward teaching him the knowledge. All that remained was to wait patiently.

This made Hiroki relax slightly, and he began to think patiently.

Hiroki pondered what would happen if he agreed to Orochimaru.

If Hiroki agreed, Orochimaru would certainly make him reveal the legacy of the Second Hokage and what was inside his experiments. But Hiroki knew nothing about this; he neither knew of the Second Hokage's laboratory nor what experiments Senju Tobirama had actually conducted while he was alive.

Since that was the case, he might as well list the various possibilities—

First, agreeing:

Once he agreed, Hiroki estimated that he would be exposed very easily. After all, he was just a corporate slave programmer; other than writing code, he had no special talents, nor was he good at acting. He wasn't like those transmigrators in webnovels who were full of drama after crossing over.

He might slip up somewhere, just like he had been caught by Orochimaru this time.

But if he didn't agree, there would be even more variables.

On one hand, Orochimaru might continue to suspect his identity and motives; on the other, he might resort to forced and violent means to obtain everything he knew.

After all, he didn't seem like the type who was easy to negotiate with.

Of course, maybe he was only like that toward him.

After all, in the manga, Orochimaru seemed quite good to his disciple Anko, or even Nawaki, and he had put his all into training Kabuto.

But in any case, Orochimaru wasn't just testing him; he had already used his genius brain to construct a complete, self-consistent, and logical closed loop that fit the ninja world's worldview to explain Hiroki's unreasonable existence, unreasonable knowledge, and unreasonable abilities.

If Hiroki resisted and rejected this logic, yet couldn't provide a new one... Hiroki couldn't imagine what else Orochimaru might do, but there was no doubt Orochimaru would definitely do something terrible to him.

Since agreeing wouldn't work and refusing wouldn't work, only one path remained—

Neither confirm, nor deny, nor refuse.

A bit like a heartbreaker.

If you ask for it, I won't refuse, but I'll only tell you the parts I know.

As for more, I won't say whether I have it or not; I'll just tell you I don't have it right now...

As for the future...

Who can say what will happen in the future?

Most importantly, he still needed to rapidly improve his own strength.

Hiroki took a deep breath.

If he had Kage-level strength right now, or Tailed Beast-level strength, would Orochimaru dare to talk to him like this? If he had that kind of power, he could act like Uchiha Itachi, giving Orochimaru a cold shoulder and telling the little brother to behave himself.

In the end, just as Orochimaru said, in the ninja world, weakness is the original sin.

He had to change his mindset, from a mediocre programmer to someone who learns to become a powerhouse!

Thinking this over, Sawada Hiroki sighed. Since things had reached this point, he could only compromise for now. He would write down today's grudge in his little notebook and pay it back tenfold in the future.

Following this, Sawada Hiroki raised his head and met Orochimaru's gaze. He didn't feign weakness, nor did he tremble anymore.

He was going to tell the truth: "I don't know..."

"I don't know anything about the knowledge of the Second Hokage, nor do I know what you are talking about."

Orochimaru frowned. At this stage, was Sawada Hiroki still going to put up a desperate struggle? But what was the point?

Before Orochimaru could figure it out, Sawada Hiroki's next sentence caused his tightly furrowed brows to relax.

"However, there is indeed a lot of knowledge in my head that doesn't belong to me. I don't know why this knowledge is in my head, nor do I understand why I have such abilities."

"If Lord Orochimaru is willing to help me develop these abilities and help me further understand this knowledge, I would be more than grateful."

Sawada Hiroki looked straight at Orochimaru. This was the only thing a mediocre programmer like him could do at this very moment.

In the future, he must copy some acting techniques from politicians, actors, and all sorts of other people! Otherwise, in times like these, he could only stare wide-eyed and tell the truth.

Seeing Sawada Hiroki's "I've given up, do whatever you want" reaction, Orochimaru actually laughed. There was even a hint of... appreciation on his face.

Right, this was the exact reaction—eyes that were clear yet revealed a hint of ignorant stupidity. To be clearly foolish and ignorant, yet able to quickly realize the current situation and make clear, rational judgments.

Only this kind of reaction made him look like a test subject or researcher tortured by secrets and power, yet unable to control them.

Only in this way was Orochimaru willing to conceal Sawada Hiroki's value.

If he were truly an old monster who was meticulous and cautious at every moment, never revealing a single flaw, Orochimaru would instead suspect whether the Sawada Hiroki before him was the reincarnation of the Second Hokage.

As for Sawada Hiroki's answer, Orochimaru didn't care much.

Helping him develop his abilities and understand his knowledge? Didn't that implicitly mean he could easily access the other party's abilities and knowledge?

As long as Orochimaru began to access the other party's knowledge and abilities, with his insight and means, would he still need to worry about how to obtain the Second Hokage's research legacy?

"A wise choice." There was a hint of rare pleasure in Orochimaru's voice.

"But you don't need to fear me, Hiroki-kun." Orochimaru's voice became slightly softer, like a venomous snake enticing its prey to lower its guard. "You will soon know that I will be your best partner."

He paced slowly, circling Sawada Hiroki, his golden snake-like pupils acting like X-rays, seeing through him from the inside out.

"For example, how about I help you perfect this muscle growth experiment of yours? I can provide you with more direct human experimentation. Moreover, I believe you are also very eager to further learn and understand more ninjutsu, right?"

"I remember your ability to copy ninjutsu from others, but after you returned from that incident with the Cloud Ninja, I don't seem to have seen you copy any ninjutsu from anyone."

"I can provide you with more targets for copying ninjutsu here."

"From Cloud Ninja to Iwa Ninja, wandering ninja to Mist Ninja, Sand Ninja to traitors within the village... You don't need to hide or hold back anymore; let your potential be fully unleashed."

"Or, for another example, you might be wondering why your contact-based illusion didn't work when you touched me, even though it worked on Jiraiya's clone? Or perhaps you are thinking about how to improve that contact-based illusion of yours?"

"Believe me, there is nothing that cannot be done here with me." Orochimaru grinned like a python staring at its prey. "In Konoha, there is no ninja who knows more or understands more deeply than I do."

Sawada Hiroki looked at Orochimaru. He wasn't very satisfied with the current situation where the initiative was in Orochimaru's hands, but now that he was the meat on the chopping block, he had no choice but to rely on Orochimaru.

He was helpless. Perhaps, just like that meme—things have reached this point, let's eat first.jpg

He would endure him for now, and once he was well-supplied and prepared, he would make other plans!

Thinking of this, Sawada Hiroki couldn't help but think about what to do next.

"Then, do I still need to go to that training ground tomorrow?" Sawada Hiroki asked Orochimaru in return.

"If you want to go, then go. Tomorrow I will leave a clone there to teach that little girl the basics of Chunin training. If you don't want to go, I can take you to my laboratory now. I believe you can't wait to explore your abilities in depth, right?" Orochimaru licked his lips, looking at Sawada Hiroki.

Chunin basic training, huh?

Sawada Hiroki raised an eyebrow. Was it tree climbing, water walking? What else? Maybe they would even teach a move or two of basic five-element ninjutsu?

Just as he was thinking this, there was a sudden knock on the door.

Sawada Hiroki and Orochimaru looked toward the door in surprise at almost the same time.

"Hiroki, Hiroki! I know how I'm going to get stronger! I'm going to become the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki!!!"