Uzuiki's Defeat

When had Uzuki been discovered?

Perhaps he had been found out from the very beginning.

[Ping~]

[New WiFi signal detected: "Uzuki_Yakushi Taro." Signal strength: Medium. Connect?]

|20:13:45||"Orochimaru... Jiro... That bastard, I'm going to kill him!"|

|20:13:46||"Who's that kid? Sawada Hiroki? He was mentioned in the intelligence reports... Something's not right. What if the rumors are true?"|→|20:13:46||"Who's that kid? Sawada Hiroki? He was mentioned in the intelligence reports... Something's not right. What if the rumors are true?... No way they're true! How could they be? He's the top sensory ninja under Lord Danzo!"|

|20:13:57||"I have to stay calm and observe the situation first. I can't act rashly..."|→|20:13:57||"I have to stay calm and observe the situation first. I can't act rashly... Damn it! Looking at Jiro like that, there's no way I can stay calm!"|

[Folder: Assassination and Stealth Techniques]

--[Folder: Combat Ninjutsu]:

[File: Ninjutsu-Shadow Clone Technique.exe]

[File: Basic Taijutsu Insights.dat]

[File: Wind Release: Vacuum Sphere (Second only to Lord Danzo!).exe]

[File: Chakra Scalpel.exe]

[File: Chakra Nature Transformation (Wind Release), from Beginner to Ultimate Master.zip]

[Calculating required time and storage space...]

[5 files in total, total size: 83.5 MB]

[Copying files from another computer (Uzuki), D Drive (Memory Disk), to My Computer (Sawada Hiroki), D Drive (Memory Disk): Ninjutsu Backup_Uzuki]

|File name|Size|Estimated time|

|Ninjutsu-Shadow Clone Technique.exe|8.5 MB|About 8 minutes 30 seconds|

|Basic Taijutsu Insights.dat|2.0 MB|About 2 minutes|

|Wind Release: Vacuum Sphere (Second only to Lord Danzo!).exe|9.8 MB|About 9 minutes 45 seconds|

|Chakra Scalpel.exe|13.2 MB|About 13 minutes 12 seconds|

|Chakra Nature Transformation (Wind Release), from Beginner to Ultimate Master.zip|50.0 MB|About 50 minutes|

|Total|83.5 MB|About 1 hour 23 minutes 27 seconds|

Hiroki had noticed Uzuki the moment his unique WiFi name appeared among the available WiFi networks.

"Uzuki_Yakushi Taro."

Anyone could tell at a glance that it wasn't the name of a normal person. Other people usually just used their names for their WiFi signals. Even Orochimaru's WiFi signal didn't have a prefix.

But this guy...

He even had a nickname in it!?

That meant Hiroki had to take a good look at what was going through his head.

And when he did, he actually found something.

A ninja who had received Danzo's approval to come see what Orochimaru was up to.

That left Hiroki a little puzzled.

Had Orochimaru withheld information about himself from Danzo?

But that was something he could think about after taking care of Uzuki.

Right now, the priority was testing the Shadow Clone's strength.

With countless prompts guiding him, Hiroki's Shadow Clone calmly handled Uzuki.

In the end, it deleted the contents of Uzuki's mental cache, then landed a Vacuum Sphere squarely on him.

A Root ninja had been defeated and beaten in an instant.

If Hiroki had wanted to kill him, he could have pierced his brain or heart.

As Uzuki fell, Hiroki slowly let out a breath and dispelled the Shadow Clone.

Uzuki wasn't dead yet. He was struggling to save himself with Medical Ninjutsu.

Hiroki left him alone.

He was reviewing what he had gained from the fight.

First, the trick of "writing code" in someone else's brain really worked.

As long as the other person initially underestimated him and didn't regard him with enough hostility or set their defenses against him to the maximum, he could act like a hacker and make a few changes in their mental cache, throwing their thoughts into disarray.

That was the most cautious way to put it. In fact, Hiroki hadn't yet encountered anyone whose mental cache required administrator privileges.

In theory, even Orochimaru ought to be someone he could kill with a single strike—but unfortunately, Hiroki had never connected to Orochimaru's WiFi under normal circumstances.

And that was where this method's limitations showed.

It relied far too heavily on the other person's "WiFi" signal. Hiroki could only wait for someone to sense him first, which was a bit like waiting for a rabbit to run into a tree stump. It wasn't proactive enough. And if he ran into someone like Orochimaru, who could send him a Genjutsu through the "WiFi," the trick would be completely useless.

Second, the Shadow Clone Technique was practically made for him.

Just now, Hiroki's Shadow Clone had been modifying Uzuki's thoughts while his real body downloaded files.

The two tasks had hardly interfered with each other, effectively doubling his efficiency.

It felt... like running a studio all by himself, with several unpaid intern slaves to help out! And he'd only just started enjoying the benefits of the Shadow Clone Technique. Hiroki could hardly imagine what else his Shadow Clones might help him with in the future!

No wonder it was the Hokage world's most overpowered jutsu!

Finally, there was Orochimaru.

Even now, Hiroki had no idea what he was thinking, how he had forcibly connected to Hiroki's WiFi, or how he had sensed Uzuki without a WiFi signal appearing.

"Clatter."

The sound of a recording pen hitting the floor interrupted Hiroki's thoughts.

He looked up and saw that all the researchers in white coats around him stood frozen, mouths agape, staring at him with blank expressions.

The researcher closest to him, a bespectacled man, adjusted his glasses before they could slip off. His lips trembled as if he wanted to say something, but all that came out was an incoherent "Uh..."

Another researcher, somewhat older, looked from Uzuki to Hiroki, then rubbed his eyes hard, as if he couldn't believe what he was seeing.

"Who... is this?" one researcher asked, looking at Orochimaru in disbelief.

Another researcher murmured, "He learned it in an instant, and already knows how to use it!? He even knows how to unleash it in battle... That's terrifying..."

That researcher knew full well that learning a jutsu of this caliber usually took at least ten days or half a month. Even managing to learn how to use it within six months would make someone a prodigy!

But Hiroki had copied it and learned it in just a few minutes—and even figured out how to use it!

No, that wasn't all!

More importantly, he remembered the chakra test Hiroki had undergone earlier, as well as the rumors from before that!

Hiroki didn't have Lightning Release Chakra! So how had he used Lightning Style: False Darkness!? The researcher was so curious that he could hardly stop himself from dissecting Hiroki right then and there to figure out how he had done it.

Their gazes were so feverish that Hiroki instinctively turned his face away and looked at Orochimaru, who was watching him with an amused expression.

"Orochimaru-sensei," Hiroki asked, "what should we do with this guy?"

Orochimaru shifted his gaze from Hiroki to Uzuki, who was still clinging to life on the ground. A trace of cold disgust flashed through his golden, slit-pupiled eyes.

Compared to a valuable target like Hiroki, his colleague from the Root was utterly uninteresting.

"Leave him alone for now. I'll deal with him later." Orochimaru glanced at Uzuki, then looked at Hiroki and suddenly asked, "Hiroki, do you know why the Third made me the teacher of you and Uzumaki Kushina? Do you know what he wants me to teach you? And do you want to know who your last teammate is?"