Zetsu's First Appearance

"Thank you for saving us, little brother," Konan said first, her voice bright and clear. At this point, she hadn't yet suffered Yahiko's death or Nagato's disability. She looked a little fierce and tired, but her eyes were clear. Judging by them, she must have been happy to be living with Yahiko and Nagato.

As one of the few beauties in Naruto, and with her impressive strength, Konan had always been popular. Her abilities had always been a mystery. As Pain's partner, many people believed he was teamed up with her to protect her, and that Konan only occasionally fought, always retreating as soon as she struck.

The only time Konan had fought at full strength was against Masked Obito. Her display of power had shocked many people. In the end, she'd forced Obito to sacrifice one eye and use the Uchiha Clan's ultimate forbidden technique—Izanagi—to turn all the explosions into illusions. Afterward, just as Konan thought Obito was dead, he stabbed her from behind with a black rod. That was how she died.

Without Izanagi, Obito would have died. Just think of how Madara had escaped death at the First Hokage's hands thanks to Izanagi.

"Little brother." Konan called again to Ye Wuji, who was still lost in thought.

"Ah. It's nothing. It was the right thing to do," Ye Wuji replied.

"Regardless, we still have to thank you." This time, it was Yahiko who spoke, his tone casual and easygoing. Ye Wuji didn't know much about Yahiko, after all, he'd died rather early.

"I think we should leave here first. Someone else might come by, and whoever it is, we'll be in danger then," Yahiko said.

Ye Wuji showed no reaction, but inwardly he thought, No wonder Yahiko became the leader of Akatsuki. He has a good grasp of the big picture.

Seeing that Ye Wuji didn't react, Yahiko and the others didn't mind. After all, Ye Wuji was still so young. How much could a six-year-old understand?

Konan and Nagato nodded. "Then let's see if these people have anything we need. Hey, kid—what's your name? Never mind, there's no time for that now. We'll teach you how to search the bodies of these ninjas. Remember one thing: never touch them directly." After saying this, Yahiko and Nagato went to search the bodies. Konan stayed behind. She probably wasn't suited to this sort of thing, at least in the eyes of Yahiko and Nagato.

With only Konan beside him, Ye Wuji was about to say something when he suddenly felt something tugging at his leg. Looking down, he saw the dog from before behind him, holding his pant leg in its teeth. When it noticed him looking, it let go and barked a few times, as if to say, "I'm right here."

Before Ye Wuji could do anything, Konan had already picked up the dog. Then she said to him, "By the way, I should thank you for saving Hua, too."

The dog was brownish-yellow, with a coat of just one color. Ye Wuji wondered how anyone could tell that its name was Hua. But he said, "How did you know I'd seen this dog?"

"That's easy." Konan pointed at Hua's hind leg. "The bandage here is the same color as your clothes. Actually, Hua was the one who saved us. She must have led you here." Konan played with the dog in her arms as she spoke.

Ye Wuji nearly fell over. Just like that, the credit for saving them had gone to the dog. He was about to say something when Yahiko's voice rang out again. "Hey, kid over there! Stop standing around and come help. You need to learn this too. Hurry!"

Nagato's voice followed. "Yeah, hurry up. Don't just stand there talking." Ye Wuji heard a hint of hostility in Nagato's voice. When he looked over at the two of them, he saw them both watching him, with anger flaring in Nagato's eyes.

Seriously? Is he jealous? That's ridiculous. I only exchanged a couple of words with Konan. Keep this up, and don't think I won't go after her when I grow up. I'll steal your girl, and then we'll see what you do. With that thought, Ye Wuji slowly walked over to Yahiko and Nagato. He'd finally gotten the chance to talk to the idol-like Konan, only for them to interrupt him. Unforgivable!

"These are yours." Yahiko pointed to Caobu, lying on the ground, and the two henchmen beside him. Ye Wuji hadn't expected them to finish so quickly. Had they done this sort of thing for a living? Come to think of it, Akatsuki had started out with just a few people. Had they built it up by doing this?

"Remember, you generally shouldn't touch a dead person's body with your bare hands. Use a kunai or something else to start with. If you need to handle anything directly, wear gloves, and check the places where ninjas usually store things. They need their gear too, so they rarely hide it somewhere hard to find. Of course, that doesn't apply to anything special.

"Touch the body first with a kunai or something else, in case there are traps on it. Wear gloves to protect yourself from poison. These are the basics. You do it first, and we'll guide you. Still, your traps were pretty well set up. All three of these men were killed by those kunai. I didn't expect someone your age to be so capable." Under Yahiko and Nagato's guidance, Ye Wuji collected some money from the three bodies, along with two notebooks, several kunai and shuriken, some pills, and a few senbon. Yahiko and Nagato watched him work without helping. It seemed they'd only called him away from Konan for that reason; they could have searched all three bodies themselves in no time.

But when Yahiko praised his traps, Ye Wuji was taken aback. He looked at the three ninjas killed by his traps, though on the surface he only glanced at the bodies on the ground. When Yahiko praised him, he kept nodding along.

"Enough. We're short on time. Remember, if you have time, take care of the bodies too. Let's move." With that, Yahiko and Nagato quickly gathered their things and led Ye Wuji off in the other direction.

Not long after Ye Wuji left, a figure slowly appeared in the tree where he'd first hidden himself. It looked as if it were growing out of the trunk.

"What a strange kid," said a low voice. Then another voice spoke, light and playful. "Yeah, he really is strange. How did he manage to coordinate with Nagato like that? How did he know Nagato would go along with him, and that Nagato could pull it off? It's really strange."

"You're overthinking it. It was just a coincidence," the first, low voice replied.

"That's true. I was just thinking about how to help them without drawing their attention when someone came along and messed things up. I guess he helped us out, in a way." The second voice, the playful one, spoke again.

As the two voices continued, a figure stood where Ye Wuji had been hiding. Only when he had fully emerged from the tree could his appearance be seen clearly. Two enormous, upright leaves with jagged edges extended from his body and could fold around his head. His body was divided symmetrically from head to toe, one side white and the other black. He looked utterly bizarre, and though he was clearly one person, two distinct voices came from him. If Ye Wuji had seen him, he would have been shocked. This was Zetsu.

Zetsu stood where Ye Wuji had been. "Did you find anything?" asked the playful voice—that is, White Zetsu.

"Just an ordinary kid. He seems to have only started training recently, and his chakra is pitifully low. Hm, that's interesting," Black Zetsu said. He'd sounded indifferent at first, but then seemed to notice something.

"Is there something special about that kid? Not many things can interest you," White Zetsu said curiously.

"Nothing much. He just has an affinity for all chakra natures. It may be a little late to have found him," Black Zetsu replied unhurriedly.

"Oh, in that case, we can keep an eye on him. We could keep him in reserve," White Zetsu said when he heard about the all-nature affinity.

"There's no need. People with an affinity for all chakra natures are rare, but we can still find a few if we look. But so far, he seems to be the only one capable of bearing that thing. The others don't seem to be suitable," Black Zetsu said.

"That's true. It's not something an ordinary person can bear. After so many experiments, we finally found someone suitable. So, can we begin the plan? We've waited so long. I can hardly contain my excitement," White Zetsu said eagerly.

As he spoke, White Zetsu added, "You were so discreet when you stepped in earlier. Those guys will never figure out how they died. The others are probably congratulating themselves on their good luck right now. Still, it's a good thing that kid showed up at the end; otherwise, we might have exposed ourselves too soon. Not that it would matter if we were exposed, but that Yahiko seems to have sensed something. He's been testing the waters lately."

"Don't worry about it. Maybe he's just doing something of his own. We only need to take care of our own business. All right, let's clean up these traces. They're at a stage where they need time to grow, and we have things to do as well," Black Zetsu said.

"Shouldn't we keep watching him? If something happens to him, that could be a problem," White Zetsu said.

"People have to go through things to grow, don't they? If something happens to him, that's his problem. And perhaps he has other plans. We already know where that person is. We can go find him."

"All right. If that's what you say, then that's what we'll do. But are you sure we shouldn't do anything about that kid with an affinity for all chakra natures? Those kids are hard to find. Shouldn't we take control of him first?"

"There's no need. He's just one kid. There's no point wasting our efforts on him. By the time Nagato grows up, he'll be grown too. Besides, if we wanted to find him, do you think he could get away from us?"

"That's true." As their conversation faded, Zetsu slowly sank back into the tree. Once he had fully disappeared into it, there was no sign that anyone had ever been there.

After Zetsu disappeared, the distinctive toothed leaves slowly emerged from beneath the Mist Ninja corpses. They appeared beneath every single body. As the leaves rose, the sound of chewing came from them, sending chills down the spine. Before long, the leaves sank back into the ground, and the Mist Ninja bodies were all gone.

Now, aside from the signs of a battle, there was nothing else to see. Zetsu had destroyed all the evidence and clues.