The visitor hurriedly said to Uchiha Akira, "Akira, Shentian Bio sent me to tell you to go over there. The person in charge wants to see you. It must be something important."
Uchiha Akira looked at Uchiha Mikoto and said, "Mikoto, I'll go over there first."
Mikoto naturally knew what Shentian Bio was working on. "Go ahead. I'll take care of Kushina."
When Uchiha Akira arrived at the Shentian Bio Research Institute, he went straight to Yakushi Nonō's office.
As soon as he entered, his gaze was drawn to a lush green potted plant, roughly fifty or sixty centimeters tall, on her desk.
It was a small tree, with luxuriant leaves and an intense aura of life.
Yakushi Nonō stood nearby, quietly observing the little tree.
"This tree... such a strong aura of life... this is chakra..."
Uchiha Akira instinctively activated his Sharingan. His eyes narrowed, and he looked surprised.
"Jonin Akira." Yakushi Nonō greeted him when he came in.
"You got the branch I gave you to sprout?" Uchiha Akira carefully examined the little tree in the pot.
He hadn't expected Yakushi Nonō to revitalize the Demonic Statue's body tissue and make it sprout again.
"More or less." Yakushi Nonō nodded. Looking at the potted plant on the desk, she said with a strange expression, "Jonin Akira, what you gave me wasn't a branch, was it? It was flesh from some kind of creature, right?"
Uchiha Akira glanced at her and nodded. "That's right. It wasn't a branch, but something made from the flesh of a creature."
After he confirmed it, Yakushi Nonō understood. "No wonder cultivating it with the method used for growing flesh made it sprout and come back to life."
Then Yakushi Nonō glanced toward the door and lowered her voice. "It wasn't made from the First's flesh, was it?"
Uchiha Akira smiled faintly. "No. Don't worry."
"Good." Yakushi Nonō breathed a sigh of relief.
After studying it for the past few days, she couldn't help associating the branch with the First, Senju Hashirama, given all the traits it displayed.
Its powerful vitality, ability to absorb chakra, rapid reproduction, strong healing ability, extreme aggressiveness, and the Wood Release it generated—all of these traits were practically identical to those of the First Senju Hashirama's cells, as far as she knew.
"Why did you think it was made from the First's flesh? Are its properties similar to those of his flesh?" Uchiha Akira asked curiously.
"It's more than just similar." Yakushi Nonō gave a wry smile. "When I began studying it, I even suspected that it was the First's body tissue, mutated."
"So its properties are the same as those of the First's flesh?" Uchiha Akira looked at her in surprise.
"I wouldn't say they're the same." Yakushi Nonō thought for a moment. "I took part in the First's cell-transplant experiments at Root. This is more like an enhanced version of the First's cells."
"So the flesh I gave you is even stronger than the First's cells?" Uchiha Akira asked, as if making sure.
"That's basically how you could put it." Yakushi Nonō nodded. "Of course, we haven't fully studied it yet. Judging by the traits it's shown so far, it does seem to be a more powerful version of the First's cells."
Uchiha Akira said thoughtfully, "So if someone successfully transplanted these cells, they could gain Wood Release?"
"In theory, yes." Yakushi Nonō nodded, then cautioned him, "But given their properties, they're even harder to transplant than the First's cells."
"I've also conducted transplant experiments with them, using animals as test subjects. Every single one failed, without exception," Yakushi Nonō continued.
Yakushi Nonō's tone grew solemn. "More importantly, these are only the results of our preliminary research. This thing has more properties than the ones it has shown us. There are many others still hidden."
Uchiha Akira slowly nodded. He knew why Yakushi Nonō was telling him all this.
She wanted to stop Uchiha Akira from venturing into forbidden practices, like Konoha had once done by conducting human experiments to obtain Wood Release.
As the most prominent clan in Konoha, the Uchiha Clan controlled the Police Force. If they truly conducted human experiments in secret, they could keep them hidden for a long time.
Just then, Uchiha Akira stared at the little green tree on the desk with his scarlet Sharingan and said gravely, "Isn't it growing a little fast?"
In the short time they'd been talking, the little tree in the pot had shot up by more than ten centimeters. It was growing even faster than bamboo.
Hearing him, Yakushi Nonō quickly turned toward the desk. She let out a surprised cry. "It wasn't growing this fast before. What's going on?"
"There's more chakra in the tree now, and it's gathering near the top. Where is this chakra coming from?"
Uchiha Akira murmured softly, as if he'd thought of something. "Maybe it's about to flower and bear fruit."
"Flower and bear fruit?" Yakushi Nonō looked at Uchiha Akira in confusion, unsure how he'd reached that conclusion.
Though puzzled, Yakushi Nonō didn't stop moving. Green light glowed in her hand as she pressed it against the trunk to sense what was happening.
But the instant her glowing hand touched the trunk, the green chakra seemed to be pulled into an invisible vortex and swallowed. It vanished completely.
Yakushi Nonō cried out and hastily pulled her hand back, staring at the little tree in the pot in alarm and muttering,
"It could absorb chakra before, but nothing like this..."
"Let's wait and see." Uchiha Akira stopped Yakushi Nonō from doing anything else.
At his words, Yakushi Nonō lowered her hand. At the Shentian Bio Research Institute, Uchiha Akira was the one in charge.
One minute, two minutes...
Ten minutes passed, and the little tree in the pot had grown to about a meter tall.
At the top of its leafy trunk, a dark purple flower bud the size of a fist appeared.
As time passed, the purple bud slowly opened, finally revealing a dark red fruit about the size of a baby's fist.
The fruit was dark red all over, and black tomoe-shaped lines shimmered faintly across its surface.
Seeing the dark red fruit at the top of the tree, Yakushi Nonō looked at Uchiha Akira in astonishment. "It really flowered and bore fruit!"
Uchiha Akira wasn't very surprised. He looked at Yakushi Nonō. "Study what this fruit does. It might have some unusual properties."
Of course, he didn't think it was a real God Tree Fruit. That was obviously impossible.
This was merely something cultivated from a piece of the Demonic Statue's body tissue that had fallen off.
If the Nine Tailed Beasts' chakra were poured into this sapling and it flowered and bore fruit again, perhaps the fruit would have some of the characteristics of a Chakra Fruit.
For now, it was just some kind of fruit with special effects.
Before you continue