The Resonance of the Cursed Seal and Baishi's Remote Analysis

The Hokage's Office, the predawn darkness beyond the shattered window frame as thick as ink.

The air still retained the dusty scent of wood shavings, the sweet, coppery tang of dried blood, and the fragrance Kushina had left behind—a wild, resentful scent that had yet to fully dissipate.

Baishi sat in the Hokage's seat, his expression utterly undisturbed.

His fingers lightly tapped the broad desktop at irregular intervals, producing soft knock, knock sounds that rang exceptionally clearly through the deathly silent room.

There was no Water Mirror before him, nor any surveillance footage.

Only an ancient-looking Communication Scroll belonging to the ANBU lay spread across the desk, emitting an extremely faint crackle of electrical static.

Just now, this Scroll had faithfully transmitted every sound from the "war of attrition" in the Forest of Death.

The ANBU's reports, the monster's roars, the thunder of Explosive Tags detonating in succession... and finally, a completely different shriek, one mixed with boundless pain and venomous hatred.

"It seems the bait's scent is even stronger than I imagined."

Baishi muttered under his breath, the corner of his mouth curling into a cold sneer laced with pure intellectual superiority.

His eyes were slightly closed, as if he were using a higher level of perception to "listen" to the chaotic and wicked Chakra resonance drifting from the Scroll.

In his perceptual world, that Chakra was like a filthy substance made by haphazardly mixing inferior ink with rotting flesh.

Violent, impure, and filled with an unstable sense of impending loss of control.

Yet at the core of that filth was an extremely faint but utterly pure strand of cold, gloomy energy, like a Fire Fly in the night, stubbornly marking its own existence.

That was Orochimaru's unique "scent."

*How interesting... Hojo Tokugawa, that fool, thinks he released a