I Have No Interest in You

Compared to the Land of Lightning, the national character of the Land of Wind is largely determined by its environment.

Living in the desert, the people of the wind possess a dual nature in their national character.

On the one hand, they are used to hard work and difficult living conditions, and they are used to a lonely life. They don't have many demands, and they are unruly and unwilling to submit to each other.

On the other hand, they can be considered innocent and simple, pure in nature, and without any distorted mentality.

Sunagakure amplifies both of these traits.

If the Cloud Village has a warrior complex, then the Sand Ninja is inherently barbaric and the most difficult group to manage. Sand ninjas are rough in their actions, have strong self-esteem, and at the same time have great ambitions and a strong desire for power, making it difficult for them to reach a consensus on their interests.

The Kazekage Building had been arguing for days about the format of the first exam. Even Rasa's banging on the table was no use; these people were so engrossed in their argument that they didn't care about family ties.

The Sand Ninja proposed many solutions, but none of them involved sitting in a classroom doing exercises.

Sunagakure doesn't have a secretarial position.

Leaf Village did this to test the candidates' intelligence gathering abilities and their mindset when faced with seemingly impossible tasks, but written tests were clearly not something the Sand Ninja preferred.

The first exam in Sunagakure was very much in line with the characteristics of the Wind Village.

They carved out a desert area for the test takers to go in and have fun.

Each group of candidates carries a piece of intelligence containing a partial route, which they are required to analyze.

Teams that reach the destination within the allotted time qualify.

It's extremely simple and brutal.

For the participants from Sand Village, there is undoubtedly a geographical advantage, but that's about all the advantage they have.

After all, they were just a bunch of Genin. The Land of Wind is so vast, and they couldn't have had their fun in every desert.

It would be unreasonable for the host country to have no advantage at all.

For the Genin of Leaf Village, the desert environment was indeed quite unfamiliar. During the Third Shinobi World War, when Leaf Village fought against Sand Village was on the offensive and Leaf Village was on the defensive and counter-attacking side. They did not enter the territory of the Land of Wind. This was the first time these Genin had ever seen a real desert in their lives.

Fortunately, the Leaf Village cultural curriculum also includes courses on desert survival, so they weren't completely without any background knowledge.

As a former member of the Wind Clan, Pakura also gave them a make-up lesson.

On the day of the exam, the participating teams from each village, led by the Sand Ninja, entered the desert one by one through the endless yellow sand.

"What do you think?" Uchiha Shingen asked Pakura, watching the Leaf Village Genin teams heading into the desert. "Are they up to it?"

"It depends on luck," Pakura said. "Even native residents of the Land of Wind could get lost in the desert without sufficient preparation. But with the Sand Ninja keeping an eye on things, any unlucky souls will be disqualified from the exam."

"Hmm." Uchiha Shingen stopped looking and said to Pakura, "Let's go, it'll take several days. Let's get to our destination first."

Pakura nodded, and he Uchiha Shingen turned and left.

Hatake Kakashi was already waiting ahead.

"This exam still has many talented people." Pakura thought of Deidara from Iwagakure, who left a deep impression on her. "Like that Deidara you captured."

"Both he and Kimimaro are over the limit. Releasing them at such a young age to undermine others' confidence is really cruel of the Tsuchikage and Mizukage," sighed Uchiha Shingen.

However, he could understand Ōnoki and Karatachi Yagura's thoughts.

Iwagakure has always been considered by other villages to have no successors.

Let's not even talk about Kirigakure; everyone thinks they'll ruin themselves.

Sending these two geniuses was also to restore their reputation.

Whether it's Deidara's explosive clay Ninjutsu or Kimimaro's Shikotsumyaku, they are practically unsolvable at the Genin level.

During this time, the Genin from the three villages got to know each other a bit and built some relationships. Otherwise, Uchiha Shingen worried that someone in his team might have gone so far as to pick a fight with those two.

Kimimaro, in particular, had no concept of holding back.

His way of making friends is probably, "If this bone didn't kill you, we're destined to be friends."

I wonder who will be lucky enough to be his good friend in the future.

As the team of ninjas, including Uchiha Shingen, gathered at their destination, the killing game in the desert officially began.

Characters like Deidara and Kimimaro, who are outside the norm, are young but have a wealth of combat experience and high skill levels, making them very comfortable in their element.

However, the Rain Village team seemed ill-suited to the format of the Joint Chunin Exams, and they were nearly wiped out shortly after the start.

As a village that emphasizes individual combat strength, Rain Village (Genin) are quite powerful. Most Genin level know a few basic ninjutsu techniques, but the problem is that they primarily rely on Water Release.

If you let those Genin Water Release in the desert, they'll only be able to grow some wildflowers.

In the original timeline, the Rain Ninja went to Leaf Village to participate in the group's exams, where they encountered Gaara.

This time, all of Rain Village's teams encountered Kimimaro, and after being beaten so badly by the skeleton boy that they wouldn't recognize their own mothers, they ran into a kid playing in the mud.

Ever since that incident in the Land of Grass, Deidara has had a particular dislike for ninjas from small countries.

He wasn't too polite to Rain Ninja.

However, apart from Rain Village unlucky Amegakure, the other village teams weren't so unlucky.

For example, the people from Kusagakure were very clever; as soon as they saw the Iwagakure group from afar, they immediately ran away.

After all, Deidara had publicly declared that he would kill all the Kusagakure Genin.

His declaration was even praised by Kitsuchi, who said that he had demonstrated the spirit of Iwagakure.

In the desert, the Sand Ninja, dispatched to monitor the examination site, coldly watched the examinees fight each other, showing no favoritism even to the Genin from their own village.

Meanwhile, those who had been hiding in the shadows also began their activities.

Chapter Thirty-Three: I Have No Interest in You

A sand dune rises slightly from a stretch of yellow sand.

The sand grains slowly fell, revealing their true form.

This was a hunched, ugly, and slovenly-dressed man who picked his feet.

No, picking at his feet is unnecessary, because you can't see his feet at all.

This is not the true form.

Sasori of the Red Sand was his former name.

Through the Hiruko, Scorpion gazed at the familiar desert before him, and a slight ripple seemed to stir within his icy heart.

That's all.

[That old hag, she's really keeping a close watch on things...]

Sasori of the Red Sand, the most rebellious uncle in Sand Village has already passed his thirties, is not very happy.

Born into a family of puppeteers, Sasori was hailed as possessing the highest level of puppetry skills ever seen in the history of Sand Village's Puppet Technique system. When he left, Sand Village's Puppet Technique paled in comparison.

But in Scorpion's mind, such an evaluation is nothing.

Even a fart makes a sound.

Scorpion doesn't ask for much from his life, just two things.

First, don't make him wait.

Secondly, no one should stop him from pursuing eternal beauty.

It wasn't because of the art of Human Puppet that they pursued eternal beauty; rather, they developed Human Puppet incidentally in pursuit of eternal beauty.

In this respect, he and Orochimaru are the same kind of people.

Orochimaru's aim was to obtain the truth and incidentally research Ninjutsu.

But Sasori and Orochimaru don't get along.

Scorpion still can't get over it; why did Pain recruit such an ugly guy?

Although Orochimaru is indeed capable and is also a fan of Eternal, if someone doesn't like you, they just don't like you.

He seeks eternal beauty, not eternal ugliness.

It's incredibly irritating to have such an eternal ugliness constantly swirling around in front of you.

This is a stain on his art!

[With so many great materials, we can't miss out...]

With that thought in mind, Scorpion manipulated Hiruko to begin moving forward slowly.

When he left Sunagakure, he also took most of the exquisite puppets he had meticulously crafted with him.

Except for the pair we made when we were kids.

Art cannot tolerate fussiness and sentimentality.

Meaningless bonds must be severed.

However, severing the ties was not as easy as he thought. To do so, he replaced his body and mind with those of a puppet, but a piece of flesh and blood remained within him, and his unbearable past still tried to influence him.

If he doesn't sever ties, his heart will have nowhere to rest.

So he came, this time both to gather materials and to sever all ties completely.

Becoming enemies allows one to quickly and decisively regain peace.

Scorpion has already chosen his first ingredient.

Hidden Mist Village is a really nice place. I should visit the Land of Water sometime.

Hiruko left a mark on the ground, which was then covered by the wind and sand.

The desert is the home ground of the Sand Village.

This is also the home turf of the Sasori of the Red Sand, where his puppets can exert their greatest effect, and the sandstorm is his good partner.

If we were to pinpoint the only weakness after becoming Human Puppet, it would probably be that, due to the reduction in flesh and blood, the amount of Chakra is not as much as before.

However, freed from the constraints of flesh and blood, its manipulability was greatly enhanced; otherwise, it wouldn't have been able to detect the Konoha Ninja's trick and perform a substitution.

This is no easy feat; the opponent's methods are exceptionally skillful, truly outstanding among all the people Scorpion has ever encountered.

Hidden in the sandstorm, the scorpion slowly approached its target.

That was a team from the Hidden Mist Village.

As Hiruko's distinctive features emerged from the sandstorm, they immediately caught the attention of the Mist Ninja team.

A Shuriken was thrust Hiruko's face. With a metallic clang, the Shuriken was swept into the sand by its iron tail.

The Mist Ninja also clearly saw who had come.

"That's really good..."

Scorpion was very satisfied; the abilities of these three people could be incorporated into the Hundred Machines.

The drawback of Human Puppet is that they cannot restore the strength of the "material" in life, but that applies to experts. Restoring strength was never the goal in the first place.

The key is to acquire the abilities of the "materials" in their previous life. The technique of creating Human Puppet is to allow puppets to acquire natural abilities and compensate for their weakness of relying too much on mechanisms, not to allow a certain master to use them as a puppeteer.

Therefore, those who possess bloodline limits are the best "materials".

Poison needles mingled with the sandstorm, and several Genin were brought down without any chance of resistance.

"Very good... very good..."

The scorpion moved over and looked at the materials that had collapsed to the ground with the eyes of someone appraising a treasure.

The secret to creating Human Puppet lies in making the materials retain Chakra.

The longer the time after death, the less is preserved, until nothing remains.

Conversely, if it is made from a living person, then the original abilities can be preserved 100%.

Just like what the scorpion did to itself.

Are Human Puppet cruel? Inhumane?

Was it violence against someone? Was it for torture?

Scorpion said that when he turned himself into Human Puppet, it was painful, but he gained even more pleasure.

Therefore, this is the difference between having an aspiration for art and not having one.

As an artist, Scorpion respects every artist, even his enemies.