Sen held the kunai, a little dirt still clinging to it.
He rubbed it twice against his dusty trouser leg.
Mud and sweat had stiffened the fabric there, making it scrape against his hand.
After absorbing the two Hokages' chakra, he felt... how could he put it?
Like he had chugged ten bottles of ice-cold concentrated black coffee in one go.
His belly felt like an active volcano about to erupt, scorching hot and violent.
He let out a burp with a faint earthy smell.
Even his breath seemed to carry a rich surge of green energy.
Sen turned around.
He slowly walked to the edge of the deep crater smashed out by the tree roots.
Orochimaru lay sprawled among the shattered bricks and tiles like a stone-dead loach.
Branches had shredded his purple clothes.
They were covered in dark red blood and green tree sap, giving off a nauseating stench of decay.
His neck was still slightly crooked, and his ragged breathing sounded like broken bellows.
Sen looked down at him.
An irritatingly smug smile curled his lips.
"Freak."
Sen tapped the tip of his kunai against a stone at the crater's edge, producing a crisp ring.
"Those two impressive bodyguards of yours are scraps of paper now."
"Now it's time to settle things between us."
Orochimaru lay on his back at the bottom of the crater.
As he watched the scraps of paper still drifting through the air, the last trace of pride and confidence in his golden snake eyes.
Shattered completely.
The muscles in his pale face twitched uncontrollably.
His mental defenses collapsed in an instant, like a sandcastle struck by a tsunami.
He had poured half a lifetime of effort into it.
He had dug up countless graves and performed endless experiments on human bodies.
Only