A Way to Heal His Hands

Watching Uchiha Sen's little hands wave nonstop, Orochimaru felt his scalp tingle. After roaming the ninja world for decades, this was the first time he'd encountered someone like this... In his memory, only a freak like Kakuzu could compare.

"Give it to him!"

Orochimaru snorted coldly. If you were asking for help, you needed to act like it. Everything else was fake; once he recovered, he could take back whatever he wanted.

"Yes, Lord Orochimaru. I'll take out the thirty million ryo banknotes right away."

He took a scroll from his satchel. The edge bore the character for three. After confirming it was correct, he handed it to Uchiha Sen.

Smack!

"Hmm? What's this thing?"

Uchiha Sen gave it a look. He'd seen money before, but he couldn't make heads or tails of these two sticks wrapped around a piece of rag.

He casually tossed it to the ground, rage flaring in his chest. His right slipper shot upward from below.

Smack!

Another big slap Kabuto loved so much.

"Are you looking down on me?!"

"You think you can fool me with two sticks wrapped in a piece of rag?!"

"You despicable Muggle native, take this!"

"I'll kick you to death! I'll kick you to death!"

Kabuto was kicked to the ground and desperately shielded his head, not daring to move an inch. This god of slaughter was too terrifying!

"Huff, huff... I'm exhausted..."

Uchiha Sen braced himself on his legs. It looked like he'd worn himself out from the beating.

"Um... Lord Sen... There are thirty million ryo in banknotes inside that scroll..."

Haku seemed to have noticed something too... But he'd just been enjoying watching Uchiha Sen beat Kabuto, and he didn't have a favorable impression of the two men before him either, so he'd kept a little thought to himself. Only after Uchiha Sen was done did he reveal the truth...

"Huh? Really?"

Judging from Uchiha Sen's confused expression, he genuinely seemed not to know that...

"Yes... It's just like how I usually store ingredients and equipment inside scrolls. This scroll contains thirty million ryo in banknotes."

Well, this was awkward...

Sen felt rather embarrassed too. He turned around and glanced at Kabuto lying on the ground... then rubbed his hands together...

A mistaken beating was still a beating. As the greatest warrior on the planet, he would never apologize to a Muggle native.

Orochimaru was growing impatient, but he still forced down his displeasure and said:

"Since there's no issue with the banknotes, Sen... Lord Sen, could you tell me how to restore my hands to their original state?"

That was close. He'd nearly gotten beaten too... The moment the word Sen left his mouth, he could clearly feel the other man's aura change... Heh, the Uchiha Clan's ingrained pride was truly planted deep in their bones. Even Uchiha Sen, whose brain didn't work quite right, was no exception.

Orochimaru muttered inwardly.

"Uh, let me think..."

Sen tried hard to recall the words from the blue prompt panel earlier...

"I remember you got hit by some sealing technique called something-or-other Seal. Anyway, it's a really powerful one..."

Something-or-other Seal?

He'd never heard of it...

Orochimaru was bewildered too...

But he didn't say a word and decided to first hear what this guy had to say.

[It's obvious the host slipped through the cracks of nine-year compulsory education... It's called the Reaper Death Seal!]

"I said it's the something-or-other Seal, so it's the something-or-other Seal! Why do you keep blabbering on?!"

Uchiha Sen's sudden outburst startled Orochimaru...

For that instant, he felt the oppressive sensation of having his inner thoughts seen through...

A few beads of cold sweat trickled down his forehead...

Too terrifying... Could this be one of Uchiha Sen's Mangekyō Sharingan abilities too?

[Fine, fine, I won't say anything, okay? Go ahead and make stuff up all you want.]

"Hmph!"

Sen folded his arms and held his head high, looking like he was the greatest under heaven.

"Um... Lord Sen... Please continue."

Helplessly, Orochimaru could only bite the bullet and speak. That Kabuto was actually lying on the ground pretending to be dead...

Kabuto: I'm lying right here today. Even if you beat me to death, I'm not getting up!

"Don't rush, don't rush. Let me think. You need to find a token. What was it again..."

Uchiha Sen's eyes darted left and right as though he were looking for something... Yet to Orochimaru, it looked as if he were seriously thinking, and the suspicion in his heart lessened somewhat.

Sen's gaze shifted back and forth. Suddenly, he spotted a stack of bricks at the end of the street. That was it!

"That's right, it's a brick. A very special brick, with a human face drawn on it!"

Hearing Sen speak with such certainty and seeing his unwavering expression, Orochimaru followed up:

"What should I do after finding it?"

Kabuto, lying on the ground, pricked up his ears as well.

A brick? With a human face drawn on it?

What the hell was that...

"After you find it..."

Uchiha Sen was stumped for a moment... He seemed to have genuinely forgotten...

But he'd already taken the money. Returning it was impossible—he'd never return it in this lifetime...

"After you find it, split it open! Then your hands will be healed! That's right!"

"And you absolutely have to use your head to split it, or it won't work!"

Hehe, now it's foolproof. No idiot would use his own head to break a brick. That would hurt so much.

Uchiha Sen secretly praised his own brilliance. As for how he knew it hurt... Don't ask. If you asked, he'd say he'd broken one before...

"Really?"

Orochimaru asked skeptically. It was simply too unbelievable. A brick with a human face drawn on it... The search area was a little too broad.

"Of course it's true! What do you rely on when you're out in the world? One word! Trust!"

"Lord Sen's word is his bond. I'd never lie to you! Take someone's money, rid them of their troubles!"

Uchiha Sen spoke with considerable confidence, his hands on his hips in a pose of perfect authority.

Forget it. He'd search while investigating further.

Orochimaru was like that. He would never fully trust anyone, and he always left himself a way out.

"If you're not dead, get up already. The ground is a little cold."

He swept a glance over Kabuto Yakushi on the ground and reminded him coldly.

"Hehehe, Lord Orochimaru, let's be on our way."

Whoosh!

With a leap, the two vanished without a trace.

Haku put away the scroll, walked to Uchiha Sen's side, and asked softly:

"Lord Sen, was everything you said just now true? It sounded to me like..."

"Of course it was true. Taking money and doing the job is only natural."

Uchiha Sen would never admit that he'd been talking nonsense off the cuff. Even in front of Haku, his understanding was simple: Lord Sen knew everything and was invincible beneath the heavens. If he said something and you couldn't understand it, then you were simply too stupid.

What he didn't know was that Orochimaru and Kabuto had merely used the Body Flicker Technique to hide nearby, while constantly watching what was happening here.

"Lord Orochimaru, it seems Uchiha Sen wasn't lying to us..."

Even as Kabuto said this, his heart was pounding with uncertainty...

"Send our subordinates out to search first. At the same time, investigate for clues. We can't completely trust that man's words."

Orochimaru instructed.

Having achieved their purpose, the two swiftly left the Land of Iron and fled to the nearest laboratory.