The three of them pushed the Life-Support Pod into the base, and Boruto was immediately captivated by what he saw.
Transparent observation windows lined both sides of the corridor. Beyond them stood neat rows of workbenches covered with precision instruments, mechanical arms, and puppet components being assembled or tested.
Holographic blueprints floated in some rooms, streams of data cascading like waterfalls. In others, swarms of miniature robots worked together on delicate welding and engraving.
The air carried faint traces of ozone, lubricating oil, and some kind of cleaning agent—a far cry from the smell of hospital disinfectant.
"Whoa..." Boruto could hardly take it all in. It reminded him of the one time he had visited the base of Mitsuki's father, Orochimaru.
Both places were filled with technology far ahead of their time, but their styles could not have been more different. Orochimaru's base had always felt organic, faintly eerie, and pulsing with life, with culture tanks and biological tissue samples everywhere.
Sasori's base, by contrast, was a kingdom of machinery, electronics, and data. Everything carried the chill of metal and the precision of logic.
They boarded a silent Hover Platform and soon reached an enormous Main Laboratory deep inside the base.
It looked like a cross between a high-tech factory and a research center. Beneath a dome more than ten meters high stood the frames of several large mechs, each a different model at a different stage of assembly.
Mechanical arms moved deftly through the air, welding, applying paint, and laying wiring.
In a relatively tidy area at the center of the laboratory, someone stood with his back to them before a Holographic Console. His fingers swept rapidly across it, adjusting a complex cutaway view of a mech's internal structure.
He had striking short red hair, wore a crisp white