Hashirama Reagent, Version 1.3

On the examination bed.

The moment the restraints clicked shut, Tsunade felt cold metal against her wrists and ankles.

Orochimaru took out the reagent and swabbed a vein on the inside of Tsunade's arm with alcohol.

"Injecting."

The needle pierced her skin.

Cool liquid spread through her veins like a tiny snake swimming toward her heart.

For the first three seconds, she felt nothing.

On the fourth, Tsunade's pupils contracted sharply.

Heat erupted from her heart, as though she had been thrown into a pool of magma.

Every blood vessel swelled. Every cell screamed.

"Urgh..."

Tsunade gritted her teeth, veins bulging across her forehead.

Orochimaru immediately turned and snatched up his notebook and pen.

His eyes locked on the numbers jumping across the instrument's screen beside him.

"Heart rate: one hundred forty... one hundred sixty... Chakra concentration in the blood is rising rapidly... Cell division Speed is thirty times the normal rate..."

He recorded the figures at breakneck Speed, his grin growing wider.

"Perfect. Even better than I expected—"

Bang!!

The iron door flew off its hinges under a kick.

Jiraiya charged in like a mad lion, his white hair standing on end.

"Orochimaru!! You sick bastard!!! Let Tsunade go!!!"

The pen fell from Orochimaru's hand with a clatter.

He turned, his expression shifting instantly from elation to blank shock.

"Jiraiya? How did you—"

"Don't play dumb!"

Jiraiya rushed to the examination bed.

He saw Tsunade strapped down, drenched in sweat and clearly in pain.

The last thread of his self-control snapped.

"You tied Tsunade up! You injected her with some mystery liquid! What the hell did you do to her?!"

Orochimaru: "..."

He instinctively took half a step back, looking somewhat guilty.

It really was a legitimate experiment, but the scene... from an outsider's perspective...

It was easy to get the wrong idea.

"Let me explain—"

"I'm not listening! Not listening! Not listening!"

Jiraiya lunged toward the bed, reaching to undo Tsunade's restraints.

"Stop!!"

Orochimaru's face changed. He darted forward and grabbed Jiraiya's wrist.

"You can't touch her right now!"

"What did you say?!"

Jiraiya rounded on Orochimaru and flung his hand away.

"You're telling me I can't touch her? You've touched her plenty! Tied her up plenty!"

A vein throbbed at Orochimaru's temple.

"Idiot! The reagent inside her is at a critical stage of integration! Any outside interference could make it fail!"

"You think I'd believe a man who tied a woman to a bed?!"

Jiraiya formed hand signs.

Orochimaru's pupils shrank, and he formed signs too.

"Ninja Art: Wild Lion's Mane!"

"Hidden Shadow Snake Hands!"

White strands of hair shot out like steel needles, while dozens of black snakes burst from Orochimaru's sleeves.

They tangled in midair.

Hair shredded snakes; fangs bit through strands.

The two erupted into battle inside the cramped laboratory.

Instruments toppled, glass bottles shattered, and chemicals spilled across the floor.

The experimental setup Orochimaru had painstakingly assembled was being destroyed before his eyes at a visible Speed.

"Have you lost your mind, Jiraiya? I haven't finished recording the data!"

"To hell with your data!"

And at the center of the chaos,

Tsunade endured the upheaval inside her body alone.

The burning did not fade. It intensified.

She could feel her cells being torn apart and rebuilt, then torn apart and rebuilt again.

Her bones trembled faintly. Muscle fibers snapped and rearranged themselves into denser formations.

It hurt.

This was no ordinary pain.

It surged from deep in her marrow, from the nucleus of every cell.

Tsunade's consciousness began to blur.

An unprecedented, ferocious power welled up from the depths of her body and battered against the defenses of her reason.

The restraints creaked.

The specially made metal began to warp.

Jiraiya and Orochimaru were still fighting.

Orochimaru's neck stretched unnaturally, his head slipping beneath Jiraiya's arm like a snake before curving around behind him.

Crack.

A sharp snap rang out.

Both men stopped and turned toward the examination bed.

The restraints had broken.

Tsunade slowly sat up.

Her eyes had completely lost focus, her pupils dilated until they nearly filled her irises.

A faint golden sheen appeared on her skin.

It looked as though something was flowing beneath it.

She had gone berserk!

"Tsu... Tsunade?"

Jiraiya called to her tentatively.

Orochimaru seized Jiraiya by the collar and yanked him back.

"Run!!!"

Too late.

Tsunade sprang off the bed, her right fist clenched. There was no move or technique behind it.

Just raw violence.

One punch.

It struck the floor between the two men.

Boom!!!!

The entire underground laboratory shook as if a giant had stomped on it.

The floor split outward from the point of impact in a spiderweb of cracks.

Great chunks of concrete fell from the ceiling. Cracks tore straight through the walls.

The shock wave hurled Jiraiya and Orochimaru away together.

They smashed through the laboratory wall and rolled more than ten meters before stopping.

Orochimaru crawled out of the rubble, blood seeping from the corner of his mouth, but his eyes shone brighter than before.

"It worked..."

He stared at Tsunade, standing amid the ruins and radiating a faint golden light, and murmured to himself.

"Cellular evolution... It worked..."

Jiraiya struggled out of the debris too, his face covered in dust and blood streaming from his nose.

He stared blankly at Tsunade.

He had been close enough to feel the force of that punch clearly.

Terrifying.

If her fist had struck his body instead of the floor...

He would have been a smear of meat by now.

Tsunade stood where she was, her chest rising and falling hard.

The golden light gradually faded, and her eyes slowly came back into focus.

Her first reaction when she regained her senses was

to look down at the floor shattered beneath her feet, then up at the two dusty, bruised men.

"...Were you two fighting right in front of me?"

Her voice was calm, but Jiraiya and Orochimaru both felt a chill to the bone.

Tsunade clenched her fist. Her knuckles cracked sharply.

"Good."

"If you've got that much energy—"

She walked toward them, one step at a time.

"Then let me help you burn some of it off."

Jiraiya and Orochimaru looked at each other.

For once, they agreed.

Run!!