Meanwhile, White Zetsu, who had used the Impersonation Technique to disguise himself as a Konoha ninja among the main force, received a message from Obito Uchiha.
Upon receiving the message, the disguised White Zetsu immediately formed hand seals, and a faint, concealed chakra fluctuation spread from his body.
This unusual chakra fluctuation vanished as quickly as it appeared. The Konoha ninjas never noticed anything amiss.
After sensing this special fluctuation, the White Zetsu spores hidden throughout the corpses immediately activated a special ability of their own—the ability to turn themselves into trees.
In the original story, these disguised White Zetsu would turn into trees when Naruto's nine-tails chakra struck and killed them. Now, they were merely killing themselves ahead of time, turning both themselves and the corpses they possessed into trees.
Without nine-tails chakra, this would be a gradual process rather than an instantaneous transformation. It would take some time.
This happened not only among Konoha's forces, but also among the forces of the other ninja villages that had obtained "spoils of war."
Once the Living Corpse Reincarnation bodies turned entirely into wood, they would eventually sprout into trees.
That afternoon, the Root ninja responsible for storing the corpses hurried to Danzo in a panic. "Lord Danzo, something terrible has happened! Something has changed with Uchiha Itachi's and Nagato's corpses."
Danzo immediately grew anxious and asked gravely, "What kind of change?"
"Their corpses are slowly turning into wood!" The Root ninja swallowed and spoke in a low voice.
"Damn it!" Danzo jolted in alarm and hurriedly took several small bottles from his person.
An eye floated inside each of the four transparent containers.
Danzo held the bottles up to the sunlight and examined them closely.
"Damn it!" He had barely begun his examination before he let out a furious roar.