Flying sands of the great desert, Kakuzu's hidden gold! "Bonus chapter for Loves Stir-Fried Clams"

Following the Scroll's directions, Sasuke and his companions reached the hidden gold cache deep in the deserts of the Land of Wind.

Yet all they could see was desert and barren gravel plains, with no structure that could serve as a "vault."

Kabuto Yakushi adjusted his glasses and offered a reasonable guess. "Could we have been tricked?"

After careful consideration, Orochimaru said, "Unlikely. It must be concealed by some ingenious mechanism. Karin, check for us."

Karin closed her eyes and held two fingers upright before her chest.

—Mind's Eye of the Kagura!

Whoosh!

"I can indeed sense a faint fluctuation from some sort of technique, but..."

Karin opened her eyes and looked at the sand beneath their feet.

"It's deep in the desert beneath us. I'm afraid that's beyond human reach!"

Orochimaru smiled. "That's all right. As long as it exists, we can reach it!"

He took out a blank Talisman, bit his finger, and used his blood to draw on it.

Sasuke watched the pattern Orochimaru drew closely and asked curiously, "I've never seen a Talisman like this. Is it another new technique of yours?"

"Yes. This talisman is called the 'Hundredfold Unbinding Talisman.'"

Once he finished drawing the Talisman, he bent down and stuck it to the ground beneath his feet.

The others had the good sense to retreat a safe distance.

Standing amid the windblown sand, Orochimaru deftly formed hand seals.

"There are countless techniques in this world. Even I wouldn't dare claim to have mastered them all. That is why I developed the Hundredfold Unbinding Talisman specifically to break techniques I have yet to study. Any trickery below the level of the Six Paths unravels before this talisman!"

—Secret Technique: Hundredfold Unbinding Talisman!

Whoosh!

The Hundredfold Unbinding Talisman ignited, breaking the unknown technique Kakuzu had used to conceal his vault!

Rumble...!

The earth trembled, and the yellow sand receded. A massive, dark-gray building hidden deep beneath the desert slowly rose to the surface!

Though enormous, the building could hardly be called magnificent. Calling it a vault wasn't quite right; an oversized storeroom was more fitting.

Kabuto Yakushi stepped forward and patted the wall, judging from its solid feel, "It's made entirely from poured cement, sand, and stone. Sturdy and pressure-resistant, yet built at the lowest possible cost."

The most expensive material in the building had to be its door, pressed from alloy steel plates. There wasn't a single engraving on it—practicality taken to its absolute extreme!

Orochimaru approached and peeled the sealing talisman off the door!

The door opened. After allowing the air to circulate briefly, Orochimaru entered first. A moment later, his low voice drifted out:

"Come in, everyone. But brace yourselves first."

Sasuke, Kabuto Yakushi, and Karin went inside.

Kabuto Yakushi and Karin were both stunned. "Hey, hey, hey... this has to be a joke, right?!"

"..." Even Sasuke, who had no interest in money, felt a surge of desire at the dazzling spectacle before him!

The sight... had an utterly overwhelming impact!

Inside a single open floor spanning nearly ten thousand square meters, gold bars were stacked in dense layers from floor to ceiling, leaving almost nowhere to step!

Kabuto Yakushi hurried forward and picked up a gold bar. Its heavy weight in his hand left no doubt—it had been refined from gold of the highest purity!

Shocked and curious, he asked, "He stored gold bars instead of the currency circulating in the Five Great Nations. Why go to all that trouble?"

Orochimaru had his own insight into the matter. "The currency circulating in the shinobi world is issued by the Gold Exchange, which is jointly supported by the Five Great Nations. Its value is tied to their ruling status. In Kakuzu's eyes, perhaps nothing in this world lasts forever—not even the rule of the Five Great Nations!"

"If the Five Great Nations fell, that currency would become nothing but a pile of wastepaper. So he exchanged all the money he acquired for an equivalent value in gold, guarding against a risk that was practically imaginary!"

"It is no exaggeration to say that this money could buy an entire great nation!"

Kabuto Yakushi adjusted his glasses, their lenses reflecting gold, and sighed in amazement. "Kakuzu really was one of a kind, taking his obsession with wealth this far!"

Sasuke: With this much money, it wouldn't matter if Sakura greeted the house with her fists every day...

Karin: With this much money, I'd have to constantly watch out for bad people coveting it, and worry about how future generations would inherit it,

Even parents and siblings might turn against one another over it. Who knows how many extra worries it would bring...

Although the number of gold bars was staggering, it was nothing a Scroll capable of holding an ocean's worth of Ninja Tools couldn't handle.

In just an hour, Orochimaru gathered every last bit of the gold—enough to buy an entire great nation—and sealed it inside a Scroll. Then he swallowed the Scroll of gold bars, locking that wealth away for good!

"Now the fruits of the Akatsuki's fundraising belong to us. Search carefully again and see whether anything was left behind."

Sasuke, Kabuto, and Karin began searching the empty room.

Tap!

Karin was the one who found something. As she stepped on a floor tile, she keenly noticed that its sound and feel were wrong.

She lay down, pressed her ear against it, and tapped it with the backs of her fingers.

Tap, tap, tap!

The hollow echo clearly indicated something hidden underneath. She was about to pry up the tile.

"Karin, don't touch it. There might be a trap. Let me."

Sasuke stepped forward, drew the Kusanagi Sword, and pried the tile straight up.

Although no trap was triggered... Sasuke's thoughtfulness still filled Karin with warmth.

Beneath the lifted tile was a box, and inside the box was a Scroll.

Sasuke handed the Scroll to Orochimaru for inspection. A look of delight appeared on his face. "An unexpected find. This is the top-secret technique Kakuzu took from Takigakure all those years ago—the 'Earth Grudge Fear Technique'!"

He glanced sideways. "Interested, Sasuke-kun?"

Sasuke recalled Kakuzu's body, altered by Earth Grudge Fear, with its stitches and sickly appearance. Honestly, it didn't suit his sense of combat aesthetics at all. He would probably never fight that way, nor did he have any need to.

Still, a practitioner was not the same as the technique itself. The application and power of any technique depended on its user.

After careful thought, Sasuke took the Scroll of the Earth Grudge Fear Technique from Orochimaru.

"I'll study it when I have time. It never hurts to have another skill..."

Orochimaru smiled. "It seems we can head to our next stop."

Rumble...!

With a thunderous rumbling, the abandoned building sank back into the depths of the desert.

Amid the windblown sand, Orochimaru gazed toward the far horizon with his slit-pupiled eyes.

"We're in the deepest reaches of the Land of Wind's desert. The legendary Ancient Kingdom of Roran is quite close, too."

Sasuke recalled, "The Ancient Kingdom of Roran... if I remember correctly, it fell long ago."

Orochimaru said, "Sasuke-kun... do you know about the Dragon Vein?"

[The concept of the Dragon Vein is not the author's original creation. It comes from the movie Naruto Shippuden: The Lost Tower.]

Sasuke said, "The Dragon Vein? I've heard of it. It's the lifeblood of the earth, containing more Chakra than anywhere else on the planet. If used carelessly, it could very well destroy the entire world. But when I learned about it, the Dragon Vein had already been sealed for many years."

Orochimaru said, "After all, Sasuke-kun, you weren't personally involved in that part of history. Speaking of the Dragon Vein, your closest friend has quite a connection to it..."

Sasuke was surprised. "Naruto... why have I never heard him mention it?"

Orochimaru revealed the truth. "For certain reasons, his memories of taking part in sealing the Dragon Vein were sealed away. The purpose was the same as when you once sealed Jiraiya's and Naruto's memories. The Dragon Vein lies within the ruins of the Ancient Kingdom of Roran, and that seal is hardly an obstacle..."

Sasuke's gaze sharpened. "So we're going to the Ancient Kingdom of Roran? But how do you intend to use the Dragon Vein?"

Orochimaru smiled. "Sasuke-kun, haven't you been asking me to find a way to extend the time limit on those Mangekyo eyes of yours? To tell you the truth, the answer is right before us..."