What was most needed for scientific research?
Time? Money? Or talent?
No. The most important thing for scientific research was stability.
Orochimaru felt that he was becoming increasingly unstable.
He already vaguely understood why his "future" self would defect from Konoha.
In Konoha, he had always been plagued by war, unable to conduct experiments and research continuously—the wars between Konoha and the Land of Wind, the Land of Thunder, the Land of Earth...
The wars dragged on as though they would never end, filling him with irritation. Every wartime mission interrupted his train of thought, and later, Danzo's schemes had directly swallowed over twenty years of his research materials, making him even more resentful. That was why there had been the Konoha Crush Plan.
Coveting the Uchiha Clan's bloodline, seeking revenge against Konoha, cutting ties with his past—these various reasons had driven Orochimaru to carry out the Konoha Crush Plan.
Of course, there might also have been a small desire to show off the achievements of all these years to his former teacher.
But now that Oguri Hayashi had displayed his strength, Orochimaru immediately felt that if he truly intended to defect, rather than spending vast amounts of time establishing a ninja village in the Land of Fields, it would be better to directly join Oguri Hayashi's village. This place had quite a few things Orochimaru wanted.
Oguri Hayashi's Sage Mode was one of them, and the Seven-Tails Chōmei was another. But what truly made Orochimaru decide was Oguri Hayashi's strength.
Orochimaru did not know how strong Jiraiya was in Sage Mode, but he had already tested how strong Oguri Hayashi was without Sage Mode. Add Sage Mode, calculate it as a twofold increase, and the current Oguri Hayashi could utterly crush most people in the ninja world.
This was