"As expected of the Uchiha Clan."
Orochimaru looked at the boy in the distance who had driven a kunai deep into his thigh. His eyes narrowed slightly in an ambiguous smile.
"Thinking to suppress fear with pain in an instant... what admirable instincts."
He slowly extended his tongue, licking from one corner of his mouth to the other, his gaze locked on the crimson figure charging toward him.
Then two low, hoarse chuckles escaped his throat.
"You lot... have really caught my interest."
Meanwhile, inside the giant snake's belly.
Naruto was trapped deep in its stomach, his entire body coated in slippery slime. He couldn't put any strength into his arms, much less stretch them out, no matter how he struggled.
"Damn it!"
Clutching his kunai, he stabbed the snake's stomach lining again and again.
Every thrust met something soft and yielding.
When he pulled the blade out, it didn't even leave a mark.
"What kind of stomach is this?!" Naruto couldn't help complaining. "Seriously-that teacher told us there were wild animals in the forest, but never said they'd be this huge!"
He took a couple of gasping breaths and struggled to reach the ninja tool pouch by his leg.
-He couldn't reach it!
The snake's stomach held him in a crushing grip. His arms rubbed back and forth as he struggled, until he barely managed to reach the pouch at his waist.
He rummaged through it for ages.
Finally, he pulled out-
A rice ball.
"..."
Trapped in the snake's stomach, Naruto stared at the rice ball in his hand and muttered.
"How did I end up finding this...?"
"Whatever. I'll replenish my strength first."
He opened his mouth, just about to take a bite-
The giant python seemed to sense his earlier stabbing, and its stomach suddenly