Konoha.
The Hokage Building.
Inside the Hokage's office.
Hiruzen Sarutobi looked at the stack of mission records recovered from the Root Base, and his expression instantly darkened.
Even a seasoned politician like him felt a chill at what they contained.
He had never imagined that Danzo had done so many unspeakable things behind his back.
He had always thought that he and his old friend were two sides of the same coin. Even if everything Danzo did was not for Konoha's sake, he would at least never harm its interests.
Now it seemed he had still underestimated his old friend's ambition.
At that moment, Hiruzen Sarutobi was grateful that he had immediately sent people to take over the Root Base when trouble broke out in Root.
If these mission records got out, there was no telling how much turmoil they would cause in the village.
Even setting aside the human experiments, secretly abducting members of various clans to study their secret techniques was enough on its own to strike a nerve with those clans.
After skimming through the records, Hiruzen Sarutobi picked out two important documents.
The first was a record concerning Yamato.
When he learned that Yamato had truly inherited the Wood Release of the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, he was overjoyed.
No one understood better than he did how powerful the First Hokage had been when using Wood Release. Saying he could fight ten thousand men alone was no exaggeration.
More importantly, Wood Release held a special significance for Konoha: it was a spiritual symbol.
Moreover, Wood Release was highly effective at suppressing tailed beasts. With it, dealing with tailed beasts in the future would be much easier.
Because Wood Release was so powerful, the village had once spent a period trying to replicate that power. Yet even