How dare you mock me!

Shuofang Si was ecstatic. Another B-rank side quest reward was his.

He had known these troublemakers would never change. Give them a chance, and they would jump on the bandwagon.

But before he could recover from his delight, his Tyrant's Will faintly sensed a change in the atmosphere around him.

"Oh, and you."

Just then, a voice rang out from the crowd, as though its owner had suddenly remembered something.

Shuofang Si's smile froze on his face.

A villager suddenly turned around and jabbed a finger at his nose.

The man wore coarse linen clothes covered in dust, and his expression plainly showed embarrassment turned to anger.

"Everything was fine in our village before you started making wild guesses and spouting all this nonsense!"

"Hiruzen Sarutobi might have his problems, but who needs a stray dog like you, from who knows where, stirring up trouble?"

"Exactly!" someone nearby immediately agreed, as though they had found a new outlet for their anger.

"What if nobody believes in the Will of Fire anymore? What if no ninja will protect us?"

"It's all his fault!" Another person stepped forward, their voice shrill. "He's been turning us against each other! He's made a complete mess of Konoha!"

"That's right! First he bad-mouthed the Third, and now he's trying to drive a wedge between us and the ninja!"

"He's no good!"

Cold sweat poured off Shuofang Si.

Holy shit. This definitely wasn't an ordinary shift in public opinion.

These villagers had been cursing the Third and the ninja right alongside him a moment ago. Now they had turned their hostility on him.

The speed of that reversal, that logic, and the shameless way they shifted the blame... the Main God must have stepped in.

No, with these Konoha troublemakers, it wasn't impossible.

After all, the Main God couldn't possibly let him change the plot this easily. The more side quest rewards he farmed, the harsher the backlash would be.

Maybe these villagers were the Main God's blade, used to balance out the changes he had forced on the plot. But given what Konoha's troublemakers were like, he honestly couldn't tell.

He opened his mouth to defend himself, but before he could make a sound, the first fist came down.

Then came countless fists and feet.

Shuofang Si was knocked to the ground. He desperately curled into a ball, both hands clamped over the back of his head and his vital areas.

His knees pressed against his chest, and for a time, he couldn't move at all.

Fists, feet, and even wooden clogs rained down from every direction. He couldn't tell who was hitting him.

He felt his ribs crying out, dull pain spreading across his back and shoulders, and the metallic sweetness of blood welling up in his mouth.

The ninja had long since grown sick of him, and not one stepped forward to stop it.

A few even folded their arms, smiles of satisfaction tugging at their lips.

Trade insults with the villagers? There was nothing they could do about that. Hit the villagers? That was out of the question.

But watching this troublemaker get beaten for stirring things up while pretending not to notice was perfectly reasonable.

Kakashi stood outside the crowd, a flicker of hesitation passing through his exposed eye.

He took half a step forward, then stopped. He didn't intervene.

It wasn't because he felt no gratitude toward Shuofang Si. He would remember what the man had said about White Fang.

But as a Konoha Jonin, he couldn't set himself against the entire village for a villager who had "incited public opinion."

He had already used a kunai to stop a Sarutobi ninja once. If he intervened again, it would become a question of where his loyalties lay.

So he called out, "Hey, leave him breathing."

Shuofang Si had no idea how long the beating lasted.

Perhaps it was only a few minutes, but every second felt as long as a century.

He desperately protected his vital areas, focusing every scrap of his awareness on a single thought: Stay alive.

His ribs had broken. He could hear it. His leg bones had cracked. He knew that, too.

But as long as his skull wasn't smashed, as long as his organs weren't crushed underfoot, he still had a chance.

At last, the villagers tired themselves out.

The crowd dispersed, cursing and grumbling, leaving Shuofang Si lying alone on broken roof tiles. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, and every inch of him hurt.

For no reason, an irrelevant thought surfaced in his mind: if he could see himself right now, he would probably look much like Yamcha in that famous scene.

Just then, Orochimaru stopped paying attention to Konoha's farce and completed his final hand seal.

Impure World Reincarnation: Release.

Hashirama Senju's body began to glow. Dust crept upward from his feet, like a sand sculpture scattering in the wind.

He looked down at his dissolving hands, then at Tobirama, who remained completely motionless beside him. A flicker of understanding crossed his eyes.

"Tobirama... so you really did..."

Before he could finish, the First Hokage's body became a cloud of swirling dust and dispersed on the wind.

Tobirama Senju, however, hadn't budged.

His body remained entirely unaffected.

His crimson eyes watched Orochimaru coldly, and the corners of his mouth lifted into a faint, mocking smile.

"You still need more practice, youngster. This is a technique I developed."

Orochimaru's pupils contracted sharply. He understood everything in an instant.

As the Second Hokage who had created Impure World Reincarnation, Tobirama Senju had built a contingency into the technique.

Now Impure World Reincarnation couldn't be fully released. Tobirama Senju had remained.

This was trouble.

Without the slightest hesitation, Orochimaru abandoned all his remaining plans. What he didn't know was that Tobirama Senju, sensing how the poor quality of the sacrifice had weakened his body, had no intention of engaging in a fierce battle either.

Orochimaru turned and signaled to the Sound Four. All four immediately understood and began preparing to withdraw.

He, too, started backing away, but as he passed Shuofang Si, his steps suddenly paused.

He lowered his head and looked at the young villager on the ground, beaten half to death.

Shuofang Si lay in a pool of blood, his arms bent at unnatural angles.

An unknown number of his ribs had broken, and both legs dragged uselessly on the ground.

His face was mottled with bruises. One eye had swollen to a mere slit, and bloody froth still seeped from the corner of his mouth.

Orochimaru watched him without a trace of pity in his snake-like eyes, only scrutiny, as though examining an ant on the verge of death.

With injuries like these, even if Tsunade came to treat him herself, she could only keep him breathing and delay his death.

"Life is so fragile." Orochimaru's voice was hoarse and soft, carrying with particular clarity across the ruins as they gradually fell quiet.

"You schemed and talked yourself hoarse exposing the Third, stirred up public opinion, and even gave me quite a show."

"But what did it get you? In the blink of an eye, the very villagers you spoke up for beat you into this state."

He bent down slightly, a hint of genuine puzzlement in his tone.

"How foolish. Do you regret it?"

Shuofang Si lay on the ground, every part of his body screaming in pain.

His consciousness was already on the verge of fading. Blood loss and excruciating pain made his vision black out in waves.

But he heard Orochimaru's words.

Did he regret it?

He didn't know whether Orochimaru was genuinely that curious or what. But right now, as far as he was concerned...

Shuofang Si spat out a mouthful of bloody froth.

Regret, my ass! You dare mock me, too!?

His body could no longer move. The agony of his broken ribs made every breath unbearable.

But deep within his consciousness, something burned fiercely: a will that refused to accept this.

How could I die here? I still have to see the wonders of those endless worlds and venture across the multiverse!

And die with someone mocking me to my face? No matter what, I can't die here!

His exposed eye suddenly went unfocused.

An indescribable power surged from deep within his body. All his pain was suppressed, and a primal instinct belonging to life itself erupted.

His body was still gravely injured, but he felt his perception of danger soar in an instant. The terror of Orochimaru standing before him became clear to his senses.

"Is this... the Gene Lock?"

In his last moment of lucidity, Shuofang Si seemed to understand something. Then a powerful refusal to accept his fate drove him to act.

"Nothing else matters! How dare you mock me!"

He desperately groped between the roof tiles with his fingers, using the last of his strength to raise his relatively intact right hand.

His fingertips touched a small stone, only the size of a fingernail, rough and cold.

He pinched the stone between his fingers.

Orochimaru watched his trembling hand rise, then looked at the tiny stone. A flicker of surprise crossed his snake-like eyes.

Then Shuofang Si drew on every instinct the Gene Lock had given him, controlled his last scrap of strength, and hurled the stone at Orochimaru.