In a dark room stood rows of tanks filled with an unidentified green solution. Inside them were young children of varying sizes, all between roughly four and ten years old.
These children were all terribly thin and frail, at an age when they needed tender care, yet they were inside these tanks, cruelly used as subjects for human experimentation. More heartbreaking still, every one of them had already lost all signs of life.
The sheer cruelty of the scene immediately made everyone present realize that this was a site of human experimentation.
"Lord Hokage, this is the main laboratory. We have searched the other areas and found no other leads. All that remains is equipment they could not take away and these dead children." A black-haired man wearing an animal mask, with a short blade on his back, knelt on one knee, his voice devoid of emotion.
"Is this all?" an elderly man with an aged face asked in anger and disappointment. He wore a conical hat bearing the character for "fire" and held a smoking pipe.
He seemed to know who owned this dark laboratory, and who had directed these cruel human experiments.
Around him, numerous figures moved back and forth, sorting through and collecting the clues left in the laboratory.
Suddenly, a noise came from a corner of the laboratory.
"Lord Hokage, there is a surviving child here. His heart is still beating."
Another person wearing an animal mask hurried over, carrying a child of about six. His pale face and slender limbs made him look terribly fragile.
The child had been found in an out-of-the-way corner. The Anbu ninja had initially thought he was long dead, but while preparing to collect his body, his keen senses had detected the faint beating of the child's heart. He had immediately rushed over to report to Hiruzen Sarutobi.
"Quickly, take him to Konoha Hospital for treatment at once. Have the others continue searching carefully to see whether we have missed any children who still show signs of life." Upon seeing the surviving child, the Third Hokage immediately issued orders to the ninja beside him.
"Yes, Lord Hokage."
And so, on the Hokage's orders, the surviving child was taken to the hospital and entrusted to the medical-nin. Hiruzen Sarutobi followed them to Konoha Hospital.
Meanwhile, far away in a dark corner of the village, an elderly man with white bandages partially covering his left eye and a scar on his chin received word that Hiruzen Sarutobi had led a search of the laboratory. He flew into a rage.
"Didn't you say Hiruzen would never discover this laboratory? How was it suddenly found?" The old man spoke with great authority, his words carrying a chill that made people tremble.
"Lord Danzo, perhaps the Anbu picked up our trail when we were gathering materials for the human experiments, and gradually traced it back there," a man kneeling on one knee said with his head lowered.
"Hmph, what a useless fool. You couldn't even handle such a trivial matter."
"But never mind. Fortunately, we cleared out all the valuable research materials and test subjects before Hiruzen found the laboratory. Without evidence, Sarutobi won't keep pursuing this laboratory."
Shimura Danzō clearly understood Hiruzen Sarutobi very well. He had even worked out exactly how Hiruzen Sarutobi would handle the matter.
Danzo's tone had been extremely stern at first, but he seemed to remember something pleasant, and his voice grew calm again.
The reason for his good mood was a child of about four standing to his right. The child was still wearing a test subject's clothing, making it clear that he was a test subject who had survived the laboratory.
Danzo had simply brought him out before Hiruzen Sarutobi found the laboratory. But surviving human experimentation alone did not establish his worth. What satisfied Danzo was that he had survived and inherited the power of the God of Shinobi-Wood Release.
Danzo looked at this test subject who had successfully inherited the power of Wood Release. The child's eyes were full of bewilderment, and he was at precisely the stage when he needed guidance. He was practically a ninja born by heaven's design for Root.
"From now on, your name will be Kinoe, and I will personally instruct you in your training."
Danzo continued, a hint of excitement in his voice.
"You will become the greatest weapon in my hands and help me ascend to the Hokage position. Then I will lead Konoha to become the strongest, or even the only, hidden village in the shinobi world."
Meanwhile, at the hospital in Konoha.
"Quickly, inject the medication and stabilize his vital signs. We're losing him."
"Yes."
As the pale green medication flowed into the child's body, a medical-nin worked desperately to save him, both hands glowing green. Yet the child's vital signs still failed to stabilize and were even weakening.
"It's no use. His vital signs are still weakening. The medication we injected isn't working at all."
"Our medical skills cannot save him. Perhaps only Lady Tsunade could save his life," the medical-nin using ninjutsu to sustain the child's life told Hiruzen Sarutobi helplessly.
"I see. Thank you for your efforts," Hiruzen Sarutobi said with a sigh as he looked at the pale, frail child before him.
Looking at the child covered in instruments and needles, Hiruzen Sarutobi wanted to say something more, but could not find the words.
Was it guilt, because this was one of the village's young sprouts, yet he had been unable to protect him, and the person responsible for this tragedy shared a particular relationship with him?
Or was it regret, because a trace of fantasy still lingered in his heart-the possibility that someone might inherit the divine power of that God of Shinobi?
You really have grown old, Sarutobi. Have you become this cowardly? Hiruzen Sarutobi reproached himself inwardly.
While he was still deep in reflection, a sudden cry of surprise interrupted his tangled thoughts.
An astonishing change suddenly came over the child whom the medical-nin had already pronounced beyond saving.
"Lord Hokage, his-his heart has started beating again, and it's growing stronger. Color is returning to his face too!" a member of the medical team exclaimed excitedly at the bizarre sight.
Hiruzen Sarutobi, however, could sense something the medical-nin could not.
As the Shinobi World Professor, he had a profound understanding of Sensory Ninjutsu. He could clearly sense that the chakra within this child, which had been on the verge of dissipating, had suddenly become immense and was brimming with tremendous vitality.
Such chakra and vitality greatly astonished Hiruzen Sarutobi. He had never witnessed anything like it in his life. No, he could not say never. He had sensed something like this before, but that person had long since passed away.
Just then, the scene changed again. Saplings suddenly sprouted from the floor, growing larger and larger. They seemed to consciously surround the child, as though protecting him on the hospital bed.
At this sight, Hiruzen Sarutobi's already startled expression grew even more shocked. One term surfaced in his mind: Wood Release. Had the power that once pacified an age of turmoil, the Wood Release that had vanished for decades, appeared in this world once more?
Hiruzen Sarutobi immediately came to his senses. Too many people could not be allowed to learn that Wood Release had reappeared.
So he addressed the medical-nin present in a stern voice. "Not a word of what happened today is to leave this room. The Anbu will come shortly to place seals on you."
"Yes, Lord Hokage," all the medical personnel beside him answered in unison. They, too, understood the importance of Wood Release.
After watching the medical team leave one after another, Hiruzen Sarutobi asked the Anbu ninja behind him, "Do we have any leads regarding this child's identity?"
"Lord Hokage, we found no useful information in the laboratory."
"But we matched his appearance to earlier missing-child reports and identified him."
"He is the son of ordinary villagers in the Land of Fire. After he went missing, the villagers came to Konoha to post a mission to find him. Not long afterward, however, word came that the village seemed to have been destroyed by bandits. His family all died as well."
"In the end, we found the child's name in the mission records. His name is Kōki Itō."
In fact, outside of wartime, bandits were exceedingly rare within the Land of Fire. After all, the most powerful military organization in the entire shinobi world was based here.
Ordinarily, any bandits in the Land of Fire would have been wiped out by Konoha's ninja long ago. Besides, bandits were mostly found along borders between two countries, or in small countries without hidden villages.
Bandits were virtually nonexistent in the interior of the Land of Fire. In other words, it was impossible for a village within the Land of Fire to have been wiped out by bandits. That meant there was more to the village's destruction.
At that thought, Hiruzen Sarutobi already had his answer.
"I see. Once the child is discharged, find an empty house in the village for him to live in. I will personally make arrangements for him afterward."
"Yes."
With that, the Anbu ninja disappeared.
Hiruzen Sarutobi, however, could not calm himself. The appearance of Wood Release gave him a premonition that Konoha would undergo changes unlike any before.
At the same time, the mastermind behind the human experiments cast a shadow over Hiruzen Sarutobi's heart.