"Most souls here are twisted and mutated. Some are called away by the Pure Land, but others are swallowed by Cleaner and brought here."
"They move and wander around here! This place represents the strongest desires and darkness inside human hearts. Because these souls lack some memories and parts of their spirit, they constantly devour their own kind to fill the gaps in their souls."
Kagetsu stopped and looked at Tsunade.
With a calm voice under Tsunade's gloomy gaze, he said, "They're like a pack of starving wolves gone mad. Souls like ours, whole and complete, are like irresistible delicious prey to them."
"So, the hostile, watching eyes I sensed… they really exist?" Tsunade clenched her fists, grinding her teeth.
"Yes. This is the Forest of Menos! The souls that failed to leave this forest and wander aimlessly here are the place where the trapped souls pour out.
We need to harvest some of these souls and find the materials we need in this forest," Kagetsu said.
As he spoke, the rustling sounds around them grew louder.
They were surrounded densely, like thousands of ants or insects.
The first to appear in front of Tsunade were several faceless humanoid figures, but in the next moment, they quickly changed into people from Tsunade's memories—people she had recalled many times before.
Originally, those faces in her memory had become somewhat blurry, but now, at this moment, those faces became extremely clear.
The suppressed emotions suddenly burst out uncontrollably.
"Dan, Nawaki, Great Grandpa, Second Grandpa, Grandma!" Tsunade almost shouted their names instinctively.
Her cries made those figures more vivid, and they even responded.
"Is that little Tsunade?"
"Sis!"
Just as Tsunade could no longer hold back and wanted to rush forward, a fierce flash of fire swept in front of her, covering those figures.
"No!"
Seeing this, Tsunade lost control instantly, and her clenched fist almost immediately swung toward Kagetsu, who had just attacked beside her.
"Wake up, Tsunade-san! Those are not the people in your memories!" Kagetsu was hit by Tsunade's punch, his feet dragging two furrows in the ground.
Then, using the connection between the runes, he awakened Tsunade from the shock in her mind.
"Look around."
Seeing Tsunade stop her next attack, Kagetsu gestured for her to take a look around.
Tsunade, now clear-headed, looked around somewhat confused. In that short moment, the two of them had already been surrounded by one after another—at least a hundred faceless beings.
As her gaze landed on these faceless creatures, they all suddenly transformed into the faces of people she longed to see in her memories.
At the same time, an inexplicable power seemed to deepen her memories and stir her emotions.
"What is this?" Tsunade stood with Kagetsu. Even though she had experienced two ninja world wars and faced many powerful and strange enemies, the scene before her still gave her chills.
"They are incomplete souls trapped in this world, evolved under the influence of the Forest of Menos. They have no memories of their own, so they crave all souls that have memories.
They feed on those memories and change themselves. Their ability lets them peek into the deepest memories of a person and stir the emotions inside the viewer. During this time, your memories of those people will be dredged up from deep inside and become their nourishment.
They are faceless beings, and one of the materials we need to collect this time. Be careful of their ability. If I had to define it, their power represents the dark side of chakra and leans toward illusion techniques.
But they have no consciousness—only instinct. As long as you lock away your memories and don't leak too much, it's fine."
Kagetsu explained quickly to Tsunade while dodging the faceless beings' attacks, reminding her, "Don't associate any memories or techniques related to these people, or they will replicate those abilities.
Also, don't hold back—finish the fight quickly. I can't even tell how many faceless beings are here. The longer we stay, the more gather."
"If more powerful evolved beings show up, then it will be a big delay."
"Easier said than done!" Tsunade gritted her teeth and punched, smashing a wood clone created by First Hokage using Wood Release into flying wood chips.
Fortunately, although these Faceless Ones could copy abilities, their real strength was still worlds apart from that of the elders.
But it surprised Tsunade that these previously aimless enemies suddenly became organized and cooperative.
She knew that Kagetsu and Orochimaru had an experiment called Hollow, and vaguely knew there was a space similar to another world related to souls and Hollow, but she never expected this place to be so strange!
If these Hollows could come to the ninja world, it might be a disaster even worse than the Great Ninja War.
One by one, the Faceless Ones quickly disappeared under the hands of Kagetsu and Tsunade. Occasionally, one or two small, dark stones, about the size of a fingernail, dropped to the ground.
Over a hundred Faceless Ones attacking made Tsunade—who already felt almost invincible in the ninja world—feel flustered and overwhelmed.
It was her first time facing these Hollows, and all the intelligence and information about them had only been collected during the recent fight.
If it weren't for Kagetsu, she might have fallen into the enemy's trap right at the start. There might not have been any deadly danger, but that was only a possibility that didn't happen.
Suddenly, a sharp pain!
Tsunade felt a blade suddenly cut through her body, and her heart sank instantly.
Flying Thunder God Slash!
It was the Second Grandpa's jutsu!
Had her memories been spied on to this extent already?
The injured soul body consumed energy to heal quickly. Tsunade glanced sideways at Kagetsu.
Around them, all the faceless clones were people from her memories, but Kagetsu seemed to be someone whose memories couldn't be read.
Tsunade's danger sense suddenly became sharp again. She bent down just in time to avoid a blade frozen by the wind, then grabbed the Second Hokage clone who teleported nearby. She threw him hard into a group of faceless enemies rushing at her.
"Pain Heaven Kick!"
Tsunade leapt high and stomped heavily on the ground below. The earth shook violently like an earthquake, cracking and rolling.
A circle of faceless enemies was blasted into the air, where Kagetsu sliced them in half with a circular wind slash.
Black crystals fell to the ground and were absorbed by shadows formed with Kagetsu's shadow ninjutsu.
After fighting for a while, Kagetsu sensed more and more Hollows gathering nearby. Her whole body radiated strong pressure.
That solid, almost tangible aura made Tsunade's heart feel heavy, as if she faced a terrifyingly powerful enemy.
The surrounding faceless enemies froze, then, overwhelmed by fear, they retreated and vanished into the darkness of the Forest of Menos.
"Is it over?" Tsunade breathed out deeply. So many versions of the First, Second, and Third Hokage had fought against her. Even if their strength wasn't the same as the originals, they made her suffer a lot.
She forced down the panic caused by Kagetsu's intimidating aura, held her ground, and as the pressure from Kagetsu faded, she finally relaxed and asked.
"Of course not. But we need to leave quickly. I could only scare them away for a moment. Against some powerful Hollows, it won't work. Soon, they will come back even stronger." Kagetsu opened the shadow space and called Tsunade to retreat.
****
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