Impossible.
The Mayfly Technique failed. Not once, ever, had it failed. There was no place he could not go with it, and no place he could infiltrate with it.
The reason he played such a role in the Akatsuki was because of this technique. He had no doubts that were an Akatsuki member to fall, he would be able to retrieve their bodies to prevent any secrets from leaking, but more importantly, he'd be able to retrieve the Akatsuki rings.
Impossible.
Sasori had fallen. Kakuzu had fallen. Orochimaru had been captured.
He could not retrieve the rings or bodies of the former two, and he could not free the latter.
Impossible.
His plans had yet to even be set into motion, and members of the organisation were dropping like flies. S-Rank Missing-Nin capable of defeating and capturing Jinchūriki alive were not cabbages to be bought and sold at the market.
Each one was an expensive, hard-to-replace asset.
Yet, none of this was what bothered him. What had bothered him was the technique used to lock Orochimaru away, deep within the earth. What bothered him was that it was the same technique which had foiled that brat's plans for the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox and his own plans for the Uchiha Clan.
He had never paid any attention to Namikaze Minato, considering him yet another lowly human unworthy of his attention. The Uchiha Clan were the main stars, the ones to whom he determined would be the focus of the History of Shinobi, so he had paid close attention to them.
Which was why he had been baffled when he'd learned that one of his 'stars' was seemingly stopped by a barrier made by unworthy trash.
Impossible.
Orochimaru had let it slip, during his failed attempt to rescue him, a fact that he could not believe. On the surface, they spoke in Kusagakure code, but beneath the code was another layer of communication, passed along via nothing else but tonal inflection and body language. A double-bluff to pull wool over the eyes of their adversaries.
"Kukukuku… Jiraiya did not make this barrier. Nor did his student. He wants me to find a way to break out of it, because he cannot do it himself. It would take too long normally."
"What do you mean by, it would take too long?"
"His student would have seen the clues if he studied it, but I doubt he found the time. Whoever invented this technique cannot be of this era."
Those words brought a foreboding chill.
"This level of fūinjutsu is years ahead of anything I have ever seen. It can only be born of as a result of mutually selective factors, a coevolutionary arms race indicative of years of warfare… or, this is a method utilizing ancient methods lost to time, a means that would appear to those of us unable to grasp it as the work of a god."
For the first time, Zetsu's heart stopped.
The work of a god.
There were techniques, limited and restricted to beings who were far above mere mortals. To the Celestial Beings, there was such a means.
Shinjutsu. 神術.
Divine Techniques.
Impossible.
Yet, Shinjutsu was something only those like Mother could perform. Those like her, or her clan.
Frantic panic set into his heart. As soon as he left, he sought answers within Konoha, as a fly in the wall, he searched and gathered information however he could.
The whispers of how Jiraiya of the Sannin changed his ways following the birth of Minato's son. The talks of how the man threw himself into fūinjutsu, fervently enough to be called the Hermit Sage. How he stopped the attempt to kidnap Hyūga Hinata with barriers and seals.
Zetsu tested the other barriers within the village created by the man and not a single one could stop him. Not one. He moved unhindered through them all, undetected, by them all.
So that one Barrier, the same one that had foiled a different plan, where had it come from? Who had placed it? That he did not know, that he could not tell, meant only one thing.
There was another player on the board.
There was someone like him, working behind the scenes, either against him, or for their own purposes. Someone he did not know.
Impossible.
He searched Konoha's history for the most notable events that had occurred in the last decade. Desperate to connect any dots, to see anything he had missed.
There were many notable geniuses. Uchiha Shisui, Uchiha Itachi, and finally, the one that gave him a foreboding feeling, Hyūga Neji.
The Youngest Shinobi to Enter the Academy.
Went from being a member of the Branch Clan to challenging his own uncle and becoming the heir of the Main Clan. The Hope of the Hyūga Clan. The Forerunner of Hyūga Clan Reformation.
And his latest achievement, spoken of with awe—
The Youngest Shinobi to Complete an S-Rank Mission.
It was suspect.
So, he infiltrated the clan. The Mayfly Technique was the greatest infiltration technique in existence, bar none. Despite this, he was in a clan filled with those who could see in all directions and see chakra, he had to be extraordinarily cautious.
He hid within a tree, planning to stay no longer than needed. There he heard a conversation he never thought he would hear.
"Do you think our fellow Clan Members on the moon are watching us now?"
"They definitely are! Remember, we have to work even harder so we can join them!"
"You're right. For the sake of Neji-sama, we must foil those who would try to resurrect the demon."
"Hai! It is our pride as Hyūga! We will save this world from the demon!"
Zetsu all but screamed out one word:
IMPOSSIBLE!
"Hmm? Do you sense something?"
Zetsu retreated with haste, nearly blowing his cover from how his chakra fluctuated. He appeared far away from Konoha, trembling with wide eyes.
How? How did they learn of that man's descendants on the moon? How do they know? Did that clan, that remnant clan, did they make contact? Should they not have died out by now?
Hundreds of years of inbreeding should have wiped them all out! There are still survivors of that man on the Moon?
And they contacted the Hyūga?
Impossible. Impossible!
That man sought to be close to Mother. He would not have told his Moon Clan descendants to contact the remnants of his bloodline!
But if he did….
The vast majority of his plans predicated on the assumption that the Moon Clan and Hamura's descendants were extinct. As they never appeared, not once in hundreds of years, he had thought them all dead by now.
However, if they were not, then it changed everything.
The descendants of Hamura would tell the world the whole truth. They would bring his Mother's existence into the limelight. All his plans, his lies, his tricks, decades upon centuries of deception and effort would be undone instantly with one word from Hamura's people.
Even the brat masquerading as Madara would realize the Infinite Tsukuyomi and the Eye of the Moon Plan were blatant traps, and he'd not be willing to allow his Mother's resurrection.
But how? Why now? Is it because of Hyūga Neji? Why would the Moon Clan contact the Hyūga because of him…?
Could it be…?
A chilling, foreboding thought, one he never considered came.
Hagoromo's sons, Indra and Asura, reincarnated time and again, and he had watched them over the years, watching as they continued a cycle of reincarnation through the Uchiha and Senju clans. If Hagoromo's sons could endlessly reincarnate…
Why couldn't Hagoromo's brother?
The Hyūga Clan was, after all, Hamura's direct bloodline.
The more he thought it over, the more certain Zetsu became. The boy's achievements were extraordinary, rivaling those of Hashirama and Madara in their youth. He was not even old enough for his voice to crack, and somehow he had achieved so much?
Hamura had faded into obscurity but that does not mean he was any weaker than his brother. Was he biding his time, waiting for this moment to return?
The Byakugan originates from Mother's Clan… and Hamura's mastery of it was without equal. Could it be, he used it to foresee the future?
If he really is Hamura's reincarnation…
All his plans would have only one outcome.
Failure.
The threat he felt from reincarnations of the sons of Hagoromo could not, and would never hold a candle to the danger of the reincarnation of Hamura himself. For Asura and Indra had not held a fraction of the power that Hagoromo and Hamura did.
I have no choice.
He would have to use that piece earlier than he had thought.
For the sake of mother's resurrection… sacrifices must be made.
Desolation of the Caged Bird
There was a clan on the moon.
Another puppet's sword passed through his body harmlessly, and he grabbed the back of its head and slammed it into the ground. The skull shattered into a thousand fragments. Seven more puppets assailed him on all sides, their attacks, their methods, phasing through him, one after the other. His leg snapped out, shattering the chest of one, his arm grabbed two more, and smashed their heads together, the creak of steel ringing in his ears.
There was a clan on the moon.
His hands moved rapidly, forming hand signs that he had practiced to perfection. A second later, a fireball roared out of his lungs and fell upon the puppets, engulfing them in flame. The puppets were nearly endless, nearly limitless in number, but he could not care about them. They were easy to take down, and the overall amount of damage they could do to him was little, so long as his Kamui was active.
When Zetsu had come to him, telling him some nonsense about using the Kamui to take them to the moon, he had thought the half-plant man had lost his mind. However, he was Madara's will, and it was unlikely, deeply, heavily unlikely to suddenly have gone insane without any explanation. While it was true that his Kamui could go to places he had never been before, the moon was the moon. The vast, incomprehensible distance between the world and the moon was such that he had doubted such a range was even possible.
Yet, Zetsu insisted. He said it was. He said he only needed to try. He urged and needled and whined and prattled with such a never-before-seen urgency that was both unbecoming and disconcerting. What, indeed, could be harbored on the moon that would push the usually silent and taciturn plant man, the Will of Madara, to such desperate extremes, to beg like a cheap, destitute Geisha?
There was a clan on the moon.
"ZETSU!"
Answers. He wanted answers. He demanded answers. Why was there a clan on the moon? His sensei never mentioned anything of the sort. His clan never had any records of this. There was nothing in Konohagakure's history that spoke of a clan on the moon. Even Madara, before his passing, had never once hinted nor mentioned, or implied that the moon held such secrets. The goal of the Infinite Tsukuyomi, the Eye of the Moon Plan, was to cast an illusion on the moon and change the world entirely.
But there was a fucking clan on the moon.
"Come out, Zetsu!"
Upon arriving at the moon, Zetsu immediately dug into the ground... earth, moon-rock, and vanished. He was hiding from him. Avoiding him. It was a fruitless, foolish, and stupid effort, considering he was the man's only way back to the earth. He needed him to return.
Or does he?
Zetsu was hiding secrets. The very existence of a Clan hidden on the moon was proof enough that Madara's Will knew things that he did not. The very idea seemed absurd. How could the will of a man possess knowledge that the man himself did not know? It made no sense, none whatsoever. The only possible explanation he could think of was if there was some sort of foul play. Either a genjutsu, ninjutsu, or some other means, which had been used to trick Madara, or trick him, or trick Zetsu, or trick them all.
Have I been tricked? Me?
He grabbed a puppet and crushed its skull with such raw fury that his entire body began to shake.
Ever since failing to release the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox from his sensei's wife, he had been biding his time. He had been planning and plotting. He hunkered down in Kumogakure no Sato and established himself in the Land of Lightning. He was aware he could not best his sensei nor his wife in the art of fūinjutsu, so he planned to hone his mastery of genjutsu and hone his skill at using Kamui. Genjutsu was the one field of shinobi arts that Minato had admitted to his students multiple times to have neither interest in nor skill at. His wife, Kushina, was worse. Possessing terrible chakra control and possessing the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox would, in theory, make her even more susceptible to Genjutsu.
To be able to cast genjutsu on Kushina, he intended first to control one like the Jinchūriki of Eight-Tailed Demon Ox. He cornered him in secret and attempted to put the Kumo Shinobi in a Genjutsu, only to be baffled as it was dispelled almost instantly. That was how he learned that the man was partnered with his Tailed Beast. That was how he learned that every time a Genjutsu was put on him, the Tailed Beast would undo it.
And it was then, during that failure, as he remembered that frustrating barrier that foiled him, a stupid, outright insane thought came to him. A barrier that let nothing in or out, not even chakra, was something he had on him, at all times, and all moments. His Kamui Dimension was a perfect barrier that no one else could enter, and no one else could leave. Nothing could escape it, not even chakra.
Thus, he performed a genjutsu again, making physical contact, and as the Tailed Beast attempted to dispel it, in that moment, he used his Kamui, and sent the portion of the Jinchūriki's body that held his chakra responsible for the genjutsu, away, into his Kamui dimension, into a place that could not be touched, and could not be reached and could not be sensed nor interacted with by anything on this physical plane.
Then, immediately after, he brought it back.
It was the same method he used for his intangibility, sending a body part away for defense, then bringing it back to attack. He could make others intangible, as well, as long as he was touching them. Had it not been for that accursed barrier, he would have never thought of using a defensive method offensively.
The Tailed Beast had tried again to dispel the genjutsu, but again, he used the Kamui and sent away the part where the genjutsu lingered to a world that could not be interacted with; thus, the attempt failed again. The beast kept trying, creating a never-ending battle of attrition where one party was attempting to undo a genjutsu, and he, with his Kamui, kept sending the afflicted part away. The amount of chakra needed to use his Kamui in such a small, tiny body part to make it intangible was almost completely negligible.
The Tailed Beast could not compare to him in determination. It thought to itself that if it kept trying and trying, success would come.
It did not.
Unlike his former teammate Kakashi, who was born with talent, everything he had was gotten by clawing, tooth and nail, fighting, and struggling, and persevering through sheer grit. He wore down the Eight Tails through his persistence, and soon, the beast realized that he was using it and his host as a training dummy, and that he was getting better and faster at using his Kamui to send away the part. It stopped. However, it was too late. He had sent away the part afflicted with the genjutsu into his Kamui Dimension permanently.
Through failure, he had found a method, a means, to make it so no one could dispel his genjutsu.
Unless one had access to Kamui.
Or to his sensei's nonsensical space-time barrier.
That latter fact had soured his joy and embittered his soul. That barrier was the greatest obstacle to his plans. Were it not for it, he would have already gone back to Konoha and killed his sensei and captured the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox. Yet, ironically, were it not for it, he would never have considered such a use for his Kamui to begin with.
It does not matter.
His influence in Kumogakure was second to none. He was unseen, unheard, unnoticed, and untouchable. His sensei may have earned a title as the 'Whisper in the Wind,' but he?
He was the 'Ghost in the Clouds.'
It was only a matter of time, before he conceived of a way to bypass his sensei's barrier. Once he did, he would turn the entirety of Kumogakure and Kirigakure's forces upon Konoha. Iwa already hated Konoha. Suna, too, hated Konoha. With Kumo and Kiri soon to be under his control, in a matter of years, the entire world turn their blades on Konoha.
The peace that his sensei had so desperately sought to hold was fragile and untenable.
Konoha would be no different from a leaf swaying in the wind, assaulted by storms and pelted by rocks.
Another wave of puppets lunged after him, but he grew tired of them. He swept them all into his Kamui dimension and charged forward. For now, the geopolitical situation of the Elemental Nations did not matter to him in the slightest. What mattered was getting answers and finding out just what Zetsu was keeping from him.
And figuring out why in the world there was a Clan on the Moon