Knowledge is power.
Orochimaru had believed that from the moment he first saw what death really looked like.
Maybe it was because he'd stared at too many corpses as a child, watched too many "experiments" end in silence, that he became obsessed with learning how the world really worked—on every level. Not just ninjutsu, not just chakra, but the underlying rules beneath all of it.
From "Adam," for the first time, he'd glimpsed something deeper.
Knowledge that didn't just bend the ninja world—it sat above it.
Knowledge that felt like it could rewrite reality.
That was why he bowed his head and pretended obedience.
That was why he accepted "Adam's" orders.
But that never meant he planned to be a well-trained dog.
Far from it.
In the dim lab, Orochimaru's golden, slit-pupiled eyes carried a faint mocking smile.
"If you want to control me," he murmured, voice low and cold, "a few threats aren't enough."
He'd started preparing a long time ago.
Quietly.
Patiently.
A test.
And the target of that test, naturally, was the one who claimed to be an angel—"Adam," high and untouchable.
The plan was slow, careful, and buried under layers of misdirection. Orochimaru was confident that even if "He" existed at some unimaginable height, the probing wouldn't be noticed too easily.
Confident—but not stupid.
If he was going to test something that walked and talked like a god, he'd be an idiot not to prepare for failure.
So he'd used an incomplete, still-unstable technique to slice off fragments of his own soul.
Not just one piece—several.
Each shard was sealed inside one of his trusted subordinates. If something went horribly wrong, if the worst came to pass, at least a few soul-fragments might survive. Even if resurrection took years, even decades… it was still a way out.
Dangerous? Yes.
But if the prize was proof—if the target was a possible god—Orochimaru thought the trade was fair.
"Preparations… complete," he whispered, lips curling.
"Now then. Let's see just how far you reach… Adam."
The words had barely left his mouth when—
Zzzzt. Zzzzzzt.
A harsh crackling filled the lab.
The dim ceiling light started flickering. Bright–dark–bright–dark, the entire room blinking like a dying heartbeat. The pulses came faster and faster until the walls themselves seemed to breathe.
Orochimaru's pupils narrowed.
A chill slid down his spine.
That's… not normal.
Especially not when he'd just spoken that name out loud in an empty room.
No. That's impossible… isn't it?
Cold sweat broke out across his back. His face stayed calm, but his fingers tensed on the edge of the chair.
The temperature seemed to drop.
The shadows in the corners stretched and thickened as if the darkness were seeping outward, greedily swallowing each trembling patch of light.
One point.
Then another.
Then another—
Buzz.
The room went completely black.
"Who's there?!"
Orochimaru shot up from his chair, hands already flying into seals. Every nerve was stretched taut. His voice, usually languid and mocking, snapped sharp.
"Come out!"
Silence.
Utter, suffocating silence.
The empty lab swallowed his shout like a grave. No footsteps. No breathing. No movement.
But he felt it.
Something was watching him.
The sensation pressed against the back of his neck like a cold blade, a presence just beyond the edge of perception. His slit pupils moved restlessly, scanning every angle, every corner.
Nothing.
Yet the gaze only grew more vivid, more oppressive—as if some invisible knife was sliding along his throat, back and forth, testing for the perfect cut.
"Fine. Have it your way."
He flicked his sleeves.
"Hidden Shadow Snake Hands!"
A carpet of snakes exploded out across the floor, dozens of them, hundreds—slithering, spreading, exploring every corner, climbing shelves and walls. Each serpent carried a sliver of his senses.
They searched the lab thoroughly.
They found nothing.
The unknown fear pressed in tighter.
Orochimaru's heart rate rose—not from panic, but from a predator's awareness that something higher on the food chain might be near.
Then, out of the corner of his eye—
Something moved.
A blurry, ink-black silhouette, standing half-formed in the farthest shadow.
There.
He turned like a striking viper and shot forward in a blur.
"Hidden Shadow Snake Hands!"
Snakes shot from his sleeve with a snap—only to slam into bare wall.
No one was there.
"…"
Orochimaru's expression finally changed.
That's… interesting.
Fear, for once, edged out curiosity.
He, one of the Sannin, a man who had explored death itself… was being toyed with?
No. There's no chakra. No presence. What is this? A genjutsu? Another system entirely?
One thought surfaced, unbidden.
"Ad… Adam?"
His throat felt dry. He tasted bitterness on his tongue.
"Is that you… Adam?"
The lab didn't answer.
No echo. No voice.
Just that crushing silence and the invisible stare pressing harder and harder, like a pressure drill boring straight through his skull and into his heart.
Orochimaru moved.
If he couldn't find it, he'd retreat. Regroup. He wasn't stupid enough to stand still and wait to be punished.
He lunged for the door.
His foot hit the floor—
—and the tile shattered under his weight.
His step slid forward into nothing. His whole body pitched sideways with zero warning.
Bang!
His head smashed into the wall beside the exit.
Two teeth went flying.
Bright pain burst across his jaw. Blood filled his mouth. He spat red and staggered, caught between fury and disbelief.
Seriously?
He wiped his face with the back of his hand, forced chakra back into his limbs, and reached for the door again.
Which was exactly when his own snakes betrayed him.
Without his focus, the summoned vipers had gone wild—thrashing, colliding, slamming into shelves and stands of glassware.
One heavy rack tipped over with a slow, inevitable creak.
Then—
Crash!
Bottles shattered.
Acidic and corrosive liquids poured like rain.
Orochimaru had just enough time to realize what was in those containers.
This is going to—
Hssssss.
The chemicals hit.
His cloak and outer skin sizzled and peeled away in strips, the stench of burned flesh filling the room.
"Aaaargh!"
For a moment the legendary Sannin might as well have been a skinned man thrown into boiling oil. He stumbled backward out of the splash zone, still screaming, instinctively trying to escape from the knives of sensation carving across his nerves.
After a few blind steps he slipped on something wet and living.
A snake.
Of course.
His foot shot out from under him.
Bang!
The back of his head crashed into the floor. Stars exploded across his vision. It felt like his brain rattled three times inside his skull.
Orochimaru lay there for a fraction of a second, chest heaving, the taste of blood and chemicals thick on his tongue.
And then he saw it again.
Out of the corner of his eye.
That shape. That smudge of deeper shadow in the darkness. A human outline, featureless and utterly still, watching him.
His breath caught.
Crack.
Something broke above him.
Slowly, he tilted his head up.
The ceiling light—the one that had been flickering madly—was hanging by a thread, its casing already eaten away by splashed chemicals. The metal frame failed.
The whole thing dropped.
Whisssh—whissh—whissh!
From less than three meters up, a handful of glass shards shouldn't have been a threat to someone like Orochimaru.
But the speed.
The angle.
The way each jagged piece spun in the air with the precision of a guided weapon—
His instincts screamed.
His fingers flew into signs even as he rolled.
"Orochimaru-Style Substitution!"
His mouth unhinged. A pale replica of himself crawled out of his own body, leaving the original behind like a discarded snakeskin.
The shards hit.
Pshhk—pshhk—pshhk—
His abandoned body was pierced through in a dozen places.
Throat. Heart. Eyes. Spine. Major arteries.
Every shard drove into a vital point as if it had been deliberately aimed.
If he'd been half a heartbeat slower, if his substitution had been delayed by even a fraction of a second, his true body would've looked exactly like that—hanging there like a butchered carcass, pinned to the floor by glass.
Orochimaru stared at the ruined shell he'd just crawled out of.
For once in his life, genuine terror crawled up from his gut.
A glass lamp. Acid. A broken tile.
A string of accidents.
No. Not accidents.
No shinobi who'd lived this long believed in coincidences that stacked neatly one after another.
One time was bad luck.
Twice was suspicious.
Three times in a row, in the span of a minute?
That was a hand pushing from behind.
"I…"
He swallowed hard.
His knees hit the floor of their own accord.
He bent at the waist and pressed his forehead down, hands flat on the cold stone.
"I'm sorry. I was wrong."
His voice shook, more from rational fear than humiliation.
"Please… forgive my rudeness. Just this once."
He'd planned carefully. Prepared multiple backups. Thought himself ready for the worst.
And before he'd even started the test, he'd almost died—three times—killed not by jutsu or weapons but by falling lamps and spilled poison.
If this continued, he wasn't sure what would kill him next.
Only that it would look ridiculous on his gravestone.
For a long moment, nothing answered him.
Then, like a whisper directly in his skull, a voice brushed his mind.
Calm.
Indifferent.
Hard as cold iron.
"Last… time."
The oppressive presence vanished.
No more staring eyes. No more crushing pressure. The room was just a room again—dark, wrecked, smelling of acid and blood.
Orochimaru stayed kneeling, head still to the floor, shoulders trembling.
"...Understood."
His voice was barely audible.
He exhaled a long, bitter breath.
The great Orochimaru, who'd wanted to test a god, had just been swatted on the nose like an unruly dog.
And warned.
Just once.
He raised his head finally, eyes hooded.
The fear was still there.
But underneath it, deeper and darker, something else was coiling.
Curiosity.
"Interesting," he whispered hoarsely.
He smiled, slow and twisted.
"Very… interesting."
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