With Mukai's matter settled, Ryuji continued studying the two swords.
The Executioner's Blade fragments were simply ordinary metallic material with nothing remarkable, possessing no ability to absorb iron from blood.
Clearly, the Executioner's Blade's special ability didn't originate from its material but from the forging technique or certain seals engraved on the hilt.
As for the Exploding Sword… the scanner quickly performed reverse engineering.
It was a forging technique combining Summoning Technique with the blade, allowing quick summoning of corresponding explosive tags through various slashing motions or hand seals. The technique was simple and crude but highly practical.
The key difficulty lay in the explosive tag summoning contract scroll.
Ryuji didn't know if a sub-space like an 'Explosive Tag Holy Land' existed in this world, but this scroll could summon explosive tags from nothing, just like the Second Hokage's developed 'Mutually Multiplying Explosive Tags'… utterly unreasonable.
Ryuji further analyzed and researched, developing his own 'Mutually Multiplying Explosive Tags'.
Then, in a flash of inspiration, he loaded the scroll as an ammunition magazine into the mechanical bird, transforming it into a bomber.
Of course, this process took a long time.
By the time the mechanical bird was fully modified, the Mechanical City had already returned to Sunagakure half a day earlier.
Mission reports, settling the Uzumaki Clan, Mechanical City's real estate plans... A pile of tasks awaited Ryuji outside, forcing him to exit his personal laboratory.
...
Meanwhile.
While Ryuji was busy handling various administrative tasks, somewhere in the Land of Wind, Sasori finally received the recruitment offer from the Akatsuki.
A cold wind blew, yellow sand swirling.
In the desolate desert wilderness, bare rocky cliffs stood side by side.
On a particular cliff edge stood Sasori, wearing a brown vest, his appearance unchanged from before. He looked down at the figure below.
Clad in a black cloak with red clouds, he was a young man with short orange hair. Black metal rods were inserted into his nose, chin, and ears. Especially the ones in his nose... their thickness exceeded mere ornamentation, looking quite unnerving.
But Sasori felt nothing.
His human puppets were modified from corpses; he saw far more disturbing sights countless times daily. Moreover, the Shinobi World had many eccentric individuals; even something exceptionally bizarre wasn't strange.
Yet, he still felt intrigued by this person.
He was clearly alive… demeanor, speech, movements... everything met the standards of a living person. But from Sasori's perspective, he seemed utterly lifeless, like a corpse, full of dissonance.
'What's the deal with this guy?'
"Sasori of the Red Sand, what is your answer?"
The calm words brought Sasori out of his thoughts.
He looked down at the person and smiled lightly.
"Pain, is it?" Sasori asked, "I don't know who you are, but I'm not interested in joining organizations."
"Is that so?" Pain seemed to have expected this, showing no disappointment. He said calmly, "Then let's fight. If I win, you join my organization."
"I wouldn't mind acquiring another human puppet either."
A cold smile appeared on Sasori's face. A scroll slipped into his hand and opened as he formed a hand seal.
Poof!
Amidst dissipating thick white smoke, the Third Kazekage's human puppet appeared beside Sasori.
'This is...'
Pain's pupils contracted sharply.
As an unprecedented puppeteer capable of multi-tasking, Sasori naturally didn't miss Pain's reaction. Curiously, he asked, "Oh~ You seem somewhat familiar with my puppet."
"...I have met the Third Kazekage."
After a moment's silence, Pain said, "I've heard of your human puppets… modified from corpses. But four months ago, I fought the Third Kazekage. Afterwards, there was no news of anything happening to the Third Kazekage. This puppet of yours..."
"Fought the Third Kazekage and know about my human puppets..." Sasori chuckled lightly. "It seems your organization isn't the small, incompetent group I imagined. Let me ask, what's your organization called again?"
"Akatsuki."
"Akatsuki?"
Sasori froze in place.
Since being exiled and driven out of the Land of Wind by Ryuji, he had been gathering information about the Akatsuki.
But the information he could obtain was only about a small organization active in the Land of Rain.
Initially, Sasori thought Ryuji referred to that organization. But after learning about that organization's usual activities, he changed his mind.
Because that organization was too naive.
Acting under the philosophy of stopping war... That in itself wasn't a problem. But they advocated mutual understanding between people, using dialogue to persuade others to abandon war and act accordingly.
Such actions made Sasori disdainful.
Not disdain for the actions themselves, but he believed an organization operating under such a philosophy was doomed to fail, thus couldn't be the organization that would later recruit him.
No, setting aside survivability,
Just based on this organization's operational style, they wouldn't recruit someone with a notorious reputation like him.
After all, not long ago, to obtain materials for human puppets, he had destroyed a small country… completely contrary to Akatsuki's stated principles.
Therefore, Sasori Sand didn't pay much attention to that Akatsuki.
And as he predicted, not long after, news spread throughout the Shinobi World that the Akatsuki had been destroyed by Sunagakure.
He didn't care, merely wandering the Shinobi World doing what he liked while inquiring about another Akatsuki.
But no matter how he inquired, there was no information.
Over time, he became less concerned about this matter.
Just as he was about to forget it, unexpectedly, someone from Akatsuki came to him.
"Hmm hmm hmm..." Sasori laughed happily. "Akatsuki, is it? Then let me see what abilities you have to make me join!"
"You haven't answered my question." Pain pointed at the floating puppet beside him. "This puppet still has many human flesh parts. This is the Third Kazekage's human puppet, right? Why is the Third Kazekage not dead, yet you have his human puppet?"
"Are you interested?"
"No, just a bit curious."
"Win against me, and I'll tell you!"
As he spoke, Sasori flicked his right hand, five Chakra Threads shooting out to connect to the Third Kazekage human puppet. His left hand formed a seal.
"Click!"
The Third Kazekage human puppet opened its mouth, a large amount of Iron Sand sliding out.
"Simple enough." Pain raised his right hand, aiming at Sasori of the Red Sand. "Shinra Tensei!"
Instantly, a powerful attractive force formed, pulling Sasori's body forward.
Sasori's eyes widened. Changing his left-hand seal, he intoned, "Ninja Art: Iron Sand Drizzle!"
Immediately, all the Iron Sand scattered on the ground rose, transforming into dense bullets shooting toward Pain.