Chapter 55: When Money and Art Collide
Land of Rice Fields, a Hidden Valley, the swamp stinks, and poisonous snakes are everywhere.
This is Orochimaru's lair, and also the location of the Akatsuki's first "team-building" event.
"This is the legendary Sannin's stronghold?"
Under the bamboo hat, Sasori of the Red Sand's voice was full of disdain as he crushed a poisonous snake trying to approach with one foot. "Slimy, dark, and utterly devoid of beauty. Keeping these mollusks as pets is a desecration of art."
"I don't care about taste; I care about value."
Kakuzu's dark green eyes stared intently at the ten-meter-high steel gate ahead, his gaze burning. "Cast from a mix of special alloys. Just taking this door down and selling it for scrap metal would be worth at least five hundred thousand ryo."
"That's a precision mechanical gate, you uncultured miser," Sasori snorted coldly.
"Quiet."
Yahiko stood at the front and said only two words.
The argument behind him about "art" and "money" vanished instantly.
He didn't look at the complex defensive barriers, but simply tilted his head slightly and gave Deva Path Pain a look.
Heavenly Dao nodded indifferently, his fingers hooking slightly.
"Clang-clang—!"
At the end of the team, the burly bald man—Asura Path—suddenly stepped forward.
This was the masterpiece Sasori had spent 120 million ryo to build.
As Chakra was injected, Asura Path's arm muscles split open like flower petals, revealing the cold iron barrels inside. His wrists retracted, and six miniature missiles marked with red danger signs ejected.
No hand Seals were needed, only physical destruction.
"Flaming Arrow of the Strange Arm: Sequential Play!"
Boom, boom, boom—!!
Six streaks of fire tore through the darkness, screeching as they slammed into the "Absolute Defense" gate.
The explosion was deafening, and dust rose everywhere.
Barriers, seals—in the face of saturated firepower, all are equal.
That half-meter-thick steel gate worth five hundred thousand ryo, along with the passage behind it, was instantly reduced to flying scrap metal.
"Alarm! The base entrance has suffered a devastating blow!"
Piercing red lights instantly illuminated the valley.
"This money was well spent."
Yahiko looked at the gap that had been blasted open and nodded with satisfaction. "Let's go and say hello to our new colleague."
...Inside the base, everything was in chaos.
Defensive mechanisms were fully triggered, gates deep in the laboratory opened, and countless "Cursed Seal failures" discarded by Orochimaru were released.
"Roar—!!"
Hundreds of grey-skinned, mutated monsters surged out like a zombie tide, their roars making one's skin crawl.
"There are quite a few small fry."
Yahiko kept his hands in his sleeves, having no desire to act.
Cleaning up trash was the employees' duty.
"How hideous."
Sasori stepped forward, looking at the drooling, twisted lumps of flesh, the disgust in his eyes almost overflowing. "Such crudely made stitched-together monsters are worthy of being called 'modifications'? Has Orochimaru's aesthetic sense warped to this extent?"
Swish!
He suddenly unfurled the scroll on his back.
"Allow me to teach him what true... eternal beauty is."
"Red Secret Technique: Performance of a Hundred Puppets!"
Poof!
Red clouds exploded.
Hundreds of Puppets clad in red robes blotted out the sky, each connected to the Chakra threads from Sasori's chest. Like a red army of Shinigami, they instantly crashed into the grey zombie tide.
This wasn't a battle at all; it was a one-sided slaughter.
Rotating blades sliced through muscle, and poisoned Senbon pierced through bone.
At this range, Sasori was a god.
Limbs flew, black blood splattered. Sasori stood at the center of the storm, his fingers dancing as if playing a piano, his expression fanatical.
However, at the climax of this "artistic performance"—
Whoosh!
Several black tentacles shot out like phantoms, accurately wrapping around the neck of a mutated rogue Ninja before the Puppet's blade could fall.
It was Kakuzu's Earth Grudge Fear.
Crack.
The head was violently twisted off.
In the next second, the Puppet blade controlled by Sasori slashed down fiercely, but hit only air.
"Kakuzu!!"
Sasori turned his head sharply, his handsome, youthful face contorted with rage. "You've disrupted my rhythm! That was my material!"
"Your material is worthless."
Kakuzu held the still-dripping head and quickly compared it to a small booklet, not even looking at Sasori. "Iwagakure rogue Ninja, B-rank bounty, black market price of three million ryo. If you chop it to pieces, it becomes worthless. That's a crime against money."
After saying that, the Earth Grudge Fear Mask Monsters behind him split off, acting like an efficient harvester, accurately "stealing kills" on the chaotic battlefield.
"Kumogakure wanted criminal, five million."
"Wandering Ninja leader, eight hundred thousand... tsk, even mosquito legs are meat."
The style of the battlefield split instantly.
On one side, Sasori was unleashing his ultimate for "art," leaving nothing alive; on the other, Kakuzu was precisely finishing off targets for "money," only snatching the expensive ones.
"That bastard..."
Sasori's fingers trembled with rage as he manipulated the Third Kazekage Puppet, preparing to launch an Iron Sand World Order at Kakuzu.
"Enough."
From the high platform, Yahiko's voice drifted down coldly.
He looked at the farce below, and far from being angry, the corners of his mouth curled slightly.
All villains, each with their own schemes, but under the suppression of absolute strength, this was the most terrifying killing machine in the Ninja World.
"Asura Path, clear the field."
The command was given.
With a thought from Nagato, Asura Path crouched slightly, the chest armor sliding open to both sides, revealing a massive cannon port emitting a purple light of destruction.
Chakra condensed frantically, and the air warped from the high temperature.
Mimicking the principle of the Tailed Beast Ball—the Chakra Laser Cannon.
"Get out of the way!"
Kakuzu, who was about to steal another kill, felt a chill down his spine. He instantly used his tentacles to pull his body, scurrying onto the ceiling like a gecko.
Sasori also snorted coldly, pulling his fingers back as the Puppets in the air instantly hovered against the walls.
"Asura Attack!"
Boom—!!
A thick purple laser beam swept out, instantly piercing through the entire underground hall!
The remaining Cursed Seal monsters didn't even have time to scream before being vaporized in the terrifying heat.
The beam's momentum didn't fade, blasting through several load-bearing walls until it dissipated at the end of the line of sight.
The world went quiet.
A scorched deep trench was left on the ground, and the air was filled with the smell of ozone and charring.
"Tsk, the power is decent." Sasori glanced at Asura Path, a hint of satisfaction flashing in his eyes.
This was the destructive power his masterpiece should have.
"What a waste..." Kakuzu jumped down from the ceiling, looking heart-broken at several corpses turned to charcoal. "There must have been valuable goods in there! That one shot just evaporated at least ten million ryo!"
Yahiko leaped down from the high ground, his red-clouded black robe fluttering.
He walked to the end of the deep trench, where the laboratory door was half-shattered.
"Stop worrying about that petty cash, Kakuzu."
Red light flickered slightly in Yahiko's eyes. "The real big fish is inside."
In the previous round, Sasori showed his firepower, and Kakuzu showed his greed.
But he saw something more interesting.
Sasori walked to the wreckage of a defensive Puppet affected by the laser, kicked the damaged joint core with his toe, and his face turned visibly dark.
"This joint transmission design..."
Sasori's voice was ice-cold. "It's a discarded draft I phased out when I was twelve. That snake-playing fellow not only has bad taste but also plagiarized my technology?"
"It seems we're not just here to recruit; we also have to file a copyright lawsuit." Yahiko chuckled.
Just then.
Whoosh—
A cold wind blew from deep within the base, the surrounding temperature plummeted, and the flames that were still burning froze instantly.
A massive, damp, and slimy Chakra, like some giant reptile, slowly covered the entire area.
"Hehehehe..."
In the depths of the shadows, a pair of golden vertical pupils slowly lit up. It was the greedy gaze a predator shows only when seeing top-tier prey.
Orochimaru's figure slowly emerged, his tongue licking his lips with hair-raising excitement.
"You broke my front door, killed all my pets, and even ridiculed my taste in passing..."
"Since you're here, why don't you all stay?"
"My laboratory just happens to be short of a few good materials..."
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