Anko and Hiruzen were currently standing next to each other, while Orochimaru stood in front of them. Seeing Orochimaru’s eyes greedily looking at her, Anko could only chuckle.
“Hehe, did you get captivated by my body? I didn’t know you had any interest in women.”
Although Orochimaru’s eyebrow twitched a little, he still answered Anko with a small chuckle.
“Kukuku, rather than women, I have much more interest in your body in general. How can you absorb natural energy without standing still? That should be impossible. That Hyuga girl did the same. Is it a special jutsu? Or maybe a seal?”
“Haha, she is no longer a Hyuga, you know. Please pay attention properly. Additionally, I can tell you if you want, it is…”
Orochimaru’s eyes widened a little. He did not expect Anko to just tell him the secret. Hiruzen on the other hand panicked a little. Whatever the secret was, he certainly didn’t want Orochimaru to know about it. He was just about to stop Anko when…
“…the power of love!”
…he almost face-planted into the ground. Although Orochimaru didn’t show much of a reaction, his eyebrow still twitched in irritation, showing that he certainly wasn’t happy with that explanation either. Seeing the irritated looks on Hiruzen and Orochimaru, Anko couldn’t help but laugh out loud.
“HAHAHA! GOTCHA!”
Orochimaru clicked his tongue in irritation and started to weave seals with his hands.
“Fine, I will just take the secret from your corpse then and if that fails, there is still the Hyuga girl to experiment on.”
“[Many Hidden Shadow Snake Hands]”
Anko glanced at Hiruzen who stood next to her and gave him a nod. She quickly went through the same hand seals Orochimaru just used and countered his jutsu with her own. Although she could tell that she would lose this contest of strength in the long run, it was only necessary to block Orochimaru for a short time. She was, after all, not alone.
“[Fire Style: Dragon Flame Bomb]”
Multiple dragons made out of fire shot past the clashing snakes and directly flew at Orochimaru. Orochimaru dodged the first few and, while dodging, started to go through a few hand seals again and created a wall of water to block the last few dragons. However, as soon as the water wall blocked the last dragon and disappeared, a horde of snakes appeared, and dozens of them bit into Orochimaru.
Anko knew that there was no way that such a basic attack would actually hit Orochimaru, so she wasn’t surprised in the slightest when Orochimaru turned into multiple snakes and reappeared in his initial position. Anko couldn’t help but glance at Hiruzen and frown a little.
‘Why did the old man use such a weak jutsu just now? I could have held Orochimaru back a while longer and the old man was clearly aware of that. He could have easily used that time to fire off a stronger jutsu, but didn’t. Why?’
Anko gave Hiruzen another glance and coincidentally met eyes with him.
‘I see, after everything that happened, he is still unwilling to kill his own student, huh. Good thing Yuna already told me about his weak point.’
A smirk appeared on Anko’s face that sent shivers through Hiruzen’s whole body.
‘For some reason, that smirk feels rather familiar. And I can, for some reason, feel a headache creeping up on me. Urgh, I wanna retire…’
“Hehe, old man I heard you made a rather interesting trade with Yuna a while ago. How about we make a little deal ourselves?”
Orochimaru was just about to continue his attack when Anko started speaking. He couldn’t help but be slightly curious what kind of deal was made. Especially if Yuna was involved. The fact that Hiruzen apparently doesn’t want to talk about it, made him even more curious.
Hiruzen, on the other hand, had no idea what to say, and neither did he know what Anko wanted to achieve. Although Hiruzen hasn’t answered her yet, Anko continued to speak anyway.
“How about this: If you seriously go for the kill, I will organize the second one in the same condition for you.”
Hiruzen’s breathing stopped for a moment when he heard this and his eyes shone with excitement. He wanted to agree immediately, but before he could do so a small white angel seemed to have landed on his shoulder and started to speak.
“You can’t kill your student just because you will get a book that you want as payment.”
Hiruzen nodded his head.
“That is true. Although I really want it, there is no way I can kill my student for it.”
Just when he was about to reject the offer, a red devil landed on his other shoulder.
“Isn’t it fine? Orochimaru has done a lot of evil things. There should be no problem killing him. You really want that book, don’t you? Wouldn’t it look absolutely amazing to have both books enshrined next to each other with matching signatures?”
Hiruzen nodded his head and glanced at the devil. He noticed that it looked very similar to Yuna which somehow didn’t surprise him.
‘That is true. He has done all kinds of inhuman experiments. I should just kill him.’
Just when he was about to accept the deal, the angel started speaking again.
“Is that really fine? Although he might have done a lot of evil, is killing your student for a book really o…”
Before the angel could finish speaking, the devil interrupted him.
“Then let’s just kill him for the sake of Konoha.”
Both the angel and Hiruzen looked at the devil in surprise. A wide smile appeared on its face that sent shivers through Hiruzen’s spine.
“Hehe, we kill him for the sake of Konoha. We will get the book, yes. But that wouldn’t have been the reason we killed him. It is just a little bonus. Isn’t it fine for a shinobi to accept some bonus for a job well done?”
Hiruzen and the angel were enlightened by that and quickly nodded in agreement.
“”Let’s do it! It’s for Konoha’s sake, after all.””
“Hehe, that’s right.”
Orochimaru and Anko, meanwhile, gave Hiruzen a weirded-out look. Hiruzen’s expression was constantly changing while his eyes were wandering from left to right and back again. Orochimaru was truly curious about what kind of deal Anko offered him. She, unfortunately, said it in a way that he couldn’t understand the real meaning behind it.
‘It must be something incredibly important for sensei to fall this deep in thought about it. She said “the second one in the same condition”, is it about a weapon? Something like a pair of swords that get stronger when used together. Now that I think about it, it seems like the Uzumaki clan has been stealthily gathered inside Konoha. Considering they accepted Yuna as a princess, this might involve some powerful seal the Uzumaki clan possesses. Unfortunately for Anko, sensei is way too soft to kill his student for a powerful weapon or seal.’
To Orochimaru’s surprise, however, when Hiruzen finished his inner debate and looked at him, there was steel-like determination inside them. Simultaneously, Hiruzen’s killing intent flared out and crashed into Orochimaru, who couldn’t help but be shocked.
“I am sorry, Orochimaru. You have done so many bad things, I have no other choice but to kill you for the sake of the village. You are simply too dangerous to be left alive.”
Orochimaru looked at his sensei completely dumbfounded. Although his words sounded righteous, Orochimaru was very skilled at reading people and could immediately tell that there was quite a bit of greed in Hiruzen’s eyes.
‘What in the world did Anko offer him?’
Anko, meanwhile, couldn’t help but chuckle a little when she saw Orochimaru’s bewildered expression. She knew exactly what kinds of thoughts he was currently having and, truth be told, she really wanted to see what his face would look like when she told him what kind of thing, she had offered Hiruzen.
‘It would probably be hilarious to straight-up tell him. Won’t he die of anger if he finds out that the old man is willing to kill him for a… love story? Well, I won’t tell him though. I feel like that might overstep the old man’s bottom line.’
Although it took Orochimaru a while to regain his bearing, when he did, he couldn’t help but chuckle.
“Kukuku, good. Very good. Seems like even you can become heartless if it is about acquiring a powerful weapon, sensei. Fine, it doesn’t matter. I came here to kill you today and that is exactly what I will do.”
Orochimaru opened his mouth wide and pulled out a double-edged sword, the Sword of Kusanagi, out of it.
Hiruzen had no idea what weapon Orochimaru was talking about, but he went through the hand seals of the summoning jutsu to summon the Monkey King Enma, anyway. Only his Adamantine Staff Transformation could deal with the Sword of Kusanagi.
Anko, meanwhile, felt a little left out. She wasn’t sure why, but she felt that she shouldn’t interfere in this fight. At first, she wasn’t sure what to do, but moments later, two ANBU sailed past her and crashed into the ground, which somewhat answered that question.
‘Guess I will go play with the second Hokage instead. Oh well, that’s fine as well.’
