Naruto: Orochimaru's Disciple

Chapter 42: Chapter 42: The Goal of This Plan Is to Help the Teacher Gradually Adapt to Their New Role

Chapter 42: The Goal of This Plan Is to Help the Teacher Gradually Adapt to Their New Role

The soul was a wondrous thing.

”In the past, there was no way to prove the existence of the soul. There was that famous theory about the soul weighing twenty one grams, but it was never widely accepted.”

Kenichi Amamiya sat at home, pen in hand, quietly recording his thoughts in English characters.

Some things he would only write in English. In the world of Naruto, almost no one could understand those characters. For Kenichi, it was the perfect cipher.

That twenty one gram theory had once been wildly popular in his previous life, so of course he knew it. But it had never been scientifically proven. Most people believed the missing weight was just expelled gas or some other physical cause, nothing mysterious.

”But here, souls really do exist, and they seem to be visible to the naked eye. Yet they do not appear to reincarnate. They simply remain in that Pure Land,” Kenichi murmured thoughtfully.

If such a discovery had been made in his previous world, it would have turned everything upside down.

Who does not have regrets?

Who does not long to see those who have already passed away?

If death were no longer the end, but the beginning of another state of existence...

What would the world become?

Kenichi shook his head. Those were questions for philosophers. He was more concerned with something else.

”If the soul can control the body, then conversely, can the body influence the soul?”

His thoughts naturally turned to his teacher, Orochimaru.

Could he influence a soul through its body, subtly guiding it until his teacher’s behavior and way of thinking gradually resembled that of an animal?

Kenichi was genuinely curious.

If that were possible, then when Orochimaru eventually changed bodies and defected from Konoha, would his increasingly twisted personality also be the result of his soul being affected by its vessel?

”Still, this kind of research is probably something I can only do on my own. If teacher found out...”

A chill ran down his spine.

Orochimaru’s personality was strange. To his student, he could be very gentle and attentive, yet at the same time he was frighteningly cold.

Those two traits should not coexist well in one person, but that was exactly how Kenichi saw him.

He was strict with his students, had high expectations, and punished them heavily when necessary. Yet his rewards were equally generous, and once he promised Kenichi something, he always followed through.

He had never broken his word.

Silently, Kenichi tore the page filled with his thoughts into strips and tossed them into the stove, watching them burn to ash.

He would never underestimate his teacher. Orochimaru was very intelligent, terrifyingly so. Otherwise, he could never have become one of the Legendary Sannin.

If Orochimaru one day decided to learn English characters, then these records would become a serious problem.

Even so, Kenichi still resolved to carry out the experiment.

He hoped to gain unexpected insights, to deepen his understanding of the soul.

The next day, Kenichi went to watch the Third Hokage’s inauguration ceremony.

”He had his arm transplanted just yesterday, and today he is already announcing his return as Hokage?” Kenichi clicked his tongue.

The Third Hokage really could not wait.

Considering Danzo’s hungry gaze and Orochimaru’s looming reputation, however, his impatience was not hard to understand.

With the Will of Fire speech he had given the day before, his prestige had reached another peak. To seize that momentum and officially reclaim the Hokage title was both politically smart and practically necessary.

The village urgently needed a Hokage to stabilize the people’s hearts and send a message to the other hidden villages.

Yesterday’s events had shaken the world. If they did not respond quickly, there was a real risk that other villages would try to exploit Konoha’s weakness.

”Kenichi, let’s go. Today’s tests are not over yet.”

Orochimaru stood with his arms folded, watching the ceremony with cold eyes.

The moment Hiruzen began another speech about the Will of Fire, he simply turned away and left, taking Kenichi with him.

Kenichi followed quietly.

He had no interest in hearing that speech again. The Third had repeated it so many times that Kenichi could practically recite it from memory.

Back in the laboratory, Kenichi’s demeanor grew more serious.

He was honestly getting tired of assisting Root in their experiments. The work was repetitive, the progress painfully slow, and most of it was not particularly challenging.

If it were not for the funding, Kenichi suspected even Orochimaru would not bother. Then again, his teacher clearly had his own plans.

He was using Root’s materials and money to quietly further his personal research.

Some experiments, however, Orochimaru flatly refused to let Kenichi take part in.

Those projects were rare, but they existed. Kenichi suspected those were related to the unique technique of Living Corpse Reincarnation.

”Kenichi, I have a research task for you.”

After changing into a lab coat and pulling on a pair of gloves, Orochimaru turned and spoke in a calm, serious tone.

Kenichi immediately straightened up.

”This task is simple,” Orochimaru said. ”I want you to research how to make the proliferation of that cell line stable and controllable.”

He spoke with complete seriousness.

Kenichi was stunned for a moment.

”Teacher, do you mean...?”

He was not entirely sure he had understood correctly.

”Just focus on the research. If you succeed and we see results, it could be a groundbreaking discovery.”

Orochimaru narrowed his eyes slightly and said no more.

But that was enough.

Kenichi understood his teacher’s meaning at once.

Orochimaru had clearly arrived at the same line of thinking.

Everyone knew that cancer cells were cells that had broken past their normal limits. As long as there was enough nutrition, they could proliferate almost without end. To this day, no true upper limit had ever been observed.

Were cancer cells the key to human evolution?

Or were they the key to immortality?

The problem was that no human body could withstand the damage and plunder caused by those cells.

Cancer cells: I would love for everyone to live forever, but you all fall apart before I can even show my full potential.

”Understood, teacher.”

Kenichi nodded. This experiment was not too complicated, at least on the surface.

During their research on Hashirama Senju’s cells, he had discovered that cancer cells and those original cells shared an uncanny similarity.

In a way, the First Hokage was like a human shaped, large scale cancer cell. The vitality of his cells was outrageous, far beyond what an ordinary body could endure.

After confirming this characteristic of the First’s cells, Kenichi could not help but wonder whether Hashirama had even still been human in the conventional sense.

How could one person’s cells be that abnormal?

The cells in Hashirama’s body were like specialized cancer cells. Each type had its own distinct function, yet they could all proliferate indefinitely, and there were no apparent side effects.

On paper, that looked very much like the foundation for eternal life.

But the First Hokage was dead, and the exact circumstances of his death remained murky.

So whether he could have achieved true immortality was still an unanswered question.

”I really hope teacher leaves Konoha soon. There are too many restrictions here for the kind of experiments I want to do,” Kenichi muttered, rubbing his temples.

Even so, he felt that day was not far off.

Orochimaru’s intent had been very clear.

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