"Kid… who the hell are you?"
Manda was genuinely shaken.
After being forcefully summoned, he realized he was still on the same battlefield. Only this time, he had appeared directly beneath the shinobi who had just unleashed that absurdly dangerous technique.
For a brief moment, Manda's thoughts matched Orochimaru's perfectly. Confusion. Shock. A complete failure to understand what had just happened.
He didn't even notice he'd been summoned into midair.
Nor did he remember the crucial detail that he couldn't fly.
So he fell.
Hard.
The massive body of the snake smashed into the ground, shaking the plain and kicking up a choking cloud of dust. But Manda ignored the pain entirely, his voice rumbling with menace as he glared at Tōma.
"Answer me!"
"That question's better directed at the White Snake Sage," Fujimoto Tōma replied calmly. "And you might want to fix your tone."
There was no politeness in his voice. He had never liked Manda. A creature that delighted in live sacrifices wasn't something he felt obligated to respect.
If not for his contract with Ryūchi Cave, Tōma wouldn't have hesitated to throw another Rasenshuriken at him. Manda wasn't Orochimaru. He didn't require elaborate setup to hit. A body that large couldn't dodge forever.
"You—!" Manda roared, fury rising.
Then it stopped.
Memory clicked into place.
The White Snake Sage had issued a warning once. About someone new. Someone important.
Manda had ignored it.
Now that "someone" was standing in front of him.
The rage died in his throat.
More importantly, Manda didn't want to experience that technique again. Orochimaru was still screaming in the sky, and even from the edge of the blast, Kabuto had been flung away like trash.
Manda glared one last time, then dispelled himself and vanished back to Ryūchi Cave.
Tōma didn't spare him another glance. He flashed over to Jiraiya's side.
Gamabunta, muttering about ridiculous humans, dismissed himself soon after. Katsuyu followed, though a small fragment remained on Tsunade's shoulder, continuing to heal her.
The storm finally died down.
What remained fell.
A body dropped from the sky and hit the ground with a dull, heavy impact, dust erupting outward.
Silence.
Jiraiya and Tsunade stared.
"I'll check," Jiraiya said.
"No," Tōma replied immediately, expression serious. "Don't underestimate Orochimaru. Even that might not be enough."
Jiraiya paused, then nodded. With Flying Thunder God, Tōma was the safest option. If Orochimaru was still alive, he could escape instantly.
Still… could anyone really survive that?
Tōma drew chakra again. A faint current of lightning stimulated his nerves, sharpening his reaction time. Step by step, he approached the crater.
The instant he reached its edge, his eyes narrowed.
Danger.
He vanished.
A massive white serpent head erupted upward, jaws snapping shut on empty air, tearing away soil and stone where Tōma had just stood.
No explanation was needed.
An enormous white serpent with eight heads rose from the ground, its presence crushing. Its scale rivaled a tailed beast. Its pressure was no weaker.
Eight heads roared in unison.
The land itself seemed to tremble beneath the sound.
"Forbidden Technique… Eight Branches," Jiraiya muttered.
Tsunade's face was grim. That technique was recorded in Konoha's sealed archives, its origins unclear, its danger unquestioned.
Orochimaru had mastered it.
Everyone tensed again.
All eight serpent eyes locked onto Tōma, killing intent flooding the air. For a moment, it felt like the attack would resume.
Then it didn't.
Two heads lunged instead, snatching up Kabuto Yakushi and Guren in their jaws. The massive body sank back underground, retreating without hesitation.
No one tried to stop him.
They all felt it.
In that state, Orochimaru was a cornered monster. Pressing the attack would only invite disaster.
"…Figures," Tōma muttered once his senses confirmed the retreat. "Still couldn't kill him."
He exhaled slowly.
What had they gained?
Tsunade's fear of blood had eased. She'd accepted the position of Fifth Hokage. That alone was a major victory.
Orochimaru escaped. Kabuto likely survived. Kimimaro had died, but even that felt hollow. The boy would have succumbed to his illness soon anyway.
Still, forcing Orochimaru to reveal the Eight Branches Technique wasn't nothing. That was clearly his trump card. Something he couldn't use lightly.
If Orochimaru had opened with it, even Tōma's strongest Rasenshuriken wouldn't have changed the outcome much.
But before transforming, Orochimaru had taken massive damage.
How long it would take him to recover… that remained to be seen.
Far away, deep within a forest, the white serpent emerged.
Its enormous form shrank, dissolved, and collapsed into a single pale, human-faced snake. Kabuto and Guren fell nearby.
The serpent swayed, then collapsed.
"Do something!" Guren snarled weakly, clutching her shattered abdomen. "Heal him!"
Kabuto could barely breathe.
His body had been torn apart at the cellular level. He had survived only because he wasn't at the center of the blast. Even so, the damage was catastrophic.
If he couldn't create cells with chakra, he would already be dead.
But chakra was running out.
That was the problem.
Cellular regeneration consumed enormous amounts of chakra, and this time… the dead cells were too damaged to recycle.
Cold fear gripped him.
If he ran dry now, he would die. Slowly.
Kabuto's thoughts blurred. Desperation took over.
Driven by pure survival instinct, he dragged himself toward Orochimaru's true form.
"Orochimaru-sama…" he whispered.
Power. Life.
That was all he wanted.
His fingers touched the pale serpent.
Guren's eyes widened in horror.
Orochimaru's body dissolved like liquid and flowed directly into Kabuto.
"What… is happening…?"
She could only watch.
Moments later, Kabuto stood.
His eyes had changed. Slitted. Serpentine.
Dead cells discarded. Living ones rearranged.
He was alive.
But what now stood there was no longer just Kabuto.
Nor was it Orochimaru.
A body carrying Orochimaru's will. Kabuto's form. Something new.
Snake Sage Kabuto.
Or perhaps…
Orochimaru Kabuto.
Or simply—
Snake-Kabuto.