Chapter 458: Extravagance Beyond Reason

Chapter 458: Chapter 458: Extravagance Beyond Reason

"Adamantine Sealing Chains..."

Danzo muttered the name to himself, then instructed the subordinate beside him, "Bring me the secret scroll for the Adamantine Sealing Chains!"

"Yes!"

The Root shinobi acknowledged the order and hurried away.

Before long, the Root shinobi returned to the laboratory and handed Danzo an old-looking secret scroll, its cover already yellowed with age.

At that moment, Kagami and Orochimaru’s gazes simultaneously fell upon the scroll.

As Danzo slowly opened it, he said, "This was left behind by that esteemed individual."

The ’esteemed individual’ Danzo was referring to was undoubtedly the First Hokage’s wife and Konoha’s first Nine-Tails Jinchuriki—Uzumaki Mito.

Uzumaki Mito had been renowned throughout the shinobi world for her formidable fuinjutsu and sensory abilities. She had been one of the strongest shinobi of her era.

However, the First Hokage’s strength had simply been too overwhelming. He had practically suppressed the entire shinobi world through his power alone, causing every other powerhouse of that era to pale in comparison and leaving their reputations relatively obscure.

Orochimaru smiled. "I never expected the secret scroll for the Adamantine Sealing Chains to be in your possession. No wonder I couldn’t find it when I infiltrated the Ninjutsu Archives before."

Danzo shot Orochimaru a cold glance, then directly spread the secret scroll open in front of Kagami and Orochimaru.

The Adamantine Sealing Chains was one of the Uzumaki Clan’s most powerful fuinjutsu, and it was also one of the techniques most favored by Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, because it could easily restrain the Nine-Tails—the strongest of the Tailed Beasts.

In the original timeline, when Konoha’s second Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, Uzumaki Kushina, had the Nine-Tails forcibly extracted from her body by Obito and was already on the verge of death, she had still managed to perform this technique with her severely weakened body.

And she had successfully restrained the Nine-Tails.

You have to understand that at the time, Kushina had only just given birth, leaving her body in an extremely weakened state. Immediately afterward, she suffered the devastating trauma of having the Nine-Tails extracted from her, leaving her practically at death’s door.

Yet even under those circumstances, the Adamantine Sealing Chains she unleashed were still able to effectively restrain the Nine-Tails, the strongest of all the Tailed Beasts.

That alone demonstrated just how powerful this fuinjutsu of the Uzumaki Clan truly was.

So the moment the secret scroll for the Adamantine Sealing Chains was spread open, Kagami stopped caring about anything else and immediately began studying it with complete concentration.

Only after a long while did he finally withdraw his gaze and think to himself, "No wonder I only remember members of the Uzumaki Clan ever using this technique. So you actually need the Uzumaki bloodline to learn it!"

The corner of Orochimaru’s mouth curled upward as well.

"What a pity."

The Uzumaki Clan had long since scattered and declined. At present, the only person in the village confirmed to possess Uzumaki blood was the current Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, Uzumaki Naruto.

But Naruto was only seven years old right now, so there was obviously no way he could help Danzo.

This wasn’t Danzo’s first time reading the secret scroll for the Adamantine Sealing Chains, so naturally, he had long known about its requirements.

He said solemnly, "This old man may be able to try cultivating it."

Kagami glanced at Danzo and chose to remain silent.

Orochimaru, meanwhile, wore a teasing expression.

Both of them understood exactly what Danzo meant.

Since Danzo had implanted First Hokage cells into his body, he could barely be considered to possess the bloodline of the Senju Clan. And because the Senju and Uzumaki Clans were relatives whose constitutions were fairly similar, theoretically speaking, a member of the Senju Clan had a chance of successfully learning a sealing technique that normally required the Uzumaki bloodline.

Of course, that was only in theory.

Kagami and Orochimaru’s reactions made it obvious that neither of them had much faith in Danzo.

After all, Danzo was no peerless genius like the Fourth Hokage.

Even if he theoretically possessed the qualifications to learn the Adamantine Sealing Chains, with his talent, actually succeeding would still be extremely difficult.

Seeing Kagami remain silent while Orochimaru openly wore a teasing expression, Danzo felt his pride taking a hit and snapped angrily, "Aside from this, do the two of you have any other ideas?"

Kagami and Orochimaru exchanged a glance before answering in perfect unison,

"Try some other fuinjutsu."

Surprised by the uncanny synchronization between the two, Danzo stared suspiciously at them for a long moment before finally sighing.

"Follow me."

The two followed Danzo through a secret passage and soon arrived at an enormous cultivation chamber.

The instant Kagami stepped inside, his expression turned serious.

The cultivation chamber was absolutely massive. Cultivation tanks were arranged in orderly rows and columns, forming more than a dozen lines. Even the researchers bustling around inside numbered at least thirty at a rough estimate.

And that wasn’t all.

Every piece of equipment in the cultivation chamber was a model Kagami had never seen before. From the looks of it, they were all classified devices prohibited from entering the public market.

If not for the mask covering his face, Kagami probably would have had a hard time concealing his astonishment.

And he wasn’t the only one.

Even Orochimaru’s expression became slightly unnatural—a complicated look containing envy, jealousy, and a thick dose of disdain.

At that moment, Danzo led Kagami and Orochimaru over to one of the cultivation tanks.

Pointing at the tank before them, Danzo said, "I’ll tell you the truth. This old man has already tested more than twenty different sealing techniques, but none of them produced satisfactory results."

Staring at the cultivation tank before him, Kagami screamed inwardly,

"So having money really does mean you can do whatever the hell you want?!"

Inside the long row of cultivation tanks before him, more than a hundred living Chimera Buds were being cultivated.

Moreover, sealing formulas had already been inscribed onto many of them. Clearly, Danzo had already conducted a massive number of experiments in secret.

One had to understand that cultivating a single living Chimera Bud wasn’t much cheaper than Kagami cultivating an entire clone.

Even setting aside the technical difficulties and ignoring the wear and tear on the equipment and instruments, the medicinal materials alone cost a fortune.

And cultivating more than a hundred living Chimera Buds at once?

The amount of money required was simply astronomical.

And unlike Kagami, who had obtained his Chimera Buds as spoils from Shinno, every single one of Danzo’s living Chimera Buds had been painstakingly cultivated with his own resources.

"This is extravagance beyond reason!"

Kagami couldn’t help sighing inwardly.

At the same time, he felt even more fortunate that he had chosen Danzo as his ’lab rat.’

Looking across the entire shinobi world, there were probably only a handful of people who possessed both the courage to implant a Chimera Bud into themselves and the financial resources necessary to develop and research it.

And among those few, Danzo was undoubtedly the one Kagami could most easily get his hands on.

Judging from the situation now, his choice had unquestionably been the right one.

Even Orochimaru looked surprised.

He clearly hadn’t expected Danzo’s ability to get things done to be this absurd. It had only been a few days since Danzo obtained the living Chimera Bud, yet he had already spared no expense to cultivate this many of them and had even begun conducting experiments with sealing techniques.

Without revealing anything on his face, Orochimaru glanced at Danzo and sneered inwardly,

"You’re already this impatient...?"

Orochimaru’s gaze toward Danzo was filled with pity.

It wasn’t the gaze one would give a powerful Konoha’s Advisory Elder who wielded enormous authority.

Instead, it was more like the gaze one would give a pitiful wretch who had fallen into obsession and madness...