Kakuzu walked through the hallways of the recently built hideout that was constructed to accommodate Hiroshi's research. After looting Orochimaru's hideouts of anything valuable, that were now mostly abandoned, he chose to build one of his own. There were no doubt the trails that lead to the abandoned ones, so staying there was not a smart move. Though, it seemed the precautions he took to keep the location a secret didn't guarantee safety.
The spirits he had assigned to defend this place were destroyed and taken away. He lost connection moment they died, yet their disappearance was left unnoticed in the heat of the battle. Whatever had attacked this place had left number of marks on the walls that was hard not to notice. Large claw marks were undoubtedly belonged to some sort of oversized beast, and from the looks of it, it must be as large as an elephant. A summon, maybe?
“What exactly happened here?”
“I'm not sure myself. It was a sudden attack.” The scientist responded. “A strange beast appeared out of nowhere and wrecked havoc through this place. Large number of scientists working under me are dead. I only survived because I discarded my body and the beast thankfully considered me dead.”
“You can ask Moroi to bring a new vessel. How much will lack of manpower will affect your work?”
“Hmm… not much with regards of final result. But the production speed will decrease by at least 40 percent. The beast stole unfinished products and any research papers it could find. Thankfully I kept most important ones in my personal storage scroll. But regaining momentum will take time.” Hiroshi sighed dramatically. “And I was just starting to see some results. What a shitty timing.”
“How's the progress?” Kakuzu raised an eyebrow. He just checked on it a week ago, had Hiroshi made a breakthrough?
“It was going fairly well, actually. The lacking resources and deteriorating body were what I was mainly concerned about before, but now that I'm not held back in either department, I can properly focus on working what I truly aspire for. It's not matter of if I'll succeed anymore but rather when.” Hiroshi took out a scroll as he went over the progress. “So far, it's more of a berserker potion rather than one that'll increase the talent. I'm missing some sort of component that'll change aspect that causes a sudden, unstable increase in power into something more stable and desirable.”
“A berserker potion?” Kakuzu mused. It wouldn't be a bad idea. He remembered some sort of berserker pill from the novel that utilized tailed beast chakra. It might not be a bad idea to go in that direction as well. It was something he would bring up after this issue was dealt with. “How potent are its effects?”
“It varies from subject to subject.” Hiroshi answered as he took out a vile holding reddish-orange fluid. “I'll use your classification here. After it was tested on the human subjects without much talent in chakra usage, the power they could display changed from average human to one equivalent of a F grade shinobi. Subjects classified as low F grade went through the change that ranged from to higher F up to the lower E grade. A subject 029, only subject who possessed heart warranting a higher F grade had his power increased all the way to the pseudo-D grade. Unfortunately, we had to take him down, as he tried to escape from confinement. A shame, really. There were so many things I wanted to learn from him. Unfortunately, we don't have access to class E or higher test subjects. An issue I'll remind you once more that, if fixed, will greatly benefit our purpose. The change is mostly physical though, while subject’s chakra were agitated, it also become impossible to perform most jutsus. But the major downside is that it takes half of the subject's remaining lifespan. The more the power is utilized, more rapidly the aging process accelerates. So far, the effect appears to be irreversible.”
Kakuzu caught the vile Hiroshi threw at him and stored it so he would test out on some poor spirit.
“Do you have any idea how was this placed tracked down?” he asked as they approached the entrance if the laboratory. The more he walked forward, more of the collateral damage came into the view.
“No. I'm sure I cleared any trails. And the place is secluded enough that it's impossible to be discovered anyone other than someone who’s actively trying to find it.”
“Anything else?” Kakuzu inquired as they walked into the laboratory. Unsurprisingly, the place was a mess. Overturned tables, broken glass, dried up blood on the ground and dented walls. Only corpses were taken care of, while most of the room stayed untouched after the assault.
“I believe that creature was a chimera.” Hiroshi said after some thought.
“Oh? What makes you say that?”
“The body had some indication of modifications. It's hard not to notice the work of a fellow artists, after all.”
“Hm, a chimera… doesn't ring a bell.” Kakuzu mused. Who could the attacker be? He doubted it was simply a beast going on a rampage. Especially after it had picked the place clean.
“I sent Moroi to track the beats down, unfortunately he lost the trail halfway. He's keeping watch right now though, and is narrowing down the locations that the beast was most likely headed towards.”
There wasn't much they knew about the attacker. Kakuzu stayed another hour in the hideout, going over the various plans with Hiroshi. He didn't hand over corpse of Manda II to the scientist yet, though. He suspected that Hiroshi might get too engrossed with the new sample to concentrate on the current state of events. And Kakuzu didn't want him to get distracted right now. Part of him wanted to turn the serpent into his puppet, but he held himself back. Manda II would definitely be an useful pawn, but it wasn't to the point that it was necessary right now. If he did that, there would be nothing for scientist to study, and he was more willing to invest in Hiroshi to create similar clones, even if it took a while.
He instructed Hiroshi to move to the next hideout. Although the construction of it wasn't finished, it was safer than staying in the exposed location.
With that, he departed to a secluded place. There was a more glaring issue that he needed to deal with right now. Kakuzu concentrated inwardly into his body, observing the new heart transplant that he acquired. Heart, along with the increase in the power, came with an inbuilt virus. That virus being the will of Orochimaru, left behind in the cells Kabuto transplanted into himself. It seemed that killing Kabuto wasn't enough to make the snake Sanin's will disappear. He was experiencing same thing that Kabuto did, the cells were trying to take control of him, and the problem could be delayed no longer.
