Hokage: Ryo's Path

Ryo followed Orochimaru to Tsunade to check out her condition. After finishing the inspection, his expression also became gloomy.

For some reason, Tsunade’s cells were not absorbing Yang Chakra. In fact, the Chakra began to be released to the outside.

With that, Tsunade’s overall vitality, was also being lost. Now, especially if she completed her transformation, her life was in great danger!”

“Ryo kun, what is going on here? Do you have any clues?” Orochimaru asked anxiously.

“I have no idea. Neither Lain nor Yamato had this condition before.”

Hearing those names, Orochimaru’s eyes brightened up and he said: “Ryo kun, perhaps this is a problem related to our use of White Zetsu cells?”

These words reminded Ryo of the fact that with past Wood Release Transformation, Hashirama’s cells were always the ones being used. With Tsunade however, White Zetsu’s cells were the ones being used.

These cells were indeed similar to those of Hashirama, but still, they had their differences.

Tsunade wanted to rely on the vitality in these cells to stimulate her own cells to awake the Wood Release Kekkei Genkai. These cells were less destructive than those of her grandfather, but they had other differences as well.

Both Ryo and Orochimaru made the same mistake as well. Ryo thought of Obito, but Obito was different, with his Uchiha lineage complementing the Wood Release.

“Orochi san, what should we do now?” Ryo asked.

“There is only one solution: we must give her Hashirama’s cells!”

Hearing that, Ryo did not hesitate to object: “Orochi san, that would kill her! She had already studied her grandfather’s cells, and if this was to succeed, she would have done it. Now that’s she’s lost so much vitality and Yang Chakra, her odds are much worse!”

“If we don’t go through with this, she would still die. If you hesitate, it would be too late for any intervention, and any chance of saving her would be lost!”

Hearing that, Ryo fell silent. Orochimaru was right; anything was better than hesitation.

“Now, it’s all up to Tsunade herself!” As he said that, Orochimaru injected some of Hashirama’s cells that he had in the lab.

After the injection, Ryo began to constantly monitor the state of Tsunade’s body.

As soon as Hashirama’s cells entered her body, they began to impact her own.

To Ryo’s surprise, they didn’t have that much of a destructive effect on Tsunade’s body.

In fact, her own cells began to absorb vitality from the new ones.

At this time, the Yang Chakra injected into her body by Korin also played its role, immediately being absorbed by Tsunade’s cells.

The vitality in Hashirama’s cells began to plummet, and that made things take a risky turn. To self-protect, they began being agitated, and attacked the most vital cells around them: The White Zetsu cells.

In fact, the interaction between the two types of cells began slowly, as if they thought they were one and the same; indeed, they were similar. But then, rather quickly, Hashirama’s cells began to destroy Zetsu’s cells and absorb their vitality.

By the end of this, things returned to balance, and Tsunade’s cells ended up being morphed enough to resist Hashirama’s cells before Zetsu’s cells were destroyed.

Tsunade’s physical condition gradually stabilized, and Orocimaru and Ryo breathed a sigh of relief.

“It looks like Tsunade hime was saved; thanks to you!”

“Well, it’s thanks to Tsunade’s body. I didn’t expect her body to change so drastically.”

“Change? How?” Ryo had been too concerned by the cellular “battle” he was observing to notice anything else.

Orochimaru smiled and said: “You will understand when you sense Tsunade’s body.

A moment later, Ryo was shocked: “This is Natural Energy! She...”

“Ryo kun, this should be the Sage Body you’ve mentioned to me.”

Ryo nodded, but he was still in disbelief.

“Sage Body” was Ryo’s name of choice when he wanted to explain to Orochimaru the existence of people who could instinctively interact freely with Natural Energy with no penalty; namely those in the Six Paths Sage Mode.

In theory, for people nowadays, it should only be awakened by Indra’s and Ashura’s Chakra, or becoming the Juubi’s Jinchuriki.

Tsunade was a descendent of Ashura indeed, born with great amounts of Chakra and vitality, but she was nowhere near the realm of those with Six Path Sage Mode.

Now that her body could communicate with Natural Energy, there was no doubt that she really had this “Sage Body”, although she did not yet demonstrate the ability to absorb it from nature.

With this, it was almost a certainty that she would awaken Wood Release as well.

Sure enough, a week later, what remained of Hashirama’s cells was perfectly fused with her body. It exuded great vitality, and her stores of Chakra also greatly increased tremendously. Tsunade, who was asleep, finally opened her eyes.

Sure enough, a week later, the primary cells in Tsunade’s body were perfectly fused with her body. It exuded strong vitality, and the amount of chakras had also increased tremendously. Tsunade, who had been sleeping, also opened her eyes

After Tsunade woke up, she also felt her physical changes. She had a strong feeling that she had achieved her goal.

Wood Release had been a hidden old ambition of Tsunade since she saw her grandfather’s feats using it.

Unlike Lain, Tsunade was a medical Ninja. She did not to tread slowly with her new Chakra. Therefore, her first attempt to use Wood Release was with the Jutsu “Advent of a World of Flowering Trees”!

As Tsunade mobilized her Chakra, small trees came out of the ground, just to grow at an incredible rate. Watching the scene before her, Tsunade could only laugh out loud.

But it wasn’t long before Tsunade saw Orochimaru long gloomy before her. Her smile froze and she realized that with her lack of awareness as she woke up, she perhaps, maybe, probably, neglected that she was still in his lab.

“BOOM!” The sound of the walls collapsing confirmed her “hunch”.

“Or... Orochimaru, I will compensate; I can pay my debts to you.” Tsunade said faintly.

“Debts? You mean this?” Orochimaru immediately took out a scroll.

“You owe this from back in Konoha, and you’ve borrowed this in the Earth Country. Back in the Sand Country, you’ve also taken...”

“Haha! Tsunade him, how much foreign debt do you have?” Ryo laughed, and Tsunade looked more and more embarrassed.

She almost forget that while gambling when on missions with Orochimaru and Jiraya, she had built up a massive dept to the two.

“Well, I don’t want your money. Don’t worry!”

Hearing Orochimaru’s words, Tsunade was relieved for a second, before she tensed up again seeing his smile grow large: “For this, I want you to pay in blood!”