The defection of Uchiha Shinichi not only highlighted the threat of the Uchiha Clan but it especially highlighted the degree of strength that the Uchiha can possess by simply awakening the Mangekyou Sharingan!
One single young Uchiha stirred the whole village upside down.
Not only was the prestige of the Hokage Faction plummeted, but there was also a loss of many combat personnel, and still there were no results as they all failed in capturing or killing Uchiha Shinichi!
If one single Uchiha can cause such trouble for Konoha, just imagine what would happen if the entire Uchiha Clan were to rebel?
Sarutobi Hiruzen couldn't help but shudder with just the thought of such a thing happening, and this further cause him a headache.
His already less hair is growing weaker day by day being involved in all these tense situations, that are popping out of nowhere one after another.
If this continued, he wouldn't have any option but to go bald!
While Sandaime was having tension about his hair, Danzo continued to urge, "Sarutobi, it's about time you make up your mind!"
The robbery of test materials will put a stop to many of his experiments.
In particular, the disappearance of all the Sharingan that were stored in the Nutrient Solution made Danzo's heartache.
That was his hard work!
Some of the Sharingan were left by his teacher Tobirama and the others were collected by him over the course of many years during the three great shinobi wars.
But now that it's the time of peace, so collecting anymore Sharingan would be very difficult; and the disappearance of each one would prompt heavy investigations, so Danzo can't afford to take such actions!
So, the annihilation of the Uchiha Clan is his best bet to collect more Sharingan, all Hiruzen has to do is nod, and Shimura Danzo will have a large collection of Sharingan at his disposal that he can use freely.
However. Shimura Danzo has to be disappointed as Sandaime shook his head, "We will discuss the matter of the Uchiha Clan later, for now, focus on Kumogakure!"
Listening to Danzo's continued urging, Sandaime who were suddenly broken out of the fantasy of his wonderful hair disappearing with each passing day, declined Danzo's opinion coldly without much consideration.
Hiruzen was of course very disappointed with Danzo's performance this time. As one of the four representatives of the Hokage faction Danzo completely failed to catch Uchiha Shinichi's tracks.
Danzo has been the representative who has always suppressed the noble shinobi clans of Konoha, and this time he couldn't even suppress Uchiha Shinichi who has just awakened the Mangekyou Sharingan, this made Sandaime very embarrassed of his old friend.
Even his prestige as the Hokage was slightly affected by all this fiasco.
Therefore, he is in no mood to entertain Danzo's blabbering for now.
Seeing Hiruzen directly diverting the topic, Danzo could only sigh and curse inwardly, 'If only I was the Hokage!'
But unfortunately, he is not the Hokage!
He had no choice but to give up the annihilation of the Uchiha Clan for now and focus on Kumogakure, as the discussion between the four advisors continued.
…
On Kuroto's side.
After leaving the Hokage Office, Team-11 was disbanded as all the four returned to their houses to rest and for other work.
After returning to his home and conforming with the Byakugan to make sure that no one was spying on him, Kuroto took out two scrolls from his ninja bag.
"Kai!"
Puff…
With a cloud of white smoke, a corpse appeared on each of the two scrolls.
The body on the first scroll belonged to Uchiha Kurumi.
To make sure that Obito or Zetsu don't get their hands on it, Kuroto ordered the Kazekage puppet to retrieve it from Uchiha Kurumi's grave.
"Hooh, this is a surprise!" – muttered Kuroto as he noticed that Uchiha Kurumi's body had some sort of potion over it that prevented the rotting of her cells, tissues, and organs.
'Does that mean Shinichi always had the intention to look for a method to bring her back to life? Otherwise, why would he use such expensive potion?' – Kuroto of course had some idea about this potion, after all, he wasn't playing stones while working in Orochimaru's lab.
That's why he was more surprised and impressed by Shinichi's action.
'Since that's the case, I don't need to be worried about her body for the time being!'
After confirming that there were almost no defects or problems with Uchiha Kurumi's corpse, including her Sharingan that was still present in her eyes, Kuroto resealed her body inside the scroll.
The storage scroll will obviously not prevent the decay of her body for a very long time, as they don't stop time as per their working mechanism, so this will only be a temporary option; until Kuroto finds some better means to prevent the decay of her body for the next 15 years or so.
After resealing Uchiha Kurumi's corpse, Kuroto moved his gaze towards the corpse on the other scroll.
This body belongs to none other than White Zetsu's clone that was attempting to spy on his and Shinichi's battle.
The only problem with this is it's the messy state because of suffering the explosion of many detonation charms. Therefore, at this point, it couldn't be considered anything other than a mass of tissues.
Activating his Tenseigan, Kuroto scanned Zetsu's body and perceived the slight traces of Chakra still present in it.
'It's really amazing that even after it's been destroyed, there are still some signs of vitality because of the presence of Hashirama's cells in it!'
After sighing at just how persistent can Shodaime Hokage-Sama's cells can be, Kuroto nodded slightly and resealed this corpse too.
Putting away the two scrolls, Kuroto walked towards his balcony and jumped on top of the roof of his house, and looked over the entire village with one hand over his waist.
Kuroto's current top priority is to build a secret laboratory as well as material storage that personally belongs to him.
Considering the issue of safety and secrecy, the choice of location is a very important issue.
While observing the layout of the village, Kuroto thought to himself, 'The location of the laboratory shouldn't be too far away from home, otherwise going back and forth will be a big hassle, and the location should definitely be hidden, otherwise, the perception ninjas might be able to find its location, which will again be troublesome!'
With that thought in mind, Kuroto's gaze turned towards the surrounding forest.
Although Konoha is surrounded by forests from all sides, it's not that they are unowned.
For example, Nara, Akimichi, Inuzuka, Aburame, and other clans are mostly near the forests and these forests are used by them for various purposes.
Now it's not that these are the only forest these clans own, after all, noble clans have a lot of property throughout the Land of Fire, so it's nothing strange.
But because these forests are near the village so they are still used quite a lot, and if Kuroto were to build his laboratory in the forest territory that is occasionally used by these clans for whatever purposes like, Insect keeping, Dog's breeding, and training, and other purposes, Kuroto can be sure that his laboratory will be discovered very soon, which is something he can't afford to have until he finds a better place.
So, moving his gaze away from this region, Kuroto turned to look towards the direction of the 'Death Forest' in one of the corners of the Village.
The 'Death Forest' in particular isn't owned by any of the Shinobi Clan and is actually a place where all shinobi have equal access to and use it for combat exercises. Almost all Konoha Shinobi either had or have a routine visit to this forest at some point in their life.
''Death Forest' is the territory where one will mostly find Genin and Chunin, Jonin rarely visits here as their activities will cause big movements, if I create my laboratory here, and as long as an appropriate location is chosen, the possibility of being discovered is quite less!
And most important of all, 'Death Forest' is not very far from the Village, so it would be very convenient to go back and forth. I can also use the excuse of concocting poisons for my visits to the 'Death Forest' '
The more he thought about it, the more Kuroto felt that this is the best temporary option, so after a little more consideration, Kuroto decided to map the 'Death Forest' and see if he can find some spot to meet his requirements.
With that decided Kuroto's figure flickered and disappeared.
After arriving at the Death Forest, he activated his Byakugan to have a look around.
After some search and find, he soon arrived around one particular spot at the edge of the Death Forest.
The reason Kuroto came here is very simple; this place actually shields his Byakugan perception.
After thinking about it a little, Kuroto murmured in understanding, "This should be one of the nodes of the Barrier enchantment covering Konoha!"
Entire Konoha Village is under the protection of the enchantment, and this barrier is erected using several nodes that have been transcribed with complex Fuinjutsu, so it is difficult to see past this spot with just one glance even if someone uses the Byakugan.
For this reason, general investigative methods don't work here or are shielded against to a varying degree.
"The maintenance of this spot should be under the responsibility of Team-3 of the Enchantment Department." – With a short pause, Kuroto tried to recall the specific information of the members of the Team-3 of the Enchantment Department.
'All the four members of Team-3 are Chunin Class, and there is also no strong perception ninja in their team! But I can't be sure about it, I'll have to check on this information once.'
As an Anbu, Kuroto has access to such information related to the abilities of the ordinary Konoha Chunin and Genin, and he once happened to look through these files of the enchantment class to see if could find someone that could help him with some doubts in Fuinjutsu practice that he was facing, but that aside, although Kuroto didn't pay much attention to anyone that wasn't much use to him, he still remembers some of their details.
But he still can't be sure if some talented Shinobi are lurking in the enchantment department.
Kuroto understands that he has to be cautious if he wants to keep the laboratory for a long period, so instead of rushing immediately to decide the location to build his laboratory, Kuroto decided to investigate the situation of Team-3 as well as also the abilities of some of the other members of the enchantment department, just to be perfectly sure, that there is no strong sensor class who would be able to find his laboratory if Kuroto does build one in this area…
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