Tsunade froze mid-step. Her body went rigid as if she'd been turned to stone.
Beside her, Shizune's eyes widened in shock. The moment she heard Dan's name, her heart dropped. Then, realizing what that meant, she turned toward Tsunade with deep concern written across her face.
Tsunade's expression darkened, her golden eyes narrowing dangerously at Orochimaru. "What did you just say?"
Was he really using the names of the two people dearest to her her lover and her brother as bait?
Orochimaru's lips curled into a thin, serpentine smile. His raspy voice carried an unsettling allure, like a hiss slithering into the ear. "I've perfected the Reanimation Jutsu created by the Second Hokage. As long as you agree to my request, I can summon them back at any time. You could see them again, Tsunade."
His words were silk wrapped around poison, whispering temptation into her heart.
"Well? What do you say?" Orochimaru asked softly, confidence gleaming in his reptilian eyes.
As one of the Legendary Sannin himself, he knew her all too well. He knew exactly which wounds to press, which memories to twist, and which desires to exploit.
But Tsunade didn't respond to the offer. Her gaze flicked to him instead, sharp and assessing. "You look weak," she said quietly. "What happened to you?"
For a moment, Orochimaru was caught off guard. Then he smiled, dismissive. "Nothing serious. Just a few… complications when I destroyed the Leaf."
Though he said it lightly, a flicker of darkness passed through his eyes.
The truth was far from simple. Naruto's overwhelming strength had driven his body to its limit, nearly tearing it apart. He'd survived only through sheer cunning and the countless secret techniques he'd prepared in advance. But now, his body was failing him he desperately needed a new vessel.
Sasuke had once been his target, but that dream was long gone.
No matter how much he coveted the Sharingan, there was no way he could take Sasuke away with Naruto still alive. That boy had become a wall he couldn't overcome. Just like Itachi, another whose power he'd once desired but couldn't touch.
Since Sasuke was beyond reach, he'd turned his focus to Kimimaro instead.
Kimimaro was loyal utterly, unwaveringly loyal. He would never resist the transfer ritual. And his clan's bloodline limit was formidable, perhaps even more so than the Uchiha's in certain ways. But fate was cruel. Kimimaro carried an incurable disease, one that even Kabuto's medical prowess couldn't fix.
If not for that illness, Orochimaru would have already claimed his body.
Shizune's eyes widened as she heard him mention "destroying the Leaf." Her breath caught, heart pounding with dread. She looked toward Tsunade instinctively, but Tsunade didn't seem to hear her at all.
Her expression was distant lost, trapped somewhere deep within memory.
"Lady Tsunade!" Shizune's voice rang out desperately. The sound snapped Tsunade out of her trance.
"You mustn't listen to him!" Shizune cried. "Your brother and your lover would never want you to make a deal with a monster like this! They cared about you more than anything in this world!"
She took a step forward, tears in her eyes. "Have you forgotten your dream? Your promise to them? Please, wake up!"
"Enough, Shizune!" Tsunade's voice cracked like thunder. Shizune fell silent immediately.
Orochimaru chuckled, eyes gleaming with cruel amusement. "Ah, you must be Dan's niece, aren't you?"
Shizune's body stiffened.
"I remember now," Orochimaru continued. "Your parents are dead too, aren't they? And your uncle followed soon after. It was Tsunade who took you in and raised you after all that."
He smiled a twisted, venomous smile. "I'm a kind man, Tsunade. So let's make the offer even better. If you agree to my request, I'll bring back her parents as well. Now that's sincerity, isn't it?"
Shizune froze, trembling.
See her parents again? The thought hit her like lightning. For years she'd buried that longing deep inside, convincing herself it was something she could never have. Their faces, their laughter it all came rushing back so vividly it hurt.
But then the chill returned. Her rational mind screamed that this was wrong. Orochimaru wasn't a savior; he was a demon dressed in a man's skin. The thought of him playing with the dead made her stomach twist.
Orochimaru, watching her fear, only smiled wider.
Seeing Tsunade still silent, he tilted his head slightly and called, "Kabuto."
Kabuto nodded and unfurled a summoning scroll. From within it, two unconscious civilians appeared sacrificial offerings already marked for death.
"To show my sincerity," Orochimaru said, licking his lips, "why don't I let you see them first? The faces of Dan and Nawaki."
With smooth, practiced movements, he pressed his hands together and slammed them onto the ground. Dark sealing symbols spread across the dirt like veins, and the temperature dropped.
"Reanimation Jutsu."
The two unconscious people jerked awake, screaming in agony as their bodies were consumed by the technique. Their flesh twisted, covered in paper-like ash, reshaping into two figures long dead.
When the light faded, Dan Kato and Nawaki stood before them.
Their eyes were closed, faces calm as if simply asleep.
Tsunade's entire body trembled. Her pupils constricted violently, her heartbeat thundered in her ears.
Years of grief, regret, and longing buried beneath duty and time came crashing back all at once, raw and unbearable. It was like a dam breaking after decades of strain, flooding her heart in an instant.
She stumbled forward, unable to stop herself.
Her eyes locked onto their faces those beloved, familiar faces, untouched by time yet utterly lifeless.
Her lover. Her brother.
The two people who had once given her the strength to believe in dreams, to fight for life, to love.
The hands that had once been steady enough to perform surgery on a beating heart now shook uncontrollably. Her throat burned, her chest constricted. The air itself felt too thick to breathe.
She wanted to speak to deny what she was seeing but only a choked sound escaped her lips. It wasn't a cry so much as a broken gasp, a sound born from decades of buried sorrow and unhealed pain.
It wasn't just grief. It was everything she'd refused to face.
Her trauma, her guilt, her fear of blood everything rooted in the day these two had died.
If she hadn't seen them with her own eyes, she might have been able to keep her composure. But now, standing before the images of the dead, all reason began to unravel.
Orochimaru watched her in silence, his expression unreadable. For once, even he didn't speak.
The world seemed to hold its breath.
Tsunade's gaze drifted between them the soft lines of Dan's sleeping face, the boyish innocence frozen forever in Nawaki's features.
She saw his bright smile again, his childish dream of becoming Hokage. She remembered Dan's warmth, his quiet determination, his dying words.
Every memory she had locked away split open, bleeding afresh.
Her legs felt weak. Her lips trembled. She clenched her fists so hard her nails drew blood, but it did nothing to steady her.
Even knowing it was a trick, even knowing it desecrated the dead, her heart couldn't turn away. The sight of them alive again, even if falsely was too cruel.
Shizune, shaking with anger and fear, suddenly acted.
She whipped her arm forward, releasing a volley of poisoned needles straight at Orochimaru.
Metal clinked sharply as they hit the ground harmlessly.
Kimimaro had moved faster than the eye could follow. His arm had sprouted sharp, ivory-white bones that deflected every needle with ease.
"Shall I kill her, Lord Orochimaru?" he asked coldly, eyes like ice.
No one who dared attack Orochimaru lived to tell of it.
Even if killing Shizune meant losing Tsunade's cooperation, it didn't matter to him. His devotion was absolute.
Orochimaru said nothing, only smiled faintly, his tongue flicking out like a serpent's as he turned back toward Tsunade.
And she still stood there frozen, trembling, staring at the ghosts of her past.
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