32 [Absorption]
"They're all White Zetsu clones?!"
The revelation struck Sasuke like a bolt of lightning, he had tried coming up with many ways he would find a White Zetsu clone but this most definitely wasn't one of them.
He stared at the motionless villagers around him with his eyes darting between them, his eyes which were once filled with shock now burst into unprecedented fervour.
Sasuke muttered to himself, "Didn't expect to find more than one White Zetsu with this plan. Hell, I even had backup plans in case I came up empty. Looks like I won't be needing those."
He then ordered his shadow clones to swiftly help reveal the appearance of the other villagers, as he wanted to make sure that all these villagers were also clones.
Seeing every single one of the villagers slowly morph into identical white humanoid entities, exhilaration coursed within Sasuke as he realised he could gain much more here than he had initially thought.
He then hurriedly dispelled his shadow clones and stared at the 30 villagers surrounding him and stared at them with his Mangekyou still activated.
'Is there a reason for this?'
Sasuke only found himself more confused about what was so special about this location, that there were so many clones hidden here in plain sight. He decided to check out the lab beneath the village once he was done here.
"I guess I should start now..."
Until now, Sasuke was still a bit confused about how well this had gone and still hadn't fully registered the situation.
He was even prepared to spread rumours about there being a treasure left by Uchiha Madara here, in an attempt to lure White Zetsu clones who would have been sent to investigate the rumours.
However, Sasuke shook these thoughts out of his head as he prepared to take this first step to empower himself.
For the first time since Sasuke had arrived in this world, he activated his Mangekyou ability.
The moment it was activated, Sasuke felt as if the entire world had been paused- everything remained still. He soon began to feel a sense of omnipotence, only now truly registering how potent his ability was.
Everything he could see currently seemed so fragile, a mere thought and he could erase anything in his line of sight from existence.
As he fought to remain sane and not lose himself to this sense of power, he gradually used his ability to create something...
Soon a dark dome enveloped Sasuke and all the Zetsu clones, this dome was pitch black and exuded a horrifying sense of oppression as soon it appeared.
Strange markings rapidly began flashing around it, reminiscent of Fuinjutsu symbols.
呑み込む ('Swallow/Devour')
The symbols then stopped their dancing and soon a select few symbols appeared above Sasuke, who currently was trying to ignore the tears of blood crazily streaking down his face and his increasingly blurry vision.
'What a terrifying strain...'
Sasuke thought for a brief second, glad that he hadn't wasted this ability before today as he would otherwise be in a bit of trouble.
Soon the White Zetsu around him gradually began to morph from humanoid figures into white blobs as the strange domain exerted its influence on them.
Suddenly, the blobs of Zetsu began to fade from existence as the strange space began to devour them whole. As the last Zetsu was swallowed, the space soon fed vast sums of energy back into Sasuke who felt his body rapidly undergo various changes.
(Author: I'm beginning to realise what is happening seems a bit confusing.
Sasuke here is using his MS ability to alter reality and generate a special domain/space that can be used to absorb things within it.
Remember! This isn't his MS ability! It is an application of it.)
As moments soon turned into minutes, the dark domain gradually dissipated, leaving Sasuke standing alone in the small isolated village.
Sasuke stood still, revelling in his newfound strength.
How strong was his body now?
Sasuke truly had no idea.
He felt that his body was once only as strong as a normal Jonin now felt several times stronger than before, he even felt he could take down Might Guy in Taijutsu in his current state.
However, that idea didn't last long once the memory of Night Guy appeared in his mind.
"*Cough* Nevermind, let's not get too cocky."
He quietly muttered under his breath.
However, that wasn't the only benefit he received as his chakra also experienced a huge surge. Previously, though only around four times more than a Jonin like Kurenai it didn't seem to compare too well with the standards of Kage from his memory of the anime.
Now it wasn't even comparable to a Jonin in terms of chakra, his chakra was several magnitudes larger than Kurenai now.
Sasuke also learned that he had received the abilities of the various White Zetsu, including things like the Mayfly technique, transformation, stealth, regeneration and most importantly...
Wood Style.
Yes. Sasuke managed to obtain the Wood Style Kekkei Genkai, though it is nowhere near as strong as Hashirama- Sasuke currently has a very important use for this.
This doesn't even include the fact that this Kekkei Genkai gave Sasuke Earth and Water attribute chakra, making him have four out of the five chakra attributes.
However, the most important reason he had even done this soon manifested itself as Sasuke reached out to feel his eyes. The previous strain and blurry vision soon disappeared and felt as good as new.
The reason for this was due to the immense vitality from the clones he had absorbed earlier, which were derived from Hashirama cells and granted Sasuke a sort of pseudo-Sage body.
Though much weaker than Hashirama's, Sasuke now possesses incredible vitality, strength, chakra etc.
'That worked much better than I had previously thought it would...'
Sasuke was lost in thought for a second as he thought about what he created with his Mangekyou ability.
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With his new Mayfly technique, Sasuke found himself rapidly moving through the ground as he made his way through towards the laboratory.
Arriving at the place, Sasuke looked around and took in every detail of his surroundings. The lab around him seemed to have been abandoned and looked nothing like the labs from his previous life.
Instead of white walls, the walls here were mainly grey-black and radiated a heavy sense of depression and gloom. This feeling was only amplified once Saske thought about the series of prison cells around here too, containing several human skeletal remains.
Lab equipment and tools were left around haphazardly as Sasuke made his way to where the pieces of paper he previously found were.
He picked up a piece of paper and glanced at it, making out its contents.
These papers all seemed to contain information regarding the test subjects within the facility, "I wonder what these experiments were...?"
Sasuke spoke to himself aloud, curious about what took place here to warrant so many White Zetsu to be stationed here.
Though he made it seem easy to take them down earlier, that was only because of his memory of the anime that revealed that such a thing was even possible.
No one other than Sasuke would have discovered this so easily, simply due to the knowledge he has from the anime.
Sasuke soon found himself some sort of diary that had belonged to someone here, that was hidden beneath the pile of papers before.
'Day 1: I don't understand, why are we even looking into this?
What do they even mean by 'transcending the physical body'?
Day 2: Damn! These people are insane! Experimentation on children?! What are we even trying to achieve here?
They keep mentioning it due to them being 'pure' in terms of spiritual energy, which makes them good test subjects.
But what does that even have to do with this experiment?
Day 17: I want to leave, but I feel like that would be suicidal with how things are managed here.
Day 56: We've achieved nothing so far...
Other than gaining a few corpses...
Day 93: Hold on. We seem to have found something.
Day 114: Never mind, Subject #39 was also a failure...
Day 637: Still no progress other than Subject #39.
We are also going through experimental subjects much faster now...
WHAT AM I EVEN DOING?! I DIDN'T WANT TO BE A PART OF THIS!
Day 649: I am most certainly going to... Hell.
Day 781: There's progress!
Day 782: Subject #293 is showing signs of success
Can I finally be free from this purgatory?
Day 801: We may need to leave the lab soon...
I heard that the Uchiha and Senju Clans are at it again...
Day 803: No!
Today was the day for #293 to be relocated! Why did it all go wrong now?
I WAS SO CLOSE TO LEAV-!'
The diary log ends on Day 803 and Sasuke couldn't find any more details regarding the experiment other than the previous mention of 'transcending the physical body'.
However, one specific detail stood out like a sore thumb.
Something that made him feel nauseous.
Day 801...
What does it mean the Uchiha and Senju are at it again?
Was this not Madara's base?
With laboured breaths and a sinking feeling in his stomach, he tried sifting through more of the papers to see if he could find anything else there.
Soon he found a single piece of paper, it was strikingly different from the other papers as it was splattered with drops of dried-up bloodstains.
'Experiment #293
Age: 8
Appearance: Young boy with brown hair and eyes.
History: Unkown
Lineage: Unknown
Experimental Success: #293 was the only successful creation of the '[Redacted]' initiative. It is believed that he will soon be relocated to [Redacted]...'
"#293? Is this all the information?! Why is the rest of it redacted?!"
Sasuke almost felt like screaming as he read the contents of the paper, he couldn't any more information that would disprove the guess that was forming in his mind.
Furthermore, this discovery was different...
Unlike his other discoveries in the past, this one didn't simply add a variable to the world. His other discoveries showed that whilst there are some things in this world he may not understand, his knowledge from the anime still stands true.
But...
This revealed something much more dreadful for Sasuke.
It meant that his knowledge of the anime may not even be able to be trusted.
According to his memory, Madara seemed to be the only one who could have ordered the stationing of White Zetsu Clones through Black Zetsu whom he thought of as his will.
However, if this base was created a time before Konoha was established, it meant one thing.
This wasn't Madara's base...
Then, who?
Who was the one that's responsible for this?
