Chapter 14

'Orochimaru' was left to himself. The empty shell was still lying on the floor and the first thing he did was bring it from the floor onto a nearby table before stripping it of its clothes to replace his own. Despite how loose they fit, they would work for now. Then he collapsed into a nearby chair, letting out probably the biggest sigh known to mankind. He was utterly exhausted in more ways than one.

Everything was still trying to put itself back into place in his head. Memories were out of order and confusing, but slowly things were returning to normal. The most troubling parts were when memories of two opposite versions of himself interacting with each other came up. Everything inside his head was a mess. It had taken Yuro a while to come to terms with these memories of a different world and come to peace with them. Now there was a new set of memories totaling up to three sets.

One of about twenty years of someone who lived a very peaceful life in moderate luxury and saw this current world as fictional. Another of a child who had essentially grown up normally until these twenty years of life experience and memories got mixed into his own. Then not long after this third one came in and took number two away from the peaceful life he just began to enjoy once more to only then become intertwined with number three just now.

The first two never interacted with each other, but number two lived with number three for half his life hating number three until just now when the two came together. They had been two separate people in mind, body, and spirit. Now this number three which had decades over both one and two life experiences combined was being introduced. Of course, things weren't going swimmingly, especially because this was an unexpected outcome.

Once the seal came off Yuro's Mangekyō, Orochimaru panicked at what might happen and decided to cancel the technique and switch over to Sasuke but Yuro tried to reverse it before that happened. However, in Yuro's agitated state, he accidentally used his Mangekyō Sharingan's ability instead. That is when the result seen now came out.

It wasn't Orochimaru taking over Yuro as the new host or reversing the process, which would have actually failed, but a complete mixing of them both. In body, mind, and spirit, they were now mixed into one being.

And now with the scientific mind of Orochimaru, he began to try and understand the process, more like what was this Mangekyō ability. It seemed to be the process of fusion. But how in-depth this fusion went was a mystery. Could the fusion of body, mind, and spirit be separated into just the body or mind? What about the soul? Did he have the soul of Orochimaru or Yuro? Or did the fusion go as far as to fuse the two souls as well? How did Yuro even manage to do that? Since unlike Orochimaru who was probably the best expert in the area of souls, Yuro held no kind of understanding of the soul.

Then there was a different question. What about the other eye? What exactly was its ability? Mangekyō's come with an ability for each eye and remembering the time when the Mangekyō first awakened, what was displayed then wasn't any kind of fusion but something else entirely. Though the memory had already become dull and hard to focus on at the moment, he recalled seeing Orochimaru disappearing, along with the room they were in.

It wasn't like that of Kamui where something or someone is transported to another dimension, but something like disintegration or erosion. And usually, one Mangekyō eye complements or completes the other. If taking a look at Itachi's Mangekyō Sharingan, he had one ability to summon ferocious Amaterasu flames which endlessly burned away at whatever it attached itself to, and the other trapped the opponent's mind inside the mindscape of Tsukuyomi where Itachi controlled the space and time to torture the opponent.

These might seem like completely separate abilities, but they were complements of the other. Amaterasu was the manifestation of the Uchiha clan's innate mastery of ninjutsu flames while the other was their innate mastery of Genjutsu brought by the Sharingan. So while being completely different, they are perfect for each other. The Amaterasu is a physical attack while the Tsukuyomi is a mental one. They simply cover the other's weaknesses.

And onto the other well-known Mangekyō ability, Kamui. Together, they are a complete set. On one end, there is an ability that takes the user, and anything or one they are in direct contact with, to the Kamui dimension. This ability can be quick enough to allow the user to send separate pieces of themselves away which might be in danger, causing them to seem impervious to any attack.

Then there is the other ability which allows for the user to send anything into the kamui dimension from a distance. The bigger the object is, the more difficult it likely is to send it away. The best part though, it doesn't matter if the thing in question is moving or part of something bigger because as long as the user has a line of sight, they can send it away. The dichotomy is easy to see. One targets the self while the other does the opposite. A complete set.

At least that was the idea until a certain Madara was shown blatantly using the long-distance Kamui on himself. But that is a different train of thought. To finish the earlier train of thought, the other Mangekyou ability might be the opposite of fusion, separation. And to what degree, it seemed to be at a molecular level if it made the target look like it was evaporating?

Ahhhh, all of this speculation was making him want to test this out right now so he understood the ability better, but that would be a bad idea. If used incorrectly, his eyesight would become worse and worse. Maybe he could test it a bit before it got that bad, but should he risk it? This train of thought then brought up another question. If he used his fusion to fuse his eyes with another set, whether it be a Sharingan eye or normal, would the blindness be fixed? What about fusing with an eye that held another Kekkei Genkai like the Byakugan?

So many questions, so many possibilities. Especially with knowledge about future events, there were an almost endless amount of things to try out. His curiosity at things had peaked beyond what he could have even known. But then he forced himself to stop thinking so much about the future because the not-so-distant future was still a little unknown.

He had Sasuke Uchiha with him, Itachi Uchiha's little obsession. And he knew Itachi's little plan with his little brother. Itachi also knew about Orochimaru wanting Sasuke for his body since he couldn't get Itachi's and if Itachi thinks that Sasuke is about to be getting his body taken over right now or very soon, then a confrontation might be about to happen.

He needed to get Itachi off his back. Two of the best immediate ideas were to either kill him or show that Sasuke wasn't in danger. Another idea began to form, one where he would continue as Orochimaru who decided to train Sasuke up to kill Itachi. And if Itachi still decides to try and get Sasuke away from him, then he would divulge a few secrets he knew about Itachi or the Akatsuki, and if he tries anything, then Sasuke will come to know some of these truths.

Suddenly, his head was aching thinking so much. He was feeling quite annoyed too, realizing he didn't even want to deal with this stuff. Should he just try to be someone who killed Orochimaru instead and move on? If so then the resources which Orochimaru had would be essentially off-limits if he wanted to keep that identity up. If not then people like Jiraiya and Naruto would continue to come after him, the Akatsuki included.

He looked over towards a mummified hand standing upright with a gleaming ring on one of its fingers. The Akatsuki ring Orochimaru had taken with him when he attacked and failed to defeat a thirteen-year-old Itachi. Seriously, how did he not have any way to overcome or negate Genjutsu? Anyway, the entire Akatsuki essentially hated him including every major village, basically in a kill-on-sight situation. So should he make himself seem like someone who defeated Orochimaru and create a new identity?

If he just up and leaves to live a peaceful life, then the amount of possible bullshit that could happen that destroys the world could still occur. An immediate example was the Akatsuki or rather Nagato, who was being deceived by Obito disguised as Madara who was also being deceived by the real Madara who then was also being deceived by Black Zetsu who wanted to unseal Kaguya and turn the planet's living beings into nutrients.

And not to mention the things that come after the Fourth Great Ninja War. He didn't even want to begin with that stuff. There were a little bit of memories where he read the beginning of the Boruto, but the amount of bullshit he had seen made him stop. Every so often, he came across the newest hype about the series, and after curbing his curiosity and reading or watching, he continued to dislike the series even more.

Mostly it was because of the absolute tragedy which was Naruto. The man just couldn't catch a break. After achieving his dream he just becomes a plot device for the new main characters to become stronger. It made him sick how Naruto was slowly becoming a damsel in distress, all while losing everything that made him who he was.

Gah, he was going off track remembering it all. The main point was after the war, things weren't all sunshine and roses, even if it looked that way for a while. So, could he just avoid it all? What would happen right now if he left everything behind right now and vanished? With that question in mind, he began to think about the what-ifs.

First of all, Sasuke would have defected for no reason and would need to either go back to Konohagakure or figure out some other way to get stronger. Maybe he would go to the Akatsuki early?

Second, People would wonder why Orochimaru had vanished without a trace, most would assume he was hiding and biding his time for something.

Third, would Naruto still go off to train with Jiraiya? This was more of now thing, since around now Jirayai would tell Naruto that there would be a couple of years before Orochimaru would take over Sasuke and the time-skip would occur, but now things had changed. Will Jirayai be on his way right now to try and get Sasuke back? Or will things continue as normal?

Fourth, and this was assuming he just killed Kabuto before leaving, it would mean the mass Edo Tensei of different powerful shinobi would not be used in the war. Would the war still even happen? Probably? Assuming so, then Kabuto wouldn't be a part of that and all the Konohagakure Hokage would still be stuck inside the Shinigami. So if Naruto got Kurama taken from him it would be over for him, assuming the Six Paths had no strange way to do something like create a tailed beast shell that would act as a battery for Naruto's resurrection until he took care of Kaguya.

And who would revive Madara? Would he still go from being an Edo Tensei puppet to being able to do the Sharingan shenanigans and reverse the Edo Tensei technique to gain self-control and then get resurrected via the Rinnegan to have a living body?

Without Kabuto, or someone to do the mass Edo Tensei, things seemed like they would go off the rails when wartime came around. But that got him thinking, since he had all of Orochimaru's abilities, well, he hadn't tested everything yet so maybe things weren't so simple, but assuming he did, couldn't he just take Kabuto's place? He would have quite an army for the future if he did, which included all the kage if he went and released them from the shinigami's stomach as well.

Then being the controller of Madara, he could set things up with his Edo-Tensei body so the man couldn't reclaim autonomy. But someone else could learn the technique and replace Kabuto's place. To ensure that couldn't happen, he would need to destroy every written entry about the technique and ensure everyone who learned it would be dead.

Wait a minute. Can an Edo Tensei perform Edo Tensei on others? Probably not? Hopefully not. Actually, that might be useful. Instead of one person controlling hundreds of Edo Tensei, just control one person and have them control others, or only control a select group and then have them revive the others. If that was possible, it seemed like an oversight. Imagine having a long line of Edo Tensei controllers, one controlled by another Edo Tensei. Just when the enemy thinks they got the mastermind, it would be revealed that this wasn't to true controller. And if, as Kabuto had, he just hid away never to be seen, no one would know who cast the technique.

This train of thought was worth delving into more. Later that is. That was for the near future. Right now he had decisions to make. And that decision was to keep the identity of Orochimaru and say that he had found a different Uchiha besides Sasuke or Itachi to take over. Besides that, he would allow people to think and believe whatever they wanted. And if Itachi or Jirayai were on their way right now, it would be annoying.

…First of all though, before he would do anything, he would bury his mother. Looking towards the husk of a corpse which he had sat on the table earlier, he noticed the pang of grief from her death, yet also noticed that it was not at all overpowering like it was before. And though it still looked like Orochimaru, it was still his mother and she deserved a proper burial.

It made him think that if she was alive right now how would she react to him not even looking like her son anymore? Would she think that her son was dead, taken as a host just like her or would she believe that he was her son after he explained? It then hit him that he could just Edo Tensei her if he retained all of Orochimaru's mastery over techniques. But the idea quickly fell apart. He wouldn't do it. If she died with the idea that her sacrifice had saved him, he didn't want to confirm or deny it because yes, he survived, but was this the way she would have wanted him to? Would she regret her decision because of how things turned out? Well, probably not since motherly love was something he couldn't understand not being a parent himself, yet he still wouldn't revive her just to comfort himself. She didn't deserve that, and also, he didn't either.

~

(A/N: If it couldn't be caught, there was quite a bit of self insert in this chapter, especially when bringing up the Boruto series. Those were my true thoughts of the series while also keeping many big spoilers out just in case someone was just beginning the Boruto series when reading this chapter.