My Techniques are a bit off

Izakaya.

"Gulp… haaah."

Tsunade took a big swig and leisurely picked up a skewer of yakitori. As she ate, she said,

"I've looked over your physical exam results from last week."

"Your cells are no longer the same as a normal human's—whether it's density, weight, or capacity for storing energy. All are far beyond human."

"That jutsu of yours, while it removes ailments, also partially retains the benefits of you forcibly devouring Tailed Beast chakra."

"Extending your lifespan isn't the big problem. The main issue is that your growth period gets indefinitely prolonged. You wouldn't want to remain a kid for decades, or even a hundred years, would you?"

"Got it," Link responded—somewhat out of character, he wasn't getting upset; he just accepted it naturally. "I'll cut back on using Delicate Illness Extraction Technique."

At Tsunade's mention of the name, she sighed inwardly. She truly didn't want to admit that that bizarre ninjutsu of his shared the same label she was familiar with. It felt too off.

Link tried a bite of the yakitori. A classic salt-grilled flavor—tasted good. He casually said,

"I've sent Orochimaru on his way."

"I see," Tsunade said, a bit wistful. After all, those three Sannin shared quite a lot of memories.

Yes, many memories and close brushes with life and death—now there truly was no chance they would meet again, which brought on a tinge of sadness.

But after all, she had long since gotten used to separation as a kunoichi, so she quickly set aside her feelings and said,

"Right, so about that: when do you plan to experiment with Sage Mode?"

"Honestly, with the condition of your body, I'm sort of worried that if you go on getting stronger, you'll directly end up 'digesting' the Original-Body cells."

She sighed and lifted her cup. Previously, they had never promoted any large-scale Sage Mode experiments mainly because of Tsunade's own cautionary example: in her past confrontation with Orochimaru, merely a touch from him had rendered her nearly helpless. With him gone now, that big safety concern was removed.

No matter how big the Sage Mode boost was, if confronting Orochimaru meant losing in an instant, there was no point.

"We'll see," Link said, not in a hurry to chase after any Sage Mode or similar. He was planning to stop using Delicate Illness Extraction Technique for a while, see how his body would develop, and only then consider how to further increase his strength.

Either way, with the world at peace right now, he could afford to take a slow approach.

The Sage Mode, Five-Element Seal, and Original-Body line had not been thoroughly figured out yet. Jumping recklessly into something that might be dangerous? Not a good idea.

Tsunade snorted softly and took another small swig, then continued,

"Also, that 'demoted Original-Body cell' animal experiment you asked about? Something went wrong."

She began to explain the situation in detail.

Once demoted (weakened) Original-Body cells were implanted into animals like rabbits, the cell modifications created reproductive isolation. In other words, these newly bred creatures could only mate among themselves or required artificial methods; they were too few in number and couldn't naturally proliferate.

More awkwardly, over multiple generations, the beasts carrying such demoted cells began to aggregate or intensify the Original-Body traits, becoming even stronger, but the side effect was that when they got emotionally agitated, they would mutate. Among them, one rabbit specimen somehow turned humanoid during a conflict.

"Huh?" Link was stunned. "Wait, did you say it turned humanoid?"

"What do you think the 'Original-Body' was?" Tsunade retorted with a question.

"Isn't it… well, oh, I get it now."

Link realized the logic.

The so-called "Original-Body" cells belonged to a human body that Orochimaru once discarded, meaning they were fundamentally human cells being implanted into rabbits.

Uh… "furry?" "Beastman?"

He felt goosebumps rise at the thought. On Earth, people often joked about commanding their cats to transform into humans, but if a small animal really became humanoid, Link found that hard to accept.

"Basically," Tsunade confirmed. "If we keep cultivating them, they might end up producing a group of naturally adept at using nature energy—let's call them 'people'? Or some kind of new species."

"Heh, since that time, the body Orochimaru used was originally female, so the Original-Body adaptation suits females better; it's much easier for them to mutate."

Tsunade unexpectedly gave a smirk and said,

"You wouldn't believe how those mutated female beasts got so strong, plus their intelligence noticeably increased. Because of the nature-energy influence, they're quite fierce. Most normal males can't handle training them at all."

"Uh, I guess that means those are, well—"

"A man-beast? Or a beast-man?" Link's mind reeled. He took a moment to calm down. "So what's happening with the experiment?"

"It's been shut down," Tsunade answered matter-of-factly. "What else can we do? We can't really mass-produce a batch of beasts that are basically 'almost human' now, can we? Think of the ethical issues.

"The entire experimental team has been disbanded."

"They pushed up a report on how to dispose of that group of rabbits. They'll wait for higher-ups to make the final call."

Link fell silent. From what he knew, they hadn't only implanted it into rabbits. They'd also done tests on many other animals, capturing them inside the Forest of Death, breeding them, monitoring them. Even if none had escaped, there were simply too many. So even if they ended the experiments, the beast population that had already been cultivated was bound to keep producing more mutations.

They already had 'humanoid forms'… plus intelligence was rising… The ethics problem was indeed serious.

What if the only solution was exterminating them all?

"Don't worry about it too much," Tsunade said with a shrug. "Even if they do evolve to a point of replacing humans, that'd be centuries from now. And if they can't naturally use chakra or ninjutsu, they're basically just special summons.

"As for them being too human-like, we'll leave that problem to future generations."

With that, she lightly swirled her drink.

Link exhaled, feeling both curiosity and a complicated sort of alarm at the thought of beastmen derived from his Five-Element Seal experiments. He definitely wanted to see it for himself…

But not today—it was late. Tomorrow, he'd file a request to get involved in the experiment, then see how it was going in detail.

~~~

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