Journey of Desires

- Where are we going next?

After asking this question, Naruko got up from the couch and took something that doesn't exist in the ninja world.

In response, she received a smirk from her interlocutor, Ban turned his head towards Hikari and nodded silently, the girl understood him correctly and said.

- Orochimaru left me and Ban a summoning snake each, they are in a fuin seal and if we want to contact him, we can do it with the help of such snakes.

- Ooooh! Are we going to his village?

- No, Kilia said yesterday that today we will call Orochimaru and find out about the situation with our search, at our last meeting she asked him to collect information about us.

- Will this creepy guy come again?

- Well... yes, and why don't you like him so much?

Naruko, hearing this question, made an expression on her face that clearly asked the question "Did you really ask such a question?".

- Hikari... are you serious?

At this point, everyone else in the room did not understand the blonde girl. The looks that Naruko saw in her direction were full of incomprehension, noticing that everyone was looking at her, she asked a question that probably any person in her situation would ask.

- What? What's wrong?

- Explain.

- What is there to explain? He's creepy, creepy and... creepy, and he's also creepy!!! Wow!

- Mmmm... I can't understand you, he's just a calm and cold-blooded person who has absorbed the features of his summoning animal, I don't know why you're so disposed towards him.

- Kilia! Doesn't he scare you?

- You know where my brother and I have been, I haven't been afraid of anything for about seven hundred years, although... I remember I was scared when we found out about our curse, well, I think the gist is clear.

- Okay, you and Ban, you're nuts, but what about Hikari??? Although it's clear she's an Uchiha, but Hinata! Hinata, you're normal, aren't you scared of this guy?

Turning to Hinata, she wanted to hear an answer, but saw only a slightly frightened girl who could only speak.

- Aan-no... Naruko, turn around...

Turning around abruptly, she saw Kiliya's narrowed and angry gaze, which did not bode well...

- Naaruko!.. that means I'm nuts, huh-uh?

Realizing her mistake, Naruko literally changed in an instant and began to look like a frightened fox.

- Aaa... Kilia, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean that...

- Hm!

The older girl chuckled and sat back down in her seat, saying only "I'll remember!" Naruko had already exhaled, but the next moment it dawned on her that with this phrase she had offended not only the calm and kind Kilia, but also her unbalanced brother. Slowly, creakingly, she turned her face in his direction and saw him calmly eating popcorn, which was exactly what Naruko had gotten up from the couch for at the beginning of the conversation.

It just so happened that although there are many plants from Ban's first world in this world, he still couldn't find corn, and therefore the supplies he had with him were the only thing they had, and without corn it was impossible to create popcorn.

In the first world, various products like potatoes and corn were brought from America, but in the new worlds the geography is different, and it just so happened that some crops are there and some are missing, and of course there are also unique products that our travelers have not seen in other worlds.

In the world of the seven deadly sins, there was corn, and even a variety for popcorn was found, but in the Ninja world, this product is not there.

Naruko, turning her head towards Ban, only looked at him warily, and he, in turn, noticing her look, calmly answered.

- What? I don't give a damn what you called me, I eat...

And completely losing interest, he only took a more comfortable position for himself, continuing what he was doing.

Naruko, realizing that nothing critical had happened, sighed with relief and again turned to Hinata.

- Hinata, so what about Orochimaru? Why aren't you afraid of him?

- Well... at first he was a little scary, but while he was talking to Hikari, constantly asking questions and listening to her explanations, he seemed, well... normal to me, it's just that his style is a little scary, but... Mmm, how can I say this. My dad is much scarier...

Thinking that those around her were crazy, Naruko just sighed and returned to the place where she had been sitting earlier, and began to have a snack while continuing her game of chess with Hikari.

***

It was night in the Hidden Village of Sound, it was already past midnight at the moment, but Orochimaru was not sleeping, he finally had a breakthrough in his research on the DNA of the immortal Ban.

It so happened that initially he wanted to study DNA first, but before that he decided to read a little of the notes of a certain Merlin, and they captivated him so much that he began to study immortality using a practical example only at the beginning of summer.

At first, all the results did not show anything important, at the very beginning he made a conclusion that ultimately turned out to be correct.

Ban's regeneration is not directly connected to his body, there is some kind of force that binds his soul to his body and even if his body is sprayed into atoms, it will begin to recover in the likeness of the soul, and because it needs to be restored to a certain standard, Ban's body froze in time.

Thanks to a more detailed study of the records and introductory books on magic that he received a little less than two weeks ago, he began to understand the principles by which it was theoretically possible to create the same immortality artificially.

- We need to delve deeper into fuinjutsu...

Muttering this phrase under his breath, Orochimaru began to consider the results.

Theoretically, if you create a long fuin seal that will restore his body based on the data obtained from the records and study of Ban, then you can freeze his body in time so that it constantly maintains itself according to the specified pattern, this is already enough to fulfill his dream, namely to get rid of the fear of death from old age. But there is still a danger from enemies, Orochimaru can be killed or sealed, and regeneration will not help here, here you need something on the level of Ban's immortality that will allow you to recover even from blood dust.

But how to create a binding of the body to the soul? As far as Orochimaru understood, Ban's soul is not literally tied to the body, but only attracted in case of fatal injuries, therefore, if you use techniques that allow you to go into the astral plane, or techniques like summoning Shinigami, then immortality should not protect against such attacks... But he also has his sister who specializes in souls...

- That's right...

When the sanin's thoughts reminded him of Kiliya, he had an idea.

Since she just specializes in what he needs help with, then he needs to somehow buy information from her the next time they meet, or better yet, help in developing fuin.

Coincidentally, just at the moment when he thought about it, he felt a call pulling at him, signaling that he was being called, apparently, those who were calling him were the ones he needed at that moment.

In order to summon Orochimaru using a small snake and the reverse summoning technique, you need to use quite a lot of chakra, since it takes a lot of chakra to summon a sannin with a huge amount of chakra, and Orochimaru himself cannot move at will to any point where his snakes are, and now he definitely felt that the chakra invested in his summoning was not enough...

***

- It doesn't work...

Hikari, who used the reverse summoning with the snake, now looked a little upset, for some reason she still couldn't summon the right person.

- Hmm... Hikari, try investing more chakra.

Having given a hint, Kilia saw how the Uchiha got a second wind and began to repeat the technique, but this time investing significantly more chakra.

This time the technique worked and with a quiet *Poof* Orochimaru appeared in the middle of the room.

- It worked, good afternoon Orochimaru-dono.

- Good afternoon, Hikari, why did you call me?

The girl in response only nodded behind Orochimaru, after which he turned around to see the huge sofas on which Kilia and Ban were sitting. Naruto and Hinata were currently walking around Iwagakure with Kurotsuchi.

- Yo!

Ban waved and said hello, and his sister nodded in greeting, after which Orochimaru showed politeness in return.

- We called you to find out the situation in other villages, we wanted to go further to Sunagakure, but I'm not sure what's going on there.

- Hm.

Orochimaru looked at Hikari who passed by him and sat down on one of the sofas.

Now the sannin felt a rather unpleasant feeling, usually it is very difficult for him to communicate with people, almost all new acquaintances periodically come down to either the interlocutor running away from Orochimaru or to a fight.

For some reason, these same people did not feel any negativity towards him and communicated with him without showing any bias or fear.

And now Orochimaru understood that the people with whom he can communicate like this can be counted on the fingers of his hands, but the unpleasant feeling is that looking at Hikari he has to suppress his desire to get the Uchiha's body...

A rather strange and rare situation for a person like Orochimaru, he understands that these people are very valuable sources of information and treat him well, but he is also gnawed by a huge desire to get what they own.

In the memory of the sanin, except for the trio that are now in the same room with him, he could only be in an atmosphere where he was neither despised nor feared with Kabuto, Jiraiya, Tsunade and Sensei Hiruzen.

The ninja of his village of course obey him, but even they are afraid of their Kage.

Having suppressed the desire and walked to the sofa, sitting down next to Kilia, Hikari sat down next to Ban, he began to tell the story.

- In short, you can't be in Sunagakure... Hiruzen filed requests for your arrest, and they have already reached Sunagakure and Kumogakure. The Sand Village accepted the request, and if they see you there, they will catch you, but Kumogakure sent Konoha far away, and there will be no threat to you there, in two weeks they will already forget what you look like.

- And what about Iwagakure and Kirigakure?

- There are some problems at the border with Iwagakure, my people were unable to find out more, but according to calculations, the Konoha Shinobi who is carrying out a delivery mission should arrive in Iwagakure within a couple of days, he should be released from the border point today. And Kirigakure... There is still a civil war going on there, there is no point in sending a request there.

- Okay, it turns out that we decided to leave Iwagakure in time, if the Tsuchikage accepted the request, they could have caught us by surprise.

After finishing listening to Orochimaru's words, his interlocutors made conclusions, Hikari was about to say something, but Orochimaru, not noticing this, started a new topic first.

- Kilia... I need your knowledge in souls.

- Mmm? Why?

- I have an idea on how to create immortality similar to yours.

At that moment, the brother and sister experienced a real shock, in the world of the seven deadly sins, Merlin was trying to study their immortality and how it works, why is unknown, but most of the members of the seven deadly sins were inclined to believe that she wanted to give immortality to Escanor and Arthur, did not want to lose them.

- What???

- Huh?

Having briefly and clearly expressed his state, Ban asked the next question.

- How? Merlin spent a year and a half, but nothing worked, and you did it in two months?

- Your mentor is a master in magic, but from her notes I concluded that she does not understand science and biology.

- What do you mean?

- Your immortality is essentially a restoration to a certain ideal state that is recorded in your souls, and when you get wounds, the body is restored based on what is recorded in your soul.

- Wait, does this mean that our souls are tied to our bodies?

- Right.

- That can't be, then the demons of the ten commandments could not get our souls with their abilities.

- Demons of the ten commandments?

- We'll explain later, please answer.

- Your bodies are connected, but not tied to the soul, in fact, you can practice techniques that force the soul to leave the body.

- Well, that explains a lot. Okay, then let's get down to business, what do you need help with?