The Eight Trigrams Seal, when it appeared, sealed the Nine-Tails. The most powerful tailed beasts were powerless against it, let alone a defective one-tailed Shukaku. Without the interference of others, Mizuki's sealing technique was much more effective than expected. With "Little Shukaku" sealed into the copy of Uzumaki Naruto, Mizuki finally achieved the biggest goal of this action that he had been preparing for a month.

He put the sealed little Shukaku and the copy of Uzumaki Naruto directly into the sealing scroll and put them away. Then he walked towards Uzumaki Naruto who was not far away, moved them over and placed them together with Temari and Gaara, waiting for his companions to come and clean up the mess.

"In the original novel, of the three Sunagakure ninjas, only Kankuro was seriously injured and unconscious, not knowing the consequences. Gaara was rescued by Temari, but this time, Temari didn't even have time to rescue the Jinchuriki Gaara, and they were both captured. This time, the loss was even more miserable than in the original novel."

…

Just as Mizuki's main body captured Gaara and Temari, Orochimaru's breakout reached a critical moment. With the chaos at the scene, the large force's pursuit could no longer catch up with the speed of the Sound Ninjas, and only a few elites could keep up with Orochimaru's pace.

"Lord Orochimaru, the situation is critical now. Do you want to join up with the Sand Ninja?" Kabuto Yakushi suggested to Orochimaru while using medical ninjutsu to relieve Orochimaru's pain.

"No need." Orochimaru thought about it and decided to give up. "Now the news that I pretended to be the Kazekage has probably been leaked. Now we are no longer in cahoots with them."

"I see." Yakushi Kabuto adjusted his glasses with his free hand, and said in a deep voice, "Then the possibility of us getting out of Konoha is quite small..."

Yakushi Kabuto glanced at the four Otonin guarding not far away and said, "Without anyone to cover our retreat, none of us can escape..."

"Cover the rear? Who covers the rear?" Orochimaru said impatiently, "If you put it that way, it seems like there is already an arrangement."

"Yes, Lord Orochimaru." Yakushi Kabuto said, "The candidates have been arranged. When the news that the Sand Ninja was colluding with us was leaked to Konoha, I had some bad premonitions, so I made some arrangements. I didn't expect that they would really come in handy in the end."

"Oh?" Orochimaru asked, "The only ones who can be used at this time are not these people on the scene. The only one you can use as a backup is Kimimaro, right?"

Yakushi Kabuto replied, “Yes.”

"Kimimaro's strength is not a problem, but his physical condition helped us kill the Fourth Kazekage some time ago. Can it be used now?"

Kabuto Yakushi said: "All the Otonin were born for Orochimaru-sama, and they are all willing to die for Orochimaru-sama. Kimimaro is the most trustworthy partner."

With Kimimaro's body, he couldn't hold on for much longer anyway. It would be easy to stimulate him in some way, and then rely on Kimimaro's extraordinary willpower to temporarily burst out with powerful strength. Anyway, he wouldn't live long, and if he died in the mission of rescuing Orochimaru, I believe Kimimaro would feel that he had no regrets in death.

"You're all willing to die for me? Including you, Kabuto?"

"Of course, that includes me..." replied Kabuto Yakushi.

"Really? That's really reliable." Orochimaru said playfully, "Especially you, you acted on your own this time too?"

"All of this is for Lord Orochimaru's ideals..."

"My ideal? Forget it, let's not talk about this. Where is Kimimaro?" As the pressure grew, Orochimaru became more and more anxious.

"Almost there, just ahead."

When the group passed a residential area, they finally saw Kimimaro, who was arrogant and indifferent, waiting in front. Seeing Orochimaru coming, Kimimaro hurriedly saluted to greet him.

"No need to be so polite, Kimimaro. The situation is not good right now. Lord Orochimaru is injured and needs to leave quickly."

"Isn't it because you bunch of useless people are so incompetent? Otherwise, how could Lord Orochimaru get injured?" Kimimaro looked at Kabuto Yakushi and the four Sound Ninjas behind him with a stern face, which made them feel creepy.

"That's it, Kimimaro." He neither praised Kimimaro nor blamed the others, "I'll leave the rest to you."

Orochimaru, who has a deep understanding of Kimimaro's talents, abilities and temperament, explains that giving orders directly is the best way to get along with him.

"I understand." Kimimaro's reaction was not unexpected by Orochimaru. "Kabuto, I'll leave the rest to you..."

Only Kabuto Yakushi was barely reliable, while the defeated and useless Sound Four were never considered by Kimimaro. He was only willing to be called the Five with them because of Orochimaru's wish.

Kimimaro also knew that Orochimaru had found a better soul container this time. Although he was originally a backup, he was not the first choice because of his incurable blood disease.

"I hope that Uchiha Sasuke is good enough to be worthy of Lord Orochimaru's will."

Kimimaro was already very content that he could make a contribution to the respected Orochimaru before his death and that his meager life could be put to good use.

"Let's go," Orochimaru gave his final order, and the group sped away, leaving Kimimaro alone to face Konoha's pursuers.

"Kabuto, I remember that Kimimaro didn't know about Uchiha Sasuke, so you said that? Although the final result was not bad, you have been acting too much on your own recently, right?" Kimimaro was cursed with the Earth Seal very early, and has always been cultivated as a soul container. And Kimimaro has always been proud of this. It is really hard to believe that Kabuto Yakushi could easily convince Kimimaro to come regardless of his health, and even risked his life to cover the retreat. Although the Four Sound Ninjas are much weaker, if they take turns to cover the retreat, they will not be much worse than Kimimaro. The only possibility is that Kimimaro knew long ago that he was no longer Orochimaru's choice. Before being abandoned, dedicating his life to Orochimaru must have been Kimimaro's last obsession.

"Yes, I'm sorry, Lord Orochimaru. If Kimimaro doesn't have the motivation and willpower to burn his life, there's really no way he can play his final role..."

"Although what you said makes sense, you have to remember, Kabuto." Orochimaru said grimly, "Only I can deal with my things. I hope this won't happen again."

"I see."

Just as Orochimaru was walking away, Kimimaro also began to let the Konoha ninjas see the horror of the powerful and crazy corpse veins of the Hidden Mist Village again after many years...