Chapter 43 - Changing ones Mind

After the fight, everyone was sad that they couldn't bring Sasuke back.

Shikamaru explained to the Hokage that somebody interfered with his enemy and that she was most alive.

The Nara boy was at a loss because he couldn't understand why someone would save only Tayuya and let the other one die.

Flashback no Jutsu.

Shikamaru, Temari vs. Tayuya

General POV

Ishizu's clone observed the fight between Shikamaru and Tayuya.

'Her Genjutsu is impressive.

A sound-based Genjutsu is very strong as your opponent uses his ears as much as his eyes. Orochimaru had a gem in his layer but never bothered with her much.

Well, I will take over.'

The fight continued and Temari showed up. When he saw her doing the summoning Jutsu, the clone rushed to Tayuya and activated his Rinnegan to counterattack with Shinra Tensei.

Shikamaru's POV

Man, this girl destroyed the forest but where is she.

"Hey let me go. Who the **** are you!" the scream of my enemy sounded, showing she was alive.

I looked to where her voice was coming from and saw her on the shoulder of a man.

"Enough. You should be grateful that you survived her attack.

Without me, you would be dead, Tayuya. Now, be a good girl and sleep."

The man did something to her and she went unconscious. Then he turns to us and I don't know what it was but I never felt so helpless before.

I was no sensor, but I knew that if I did something wrong, he would kill me instantly.

Fortunately, the man did not attack.

"Relax. I am not here to hurt you. I have business with this foul-mouthed girl.

A Genjutsu user like her is not someone who should die.

You have won, congratulations, but I wouldn't say that about the Uzumaki boy. Goodbye."

With that, he left us.

Flashback end.

Fortunately, nobody died so Tsunade could heal everyone up.

Ishizu was happy that his plan went as planned. Sasuke was with Orochimaru and he wouldn't be found in the next 2 years.

Tayuya was hidden where he would give her an ultimatum as well as taking the seal of her.

She already started training in medical Ninjutsu, so helping her was good for doing something in the meantime.

As Shikamaru spoke with Naruto, Sakura overheard them.

"You know if you want to say something then go in and tell him," a voice said.

Sakura quickly turned around to see Ishizu standing there.

"You made Naruto promise something that he couldn't keep but what did you do during that time. It is good that you stated with medical Ninjutsu but you are still weak."

Sakura could keep silent as she knew that he was right.

"Saying nothing is also unnecessary. Why don't you start where you lack strength? Come with me."

Ishizu took her hand.

"Where are we going Sasaki-san?" asked a confused Sakura.

Ishizu smiled: "We will take one of my students and then you and she get a teacher."

Ishizu and Sakura went to the Yamanaka residence.

Sakura had a nervous expression because her friendship with Ino was rather bad.

Ishizu saw her expression: "You should talk with Ino about this whole problem that started with Sasuke.

It would help you. Ino was once the same as you.

A fangirl who chased after a boy who didn't want girls. You concluded that you should diet so you would look beautiful.

With your intelligence, you didn't even look at other Kunoichi.

You would have seen that there are no fat ones.

Sakura, you made yourself useless.

Ino had luck. She found somebody like Naruto who gave her a feeling of love back.

She is one of the strongest female Genin in Konoha right now. Compared to you, she is miles ahead.

Now, I am Ino's Sensei but I am also a Konoha Shinobi and seeing someone like you who is smart and is wasting her talent I won't look away.

I will take you to the one who will mold you into a Kunoichi you are worth."

General POV

Ishizu took Sakura to the Yamanaka residence, and they waited for Ino to come ours. As Ishizu saw Ino, he shoved Sakura to her while telling both of them to finally get over it.

Ishizu didn't listen to their conversation, but he heard crying and then he saw both of them coming out holding each other's hand, smiling.

Ishizu knew they finally managed to sort things out.

Friendship was very important in Konoha. It was one of the reasons why Konoha survived most of the fight against other villages.

Obito's and Kakashi's sentence about being trash or worse than trash was the perfect example.

The 3 of them went to Tsunade and Ishizu explained to her that Sakura and Ino should be her apprentices. Both of them exhaled greatly in medical Ninjutsu.

Tsunade reluctantly accepted but would first determine if they could be her apprentices.

Now with that out of his way, Ishizu made his way to his prisoner. It was time to create his own small spy network.

During his stay with the pandas, Ishizu wouldn't have much time to know about the things happening in the elemental nations so to compensate it he decided to gather people into his group that would help him.

Tayuya was one of them.

Somewhere in *DD*

"So, mind control? A rather 'extreme' way to get a follower, ne?" asked Tau as he watched Ishizu working on a seal.

"It is not mind-control. Sure, I will enter her mind but I won't change her personality. If everything goes right she will still be the bratty girl but her loyalty will be with me," explained Ishizu.

"Loyalty, what a difficult word. Tell me Ishizu, do you know of the Power of Friendship. It was something Master Po told me once when he lived with his teacher and friends," asked Tau and Ishizu stopped his work.

Then a small smile appeared on his lips.

"The ultimate weapon against mind control, brainwashing, etc. In my past life, I have read many books where the villain manipulated his enemy only for his friends to come to help and with some words about friendship they brought their friend back, ultimately destroying the mind-control.

I have never seen it for myself but I am a believer of it."

Tau smiled as he came closer to Ishizu and sat in front of him.

"Then why are you trying to change Tayuya?"

"Because every weapon has its shield and I know how to block it," answered Ishizu.

Tau looked amused.

"Then do tell."

"The problem is not the person I try to get to me but the others. As long as they don't exist nothing will happen. In Tayuya's case, she has no family. Her comrades are dead and the only person she served will soon die. Orochimaru isn't someone who would go to the end to get Tayuya back.

She is disposable to him, making it easy for me to gain her trust.

To counter the Power of Friendship one has to get rid of the friends first.

Take Obito for example.

Sure, Naruto got him back from Madara's control with his own Power of Friendship, the Talk no Jutsu, but he was not the only one who helped. Most people forgot that Kakashi played a very important part.

He was the last thing that Obito had in this world. If Kakashi was dead, Obito had no one and not even Naruto could come through him.

Now, this is all theory I believe, as nothing I have said was proven in any way but I am taking this into account.

That's why I don't try to brainwash people like Naruto or Sasuke or any other important people. First, it is not my type of style, the second, I don't have the necessary things and third, I fear it either won't take effect or it will be counted by the PoF

I don't want to screw my palms up."

After a pause, Ishizu looked at his seal.

"The best way to get somebody to join you is to open his mind for the other to see, therefore eliminating betrayal," said Ishizu.

Tau's eyes widened.

"You are going to use 'it'?"

Ishizu nodded.

"Like is said. Sometimes the truth is the best way to gain followers."

Ishizu's secret layer.

Ishizu POV

I opened the door and was hit with profanities from the former Orochimaru slave.

"Where did you even learn such words? I don't think Orochimaru taught you them."

Tayuya glared at me: "Open those seals and I will show you how I learned them!"

I sighed: "Please don't. I don't really care but you should, as what I am going to do will make you speechless." She started to shake as she saw my grin.

I bet countless things went through her head. Most of them would be what male Shinobi did to Kunoichis.

She has luck as I was not into such things and I still was a v.i.r.g.i.n up to this point.

I shook my head: "I am not going to do anything bad. No, I will do the opposite.

I will remove the bad stain you have on your body and mind. It is time you see the light, Tayuya-chan."

Tayuya tried to move with all her might, not believing me a single word.

She was frightened, believing I was another Orochimaru who would to inhuman things to her.

I doubt her first few months with the snake were good. She acted though but deep inside her she was broken.

I would fix her.

"Stop moving or you will hurt yourself more," I commanded her.

She stopped and looked at me with fearful eyes.

My eyes turned to the Rinnegan and I grabbed her head as I used the Human Path to look for the soul of Orochimaru.

The process was very hard to control and I had to concentrate as the mortality of this procedure was high.

I had to search for the tiny part of Orochimaru's soul before grabbing it and pulling it out.

I was not a master at this path as I felt the soul struggling against me, trying to remain in her body.

I made a mental note to learn this in my time in *DD*.

Tayuya stayed awake during that procedure and she looked horrified and she saw a ghost-like Orochimaru coming out of her body.

"What the hell was that?" she asked.

I answered her: "That, my dear Tayuya, was what was inside the curse mark.

A part of Orochimaru's soul.

You are still under the influence of the curse mark but just give me a minute and your mind will be clear."

I made a sealing array around her.

"This will hurt a bit as I will completely extract that seal of you. It is a weaker version of Sasuke's so it won't take long."

Fuinjutsu: Complete Absence of Evil.

This was the best Fuinjutsu I had at the moment for getting rid of something disgusting like that.

With years of studying Anko's seal plus the time I had with Sasuke and together with the Senjutsu Jugo provided, I made the perfect seal to completely eliminate the Curse Mark.

Not only would it erase the mark but the Fuinjutsu would enter into the souls to clean it from any long-term effects the seal had on the user before.

Essentially cutting the bond between Tayuya and Orochimaru.

I would be happy if it was the perfect seal against everything evil but nothing 'perfect' exists. It would not work on people who took the dark path with their free will.

People like Orochimaru, Danzo, or Madara would completely be unharmed. As they choose their path.

It would not affect Obito as he believes Madara's plan to create a perfect world, making the Fuinjutsu useless.

The same goes for Nagato who believes his way of achieving peace is the right way.

Tayuya was screaming as the seal was pealed from her body.

She collapsed and that was my time to use 'it'.

Ninshu.

Hagoromo made it so people could connect with their chakra.

With that in mind, I entered Tayuya's mind through one of the Yamanaka's mind jutsus.

I didn't want to see her memories or some secrets.

No, I wanted to find the girl who was imprisoned in her mind because of that seal.

Tayuya's mind:

I was in a labyrinth and annoying flute music was heard.

It was dark but the darkness slowly faded.

It seemed that the darkness was the curse. I walked around the labyrinth and saw a little girl crying.

'That must be Tayuya's psyche.'

Well, thoughts could be heard as she looked at me.

"Who are you? What are you doing here?" asked Tayuya frightened.

"Everything will be fine. Those demons will not hurt you anymore," I said as I crouched to her eye level.

She was reluctant to agree, so I utilized my Ninshu and connected with her.

The thing with Ninshu was that once you connect, you cannot lie to the other person. It opened every thought for the other to see, but I was not afraid.

I wanted her to live as I saw her potential. Of course, I wanted to use her but everyone in this world was like that. I was no different.

People used people and were being used. Such was the life of humanity and as long as both benefited nothing bad would happen.

I would use her and she would use me and we both would gain benefits. Our minds connected and she relaxed.

The labyrinth slowly crumbled as a light shone on us.

"Good girl, Tayuya. We both will get what we want. You will be a great spy. I will depend on you. Let's work together to achieve our dreams, ok?"

With that, I left her mind, picked her up and let her sleep on a bed.

I made my preparations for the upcoming adventure I would do.

Who wouldn't be excited to learn Senjutsu, from a legendary Panda like Po nonetheless?