CH 457

‘If this toxin is related to the Kekkei Genkai of the Kaguya Clan, then why aren’t the members of the Kaguya Clan immune to this toxin?’ was the thought in Kuroto’s mind.

Kuroto who has studied, and compounded various types of poisons and venoms, for many years now is no stranger to Toxins, in fact, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that he is also one of the few shinobi with an in-depth knowledge of both biological toxins or Mineral toxins. Therefore, he understands well enough that all animals and plants that carry any kind of toxins are generally either directly immune to their own toxins, or they have a certain mechanism in their body that prevents the toxin to harm themselves.

This is not some kind of magical thing, it’s a strict requirement to ensure their own survival. If a species doesn’t have a protective mechanism against the toxins produced by its own bodies, then that species wouldn’t be able to survive for very long, and would soon go into extinction.

After all, the survival of the fittest is not a joke.

But the Kaguya Clan managed to survive for a millennium despite the harmful toxin in their bodies, this shows that the Toxin rooted in their bodies, more specifically in their bones does not directly affect the Kaguya Clan’s survival. What this Toxin restricts is the upper limit of their strength and how much they can or can not use or explore Shikotsumyaku.

And this uncharacteristic restriction somewhat reminds Kuroto of the Mangekyou Sharingan of the Uchiha Clan.

The Mangekyou Sharingan in a true sense is just the product of the Uchiha Clan’s in-depth development of their own Sharingan Kekkei Genkai. True, there are several extra requirements involving emotional stimulations and whatnot, but at the end of the day, it is still the next stage of the evolution of their Kekkei Genkai.

Mangekyou Sharingan represents the pinnacle of Visual Prowess that a single Uchiha can have, before losing his light and eventually going to blindness upon continuous use unless he awakens the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan by taking the eyes of his blood relatives, preferably siblings.

However, Otsutsuki Hagoromo and his eldest son, Otsutsuki Indra never faced this problem of blindness, why is that the case?

It’s obviously because their Chakra was strong enough, but that alone can not be the reason, after all, if it’s just Chakra, then Madara and Sasuke also shouldn’t suffer from this blindness effect because they are reincarnations of Otsutsuki Indra, thus possessed Indra’s Chakra. Yet, they did and suffered, which means that strong Chakra itself is not the key.

Kuroto attributes this to the thinning of their bloodline. Rikudo Sennin and his son Indra’s bloodlines were pure, as such, they never needed the eyes of their brethren. However, the blood of Rikudo Sennin in itself has gradually become thinner and thinner generation by generation over the course of a thousand years of reproduction.

Even if Uchiha Clan took the policy of not allowing the blood of the Clan from flowing out of the Clan, or foreigners not entering into the clan, and limited marriage between the members of the clan only, it couldn’t have been a hundred percent full proof approach. There have to have been hundreds of instances in the millennia when the members of the Uchiha Clan reproduced with the non-Uchiha; as a result, gave birth to half Uchiha children whose bloodline was thinner compared to their parents.

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And this process went on until Indra’s bloodline became extremely thin.

As a result, a single Uchiha is unable to support the huge consumption caused by the Mangekyou Sharingan, and his eyes will inevitably be sealed the more he uses.

The Uchiha Clan should have been trapped in this problem for many years, but they eventually found a solution, which is the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan.

That is, by the fusion of the Mangekyou Sharingan of two blood relatives, preferably brothers; they are probably able to bypass the thinness of their bloodline and obtain eternal light. This way, the problem of bloodline thinness is fundamentally solved for that particular Uchiha and his eyes again evolve into the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan, a Mangekyou Sharingan, that that does not go blind.

And for some reason, the Curse of the Kaguya Clan seems a bit similar to Kuroto, of course, there are many differences, but the matter of bloodline thinness seems to be the cause.

‘Does that mean the cause of unnatural illness caused by this toxin in the Kaguya Clan is also the result of their bloodline becoming thinner over course of the millennia?’ as this thought came into Kuroto’s mind, he quickly realized that if his guess is correct, then the mysterious ‘Toxin’ rooted in the bones of the Kaguya Clansmen is not a simple ‘Toxin.’

But this is just a guess and it is not enough to prove Kuroto’s theory. So, instead of speculating out of thin air, Kuroto started to carry out a few experiments that would help him in understanding the true characteristics of this Toxin.

Because the Toxin is circulated throughout the bodies of the Kaguya Clan members with blood as the medium, so Kuroto quickly took out the sample of Kimimaro’s blood and tried to extract the ‘Toxin’ out of it in order to research this Toxin.

And the extraction process went quite smoothly, Kuroto quickly identified the unknown Toxic substance in Kimimaro’s blood, then separated it from the blood using the simple centrifugation process.

But as the Toxin particles were gradually separated from Kimimaro’s blood and collected in another solution, Kuroto soon encountered a problem.

Kuroto was surprised to find that once this ‘Toxin’ present in Kimimaro’s blood was purified to a certain level, it became impossible to collect, or rather, impossible to hold somewhere.

No vessels in his laboratory could hold the Toxin, even if they were made of some of the best and strongest substances in existence, they would just collapse in the face of this toxin and turn into ashes.

Kuroto never expected that a day would come where he would encounter such a problem, holding a mere Toxin has become an impossible task, okay, not a mere toxin, but I think that the main point is still cleared. No equipment in his laboratory was capable of holding the purified ‘Toxin.’

Although he felt troubled, Kuroto did not let it bother him too much, because this phenomenon of things collapsing and disintegrating into ashes reminded Kuroto of the effects of Otsutsuki Kaguya’s All-Killing Ash Bones.

Kaguya’s All Killing Ash Bones are capable of disintegrating anything and everything with a mere touch alone and unlike the Truth-Seeking Orbs, which have similar effects, in the case of All Killing Ash Bones, even Senjutsu is pretty useless, so anything that these bones touch soon collapses into nothing more than ash.

Upon this discovery of his, Kuroto was more sure of his guess, “It does seem that the Kaguya Clan’s ability to control their bones is a much-weakened version of Otsutsuki Kaguya’s ability to manipulate her bone structure into All-Killing As Bones.”

After understanding this Kuroto’s gaze flickered, and he entered a thinking mode.

Otsutsuki Kaguya also protruded All-Killing Ash Bones from her body, but she remained unharmed from them, which means that she is immune to the effects of All-Killing Ash Bones.

But the members of the Kaguya Clan aren’t.

Of course, just because Otsutsuki Kaguya is immune to the negative effects of All-Killing Ash Bones by no means imply that those of the Kaguya Clan have to be immune too.

It can also be attributed to Otsutsuki Kaguya being the progenitor of all Chakra. Her Byakugan is a true Kekkei Mōra, and her body is extremely strong, probably the strongest in the Shinobi World. This means that her body is strong enough to negate the negative effects of All-Killing Ash Bones.

And if all his guesses are indeed true, and if Shikotsumyaku is a weakened version of All-Killing Ash Bones, then Kuroto feels kind of sorry for the Kaguya Clan, as they have probably been the unluckiest of all the descendants of Otsutsuki Kaguya.

Even though Kaguya Clan inherited the most dangerous ability from the arsenal of Otsutsuki Kaguya, because of thinning of their bloodline over the course of millennia, they can not use this most dangerous ability.

In the case of the Mangekyou Sharingan of the Uchiha Clan, they only lose the light of their eyes because of their thin bloodline, but in the case of the Kaguya Clan; as their Kekkei Genkai develops more and more, and as it reaches closer and closer to its true form and slowly starts to acquire the characteristics of All-Killing Ash Bones, it actually results in the death of the Kaguya Clan Shinobi.

Even if the Kaguya Clan inherited the Sage body of Hamura, even if their Yang Chakra is extremely strong, even if their physique is perhaps of the same league as that of the Senju and the Uzumaki Clan, in the face of All Killing Ash Bones, that is capable of killing even Six-Path level people with just a single touch, how can the mere Kaguya Clan people who are nowhere near close enough to Six-Path level shinobi resist, and not die?

After inferring this, Kuroto also understood that the ‘Blood Exchange Ritual’ that the clansmen of the Kaguya Clan use to decrease the level of their blood toxicity is not actually a cure, but a method of self-weakening for self-preservation.

When the toxicity levels in their blood decrease, the speed at which Shikotsumyaku develops into All-Killing Ash Bones decreases, so although the members of the Kaguya Clan get to live a longer life, they do so by sacrificing their strength.

Of course, even this method of self-weakening is not a permanent cure as sooner or later they do die, and this hasn’t changed.

The solution found by the Kaguya Clan is completely incomparable to the Uchiha Clan, the Uchiha Clan has found a method to bypass the thinness of their bloodline and attained greater power in the form of Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan.

But the Kaguya Clan has only found a temporary method to extend their lives for a few, and that too after sacrificing a lot of theirs.

Of course, the ancestors of the Kaguya Clan can not be blamed or called incompetent for this, after all, no matter how much they try, dealing with All-Killing Ash Bones is simply impossible.

If there really is a method to cure the curse of the Kaguya Clan, then it is by possessing bodies as strong as Kaguya, Hagoromo, and Hamura, so that the bodies can withstand the attacks of All-Killing Ash bones.

Kaguya’s Byakugan and Hagoromo’s Rinnegan are Kekkei Mōra, in fact, Kuroto even speculates that Hamura’s Tenseigan is probably Kekkei Mōra too, and as for how strong their bodies truly are, it is extremely hard to imagine even for Kuroto.

And attaining Kekkei Mōra is obviously no joke. Let alone Kekkei Mōra, that is the fusion of all seven Chakra Natures; even reaching the level of Six Path by the fusion of Yin-Yang and attaining the Power of All Creation is no joke.

Therefore, the fact that the ancestors of the Kaguya clan could find a solution to cure the Curse of the Kaguya Clan can not be blamed, at the very least, they did find a method to increase their survival rate by using the ‘Blood Exchange Ritual.’

After everything was said and done, Kuroto can’t help but sigh inwardly, ‘No wonder Orochimaru-sama couldn’t save Kimimaro.’

In the Canon, it’s not that Orochimaru did not try to save Kimimaro, in fact, he did use everything he could to find a Cure to the disease that Kimimaro suffered from, but he was completely helpless. The lack of knowledge about the Kaguya Clan became one of the many causes of Kimimaro’s early death.

‘Heh, it is quite ironic to think that the Curse of the Kaguya Clan is actually a genius disease, the more genius a member of the Kaguya Clan, the earlier he would die.’ Sighed Kuroto.

Kimimaro died at the mere age of 15. He did not even have any chance of leaving behind any descendants.

However, Kuroto soon put aside the thought, and muttered to himself, “It seems that I will not be using the ‘Blood Exchange Ritual’. The so-called ritual is actually self-weakening, not healing, and I obviously wouldn’t want to weaken the Clone.”

Despite this, Kuroto isn’t much worried, because he is working towards Project Godhood. And the Project Godhood would be completed when Kuroto attains Kekkei Mōra. When Kuroto attains Kekkei Mōra, his body would be as strong as Otsutsuki Kaguya, so the curse of the Kaguya Clan would obviously be meaningless upon him.