For someone of Satsuki's level, travel by foot was already a meaningless concept.
Using the giant Tenseigan to scan the area, she quickly located her target.
Activating her space-time ninjutsu, Satsuki appeared instantly upon the steps before the temple gate. After confirming she had arrived at the right place, she lifted her gaze toward the plaque.
"Fire Temple."
This temple was built atop a towering mountain peak, surrounded by vast forests. Its massive gates, nearly ten meters tall, were forged of solid iron blocks. On either side of the gate stood large statues of great tengu clad in monks' robes, their faces ferocious and their stances imposing.
The style made it obvious that this was not a temple open to ordinary worshippers. With such blatant distinction, it was clearly not a temple dedicated to Mahayana Buddhism.
According to the intelligence Satsuki had once gathered within the Iga stronghold, Fire Temple was a highly unusual shinobi temple. The monks training within had all once been shinobi, and its stronger members were often hired by daimyō as bodyguards. Even Toudou Naoto, the lord of Iga Castle, had dealings with them.
After only a cursory glance, Satsuki approached the temple gates. Their size was disproportionate for ordinary people; rather than being meant for humans, they seemed designed for some much larger beings.
But Satsuki had no interest in such details today. She simply knocked lightly.
Moments later, the heavy doors slowly opened. Three monks in gray-white robes emerged. Satsuki had already sensed the chakra fluctuations within their bodies—at best equivalent to genin or chunin. Their shaved heads bore no burn scars, and no clear ranking was discernible.
It was also obvious their training was lacking. When the two monks flanking the leader first laid eyes on Satsuki, she instantly detected desire flicker in their gazes.
Her attire left little doubt as to why. She had exchanged her short kimono for a flowing black robe with an open collar that revealed the soft curves of her chest. Its cut displayed her long, shapely legs sheathed in black pantyhose, while her feet rested in striking high heels—an exotic design in the shinobi world.
These heels were her own creation, crafted by her puppets in Rōran using memories of her past life. Platform stilettos with a 6-inch heel, their bold design and beauty captivated her the first time she wore them, making them her regular choice. Not only did they enhance her figure, they elevated her presence, making her appear even more alluring and imposing.
Her captivating appearance pulled their stares as though against their will. They were monks, but men all the same, and no one could fault them for faltering before such a vision.
The leading monk noticed as well; the heavy breathing was impossible to hide from someone who had once been a shinobi.
"Still your hearts!"
At the sharp rebuke, the two dazed monks jolted back to clarity. Realizing their lapse, they paled in alarm, immediately sitting cross-legged to recite sutras and cleanse their minds.
Turning to the only monk who still maintained composure, Satsuki said: "I have heard of Fire Temple—it is a famous shinobi temple. I have come today to observe the secret arts cultivated here."
"I am Gokō Kaito. May I ask how I should address you, honored guest?"
Even at a glance, he could tell she was extraordinary—the golden eyes, the striking attire, the presence that eclipsed ordinary beauty. One need not be sharp-eyed to see it.
"Just call me Satsuki."
"Lady Satsuki, forgive me, but your request cannot be granted," Gokō Kaito said, bowing low. "To be frank, in our temple only the abbot has successfully cultivated the secret art. But he has been bedridden for many days."
"The abbot?"
With her Tenseigan's vision piercing the temple's barrier, Satsuki searched briefly and saw a familiar figure lying in the grandest chamber. It was none other than Fayen, the shinobi monk who had once stood alongside Butsuma Senju during the battle with the Eight Tails.
What a coincidence—sought far and wide, only to find without effort.
"How convenient," Satsuki said softly. Catching the monk's startled expression, she continued: "As it happens, I know some medicine." Having found her target, there was no need to linger. With that, her figure vanished before the three monks' eyes.
In the next instant, she was standing beside Fayen's bed.
"Who's there?"
Despite being heavily injured, Fayen's senses remained sharp. The moment Satsuki appeared, he reacted instantly.
"The taste of the Eight Tails' Tailed Beast Bomb isn't pleasant, is it?"
Her opening words left him shaken. That incident was one he loathed to recall—not only had the mission ended in failure, but even the Amber Purifying Pot had been lost. A complete disaster. If not for Myōken Senju's sudden eruption of power and later support from the Uzumaki, he might have perished outright on the battlefield.
But that operation had been a top-secret joint mission with the Senju. How could an outsider possibly know of it?
"You… cough, cough…"
Suddenly having his past brought up, Fayen was overwhelmed with emotion, breaking into a fit of coughing, unable to form a complete sentence.
The moment Satsuki laid eyes on him, she had already used her Tenseigan to scan his body structure, instantly understanding the state of his injuries.
She raised one hand, whereupon a sphere of natural energy for healing appeared in her palm. With a wave, she injected that energy into Fayen's body. Under her control, the natural energy quickly reached the locations of his internal wounds and began to work.
Naturally, Fayen noticed this, but since she displayed no overt hostility—and given how unusual her appearance was—his experience as a seasoned shinobi told him that silence was the wisest choice.
Then, almost immediately, he felt the change within.
To call it revival like spring returning to dead wood was an understatement. Within mere seconds, the agonizing pain and blocked chakra flow in his body vanished completely. In less than half a minute, his body had healed at an astonishing rate.
Not only that—old hidden injuries from years of taijutsu training were also wiped away. Now he felt stronger than even before his recent wounds.
His perception of his own body left him utterly shocked. He had never seen—nor even heard—of such methods. Though he had been close to the Senju clan, said to inherit the body of the sage, even they could not achieve such recovery.
"Perfect timing."
Satsuki spoke meaningfully. Before Fayen could think further, the sound of hurried bare feet echoed outside, followed by the crash of the doors being thrown open. The one leading the group was none other than Gokō Kaito, the monk she had spoken with earlier.
The moment he mentioned Fayen as the temple's only one who had mastered the Sage Clan's secret art and who was bedridden, she had vanished right before his eyes.
Even an ordinary jonin could not disappear so completely before him, and he had sensed no chakra fluctuation, nor had he fallen into genjutsu.
There was only one explanation: her speed was so great that he could not even register it.
That thought alone left him horrified. Instinctively, he had gathered many monks to rush to Fayen's quarters, for surely she had come for him.
And indeed, upon pushing open the door, he saw Satsuki standing at Fayen's bedside.
Her calm glance at him carried such pressure that he immediately grew tense. That look he had only seen on the faces of top-tier shinobi—beings who could sweep across the world unmatched. Though she was a woman, she was without a doubt one of those rare, overwhelming powers. What she had displayed already was enough to terrify him.
"Kaito, what are you doing here?"
"I…"
Flustered, Gokō Kaito found himself at a loss before his abbot's question.
Fayen's body may have been wounded, but his mind was sharp. Seeing Kaito's stance and expression, he immediately guessed the situation. It was up to him to defuse it.
"Oh, you must be looking for this lady. She is my friend, who came here specifically to treat me."
To strengthen his words, Fayen even rose to his feet and demonstrated a set of punches.
The monks exchanged bewildered glances until one of them stepped forward and said: "Abbot, only a few days ago the doctor declared your injuries extremely severe. How could they be healed so quickly?"
Feigning casualness, the monk placed a hand on Fayen's shoulder and pushed chakra into him, testing for genjutsu. This little trick was plain to Satsuki's Tenseigan, yet she ignored it, standing silently aside.
Fayen understood the intent and laughed heartily: "Do not worry. I know if I were trapped in genjutsu. This friend of mine is an exceptional medical shinobi. My injuries are truly healed."
After repeated reassurances, the monks finally accepted that their abbot had been miraculously healed within a minute by this mysterious visitor. With embarrassed expressions, they bowed their heads toward Satsuki in gratitude.
"Enough. Since the misunderstanding is cleared, you may leave. This guest came to see me. Go finish your practice. And now that my injuries are healed, I shall personally test you all in a few days, haha."
Fayen's cheerful personality was on full display. But the monks' faces twisted bitterly at his words, as though they had swallowed something foul.
After they had filed out dejectedly, Satsuki finally spoke: "The puppet play is over."
She extended her hand toward Fayen. "Hand over all the secrets of the Sage Clan."
At her words, Fayen's eyes suddenly grew vacant. His mouth opened involuntarily, and a chakra sphere was forced out.
Though inelegant, the chakra was not a physical object, free of saliva or bile.
Satsuki immediately used her Tenseigan to read its contents. Within moments, she had completely scanned all the information contained inside.
"It's only one secret art, but not without value," Satsuki murmured. "Sage Clan Secret Art—Raigō: Thousand-Armed Murder. It reminds me of techniques used by two acquaintances of mine."
"This technique is quite similar to the First Hokage's Sage Art: True Several Thousand Hands, and to Kaguya Ōtsutsuki's Eighty Gods Vacuum Attack."
In terms of power, however, it could not be compared to those.
Satsuki was a logical thinker, and she had long harbored a question: what were the specific details behind the First Hokage's power growth?
Hashirama Senju, as the only person of his time able to contend with Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan Madara Uchiha, had a very mysterious path of growth.
Madara's strength, at least, could be traced step by step through the progression of the Sharingan.
But Hashirama seemed to suddenly awaken to Wood Release, suddenly master senjutsu, and suddenly possess a whole host of bizarre Sage Arts.
The former was not so concerning. Wood Release was just a kekkei genkai-level ability—not particularly overwhelming in itself. After all, Yamato, who inherited the First Hokage's cells, also used Wood Release, yet all he could manage was some landscaping.
But the latter was far more suspicious. Where had Hashirama learned all those Sage Arts?
Upon mastering the Sage Clan's secret art Raigō: Thousand-Armed Murder, Satsuki formed a hypothesis—perhaps the early Sage Clan had some significant connection with the First Hokage.
Was it possible? Very possible.
The supporting evidence came from the chakra sphere she had just read.
The so-called Sage Clan, in fact, had no direct connection to this world's true sages. However, they had, in one way or another, glimpsed traces of sages in the past.
This was not especially surprising. The regions inhabited by humans in this world were not vast. Many expansive domains remained untouched by ordinary people—or even shinobi. Such places were either territories of sages, or realms belonging to certain summons. To intrude rashly without sufficient power was to throw one's life away. In this world, ordinary humans were an exceedingly frail species.
When mortals witnessed beings of overwhelming power, it was inevitable that awe would grow into worship, and eventually, into the formation of faith and totems.
The so-called Sage Clan was precisely such a group—people who worshiped sages as their faith. They drew strength from this faith while spreading the tales of sages throughout the world.
In ancient times, they had been powerful indeed, for sages would occasionally respond to them, imparting modified Sage Arts. With such techniques, the Sage Clan had once stood as a dominant force.
But in the past few centuries, they had declined to the brink of collapse.
For this world had birthed a single, universally acknowledged sage—Hagoromo Ōtsutsuki, the Sage of Six Paths.
The Sage Clan, however, was not devoted to any single sage. Strictly speaking, they were a kind of polytheistic group. Once Hagoromo emerged, the descendants of the Sage Clan grew fewer and fewer.
Most abandoned their traditions and joined Ninshū, severing ties with other sages.
The sage that Fayen visualized, when he cast Raigō: Thousand-Armed Murder, was a golden bodhisattva conjured through chakra—a legacy of the monk Chiriku.
And the thousand-handed Buddha invoked through Hashirama's Sage Art combined with Wood Release was another manifestation of that image.
But to return to the point—this so-called Raigō: Thousand-Armed Murder was never part of Ninshū's repertoire. Naturally, it could not be neatly classified as taijutsu, ninjutsu, or genjutsu.
Strictly speaking, when Chiriku used it, the move belonged to the category of "counter techniques."
A counter technique does not deliver an active strike. Instead, when attacked in close combat within a certain window, it interrupts the opponent's move and retaliates.
By using chakra or natural energy to visualize the form of a sage behind oneself, the user borrows the sage's power to strike back. Once assumed, this stance could directly confront even an opponent one tier stronger.
But such formidable power naturally had glaring flaws. The weakness of a counter technique lay in its inability to respond to projectiles or ranged attacks.
Yet upon examining the training method of this secret art, Satsuki had no intention of cultivating it into such a low-level technique. At her current level and ability, she could already see a path to evolve it into a legendary strike—not inferior even to the Eighty Gods Vacuum Attack.
And such a technique could only be cultivated by someone with the Tenseigan and profound insight into Buddhist doctrine—someone like her.
Withdrawing her thoughts, Satsuki teleported to a desolate valley, preparing to begin training this secret art.
She assumed a posture with one hand pointing to the sky and the other to the earth, and began to cultivate according to the path described in the chakra sphere.
"One nature penetrates all natures. One dharma encompasses all dharmas. One moon reflects in all waters. All waters hold the moon within them."
Silently chanting within her heart, Satsuki sank into deep visualization.
Strictly speaking, the result of visualization was different for everyone. Thus, Raigō: Thousand-Armed Murder had no fixed form—it relied on the practitioner's own imagination.
For her chakra control, this was no difficulty. She understood the meridians and circulation routes within her body perfectly. Before long, a vast phantom figure appeared behind her.
The phantom was over a hundred meters tall the instant it emerged. Behind its head shone a radiant halo of light-lines, signifying noble divinity, and upon that halo were countless eyes opening and closing.
As her visualization deepened, the phantom's face began to writhe. Soon, its sides extended outward, stretching into two additional visages.
On the left appeared a fierce and commanding male face. On the right, a female visage strikingly similar to Satsuki's own.
The central face, under the flood of energy she poured forth, solidified into a visage at once sacred and evil, its gender indiscernible.
At the same time, two additional arms manifested at its sides, forming a three-headed, six-armed form.
Enormous horns, like roots from the underworld, separated the three faces. Countless horns sprouted atop the phantom's head—not like the Ōtsutsuki's traits, but more akin to those of a dragon.
When the three faces took shape, Satsuki's Tenseigan caught the details clearly. Seeing them, her heart quaked.
Though the three faces were shut-eyed, she recognized the male face on the left—it was the visage of her former body in her past life. The female face on the right was identical to her current one.
The central visage was one she had never seen before.
But once a visualization reached this stage, stopping it was not so simple. Having already attained Six Paths-level power, she felt no fear toward the change.
She was only slightly surprised at the faces' appearance. Yet since they arose from her own visualization, such changes were not unacceptable.
Time slipped by without notice…
At last, within the uninhabited valley—
A massive black pillar of light shot skyward, tearing through the clouds and plunging the bright sky into darkness.
Had Satsuki not chosen a location so distant from the regions familiar in the Naruto world, such a phenomenon could never have gone unnoticed.
Within the ominous black column, a three-headed, six-armed giant emerged—garbed in a robe of black and gold, adorned with a jeweled necklace, and with dark golden ornaments coiled about its arms. Its main body assumed the posture of one hand to the heavens, one hand to the earth.
As the giant manifested, the surrounding terrain quaked with thunderous roars. Endless destructive energy surged through the valley for miles around, leaving devastation in its wake. Space itself tore open under its presence, riven with cracks.
So great was the giant's power that mere existence ripped apart reality. Only as Satsuki drew in the giant's rampant aura did the upheaval gradually subside.
The energy collapsed inward, the black pillar vanished. Satsuki's figure could be seen within the giant's forehead, her eyes shut tight in unison with its own.
Black lightning coursed through the giant's form. With its surge, Satsuki and the three faces opened their eyes together—eight eyes flashing at once.
An apocalyptic force erupted outward. The scarred earth, already ravaged, was leveled yet another three feet deep.
Yet before Satsuki could grow accustomed to the power, a massive spatial gate opened before the giant. Under the pull of an overwhelming external force, Satsuki and the colossal three-headed, six-armed giant were drawn into it together.