"Lord Morino Isuke, I've completed today's autopsy assignments. The analysis reports have been categorized and sealed. If there's nothing else, I'm heading to the memorial stones to bury the bodies."
Tsukasa Kaede grabbed his umbrella and stepped out into the night.
A fine drizzle drifted through the air as he carried a lantern through the forest of stone memorials. He stopped at a forgotten patch near the edge.
He raised his engraving knife, carved an unfamiliar name into a blank headstone, and below it, etched the lie: "Killed one Iwa Chūnin."
The scraping sound of blade on stone was like fingernails against a coffin lid.
He'd stitched this corpse together himself.
But the fatal wound on the skull… it was unmistakably inflicted by a Konoha kunai.
This was one of the standard duties of the Corpse Processing Division: carry out burial for remains deemed "unidentifiable," as ordered by Intelligence Interrogation. The division worked alongside Information Archives and Prison Management to discreetly dispose of certain corpses.
For every new "casualty" added to the official KIA list, the Daimyō of the Land of Fire disbursed another round of bereavement funds.
And those funds? They didn't go to grieving families.
They became the budget for human experimentation.
As the war dragged on and economic strain intensified, Konoha couldn't shoulder the costs alone. The village, in truth, was just the largest military stronghold of the Fire Nation. Any long-term war required the nobles and feudal lords of every town and province to funnel resources toward the village.
Under such conditions, siphoning even a little from national funds to fuel bio-research was a miracle—especially for projects with no direct battlefield output.
But this was the village's will.
It had to be done.
The cemetery dirt squelched from the rain as Kaede dragged a Kumo genin's corpse into his private workspace.
In a five-man department like this, low staff had its perks. Kaede always had room to operate. No one asked questions—they all worked with corpses. Most were involved in operations that ran directly counter to the glorious narrative of the Will of Fire. Tolerance for eccentric habits was unusually high.
"October 25th. Tsukasa Kaede continues practicing Dead Soul Jutsu. No recorded contact with the shrine maiden."
Morino Isuke glanced up and silently jotted it down. Then he resumed his dissection. He didn't like this work either, but as a shinobi, he had no right to choose. Only to accept and execute.
A pale-blue stream of chakra seeped from Kaede's fingertip, threading into the corpse's chakra pathways.
The cadaver's eye bulged in the dark. Its rotted throat issued a guttural hiss.
"Experiment #37 this month. Subject: Genin, deceased over 48 hours. Spine collapsed after 15 minutes of high-mobility taijutsu."
"Subject B: Iwa Chūnin, deceased under 48 hours. Capable of performing nearly all jutsu used in life. Severe bone fragmentation during hand seals—phalanges exploded during tiger seal."
But what captivated Kaede most was the Sunagakure jōnin. A puppeteer.
Even zombified, his fingers could still form chakra threads.
"Based on experience from the Transport Unit and my current assignment, the optimal zombification window is within ten minutes post-brain death."
"Within this margin, the subject retains nearly full combat potential—and can briefly exceed it. But drawing on chakra like this burns through the body at horrific speed. The corpse becomes unusable after a single fight."
Which wasn't wasteful.
If the corpse reached terminal failure, Kaede could always detonate it via Corrupted Explosive Release, turning it into a biohazard bomb. Waste not.
He plotted the data on a curve in his experiment log. The Suna corpse's lungs displayed strange, web-like chakra scarring.
With a scalpel, he sliced open the throat. Blackened blood poured out, and the necrotic vocal cords shuddered once, tore—and fell silent. This one had retained about 40% of his power.
Kaede frowned.
His first jōnin-class reanimated corpse turned out to be a puppeteer—and he didn't have any puppets to offer.
Maybe he could have weaker zombified genin act as makeshift puppets? A zombie commanding other zombies… that could count as an entirely new branch of jutsu.
The thought was interrupted by a slam.
The door flew open. A wave of blood-slick air crashed through the room.
Two Root ANBU stormed in, carrying a stretcher. On it: a young shinobi convulsing violently, flesh purple-black with necrosis. Blood oozed from his ears, eyes, and mouth, pooling thickly on the table.
Kaede glanced once and immediately recognized him.
Tobidake Tonbō.
"He's not going to make it," Isuke muttered.
A brief examination, then a resigned shake of the head.
"The war with Amegakure is over. This has to be Suna poison. Internal corrosion's complete. Should've been disposed of already. Why bring him here while still alive?"
One Root agent yanked off his bloodstained gloves and dropped them to the floor, ensuring no trace of toxin remained on him.
"The medics at the hospital tried for two days. Nothing worked. Lady Tsunade is on a mission with Kato Dan. Since no antidote is possible, Aburame Ryoma ordered us to bring the body here."
Isuke's tone sharpened. "What do you expect us to do? He's already dying."
"We're not asking you to save him," said the second Root agent coldly.
"While he's still alive, we want a full dissection. Document the effects of this poison on every organ. Compile a detailed analysis report. It will be forwarded to Lady Tsunade to assist her future antidote development."
The ANBU's emotionless mask betrayed nothing.
"This is a B-Rank mission. If you succeed, it will be credited to your record. If you leak anything about this mission—then you become our mission."
Isuke stiffened but nodded. "Understood."
"Anyone assigned to Corpse Processing isn't stupid. We don't gossip. We know our place. We know our fate."
Because if this leaked?
If anyone discovered that Konoha dissected living comrades for toxicological data, morale across the front lines would collapse.
Isuke looked from the two Root operatives to the dying shinobi on the table, writhing in agony.
Then he severed what little empathy he still had, and gave the order.
"Begin the… diagnosis."
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300 Stones in this story = 1 Bonus chapter in every fanfic currently translated