Chapter 10: CH 10 Cursed Seal Counter and The Initiation
A few days later, Alcor was discharged as he had secretly healed all his injuries. The doctor attributed it to him having a good physique and didn't think much about it. After all, the chakra was still a mysterious force that was full of possibilities. They had not even cracked the secrets behind Bloodline abilities yet.
After reaching home, Alcor started preparing for his initiation into ROOT. They probably would not give any more physical tests, after all, he already survived an Assassination by six high-level ROOT members. He also had a personal 'brainwashing' session by Danzo in his hospital room.
Therefore, the last step was probably--
'The Cursed Seal.' Alcor thought while grimacing inwardly. He hated Danzo and his need for absolute control. With the Curse Seal, Danzo had done many atrocities without worry as all the 'witnesses' were sealed by him to be absolutely loyal or face death.
'Well, fortunately, I have both Hiruzen and Danzo's comprehension of Fuinjutsu. Also, I have the knowledge of the Cursed Tongue Eradication Seal itself.' Alcor thought.
He sat cross-legged on the floor and meditated, at least that is what it looked like to any observer. Inside his mind, Alcor was devising protections from the Cursed Seal and running mental simulations of their viability.
Finally, after two days of high-speed mental simulations, he finally created a solution. He took inspiration from Hyuga and their Caged Bird Seal concept.
Alcor already had a skill called Self-Curse Seal from Danzo, which allowed him to set a specific Fuinjutsu Seal on himself to activate automatically at a given time or situation. With that as a base, Alcor created a new Fuinjutsu: Evil Protection Cursed Seal.
Evil Protection Cursed Seal used the cursed seal to counter the existence of other cursed seals, sort of like fighting poison with poison. As long as he applies this, Cursed Seals of similar or lower rank than it would be automatically nullified. They would be nothing more than fancy tattoos in the weird script.
The only cursed seal he knew that was of a higher ranking than this was the Dead Demon Consuming Seal. He could not invent something of that level at the moment due to his Limited comprehension of Fuinjutsu, Limited time, and Limited Chakra to fuel something like that.
As a means to hide the existence of the seal, he designed it as such that it would sink into his body like a Jinchuriki's Seal. Unless he wants to display it, no one will come to know of its existence, no matter how they try.
However, there was currently one flaw in this seal that he was not able to improve given the time crunch. Evil Protection Cursed Seal only fought against Cursed Seals that would be applied after it. If one already had a Cursed Seal before applying the Evil Protection Cursed Seal, then it would not be able to remove the effects of the Cursed Seal.
However, Alcor was fortunate enough that he managed to invent the Cursed Seal right before his initiation into ROOT. He decided to not waste any more time and apply the Cursed Seal immediately.
First, he made sure no one would be able to disturb or spy on him by creating a sealing barrier in his room. Following that, he created a shadow clone to perform the sealing while he lay down on the ground.
His shadow clone nodded at him before taking out a brush and inkpot from his ninja supplies. He had bought and kept supplies related to Fuinjutsu ever since the day he first extracted Fuinjutsu skills from Hiruzen.
The shadow clone swiftly opened Alcor's clothes and started inking his entire body with Fuinjutsu. It was a detailed and time-consuming process as he had to ensure that all of his body would be protected from all kinds of Cursed Seals.
After few hours of intense hard work and intense concentration, Alcor's clone finally managed to finish the inking process. As he admired his masterpiece, he smiled in satisfaction and relief, before forming rapid hand signs and ending with, "Seal!!"
Alcor felt as if his body was being turned inside out as the seal started self-multiplying and affixing itself to his entire body, spreading like an allergic reaction. After his entire body was covered in dense tadpole-like marks, they started sinking into him rapidly. Within a few minutes, Alcor was without a single blemish or mark, just like before he applied the Cursed Seal.
Dismissing the Shadow Clone, Alcor removed the seal isolating the house from others before going to sleep. This had been a hectic few days and he needed his sleep.
-x-x-x-x-x-x-
Drip…
'...hmm..'
Drip…
'.hmm...'
Drip…
'Hmm..'
Drip…
'Hmm….what…'
Drip…
'Hmm..?! What is this?? Where am I?' Alcor awoke with a jerk. But he soon found that he was tied up very thoroughly on a flat medical operation table. His eyes were completely covered with a thick spongy eyepatch that didn't allow him to move his eyelids even a bit, nor let a single ray of light reach his eyes.
"Ah, so you are awake.." A weak yet hoarse voice reached his ears, while he felt the touch of a human hand on his upper body, which was apparently naked.
"Now, Young Genius of Konoha, we hear that you have been creating new Jutsu for Konoha. What say you create those for us instead? In return … let's see… we promise not to harm you even a little bit." the voice said as Alcor felt a touch of cold sharp metal on his skin.
"Yeah, that is not going to happen," Alcor said calmly.
"Alright then. Hard way it is." the voice said and Alcor felt slight sounds that he instantly associated with forming hand signs at a high pace. In a few moments, Alcor felt something clay-like creep up the side of his face and cover both of his ears, completely depriving him of all hearing.
It was normal at first, but soon Alcor could feel a high-pitched ringing in his ears that seemed to get stronger every moment. Combined with the lack of sight, he felt extremely awful.
Suddenly, a terribly sharp and cold blade started methodically slicing at his skin. This unexpected burst of pain was extremely shocking after the complete lack of senses.
After a few moments, the slicing object was removed and Alcor was left to experience the pain in deafening silence. But as soon as he got used to this level of pain to ignore it, a new session of torture would take place.
This cycle was repeated again and again till Alcor lost all sense of time. His sight and hearing ability had been taken away so he had nothing to judge the passing of time with. Moreover, the cycle of pain and torture made him unable to keep track of time through mental counting.
However, Alcor didn't bend his resolve and refused to spill his secrets no matter what. He kept his will firm and kept on enduring.
-x-x-x-x-x-x-
A bandaged old man with a walking stick walked up to a certain hall that had a large floor-to-ceiling glass wall on one side. Two ninjas in ROOT masks stood like statues in front of the glass wall, observing the activity going on inside the hall.
The bandaged man stood in the space between the two masked ninjas and peered through the glass. A certain young boy was strapped to a medical operating table with very dim light illuminating the place.
There were 16 masked ninja around the table, their hands forming a hand sign as they stood perfectly still. The entire torture session of Alcor was being done through High-Level Cooperative Genjutsu where each ninja controlled a certain part of the Genjutsu.
This method divided the difficulty of maintaining the reality of the Genjutsu, making the Genjutsu be extremely detailed and powerful.
"Not even a single word out of the boy?" Danzo asked the two masked ninjas next to him.
"No, Lord Danzo." the masked ninja on his right spoke softly "Let alone begging for mercy, he has not even shown any signs of anger or lashing out."
"Are you sure you all have not broken the boy's mind and made him useless? Because if that happens then I will watch you be tortured with our best experts and have you killed by the most painful and slow methods." Danzo said, a slight pressure emanating out of him.
"No, Lord Danzo." the masked ninja on the left rasped "It is the opposite of what you think. We have been trying to breach the boy's mind, but he seems to have an incredibly strong will and control over his emotions. All torture techniques, that don't involve damaging his mind or body permanently, are useless on this kid."
Danzo looked through the glass one more, his eyes on the small nearly motionless body on the operating table, "If you are saying the truth, then this kid might be a talent on the level of Kabuto, Shin, and Sai."
"End the initiation by tonight with the usual slaughter-rescue scenario, and bring him to me for application of Cursed Seal. He will be joining ROOT as our newest recruit." Danzo said before walking away.
However, unknown to all the ROOT ninja, something vastly different was going on in the depths of Alcor's mind.
'16 around me ….. 2 watching from a certain distance… no.. it was 3 …. the third just left..….. The highest possibility is that I am in ROOT Headquarters and that I am being tortured through incredibly strong Genjutsu.'
'While I can't break through this Genjutsu, maintaining my mind is a pretty easy task, thanks to the side effect of the Card Analysis function. The side effect of this technique is even better than most sensory techniques as it seems to work with no chakra use and cant be hindered even if the mind is subjected to Genjutsu.'
'Well, now that I know this is a Genjutsu, I can endure this calmly. Danzo did say I was going to be initiated, so maybe this is a way to judge my loyalty and willpower. Let's endure and wait for this to be over.' Alcor thought.
He calmly let the torture continue as if watching a boring part of a movie which he had to endure to get to the interesting parts.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone