AN: Hey! Sorry for the long update time, I've been busy. I do intend to keep updating, but it'll be more slow, kinda like how this update was a bit slow. This is a creative hobby of mine, not an assignment! Thank you for all your reviews! I've been loving writing this story, and hearing reviews makes it all the more special. This chapter is a lot of development, the next chapter is going to refocus more on Orochimaru and the consequences of her being transgender.

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Orochimaru had never had a hard time earning money. Between assuming control of an entire nation, albeit a small one, full of shinobi whom she could collect a share of mission income from, and her natural wealth of talents and knowledge to which she felt no issue commoditizing if the price was appropriate, she had easily been able to assume a stockpile of wealth in her previous life.

In fact, the financial situation of Oto had been fabulous in the past, in the original timeline, the vast majority of her chuunin and genin shinobi had been slaughtered in the invasion of Konoha she had attempted, leaving behind a manageable pool of jounin. Because of Konoha's retaliatory invasion of the land of rice patties, she'd been forced to move most of her operations into her hideouts, which only furthered her wealth: Although it sounds expensive to maintain hideouts, the abandonment of anything resembling a village proper had removed virtually all of her expenses: She didn't have to pay for a hospital, police force, any structure. The shinobi under her control had begun to work for practically free: They were a nation at war, and operating was a matter of survival, not a paycheck. To abandon the hideouts meant death.

So the wealth she procured from her genetic consulting with Danzo, and the augmentation work she did with a few criminal organizations had gone a long way. Her organization also found that it rarely had to pay for things: A reputation for being criminal and kidnapping only allowed her to get away with what could be called "ransacking" the regions in which she operated. If she was going to have her ninja kidnap a man so she could use him to test out a tweak she had made to the cursed seal, it would be more suspicious if the man DIDN'T have all of his possessions and valuables stolen. So her ninja carefully pretended to be bandits, kidnapped with liberty, and fed themselves on the loot of those whose lives had been destroyed. She got followers, subjects and victims, and the men got paid without her really having to pay them. Everyone left alive, happy.

Another tidy benefit had been the promotion of a general sense of unsafety in Hi No Kuni, bandits were about, and Konoha was forced to stretch itself thin on the plethora of escorting missions. Obviously it was a negative to be funding Konoha so directly, but hampering the economy of Hi No Kuni and forcing Konoha to compromise between security and escort mission had been well worth the risk. Furthermore, Konoha had taken a lot of heat for the general lack of safety in Hi, they were charged with protecting the country by the Daimyo, yet sill so many went missing on the roads.

The fact that things had gone differently in this reality was why Orochimaru was currently on a small boat, traveling on the ocean in the dead of night, with 3 terrified genin and stash of sealing scrolls.
Oto was in the middle of a financial crisis, the hundreds of ninja who were no longer dead didn't have missions to take, and without preparation and promise of riches in invasion, the Oto Shinobi were getting restless. Although Orochimaru still had cash stashed away for personal use, the village coffers were getting notably empty and the jounin council in charge of managing the village had been pressuring Orochimaru about the situation.

Orochimaru had never been interested in sports, so shamefully she was unable to exploit gambling and betting to her victory for some quick cash. What Orochimaru was an aficionado for, was politics and wordly events. And she distinctly remembered , nearly a decade after the 4th shinobi war, a vault was discovered on a small island near wave. The island appeared to outsiders to be desolate and abandoned, a rather large jutting rock, only about a quarter kilometer in area, but sharp and pointing upwards. With no plants or natural shelter, the island had been mainly unvisited. It was also close to the archipelago that had once been known as the Land of Whirlpools, a region rife with danger for the average shinobi.

It was quite fortunate to the Country of Water, which had annexed the Land of Whirpools shortly after the 4th shinobi war, that one of their few earth jutsu users had taken a brief stop on the island, intending to warp the jutting stone into a statue to commemorate the Water Nation, as part of their recolonization efforts in the region. During the mans efforts to turn the tall rock into a symbol of national pride, he had realized through his technique that buried underneath the rock, as it extended into the stone, a large metal structure was buried underneath the rock. He opened a hole to the metal structure and realized it was a vault, covered in protective seals. He had immediately thought he had discovered a Uzumaki vault, and Kiri sent a team of their best seal experts to slowly dismantle the vault, hoping for secrets and techniques inside.

What they had discovered though wasn't an Uzumaki vault, but rather a vault filled with nearly 400 million ryo and a large sum of scrolls detailing Takigakure secret jutsu techniques. An investigation concluded that the vault had been Kakuzu's, a secret vault of cash he had likely kept separate from other holdings (including nearly a hundred million he had kept in Amegakure which Konan had taken over after his death, and hundreds of millions he had invested across the elemental nations under various pseudonyms, and possibly more cash that had never been found). The country of Water had "graciously" returned to Takigakure the hidden techniques, after various public accusations that they had made copies of all the scrolls before doing so, and had reclaimed all the ryo for themselves to international discontent. However, given most of Kakuzu's wealth had been in fact obtained semi-legally through the bounty trade, no one had a strong claim to cash otherwise, and Kiri quickly put a spin on the cash, labeling it as a semi-charitable "Waterfall Region Development Fund", a way of trying to make their annexation of the waterfall region sound charitable and justify profiting off of a known Akatsuki criminal.

Kiri would not be getting the cash this time around however. Orochimaru arrived at the island, using senjutsu to ensure that she wasn't lucky enough to arrive at the island the same time as Kakuzu was making a deposit, and she quickly dug open a large opening to the vault. The squirming genin left on the boat to wait, she spent nearly an entire night carefully disabling the seals around the vault.

They were relatively decent sealwork for something clearly not done by a seal master, the seals primary purpose were to release a large volume of poisonous gas every time the vault was accessed, explode outwards at any tampering, and a variety of other extremely deadly boobytraps. Kakuzu had clearly taken well advantage of his own semi-immortality and made the vault a literal deathtrap.

Unfortunately for Kakuzu, Orochimaru was far better at the immortality game, and she was able to open the vault with only a few large bursts of poisonous gas.

Poison had stopped being effective against her when she learned to grow new bodies out of chakra and slide out of her old bodies, not to mention the natural resistance that came from replacing her body with what she could only describe as that of a snake demoness possessing a half-plant body.

As she verified the vault was safe to enter and got the genin to work sealing away the wealth contained, she could only smile at the thought of how Kakuzu would rage upon discovering what had happened to his vault.

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Leaving with 3 genin and coming back alone had hardly bothered the jounin council that administered Oto on her behalf, no had really expected the genin to come back alive after she had specifically requested genin assistance, but dropping off 300 million ryo, and a copy she had made of Takigakure's forbidden techniques, had suitably quelled any concerns they might have had with her leadership after the invasion fell through.

Ideally that'd be enough to supplement the villages income for years, and keep them from needing more of her hand holding. She'd been half tempted to simply abandon the country as a whole, running off with the cash and anyone she saw as valuable.

But even if she didn't have any immediate needs for a village, nor did she really expect the village to contribute any S-rank shinobi who could reasonably challenge Akatsuki or contribute in stopping the Otsutsuki. The only S-rank shinobi that had risen out of Oto in the past had been Kabuto, Guren, Kimimaro and Sasuke. Suigetsu might've eventually be roughly S-rank, but only a few decades after the 4th shinbo war.

Kimimaro had gotten fatally ill and gotten killed by genin, a shameful end even if the genin did have tailed beasts sealed in them, Guren had run off in that disastrously failed attempt to use her as a handler for the boy with the power to control the Sanbi. Kabuto and Sasuke were the only ones who had ended up actually succeeding, if you count Sasuke trying to kill Orochimaru and Kabuto running off to join the Akatsuki and then proceed to give up on science in some foolish orphanage matron fantasy.

To be fair, Kabuto had been planning on betraying Obito once the 4th shinobi village had been suitably defeated, and run off with all the tailed beasts. Itachi had ruined those plans with his stupid sharingan tricks that had let him both overcome the reincarnation jutsu, and then defeat Kabuto with another Sharingan trick.

It was the defeat of Kabuto in the completely uncontrolled way that had left Kabuto's careful watching of Madara's actions slip, letting Madara free himself of the Edo Tensei when the technique was released. At that point, things really had gone south with Madara in control of himself. Damn Itachi.

Regardless, things would be better this around: Guren would be handled more carefully, Kabuto would prosper from a decades head start that Orochimaru could give him, and Kimimaro would be saved from his illness this time around, and given opportunity to grow even more powerful. He had never gotten his chance at his full potential the first time around. And of course Sasuke, Orochimaru would not be troubling herself overly with this time.

Orochimaru took a break from her musings and strolled through the Oto Hospital. Still being a village proper and not a series of underground hideouts, Oto had a decent sized Hospital.

She opened her Senjutsu sense and reached out to find Tsunade, the cracked ghost that was her soul bound to a half-dead mans body. Orochimaru moved towards Tsunade, and saw her old teammate in action: Tsunade was rushing around with confidence, Kabuto on her wings, discussing something about the advancements in Oncology that had developed in the future decades.

It really was perfect. Oto got an S-rank medical genius with decades years of future knowledge and decades of hospital and village management experience, and it seemed that Tsunade had taken a shining to this young impressionable Kabuto. If anything, it seemed as though Tsunade was making it her mission to mold Kabuto into a ninja dedicated to medical science instead of the Orochimaru copycat he had become. Tsunade had already composed a short book detailing some of the important findings in medicine, and as per their agreement, Orochimaru had sent copies of the findings to the major hospitals around the world. It was not public knowledge that Oto was Orochimaru's village, and so they were able to get away with giving Tsunade a pseudonym. Funny this time around, Oto would probably get a reputation as the center of a new wave of scientific and medical accomplishments.

Orochimaru was broken from his musings to see a Tayuya landing in front of him, and giving a deep bow. Ah, the sound four. Trusted body guards a long time ago, a disappointing investment of time in hindsight. They'd been outcasts, freaks who were easily exploited into service, but none of their techniques had ended up being that useful. They were decent shinobi overall though.

"Orochimaru-Sama, you've been away for nearly 2 weeks, and you had previously instructed the sound five, after the invasion, to secure Sasuke Uchiha. We were unable to verify if you wanted us to keep the mission up in light of the invasion being cancelled, but we proceeded anyways. Sasuke came willingly, and with Kimimaro's assistance we were able to disable the anbu squad that the village had sent to inhibit our travels. Furthermore, a number of genin had followed the team, we managed to capture what we believe to be the kyuubi container."

What.

Orochimaru ignored Tayuya and extended her sage mode, searching for the chakra signature she had been familiar with.

My fucking god.
Sasuke was here. And Naruto.

Orochimaru had not planned on kidnapping Sasuke this time around, she had hoped the boy would be able to make his own in Konoha, perhaps piggyback on Jiriaya with Naruto or learn from Kakashi. The boy had certainly been a worthwhile investment in the past, he had become the second strongest shinobi in the world. For fucks sake.

Kidnapping Naruto too, that would likely bring Konoha back down again on Oto in a way that Orochimaru had been hoping to avoid this time around. It'd also likely attract the attention of the Akatsuki.

Orochimaru moved quickly to the dungeon where Naruto and Sasuke were being kept. Sasuke was freely sitting on a couch arguing with Kimimaro about when he was going to get to see Orochimaru, and Naruto was seemingly unconscious and bound.

"I came here to get training from Orochimaru of the Sanin, not to sit in this room with nothing to do but listen to the dobe snoring. At the very least if he won't come train me, you should train me."

The arguments kept going on and on.

Orochimaru paused and meditated briefly on what to do.

She didn't want to train Sasuke this time around, and she certainly wasn't interested in training Naruto. He'd already signed the toad summons at this point, she'd have to seal his connection to the other planes the moment he regained consciousness to prevent him from being reverse summoned away. For fucks sake. She needed to return Naruto to Konoha, hopefully making something equitable out of the exchange and not it being a pretense for extended war with Konoha. She already had it reported from her Suna spies that Suna had informed Konoha about Orochimaru's involvement in Oto, it would be the first place they'd look for Naruto.

It would probably be best to return Sasuke too. Perhaps she could send a diplomat to Konoha, agree to return them in exchange for an agreement to a cease fire? Tsunade had refused the handful of offers of peace she had sent along, up until the 4th shinobi war. But that was after the Konoha invasion. And Sarutobi was already famous for being soft, and he was still in charge atm. Perhaps an agreement to return Sasuke and Naruto, and an agreement for Orochimaru and Konoha to not bother each other?

If that didn't work out, the alternative was to raise an army of the undead to destroy Konoha for real this time, and then resurrect Konoha's top brass to train Sasuke and Naruto into tip-top shape for the Otsutsuki invasion. Actually, that's not a bad idea.

Orochimaru paused, thinking of Tsunade's agreement to help her only if she didn't take any provocative actions against Konoha. That would clearly be a provocative action against Konoha. Of course Orochimaru could always force Tsunade to obey her, but she'd be a much less effective mechanical tool than she is as willing assistant. The same is true for virtually all of the undead. Damn this entire thing.

Orochimaru briefly entertained the idea of resurrecting Sensei from the old timeline, to send as his diplomat, but shuddered at the image. Most people probably wouldn't do well to seeing a resurrected older version of themselves show up under what appears to be a traitors control. Being able to verify knowledge that only Sarutobi has would probably only upset them even more: It'd imply that Orochimaru can create simulacrums of living people and mine them for information. Half-true, but a very valid fear. Konoha would probably pull one of their dusty doomsday techniques out of hiding and try to just blow Oto off the planet out of fear. Probably wouldn't work, but hey, it's hard to test city destroying techniques.

Orochimaru composed a letter in her own handwriting detailing that she sincerely did not intend to kidnap Sasuke or Naruto, that the entire mixup was a complete misunderstanding, and that she would like to have diplomats on behalf of Orochimaru meet Konoha diplomats to seek a peaceful resolution to this encounter.

Orochimaru could send Naruto and Sasuke directly back with the letter, but holding onto them atm was likely a better leverage. If she simply returned them, Konoha may still prosecute her for all their other misgivings, and attack Oto. But having the last Uchiha, the Kyuubi and the son of the fourth Hokage? They'd probably take the chance at peace to get them back. She sent a team of chuunin wearing diplomatic uniforms towards Konoha with the message, as well as a picture of Sasuke and Naruto with a caption (to prove in good health). She then ordered the sound five to take Naruto and Sasuke to the northern base, the one the fewest in Oto knew about.

Orochimaru smiled.

She went to her private laboratory in Oto, and found the stash of DNA she kept. A long strand of red hair, and a small piece of black hair. Perhaps she could get Naruto and Sasuke a headstart on their training with a bit of family reunion for them.

And there you go! Another chapter.