A certain, inconspicuous building resided in the southeast part of the Land of Fire. From the outside it appeared to be nothing out of the ordinary. However the truth was different. The building acted as a secret exchange point for the black-market. It was a bounty station, where the shinobi collected the bounty on the names listed in the Bingo book.

In the said station, in the middle of the hidden room, where the exchange process usually took place, stood a man with a tall, imposing figure. He had unusual green eyes with no pupils. His face was covered with a black mask and a grey hood. And he wore a black cloak with red cloudy markings on it.

The man opened his eyes, staring at the dark wall in front of him.

Wait

Something was amiss.

Where am I?

He had puzzled expression on his face. As he looked around, trying to determine where he was, his eyes started to adjust to the surroundings.

The room was dimly lit with no windows for light to pass through. Then, he noticed a certain pattern along the walls. Rows upon rows of identical drawers were lined up next to each other, like the ones you would see in a morgue. The entire room was filled with an eerie atmosphere.

What's going on? I don't remember coming here.

But before he could take a proper look at the strange place he found himself in, he heard a deep voice echo from behind.

"Hope to see you again soon, sir"

He was about to turn around and take a look at the mysterious stranger when something suddenly clicked in his mind. And he recalled what he, just a few moments prior, had experienced.

He had experienced life of a certain someone and gained memories that weren't his. He could remember the tedious training, continuous practice and skills of a ninja that had been suddenly ingrained in his mind. They were experiences that only person who trained for decades in the art and honed his instinct to limit would have.

Had he gone insane? Or was this some sort of twisted joke?

Memories of the interactions with people he had never knew before, experience of killing, torturing and fighting had suddenlybecome part of his being. In some weird twist of fate, he had somehow possessed the body of Kakuzu. A shinobi and the member of criminal organization Akatsuki who was playing a role of a villain in a certain anime.

He had just now had collected a bounty on Chiriku, ninja monk from the Fire Temple and one of the Twelve Guardian ninjas.

I need some time to digest this

Of course, it was completely reasonable conclusion. After all, he had memories of doing those things as if he was Kakuzu himself.

As he was in deep thought, the man, Kakuzu – the name he decided to keep for now since he couldn't remember his own - recalled that he wasn't alone in the room and turned around.

A bald man, with a mustache, scar on his forehead and unnaturally thick eyebrows was staring at him with a confused expression.

"Is something wrong sir?" Asked the man who he recognized as Zangei.

Kakuzu's mind slowly begun analyzing situation he found himself in and what he just experienced.

He seemed to be at the beginning of the second part of Naruto. This sort of situation, by itself, begged a lot of questions, but there was more immediate issue right now that needed to be taken care of.

While Kakuzu was deep in the thoughts, the man with a scar, trying to determine if something had gone wrong, politely asked.

"Was the amount perhaps incorrect sir?"

"... No, it's not that." He answered. "Just to let you know, I won't be back for a while. I will be returning to Konoha to search for jinchuriki"

While Kakuzu answered Zangei instinctively, his mind was trying making sense of things.

What was this crazy situation he found himself in?

"Some advice then if I may…" Zangei said with a friendly smile. "Distance yourself from your companion... He has a face that is inauspicious for a money matters."

"… I will keep that in mind." Kakuzu shortly replied.

He was about to turn around and leave. He wanted to clear his head and some peace of mind. But he recalled what would soon occur here.

Team Asuma's encounter with Akatsuki wouldn't leave this place behind untouched. And since Zangei seemed as a resourceful fellow, he didn't mind sparing few words for a simple favor.

"Advice, huh… I'll give one to you as well, Zangei. Move to another branch immediately… soon this place will be surrounded by Konoha shinobi."

Zangei widened his eyes for a moment before his expression returned to normal. He simply nodded in understanding at Kakuzu. Since it came from his regular customer, he didn't have much doubt that the information would be reliable.

"I will prepare immediately then… and good luck with your mission sir"

After hearing Zangei's response, Kakuzu simply nodded back and turned around and headed towards the exit.

He stepped into the bathroom and shortly after the door closed behind him. Stench inside bathroom wasn't any better than it was inside the room full of corpses. This was not where he wanted to stay.

The next room he entered looked like abandoned office room. It was empty, expect few desks, chairs and randomly placed filling cabinets.

After taking few steps, Kakuzu halted and looked down at his hand. He closed it into a fist. Noting the tremendous amount of energy building up within the body.

This was one of the reasons he felt something was off earlier. Though, it was fascinating sensation. He felt that his body was overflowing with vitality.

He could also sense the flow of certain energy. Something he identified as the chakra.

He raised his hand and concentrated on it. He could feel the energy – chakra, building up on the tip of his fingers. Then, without his conscious command, his arm shot forward, half of it detaching from his body while threads pushing it further than it was physically capable for a normal human.

Although, to be fair, this was not a feat that normal ninja could perform either.

Kakuzu concentrated his chakra and willed arm to return. Black threads pulled back the arm and it connected his body like it was always there. There was no blood, no pain or injury.

It was something that made him wonder how he was even alive without blood or bones. How could a body even stand straight in this condition?

After observing further, he noticed that his vitality was concentrated in his chest. Something that shouldn't really be a mystery. Heart was a vital organ, after all.

But it wasn't that simple.

Because it wasn't just one heart.

It seemed threads were connected to the blood vessels of the heart, or in his case – hearts, and were drawing out chakra from it. They acted as skeleton, as muscle and as vessels at the same time for chakra to travel. Underneath his skin was a tissue, but there was no blood flow. Threads were connected to skin and were infusing it with energy.

Kakuzu sighed. Getting too absorbed with this right now wasn't something he could afford.

He would explore more about the power he gained later. He had already gotten hang of the basics, but delving any further would take considerable time. Something that he was currently running short of, unfortunately. After all, there wasn't much longer before 4th shinobi war started.

"Hmm… I wonder though, will this be enough to survive those events? "

Kakuzu wasn't nearly as strong as someone like Pain or Obito, not to mention someone from later parts of the story. And because of that, this was a question he needed to have answer for before he decided on any kind of proper plan of action.

Although he had taken over body of Kakuzu, he was uncertain of what happened to himself or the fate of person he replaced. And maybe he wasn't even person who he thought he was. There was no way to know for sure. All he could do was trust whatever his instincts were telling him unless proven otherwise.

"But most important question is - why and how did I end up here?"

Questions, one after another, filled his mind. Reluctantly, Kakuzu pushed them aside. Now wasn't the time for an existential crisis. What he now needed was a plan.

As he was in deep thought, he heard sounds of fighting outside.

"Haa… I don't even have time to properly think, the fight has already started" Kakuzu sighed, thinking over if and how should he interfere.

For a moment, he thought of ignoring it, so he could have some peace of mind and think about his position without disturbance.

But this was a just a momentarily that he shortly decided against, not wanting to cause some irreversible change that he would later regret.

His actions would cause ripples in the original timeline. And there might be some undesirable changes.

"I do wonder though, if this even is the original timeline. After skimming through the new memories, I haven't yet found any deviations from it. But still, I'm not entirely certain…"

Since couldn't delve deep enough because of time constraints, there might be some details he didn't take into account. He had no idea if there were more anomalies like him either. And chances of that weren't low.

knowledge and power he currently possessed was a tool only as useful as he would make them out to be. Although, to be frank, more alluring aproach to him would be to slowly gather power and influence in the dark until it was right moment for the action, he had no time nor means for that. He had to take a more active role in events to come.

"I guess there's no helping it. Even with knowledge of future, there are still many unknowns…"

"How will world react to the changes I'll cause? Can I predict the different decisions the characters might make because of my actions? And are there more outsiders like me?"

Kakuzu looked at the window, shifting his thoughts about the ongoing battle outside. First, he would deal with situation at hand.

"Hidan, Asuma and Shikamaru… there are some interesting characters I'm about to encounter. I won't lie, there is part of me that finds this rather exciting. But, somehow, I'm not really worried about the outcome of this battle."

"Though I wonder if I should tweak some things a little…"

He was about to join in the fight. But, before he did that, there was something he was not entirely certain of. Specifically - how should he handle the Konoha squad.

After all, today was the day that Asuma Sarutobi was supposed to die.