Chapter 452 — Orochimaru and Rick and Morty

Within the Main God Space.

An old man in a white lab coat, thin and wiry, appeared abruptly alongside a round-headed little boy in an apricot-yellow T-shirt.

"Ha! So this is the Main God Space! From today on, we can freely travel to any plane we want! Aren't you happy, Morty! We won't die anymore! Hahahaha!"

The old man was spry and spirited, with the temperament of a child, blue hair, and blue unibrow—quite distinctive.

"Why won't we die?"

The boy called Morty didn't seem to have adjusted to his surroundings: "If you get killed, you die!"

"You little idiot, the Main God Space has a resurrection function! I confirmed it before I came—memory, body, soul, all original goods, not one of those scam clone bodies!"

"Come on! Let's go check out the XEI2 market!"

"They've got a subatomic annihilator over there—very useful for my research!"

As he spoke, Rick dragged Morty toward a reincarnator market.

"What? Two thousand five hundred reward points? Why don't you just rob someone? Give me a pile of scrap and I could build one of these in half a day!"

"How about a ninety-nine percent discount—twenty-five reward points?"

"This kid and I are plane protagonists. In your terms, we've got 'great destiny' on us! Investing in us early—you won't regret it!"

"What? My name is Rick, his name is Morty, we're from the 【Rick and Morty Plane】. Was your brain soaked in sulfuric acid? Or is your true form actually a paramecium?"

Rick's haggling had clearly failed.

In the current Main God Space, reincarnators possessing "protagonist status" numbered no fewer than eight hundred thousand, if not a million.

And what's more, anyone with half a clue knew that the 【Rick and Morty Plane】 was an overspec multiverse containing countless parallel spaces—which meant...

There were countless Ricks and Mortys there.

"What kind of joke is this? I'm the Rickest Rick! Rick C-137! If there has to be a protagonist, it can only be me!"

After ranting like a madman for a while, the old man with the blue unibrow pulled a small metal flask from his lab coat and gulped down a bellyful of liquor.

He belched, wiped the drool from his lips, and was about to say something when he suddenly raised his head and looked toward the northwest.

"Hey, Rick, what are you doing?"

The boy in yellow asked blankly.

"Waiting for someone!"

No sooner had Rick spoken than a gaunt, sinister-looking man appeared abruptly before the two of them.

The man's face was deathly pale, drained of all color, and his shattered-gold snake eyes were cold and merciless, freezing Morty almost in place.

Rick completely ignored the pressure radiating from the man. He swaggered up, slung an arm around the man's shoulder: "Hey, I'm Rick, protagonist of the 【Rick and Morty Plane】. Interested in investing early? A hundred thousand reward points, three S-rank destiny gems—how about it?"

"Rick!"

The boy in yellow tugged at the hem of the old man's coat, indignant: "You forgot me! I'm a protagonist too!"

"Oh. My formal apologies."

The old man with the blue eyebrows replied with zero sincerity.

Orochimaru gazed at Rick with burning eyes.

He quickly confirmed the other's true identity.

Back in the Naruto plane, this was a figure he had once admired—the finest scientist across the endless planes: Rick Sanchez.

"Heh heh heh heh..."

Orochimaru laughed darkly: "Unexpected. Your accomplishments in science run deeper than I imagined. Let us exchange techniques, knowledge, and resources from now on, and form an offensive-defensive alliance. What do you say?"

He did not bother to lower his voice as he spoke.

Hearing Orochimaru's words, the passing reincarnators nearby were left gaping.

Just what was the background of this newcomer with the blue unibrow?

The Cold Lord Orochimaru was famously a lone wolf in the Main God Space. Even Jiraiya and Tsunade, who had signed team contracts with him, rarely took missions alongside him.

What did this newcomer named Rick have that made him worthy?

What left them even more dumbfounded, however, was Rick Sanchez's reaction.

He casually tossed away the metal flask, looking utterly uninterested, while spouting nonsense: "Hey, Morty, you know why I agreed to become a reincarnator?"

The boy in yellow beside Rick scratched his head: "Immortality? So you can bring me back after I die?"

"You little moron! Of course it's not something that boring!"

Rick waved his hand, and a mountain of steaming hot food appeared beside the two of them.

Cola, fried chicken legs, hamburgers, Colonel's chicken nuggets...

And most importantly...

"McDonald's Szechuan Sauce!"

Rick held a small sauce packet in each hand, spittle flying, his face plastered with a fanatical grin: "Hahaha! You know what? If the story of the 【Rick and Morty Plane】 has a main plotline, it's the search for Szechuan Sauce!"

"As a genius who invented the portal gun, what's the most tragic thing?"

"When you invent the thing, you discover that across the entire multiverse, you're the last 'Rick' to have invented it."

"Even more tragic—Szechuan Sauce has gone extinct across the whole multiverse!"

"And the Main God Space actually has the stuff!"

"Oh! This flavor—it's even better than the rush of cosmic apotheosis when you cross parallel dimensions!"

Rick Sanchez was saying all sorts of incomprehensible nonsense.

Orochimaru merely gave him a long, deep look.

He knew better than anyone the abilities of this mad old man before him.

The space-time portal gun, the time-lock device, the microverse quantum bio-energy battery, matter expansion and shrinkage, Anatomy Park, the intelligence amplification device...

Rick C-137's scientific foundation and accumulated knowledge were in no way inferior to Orochimaru's, and his wild, fantastical ideas were all the more refreshing.

Orochimaru resolved to ally with this man, to climb to the summit of the tree of truth and knowledge.

Rick Sanchez merely gave a strange laugh and said: "Whatever works for you. From the look of you, you're enjoying this 'reality' just fine. I think you're not bad either—we can be friends!"

"Gearhead, Birdperson, Squanchy... I don't have a snake-man among my friends yet..."

After he said this, within a hundred li, apart from Orochimaru and Morty, not a single reincarnator could be seen.

No one was willing to bear the Cold Lord's thunderous wrath.

And yet.

Orochimaru treated different people with different attitudes.

Rick Sanchez C-137 was a very interesting fellow, and also a goal he had once aspired to.

No matter what, no matter how eccentric a fellow might be, he couldn't possibly be more annoying than Jiraiya.

Could he?

...

After Rick, Morty, and Orochimaru left the area, two reincarnators walked into the trading market.

"Huh, why is no one here today? Did the Main God Space go bankrupt?"

"Not my concern. I made up my mind long ago—I'm applying to renounce my reincarnator status and leave the Main God Space."