Saruta recurs throughout Osamu Tezuka's Star System, consistently depicted with a grotesque, swollen nose marked by pock-marks. In "The Phoenix -Space-" (2577 AD), he is one of four astronauts from Zaltz. After cosmic dust damages their ship and crewmate Makimura dies mysteriously, Saruta escapes in a life pod, crash-landing on a prison planet for space criminals. There, he embroils himself in a rivalry with Makimura over fellow crewmate Nana, a conflict persisting even after discovering Makimura's corpse and his sentient escape pod.

Upon planetfall, the cosmic Phoenix reveals Makimura is an immortal space criminal cursed to endlessly age backward and forward for genocide, including killing his alien wife; his physical form has regressed to infancy. Consumed by jealousy over Nana's care for the infant Makimura, Saruta attempts to kill the child. This act provokes the Phoenix to curse Saruta and his descendants. Nana transforms into a plant to sustain Makimura, leaving Saruta as the sole astronaut returning to Earth with the curse. His distinctive nose deformity, noted elsewhere as resulting from events like multiple bee stings, manifests or worsens during this story.

Saruta appears throughout the Phoenix series as ancestors and descendants across eras, including General Sarutahiko in "Dawn" (240-270 AD), the bandit Gao in "Karma" (720-752 AD), and scientist Dr. Saruta in "Future" (3404 AD), all sharing the familial trait of enduring harsh trials. He also appears in *Black Jack* as Dr. Honma Jotaro, an ostracized surgeon. Honma saves and reconstructs the young Kuro Hazama (Black Jack) after a devastating accident, becoming his mentor and father figure. Honma frequently emphasizes the power of nature and death's inevitability to Black Jack, aligning thematically with Saruta’s *Phoenix* role concerning life, death, and reincarnation cycles.