Having stayed up the night before grinding, it was very hard for her to pay attention to her new Sensei being smug or her teammates introducing themselves.
It was even harder to pay attention to them when a statistics window opened for her.
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Meeting Kakashi on the roof is nerve wracking for her. Sasuke by her side, Naruto even further away from her. The half oval steel beams floating above, holding up a sign right above the trees. Kakashi stands leaning against the railing, not a care in the world. It's odd, he's so arrogant, she can already tell, and yet she finds his obvious experience alluring. He'll make a great teacher, she's sure of it, if a lazy one.
Her analytical mind spins a million times a minute, trying to figure out why he couldn't talk to them in the room when they were the only ones left. Why was he late? Why seat them so far away from him, and why did they listen without question? A commanding aura, perhaps a high ranking even among jounin? Did they truly get someone special, or is it all a really well held together facade that's about to come crashing down like a cascade of novelty. Their time has been wasted, but maybe that was a test on its own. Did they fail by pranking him, or did they succeed by being clever? He had to have let the chalk eraser hit him, but why?
She rests in her own little world, pondering endlessly and contemplating what his statistics must look like if they were put on a status screen.
Yes, a status screen. Sakura Haruno, top kunoichi of her class, official leader of the Sasuke fanclub and academic genius, spends her nights tirelessly playing games. Not even necessarily good games, mostly old RPGs her parents used to gush about when she was little. The odd action adventure, maybe the odd dating sim if she's feeling especially romantic any given day.
Fawning over the boy by her side - a total dark and brooding anti-hero with a tragic past -, being aggressive towards her blonde aggressor, even fighting with Ino, growing out her hair, buying the odd perfume; it's all to hide where her time and money really go. Everything is to hide that she has an obsessive gaming addiction that's eating up her life, her sanity, and her ability to function in society.
Fangirl is one thing, but if they really knew what a loser she was… The loser she is.
Laughter would be the last of her worries.
Wait, why is Kakashi looking at her?
"Oh, is it my turn?" She asks, jumping in place, her big green eyes wide in surprise. Her cheeks glow a little red, and her palms land on her bare knees. "I'm Sakura Haruno." She begins, looking between them all to make sure they didn't realize she wasn't paying any attention at all. "What I like… I mean, who I like is…" Her eyes move between Naruto and Sasuke, clarity coming back. Right, Sasuke, it's Sasuke!
She likes Sasuke, definitely not whatever gaming hero is in her head on a given day, the broody prick that's given her about as much attention as he has mastering that awkwardly pensive pose. Okay, that's unfair, Sasuke has depth and an ocean of emotion hidden under that cold exterior, and she does appreciate it quite a bit. Buuuut, if she managed to snag him he'd find out she's a gaming obsessed insomniac so fast his rejection would make her head spin so fast her neck snapped.
"And, my hobby is, I mean, I run the Sasuke fanclub."
"That's you!?" Sasuke finally looks at her with something other than disdain, that's progress! Disgust is progress! "What the hell! You all stole my toothpaste yesterday!"
"In my defense, your toothpaste cost more than my conditioner." She quips quickly.
"Errp-" Realizing she just admitted it, and flushing harder than any tomato ever has.
The boy sighs, looking away from her. "At least you can steal."
That actually wasn't her, but they did report it to her, and well it tastes a bit like ice cream. Who buys toothpaste that tastes like ice cream? Spoiled rich kids with too many problems deep inside to count, that's who… She kinda wants to know where he got it.
"My future dream is-" She takes a deep breath, so she can get a nice screech in there. It's really convincing, she's sure of it, that look of pure disappointment Kakashi is giving her could not be fake. Even with that mask she can see actual sweat dripping down the side of his face.
She's a useless fangirl, she definitely doesn't spend her entire night grinding mats and leveling up, only to crawl out of bed unsure when she got there each morning and force herself to school. That'd be a very odd thing for her to do, and she's very normal. She likes boys, she likes Sasuke, and she gets tons of sleep!
"My first thought…" Kakashi begins. "Is that you're lying."
He really does stare her down.
"Errr…"
"I'm just not sure about what."
At least there's that.
She doesn't even bother listening to Sasuke's intro, she knows everything there is to know about him. Maintaining this cover has been a full time job for years now.
Now if only her grinding had actual real world applications…
A lot of information appears before her very suddenly. She rubs her eyes to make sure she didn't pass out sitting down again, before parsing it while Sasuke talks. Not her problem, this is.
A lot of that info is as insulting as it is accurate, but it raises a few questions.
If her charm is six, does that mean everyone knows she's lying and not just the awkwardly perceptive Kakashi? Are they just too polite to mention it?
Why is her Chakra identical to her Constitution? Shouldn't it be some equation based on her mental and constitution, what with spiritual and physical energies?
No… It's a mixture of the two, which means when she runs out of physical energy there's nothing left to mix and she has no chakra.
She needs to do push ups, to do jutsu.
Why is her control so high, is that even a high number or are all her other numbers just really low?
More importantly, if Chakra works on an exact value, why does Naruto have so much of it when his mental score has to be abysmal? Yes, she's noticed. She'd have to be blind to miss him actively failing basic jutsu from too much energy.
His stamina is commendable, and his physical scores are great, but he's dumber than a bag of bricks trying to do calculus while flipped upside down. Perhaps these stats don't work this way for everyone else?
Or perhaps she's an idiot, and she forgot to sleep last night while binging a new MMO, and is now hallucinating while all three members of her team wave their hands in front of her face trying to get her attention. "I'm awake!" She shrieks, falling back and waving her own hands in defense.
"... Right." Their teacher says, standing over her with one foot bent on the bench and the other awkwardly back. "Did she really pass?"
"Yep." Sasuke nods quickly, quietly, boredly.
"You betcha! She's the smartest!" Naruto praises her, and she actively has to suppress the power overwhelming level timidness trying to out her across her cheeks and the bridge of her nose. Scarlett is a beautiful color, and also the screen name of a trans Olympic Esports champion; it is not the color she wants her cheeks to be while her team stares down at her.
"Well, we meet at five in the morning." Kakashi says, disappearing in an actual puff of smoke.
Leaving her to look at her two teammates in surprise.
"What'd I miss?" She asks, and they actually do look at her like she ate the whole stupid tree bark and all.
"Sakuraaaaa!" Naruto whines quite loudly. It's enough to make her wince.
It's less that a headache started, and more like she woke up with it and Naruto can't help but prod it with a stick. She really should've slept last night… She has a day to prepare before this test or whatever, Naruto described it very loudly and her head was throbbing so she might have missed some of it.
She'll be sure to get a good night's sleep tonight so she doesn't screw up whatever that test is. Today was embarrassing, and she's a ninja now. She'll fall behind on her grinding but, sacrifices must be made for her future. Besides, her mom was super clear, if she fails to become a Genin her computer will get taken away and she needs that or she'll die. She can lose some grinding to be able to grind at all.
Now she just has to figure out what to do with her day besides sleep, so she can be productive, prepared, and then sleep. Doing that in the wrong order could be a problem…
"Skills." She mumbles to herself.
Academy Taijutsu Style
Studying
Gaming
Clone Technique
Transformation Technique
Body Replacement Technique
Lying Badly
That's not a good list. Especially that last one.
"Traits."
No Life Gamer
Chronically Underslept
Sasuke Trivia Expert
Unnaturally Good Chakra Control
Cram Study Master
Double Life
Disappointment
"Okay." She nods to herself.
"I can live with that. That's mostly positive."
She can probably work off Chronically Underslept by, you know, sleeping…
That last one's a bit of a sore blow for no damn reason but that just means when she becomes a genin people will be all the more shocked and believe in her!
She just has to figure out what to do with today, so that she can become a Genin tomorrow.
Fuuuuck, she needs a nap…
One nap later, she wakes up in a tree. Why nap in a tree? Because comfortable sleep would steal her entire day, and she isn't prepared for tomorrow.
"Status." She grumbles, and finds the same information from earlier appearing in front of her. "So it's not a hallucination… Or if it is, it's persistent." A part of her wonders if someone's messing with her. A genjutsu to screw with her head would be pretty effective all things considered. That being said, who would do that to her?
No one she can think of. Ino would be capable, maybe, but Ino's not malicious enough to try to make her think she's crazy. Kakashi? He wouldn't have singled her out, that'd be pointless.
Her parents might come up with something to try and steer her away from games now that she's graduated, but doing it right now would just sabotage her and they do want her to succeed.
"No, this is real." She decides, rubbing her eyes and taking a stand here in the trees. This is the training round Naruto said they'd be at tomorrow morning, so now that she's napped, she decides to scout it out and see if she can come up with any plans. Her stats say her mental is her only real strength. Well, control, but that's useless to her with so little chakra.
She doesn't have to understand how the numbers work to know that her constitution is low. If her constitution is low, and her chakra is linked to it, then her chakra is low and weak.
Actually, she can make a pretty good estimate of how the stats work right now.
She gets a stick and starts drawing them out on the ground.
Maybe in a few months she'd forget, but right now is perfect. Excluding the clan kids and their frankly absurd advantages, she can pretty easily compare herself to other academy students that passed. She's on the higher end of strength for them, most of them being from civilian families or disadvantaged in some way. She's about the same speed as most of them with her hand movements, but faster than them in raw speed. She has a little less stamina, but not much.
With that math, an average academy graduate probably has about twenty five in any given stat. Well, no one is truly average, but as a base.
That makes her pretty much where she's supposed to be everywhere but mental, control, and charm. Work ethic actually wasn't that important in the academy. You either passed or you didn't, so by passing she had to be average, it makes sense.
Charm is probably her ability to convince people of what she's saying, or maybe her likability? Probably not, people like her, she thinks… but then what if they're just putting up with her? It's not like she puts effort into other people. It's something to think about. If statistics like charm have passive effects, she might be lowering her team's capabilities by not being very friendly. Top that off with being paired with two freaking monsters in their own right, and this might be a terrible situation.
Control is taught in the academy, it's the concept of being efficient with jutsu and applications of chakra. Being efficient also means being effective, and such a high and overblown number gives her a lot of perspective on what she could be doing. She did think it was weird how easily she learned the academy three. Even Sasuke had to try, but she just kind of did it.
Mental is probably not directly intelligence. While she had perfect grades, she frequently made very poor decisions. She didn't even sleep last night, and off the cuff decided to sleep in the damn trees. She lacks foresight, but has great in the moment decision making, so perhaps it's about off the cuff moment to moment thought processing?
This is too much thought all at once. She grumbles, wishing for some caffeine or maybe a longer nap. She kicks the dirt to hide what she drew, lest someone connect what she did to a game system. It doesn't take a gamer to detect gamer habits. She's put a lot of effort in over the years to evade detection. Now, looking at her charm, she wonders if anyone believed her in the first place or if people just kind of stared and moved on when she made an excuse?
Does she come off crazy?
She contemplates her skills while wandering around the training field in hopes of finding a good place to lay a trap or plan an ambush for tomorrow.
The Academy Taijutsu Style has zero chance of passing any advanced test of capabilities. She's not especially strong, fast, skilled, or tough, and it's only meant to provide a basic ground to work from. It covers every area a little so that you can find matters you're proficient in, and you always have a move that could theoretically reply to the one sent to you.
Against a jounin, it's an automatic loss.
Studying is useful if it applies to stuff like this field, which it appears to. She can't tell if it's mental skills or studying itself, but she very quickly grasps the lay of the land and understands intuitively exactly where they should position themselves tomorrow if they get trapped or cornered. The exact terms of the test were not given, but she can make an educated guess that Kakashi will likely try to pummel them. Why? Because he's a smart ass, and pummeling them would be funny. She knows the type, she's gotten into enough arguments with them in various guilds and raids.
Gaming isn't useful here unless he's about to challenge them to a team fight in CoD or something. Perhaps some RTS knowledge could be useful while knowing the grounds, but without having any clue about their enemy's statistics or her teammate's statistics, no real strategy can be made. The best she can come up with is having a Naruto kite while Sasuke uses range and she oversees and directs them.
Actually, that's a good idea. She has a few headsets, she's sure they have something which can receive her voice without Kakashi hearing it. She'll get that ready, maybe meet them early tomorrow and get them familiar with the devices. It'd give her away a little bit, but they're gonna find out. They're her team. She'd rather be the useful loser than the idiot who decided not to be useful who is also a loser.
Clone technique isn't useful against a Jounin. He'll see right through it. Even if he can't literally do so, the moment they move he'll know better. It'd be better if he knew some of their skills, but aside from maybe cloning a Kunai or trying to copy one of Sasuke's fire jutsu so Kakashi dodges something he doesn't have to, there's really not a lot there… She will probably do that. She's got amazing control, she can probably clone it after seeing it once. This is important, because having him do it before the training would waste his chakra, and every resource is invaluable.
Transformation isn't useful right out, nor is Body replacement. While she could probably pretend to be Sasuke when she uses the clone technique, he'll catch on if there's two of them and that might kill the gambit before it starts. Body replacement means getting hit, and she doesn't trust her twenty seven agility to keep her alive if Kakashi actually tries to hurt her.
Lying badly… Actually.
She might have a plan. Standing in a full out clearing, headset on, Sasuke's voice whispering into her ear while Naruto sets traps with a surprising skill she didn't know he had, well, she can't help but smirk when Kakashi arrives in front of her. "Not even going to try and run or hide, Sakura?"
"Nope." She lies, grinning like a loon. "I won't play your game, you're playing mine."
"You know, I've played a few games myself over the years." He stands with his hands in his pockets, not even a care in the world. "You're communicating with headsets, that's fairly basic although those are very bulky."
"It's more comfortable for long sessions." She admits freely. "I imagine this is going to be long."
"Really?" He asks, taking one step forward-
"I would totally do that if I were you, absolutely undefended." Sakura lies through her teeth. "Not a single plan."
"... Sakura, after I send you back to the academy I'm recommending they give you a trainer for deception." He scowls, taking a step back.
"Nothing that way either, nope."
"..." He looks around.
"Not there, or there, or there."
"You've booby trapped the entire area." He realizes. "Dangerous?"
"Noooooo, why would I want to hurt you Sensei?" She asks, reaching down and collecting a bit of dirt in her palms. "Hehe, let's be real Kakashi-sensei, you'll see through anything I do."
"..." He decides to stare for a moment, see where she's going with this, or maybe analyze to see where her weaknesses are. If nothing else, he'll assume the dirt means something. Making him overthink is her only real shot here.
"Which is why I'm not doing anything."
"Wha-" It's at that moment that the ground erupts from all around. He tries to move, and finds he cannot, his body won't let him, even as he's grabbed by a hundred blonds and dragged to the ground. They hang off of him, holding him in place above a massive pit. It's so simple, with his arms grabbed, and his legs grabbed, and his entire body suspended above a field of thousands of blonds in all directions, for a simple kunai to fly by and snag the bells, bringing them to Sakura's hands.
"As a Jounin, you would instinctively recognise what was and wasn't stable ground without even thinking about it. Subconscious skills are great, they keep you safe, they work so well that they become automatic. I can't even imagine how powerful you must be, or how above us you are." Sakura cites. "But if you don't consciously recognize it, you wouldn't catch up to why you landed on that exact spot, or why I'm standing here without moving."
She spins the bells in her fingers happily. "You'd land exactly where I wanted you to, because the entire field was a trap."
"What if I had landed on you?" He asks.
"What's a game without a little risk?" She can't help the cackle that leaves her lips.
"You missed one small problem with that plan." Kakashi explains.
"Oh?"
"You're still a genin." He winks, one eye smiling brightly at her after a moment. "This isn't just a trap for me, you're also stuck on that spot." He points out the fifty foot chasm all around her. "It's a trap for both of us."
"Well yeah, but I'm useless." Sakura says, spinning in place and hucking the bells as far away as possible. "As long as none of us attack you, you can't use replacement. We're both stuck here, while Sasuke keeps the bell."
"And when I get out of this?" Kakashi asks.
"Winning was never an option." She shakes her head, telling the truth for once. "You were either going to cheat for us by not trying very hard, like a miniboss version of a later challenge, or you were going to give us an impossible fight we were supposed to lose. This is your time to reveal that, Kakashi Sensei. Was the game rigged from the start?"
"Yes."
"Wha-oof!" Her vision goes black as a foot places itself directly in her nose.
"It's broken." Sakura groans, lying in a puddle of her own blood surrounded by Narutos
"We won though." Sasuke says from a little to the side, "good work, Sakura."
"Thank you." Another her might have just died.
She really just wants a nap. She stayed up all night planning that!
It's way too easy for her to forget to sleep. "If he was gonna let us win, why'd he break my nose?"
"Pissed him off." Sasuke shrugs. "Woulda pissed me off."
"Yeah…" She agrees. "Naruto, good work."
The overly excitable boy does exactly what she expected, and hops. Not just him either, a hundred clones hop. It actually shakes the ground.
"Carry me to the hospital?" She asks Naruto, and finds he's a very useful pack mule.
Heavy Emotions are Felt, and Sakura is given an elite solo mission: Sleep
"I have failed every single student that has taken the bell test under me." Kakashi admits while staring them down. The moon is high in the sky, the hospital trip taking an awkwardly large amount of their day. They tried to blame Naruto until she explained it was Kakashi that did it, at which point they stopped asking questions entirely. It turns out Kakashi could just go around decking students and everyone would assume he had a good reason and ignore it. To have that kind of respect from even random hospital staff is so absurd it boggled her mind.
"Then it's not meant to be passed?" Naruto asks, raising a hand as if he'd been called on. "It's a trick question or something?"
"It is." Kakashi is very honest as he glares at Sakura, before looking back at Naruto. "The bell test is a trick question, to pass you have to put your teammates above yourself even in a situation where you should be doomed by doing so. It's designed to pin you against each-other, then require self sacrifice. Sakura had no idea this was the case, and just decided she didn't really need to pass anyway."
"I figured either it was rigged in our favor and you were lying, or Sasuke was who Copy Cat Kakashi wanted." Sakura shrugs. Her nose feels great now, thanks for asking. "In either situation, Sasuke's the fastest and most agile of the three of us. Having him run away while we stopped you just made sense."
"Right." Kakashi actually has to visibly resist palming his forehead, he can already tell this team is going to test his patience. "That doesn't explain why Sasuke got both bells, and Naruto didn't grab one."
"I forgot." Naruto admits.
"... I hate you." Kakashi looks up into the sky. "I hate you both. Sasuke's been brutally traumatized since a young age, left with no adult supervision with more money than god, and told he can do anything, and he's the only one I like."
"That really says more about you than me." Sakura quips.
"Oww!"
And finds that yes, Kakashi can just deck her without moving from a rather significant distance. How? Who knows, hopefully she'll learn it someday. She rubs her nose and admires the work the staff put in to make sure it wouldn't have cosmetic damage.
"With that settled, Team seven has officially passed the bell test. You will be reporting to this training ground every morning at exactly seven sharp."
"So we get here at nine." Sakura nods- "Ow, fuck!"
"Seven sharp." Kakashi says sharply. "I will not be here. You will be physically training until around eleven, when we'll take a D rank mission and get you familiar with mission structures and the way ninja are paid. If I find out any of you were not here on time, and training, I will hit you."
"Because that'd be so dif-fuck, why!"
"Sakura, maybe you should be quiet." Naruto tries to help.
"No shit, Naruto, I couldn't have guessed that!" Sakura groans from her place in the dirt.
Naruto flinches away, and pouts rather heavily, causing her to instantly regret her words. Why couldn't Kakashi have hit her before she said that? She'll find a way to apologize once her head doesn't throb.
Bell test complete, she can't help but ask her parents.
"Hey…" She asks, spinning her fork at dinner. It's not much, but she's actively trying to find new ways to train her dexterity. She wasn't given a level up system, so her stats have to level up based on training. Her Mental and Control are incredibly high, which means they'll be difficult to raise. This means that the main focus, at least for now, should be constitution so that being hit won't hurt so much, dexterity as it'll help her deflect hits, agility as it'll help her avoid hits. and charm as it'll stop her from getting hit in the first place. "Is it normal to get hit by your jounin sensei? A lot?"
"Nope." Her mother pretty instantly responds, but despite her response, she doesn't look very concerned. "Most students don't get sensei, they're thrown right into the genin program and given temporary chunin sponsors who take a cut of their mission pay for teaching them a thing or two every other week."
"Okay.. But like, say you did get a jounin sensei. How normal is it to get hit?" Sakura stresses. "This feels like child abuse."
"Sakura, you're not a child anymore, it's regular abuse." Her father explains, softly, gently. He's always understood her feelings, so it's a little weird to have her correct her like that. "And I imagine it's fairly common to get physical with your trainees if there's something direct you need to teach them."
She's not satisfied with her parents telling her it's okay. They never hit her. She took plenty of hits growing up, the academy is filled with them. Spars are very physical, and you can't even train substitution without someone willing to deck you. Most people find being your training partner pretty fun, and in retrospect the amount of people who really wanted to punch her should have probably tipped her off that she wasn't very charming. Most people got a few yesses, people lined up to help her train. She just thought they were being helpful…
But her parents?
Never.
"I guess you're right." She sighs, "I just don't get what he's trying to teach me, and it hurts. I was excited this morning and now, tomorrow is scary." She allows her gaze to soften, to show them her fears.
It's a little nerve wracking, seeing no sympathy.
"You should ask." Her father says, tempering his breaths carefully. "You should definitely ask why one of the most talented ninjas of all time is doing something you find odd. You should ask all the time, every day, every minute. If you find the man is breathing oddly, you should ask. This is a man who can probably teach you more about breathing, than I can the entire ninja field."
"So I should just shrug it off?" Sakura asks, visibly a little uneasy with that idea. "That sounds like enabling."
"No, you should ask." Her father stresses. "Kakashi Hatake is one of the most talented ninja of all time. There is nothing he does without a reason, because if randomness was in his skillset, he'd have died by now."
"I… Yeah." Sakura finishes her food, unsatisfied with both her parents and the hospital just accepting this. Even if Kakashi isn't doing anything wrong, even if she is learning some lesson, even if he's being a great teacher and she's just missing it because she has a charm of six which implies a massive social deficit which'd include social understandings and comprehension of social situations.
It still means ninja like Kakashi could totally just get away with doing it unprompted just to be a dick, and everyone would blame her. It makes her stomach flop. She always knew that jounin were valuable, but that's, well, her worldview is expanding rapidly.
It's not a good feeling.
She couldn't sleep.
Seven O-clock sharp - maybe add on a few minutes - she's at the wrecked training ground, watching Naruto do push ups and Sasuke practice Kata expertly without a single extra thought running through her brain.
She'd been so nervous about today, she'd stayed up all night playing the Resident Evil 4 remake. It'd uh, calmed her nerves a bit, then she'd totally forgotten to sleep.
Here she is, bags under her eyes, reality a little fuzzy, and feeling chipper.
First thing's first.
"I'm sorry." It's hard for her to say.
It's hard for her to grasp the words, and she spent a good portion of her playtime racking her brain on how to make things up to Naruto.
Standing above him while he does push-ups, a foot rubbing against her ankle, a finger twirling her hair nervously, and the thickest blush she can't deny is the best she can do.
"For what?" Naruto asks, not even looking up at her. The sweat dripping down his brow, he's likely been at this for more than the few minutes she was late. She really hopes Kakashi doesn't find out about that, her heart is already pumping thinking about it. At least it helps her stay awake.
"For um, yelling at you yesterday. I'm really sorry, you were just trying to help and…" She can't continue, she doesn't have it in her.
For willing up the courage to try and make amends, and recognizing your social fuck up, Charm has increased to 7.
Well that's nice." She can't help the smile that works its way onto her face for that.
"It's okay." He says, his usual chipper smile has a crack in it, and she hates that she can see it.
Because it's not a new crack, his smile has always looked that way.
It only took a charm of 7 to see it.
She was socially disabled. What's everyone else's excuse?
"No, it's not." She shakes her head quite forcefully. "I mean it, I'm sorry. I'll try to be more considerate next time."
"You think you're gonna yell at me while laying in the dirt after Kakashi used a jutsu to punch you from a distance, again?" He asks.
"No-well yes, maybe?" She grits her teeth, why is this so hard?! "I more mean, the next time you make me angry, I'll be less… mean."
"You mean you'll stop hitting me?" He asks.
And that makes her crack a little inside.
Could that be it? Has Kakashi watched them interact before?
Has he seen one of the many times she's rejected him quite brutally? Could this be… No, that's paranoia, she's doing something to piss him off.
Naruto has never taken serious injury from her, he's a stamina monster and she's not even a genin in strength. It's not like it really hurts him, is it?
She can't take that risk.
"Never again." She swears.
"What if-"
"Never." She kicks the dirt, sternly. "Except for spars, I imagine Kakashi would get really mad at me if I refused to hit you in a spar."
"So does that mean we can do that date?" He asks.
"No, Naruto, it does not." Unlike Kakashi, she does facepalm, hard.
Hitting herself is better than hitting him, she decides.
When Kakashi arrives, she's exhausted. Hours of working alongside Naruto have brought her to her limit multiple times. Luckily, as a ninja, those limits are high and her stamina regeneration is fast.
Unluckily, that means she has pretty much emptied her tank for the day when Kakashi shows up, and she feels like an idiot.
On the bright side, her constitution managed to jump to 25 already.
It seems training her stats is a lot easier now. Sure she's never taken it this seriously before, but she's also never progressed a solid twenty fourth in one of her abilities in one day before. At least, she's pretty sure she hasn't.
It's with wobbly feet and a tired mind that she wanders over to him the moment he arrives.
He doesn't even get to greet them before she's bombarding him with her question, egged on by her father. At least, that's what she tries to do.
In reality, from everyone else's perspective, she gets up from a crunch.
Walks over to their sensei at a dead trudge, wobbling and staggering back and forth.
And then immediately collapses into his arms without saying a word. "Snnrrrgg-chest hard."
"... Is she okay?" Kakashi asks, while her mind whirls and she takes solace in a place to rest her face that's not the hard ground after a failure to complete the next set of whatever exercise Naruto pushed her on. "Did one of you do something?"
"Nope." Is all Sasuke has to say.
"I might have pushed her too hard." Naruto admits sheepishly. "It was fun, I got carried away."
"Ah…" Kakashi looks down at the pinkette firmly passed out in his grip, shakes her a little, and then hands her off to a Naruto clone that spawns out of thin air. Naruto's instinctive with those things, it's scary. "You carry her while we go get our mission. We'll be doing this hundreds of times, so it's not like it really matters if she catches it this one time."
"No problem!" Naruto seems very happy to get to carry his crush.
Sakura dreams of shooting ganados in the damn face with the red-9.
"Bang, bang, suck it loser! Double kill!"
It's with those words that Sakura's eyes snap open to find she's staring directly into the raised eyebrows of the third Hokage. "Uhhhh-"
"Moving on." Kakashi says, cutting her off. He can just do that.
Everyone in the room actually moves on. She's never seen the third defer to anyone before, but he really does choose not to question her.
"As Team seven destroyed the training ground during their genin test, and that is official village property, we have two options." The Hokage continues from wherever he was before, holding up a scroll. "This is the D-rank mission to repair your training ground. You can take it unpaid, or you can pay for someone else to take it. It matters very little to me, just that it gets done."
Naruto really looks uncomfortable with that, Sakura can tell that much, which means everyone in a wide radius can. He says nothing, apparently even he understands that there can only be one crazy outburst within one Hokage statement before it's a crime.
"It was my idea, Hokage-sama." Sakura speaks up. "They should get to take a real mission while I clean it up."
"No." Kakashi bonks her! He actually smacks her in front of the damned Hokage. At least this time is incredibly light, it feels more like a rub than a smack. "Bad Sakura."
While she is trying to figure out what the hell that was for, they accept their mission directly from the Hokage - apparently he likes to do all of the first few missions for teams, makes him feel youthful - and leave as quickly as possible.
"Kakashi." She grumbles, rubbing her eyes.
"Yes, Sakura?" Kakashi asks right back, not a care in the world.
"Why are you carrying me?" She asks, looking down at her body in his arms. It's a little awkward, really awkward actually. She'd really rather he not!
"Because when you tried to walk out of the Hokage's office you fell on your face." He explains patiently.
"Yeah, I got that, I mean, why are you carrying me? Why not Naruto or Sasuke?" At least he's skilled enough that he's sturdy, and she can close her eyes without being jostled around.
"Would you rather they do it?" He asks.
"No…" And that's that.
She really can't continue that train much longer.
So, she asks a different question. "Why do you keep hitting me?"
"..." He answers back easily.
It's not the answer she expected.
Doesn't really make her feel better.
When it becomes obvious he doesn't intend to actually explain, she opens her mouth-
And he actually starts. "Do you really not know?"
He has the decency to look sheepish.
He genuinely does, she views it out of a lidded gaze and can't help but be a little flabbergasted.
"The old proverb, I do believe, is "talk shit, get hit," you shouldn't intentionally antagonize someone you can't defend against." He explains. "That could get you killed, especially with the kind of ninja you'll likely be interacting with as my students. If a few smacks breaks a dangerous habit and saves your life, I'm not going to apologize. If it doesn't break the habit, you'll at least get very good at taking a hit and that might save your life too."
She doesn't like that answer.
It doesn't sit well at all.
But it is an answer, one she'll have to take note of.
She can't think of any time she's been especially rude, but maybe that's the point. She can remember getting hit. Maybe if she looks back on those times she can clue in to her mistakes and learn a lesson.
Or maybe he's just an asshole covering for it.
He doesn't feel like an asshole carrying her like this though. "I'm sorry."
"For what?" He asks.
"I dunno yet." She mumbles sleepily. "I think I'm gonna fall asleep again."
"Sakura… did you sleep last night?" It's a striking question, one she's very much not happy to hear. "Because I'm getting the impression you don't sleep."
"I'll work on it." She groans. "I was distracted - hey, why are we going a different way?" She eyes Sasuke and Naruto heading off to the training ground, while he goes… towards her house? "Sensei?"
"You're officially barred from team activities until you can get your sleep under control." He says incredibly sternly. "No training, no missions, no lectures. Anything I could possibly teach you will be worthless if you're half dead all the time."
"But, the mission…"
"Naruto and his hundred clones dug the hole, they can undig the hole." Kakashi quips. "You're going to bed. You'll report to the training ground when you're fresh and awake, or you won't at all."
It's not the move she expected from a dude she spent all night terrified of.
It's not exactly great either. Missing out on the first D rank mission means she'll be behind.
What if this takes more than a few days and she ends up really behind?
What if she ends up left behind entirely?
She finds herself tearing up at the thought.
"I'm not abandoning you, Sakura." His voice cuts through her half delirious thoughts.
"I just can't teach you if you're so tired you don't even realize you're being a liability."
It's not a line she likes, but it makes sense.
That seems to be the theme of her life at the moment.
The World while Awake, and a Prophesy is Foretold.
A week passes in relative silence.
Gaming during the day, trying to sleep during the night. It's difficult, incredibly difficult, and despite his orders not to train she does it anyway.
Strength has increased to 31, for reaching Genin Strength, you have unlocked the "Genin Strength" trait.
Genin Strength: You officially no longer tire from medium encumbrance, and when testing your strength against anyone below genin strength, you just win without a contest. Your state does not matter, winning is set to 1 and losing is set to 0.
Dexterity has increased to 29
Agility has increased to 29
Constitution has increased to 26
Charm has increased to 8
She exercises a good part of her day away in between gaming breaks, and takes special effort to exercise before bed so she can collapse into it exhausted and empty.
She learns to juggle.
She learns she can sprint around her city block, and no one questions a ninja running around.
She even intentionally runs into a few walls mid-sprint, for constitution and asks her father to help her spar so she doesn't fall completely behind her teammates. That was emotionally difficult, she'd never been hit by her father before and even in an intentional setting it felt really bad. He didn't seem to like it either, but she can't just fall behind.
She can't be abandoned.
Charm was harder.
"I bet you're talking like that because things are really hard right now, want to talk about it?"
She had to actually talk to shittalkers instead of telling them she did their mom last night.
"Are you okay? I know things are hard, but I'm a person too. I understand you."
Yes, she got these lines online instead of coming up with them herself, so they were worth less experience but… It helped. Charm 8 and she already feels like she understands what she did wrong a little better. She still thinks Kakashi was overboard, but she was antagonizing him. Nine? Just because she knew he wouldn't be there at seven didn't mean she wasn't intentionally calling him out without an explanation. She challenged him, and he responded with a jutsu.
That's what ninjas do. That's what they're taught to do. Ninjas aren't like civilians, when you don't have the tools to socially do something you have an alternate option, punch them in the face.
She still doesn't like it, and she definitely can't wait until the day she can deck him back, but that day isn't today.
It takes a week, but…
Chronically Underslept Trait, Lost. Debuffs on all statistical applications removed.
She wakes up on day seven to that message. It's a good message. She's not sure how strong the debuffs were, but she's happy to know they're gone. Her actual statistics haven't changed, so it must have been invisible.
And also this one.
Sleeping Skill Gained
At base proficiency, the Sleeping Skill increases the ease of getting to sleep, and shrinks the amount of sleep needed for a restore. You now awaken from a full rest with a reset state, meaning injuries, and debuffs, are removed upon waking no matter how severe. HP and Chakra are set to max upon a reset.
A reset is accrued after a full 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep at this moment.
That's huge.
That one skill is so strong she spends over twenty minutes staring at it.
It doesn't say she grows limbs back, but it might as well say that. Chakra is set to max, really?
They're taught in the academy that your chakra pool is the effort of about three days of a slowly trickling force working its way into a pool. Unless you completely empty the pool like a dummy and accrue a debuff, you will get it all back within three days.
This means that she can use three days of chakra every day as long as she can get good sleep. This might be a real problem if she has to camp out behind enemy lines and has to sleep with one eye open, but in her daily life that means she's actually working on almost three times her normal capabilities.
While she's still limited by her chakra stat as to how much she can use in any one instance, her daily stamina overall just went up to incredible degrees.
All she has to do is get some sleep. Now if only she wasn't bad at that.
Genin strength is cool too, but auto-winning a situation in which she already won doesn't feel like a huge win. No longer tiring from medium encumbrance is huge, but she doesn't carry equipment at the moment so until she has the money to get equipment, she's screwed.
She has missed the last seven days of missions, so she's broke. She actually had to cancel her sub to FF14, which was painful but daddy Yoshi did say to cancel it when you need to, that it's not a job and it's okay.
It's time to take drastic measures. Further drastic measures, pausing her sub hurt her soul.
"Fanclub, I call you all here today, because I need money." She hasn't used her status as leader in a while, and she can already tell they're thinking of replacing her. Being Sasuke's teammate is bad enough, the entire club relies on them having equal odds or it falls apart; being gone for over a week without so much as sending a text?
Scandalous.
They're all here, including Ino, that's helpful. Ino doesn't normally come to meetings, she's more an honorary member than an actual member. She finds their methods too severe, too creepy, and has said she all around despises whoever stole Sasuke's underwear that one time.
Sakura kinda agrees, actually, this facade has gone on too long.
But dropping it before she can dismantle it from the inside would be irresponsible, so she's gotta take this opportunity to do that.
Sasuke deserves better than her just dropping it and letting some crazy run the club. She's managed to keep things largely safe, and contained. Largely, sometimes things get out of hand and while she'll accept that's partially her responsibility, she can't actually control every crazy girl twenty four hours a day so she doesn't feel too bad.
Ino looks really worried about her, but that changes very quickly when she actually looks at her face. Something about looking at her right now reassures Ino, and she suspects it's the lack of bags under her eyes.
Has Ino been that worried about her?
Has everyone been that worried about her?
"And because we're becoming adults, and some of us already are… I know some of you failed to become genin, but I believe in your persistence, your capabilities, and your perseverance."
Drafting up this simple speech took hours, which is more shameful than she'd like to admit.
But her parents are very against her and this club so asking them wasn't an option.
"I'd like to gather the funds to throw one last party, and then disband the club. We can't have harassing a person be a huge part of our identities as adults, and Sasuke has shown zero interest in any of us. Ever."
"That's not true, he looked at me that one time!" One girl shouts.
"He was looking in your general direction, Nemi." Sakura has to hold back the snark, make it sound pleasant. It's so hard. "Sasuke is anti-social, he's not interested in any of us. I think he's into mature women? Maybe we try again in a more, calm, collected manner in a few years." She suggests. "But for now, let's throw a party, and move on with our lives." Sakura feels really proud of herself.
Until the throwing starts.
"That was really mature of you." Ino praises her, patting her shoulder while Sakura checks over the new shuriken cuts on her face with a mirror. They'll disappear tonight, she doesn't really care that much. It'll also be proof that she's not hallucinating. She'll finally have real, tangible proof that her abilities are real.
"Didn't work." Sakura points out.
"Sometimes it's the effort that counts." Ino shakes her head, leaning against her and dabbing one of her wounds with a cloth. It feels nice to be cared for.
By being removed from the Sasuke Fanclub, and being honest about your gaming with your team - at least kinda - you've officially lost the Double Life trait.
It has been replaced by Undercover Novice.
Undercover Novice: You receive bonuses to skill checks related to maintaining your cover when pretending to be part of an organization.
"I thought you were great." Ino continues. Sadly Ino's praise does not remove disappointment, but maybe enough of it from enough people will. "That organization has done terrible things to someone we care about, and trying to dismantle it was the right thing to do."
"I, don't even like Sasuke." Sakura admits, looking into Ino's cute eyes. They always struck her as so pretty, and the girl has the kindest smile. She looks so proud of her, it's rejuvenating.
"I know." Ino says. "Me neither."
"Wha-"
"We were kids." Ino actually giggles, shaking her head in amusement. "He's kind of a dick. Like, a cute, very noble, broody dick, but still a dick."
"Why pretend?" Sakura asks.
"Same as you." Ino says.
"To hide something?"
"Mmhmm."
Sakura doesn't ask what, she doesn't feel like she has that right.
"So are we friends again?"
"We never weren't." The hug from her bestie does warm her heart.
She hasn't been this awake while talking to Ino in actual years. It's so nice to actually feel the breeze, and feel her warmth.
"Thank you." Sakura sighs happily.
Like a great weight has flown away.
"Now about you needing money…" Ino trails. "What are you doing with all your money? It's not drugs is it?"
"I haven't been able to do missions." Sakura admits. "Kakashi gave me a private mission: learn to sleep. No missions means no pay."
"..." Ino stares at her.
"What?"
"Sakura, you're aware we get a salary for being Genin students under a sensei, right?" Ino asks. "It's to stop students from starving if their sensei decides to postpone missions for a couple weeks."
"I'm sorry, what?" Sakura instinctively salivates at the idea of money in her FF14 account, err, her pocket!
"Did you sleep through the Hokage's briefing on it?" Ino laughs.
"Yes."
Sakura hasn't been reflexively slapped by Ino in a while.
It feels nice.
It's a lot of money.
Like, far more than D ranks pay. She has two paychecks to cash at once because they got a paycheck on day one and it's been a week. It's so much money, she's never held even remotely this much cash in her hands before.
It's supposed to be used for living expenses, equipment, rations for extended travel, supplies, and to ensure their sensei cannot put them into a situation in which they can't survive. Apparently Jonin used to do stuff like that, which means there are failsafes to prevent extreme sensei abuse.
Visiting a local blacksmith and a few other ninja shops - to be professional and responsible - nets her a traveling pack, an armored mesh undershirt, a freaking sword because swords are cool, and enough kunai to kill a hundred Naruto clones. She also now has a chain mesh netting on her legs, which draws a few eyes to them. It's nice to be appreciated for being professional… She hopes that's the case anyway. Freaking maybe perverts…
She doesn't have the money to put in a special order to make the sword look like any famous blades from her favorite games, but to be fair she doesn't actually know how to use a sword right now so getting all decked out in cool loot would just be a waste of money anyway. For now, the sword will hang by her side and on her wall until she can convince Kakashi to teach her how to use it.
Who knows, maybe he'll tell her she's an idiot and make her return it. It wouldn't be the first time he's called her out in recent times. Well, recently this week, he's done it zero… It's thinking about her team wistfully when she remembers something. Looking down at her paycheck, she can't help but think about how uncomfortable Naruto looked at doing a mission unpaid. For her, it was whatever. One day of pay means nothing to her.
Sasuke's rich, so it means nothing to him either.
But to Naruto, it looked like he was told to eat glass.
"I should go check on him."
Finding out where her teammate lives was surprisingly easy. She had to formally tell Kakashi she'd be there at training tomorrow anyway, so asking him about Naruto was just a simple extra line. The man stared at her sword with a questioning gaze, but decided not to ask about it.
Standing in front of Naruto's home, she's actually pretty surprised. It's okay.
She kinda figured he'd have painted it orange or something, but maybe his parents are very strict about the home life.
Knocking on the door, she's met with a grouchy Naruto.
"I said I'd have it when I get my next stipend you-Sakura?"
His eyes light up from pissed to happy and practically glowing the moment he sees her.
She's never seen him with that kind of face.
Looking behind him, she sees clothes stacked all over the place, dirty dishes, it looks like he hasn't dusted in actual years…
"Naruto…" Sakura begins.
"Why is your home this dirty?"
"Well, um, I uh-"
"No, Naruto." She places a hand on his shoulder, and spins him around to look at what she can see from the damn doorway. She can already smell mildew, and she's sure there's mold out of sight. "Why."
"Well I don't really know how to clean." He admits.
"... Why not?"
It turns out Naruto's an orphan in an overpriced home he moved to because he was annoying his neighbors with his boisterous attitude and loud training at all hours of the night and he was evicted.
She lives in a six bedroom house her parents purchased when young and in love because her parents genuinely thought they would have five kids, and then only had her.
It's not a hard math equation.
"Mom, Naruto's moving in."
Announcing this at dinner may have been a bad idea.
Their faces are mixed, to say the least.
"Okay, let me rephrase that." She takes a deep breath.
"Naruto lacks basic life skills, lives beyond his means, has no parents, is my teammate, and we have enough extra rooms to move my entire team in. What is the correct answer?"
"Ah…" Her mother takes a sip of her drink. A very long sip, super long.
"Honey, moving a boy in suddenly is uh…" Her father tries. "You have no idea why this is a problem, do you?"
"Nope." She admits.
"..." Her parents share a look.
A very lengthy look.
Woo, matter settled! She praises herself for a job well done.
No rebuttal means she wins!
She's not exactly sure what his neighbors complained about. Naruto is actually very quiet in his room, and sticks to himself. Maybe he learned the lesson but too late at his old place? Or, maybe he's just older and smarter now.
That is before the whole family gets together and teaches him how to do laundry, how to clean his room, how to dust, and many other essential important factors he needs training on.
It was difficult at first, but once she explained it's like training but for his life instead of his fists, he got really behind it. Watching him bond with her mother over small things like how to clean was really heartwarming.
Watching him create a hundred clones and suddenly clean their house to such a degree that the three of them can only stare in awe is a very different experience.
Phenomenal, might be a good word.
"Sakura." Her mother says suddenly. "Naruto's moving in."
"I know." Sakura nods slowly. "He already did."
"Can he move in again?" Her father asks.
"Probably, he's got clones…" Sakura trails, watching as their kitchen goes from normal to sparkling in seconds, and a roving band of house cleaners passionately turns the environment into something out of a fantasy novel. "He could make so much money as a cleaning service."
"The world will be cleaner." Sakura's mother agrees. "We have made the world cleaner on this day."
"Let the prophecy be fulfilled." Her father croaks.
"So it has been foreseen, so it shall be." Sakura finishes.
"Holy shit."
Her first D-Rank mission, and Discoveries are Made
She's practically vibrating when she arrives at the training ground at seven, it's the fateful Monday where she'll prove she really is wide eyed and bushy tailed and nothing can stop her. Which is odd, because before this gaming system she never woke up before noon without feeling like hell frozen over. The cuts on her face from kunai disappeared without medical treatment, which finally proved exactly what she suspected.
She's probably not crazy. There's always the possibility that the cuts are still there and she somehow hallucinated their disappearance, and no one's reacting to open bleeding wounds…
But that's absurd, and the most logical scenario is that she has gaming based super powers.
It's just what makes sense. She'll be doing a mission today, so she spent a good portion of yesterday deep diving back into Streets of Rogue. As a mission based, objective based rogue-lite with a focus on hardcore consequences and fast reaction times in chaos, she figures the refresher'll help in their hardcore missions. She also needed to remember how to get away from crazy nonsense in an emergency, because uh…
Naruto Uzumaki
Threat Level: Flee On Sight Order, Grade 2
She wishes she could say learning a new scan trait was a cause for celebration. Even if it's just "Scan Trainee" and all she can tell is someone's full name and threat level, it's an incredible proof of concept and that's awesome?
But uh, Her parents were considered medium, the chunin she passed on the way here were dangerous, and Kakashi who is here early to make sure she's okay and ready is uh…
Kakashi Hatake
Threat Level: Incredibly Dangerous
Remarkably less concerning than Naruto's.
What the actual fuck is with her new roommie that whatever's up with the world finds Naruto scarier than Kakashi?
It gets weirder, she visited the library on the way here. The only other Flee On Sight Order issued by the ninja villages was a Grade 1, as in the only person to ever be more terrifying than Naruto by law, was the Fourth Hokage.
Her genin teammate is only considered marginally less soul destroyingly, quake in your boots, piss yourself and pray for death terrifying; than the most dangerous man to have ever lived.
Minato Namikaze once killed three hundred men in one fight then announced his warm up was done.
Minato Namikaze single handedly turned the tides of a war by being so scary the enemy just didn't fight battles he was at.
Entire armies shit themselves and fled important strategic objectives at the mere sight of blonde hair and a strange kunai. The entire Yamanaka clan did better in the war because people were too nervous at the sight of them and their hair to think straight, giving them a strategic edge for the first twenty seconds of every engagement.
Minato Namikaze killed the fucking Kyuubi. She's not entirely sure the man died, it's a popular myth in the academy that he's just taking a nap because once you step that far outside the realm of human being you don't sleep in the same timestream as everyone else.
And as far as her new powers are concerned, she should treat them as basically the same person.
Death itself lives a room down from her, and a room away from where her parents sleep.
So no, she's not happy about Scan Trainee. It's either lying to her or almost everything she knows about the world is a lie.
Naruto's nice though, so surely that's not important.
Eheh… Heh…
Fuck.
"Sakura, sword." Kakashi points at her hip. Pulling her away from the other two while they got to work did make her cheeks a little puffy with indignation. It singles her out, and makes her look like a slacker. She wanted to get right to working out with Naruto, and showing that she's gotten stronger.
Still, him taking notice of her new equipment is nice. "I thought I should get serious, and I figured, your bingo book entry mentions you used a sword so maybe you could teach me a few tricks?" Her smile is bright, her nose twitches, and she's pretty sure he sees right through her. She thinks swords are cool. He's totally going to tell her it's not a toy and make her return it.
She's waiting. Any moment now, anyyyy moment.
"I could." He agrees.
She finds herself startled enough to blink a few times, before taking a step back, then taking it forward again. "Really?"
"Kenjutsu is not to be taken lightly, so I'll need you to return that piece of scrap metal after today, but yes." He says, eying the piece at his side with his one good eye. "I have dozens of much higher quality blades lying around, and I'd rather you practice with a wooden sword anyway. It'll allow you to train with your teammates without worrying about holding back."
"Don't I need to learn the weight and stuff?" She asks.
"Yes, but as a ninja, learning to follow through is actually significantly more important than technique. Most of our fights are not resolved with a swift strike or a good parry, they're decided in a moment of distraction. Catching your opponent off guard is how you should always be fighting, it's your intent from moment one and you should never let it stop being your intent."
"All that to say…" She trails, scratching her cheek a little.
She gets it, and it makes sense, but that doesn't explain why she can't use a sword to train, which sucks, because swords are really freaking cool and swinging them in the wind was half of the point.
"If you train against your teammates with an actual sword, you'll learn to stop your strikes before they're hurt. That means you'll die." He manages to say that without sounding too sarcastic.
He is quite blunt though. She appreciates it. "Like, die, die. No respawning."
She does idly wonder if she can respond-"Ow!"
"Reality is not a game." He scolds her, holding a wooden sword he got from who knows where. She didn't see it, but that's kind of cool. "You'll train with an actual sword for kata and technique, you'll use a wooden sword for sparring. Now, you're going to repeat these next six movements for the next three hours straight. Watch closely."
He takes a step back.
Takes hold of the hilt with both hands. Raises the sword, swings down until right around her thighs - a strike meant to bisect her but not go any further and waste movement -, he then spins on his heel and holds the blade up to block something that isn't there, before spinning around and slashing from left to right, before spinning the blade just enough to change its direction, and using his grip to completely switch directions for a slash just as damn fast as the first.
He jumps forward a little, pretends to clash with another blade, then throws a textbook kick meant to hit someone's hand, before following up with a full on slash from top right to bottom left.
"Am I supposed to take special meaning from any of that?" Sakura asks. "That looked cool and all but a little strange."
"No, none of that is important." He says sternly, looking directly into her eyes.
"Then why, um, Sensei?" She gulps.
"They are marginally complicated movements that would be useful to know how to do, set up so that you can tell how to flow between one and another. I don't care if you memorize those, or if you decide to go read a kenjutsu book and learn a bunch of basic techniques. What I do care about is that you can flow between a set of movements that are comprehensive and on the fly."
"I appreciate the importance, but why learn that before actual technique?" She asks.
"Because I don't have ten thousand hours with you, so I need to make sure you can actually learn Kenjutsu before I start. If you lack the flexibility to flow between a set of six movements interchangeably, every single thing I teach you is a waste of both our time. We'd both be better off just teaching you ninjutsu." He pats her shoulder. "Now get to work, I have a date with my dead friends."
His single eye makes a smile at her, before he poofs away like fainted pokemon porting back to its ball. There's even a red light, making Sakura vaguely suspicious for a second.
Luckily having slept recently gives her the clarity of mind to recognize that no, Kakashi is probably not the Hokage's favorite pokemon.
Well, time to get training and prove she can waste her time efficiently. It was not a waste.
First, Dexterity rose to 30, that's nice.
Skill Learned: Kenjutsu Basic
You officially know the basics of Kenjutsu. The weapon flows in your hand in a way it didn't before, you no longer suffer as many negatives in combat for the awkwardness of a weapon you don't understand, and you do half damage to yourself in the event of a sword accident. You are no longer more dangerous to yourself than the enemy with a sword.
Just the half damage to herself is incredible, but a few practice swings show that she just probably learned a few hundred hours of training in a few hours. She's still bad at this, but there's no way in hell that's natural. Thinking about that led her to the discovery that she has traits she isn't aware of.
Trait Discovered: Chunin Mental
Learn skills below Chunin level at 10x the speed. (Does not apply to Traits or Stats)
That's bullshit, she feels like a cheater.
She doesn't like cheating, but she can't get rid of the ability so there's not much she can do.
Trait Discovered: Jonin Control
Perfect Control of Chakra Techniques below Jonin, once learned to at least Medium proficiency.
That's probably worse.
But it's actually a pretty good time, now that she knows how to investigate skills and traits, to look into the skills and traits she doesn't have a description for and figure them out.
Laying in the grass, sweating a river. She's not pretty right now, but she at least needs to catch her breath before Kakashi shows up so he doesn't send her home before her first mission.
Academy Taijutsu Style: You are significantly proficient in the Academy Taijutsu Style. The groundwork has been completed for you to learn other, still low complication, Taijutsu Styles much faster.
Studying: You possess a great capability to amass knowledge on a specific topic you are in search of. You know where to look, what's relevant, and understand a multitude of different study techniques.
Gaming: You are highly proficient in gaming, and improve significantly quicker than most at any game you put your mind to. You're naturally more skilled than most, and are successful at most gaming avenues. You couldn't go pro, but you could probably make a decent streaming career if this whole ninja thing doesn't work out.
Clone Technique: You are highly proficient in the E rank jutsu, Clones Technique. You do not currently possess the chakra capacity to evolve this technique.
Transformation Technique: You are highly proficient in the E rank jutsu, Transformation Technique. You do not currently possess the chakra capacity to evolve this technique.
Body Replacement Technique: You are highly proficient in the E rank jutsu, Body Replacement Technique. You do not currently possess the chakra capacity to evolve this technique.
Lying Badly: You are really bad at lying.
No Life Gamer: You put all of your efforts into gaming and you're still only a few steps above a filthy casual. You're who people on the internet joke about, and the worst part is they're not totally wrong.
[Negative], [Can Be Worked Off by either Getting a Life or Becoming a Professional Gamer]
Sasuke Trivia Expert: You know everything you think there is to know about Sasuke. His style, his interests, his mannerisms, you even know what his toothpaste tastes like. But have you actually had a conversation with the boy? You should.
[Neutral] [Can be Worked Off by either ignoring Sasuke for too long, or Upgraded by getting Sasuke's Trust to Friend]
Unnaturally Good Chakra Control: You're a freak of nature and no one is sure why. You have Jonin level chakra control as a Genin, and it's not because of hard work.
[Positive], [Can be Upgraded through Hard Work]
Cram Study Master: Nothing says passing like shotgunning an energy drink and studying everything you need in the last thirty minutes before a test. You have shown an incredible proficiency to cram knowledge down your throat like a breakfast burrito, and gain big bonuses to last minute information gains. Events must be significant for this trait to take effect.
[Positive]
Disappointment: A significant portion of the people in your life find you are not living up anywhere near to your potential. You're not impressive, you don't stand out, and you need a shower.
[Negative] [Can be worked off through reputation gains and basic skills learnt]
Now she's pretty sure she takes enough showers, but Disappointment still really hurts. Quite a few of her traits do. It's not where she wants to be in life, and it feels like before today she didn't even have the option to know what a screw up she is.
"That's probably the point." She jokes, while stabbing the air above her.
"Hehe, point."
Well, it's eleven and Kakashi isn't here yet so, time to go talk to Sasuke.
Maybe her skill is right, maybe she does need to be friendly to people.
"Heya Sasuke, how's the training going?" She asks the boy who's currently doing some sort of exercise she doesn't know the name of. His legs are hanging over a branch on a tree at around his knees, and he's pulling himself up with his waist alone. At least, that's what it looks like. There could be chakra involved in some crazy way.
She's never seen him sweat before, but there's so much. It makes his shirt a little see through, and she has to look away with a blush. He of course sees that blush, which means she's already off to a great start.
"Same as yours, why?" He asks. Which is actually more acknowledgement than he gave her the entirety of the academy. "I can't help but notice your rabid pseudo-clan has gotten worse in the past day."
She winces instinctively at that. "I tried to disband the club." She admits. "They didn't like that."
"Too bad they didn't hurt you." He says aloofly.
"I'm sorry, what?" She blinks right up at his moving form. Forget the shirt, he's an asshole.
Always remember Sakura, he is an asshole.
Naruto is death incarnate but Sasuke's a dick.
"Well, if they hurt you, we could both press charges." He explains. "You're a ninja, and the moment they're a violent organization, they're a violent organization that's targeting both of us."
"Harassment isn't enough?" She asks, very suddenly wishing her powers weren't real, if only for a moment. If she said they did attack her, evidence would be requested. She's pretty sure Ino's testimony would be enough, but then there's the question of where the damage went. She didn't go to the hospital, and her parents don't know medical jutsu, so…
"No, you can't actually harass a public figure in the same way you can a civilian. I'm the last Uchiha and a ninja, and you're a ninja, so we're both public figures. Violence is prohibited no matter what though, at least aside from training purposes."
"Ah." She stares a little slack jawed. "So you don't want me hurt?"
"Why would I?" He asks, continuing what looks like the hardest exercise, in the freaking world.
She is not happy to see that she'll be doing that someday. That looks like the worst thing ever.
"Ah, right. Sorry." She turns away and starts walking.
"Sorry for what?"
"Nothing!" He's not an asshole, apparently.
Her bad.
She flows from movement to movement like a natural, the air moving for her, a little dance making her feel alive. Performing has always been something she's loved doing, and her traits were right, streamer was actually one of her back up plans if she failed the academy.
To have Kakashi's eyes on her while she uses her blade to perfectly portray the movements he told her to learn, in random orders that shift perfectly, is magical. If she wasn't so exhausted she'd be pretty sure she died and went to heaven. There's nothing in the world that could make this better.
"She learned really fast." Sasuke praises her to Kakashi. "It's all gibberish, but she learned it."
"It reminds me of some of your clanmates." Kakashi says. "I had to show her once and now it's rote."
"That'll be me one day." Sasuke points out.
"But not today." Kakashi pats him on the back, and for his credit, Sasuke nods to himself.
She genuinely managed to impress her sensei and teammate. If nothing else, it's probably credit towards working off Disappointment. The description doesn't say it has any real negatives to it, but she hella wants that off her sheet. It's a very sore point for her at the moment. "Today, Sakura's the Uchiha with the magic eyes."
"Wish I could argue." Sasuke says simply. Admiring her in a way she really didn't expect from him, ever. Why isn't he being a dick?
There are two universal facts she knew before today.
Naruto can eat a lot of Ramen, like an absurd amount, like too much god damn ramen.
And Sasuke's a dick.
She's gonna have to buy Naruto Ramen to make sure she didn't warp dimensions in her sleep. Her poor paycheck…
Her first mission is simple. It's also incredibly disappointing. Naruto made it sound awesome, like they were saving princesses and killing demons and conquering border territory.
As it turns out, Naruto is a much, much, much better liar than she is.
Her first mission is to pull weeds from a farmer's potato farm. Large green roots and tops stand up to about her knees, and she's pretty sure they're not supposed to. She's never seen a fresh potato plant, but she has eaten a potato, and these are huge.
These potatoes could probably end world hunger, if it was a big problem.
With chakra farming that issue kind of evaporated quite some time ago. Food bills are rather cheap, and there's so much excess that the needy have no problems. Most farmers pay their taxes in excess food which is routed right to orphan and homeless mouths.
At least here in fire country, these potatoes are more weird than useful. The strange part is that she's having problems finding actual weeds. "Naruto?" She asks, looking up to check with them all. Ten Narutos and not a single nod, just a lotta shakes and a pissy Sasuke. The boy looks like he's about to use a fire jutsu and torch the whole farm, but that'd likely end up with another unpaid D rank mission to find some way to compensate the man. Possibly several, since it's his livelihood and Konoha's reputation would be at stake. They might end up unpaid servants for years… Or at least until Sasuke got fed up with it and dropped enough money on the man to make his roof collapse from the weight alone.
The air is warm, it always is here in fire country, but she can't help but notice it's a little warmer than it probably should be. "Sasuke, nooo!" She shouts.
Earning herself an odd look from eleven genin - err, two, and nine clones.
"What?" Sasuke asks. His hands are still resting by his side, and one of his brows is raised rather high. "I thought you said you were awake?"
"I am, I just, it's hot." Sakura admits with a flush, one that steams across her cheeks and torments the bridge of her nose like molten iron. "I thought um, fire chakra."
"Why would there be fire-wholly crap!" Sakura for the first time in her life, witnesses Sasuke fall back and land on his tush with genuine fear in his eyes. In another setting she might clap. It's a hilarious sight, and Sasuke's superiority might genuinely be challenged if the now unofficial fanclub saw this. In another setting, in this one, she's terrified.
She whips out her janky sword that Kakashi will probably scold her for using, and jumps to cut a giant potato in half. Why? Because that potato is six feet tall and just shot flame breath at her teammate.
Why?
How?
Who cares? She's got her weapon half lodged in the monster from head to root, when her blade gets stuck, and she's already kind of got a grasp on what Kakashi meant about her weapon. "Shit." She jumps up in the air and kicks off of it, holding her weapon with both hands so that it flies away with her. A hasty flip is realized mid-air, and she lands just in time to realize she managed to cut into her leg during her kick.
It barely hurts, lucky her, another injury she'll have to explain tomorrow morning when it's missing. At least it doesn't seem very deep. "Naruto!" She shouts. "The potatoes are attacking, make like a thousand clones and get weeding!"
"Alrighty Sakura!"
The fact that such a simple statement is said with the deafening power of a stadium filled to the brim is good enough for her to book it towards Kakashi, at the farmer's house. A combat roll to the side - after being sure to put her weapon away to avoid mishap - is completed just in time to avoid a fireball that scorches the land and burns the devil crops.
As it turns out, lying about what your mission entails is a crime.
It's also incredibly common, like, the main reason genin are required to have a higher up for any mission outside the direct confines of the village, common. Her first D rank is a C rank, she really hopes that's not indicative of a pattern or anything. A girl like her thrives off plans. Having nothing go according to them really bothers her in a way she can't quite describe. It's why she doesn't play a lot of team games, others add randomness she's just not very comfortable with.
MMOs and run and guns are one thing, but if teamwork is actually required she's probably trying it solo despite having a team, and even then, she's got her mic on to trash talk her bad teammates into submission.
Which is why she's doing just that tonight, playing a nice run and gun extraction shooter while enjoying the catered experience of the bayou. The thick swamps, the horrifying abominations, the sounds tickling her ears and the distant gunshots are identifiable because every single gun in this game has its own unique sound. If she liked teammates more she'd probably be really into this game. It's fun, it's gritty, it's got excellent sound design and her footsteps feel real.
As is, going solo kind of sucks. You never know when you're going to - "gaah, damn-it!" She groans as she's shown her death screen, nice and red and oh great she's being burned.
Her rando probably won't even revive her.
She grabs her energy drink while looking at just who killed her.
[Go-To-Bed-Sakura]
That's an odd screen name.
She looks at her hand, shakes the drink a little, and decides to put the rest in the fridge for the morning.
"The alarm is set to twelve." Kakashi's palm lands on a timer, one Sakura swears she's seen in her basement at some point. The man likes older things, that's info she didn't have before. Even as her brain fizzles a little from a lack of sleep, she is still able to pay enough attention to that.
More importantly, she's able to swap her attention back to Kakashi before he moves on without her. "Today's test is to get these two bells from me. Anyone who doesn't have a bell by noon, is being sent back to the academy." The man holds up jingling circular bells. The kind you might play with if you were trying to treat a cat. He clicks them together and he can even hear that little kitty jingle.
"We're going to start after I say, "ready, start." He stares them down with a very distasteful expression. She can't see it behind that mask, but she knows a shittalker when she sees one.
She's argued with enough on the microphone.
Naruto rushing forward before she can say a word doesn't surprise her. He's their idiot now, but he's still an idiot. She supposes she should try to find it endearing or cute, but right now her head kinda throbs and she'd rather he fall over and take a nap.
Kakashi does exactly as she suspects, he proves they cannot win. He has a kunai at the back of Naruto's head within a second, holding him in a position of pure dominance. She's worse than Naruto at Taijutsu, and even if she wasn't, it wouldn't matter. It was such a no-contest moment of sheer power that she's left rolling her eyes at the entire concept.
This isn't a test they're supposed to win by overpowering him, check, understood. The rule is set. "I didn't say start yet." Kakashi teases him, and she picks up on the little flicker of amusement in his tone. It's not something she did intentionally, but she knows the difference between a man trying to be scary, and a man who's actually being scary.
One does not play a party game without getting the idea.
"Ready, start!"
He shouts, and… disappears.
Great.
"Hey, wear this." She slips a headset directly over Naruto's head, having found him quickly. He's not very stealthy. "You too Sasuke." Neither is Sasuke, watching her from the trees. "They'll help us communicate."
"Why should we?" Sasuke asks, spinning a kunai in his fingers, to look cool most likely.
"Because the test doesn't make any sense, which means there's a trick." She explains. "And if there's a trick, all three of us need to come up with a solution."
"Maybe you can't solve it, but it's really obvious to me." Sasuke says, staring down at them both with that awkward - somewhat endearing - look of disdain. He's got an ego on him, that's true.
She ignores Naruto's shouting up at him, and continues herself. She's sure he can hear her, toning out Naruto is an Academy level skill. "Then you're an idiot." She calls him out. "Because it's not a test at all."
"... Huh?" She manages to get both of them to say that.
"We were told we'd be split into teams of three in the academy, even those that didn't get a jonin sensei were still split into three, and that made sense because every other team we've ever heard about was a three person team." She begins. "The hokages had three, the Sannin were three, even Kakashi's old team was three."
"Uh-huh…" Naruto pretends to follow along. See that, that's cute. Running at Kakashi, not cute.
Maybe she can get him treats and start training him to be cute.
"So, he's not splitting us into two and sending one of us back or anything, he just lied." She holds out the set for Sasuke after he jumps down. "They're bluetooth, which does mean if they're within a good range they should be able to connect to the receiver I put in the ground earlier. It's complicated nonsense, don't worry about it. We just have to meet Kakashi at the clearing and stay within that range anytime we need to communicate."
Naruto seems very happy to not have to care. Sasuke gives her a pointed stare.
"It'll stop us from having to yell." She explains, and Sasuke does grasp it… Probably.
"So, he's not splitting us up, which means he's also lying about the objective. We're not going to overpower him, it's just not happening - shut-up Sasuke - it's not." She pointedly points at him.
The boy, to his credit, does shut up.
"The test is either rigged, or it's not, and if it's rigged we have no option which means we can only logically work as if it's not." She explains. "Only play when you can win, if you can't, don't even consider that game."
"So you think it's possible we can't win?" Sasuke asks.
"Yeah, it's very possible our sensei is just an asshole and doesn't like kids." Sakura shrugs. "I'm not sure Jonin are required to take students or anything, maybe he just got saddled with us and wants out."
"And you're saying that doesn't matter?" Sasuke asks.
"Not even a little. We have to work under the assumption the game is rigged in our favor, because in no other situation do our actions matter. It's a split branch scenario with one path. At every step it's either rigged, or it's not, and we have to work with the one where it's not." She pulls out a strange device that's blinking a little bit, and a shovel.
"Now do any of us have a way to turn this shovel into a hole?" She asks.
"I do!" Naruto jumps up, grabbing the shovel.
And suddenly there's fifty shovels and fifty Narutos.
"Gonna need you to be a little bit stealthy." Sakura gulps, staring at it all.
It's incredible.
Ino would trade sides in an instant. There's just so much man here…
Awkward, strange, overly loud man without many redeeming qualities, but she's pretty sure Ino would use the line 'I can fix him.'
That sucked.
That sucked so hardcore.
They won, but it hurt, and now, now she's being carried by Naruto.
"You know, you're pretty strong." She compliments him, snuggling into the grip of the boy holding her aloft. It's comfortable at least. "I think I might be wrong about you."
"Wrong about what?" Naruto asks.
"Don't worry about it." She reaches up and pats his cheek.
"You're gonna be a good teammate. Forget anything bad I've ever said about you, okay?"
"Okay, Sakura." Naruto smiles brightly. It's enough for her to fade away with a smile of her own.
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Self Care, a Dramatic Spar, and the Friendly Fire Kunai
"Am I pretty?" She can't help but ask herself while looking in the mirror. Dull eyes have turned colorful and vibrant, looking right back at her like little gems. The bags under her eyes are gone, her skin has cleaned up, even her forehead looks less big with giant bags no longer such a big part of her defining features. Her skin feels better cared for and the vibrance is back and alive. Yet somehow, she can't help but feel like the mirror is saying no. Pointing out the places where her lack of efforts have resulted in dead or dying parts. Like the mats in her hair, for instance.
"Should I start caring?" It's an odd question. She has no one she wants to impress. Making Ino compliment her looks would probably make her feel nice, but everyone else in her life either already thinks she's pretty or doesn't care in the least how she looks.
She could care for herself, and it might help her mood… "That's it, starting tomorrow, I'm gonna stop procrastinating and buy quality hair products if nothing else." She uses her brush for the first time in months, if not years, and finds she has her work cut out for her.
It's going to suck fixing that, but she likes her hair enough she'll spend the hours to fix it without removing it. It's pink!
It turns out her Dexterity was low enough, and her constitution low enough, that spending three hours gently coaxing knots out of her hair without destroying it gave her a level in each.
Her Constitution is now 27 and her Dexterity is 31.
Here's the thing.
Genin Dexterity
You officially no longer ever fail Academy Student Dexterity Checks.
You do not have to notice the dexterity check is required to pass it.
You do not have to make an attempt, your body will automatically react should it be a check that is considered positive to succeed, or negative to fail.
You can still intentionally fail, if the intentional failure is still an Academy Student Dexterity Check
She's a fan of that. Trying it out in her bedroom she is officially significantly better with her kunai out of nowhere, and her sword feels more natural in her hands.
On the other hand, "Oh shit, it's ten."
Jumping out her window doesn't count as a Dexterity Check, that's Agility. Luckily, 29 is okay for a two story drop.
"What'd I say about seven?" Kakashi asks her at the training ground. "Did you oversleep?"
"I was training my dexterity and performing self care." Sakura explains while standing rigid. "Please do not hit me."
"Why do you think I'm - oh right I said that didn't I." She can almost see a laugh, not that the mask shows much. "You know what, I am going to hit you."
She flinches instinctively, drawing her sword to deflect or block or maybe just not get hit in the face.
"With your teammates." Kakashi explains. "I'm going to hit you with your teammates. You're sparring before today's mission. Here." She finds a wooden sword suddenly appearing in her hands.
No, that's not accurate. It's more like she catches it out of nowhere without even knowing it was there. "And I'll take that." Kakashi uses the moment and her shock to take her crappy sword from her. "I'm going to go return this, since you clearly forgot. When I return in an hour with an actual sword, you better be worn out from your teammates' punches."
"Understood, Kakashi Sensei." She has to resist a salute, as he takes off whistling.
The wind in her hair, her feet firmly on the ground, her wooden sword in her hands and her eyes fully focused on her raven haired teammate; Sakura is scared.
Her hands shake, her boots feel too loose, her new armored equipment feels too heavy and her tunnel vision is screaming at her internally.
He's better than her, she knows that. She wasn't here to set up traps, she doesn't have a plan, and she's entirely sure he can work around a wooden sword. She hasn't been training jutsu or taijutsu or even kenjutsu against real people so she has no idea how this is going to work. Her breathing is uneven, her heart is beating in her ears, and Sasuke just moved like a lightning bolt. Focus, think - she hears the slight crunch of a leaf behind her, and she moves automatically into the motion Kakashi made her memorize. Spinning on her heel and putting her wooden sword up to deflect behind her. She instinctively lowers the wooden blade just enough to match a kick that sends her skidding across the grass even without losing her stance. The force makes her hands throb, echoes and vibrations hitting her core through her bones.
"Good." Sasuke says, foot still outstretched, his dark eyes focused right on her emeralds. "You aren't as bad as back in the academy."
"I fear that I won't be impressing you for long." She huffs, trying to control her breathing and calm the shaking of her hands. She knows he sees it, why isn't he criticizing her?
"I don't care." He admits, lowering his foot and palming a kunai. He spins it with the ring in his fingers, giving it his attention over her. "You're improving. With our team goals, that's all that matters."
"Team goals?" She can't help but ask, racking her brain for when the hell that came up. It's not like she's been here every waking moment, but she has been here some while asleep, so she should know what he's talking about. The fact that he doesn't makes her nose scrunch, and she can't help but notice the eagerness to Sasuke's figure.
He's shaking too, but not out of fear.
Naruto shouts out for her. He's got a dozen gender altered clones with pigtails in cheerleading outfits cheering her on. It's cute and makes her blush, even if it's too stupid for her to give much attention. She can feel the way the air moves around her, he's going to move soon, and she needs to intercept it.
Now.
Her step forward and slash is just in time for him to dart towards her. Their distance was great, but he's incredibly fast, meaning that by the time her follow through is completed he's had to jump to the side entirely. A kunai is thrown at her side, and she deflects it without even looking at it. Her hands move on their own, the blade of her wooden sword catching the ring of the kunai as it passes. Her next move is instinctive too, she spins just enough to get a nice additional motion to the sword, and she uses that attack to send the kunai flying back at him just as he charges at her.
All around, she's not sure how badass that looked, but she really hopes Kakashi is secretly taping this so she can check.
Thunk
"Gah-"
Thud
Her blinking at his form on the ground is only as awkward as Naruto's cheering getting louder.
"What?" She can't help but ask, as he pushes himself off the dirt, a kunai embedded very seriously in his arm.
"That was awesome." Also not the feedback she was expecting. "How'd you use enough force to knock me over?"
"I ate my wheaties." She shrugs.
Just in time for him to glare at her and for the tone to shift in an instant.
He darts in and she is barely able to block one punch, block a second, and have to jump back before a kick would crush her ribs and send her out of the fight. Possibly the day. She's pretty sure Sasuke's not supposed to go that hard.
She's also pretty sure she pissed him off. Was that not okay?
Talk shit, get hit? She thought he'd appreciate the joke!
Another kick lands right where she just was, her body only barely dodging to the side and sending her onto the ground. Rolling over is just well timed enough to get out of the way of a downwards kick that breaks the ground and kicks up dirt. "Shit!"
Yeah she pissed him off.
She throws her sword up so she can use both her hands to push her up when she rolls over. She has to use all her strength, which sends her a little in the air, which means flipping to get her orientation correctly. She manages to catch her sword on its way down, but not in time to avoid a kick to the side of the head that sends her spinning. She tastes iron, a little copper, and far too much rage to control herself.
She's never been hit that hard before.
Not once.
Kakashi's definitely holding back, and that makes her more angry than it should.
She manages to stay standing after her feet touch the ground and skid, just barely, blinking bleary tears from her eyes and ignoring the sting just as his foot tries to imbed itself in her face again. She barely has time to adjust her footing, sidestepping the kick, and slam the sword into the bottom of his knee. It's enough to hear a crack, and more than enough to stun him.
He's better than her. That much is clear.
What he's not, is used to taking a hit.
She's learned to do that pretty well recently.
She takes his moment of being stunned to dart forward the small distance between his knee and his face, raising the sword, and smashing his nose with the handle of the sword.
The crunch she hears is definitely way too far for a spar, Kakashi's gonna be pissed.
In her defense, Sasuke started it. Hot blood splashes her face and covers her arm, and she can't help but feel really bad watching him squirm on the ground. He's leaking like a pissy octopus, and she can't help but look to Naruto for help.
"Sorry, Sasuke." She finds herself slurring, her own words half gargled. She reaches up, and she's bleeding a lot more than he is.
Her entire mouth is pouring.
"Kakashi's gonna be pissed." She groans. That's a tooth. Who the fuck kicks their teammate that hard?
"Okay, now that we've all received medical attention." Kakashi glares at them with his domineering single eye, but she can't help but smile so brightly. Her smile'll be better tomorrow, she's sure, she's not looking forward to explaining how her tooth is back.
She doesn't care that she's got a big fang missing, she's super giddy. "Kicked Sasuke's ass." She is so proud of herself.
And oddly enough.
"You did." Sasuke is too. "Sorry about that, you surprised me."
"I noticed." She titters.
She was gonna spar Naruto next, but uh… Ow. She is sad she didn't gain any skill points from that, but she can't get something every time she swings a sword. She's sure she gained tons of experience towards Con, Agi, and Dex though.
"Sakura, here is a real sword." Kakashi says as he hands her something incredible.
The bright red tassel tips her off, as does the dark red scabbard. It's a rather plain design, but it's one she recognizes easily.
She unsheathes a blade, admiring how it's practically glowing with blood red markings and glowing symbols all the way from its tip down to a little before the two handed handle. It requires her full grip, and she has to admire it with a few swings quicker than reason would dictate for such a big sword.
"Did you get me the chaos blade?" She can't help but ask, her cheeks hotter than a summer day, the flames spreading down her neck aggressively. "This is way too much…" She gulps, it looks so professional. It's not just custom made to fit an iconic weapon from an iconic game.
It looks master crafted, and she can feel its weight in her hand like it's an extension of herself. It feels good, really good. Incredible. "Why do you have this?"
She knows he didn't get it for her, she showed up with a sword yesterday and having a custom made blade of this quality would take weeks at the least. Months even?
"I have my ways." He winks at her with his one lone eye, and for once instead of annoyance at it she can't help but feel a little spark of worship. "Now you have it. Be careful, I hear it's thirsty."
"Haha, Kakashi…" She has to wipe away some tears that threaten to flow from her, for the second time today, though this time is very different. "I'll make you proud."
"I'm sure you will." He reaches out, and pats her, unable to miss the way she flinches even while smiling like a loon and holding his gift. "I should lay off on the smacks, huh." He decides quickly. "Ready for your second D rank mission?"
"You mean my first?" She jokes.
"Yes."
"I was going to ask for a C rank mission, since you all did so well last time." Kakashi says, while holding out their D rank document for them. "But since I can't trust you to spar without ending up in the hospital, I don't want to know what happens when you fight bandits."
Sakura wishes that wasn't fair.
Unfortunately as she's learned a lot recently, reality doesn't work that way. "I defended myself." Sakura huffs, unable to look Kakashi in the eyes as she spouts some bullshit.
"I got a little carried away." She really doesn't like Sasuke being so agreeable.
Really scares her. "But she definitely broke my nose on purpose."
"I mean, yeah but…" Her cherry cheeks are not helpful to her level of portrayed confidence.
"So a D rank mission, so we can train in some teamwork and basic respect." Kakashi says. "It is only your second day as an actual team, it's understandable."
It's not. They fucked up, bad, and Kakashi is being really nice. She mopes in being in the wrong, and reads their mission.
"We need to open a pickle jar?" She asks. "A jar."
"It's a hard job." Kakashi says.
"So do we need to use a special technique or…" Naruto asks.
"Just a really tight jar." Kakashi denies. "It's enough of a pain that she paid for a D rank mission, so expect a fight."
"... A jar?" Sasuke agrees with them in the only way possible.
Pure befuddlement.
"Do-do-dooo!" Kakashi is skipping behind them with all the childlike glee and wonder of Naruto in a candy store. He finds the concept of them coming all the way out here for a jar that exciting, that while they trudge like half dead corpses, he could not be happier without coming off cartoonish. He even has his own little jingle he keeps whistling and mumbling whenever they so much as look at him.
"This is ridiculous." Sasuke grunts, glaring at the air in front of them like it insulted him personally.
"I bet it's gonna be a really hard conquest." Naruto is ever optimistic. "I bet she has multiple jars, and each one is harder than the last. Like some kind of jar based trial."
"I wish I shared your enthusiasm." Is all she can say. "But that'd be illegal, since she clarified one jar."
"Not true." Kakashi says. "Lying about the mission details is not a crime."
"Wha-"
"It's to prevent forgetful old ladies and terrified people with bad memories from being punished, and to stop ninja from abandoning missions if things go a little off plan." Kakashi explains. "Mission details are to help you decide to do the mission, and to help you prepare for the mission. It's only a crime when the omitted or lied about detail changes the rank of the mission."
"Ah…" She can understand that, kind of.
Sounds kind of dumb though. Who buys a mission without being sure what the mission is?
"Part of your job on a mission is evaluating what you actually have to do, and determining if the mission is within the boundaries of that mission class." Kakashi continues cheerfully. "It's why you write reports. The village trusts you, you're its private ninja, the village doesn't trust them."
"Does that mean Anbu don't write reports?" Sakura asks.
"I hear they do-" Kakashi seems rather befuddled by everyone's immediately snickering, but continues anyway "- but only to ensure the Hokage and direct superiors share all that important information from the super important mission. The reports are burned quickly thereafter, to prevent identities from being leaked if the stack of paperwork is ever discovered."
"Right." Sakura teases, "that makes sense, you totally just figured that out and heard about it."
"I did." He defends. "I heard that with my own ears."
None of them decide to finish that sentence, specifically the part about how it was from the Hokage when learning about his new job.
"How many is a C rank?" Sakura asks.
"How many what?" Kakashi asks.
"How many jars before it's a C rank?" She continues.
"..."
"It's my job to evaluate, how many jars, Kakashi?"
Their sensei dead sprints away, causing them to run after him shouting "How many jars!!"
Things make a lot more sense once they get to the house. They're met outside by an older lady with hair so gray it's white, enough wrinkles to make a tree look smooth, and a cane that she's putting most of her weight on. The house behind her is massive, and shows off a lot of wealth, wealth that Sakura can't find the 'how' for. This isn't a farm, it's really outside town so there's no way she's a merchant, and there's no evidence of hired employees or family anywhere around. In fact, if there were hired employees - implicating some business - she likely wouldn't have hired them.
All this to say, an old lady alone in the woods with a lot of money hired them for something simple.
That makes sense, that's what a D rank is supposed to be.
Sakura finds herself equal parts disappointed, and relieved. No flaming potatoes today. They chased her for a while, Naruto was not efficient at stopping their onslaught and Sasuke's fire was meaningless.
Following the woman in, she's clearly not hiring them just for a social moment as she leads them right to this demon jar. The jar of no-opening, the enchanted Plus three jar of never release. Some use glue, some use friction, and some use magic.
What'll it be? No one knows!
She does, it's friction. But she could be wrong! And that idea is very exciting. Naruto jumps right at the jar, while she tries to calm the customer with her potent social skills. "So, where are your kids?"
"Dead." She rolled a nat one! She did it everybody!
"Dead as in, err, to you? Like-"
"Eaten alive by ferocious beasts." The woman says quickly while someone bangs the jar around behind her. The objective was to open the jar, not shatter it, but the client isn't speaking up so it's not her job to stop them.
"Well that's just sad." Low charm or not, she's pretty sure this one isn't her fault, just bad luck. So she gives a sheepish laugh, rubs the back of her now smooth hair as of this morning, and cringes when she hears a glass thunk and kunai tear through flesh. She spins on a dime to see Naruto bent over on the floor out of breath and laughing at the last Uchiha like he just saw the funniest thing ever.
She gets why. "Sasuke, why?" She observes the now bleeding boy, observes his arm, observes the exact same spot she stabbed him earlier and notes the exact same kunai is embedded there again. He should probably throw that one away, it's the friendly fire Kunai.
She then stares at the undefeated jar that just assaulted him with his own kunai.
"I thought the kunai ring would shatter the glass." He admits, blade still stuck in his arm. To his credit, he barely seems to notice it. "Naruto, wasn't getting it."
"Naruto, go clean Sasuke up in wherever this woman's bathroom is." She orders, and doesn't think much of it when they both run off. Kakashi has his eye on her, but that's okay. She's been the limelight of his attention a lot recently.
"Please do not sword the jar." Kakashi feels the need to say as she approaches it.
"I'm not stupid, Kakashi." She snickers, while immediately moving onto Plan B. She settles her fingers on the jar, and gets a faint quirk of Kakashi's fierce gaze when the lid begins to spin. She barely has to channel her chakra at all, isn't even sure how she's doing it until she takes a moment to pay attention and feel it flowing around.
Click.
Pop.
She lifts the jar up, admiring how her chakra has it stuck to her fingers, and smiles brightly as the old lady claps for her.
"Now I can eat my pickles!"
It's a dumb victory, she can't say she's proud of herself, or that she made a significant impact on anyone's life. But she did figure out a new technique.
She can now provide downward force, magnetic force, and swirling force with her chakra, and it really only took a few seconds to figure out all three. Two Hundred Control is no joke.
Now if only she knew how to explain that to Kakashi without sounding actively crazy.
Shit.
Chaos Blade
Epic
A blade that gets stronger the more awake and alive the user is.
It feeds off its users strength, meaning prolonged use could result in untimely demise.
Should be used with furious badassness, and excessive caution.
It's thirsty.
Friendly Fire Kunai
Uncommon
Some say this Kunai thirsts for blood, but it's actually just owned by a moron.
"The next mission for Team 7 is, an errand to the neighboring town... to baby-sit the chief councilor's boy." She hears the Hokage speak, and while she cringes inside at yet another boring D rank mission, she can't deny that it's probably wise. It's only been a month since she and Sasuke put each-other in the hospital over a friendly spar, it's not like they can be trusted. Doesn't stop her from failing to hold in her disappointment in her air flow, but that's the price of being her.
"Enough! I want to do something exciting! We already did a C rank mission, remember, we can handle something like that!" Naruto shouts. His hand outstretches and points right to the Hokage.
"You fool, you're still bottom rookie, everyone moves up the ladder by gaining experience with simple missions!" Iruka of all people shouts, slamming his hands on the desk and standing right up to growl at them all in the instructor way he's known for.
Sadly for him, they're not his students anymore. They don't have to care, and she doesn't.
"But we've gotten experience, Sakura's not even wearing the same outfit anymore!" Naruto shouts. "That's development!"
She is in fact, not wearing the same outfit anymore. A fact that suddenly makes her rather self conscious as everyone looks at her. It's still pink, she wanted to keep that. Her bubblegum aesthetic is bright and happy and makes her feel good about herself when she looks in the mirror. But a long cloth almost skirt has been replaced with bright shorts and long armored mesh leggings. They came in fishnet or actual chainmail, and she figured fishnet was better because who the fuck wears chainmail openly as a design choice? Her shoes are of much higher quality, and her top, while still flowing over a little, has been changed to wear the Uzumaki, Uchiha, and Haruno crest in a triangle on her back and front.
She wasn't aware that the Uzumaki had a damn crest until she went to the library for a day with Naruto and he decided he wanted to learn about his past family. Apparently having a family now made him really want to know, so here she is, wearing the past sins and achievements of his family just like she does hers.
Her family crest? It's nothing special, it's a leaf with a carriage. They used to be merchants apparently, and when they switched over to ninjas to protect their home they kept the idea. She's vibrant, she's bubblegum, she's supportive of her teammates. A glance at Sasuke says he wants a better mission too. They've gotten so much better, and not just in skill. They've had an entire extra month of paychecks come in, and the quality of her gear has gotten a ton better if nothing else. There's not a single thing she wears today that she owned last month, besides her Chaos blade at her side.
She's found it actually does drain her life to use it. There's a lot of cool factors to it. Kakashi got her an actual magic sword, and by kami's word she intends to fucking use it!
"Naruto, let me enlighten you to the nature of missions." The Hokage says. "Requests pour into the village every day. They range from babysitting, to assassinations... A wide spectrum of requests are recorded on the request list-"
The Hokage continues explaining the rules of the universe to her teammate while she checks on her equipment, idly listens in on Naruto talk about his ramen order - she'll be joining him for it so it's kinda important - and thinks back on a conversation a couple weeks ago. It's technically rude to ignore the Hokage, but she already knows all this, and so should he actually since he passed the academy.
Team goals, Sasuke had said them so offhandedly, he expected her to know.
She didn't, and she was too afraid to ask and reveal that she'd slept through whatever lecture. It wasn't until she managed to corner Kakashi alone after training one day that she got an answer.
They're going to kill Itachi. She didn't know who that was, but they all agreed - her included - they'd help Sasuke murder some random dude. Naruto had probably misunderstood, she wasn't awake, and now they have an objective.
Looking into this man, they stand no chance. Sleeping or in full fighting gear, it doesn't matter to Itachi, the fight would go exactly the same. He would actually prefer they be ready for the fight because that'd be less walking from house to house.
But that's okay. Itachi's a missing nin, and without the help of a village, missing ninja don't tend to get better. They still can, they'll get stronger, and one day they'll kill a man she hadn't even heard of until not too long ago. It's sad she still has Sasuke Trivia Expert and not its enhanced version, but she's been talking to him more, she's been supportive, and she really thinks she's making ground.
She's been wrong about Sasuke for years. He's not an asshole.
He's an idiot hiding it by staying quiet. She has two idiots on her team, they're her idiots.
Hence the crest. That's the real reason she was assigned to this team, because she's an idiot too. At least social, and they're all supposed to become people together… Or at least one moderately functional person.
"Huh? Listen!" The Hokage shouts, while Naruto rambles about lunch.
And it occurs to her. No one was paying attention. Not even Kakashi. They might be in trouble.
"Maaaaan, you always lecture me, old man!" Naruto says. "But I'm not some little prankster like you think, we already did a C rank, give us a C rank! We didn't even need Kakashi's help."
"You destroyed an entire farm field." Kakashi points out.
"The farm field was attacking!" Naruto argues.
Sakura pulls a drink from her pouch, and has a sip. Fizzy and orange. Is it good? No, don't store soda in a flask, that's dumb. It makes her look distinguished though.
"Man, I'm gonna get scolded later for this." Kakashi sighs as he rubs the back of his head. Her gaze focuses on those fingers, she's found anytime he's doing something there's a secondary purpose. Kakashi never just does something. Her parents were right, he could probably teach her to breathe better.
Sadly she can't determine the reason for this action.
"Okay, fine!" The Hokage shouts with dignity only the hat could give.
"Huh?" It's not just Sakura.
Sasuke and Naruto all look up.
"If you insist, I'll have you do a C rank mission." The Hokage announces. "But it's gonna be terrible."
"I like terrible things." Sakura shrugs.
"Terrible does sound amusing at least." Sasuke agrees.
"Go terrible!" Naruto jumps in the air and throws a fist up.
"Gonna get scolded so much." Kakashi complains. They find their charge, passed out outside of a bar, covered in piss. It's not exactly a dignified place for him to be, but his mission is in an odd place. It's long term so it's a C rank, and there is some danger, but it's mostly just an easy but long mission. This means people capable of doing C rank missions have turned it down because they'd rather have something quicker, and those not capable of doing D ranks weren't assigned it.
They're officially an in-between.
"This is who we're guarding?" Sakura asks, kicking the man on the ground. He rolls over just in time to vomit in response. "Really, this is our reward?"
"He needs guarding." Kakashi shrugs.
"Looks like he really, really, needs guarding." Sasuke quips. "Does anyone know a quick trick to get sober?"
"He's doing it." Kakashi points. "He'll be sober in a bit."
"It looks like he's projectile vomiting." Naruto's face turns a little green at the statement, looking away.
"Exactly, he's sobering up." Kakashi says. "I have a friend inside I should meet with. Someone get him cleaned up while I do that."
Sakura groans and rolls her eyes while Kakashi disappears, leaving the hard work to them as always. "Come on Naruto, it's not the first time we've been tasked with taking care of a drunk person." Her hands land on the guy and pull him back so he's sitting up at least. The man burps, before emptying his guts a little more. "Clean him up real quick." She orders. She lets go to palm her face, while her teammate gets right to it. He's gotten incredible this past month.
But so has she.
It's been a month, and she doesn't even feel like the same person.
Sakura Haruno
HP
96
Chakra
32
Strength
35
Constitution
32
Dexterity
36
Agility
35
Mental
94
Control
200
Charm
10
She's worked her cute tush off every day. Spars that haven't ended up in the hospital, training with her gear, sleeping well, training with her sword, training with her practice sword.
Endless exercise, endless socializing - well for her at least it felt endless it was really more like a full conversation a day which is nuts - and so much more.
She hasn't had time to train techniques really, it's been fully the basics from sun up to sun down - and the odd game of course - and she feels better for it. She's also super happy they have a mission now and she gets to take a break. Her switch is held soundly in her pouch, and she's so excited she gets to use it!
She has gained a few traits and skills though.
She's happy about those.
Genin Constitution
"Stand your ground, Sakura. You will not fall, you will not fail, you will hold until your bones turn to dust and your blood dries around you. Your feet will not move, your stance will not falter, and you will not die."
You take 1/2 damage from any attacks at Genin level, and do not take any damage from attacks below Genin level. This bonus applies before armor checks. Armor checks reduce both a flat damage and percentage now.
[Positive] [Can be Upgraded]
Genin Agility
You are fast, fast enough to be paid for it. You're professionally fast.
You no longer need to speed up. You can go from still to top speed in an instant.
[Positive] [Can be Upgraded]
Genin Chakra
You now possess the Chakra of a full fledged genin. You may now advance E and D rank techniques with enough practice, and you may learn C rank techniques without immediately passing out. You may also use chakra equipment.
[Positive] [Can be Upgraded]
Sadly she's still pretty far behind on Charm so she's not sure if there's a set bonus, but she's happy to be here so she doesn't have much to complain about there. The Constitution in particular makes her smile, and genin Chakra is really nice. Specifically, the part about equipment. Her Chaos Blade wasn't active until she got it, but holy hell is it active now.
She intends to use it on this mission.
Kenjutsu Moderate
You officially know more than the basics of Kenjutsu, and you can show it off. The weapon flows in your hand naturally and instinctively, and you suffer bonuses in combat for holding your sword. You do a quarter damage to yourself in the event of a sword accident. You are dangerous.
Sleeping +
You find it easy to get to sleep, and need less sleep. You awaken from a full rest with a reset state, and gain minor buffs for the first few hours of being awake.
A Reset is Accrued after a full 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep.
Scan Minor
You may now access the full name and threat level of anyone you target and focus on for five seconds. If the target is famous, you may now access their bingo book entry mentally.
Gaming +
Reflex training and regular sessions have made you highly proficient in gaming. You improve at an incredible rate with any game you put your mind to. You couldn't go pro, but you could nip at their heels if you put in effort.
It's not all amazing, but it is progress. Great progress.
Time to go kill Ita-wait, no, time to escort a drunk.
You are leaving the tutorial zone. Random Encounters will now spawn. The further you are from your official village, the more frequent and strong these may be.
It's with her footsteps on the path that the warning appears. She has to look up from her Switch, and she dies in-game, but that's fine. Using a game mid-mission means she'll have to pause or blatantly drop it sometimes. She's a professional now, she won't miss things for the pause button.
She kinda wishes she'd missed this notification though. That's a terrible sign, but at least they're not going very far from the village. She can handle some basic Academy student level random encounters-
It's with a splash at her feet that her attention is drawn down. She's standing directly in a muddle puddle, and not one that's surface deep. It feels like it goes on forever, and only her skills and traits let her stand on the side of it and not get sucked deep in. "Ewww, I think there was something meaty in this." She rubs her foot a bit in the puddle, trying to wipe it off. "It's thick… Wait, it hasn't rained in…"
"Sakura, you're holding us up." Kakashi calls out to her.
"Right, sorry." She rushes after them. They come for her. She's not sure what she did to piss these two off, but after a bright and brilliant display where Kakashi totally gets caught off guard by something she noticed - yep, uh-huh, not hiding in the trees at all - a chain made of shuriken appears in mid air flying towards her. She knows, analytically, that it's attached to something, but all she can see is blade and she doesn't have time to think about it.
Her skills don't activate, so it's not Genin level. That doesn't stop Genin Agility. She goes from standing to back first in the dirt in less than a second, and the chain passes over her. Jumping to her feet, she jumps away from everyone else and finds it comes back for her. Naruto and Sasuke are guarding Tabini, or, uh, Takuno, or, no, their drunk. Naruto and Sasuke are watching their new drunk, so getting away from them while the fight is focusing on her is the correct move. So she jumps back, again, and again, and before long she's made enough distance to see the two monsters chasing her. She keeps up the distance for just long enough-
Gozu and Meizu; Genin boss fight
Threat Level Moderately Dangerous
She reads their bingo book entry in less than a second, her abilities really kicking into gear and letting her take in information like she's a savant. Their clawed gauntlets are poisoned, those chains can disconnect their links if needed, and both are specifically focused on fighting together.
She genuinely isn't that intimidated. It's not that they're weak. Despite the statement about it being a genin boss fight, she's sure they're chunin.
But they're also missing nin. They're defects, and they're in the wrong damn country.
She draws her sword, and charges.
"Idiot." She hears one chide her as they get close, planning to wrap around her and her sword and tear her to bits. Her sword glows a vibrant red, blood flowing from her hand and flowing up its sigils. The stench of copper fills the air in a way that once again gives away that Kakashi isn't dead. It should already smell like death, but it doesn't.
It smells like righteous fury. She goes right through the chain. Her sword doesn't even count it as a hit. The blood glows brighter as she moves onward, turning around to face them confidently as they realize their chain is dragging on the ground and slowing them down. Not a nick in her sword, just suddenly scared chunin mooks. She grins brightly, her bubblegum aesthetic playing very oddly with the bright red glow of a demonic blood sacrifice.
That doesn't stop them from charging. "Sasuke!" She shouts, and Meizu jumps to the side to avoid a fireball.
She's not worried about it. It's a genin attack. She charges through the fireball without an ounce of hesitation. Flames at her heels, clothes igniting, sword catching the chakra and sucking some of it up as her blood turns to charcoal on her blade. He's not expecting her on the other side, still halfway through the air with wide eyes. "You crazy bi-" He doesn't get to finish his sentence.
Her sword replaces his vocal cords too quickly, and her grin stains crimson before his corpse parts hit the ground. Ninja fights are all about moments like that. Kenjutsu for a ninja isn't like a normal sword fight, it's about becoming an opportunity and cutting a path true and hidden. Her skin hurts, her clothing is a little worse for wear, but she's standing on her toes watching the remaining brother stare with wide eyes and an agape mouth at the still falling remains of what was once a person.
She takes a step towards him with a vicious grin, and finds he chases towards her in a blind fury. "Naruto." She orders, and he finds himself surrounded by a hundred clones in an instant.
A hundred clones which hold him down just long enough for her to drag her sword across the ground. It scrapes with every step, loudly echoing a damned sentiment. The man claws clones left and right while she approaches, fear in his eyes fully realized as he grasps there's more clones than there is distance.
She lifts the sword at the held down man, her eyes glowing a bright red, and the world filled with lust for chaos sees a dark eclypse.
The sword drops. "I don't really know what that was about." Kakashi admits. "I felt for sure they were targeting Tazuna, but they wouldn't leave you alone. I guess it really wasn't about him."
"I'm too pretty to ignore." She excuses, knowing damn well it was a random encounter. "At least our charge is safe."
"We'll have to take a look when we get back to the village." Kakashi says. "Ask around and make sure you're not wanted somewhere for some reason."
"I can look." Sasuke offers.
A month ago she might have hugged him for offering genuine help out of nowhere. It's so out of character she'd want to make sure he still wasn't into her. Now, it's just normal Sasuke, well, with caveats.
With that, Sakura mouths a silent apology to Tazuna for bringing her crazy into his life, and gets ready for a long journey. It should be fine from here though, right?
It's not like the encounters scale that quickly, it's only a couple days of walking.
She couldn't go anywhere if it scaled that rapidly. That'd be stupid.
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Death Does Not Distinguish Between The Feeble Or The Brave
AN: Normally I'd have it in a spoiler, or in the message after, but it's very important that you take what I'm about to say seriously. This story is not a comedy, this story is funny.
This chapter is not funny. This chapter is very serious. This chapter contains a very bad no good time for Sakura and I don't skip over it. It has artistic merit, but if you're a very squeamish person or you feel a little overwhelmed, take a moment. Stop reading, go get some water, do some jumping jacks.
Or skip to the next linebreak, you'll get the gist pretty damn quick.
"This is stupid." Sakura thought the fact that they had to sneak into the village under a fog while being silent on a ship was kind of weird, but then being stealthy is good for bodyguarding someone so she hadn't said anything against it. The mist had felt nice in her hair, and she'd managed to sit around and go over basic tactics with Naruto and Sasuke while Kakashi kept an eye out. Tactics have become a passtime for them. It's given her time to correct certain problems, like Naruto thinking Chakra is pronounced Chatora. Chatora.
She repeats. Cha-tora. He graduated from the Academy. Being the best student in the Academy suddenly became meaningless because he passed while others failed.
A boy who didn't know how Chakra was defined passed the same test she aced. It's like finding out you're king of the idiots when you think you're a genius!
It makes sense though, ninja can't have a crazy high bar or there wouldn't be enough ninja. It just hurt to find out. Without her stats to prove she's smart she might have gone into a crisis over it. When Sasuke played along and pretended he didn't know how to pronounce it either, she almost drew her blade.
Back to the really stupid, that's not it, this is even dumber she's just easily distracted while panicking.
The fact that the hair that had burned off is back and the burns covering her skin from jumping through one of Sasuke's fireballs is fixed did seem to bother, well, everyone, but it wasn't the first time and no one had questioned it then either. A ninja is allowed to have secrets.
This is bullshit.
Naruto had almost killed a bunny, jealously trying to show off to her after she took charge during her previous fight. She hadn't even had time to really yell at him, before Kakashi's words clicked in her ears. "Get down!" He'd shouted, and for some reason, all she could think about were her boys behind her. She could hit the ground, but could they without Genin Agility?
Her heart pumping and her adrenaline coursing; she drew her sword and gave her all to block the force against them. It came from the sky, a masterwork blade sent to behead her and everyone with her. It was so huge, just its spin had her weapon grinding against it hard enough for sparks to fly. She knew she was losing though, even with the reflexive blood loss from the Chaos blade's activation, she was barely holding herself up against it. So she did something Kakashi told her not to do without good reason. She channeled more. She bled into the blade, begged for its power and let out a scream as agony racked her body from head to toe. Sipping her life force, it came to life in the split second between calling it and finding her target. This lesser, giant, needless sword crashing against hers.
Only half a second had passed but she'd let out a battlecry and she wasn't going to hold back when she had no way of knowing if Naruto and Sasuke had fallen to the ground behind her. No, it was up to her, and her vision saw red.
For all of that second. Before the titan of a weapon still forcing itself against her glowed. She barely had time to see what was going on, before the blood sucked right from her weapon into it. "Wha-"
She didn't even get a half a second to figure out what just happened, before she was gone.
Mission failed, and she didn't even have time to realize it and check on the boys before she couldn't see them anymore.
She felt bushes tear through her on the way back, the momentum kept her going through them like they were simply paper in the way. She felt grassy ground smacking against her feet, her attempts to stop herself by slamming her feet down meaningless against the insane momentum of the powerful attack. The world had kicked up, and just her feet trying to bleed off momentum destroyed her shoes within seconds and knocked enough dirt into the air to blind her.
Back to the present. The stupid bullshit.
"Fuaaa!" She doesn't get to grasp anything else.
Pure hatred flows through her, hatred and pain so great she can't comprehend it. Her vision goes white, red, black, and blue all at once. Her sense of color is destroyed in the moment it takes her to realize she's not blocking anymore and is instead slammed against a tree by her back.
It's not a flash of pain, that'd be exaggerating in the wrong way. Her barely lucid moments are so painful her vast vocabulary lacks a word for it. She doesn't know where it hurts, she can't tell, the system that tells her that information has left the building and dropped the keys in the trash on the way out.
It doesn't end. Ninja are trained to take pain and to block it out. Every Academy student knows how to ignore a punch, and by genin you can handle a pretty deep stab or cut with a kunai without locking up. She once blocked out the pain of Kakashi breaking her nose and took a nap in Naruto's arms. She invited Naruto into her home, she saw him get a mother, she saw him learn from a father. She saw that mother learn his nuances, and comfort him time and time again when he wasn't sure if he belonged in any given moment.
It's a faint smile at the fond memory that allows her eyes to close-
And then shoot the fuck back open as she realizes what that is, her recent life flashing through her eyes while she gives up at her core. "I refuse." She manages to get out, or at least she thinks she does between all the screaming. Her head pounds and she manages to blink through the tears to get a moment of her surroundings.
She hears the clashing of kunai, screams - those are hers -, Naruto's shouting something and Kakashi's barking commands. Naruto's alive, that's good, and since he's not catatonic she can assume Sasuke's still alive too.
She locks them out of her brain, they're her idiots but they're also her greatest distraction and her focus is fading really fast.
It's not in her shoulders, that'd be reasonable from the jar of trying to block that and failing, but it's not there. It's not from her back, that'd make sense having smashed into a tree full force, but it's not there either. It's when her hands land on a pool of her blood and the sparky power of the Chaos blade that she realizes exactly what it is.
Her sword is in her stomach, flaring to life and using her life force as power against her. A cool idea she'll need to try sometime against a superior enemy, but also a death sentence. She needs that out, and she needs it out now. Fuck conventional medical wisdom, she will die.
She bites her lip hard enough to draw blood just to try and distract herself, unable to do anything but whimper. That is until she hears another scream - this one not hers - and her desire to get back up and fight wins out over her overwhelming inner desire to give up and fade from this.
She'd thought the demon twins had made a lot of blood, and to be fair she had cut them both in half so they certainly did, but seeing a weak idiot taken down mostly by Naruto - she'd really only done the stabbing a held down person part - dead on the ground and seeing her own blood trail off far enough in the distance it disappears into the bushes… Well, they're different experiences.
She reaches around her to get her bandages and a chakra pill. It might not help much later, but the energy would be really helpful right now. That's what she tries to do anyway, before she realizes it's impossible. A quick look shows her why.
Her sword isn't 'inside her stomach,' her blade is speared through her and halfway into the damn tree behind her. Her pack is speared with it, making it impossible to slip it off or move and she's too crammed against it to cut it off using the stuck weapon. "If I get through this, haah, I'm getting a front pocket, and I'm putting medical supplies there!"
Her only saving grace is that the Chaos Blade is her weapon, which means it's only been one fourth the damage because of Kenjutsu Moderate. That's not a comforting thought, but it is helpful information. This'd suck four times more for anyone else. She quickly vows to force this on whoever did this to her.
She feels like she's on death's doorstep. If it had been anything else, well, she doesn't wanna think about it. Pulling up her stat sheet, she's happy to report she has about twenty health. Which is - nevermind, nineteen, it's lowering - more than enough for her to try and figure this out. She has a max of ninety six right now, which means she took almost eighty damage there. Just a month ago, she'd be dead right now.
"The only health point that matters is the last one." She grunts, while wondering about something very important. How does this HP thing work? She hasn't had a lot of chances to test it, or, more like she hasn't been insane enough to test it. Jumping through fire to freak out Sasuke, training new techniques, cutting herself on accident with Kenjutsu, none of that's given her a definitive answer.
If she pulls the sword out of her, will she bleed to death?
Eighteen life. She doesn't really have much of a choice. "Ghaa! Bullshit!" She shouts as the weapon inside her charges meaninglessly. She's really hopeful it doesn't do some kind of giant laser attack if it sucks enough of her blood. Leaning forward and lodging the piece into her a little strongly, so she can get at the hilt. "Fuck…" She pushes it away, and she does have some success, but that brings about another issue.
Now she has to lean more forward to push it.
And more. Every single inch another cause of agony, and another moment that might be killing her. She remembers basic first aid, there's a reason every ninja has to have bandages on them.
This is the dumbest idea ever, but while her hyperactive sword is inside her, she is going to die. Her team is too distracted by whatever the hell that was, and it's that thought that pushes her forward.
"Guh-okay, just-"
It's with another push that the overly long sword is out of the tree, the scrape rending wood well. She's grateful the weapon is so sharp or she'd be kinda screwed. allowing her to weakly push herself to her feet. Standing up allows her to push the sword out in a very different way, using gravity. Unfortunately, her life force likes following gravity too, and she feels the warmth overtake her feet just as the sword hits the ground completely. She holds one hand to the wound, and turns a little to try to get at her pack now that it's not stuffed under both the weapon and tree.
It's too much. "Okay I just need-" That's all she gets before she finds herself on the floor of a forest, forgetting her own name. Blearily, she tries to make out reality, she tries to save herself.
She tries to get through this now that the hard part is over. She can't. The adrenaline that coursed through her to get this far left with what little blood she had left to lose when the sword clattered helplessly to the ground. At least she knows she's one with the sword, as she mimed it just a second later. "Just a little more…" She mumbles to herself, watching her HP hit eight without anything she can do. None of her words reach her brain, and none of her desires or fears hit her body.
She got the sword out, now she's going to die. Question answered; yes, she will bleed to death.
Tears fill her eyes all over again, and she feels something touch her. It's vague, frozen.
It's so cold…
From what little her eyes can see, there's a mask peering over her. A white mask, with a red tendril around the middle. "Don't take me." She begs the specter peering over her in her final moments. "Not like it matters what I say." Against her will, her eyes close, and all she can do is hope the demon that has come for her soul is merciful.
Her dreams are filled with bloodshed and agony. The moment is so real even now that she replays it over and over. She was stuck against that tree for maybe thirty seconds, and yet she's sure that even without the sharingan she'll never, ever, forget even a single detail of her death. She was an afterthought in someone else's battle. One bad call and her own power destroyed her. Why did the blood she'd given her sword get absorbed by the giant horse chopper?
She has no idea, but it doesn't matter.
She'd have to be alive for it to matter.
"It seems I've overused my Sharingan." She hears Kakashi's beautiful voice, as her eyes slowly open. She's in a strange place, with a wooden plank ceiling. She can hear birds outside, and the world is so warm right now. It's not worth paying attention to though, because Kakashi sounding exhausted is much more important. Specifically, Kakashi sounding anything except pissed she got herself killed is important. "It's too bad I can't regenerate, unlike a certain someone."
"I died." She finds herself softly mumbling. "This isn't regeneration, this is some kind of unholy, possession kinda thing. People are supposed to die when they are killed. Am I a shitty ghost now? Was I ever alive?" Her thoughts race as her heart does. She doesn't give herself even a moment to take in the fresh smells of being alive before the panic from the dreams hits her at full force.
"Stop complaining about living." Kakashi scolds her, and she nuzzles her pillow with her full face, holding back tears and a retort in the same way one resists an angry 'I hate you' at their father. "Some of us have to deal with consequences."
"... Yeah, sorry." Letting your fellow ninja keep their secrets is a common rule of thumb in a ninja village. Even your students. The first time Kakashi noticed her healing was after Sasuke knocked her tooth out. She'd genuinely thought he was going to pin her down and torture information out of her, he hadn't. He'd just said when she was ready to tell them what was up, he'd be happy to listen.
Now, she's pretty sure she owes him an explanation. But not right now, now, this pillow is so comfy, and this world is so warm and real and not super fucking dead! Who knew not dying when you die felt good! "Who saved me?" She asks. "From the ground I mean, someone had to collect me."
"It was a ninja tracking unit." Kakashi says, using a hand to sit up and stare at her with his one good eye. "They bandaged you up… You didn't die."
"That's good news," Sakura mumbles. She has a hard time letting her joy cut through it all and hit her voice, let alone feeling it internally, but she is happy. She has to be. "I'm not a zombie."
"I wouldn't be so sure, with wounds like that, you should have died." He says. "Being undead would be less of a surprise to me than whatever the actual reason for all this probably is. Who would have thought Sasuke would be the normal one on team seven." He actually shivers at the thought. "You're troublesome."
"Sorry." She apologizes yet again, while he stretches a little. Reaching towards the air, and wiggling his body ever so gently.
"I think it'll be hard to move here for the next week." He admits. "I don't know what's up with this mission, but Jonin aren't supposed to just appear out of thin air."
"Yeah…" Her blood runs cold at the thought. Is that what happened? Did she summon a random encounter so strong it almost got them killed? Are Naruto and Sasuke okay?
"And once again, the attacker immediately focused on trying to take you out of the fight." He says. "This time, he succeeded. You definitely have a bounty on your head."
"I can't imagine why." She sighs, finally sitting up to give him real attention, only to dive back under the covers a moment later with red cheeks. Her clothes had been ruined, they changed her clothes, but her pack was stabbed through! So she's in someone else's nighty, and it's not exactly designed for dignity. "Don't look!"
"I hadn't intended to." She can feel the eye roll behind his mask and headband. "I'm not in the habit of peeking at my vulnerable students, regardless of what you might think of me."
"That's not what I, I'm sorry." She admits, flushily simmering back into her pillow.
"I'm going back to bed." She hears him thunk into his roll out bed. "Go get breakfast or whatever, your teammates are making a mess without you there to clean up."
Secretly, she's happy for the excuse to bug out of this conversation.
Realistically, she knows damn well Naruto's got the cleaning covered.
She'll just have to stop and find better clothes before she gets there.
"Howwwww." It's Sasuke's oddly elongated word that hits her ears first as she enters the kitchen. There's a stew of sorts that fills her nostrils, and the sight of a whole group of people at the table makes her smile a little. There's a small boy, unremarkable except for his big ol fisherman hat and a pouty attitude. There's a dark haired woman, also pretty unremarkable, except for the fact that she wears lots of pink just like she does. It's nice to see someone agree on the color.
Then there's the bridge builder himself, who's looking a little boozed out - what else is new - and her team, totally staring at her like she's a ghost. It doesn't help that she's raided someone's room to get those new clothes and the obviousness of that has the woman glaring at her too. "It was revealing." She explains herself.
"It's still rude." The woman scolds, and her tone is just no nonsense enough Sakura looks away from her to focus back on her team. There's no winning that one, but there was no way in hell she was walking out here in that to ask permission. Maybe in front of Naruto now that he's calmed the hell down, but she saw the way Sasuke was looking at her after she killed those Chunin. She doesn't want his pervy awakening to be about her. She spent way too long fakely trying to get his attention to accidentally get it now.
"How." Sasuke repeats himself, giving her the one two stare of death. "You were basically dead just a few hours ago." He actually points at her midsection. "Now you look like you just got up from a soothing nap."
"I did, actually." She says, finding herself a seat real quick, before scrambling over to find a bowl for some of that stew while she's at it. "It was a very nice nap, very pleasant. Much wow."
"That's not what I mean." Sasuke growls.
"I know." She says, filling her bowl quickly with a ladle. What, the woman's not gonna scold her for serving herself too? That's unfair, she realizes after a moment. Doesn't make her irritation bubble away, just tells her she's being moody. She gets to be moody, she just died. "But I don't have a good answer for you."
"Could you give us any answer?" It's Naruto's unsure tone that catches her off guard, and lowers it completely after a long second. "Sakura, you've been acting really weird lately… Some of it good, like you know, the whole, taking me into your home thing." The dumb blond speaks up awkwardly, hands intertwined with themselves, rolling over each-other a bit. Fear of rejection is a common expression for him, and she can recognize it instantly now that she's seen it in its native environment. Normally this'd be about the time where her mom would swoop in and make things better. She's not here to tell either of them that it'll be alright.
Naruto's a lot more used to this than she is.
She wishes that wasn't true. "But some of it's really scary." Naruto continues. "Like how you killed those guys who attacked us. You said you knew Kakashi wasn't dead, but you still went right for the kill."
"What's your point?" She asks a little coldly, sitting down and picking up a spoon, now that she has a nice steamy bowl to coax her grumbly stomach into its normal function..
"You didn't have to kill them, Sakura." Naruto says.
"And when Kakashi killed them, what would have changed?" She asks. She takes a nice bite, remembering her previous anger and deciding to do something right. "Thank you, this is very good." She immediately compliments the woman before the taste even really hits her.
"You wouldn't have bloodied your hands." Naruto says. "Why were you so eager to bloody your hands?"
"Why do you care?" Sakura asks, quirking her brow with no small amount of piercing, hot irritation. "They weren't people, forget about them." It's the moment she says it that she realizes what she said. The truth is they weren't.
As random encounters they were made entirely for her to fight. Their entire life a story told in a bingo book just for her to indulge in before destroying them. They were given pointlessly elaborate mission histories, and cartoonishly evil deeds on their record. They were bad guys spawned for her to crush, and that makes sense to her. Her power delivered exp bags to her, and she cut them in half and claimed the spoils.
But there's no way to explain that without sounding mental. "I mean, by leaf rules." She quickly tries to save it, even while Naruto gawks and Sasuke looks at her with genuine concern. "Don't you remember, from the Academy? It's a lot easier if you don't think of enemy ninja as people. They're clever enemies you need to exterminate at all costs."
"I don't remember that vocab." Sasuke snarks immediately. "I think I'd remember that."
"I'm paraphrasing." Sakura defends, crossing her arms over her chest. For a second, before she remembers she needs her hand for food and her stomach is gurgling like whispering madness. "They're dead, we got some cool loot, and we moved on."
"Yeah that's another thing." Sasuke winces at her sudden snappy glare. "You're the only one that looted their corpses. Even Kakashi didn't wanna do that."
"..." She opens her mouth.
"..." Then she closes it.
"Who does that?" Sasuke asks. "You cut two guys in half in five seconds and your immediate thought was to go through their pockets."
"I found a good amount of cash in there." She defends.
"We're just worried about you." Naruto manages to articulate. "And confused."
"I kinda figured 'I will jump through your fireball' was a technique we were training for emergencies." Sasuke says. "I didn't think you were going to pull it out on our first fight like it was meaningless if you got hurt."
"To be fair, it was meaningless." She says. "I was fine after a nap."
"That doesn't mean I like watching my friend burn while covered in blood and guts." Sasuke points out harshly, anger vibrating in his tone like a raging fire only kept under wraps by respect for what she's recently been through. She'll have to have a very real conversation with him soon, both of them. Just, not now. "Some of that burning blood was yours. Why are you so willing to give yourself to that stupid sword?" Sasuke has no idea how right he is, holy crap, it murdered her recently. "I watched my family die, Sakura, and you're making me watch you die too." Lucky for him, she'll die just out of sight, attached to a tree by her stomach.
"I just…" She finds there's nothing left in her bowl when her spoon scrapes nothingness. "I think I need to go think." She says, getting up, and walking towards the door with footsteps eerily reminiscent of a corpse walking. She can hear wet thwacks and bloody squirts with every step, her struggle to fight back the haunted memory of what was making her stop dead in her tracks. Her eyes close to try and block out the sights overlaying in her vision from her dreams.
She has to fight back her own reality trying to catch up to her. It turns out full healing doesn't cure her from mental status effects like pissed off or traumatized, really cool of it, maybe at a higher level. For them it's been hours, for her, it was minutes ago. It's the sigh from Naruto that snaps her out of herself for a moment. So pained, so drained, so disappointed.
She plays mom.
She turns on a dime and hugs him from behind. She wraps an arm right around him, holds him as close as she can with the chair in the way, plays with his hair with one hand and gives him a gentle kiss on the cheek. At the hitch of his breath, she takes his hands in both of hers, abandoning her objective to stop something she hates.
She splits his hands apart, intertwines their fingers, and whispers in his ear.
"You're wanted, okay? Nothing is going to change that." His warmth is all that keeps her from shaking, and her warmth is what soothes him.
A month ago she'd hesitate to give him any intimacy, but he knows what this is. It's a perfect copy of many nights in their kitchen, him making some mistake and falling apart. To think he was that torn apart inside, and no one at the Academy ever noticed. She can't help but feel like some of that was intentional, just another broken idiot to forget about and move on from.
Ninja villages are cruel.
There's no room for misinterpretation, and that makes it okay to comfort him with all the energy she has left. Sadly, she doesn't have much energy. As soon as her comforting touch gave in, it left. She doesn't even bother to elaborate to the very confused Sasuke. Naruto will explain it, or he'll think she suddenly has a crush on the blond; right now she couldn't possibly care less which.
She just leaves, and she's happy she does.
Because she has a lot to think about. Having just died changes things.
What was she supposed to say? She's not sure, but she knows it wasn't the stuff she did say. Can she really be blamed for that though? One person is allowed to have a breakdown at a time and she's pretty sure it was her turn with the breakdown stick, she fucking died! Who cares if some random ninja offscreen saved her, she ceased living. It wasn't even a big fight where she didn't measure up, or some final battle, she got thwacked out of existence by a spinning sword some guy threw. It was the equivalent of a giant kunai. Who dies from a kunai?
She was an afterthought, and she died. All her training, all her efforts, all her clever strategies and planning, gone in an instant on the whim of a random encounter she spawned by being a little too far from her village.
On that note, what the actual hell? Sure. Wave Country is another country, it's in the name, but it's not particularly far from Konoha. They're a week from home, two days without Tazuna to slow them down, and Jonin are showing up?
She'd thought these powers were a boon, but it turns out they are going to kill her. The worst part is, she's not sure if the ninja that saved her was a respawn mechanic, or if she just got lucky. It'd be so much easier to get over this if she had a respawn mechanic. Instead, she spends more than an hour out here in the rain, under tree branches and leaves, rocking back and forth with her arms around her knees and her knees held to her chest. Her face rests in her legs, and her breaths are as twitchy and broken as her tear stained gasps are.
"Sakura, you need to come inside." Kakashi's voice barely even reaches her, but she's so used to quipping back at him it doesn't even get to her brain before it leaves her mouth.
"It's my turn with the stick!" She shouts.
"Sakura that doesn't make, okay…" It takes him a moment, she doesn't really care what he's doing. She cares a second later though, when something pointy pokes her face. She looks up to glare, and finds he's prodding her with a sturdy wooden pole.
A stick, to be exact. "You can have the stick, just come inside," he says, "We can't both be sick, Sakura, someone needs to keep those two from doing that dumb thing where they die."
"Oh, so you care about when they die, but me, I'm just complaining?" She shouts, fire in her eyes. Even without the Chaos blade tainting her essence, she can feel the sting of red enter her eyes. It's changing her, and she should probably get that checked out by someone that grasps how magic swords work, but that's not a today problem!
"When you die, you're annoying." He says. "When they die, we'll wish they could be."
It's a few seconds, just staring between them. A few seconds of honest contemplation.
Before it clicks, and just like that, she reaches up and she takes the stick.
"I'm not human anymore." She says, a sniffle stealing her whole breath.
"I know." He says gravely, and yet, she believes him.
She believes he knows, because he doesn't look the least bit surprised by her emotional confession. He's staring at a monster, and she understands that because she feels the same.
"My life's a game now." She tells the truth. She looks him in the eye and she tells the truth. "I have stats, and skills, and traits, and my money is held in an invisible prompt box so it doesn't weigh me down, and, and, and I heal when I sleep."
"I got that last part." He says. The rain has drenched his hair, making him shiny. She's never thought Kakashi was pretty before. Dignified, experienced, magical, but never pretty. Looking him over with the rain glistening off of him and his clothes clinging, he's pretty.
Alternatively, after an hour out here in the mud and rain, she can't even imagine how she looks. She doesn't want to know what horse shit she has managed to take the visage of. "I've started carrying sedatives around in case I need to knock you out in an emergency." He admits playfully.
"That's smart." She says, finally picking herself up, and stabbing the stick into the ground.
"You don't have questions?"
"I could ask you one question per minute for the entire rest of our lives, and I don't think I'd run out." He says, helping her up despite his relative weakness. His hand is warm in hers. It reminds her that she's not alone, just like Naruto, she is wanted. "I don't like wasting my time with futility."
"That's a lot of minutes, Kakashi." She points out.
"It's a lot of questions."
"Kakashi-Sensei, why are we getting ready to train on a mission?" Sakura asks. "You said we shouldn't do that, because we'll be tired when something comes up suddenly."
They stand in a field of trees, not a particularly new field of trees either. She can see where she was crying just last night, and that unnerves her a little. Breaking down isn't something she's done in a few years now. She normally has her games to delve into, or trolls on the internet to make fun of to make the pain fade away.
Last night was the first time in a long time that she's been pushed to her limit while too far away from her gaming systems to jack in and lose all concept of time. Her Switch died days ago, her battery packs were only really enough for three days of the week-long trip, and while she's sure there's a place for her to plug it in here… She's also a little terrified to check on it. Her sword went through her, through her pack, and into the tree behind her. She hit the tree so hard that she's pretty sure she broke bones despite the pack taking the brunt of it.
Her Switch might be dead, really, really dead.
No Ninja Tracking Unit is gonna save her Switch.
"Because I'm injured, and I need you all to be able to support me if Zabuza comes back." Kakashi says.
"You didn't kill him?" Sakura asks.
"He killed him." Sasuke asserts.
"I watched you kill him." Naruto agrees.
"Yeah, that's the thing though, I didn't kill him. A ninja tracking unit did." Kakashi explains. "The same ninja tracking unit that saved Sakura."
He says that as if they're supposed to grasp something, but all she can ask is "What's a ninja tracking unit anyway?"
"Not someone that saves random leaf ninja." Kakashi deadpans.
"So…"
"So Zabuza's alive." Kakashi is very clear. "Do I need to repeat it?"
"Nope." Sakura sighs.
The monster that killed her in one second is still walking around, and likely going to come back for more. She could not be happier to have this new information, it really makes everything better on her trauma cream sandwich. "I don't think we can get strong enough to handle that in the time we're here, Kakashi."
"Why not? By my estimates, we have at least a month before the bridge is finished." Kakashi says. "He's probably not going to be quick to attack. He'll wait until we're complacent, which means we might have the whole month."
"I don't think a month is going to change the outcome of that fight." Sakura's surprised to see Sasuke nod along with her, but things have changed in recent times. Maybe not last night recent but, well, she needs to apologize about that when she gets the chance. It wasn't fair how she treated them, and their questions are valid. It just sucks she doesn't know how to explain it. She really needs to figure it out though, they deserve to know. Ninja are allowed their secrets, but her secrets are changing their odds of survival in drastic ways. She's putting them in real danger, and they have no idea why.
"Not a normal month, no." Kakashi agrees. "That's why you two are going to practice a technique I think you'll benefit greatly from, while Sakura and I do more one-on-one training."
"That's no fair, Sakura's already pulling ahead!" Naruto shouts, throwing a fist up in the air. "Why does she get super special training?"
"Because she died yesterday." Kakashi says it.
And no one has anything to say to that. Not even her, it lingers in the air like a bad smell. "She didn't listen to me when I said to get down. She realized Tazuna might not be able to get down in time, and blocked something she shouldn't have to protect the client, and she died for it."
Their faces can't fall, they already did, and Sakura resists the urge to point out that's not what happened at all. She forgot Tazuna existed, it was all about her boys. She kicks herself internally for that.
With her Genin Agility, getting out of the way would have been trivial.
She should have trusted them. They'd be so mad if they found out she got hurt because she didn't trust them to take care of themselves. Just another secret to take to the grave. This one, actually, to the grave. Her new gaming powers, she just needs to find the right time.
"A little bit of competence is a dangerous thing." Kakashi says. "You all knew to get out of the way because you understood instinctively that you were outclassed. Sakura didn't, which means if she doesn't get stronger, she'll die when Zabuza attacks again."
"I can learn to dodge." She mopes, her head falling as well. "I promise."
"Besides. We have a lot to talk about, and it's a good excuse to be alone." He says. "It's not every day your student bleeds to death and is still walking around to talk about it."
His eye smile is unnerving in a way it has never been before. Sakura is sure of it, this is going to suck.
"I need an adult!" Sakura shouts.
"Too bad there's no one for a hundred clicks that could save you." Kakashi answers back.
"Kakashi, that's really creepy…" Naruto trails.
"Too far?" Kakashi asks.
"Way too far!
"Why did you really pull me aside?" Sakura finds herself asking mid mope. He'd given them instructions on how to do something called tree walking, it looked interesting.
"To begin, you already know tree walking." He says. "You used it on the jar mission with your hand. If you want to learn the technique, I have no doubt you could learn it on your own rather easily."
His confidence in her makes her blush, but that doesn't stop a flare of anger for being split from the group. Her dumb boys are hers now, she doesn't like being singled out. She's never liked being singled out. Her favorite type of project back in class were group projects, because she was smart so people would flock to her. She could do all the work while they pretended to take credit, taking focus off of her. It was nice for her anxiety, really nice. She did the work, someone else presented, simple.
"Then there's this whole, your life is a game matter you said yesterday." He says. "Was that serious, or hyperbole?"
"Serious." She can't look at him. "I have stats, and other stuff. I thought I was hallucinating at first but then I got a skill that heals me when I sleep and... You know, I keep healing when I sleep."
"That's not conclusive evidence, but I understand why you might take it as such." He says, stopping suddenly. They're in a field of trees and ground, not a lot of bush or anywhere to sneak up on them from. It's big, wide and open, a friendly reminder of what nature will do if given time and a little bit of groundwork is done.
"What else could it be?" She asks, summoning up her stats box and moving it around with her hand. "I can see and feel it, and it's altering my reality."
"You could be in an elaborate genjutsu. Weeks can pass in such a thing, I might not be real." He suggests. "Maybe you're in a coma, or a deity beyond our comprehension has decided to mess with you."
"If it's a genjutsu I can't break it, if I'm in a coma I can't wake up, and if it's a deity I have to work within the blessing given." She says. "Nothing changes in either scenario, the only move is forward."
"That's one way to look at it." He agrees, resting his hands at his side. "The boys will be training their chakra control and general movement over the next while. Working on the basics means a lot for boys like them who ran past the basics to try and get stronger faster."
"You think what they know will mean more once they've practiced?" She asks.
"Yes… You on the other hand, learned too much of the basics and never strove for any greatness at all. Your new desire for Kenjutsu is impressive, but as you learned earlier, it's not enough. It being your only option can even lead to being impaled by your own sword. Imagine if instead of a sword you had used a rock ninjutsu to block."
She bites her lip, thinking about it, remembering. It hurt so much, and every single second is burned into her memory in a way she'd rather forget.
"Our goal for these coming few days is to learn what your elements are." Kakashi says. "Then I will teach you how to waterwalk. If we still have time and aren't in mortal danger yet, I'll then teach you how to make your own jutsu."
"I, what?" Her head spins at that. "I thought creating ninjutsu was restricted to Jonin for safety reasons."
"It is." He stares at her sternly. "We know exactly how much chakra any jutsu already made costs, we don't have the slightest clue how much chakra a new jutsu could cost. Someone trying a relatively basic concept with an absurd cost could lose limbs, or wind up in the hospital for chakra exhaustion if they mess up."
The stare is physical. She can't help the sweatdrop that rolls down her cheek. "So what you're saying is…" Her feet clack against each-other, the awkwardness taking a toll on her health and energy. There's nothing worse for a gamer than a very, very awkward moment without a clear puzzle to solve.
"You got pinned to a tree by your own sword, ripped the sword out of your body on your own, and then passed out in a pool of your own blood." The stare continues. He's expecting something from her, but the words are stuck in her throat as a lump. "And then you got up and walked around six hours later. I think I can trust you'll be fine learning how to shoot water out of your hands."
"I'm gonna make pokemon moves." She admits.
"Not yet you're not." He says. "Right now, we're going to test your affinities."
"I don't have chakra paper." She says.
"You don't need it. You have a gaming system." He prods her forehead suddenly, causing the slightest flinch but she doesn't fear pain like she used to. She died yesterday, she fears death a lot more than a Kakashi hit. Luckily, he doesn't see fit to give one. "I'm going to teach you a very basic jutsu for all five elements, and you're going to practice them until you are alerted you've developed an element. Then we're going to continue that, until it's very obvious you're not going to develop it for one of them."
"And if I get them all?" She asks.
"Then I'll accept that you have a gaming system in your soul." He says rather bluntly. "That's just not something that happens."
The water jutsu is simple. She sits around meditating and controls her chakra until she can find the moisture in the air and turn it into fluids. She then has the fluids fill a flask that she drinks to replenish some of her energy, and repeats. She does this all of the first day. From the end of Kakashi's speech to sun down, she gets progressively better at doing this droplet by droplet.
It's not until nightfall that she manages to fill the entire flask in only a few seconds. She'd been pouring the water out for a while, too much hydration is a dangerous thing.
You have gained Water Affinity Level 1, all Water jutsu will be more effective and cheaper.
She expects Kakashi probably didn't think she'd reach it in one day, but it sets a good precedent for the others. If any of them aren't learned after two full days, she probably doesn't have that element. With that she gets up, and decides the boys could use some water. She can still hear them, quietly arguing in the distance. The forest carries sound well, making her feel like she was right next to them.
It's not long before she sees them through the treeline, and not much longer after that before she's standing at the bottom of the trees watching the two boys collapse onto the dirt on their backs. "Do you two need water?" She asks, jingling the flask.
She's surprised to see them both nod, but neither move. "Are your legs not working?"
"Not much." Sasuke says. "I'm exhausted." It's good to see Sasuke with humility, but it's actually not that uncommon an occurrence recently. She thought he was growing as a person, but she knows better now that he's expressed his concerns about her. He cares about her, and wants her to know that. Expressing weakness is a good way to show you trust someone, and she's pretty sure someone told him that at one point.
He's an idiot but he's a sponge. If something is important, he'll never forget it, and that means if she grinds her own social skills up she can probably help boost him too. "Then let me help." Kneeling by his side, she brings the flask to his mouth and takes some joy in watching him drink.
"Hey no fair, I need water too, Sakura!" Naruto groans slash shouts from his place on the forest floor. "My legs aren't working either."
"Somehow, I feel like your issue is less from a lack of stamina and more from falling on your head so much you crippled yourself." She quips, quickly refilling the flash with her palm after pulling it away from Sasuke.
"That's fine, just let me sleep it off. What do I need, six hours?" He jokes.
She shakes her head, crawling over to help him. She rests his head in her lap, and brings it to his lips, helping him along. She's gotten a lot more intimate with him over the past month. He responds very well to physical affection, and once he stopped badgering her about dates it became easy to see he hasn't the slightest idea what a date is.
For years she's thought he was sexually harassing her.
Turns out he's an idiot and thought that's what friends do. He's also a sponge, and someone said the words 'friend date' around him once and quickly changed their dynamic for years to come. Not that he isn't interested in her, she's pretty sure he is, but he loves the gentle kindnesses far more than his puppy crush.
Who knows, maybe one day she'll find she's interested in him too.
It's not today. "Have you two made any headway?"
"No." Sasuke grunts. "Kakashi was too tired to teach us, so he disappeared back into the house almost right after he got back from you."
"Baah, haah, well, we learned if we put too much chakra in we go flying." Naruto says, pushing the flask away with a hasty draw of breath. "You might like that one. It hurts a little but…"
"I'll try it." She agrees. "And if you put too little in, you fall off. Is it just about the amount though?"
"Huh?" Naruto asks.
"I mean to say, is chakra quantity the only variable that's important to sticking to the tree, or is there a secondary or tertiary objective like conforming your chakra to the shape of the bark, or trying to make the chakra sticky?"
"..." That's the sound of crickets, crickets and silence.
Neither boy has anything to say to that, honestly, neither does she, the idea that they wouldn't think of that, well, it sounds like Naruto and Sasuke.
"Fuck." That's Sasuke clapping his hands over his eyes.
"I promise, I tried really hard." Naruto mumbles.
"Okay, let me figure this out and then teach you both, okay?" She gently rests Naruto's head back on the grass, and gets to her feet.
She runs at a tree, and finds herself at the top a few seconds later. It was as simple as breathing, a technique she already knew instinctively. She started with a little too much chakra, but was able to adjust to match in real time until each step was incredibly easy and movement was simple. The issues didn't begin until she reached the top, when momentum was canceled and suddenly she had to float there on her own merit.
She found she had to increase the chakra for a second to stop from falling, before she could flood the area under her with controlled essence and conform to the shape beneath her. It was less digging her chakra in and more creating a friction barrier that stopped her from falling. She imagines it'd be harder to do on a wall where the holes are microscopic, but it should be doable with some practice.
It's all about feeling her chakra, and latching on graciously while ensuring it sticks.
"Oh, boys…" She sighs to herself, looking down at their jealous faces. "There's a secondary and tertiary objective!" She shouts down.
![Sakura Haruno The Gaming Addict, and Her Gamified Life [Naruto]](/data/threadmark-index-icons/l/73/73915.jpg?1714737265){kind=icon}
