"Arms up, girl!" barked Hato, brandishing a length of measuring tape. "Banzai… that's it, you can put your arms down, now."
Sakura let her arms drop to her sides as the older woman turned away, scribbling her measurements onto a notepad.
"Would you mind reminding me why you're taking my measurements, Hato-san?" asked Sakura. "I've never heard of people getting measured for a sword."
"Well, you have now," grunted Hato. "My family's been forging swords for samurai for generations, and I pride myself on making proper blades— none of that flashy, gimmicky rubbish that snaps in two after a couple of swings. Just good, honest steel."
As luck would have it, Granny Sanshō's old mahjong partner happened to be a famed swordsmith from the Land of Rivers, with a lineage stretching back to the days before the warring states era, long before shinobi ever came into fashion. The only hitch was that she seemed a touch old-fashioned, so Sakura wasn't sure if she'd be able to handle high-grade chakra metal quite like those legendary swordsmiths over in the Land of Water.
"But was it really necessary to take my three sizes?" Sakura blurted out.
A girl's three sizes were among her most closely guarded secrets, right up there with her weight. Even the System didn't dare carelessly display that private information on its translucent panel!
[Would the host like to append these additional statistics to the panel?]
"No!" Sakura snapped at the System.
Watching her weight on the scale climb after eating too many dango was depressing enough, so the last thing she wanted was to have a constant reminder of the exponential growth of her backside! Damn her Akimichi bloodline!
"Of course it is!" Hato snapped, assuming Sakura was speaking to her. She began rummaging through her drawers in search of some knickknack. "Didn't they teach you basic biology in school? Or do you just have no self-awareness whatsoever?"
Sakura gave a small, pained gasp, her face beginning to redden. Her sarashi was getting uncomfortably tight around her ribcage, pressing in so firmly she could hardly breathe.
"There are stark differences between men's and women's bodies," Hato explained, turning to face Sakura and thumping her palm with the hammer she'd just fetched. "Women's arms and legs are shorter than a man's at the same height, so this needs to be accounted for tailor-made sword. Our pelvises are wider, too— take you and those childbearing hips of yours. Compared to men, having your legs set further apart makes it easier to dash sideways, but harder to run forwards and backwards. The difference only becomes more noticeable once you factor in chakra, which amplifies your natural strengths to frankly absurd levels…"
Hato's voice trailed off.
"Childbearing hips?" Sakura protested. "Ugh, you really are a product of your time, huh? I'll have you know I can do a lot more than pop out babies!"
Hato's internalised misogyny aside, Sakura's rapidly expanding milk sacs really weren't helping with her case that she wasn't only valuable for her fertility.
"Are you binding your chest? Those things are definitely bigger than they were a moment ago!" Hato said accusingly, jabbing a finger at Sakura's breasts. "Your bindings are slipping, aren't they? Ugh, I should've known— now I'll have to measure you all over again!"
For samurai, swords were meant as weapons of last resort, for duelling and self-defence, for when they'd run out of arrows or been ambushed in close quarters. So, no shields for sword-and-boarding, and certainly no fancy European escrime with one hand behind the back— katanas aren't rapiers, after all.
While there did exist one-handed schools of Japanese swordsmanship for smaller swords, and even styles for dual wielding with a sword in each hand, the gold standard for regular-sized Japanese blades was two-handed use— which is obviously tricky if you have gigantic breasts bouncing all over the place and getting in the way of your swings.
Just try and touch your elbows together if you have big boobs, and you'll see!
"Look, I'm not a samurai, I'm a ninja," said Sakura in annoyance. "I know my sword's dimensions by heart, so couldn't you just make me a sword just like the one I used to have? And do you even know how to work chakra metal in the first place?"
At that moment, a second green-haired woman burst through the front door of Hato's workshop— stunningly beautiful, with eyes wild and fierce, like those of a starving dog who had just spotted its next meal. But the first thing Sakura noticed wasn't her eyes, but her forehead protector, marked with the emblem of Takumi Village.
This woman was a kunoichi!
"Did someone say… chakra metal?" the woman panted breathlessly, doubling over with her hands on her knees. "What is it you want made? A special tool? A sword that can shoot out fireworks? I'll make whatever you want for free, just as long as you let me have a little bit for my experiments!"
"Trying to steal my customers again, Kujaku!?" roared Hato. "Get out of my shop, or I'll write you out of my will!"
Sakura looked from one green-haired woman to the other as they continued bickering with each other, as if they had completely forgotten that she was there.
Though Hato's beauty had faded slightly with age, and her skin had become dried and cracked from years spent standing in front of the fires of her forge, it was plain she was Kujaku's mother. And, like all good mothers, Sakura suspected she was very disappointed that her daughter hadn't followed in her footsteps to become a great swordsmith, but had instead thrown herself into gadgetry and gimmicky tools, like all the other craftsmen in Takumi Village.
"Please, ladies, there's no need to fight over me!" said Sakura peaceably. "I actually have enough chakra metal with me to forge two swords."
Since she no longer needed all of her chakra metal, as her System-version of Lightning Style Chakra Mode didn't require hours of electric torture to learn, Sakura had been thinking of gifting Sasuke a sword of his own.
In the original timeline, Orochimaru would have given Sasuke a proper blade, but now, he was stuck using whatever Danzō hadn't pilfered from the Uchiha storehouses on the night of the massacre. Furthermore, Sasuke was even handier with the way of the blade in this timeline, as he'd been studying the White Fang's Hatake-style Kenjutsu under Kakashi!
And besides, Sakura and Naruto hadn't had time to celebrate Sasuke's birthday— what with the Chūnin Exams getting in the way— so she figured it would be fine to give him his late present alongside Naruto's, when his own birthday came around in October.
"How about this?" Sakura proposed. "You'll each forge a sword for me, and whoever makes the best weapon gets to keep what's left of the chakra metal… and I don't have to pay the loser."
Sakura flipped a scroll into her hand and unsealed its contents with a quick hand sign, tipping a small pile of high-grade chakra metal dust onto the nearest table. After taking an acid bath with it, this was all that remained of the box of chakra metal scraps Sakura had found buried in the desert.
"Deal!"
The two green-haired women's pupils practically turned into yen symbols as they watched the dark metal dust catch the afternoon light. This was the real deal— each grain worth more than its weight in gold! Hato and Kujaku dived for it at once, sweeping it up with the giddy urgency of children let loose in a Japanese sweets shop.
And Sakura didn't know it yet, but as a result of the chakra metal drinking in her gamer girl bathwater, the material had become highly attuned to her own chakra!
After having their deal notarised in writing, Sakura left Hato's workshop and began crossing the street to the village square, where Shizune had said she'd be waiting. But she had barely stepped outside when Kujaku's sheepish voice drifted from the workshop behind her.
"Excuse me, Sakura-san? If it's not too much trouble, I have a favour to ask…"