Chapter 332: Side Story — Sakura Haruno, Part One
Eyes the green of a distant star opened in the darkness.
Gazing out at the cosmos before Her — vast beyond comprehension, and yet somehow insubstantial, dreamlike.
Something like a "river" surfaced in Her sight.
That river ran through the entire universe, present everywhere at once, and yet no living being besides Herself could ever perceive it existed at all.
Within it, She glimpsed another world. Another dimension entirely.
Perhaps it was a thousand, ten thousand years of solitude finally catching up with Her, leaving Her faintly bored — but from the endless, waterfall-like cascade of pink radiance that filled the star-strewn expanse around Her, a single, slender strand of hair drifted free and slipped into that other dimension.
...
...
...
Konoha.
The Forest of Death.
A streak of pink light settled silently into the forest, without a sound, coalescing into a human shape.
Hair like a waterfall of pink cascaded loosely around her shoulders; her skin was pale and fine; her features, at a glance, looked almost ordinary — human. And yet her jade-green eyes carried a stillness no ordinary person could ever hope to possess.
She wore a white robe, patterned with flames that seemed to burn, alive, across the fabric.
A woman. Achingly beautiful — and yet somehow entirely beyond the reach of any impure thought.
She simply stood there. The insects and beasts of the forest around her seemed entirely unaware she existed at all.
She looked down at her own hand, a flicker of confusion crossing her eyes.
"Me, at nineteen?"
"What was I even like, back then?"
She murmured to herself softly — and then, all at once, something bright broke through the stillness of her gaze.
An ordinary, mortal kind of brightness.
In that instant, She went from god to mortal.
Sakura looked out over everything around her — familiar, and yet strange all at once — as memories buried under untold tens of thousands of years surfaced, unbidden, back into focus.
She smiled. She remembered now.
This was the Forest of Death.
Once, long ago, she'd fought Orochimaru right here.
Sakura wandered aimlessly, taking in everything around her — every last detail of this world laid bare and clear to her senses.
She had no particular intention of doing anything. She just wanted to look around, take it all in.
Whatever happened on any given world ought to be left for that world's own people to handle, to resolve on their own.
Otherwise, being the Empress of Heaven would run her ragged with work.
But that was really all it ever amounted to — just more work to keep her busy.
Sakura wasn't in her own original timeline right now. She'd simply felt something stir in her, and come here, on a whim.
Walking at an easy, unhurried pace through this forest — familiar and yet strange all at once — she found her mood, for once, actually decent.
After all, right now, she was nineteen.
She watched a cold-faced, red-haired boy crush someone's body using sand.
She spotted a white-eyed girl, a boy in dark glasses, and someone walking a dog, all hiding nearby.
She watched a black-haired man stick out his tongue and swallow a scroll whole, gesturing toward a familiar face — inviting her, apparently, to a contest over who could grab it back.
She stopped.
Her gaze had settled on a trembling pink-haired little girl, nearly frozen stiff with terror.
This is... me?
Sakura tilted her head.
So this is what I was like, in this world?
Sakura felt no particular disapproval, watching her own younger self tremble in fear before this world's Orochimaru.
Everyone had the right to be afraid. Everyone had the right to run.
Fear and the instinct to flee were both hardwired deep into every living creature — an indispensable part of what let nearly any species survive at all.
Fear kept you alive. Being afraid kept you alive.
Sakura simply watched her past self with mild curiosity, nothing more.
No one present had any idea Sakura was even there.
None of them were qualified to notice her.
Even though this was nothing more than a fragment split off from a single strand of her true self's hair, no one could perceive her at all — not unless she chose to reveal herself.
Sakura's gaze shifted to the little blond boy and the little "ping-pong paddle" boy.
The little blond had made the first move, taunting the ping-pong paddle boy in the process. The ping-pong paddle boy, working up his courage through a bit of self-inflicted pain, joined him in charging the little snake.
And then both the little blond and the little ping-pong paddle got beaten down by the little snake.
Only the little pink-haired girl stayed hidden off to the side, protected by the other two.
Sakura watched it all unfold and made no move to interfere.
Hmm...
If this body had been set to the mindset of a twelve or sixteen-year-old, she probably would have jumped in.
But her true self had specifically set this fragment to nineteen.
So Sakura simply watched, quietly.
She witnessed everything that followed.
The little snake left. The little blond and the little ping-pong paddle passed out. Then the little pink-haired girl, trying to protect the two of them, ended up fighting the Sound Trio — Six-Paths Dosu, Rock-Crushing Zaku, and one more, gold-colored.
Unfortunately, though the little pink-haired girl showed real, stubborn resolve and courage — even cutting off her own pride and joy, that long pink hair — losing was still losing.
Eventually, with reinforcements arriving and the ping-pong paddle boy awakening a new power, they managed to beat the Sound Trio back.
Watching the little pink-haired girl hug the little ping-pong paddle boy and beg him not to keep fighting, Sakura found the whole scene a little strange.
If Sasuke ever found out about this, he'd probably claw his way out of his own grave in delight.
Not that it'd matter — if he ever did try to climb out, Naruto, buried right next to him, would get jealous and drag him straight back in.
Wouldn't let him climb out at all.
Hmm...
Just kidding, obviously.
Both of them had been dead for tens of thousands of years, after all.
Sakura watched everything that followed — the preliminary matches at the Chūnin Exam venue, ending one after another in sequence.
The little pink-haired girl faced off against Ino.
Sakura found herself looking at Ino a beat or two longer than she'd expected to.
The two of them ended in a draw.
Watching from the spectator seats as the preliminaries wrapped up, everyone was given a month to prepare for the finals.
As she left, Sakura glanced once at the old man slowly making his exit, a smoking pipe clenched between his teeth.
Sakura followed the little pink-haired girl home.
The first thing the girl did upon getting home was take a bath — understandable, given how long she'd gone without one in the Forest of Death.
Steam curled through the air as the little pink-haired girl soaked in the hot water, savoring a bit of hard-earned peace.
Watching the little girl drift off to sleep right there in the tub, Sakura considered the very real possibility that, left alone, she might actually drown in her own bathwater.
Sakura stepped closer and gave her forehead a light tap.
Hm. Pretty wide, that forehead.
Ino wasn't wrong about that.
And besides, Sakura had no interest in letting this world's version of herself actually drown in the bathtub.
That would be a genuinely terrible way to go.
"Hm?"
The little pink-haired girl felt something poke her and blinked her eyes open, groggy.
Then, all at once, a blurry pink figure swam into focus in front of her.
Huh? Someone's here?
Wait!
SOMEONE'S HERE!
The little pink-haired girl's eyes shot wide open. She scrambled upright, arms instinctively flying up to cover her chest, sending water splashing everywhere — and only then did she get a proper look at the person in front of her.
"You—!"
The little pink-haired girl started to speak, then froze completely.
She blinked, staring at the figure before her, unable to process what she was seeing.
This person looks like... me?
Wait, no!
There's no way that's me!
This person had to be, what, seventeen?!
"Your first instinct was to cover the landing strip?"
Sakura eyed the little pink-haired girl's frantic motions, glancing pointedly at her figure.
However much she tried to cover herself, Sakura could see everything perfectly clearly regardless.
"With a figure like that, honestly, even if you showed me, I wouldn't bother looking twice."
Sakura said, entirely unimpressed.
"You—!"
"Where the heck did you even come from?!"
The little pink-haired girl was now certain — whoever this was, it definitely wasn't her.
There was no way she herself could ever have a personality this awful.
Even though the two of them shared the same pink hair and green eyes.
And though the little pink-haired girl hated to admit it, this sudden stranger really was, undeniably, stunningly beautiful.
Which left her feeling a little inadequate by comparison.
"Shy over looks, are we?"
"This world's version of me is honestly a little embarrassing."
Sakura reached out and, ignoring the girl's resistance entirely, gave her forehead a solid flick.
"Wh— what?"
"'This world's version of you'?"
Though she knew it was a shallow thing to fixate on, hearing this stranger claim to be "her" from some other world raised an immediate question.
Does that mean I'm going to look this good someday?
Sakura tilted her head, looking at the little pink-haired girl, and answered:
"Don't get your hopes up. We're the same person, sure, but if you want to look like me..."
"You'd need about five hundred years of cultivation to have a shot."
"That's just for the looks, mind you."
"As for actual strength — you could train for ten thousand years and still never come close to catching up to where I am."
"And honestly, after ten thousand years, there probably wouldn't be enough left of you to call a person anymore."
Sakura delivered all of this with a perfectly straight, earnest face.
...
The little pink-haired girl stared at the woman in front of her, her mouth twitching involuntarily.
Do I maybe want to punch her? Just a little?
"So — who exactly are you?"
"Just showing up out of nowhere in my house, and..."
The little pink-haired girl, catching that appraising look aimed her way again, sank her whole body back underwater, leaving only her jade-green eyes visible above the surface, blowing a steady stream of bubbles.
"Since you've asked so sincerely..."
"I suppose I'll grace you with an answer, out of the goodness of my heart."
"In order to avoid..."
"Ah, wait, that's not it. My true self had a passing thought, a faint sense of something, and glimpsed this world."
"And since existing alone gets rather dull, I sent a small fragment of myself down here to take a look at this flower that so happens to resemble me."
...???
The little pink-haired girl stared at the completely nonsensical explanation, an entire cloud of question marks practically visible over her head.
She had absolutely no idea what any of that meant.
"Put simply — my true self had a dream about you, so I sent a little piece of myself down to take a look. That's it."
Sakura waved a hand, casual.
"A dream?"
The little pink-haired girl's head shot up out of the water, staring at her, incredulous.
"That's right."
Sakura nodded.
"So you're saying I'm just... someone in a dream? Not real?"
Clearly, the little pink-haired girl wasn't quite as slow as she looked — she'd zeroed right in on the important part.
"Not exactly. There are countless worlds out there, and every single one of them is real."
"Once you reach a certain level of power, it becomes possible to dream of other worlds, other existences."
"Though, of course, that's a level of power you couldn't reach even after ten thousand years of training."
Sakura was simply stating the facts as she saw them.
The little pink-haired girl: ...
Why does being insulted like this somehow feel kind of nice?
So I turn out this strong, in some other world?
"You said you're a fragment of yourself, earlier?"
The little pink-haired girl looked at the woman before her.
"That's right. I'm just a single strand of my true self's hair, given form."
"Impressive, right?"
Why does she sound so pleased with herself, over being a strand of hair?
The little pink-haired girl said nothing, simply sinking back underwater and resuming her bubble-blowing.
"So — what's your actual point in coming here, then?"
The little pink-haired girl found herself trusting the stranger's words easily enough — there was something about the warmth radiating off her that made it hard not to.
"Didn't I already say?"
"I'm just here to take a look at this flower so much like myself."
Sakura tilted her head.
"Well, you've looked plenty by now, haven't you?"
"You've basically seen it all already!"
The little pink-haired girl grumbled, a little exasperated.
"Emmm..."
"Not quite yet. I'll probably stick around to watch you get buried, and see you off to report to the Pure Land."
Sakura said this like it was the most obvious thing in the world, and it horrified the little pink-haired girl utterly.
What the hell?
Watch me until I die?!
Your true self must have way too much free time on her hands, holy crap!
"Yeah, my true self really does have a lot of free time."
"Unless some world-ending menace shows up, some evil race trying to drain a planet dry, or some anti-human maniac bent on destroying the whole universe, my true self really doesn't have much to keep herself occupied."
Sakura explained, as though she'd read the girl's exact thoughts.
And she'd made sure to specifically emphasize "draining a planet dry" — as in, wringing it completely dry, leaving nothing behind.
Which meant, implicitly, that if the draining had a legitimate reason behind it, and the ability to restore the planet's vitality afterward, her true self generally wouldn't bother getting involved at all.
"Wow, hearing you talk about her, it kind of sounds like your 'true self' doesn't have any feelings at all."
The little pink-haired girl grumbled.
"..."
"Maybe."
Sakura fell briefly, helplessly silent at that.
"Just thinking about you watching me die gives me goosebumps all over."
The little pink-haired girl bristled, indignant.
"Don't worry. When I watch you, I just make sure you don't notice."
"Simple, really."
Sakura explained, thoughtfully, as though it were a great comfort.
"...Thanks so much."
"You're welcome. Only right."
Faced with the little pink-haired girl's heartfelt sarcasm, Sakura waved it off graciously.
"All right, get out. I need to get dressed."
Having concluded the stranger meant her no harm, the little pink-haired girl spoke up.
Sakura vanished at once, right where she stood.
Seeing that, the little pink-haired girl called out warily:
"Are you still here?"
"Yep, still here."
...???
Didn't I just tell you to leave?!
The little pink-haired girl was furious.
...
By the time the little pink-haired girl finished dressing and returned to her own bedroom, she found someone already waiting for her there.
Going through her drawers, no less...
—!!!
"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!"
The little pink-haired girl lunged at her, but Sakura simply turned aside, dodging her effortlessly, and calmly opened a faded, yellowed... love letter, held in her hand.
"This one's for Sasuke, huh."
Sakura opened the never-delivered love letter right in front of the girl, with visible interest.
Judging by the date, it had been written all the way back in Academy days — and yet somehow it had survived, untouched, all this time.
She glanced casually over the contents, ignoring the little pink-haired girl's mortified fury entirely, and tossed the letter back into the drawer.
"I figured you might have it bad for love, but I didn't expect you to have it this bad."
Sakura studied the little pink-haired girl in front of her, deadly serious, and spoke:
"What's even the appeal of romance?"
"A pink-haired girl like you — even after ten thousand lifetimes, you'll never reach the level my true self has. And even so, you should still know the basic truth: cut a pink-haired girl open, and it's black on the inside."
"You're not some special pink-cut-pink case, like Elysia."
"And even Elysia — pink-cut-pink and all — still ended up dead."
"So if you don't want to end up the same way, you'd better understand what pink-cut-black really means."
...???
What in the world is this woman even talking about, deciding all this on her own?!
The little pink-haired girl found the stranger completely infuriating.
Barging into her private letters uninvited, popping up in the middle of her bath —
An absolute menace!!!
"So — is this really how you're planning to spend your life? Just watching Naruto and Sasuke's backs from behind?"
"Without any real strength of your own, you're worth less than a stray dandelion on the side of the road."
(End of Chapter)