Chapter 337: Side Story — Sakura Haruno, Part Six
Watching the girl's performance from a distance, Sakura felt reasonably satisfied.
Compared to how things had gone originally, this was already a marked improvement.
Naruto's return also stirred up a bit of a ripple through Konoha's three years of relative calm.
Meanwhile, out in Sunagakure, in the Land of Wind, the village's Fifth Kazekage met with disaster — Akatsuki's Deidara had infiltrated the village single-handedly and abducted Gaara, now the Kazekage.
Sunagakure sent an urgent request for aid to Konoha.
In return for the support Sunagakure had provided three years earlier during the mission to retrieve Sasuke, Tsunade immediately dispatched Kakashi's team and Guy's team to the Land of Wind.
Sakura watched it all unfold.
Following, as ever, the same course as the original story — Kakashi and Naruto pursued Deidara, who'd lost an arm in his fight against Gaara, while Chiyo and the girl faced off against Sasori of the Red Sand.
Sakura yawned, bored.
Watching something play out when you already know exactly how it's going to go was, frankly, tedious.
The girl and Chiyo defeated Sasori. Kakashi and Naruto recovered Gaara's body.
Chiyo then used the Life-Transfer Technique to bring Gaara back.
Afterward, using intel recovered from Sasori, Konoha located one of Orochimaru's hidden bases, and Naruto's group — having only just returned to the village — rushed off once more. Around this time, Root's Sai joined Team Seven, and with Kakashi occupied elsewhere, ANBU's Tenzō, under the alias Yamato, took over as the team's temporary captain.
A pitch-black corridor. Uncertain footsteps. Feelings too complicated for words.
Naruto had no idea what he was even thinking anymore, walking through it.
All he knew was that he wanted to drag back the man who'd once tried to kill both him and Sakura.
Even though, by now, the girl had completely given up on that man.
They broke through the oppressive darkness and out into the light waiting at the corridor's end.
The sudden shift in light made Naruto squint on reflex — but even so, he didn't stop, his eyes locking onto the black-haired young man standing above them.
The sky, framing the boy's white outfit, looked almost unnaturally blue.
Three years had passed, and the orphaned Uchiha boy once called Sasuke had grown into a genuinely handsome young man.
Standing above them, Sasuke's dark eyes carried nothing but distance and cold indifference.
"Sasuke!"
Staring up at that familiar-yet-foreign face, Naruto couldn't help shouting.
At that moment, Yamato, Sai, and the girl arrived on the scene as well.
"Ah..."
"Wondered who it'd be..."
"Naruto, is it."
Looking down at the blond boy below him, Sasuke spoke, slow and measured.
Then, in the next instant, his form vanished from where he stood, reappearing directly in front of Naruto.
The sight made everyone tense at once.
Sasuke draped one arm around Naruto's shoulder, his other hand resting on the Kusanagi Sword at his waist.
The metallic ring of the blade sliding partway from its sheath was enough to make the girl start moving.
Naruto, seemingly oblivious to any of it, simply looked calm.
He didn't believe it.
Even now, he refused to believe Sasuke would actually kill him.
But just as the blade was about to pierce straight through Naruto's body, a hand closed tight around Sasuke's wrist.
A pale hand. A woman's hand.
"Reuniting with your old teammates, and this is what you choose to do?"
Jade-green eyes stared, unflinching, into Sasuke's own.
"Well, if it isn't Sakura~"
"You've changed a lot more than Naruto has, it seems..."
A faint smile crossed Sasuke's distant, guarded face.
"Is that right..."
Three years apart, and the team that had once fought side by side, faced death together, was now reunited in this strange, tense standoff.
Sasuke and the girl stood on either side of Naruto, boxing him in between them.
"If it weren't for Naruto, I wouldn't have bothered coming."
The girl answered Sasuke evenly.
The words left something bitter and unspeakable churning in Naruto's chest.
They used to be able to just be together, be happy, back then.
Why did it have to end up like this...
"Is that so."
"So you're the one who's replaced me, then?"
"Not even Kakashi bothered showing up."
Sasuke glanced once at Sai, whose face gave away nothing, then at Yamato.
"Sasuke. Orochimaru's only trying to use you."
"He wants to make you his new vessel."
Naruto had, by now, gathered himself enough to speak.
"I've known that for a long time already..."
Sasuke looked at the boy in front of him, his voice calm and even.
"I only went looking for Orochimaru to gain power."
"If I'd stayed in Konoha..."
"Do you really think I'd have this kind of strength now?"
Sasuke spoke, cold, and lightning began crackling across his body — in an instant, it had spread out to cover nearly the entire clearing.
The girl let go of Sasuke's wrist immediately, grabbing Naruto by the back of his collar and pulling him back to safety.
This range...
Yamato's expression turned grim at the sight.
Reaching that scale with Lightning Release took not just rigorous training but exceptional natural talent as well.
And he'd never seen a technique quite like this before — clearly a Lightning Release variant unique to Sasuke Uchiha alone.
"Sasuke!"
"WHY?!"
"You already know Orochimaru means you nothing but harm!"
At that, Naruto's heart ached even as he felt the Nine-Tails inside him surging, barely held in check — his once-blue eyes now flashed the crimson of a feral beast.
Watching Naruto's same old failure to understand him, Sasuke's face grew colder.
His three-tomoe Sharingan settled over his dark eyes.
In an instant, he'd slipped straight into the mindscape sealing away the Nine-Tails inside Naruto.
Within a dim, sewer-like passage, a massive, nine-tailed fox demon sat imprisoned.
Chakra thick with malice poured out from behind the cage bars, coalescing into the shape of the beast.
"I see."
"So this is the power sealed inside you."
Naruto stared, caught off guard by Sasuke's sudden appearance.
"Wicked eyes."
"Seeing your eyes reminds me of someone."
Kurama, watching Sasuke intrude on his own space, bared his massive fangs in a grin.
"But, kid — let me tell you something."
"Don't kill Naruto."
Sasuke sneered at the sight of Kurama, and slammed a palm straight into the mass of crimson chakra taking his shape. With a single tearing motion, that endless, malevolent chakra was torn apart instantly.
The sight left Naruto stunned.
Facing Kurama, Naruto himself had barely been able to put up any resistance at all — and yet Sasuke had just...
Back in the real world, Naruto's eyes reverted from their beastlike form as the Nine-Tails' chakra dissolved.
He simply stared at Sasuke in the distance, speechless.
"Since that's how it is, then none of you seem to have any power worth my attention."
"So..."
Sasuke raised his hand high, preparing to unleash some technique that would finish off everyone present, once and for all.
But then, a hand caught his wrist.
"It's time we left, Sasuke."
Orochimaru had appeared out of nowhere, watching Sasuke with his usual, unsettlingly sinister smile.
"Tch..."
Sasuke's expression flickered with visible displeasure at the sight of Orochimaru beside him.
But he lowered his hand regardless.
"Consider yourself lucky, Naruto."
"You get to live another day."
Sasuke glanced back once at the blond boy — held back only by the girl's grip — then left with Orochimaru without a shred of hesitation, no trace of lingering attachment.
"SASUKE!"
Naruto watched him go, teeth gritted hard.
He couldn't understand it. Couldn't understand why things had ended up this way.
Sasuke would rather trust someone like Orochimaru than come back with him.
Looking at Naruto, the girl felt something dim and quiet stir in her chest.
Compared to Naruto, she seemed to have already stopped caring, entirely, about the Sasuke she'd once been so consumed by.
"Naruto..."
The girl gently laid a hand on Naruto's head, hoping to help him settle.
However much Naruto refused to accept it, he had no choice but to face the fact that Sasuke had, once again, walked away from him.
This mission, in the end, was declared a failure.
Afterward, Akatsuki's Immortal Duo attacked Kumogakure and captured its Two-Tails jinchūriki, Yuki — and along the way killed Chiriku, one of the Twelve Guardian Ninja protecting the Fire Temple.
Konoha immediately issued a kill order against the Immortal Duo, Kakuzu and Hidan.
Asuma died in the fighting that followed.
But in the pursuit that came after, Naruto — drawing on a new technique, the Rasen-Shuriken — struck Kakuzu with a critical blow, and Kakashi finished him off.
The Three-Tails, Four-Tails, Five-Tails, Six-Tails, and Seven-Tails were all, one after another, captured by Akatsuki.
This drew growing alarm from the other shinobi villages.
Throughout this stretch of time, the girl kept steadily growing stronger, her Strength of a Hundred Technique nearly finished accumulating the chakra it needed.
A little more time, and it would be complete.
But time had no intention of waiting for her.
After Sasuke killed Itachi Uchiha and was invited into Akatsuki by Obito Uchiha, Akatsuki's leader Pain had already dealt with Jiraiya, who'd traveled to Amegakure to investigate — and Pain had now arrived at the outskirts of Konoha.
A massacre began.
A mere six paths of Pain's puppet-bodies broke through Konoha's defenses with ease.
Iruka assigned the girl to Konoha Hospital, treating the wounded.
During the chaos, Deva Path Pain rose into the sky.
Unparalleled chakra gathered within him.
A single blast of an amplified Shinra Tensei instantly obliterated Konoha, the foremost of the Five Great Villages, in one strike.
Countless people died in that instant.
Having barely survived the technique herself, the girl stared out at the devastation around her, utterly helpless.
Dead.
So many people, dead.
Even the little girl she'd just finished treating lay crushed beneath the rubble, lifeless.
Tears slid down the girl's cheeks.
"Well, well. Crying again?"
Sakura, who hadn't appeared in some time, materialized beside her.
"WHY?"
"Why did it have to be like this?!"
"I gave everything I had to save them!"
"Why — these people were all innocent!"
The girl stared at the endless ruin around her, at the countless bodies, her voice trembling.
"You already knew this was going to happen, didn't you?!"
The girl turned on Sakura.
"Who's to say?"
Sakura shrugged, indifferent.
"YOU—!"
The girl's fury boiled over at the sight of Sakura's careless dismissal.
"Didn't you say you wanted to protect everyone?"
"What exactly did you protect?"
"Next time you want to talk that big, maybe think about what you're actually capable of first."
"Setting a goal that far beyond your own reach is honestly kind of pathetic."
Sakura watched the girl's expression shift, and kept going.
"...I understand."
The girl looked at Sakura, fists clenched so tight they shook, teeth gritted — and then, without another word, took off running straight toward Pain, standing like a lone figure in the middle of the wasteland.
"Planning to take him on one-on-one?"
"If you'd finished the Strength of a Hundred Technique, you might actually have a chance."
"But as you are right now..."
Sakura shook her head.
Ignoring the pity in Sakura's eyes behind her, the girl broke free of the last surviving cluster of villagers without a moment's hesitation and charged.
Straight at Pain!
Sakura's attention, meanwhile, had drifted toward a white-eyed girl standing not far off.
Hinata...
She let out a quiet sigh internally and didn't dwell on it further.
By now, the girl had already engaged Pain in combat.
Deva Path had just unleashed the amplified Shinra Tensei and was temporarily unable to act — leaving only the other four Paths, minus Naraka Path, to face her.
Thanks to the intelligence Konoha had gathered on Pain's abilities, the girl was able to hold her own against him reasonably well, drawing on everything she knew.
But it wouldn't last.
However much intel she had, raw combat strength was still raw combat strength — knowing your opponent's tricks didn't magically flip the outcome of a fight this lopsided.
Only if she'd finished both the Strength of a Hundred Technique and mastered Shikkotsu Forest's Sage Mode could she have stood a real chance of beating Pain outright.
As things stood, facing Pain now was little more than a mantis trying to stop a chariot.
Dodging an attack from Human Path behind her, the girl was just about to launch a counterattack—
when an iron fist appeared directly in front of her.
Asura Path!
All six of Pain's bodies shared a single field of vision — there was no exploitable blind spot to be found anywhere.
Asura Path seized the opening instantly, sending the girl flying with a single punch.
At the same moment, Animal Path, Human Path, and Preta Path closed in, each driving a black rod straight into her body.
Both legs pinned through. Her hands forced flat and driven into the ground.
Bright red blood poured from the wounds, and the girl bit down hard on her lip, refusing to let herself cry out in pain.
"Sakura!"
A figure came rushing toward the scene.
Tsunade.
But by now, Tsunade's own condition had visibly deteriorated. To protect the villagers, she'd been channeling her chakra through Katsuyu to every single person in Konoha.
Even so, that one blast of amplified Shinra Tensei had left Konoha devastated regardless.
"Master."
The girl gritted her teeth hard, trying to force herself to stay calm.
Just as Tsunade prepared to face Pain alone, a massive cloud of smoke bloomed across the empty, wasteland-like remains of Konoha.
The girl turned to look — and found three colossal toads standing there.
That was...
Naruto?
She blinked, startled.
Why is Naruto back...
Pain's actual target was the Nine-Tails sealed inside Naruto.
"Don't worry — I'm the one who called him back."
She knew Naruto had gone to train at Mount Myōboku in Sage Mode.
But she'd never expected Tsunade to call him back, of all times, right now.
If Pain simply captured Naruto now, wouldn't every single death here have been for nothing?
"No — this isn't right..."
The girl tried to force herself upright, but Pain's black rods disrupted chakra flow — despite looking like nothing more than three ordinary rods, they held her pinned to the ground with absolute, unshakable force.
By now, Naruto had already recognized this wasteland as the Konoha he knew.
And in the same instant, he spotted the girl, pinned helplessly to the ground.
His heart stopped, dead in his chest.
Again.
Again.
The girl he wanted, more than anything, to protect — the girl he loved most — had been hurt again.
An expression too raw to name crossed Naruto's face. In an instant, he'd flashed to her side.
Carefully, he pulled the black rods out of her body, one by one.
"Sakura..."
Looking at the girl before him, blood pooling around her, dirt and blood staining her skin, the blond boy's face twisted with anguish.
"Naruto, go. Now."
"You're his target."
The girl's face had already gone faintly pale from blood loss.
"Don't worry..."
"I'll... kill the man who hurt Sakura."
With that, ignoring the girl's protests entirely, Naruto scooped her up and prepared to leave, intending to carry her to safety.
He glanced back once at the six figures behind him.
And for the first time, something like true, bone-deep killing intent flickered in his eyes.
(End of Chapter)