As Kimimaro left the shop and headed to the Hokage monument to sightsee a little, he thought about his previous encounter with Ino.
He's pretty sure that she had fallen for him now. Sai from the original series managed to make her fall for himself in just two words after all. Why can't more the handsome him, do the same?
'That bastard' Kimimaro though, but soon calmed down realizing that the guy probably already died. If not he would've killed him personally now. What can he do, he's just too jealous...
And not just that. Since Sasuke 'disappeared', Ino needed to find another crush to fill her void or else she'll remain in the depression forever.
He'll happily fill that place though, she'll grow into a real beauty when she grows up. As for his direct involvement in dealing with Sasuke, she doesn't need to know about. As well as many other things about him too.
But he'll always be fair to her too. She's one of the few people he wouldn't hurt no matter what in this world. When he saw how lovingly and trustingly she was looking at him, he wanted to make her his and protect her forever.
But, she's currently too young for his taste, he would have to wait at least until the Shippuden time to get together with her.
And since there's nothing else left to do here, he'll leave Konoha.
He'll explore this whole world along with learning his Fūinjutsu. Even though he can't directly seal the Ten-Tails instead himself since there needs to be a Rinnegan for that.
He had found a way around that too, like always. He has a theoretical idea about that but needs to practice a little more to learn how to make that seal a reality.
He had one clone left in the Orochimaru's base. He decided to visit his old mentor and see how was he doing on his Rinnegan conquest, before starting his journey.
He communicated to his clone to summon him and soon, he was summoned. He made another clone in Konoha before that too, just in case.
He appeared inside the Orochimaru's courtyard. There were Jugo, his clone and Karin there. His clone looked like he was hanging out with them.
"You're free now" Kimimaro said, and his clone left.
Jugo and Karin looked happy to see him. Karin was a lot more of course. When he looked at her, he spotted a couple of differences on her. She looked really cuter now than before. She wore no glasses and even though her hair was still red, her hairstyle was a lot better now.
"You looked a lot cuter now Karin" Kimimaro surprisingly said.
'Yess, he praised me!' Karin thought while blushing and looking somewhat proud.
"Your clone told me your favorite hairstyle" she said smugly. Yes, her current hairstyle was even better than Ino's, to be honest.
"Nice, maybe I even take you when you get older" Kimimaro said jokingly.
"You can take me now! What's wrong with me now!?" She said excitedly.
He looked at her chest and said "Well first work around on that too and we'll see then"
She looked a little embarrassed and shut up.
"Good seeing you too, friend" Jugo said awkwardly.
"Good to see you too, Jugo" Kimimaro said happily.
"After I took those cells from you, I got an amazing power up. If you need any help from regarding anything, just say it" he continued happily.
"No need, that's what friends are for" Jugo replied.
"Where's Orochimaru?" Kimimaro asked curiously.
"I don't know. He and Kabuto were in that laboratory ever since you left last time" Jugo replied again.
'Hmm, I wonder what they could be doing?' Kimimaro thought.
He activated his senjutsu wanting to see what's going on in the laboratory.
But, fully accidentally saw two large chakra presences soon nearing the Otogakure.
'Who could these two be, and what do they want with Orochimaru?'
'Well I hope they want some smoke, I haven't had a good fight in a while'
'Judging from the size of these two chakra presences, it would be a good fight'
He thought that he is stronger than anyone in this world on one on one situation. But he doesn't know what would happen if two or more strong enemies joined together against him. Maybe they could catch him off guard, or something.
He smiled crazily and said "Wait for me here, I need to check on something"
Then he jumped 15 meters into the air and started running towards the two presences.
__________________________________________
Ever since he left, Ino was absent-minded thinking about him, oftet with a blush appearing on her cheeks. She sometimes smiled to herself a little too when no one looked.
But her father Inoichi managed to catch on that. Either way, he was more happy to see her like this than her depressed version.
"Did something good happen to you today Ino?" he asked her on the dinner plate.
Ino woke up from her thoughts and looked a little shocked "N-no" she replied a little embarrassingly.
Inoichi didn't press any further and they continued eating. Once they finished, Ino got to her room ready to sleep. She changed to her pajamas, but she was nowhere near being able to sleep.
Her thoughts always drifted to a certain white-haired boy.
'Kimimaro...' she thought 'Even his name is nice'
She must admit that she had fallen hard for him. No one ever told her that she's pretty, including the boy she had previously liked. He straight up always ignored her to be honest.
Wait, she now realized that she forgot and didn't even once ask her father about Sasuke today at the dinner's table.
'Well... maybe it's time to really move on' she thought.
"Hmm, Forehead will be really surprised when she learns about this" she said aloud.