"Looks like you got the hang of it pretty quickly," said Asuma, forcing himself to smile. "That's a good weapon you've got there…"
"Ha, ha…" Sakura laughed awkwardly.
If Asuma had been born to any other shinobi clan, he would have been regarded as a talented ninja, but as the Third Hokage's son, great things had always been expected of him… which had made his normalcy all the more disappointing. If he had been mediocre, that would have been that, and people would have quickly forgotten about him, but…
But the problem was that Asuma was just plain ordinary.
In his youth, the weight of expectations had crushed his spirit, so he had run off to join the now defunct Twelve Guardian Ninja group to serve directly under the Daimyō. To Asuma, becoming a bodyguard for the Land of Fire's Daimyō was much easier than having to face the Third's disappointment… or having to face the reality that he wasn't like Kakashi, his generation's most elite genius.
After the total implosion of the Twelve Guardian Ninja, the prodigal son Asuma had returned to Konoha with a much healthier mindset and reconnected with his love interest Kurenai, but… witnessing others' genius still made him uncomfortable.
'There's nothing strange about us mastering the method to channel chakra through a weapon that quickly,' Inner Sakura guffawed. 'Orochimaru's already taught it to us a few days ago!'
It was the day after the preliminaries, and Sakura had already been training for a few hours under Asuma at the Third Training Ground. With her 200% fire affinity, she had pretty much mastered the Fire Style: Ash Pile Burning Jutsu by noon, and now, with her 175% wind affinity, she had now fully grasped the Wind Style: Vacuum Blade Jutsu, making Asuma feel extremely inadequate.
Having been strong-armed into training Kakashi's genius disciple had awakened some bad memories in him, so Asuma was rather eager to escape this waking nightmare…
"Let's call it a day for now," said Asuma, trying to put some cheer in his voice. "Why don't you go tell Kurenai she can head to Yakiniku Q's with her team early? Here's her address…"
Sakura accepted the slip of paper Asuma was handing her, and nearly did a double-take upon seeing the address scribbled on it.
'She was our next-door neighbour all this time…' groaned Inner Sakura.
And so, Sakura bade goodbye to Asuma and began making her way home, hoping that she wouldn't run into her mum on her way back from groceries. The last thing she wanted was a repeat of last night, when her mother had screamed upon seeing her return from her five-day absence with significantly larger breasts…
'Always nagging about this and that,' Inner Sakura grumbled. 'Don't leave your shoes lying around in the entrance, wash the dishes, go buy some milk, you're too skinny, your chest is too big, you're never going to find a husband like this— oh, shit!'
Sakura leapt to the rooftops to hide, having just spotted her mother chattering away in front of their house with old woman Yūhi, who was incidentally Sakura's first breast hunt target after her transmigration. Sakura really didn't want to get dragged into their interminable gossiping, but they were blocking the way to Kurenai's house…
While she was waiting for them to finish their conversation, Sakura began picking up on some indistinct voices coming from within the Yūhi family home, which sounded rather like shouting… And mere seconds after Sakura had heard the voices, the Yūhi's front door flew open, and out ran a young girl with hazel-coloured hair, followed closely by a tall, black-haired and red-eyed woman… Kurenai!
Kurenai grabbed the young girl by the shoulder, but the girl twisted her body out of Kurenai's grip and turned to face her, tears of despair streaming down her face.
"You know my dream is to become a splendid kunoichi, Kurenai-sensei!" she cried. "You knew, and you still did that to me! Now, I'll never become a ninja, and it's all because of you!"
"Yakumo-chan," cried Kurenai. "Please, you have to try to understand. If I hadn't—"
Sakura, who was lying as flat on her belly as was physically possible for her, peeked over the edge of the roof down at the street below. That brown-haired girl, she felt somehow familiar…
"I understand perfectly well," said Yakumo with a voice that sent chills down Sakura's spine. "It was the Third Hokage's orders again, wasn't it?"
"I didn't have a choice," Kurenai said miserably. "But you're wrong about—"
Without a single word of warning, a bear-masked ANBU member appeared out of nowhere, flickering behind Yakumo and wrenching her arm behind her back in a joint lock, causing her to cry out in pain.
"Please, Kurenai-sensei!" Yakumo shrieked. "You can't let them take me away again! They'll never let me out of their sight again!"
"We received your message," the ANBU member told Kurenai in a neutral tone, much to Yakumo's horror. "The girl's keepers will be here shortly to ascertain her condition."
"So, it's true, then… I overheard my wardens saying that after you had given up on me, you had taken in three new disciples, and that they were now participating in the Chūnin exams," said Yakumo, crying bitterly. "Why won't you believe in me, Kurenai-sensei? This Rock Lee person we talked about before is doing very well for himself with only Taijutsu, so why, Kurenai-sensei? Why can't I become a fine kunoichi with only Genju—"
Perhaps tired of hearing her voice, the ANBU member delivered a swift chop to the back of Yakumo's neck, causing her to instantly lose consciousness. A few seconds later, two white-clothed Medical-nin arrived on the scene and picked up Yakumo's unconscious body, before flickering away with her.
And just like that, all four of them were gone.
At no point during any of this had Kurenai attempted to interfere; she had merely stood there, looking at her feet, fists clenched so tightly at her sides that her knuckles had turned white…
'Ah!' said Inner Sakura, 'I think I remember this plot! She's the girl with the Kurama clan Kekkei Genkai!'
Back when Sakura had watched Naruto in her first life, she'd been too young to know about the insidious lies known as filler. Near the end of the first Naruto anime, there were a little under a hundred episodes of pure filler. They were mostly unmemorable or boring, but there were a few good ones, such as the Hidden Star Village arc, and the episodes that had Tenten in them.
Basically, the Kurama clan arc was centred around Kurama Yakumo's loss of control over her powerful Genjutsu Kekkei Genkai. Her illusions were so convincing that any injuries or deaths that occurred in the Genjutsu would transfer over to real life!
However, Yakumo had been born with a weak body, making her incapable of controlling her own powers. So, when the split personality that she had developed to cope with her powers murdered her parents, the Third Hokage had ordered Kurenai to seal away her powers…
In Sakura's opinion, Yakumo had a clear-cut case of excess Yin chakra; or in other words, Yang deficiency, which explained her overly powerful Genjutsu and her poor physique.
Now, in Chinese novels, if one happened upon a jade beauty suffering from excess Yin, the solution was obvious: a prompt and direct administration of Yang energy to the jade beauty's lower mouth, from the protagonist's mighty rod (of justice).
Obviously, Sakura wasn't about to do something like that.
First of all, as a girl, she didn't have the necessary equipment, and second of all, it was just wrong to do something like that without asking for permission first. However! If Yakumo's problem was excess Yin chakra pervading her body, and Sakura's speciality was permanently stealing chakra… then wasn't she the perfect person to cure her!?
The only problem now was that Sakura had lost track of Yakumo, and she didn't know where she lived…
"Where's Karin when you need her," Sakura sighed. "I'm no good at urban tracking…"