Sakura meets her sensei fresh and lively at the crack of midnight thirty or something. She's not sure what time it is, just that it's really dark, everyone else is asleep, and she's got her training shoes on. Not to be mistaken for her normal shoes. They are technically the same thing, but it's a mentality, one decided when putting them on. One must always decide beforehand whether they are in their asskicking outfit, or in their go for a walk outfit. The clothes are about as important in that choice as the difference between an eight Kay television and a four Kay television, it's a mentality and unless you're truly in the top percentage of professional players it'll stay that way.
Does she believe Serral could benefit from a better visual setup than is normally humanly possible to benefit from? Yeah, totally. By the time you can spot an observer passing by your overlord by the shimmer it makes in the air during the eighth of a second you happened to scroll over it, human limits aren't in the equation anymore.
Could she?
Tangent aside, the point is she's here and she's ready for whatever absurdity Kakashi plans to throw at her. She won't falter, she hasn't before and she won't now. Somehow she's earned the respect of their teacher, and she's not immune to the fluffy feelings that creates in her gut. She won't lose hold of that, she'll work harder to keep it than she's ever worked before.
"Sensei." She greets, walking around the final tree line to get to their designated training ground. The boys aren't here this time, they're nestled in bed now that the urgent training is over and they can take things at a reasonable pace. No one wants to work themselves like that forever, it's mind breaking and not in that good way people on the internet talk about but refuse to elaborate on. She might be a little worried that Kakashi plans to punish her for her earlier shenanigans on the bridge. Later thought let her realize that was a little dumb, as he's taught her several times that he will hurt her for antagonizing a bigger beast.
Kakashi stands at the center of their race track, looking oddly thoughtful for once. The man is normally so confident in everything he does, this is one of the first times she's seen him question himself. She wouldn't call it pensive, that'd imply he's not sure he's about to teach her, but he is certainly going through the motions to figure out how best to implant the knowledge he must in such a way that she doesn't explode from it. Or, maybe he's trying to figure out the way to talk the absolute least while simultaneously giving the most poignant explanation. "You can have confidence in me." She asserts before he even says anything. "I won't do anything hasty."
"You say that, but you immediately went back into that dungeon the day after you all completed it." Kakashi says. "I didn't miss how you and Sasuke couldn't meet each other's eyes anymore, something scary happened in there. That's before I consider that he unlocked his Sharingan, which is an entire bag of worms on its own."
"Eheh, well, he got cornered when I wasn't ready." Sakura excuses, sheepishly able to look anywhere but at Kakashi. "And Naruto was busy I think, so… actually what was Naruto doing?" He'd already taken out the stragglers, right? Why weren't there a dozen Naruto's backing Sasuke up, why did it come down to her? She can't really remember, not with the head injury she took during the fight. It was all so fast even excluding the tiny gaps she has, and Naruto already had such an important job she wasn't thinking of him at all. It's hard to reflect.
"Naruto has gotten a lot better at knowing his limits, unlike the two of you." Kakashi says. "He was more than likely looking for an opening."
"Yeah…" He definitely wasn't letting Sasuke die or anything, that'd be absurd. They're a team, she needs to get that kind of thought permanently bleached from her head. She shakes it off, smiling to herself at the memory of how concerned they both looked when she woke up. "Jutsu, Sensei?"
"Jutsu." He agrees. "It's time to teach you how to make your own techniques. We call it a secret but it's not particularly hard to do." He lifts one hand out of his pocket, and begins slow, methodical hand signs. Funny shapes aside, they have meaning to her that she instinctively remembers from childhood. Ox, Boar, etc. "Do you remember why we make hand signs?"
"Because manually controlling your chakra takes an incredible amount of focus." Sakura recites, "and jutsu need to be formed very quickly, doing it too slowly will cancel out the effect and reset the formation. Hand signs are used as a way to form chakra in one moment, it's not that the hand signs themselves are important, technically anything could do it, it's that we are taught to mold our chakra in the way the hand sign indicates from a very young age so that later on making the hand signs and the chakra molding pattern to match is so instinctive that we can learn jutsu through that instead of a mechanical precision process for every part. It cuts training down from years to months, in some cases weeks or days." She looks proud of herself, she's sure, but she's prouder that Kakashi's stare only makes her flush a little bit. He probably didn't expect her to go off in such a long winded way.
Technically it's more than jutsu are written using the hand signs, so even if a more efficient method was developed, it would need to be painstakingly transferred over and would likely cause a skill gap between generations that'd only grow the more efficient or hard to learn the new method is. Skill gaps aren't great for the predictable nature of soldiers a nation needs to continue to confidently make the moves it needs to in its day to day.
"Correct," he says after a long second, "but if they're just shortcuts, does that mean someone could learn to cut out hand signs, or remove them entirely?"
"I've heard it's possible, and I bet Tsunade of the Sannin could do it with any random jutsu with practice." She says, "but the amount of control that would require for even basic jutsu you're not familiar with, I can't imagine it."
"That's funnier coming from you than I expected it to be." Kakashi teases. "Hmm, but that wording, not familiar with, do you think you could do it with a jutsu you were?"
"Given enough time." She says. "None of the techniques I've been learning recently require hand signs, just molding the chakra and commanding it to do something in a way I want."
"So you already know how to make a new jutsu." He says.
And waits-
And waits-
And waits-
"Wait…" Her brow furrows, as she thinks about it, running through her new skills she's gained recently. It's true, in none of the techniques has she used a hand sign, or any sort of formal instruction, each one was purely focused on learning how to mold and control the different types of chakra manually.
"I will leave you to that." He says, walking away faster than she expects, like he's worried the whole area is going to explode or something. "Good luck, have fun!"
"But, Kakashi! I don't know where to start!"
It's just like him to give her the first step of a task and then disappear, it's kind of how he teaches.
It's not really teaching at all, if she was the one who got to define it. Unfortunately she's not, and she's sure the Hokage is fine with this method as long as they get stronger and stay unhurt.
She bets her parents' Chunin mentors were more helpful.
"How did I not figure that out on my own!" She shouts at herself, tearing at her hair in frustration the moment he's out of sight.
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The bridge's completion catches Sakura by about as much surprise as it does anyone. Even Tazuna looks incredibly unsure of himself as they lay in the last piece of the structure, looking around as if ready for something to attack and show them all that the effort was futile all along. Nothing happens, not even after several minutes of waiting. The eerie silence stretches on for quite some time, only broken by the ambient sound of lavender town. She probably could have chosen a better place to play around in, but it's Inari's save and he's the one who's save is here, it's not her fault! She chose not to move forward in his game, just grind a little, lest she ruin his first experience. It's not like kids like grinding, so he doesn't complain or even seem to notice the extra odd level on his side Pokemon. He's not leveling them up evenly, as is customary for someone's first playthrough, so she's just making sure they don't fall too far behind and become a burden.
The least she needs is him getting stuck and getting discouraged. Especially with all the new toys she brought him and his friends from the dungeon. He's so active now, playing outside and running around and bonking his friends when he's not hanging out with her and playing the game. It's enough to etch a permanent smile on her face, at least when she's watching him.
She'll be sure to harass her parents about why they never gave her a little brother to spoil, after she's done introducing them to Haku and getting lots of hugs for her and Naruto that is.
When nothing happens for longer than anyone can handle, Tazuna finally raises his hand. "I now declare our bridge, finished!" The roars of excitement deafen her, but she doesn't shy away from the celebration. Even if it is a little much for a hyper focused person with enhanced ninja senses like her, she's pretty sure it's the shut-in part of her that hates this kind of thing, and she's made an active effort recently to avoid letting that get the mood down. This is a huge moment for Wave, and she couldn't be happier about it. "From now on, Wave can export via caravan. Should Gato turn out to be alive and in hiding, he'll stay that way, as his reign of terror is over. He can hurt us no more, stifle us no more, the people of wave are free!"
She didn't take Tazuna for a man of speeches, but then, he hasn't had a lot of chances to show it off. He's been scared shitless by Gato for so long that even news of his death didn't make it disappear. There was disbelief in everyone, fear that she was lying and that the man was only silent because he was planning his next act of extreme cruelty. Even as shipments of food came in, and the people stopped starving, there was always that thought in the back of their minds that the looming threat could reveal itself any second.
For them, it was Gato, for her, it was Zabuza.
The man who killed her, and then the man who gave her Haku without a fight. He didn't even come to say hello, or threaten her into taking good care of his son or whatever they are to each other. It's so anticlimactic it doesn't feel real, and so while she knows Gato's dead for a fact - she's killed his zombie-zombie-zombie version - she can't blame them for their doubts and uneasy feeling of dissatisfaction.
It'd have been much better if she could have hung the man in town square, or let the children beat him with the inflatables like a pinata… Actually scratch that, that would have been horrifying.
"I now name it, the great Sakura bridge!" Tazuna shouts, and she hears a hundred shouts right after.
"I'm sorry, what?" She spins around on her heel, the news finally clicking after several seconds of brain fizzle. She's not used to that kind of spectacle, or the eyes that land on her as if she should have expected this.
"Is this because I announced Gato's death? Because I really feel like that was a team effort."
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Her footsteps had been rather harsh. While the boys had thought ahead and gotten clean before arriving at the house, Sakura did no such thing. Sakura had gotten right to training the moment she was done introducing Haku to Kakashi, meaning she was still sweaty and drenched when she arrived at the home shortly after nightfall.
She opened the door quite forcefully, finding Tsunami setting a table for Tazuna and the boys, and both civilian gazes landed on her immediately, not even flinching away when the door she pushed open loudly smacked against the doorknob stopper. She tracked dirty footprints along the hard wood, and Sakura's gaze landed squarely on Tazuna with enough frosty focus to freeze the man's breathing in place.
"He's dead," She said, her tools clacking a little as she reached into her pouch to pull out the prize she'd had Haku go get her.
"Please don't do that." Sasuke gulped, seeing exactly where her head was going. He may not have known the exact details, but he'd gotten rather good at detecting when Sakura was about to do something very disturbing without thinking about it.
"Ah." She agreed, nodding to his superior experience, and put the fleshy object back in its wrapping inside her pouch.
"Who's dead?" Tsunami can't help but gulp.
"Gato." Dull red eyes from training with her sword so soon after that chaos reflected a sureness and blood lust that made the young woman twitch on the spot. "We killed him."
"Uh… Is that, um, him?" Tsunami asked, pointing at the young girl who shambled into the house, dreadful and weary. It was only then that Sakura looked down at herself and grasped what everyone's lack of celebration was about. Before this moment it didn't make any sense that despite her joyous news, everyone looked like they wanted to vomit.
She had person on her.
She was not sure if she borrowed a red outfit from Tsunami this morning, but she was sure it was red now, not a single spot of it wasn't painted by her glorious combat. Her footsteps tracked blood into the house, ruining someone's cleaning job with splattery madness that seeped into the wood further with every moment, permanently staining it with the death of their enemies.
Her hair was wet and weighed down, not with sweat like she thought, but enough matter she was pretty sure something physical remained tangled in her knots and she was too afraid to check.
"Yes." She asserted, realizing she had no recourse but to accept it as she stared out at the civilians and her judging team. "This is probably gato, I imagine this came from when I climbed on him and started stabbing."
"That was um, like six hours ago." Naruto pointed out with several twitches and green cheeks.
"Shut up about me, Gato's dead." She growled. "He's gone, the village can get food, the bridge is uncontested, celebrate!"
"Y-yeah, that's, I'll get the good tea!" She watched Tsunami run away, presumably to get the good tea.
"We should get Inari, he'll want to know," Sakura said, "we brought presents for him too."
"Shower first." Kakashi scolded. "Do not approach a little boy like that."
"Understood!" Sheepishly, Sakura couldn't help but agree that approaching Inari like this would be a terrifying thing to do. Even if she was pretty sure he'd appreciate the news of the bastard's demise a lot more than he was disturbed by the proof. Maybe she's not a master of child psychology.
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"It's now or never." Kakashi asserts, standing over them at their training ground and tapping his foot pointedly on a hollowed out rock she made just the other day with yet another experiment. She's been using it as a water bowl to play with and wash up with, after that very weird event with Haku, she's gone out of her way to avoid a repeat and has been proud to show up squeaky clean lest he draw her another bath. The extra water control training doesn't hurt. "We leave in a few days, either you complete the fifth dungeon clear or you don't."
"I could always come back on vacation when I'm a chunin." Sakura points out, "I doubt it's truly now or never."
[Dungeon Expiry time: 3 Days, 2 hours, 32 minutes, 27 seconds]
"Nevermind…" Sakura sighs at that, "alright boys, we rest up tonight and attack tomorrow, since we need to be fully rested and prepared for the trek home in case of ambush or if Haku tries anything funny."
"You said you're sure he won't." Naruto points out.
"I'm sure, but Kakashi's not." Sakura pointedly points towards their sensei. "If we're not prepared he's gonna punish us."
"I will punish you." Kakashi explains, and despite repeating what Sakura just said, it couldn't be more menacing coming from him. Even with the mask on, they can tell he's grinning and happy about the prospect of a chance to enact some fearsome sadism on them.
"You hear that, he'll punish us." Sakura says.
"I feel like he might punish us." Sasuke says.
"I'm getting the feeling he might punish us." Naruto nods sagely, earning a pat from Sakura and a rub of his hair with her fingers. Watching him accept her soothing touch is always therapeutic for her. It seems every other day she's disturbing him in some way, some part of her lacking humanity in a way she doesn't grasp and probably never fully will. It's not intentional, she didn't ask to be desensitized by the academy in a way no one else seemed to be. They showed them horror, they showed them bloodshed, the academy made it clear every single day of their lives would be bathed in violence if they took this route and sought advancement instead of a cozy life guarding the wall or something.
She wouldn't say she took to it, she just internalized it in a way that she assumed everyone had. Gaming made it easier, she could use tactics she learned in the academy to get a one up or end a virtual life and while she wouldn't say that gaming makes taking a real life any easier, she would say that the combination of intentional desensitizing from her superiors and teachers and having a practical application of that knowledge made it all the more effective.
Naruto trusting her makes her feel a little more like a person, like she's not that different.
She'll need to hunt Iruka down and ask what the fuck when she gets home. Surely most students took to it like she did, and Naruto and Sasuke are different…
Surely.
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