Chapter 53.1- Gamer of the Desert (Patreon)

XXXXX SAKURA HARUNO

The Leaf hadn’t felt like home in years, she thought to herself as she walked past the stadium that had held the chunin exams that had changed everything. Sometimes she wished that she’d done what she really wanted to do on that morning of the first exam and just stayed home, pretending to be ill. Naruto and Sasuke would have been furious with her, but she’d probably still have her team with her. Not the way things were now. Kakashi-sensei was dead, killed in Iwa’s attack. Naruto was gone. The Hokage said he’d been kidnapped by the Legendary sannin Jiraiya when he betrayed the village to join his former teammate. Orochimaru. The creep that had marked Sasuke and killed the Third hokage. Speaking of Sasuke, he was still a shinobi of Konoha, but he might as well have been as gone as Naruto was. Hokage-sama had recruited both he and Neji-san for special training. It meant that her team was essentially gone.

Without a team, she’d floated along for a few months until Kurenai-sensei had recruited her into her own team. After Akamaru had died in one of the multiple explosions the Kazekage had left behind to sabotage the village, Kiba had retired from life as a shinobi to run the hospital in his clan’s kennels, and the Genjutsu mistress had needed another number to complete her team. Sakura could not lie, being in the team with Hinata and Chino was much different from being in Team 7. In some ways it was better. Training was actually training and not just their sensei tossing them at mission after mission and then tossing them a bone whenever he got the mood. Kurenai-sensei actually went to the effort of making sure she knew what they each needed to get better and worked to make sure those things happened. Every training session was well planned ahead of time, and they didn’t stop until they accomplished the objectives for each session.

For Hinata and Shino, most of their training was in strategy, application, and teamwork since their clans handled most of their education, but Sakura didn’t have a clan. Neither did Kurenai-sensei so she could relate to her, at the very least. And she’d used that to mean that Sakura’s training got to be different from the others without anyone complaining. For the first time, it felt like Sakura was the special one in the team- like she was the priority. And she made sure to live up to that. Every genjutsu Kurenai-sensei taught her came easy and she made sure she went beyond just learning them to mastering them to Kurenai-sensei’s high standards.

Even now, Kurenai-sensei was already joking about not having anything left to teach her. She fiddled with the zipper on her chunin vest as she quashed the urge to feel pride in her ambitions. There was a reason she took this route everyday. Right to her left was a massive pyramid made out of sand. It was a monument to the Kazekage’s power, that he could place such a structure in the middle of their village and still not have it removed after over two years. The fact that there were people out there who could do things like this made her very aware of her place in the world.

She wasn’t even as strong as a Jounin yet, and Gaara of the Desert had been killing Jounins since he was about Eight years old. Her thoughts left her as the distinguishable sound of an explosion going off sounded across the village. She would recognise that sound anywhere. She looked around her for the damage, and noticed the smoke coming from the Hokage tower. The entire top two floors had been destroyed in one fell swoop.

There was a massive popping sound, even louder than the explosion as multiple giant snakes reared over Konoha’s walls. She almost fell to her knees. Scratch that, she did actually fall to her knees. Not again. Not again. She wanted to cry.

Suddenly there was someone by her side. “Stand up, Sakura. Let’s go. You remember the protocol, don’t you” She heard from beside her. Whose voice was that? She couldn’t recognise it. She really couldn’t. She focused on the words instead of trying to place the voice. They were right. Whoever they were, they were right. Protocol as Chunin was to respond to the most immediate threat. That was the attack at the gates. She stood up, forcing her hands on the ground to push herself up.

She could see him now. “I-Iruka-sensei?” She asked, shocked. He looked so different. Like he’d aged a decade in the last two years. The academy had been blown up. He was one of the few who had managed to survive, but his entire class had died from the attack. Of course he wasn’t in a good place.

“Let’s go, Sakura” he said to her with a painfully fake smile on his face. She nodded. She couldn’t break now. Her name is Sakura Haruno. Last of Team 7, under Jounin-sensei Hatake Kakashi. Chunin of the Village Hidden in Leaves. She would not fail.

She jumped with him unto a rooftop, and out of the corner of her eyes, she was something strange. Like a heat mirage. There was just a moving spot where the light wasn’t passing through properly. What could that be? She thought to herself.

“Come along, Sakura”

“Y-yes, Iruka-Sensei” She replied, figuring it was probably the tears in her eyes messing up her vision.

She jumped after him, and they made their way to the wall much faster than she’d ever had to move within the village. When they landed at the wall top and looked over at the other side, she felt her stomach fall to her feet. “Oh Gods” She heard Iruka say, and she very much supported the sentiment.

Stretching out beyond their walls was an army. Not even an army of Shinobi. Monsters. She noted a creature with Grey skin and a wooden bat slam into the Village’s gates with monstrous strength near the front of the line.

“Iruka-sensei, Sakura-chan, over here” She heard, and turned to see Choji’s large frame waving them over.