Chapter 106: Danzo's Inscrutable Intentions
"What can I do for you, my lord?"
Danzo was silent, not answering her question. His sinister, hawk-like eyes just looked at her calmly, his face, with its deeply carved wrinkles, showing no change. He waved his hand behind him, and another ninja wearing an animal mask walked out.
"Chunin Haruno Sakura, according to the order issued by Lord Hokage to strengthen the review process and investigate for traitors in light of the large number of spies that appeared during the Chunin Exams, the Anbu has been ordered to ask you for some information. Please cooperate," the animal-masked ninja said, stepping forward and holding up a stamped order form for Sakura to see.
Hmph, using the tiger's skin as a banner... you old fox.
"Is that so? It says here that suspects are required to cooperate unconditionally with the Anbu's review," Sakura said faintly after reading the order. "Then may I ask, am I a suspect?"
The person was silent for a moment, then said, "Of course you are not a suspect. The Anbu just needs to investigate a few matters in your political review and hopes that you will cooperate."
"Is that so? Then do I also need to go back to the Root base with you for the review?" The arc of the girl's lips was like a sneer.
The Anbu ninja's tone, however, remained flat. He glanced at the empty alley. "If you don't mind, it's also possible to conduct the inquiry here."
The girl was silent.
She wasn't afraid of them being hard-headed like the two ninja from before. But this Root ninja was yielding at every turn, and Danzo was using Tsunade's previous order to investigate spies as his banner. She was finding it hard to refuse. This trick of using a chicken feather as an imperial command—Danzo was quite good at it.
It's just... this way, besides really conducting an inquiry, what other tricks can Danzo play?
"Then let's ask here. I will tell you everything I know," she said.
If I can't figure it out, then I won't think about it. Her personality had always been so open-minded. Perhaps Danzo really did think she was a big problem, so he had to use a little trick to review her like this?
Hearing this, the animal-masked ninja carefully took out two scrolls.
"A Sound-Proofing Barrier and a Yamanaka Secret Technique Scroll. You should know what they are... We will be using this next. Do you have any questions?" he asked, unrolling the scrolls and glancing at the girl.
"No," the girl said, staring at the scrolls.
Sakura of course recognized these two scrolls.
The Sound-Proofing Barrier went without saying. The secret technique scroll was not uncommon in Konoha either. It contained a secret technique of the Yamanaka clan that could produce an effect similar to a lie detector when used on a subject, commonly known as a "truth scroll." Because its effect was good, and it would not harm the subject or pry into their privacy, only having the function of judging the truth or falsehood of the subject's words, it was widely used. It was a common practice for the Anbu to use this in important interrogations. Sakura had a clear conscience, so she could not refuse, nor did she need to.
It was just that this kind of scroll was quite expensive and was usually only used for important and serious matters. She had never thought that her status as the Hokage's disciple would also give her the qualification to enjoy this scroll. However, this was also within Sakura's expectations. Besides, she didn't need to rely on lying to deal with this kind of review—after all, she had never done anything to betray the village.
The Yamanaka secret technique scroll was activated by the Anbu. A faint chakra invaded Haruno Sakura's brain and locked onto a few specific positions. Then, a faint green light lit up on the scroll.
The animal-masked ninja glanced at the scroll and began to ask questions.
"On the day of the third round of the Chunin Exams, when you led your squad to leave the venue, why did you leave on your own midway? What did you do afterwards, and who did you come into contact with?"
"At that time, we were ordered to go and support Sasuke. When we found that there were enemies in pursuit behind us, I stopped alone, killed all the pursuers, and then caught up with the team. I didn't encounter anyone else besides them."
Green light.
The Anbu ninja then continued to ask, "In the second round of the Chunin Exams, during the battle with Orochimaru, did Orochimaru say anything to you? How did you answer?"
"Orochimaru said that Konoha was detrimental to my growth and hoped that I would defect from Konoha to his village. I refused him."
"Did he say anything else?"
"That's all."
"Why did you refuse him?"
"Because my family and comrades are all in Konoha, and following him would stunt my growth."
Green light.
After recording Sakura's words, the Anbu ninja looked up at her and continued to the next question.
Most of them were trivial matters, such as whether she had come into contact with external forces during a certain mission in a certain year and month, whether she had sold out Konoha's intelligence when she met a certain foreign ninja one day, whether she had murdered a certain Konoha ninja she knew who had died, and so on. The questions, back and forth, were nothing more than to confirm whether she had had contact with foreign enemies, whether she had sold out Konoha's intelligence, and whether she had harmed her compatriots.
Sakura's answer to all of them was no. There wasn't even a single question she refused to answer.
And the scroll's reaction was green light, green light, green light... green light all the way.
These questions, if asked to any ninja who wasn't harboring ulterior motives, would obviously be a straight line of green lights.
Sakura hadn't snuck out of the village as a child to abduct Kimimaro and Haku, she hadn't snuck in to dig out eyes during the Uchiha massacre, and she hadn't secretly joined the Akatsuki...
Apart from the transmigration itself, she had no ulterior secrets, so naturally, she could face any review with a clear conscience.
Of course, she also knew that the transmigration itself was the biggest abnormality. Her strength, far exceeding that of the original story, and her unusual ninjutsu could easily attract the attention of people like Danzo. People who were used to doing clandestine work all had this problem of being suspicious of everything. Danzo had always felt that Sakura's ninjutsu was a reward for being bought by the enemy.
And so, this inquiry had completely proved that those ninjutsu were the result of Sakura's own development. Danzo could only accept it now; the young girl before him really was a genius.
Sakura answered crisply and cleanly, so the inquiry proceeded rapidly. In less than two minutes, they had reached the last question.
"Well then, the last question," the ninja with the animal mask said, flipping to the last page of the inquiry manual. "On the night of the academy graduation, during the incident where Naruto stole the Scroll of Seals, you were also present. So, did you peek at the contents of the Scroll of Seals?"
The incident of stealing the Scroll of Seals? Sakura recalled the past and felt a sense of a trance.
The incident where Naruto had stolen the Scroll of Seals had clearly happened less than two years ago, but it felt like a very, very long time had passed. In the short time since graduating from the academy, so many things had happened that she had almost forgotten what she had been thinking at that time—why hadn't she taken the opportunity to take a peek at the Scroll of Seals? She actually had the chance at that time.
Oh, she had already forgotten her mood at that time. But she still remembered the other parts of the plot from that time clearly. Perhaps it was because she felt that such a question was no longer important? After all, she now had the authority to access the Scroll of Seals—but now she felt that the ninjutsu on the Scroll of Seals no longer held any attraction for her.
Her caution at that time had been rewarded. Otherwise, she would have had a bit of a headache dealing with this question.
She recalled the past and sighed with emotion for a good while before saying frankly, "No."
The green light from the secret technique scroll remained motionless.
The animal-masked ninja quickly wrote down a few words, put away his paper and pen, raised his head, and nodded to Sakura. "I'm done with my questions."
He bent down to pick up the scroll that was spread on the ground and stopped the chakra supply to the Yamanaka secret technique. Suddenly, Danzo's voice sounded abruptly.
"Miss Haruno Sakura, Root has perfect experimental conditions and a large amount of data, sufficient to support you in developing any ninjutsu. The purpose of Root also aligns with your thoughts and your desire to protect Konoha. As the leader of Root, I sincerely invite you to join our ranks. Are you willing?"
Sakura was suddenly surprised and turned her head to look.
Danzo stood quietly on the street corner, leaning on his wooden staff. His one half-open, half-closed turbid old eye seemed to flash with a sharp light, distantly locking onto Sakura's figure.
"I'm sorry, I'm not willing."
She said subconsciously.
The green light dimmed for a moment, and then the scroll finally exhausted its remaining chakra and returned to darkness.
An evening breeze blew past, rolling up a few withered leaves of the new autumn.
"In that case, we have disturbed you. Farewell."
Danzo gave an almost imperceptible nod. His wooden staff tapped on the road, and along with the other ninja, he turned into a few afterimages and disappeared from before Sakura.
Sakura watched them go and took a deep breath.
She wiped her forehead. A few drops of cold sweat had trickled down at some point. As the new autumn's evening breeze blew over, Sakura suddenly felt a bit of a chill.
The setting sun had now completely set, and the lights of the various houses lit up one by one.
She pushed off and leaped onto the roof of a house. She immediately smelled the rich aroma of dinner. Spurred on by the smell, her stomach reflexively rumbled a few times.
"So hungry..." she said, rubbing her stomach and pouting.
Looking at the lights of her own home not far away, the girl leaped a few times and disappeared into the night.
At night, Sakura hid in her room, experimenting with Phase Two of Sakura Rush with her ice clone while thinking about the previous events.
What exactly were Danzo's intentions? A show of goodwill? A show of force?
Why, when he clearly knew she was the Hokage's disciple, did he still want to pull her into Root?
Was there some conspiracy in this? Or was she overthinking it? Was his purpose actually laid bare, and she was just failing to see it?
She thought hard in her heart but still couldn't figure it out. Perhaps, for a person like Danzo, others could simply never figure out his thoughts.
The experiment, on the other hand, was going very smoothly: Sakura Rush - Phase Two could already be maintained on the ice clone for one or two minutes.
However, the experience fed back left Sakura in a cold sweat all night from the pain. The crude method of increasing reaction speed in Phase Two would bring huge pressure and damage to the nervous system. Just a few minutes of "Sakura Rush" was enough to completely destroy the clone's nerve cells, causing it to collapse and die.
To master it to the point where it could be harmlessly sustained for the duration of a small battle would probably take another month or two of practice.
The next day. Sakura's political review was passed.
❃❃❃
⤑ Show your support with Power Stones!
⤑ Unlock a Bonus Chapter every time we hit 400 Power Stones!
❃❃❃
♕ Get early access to 30+ advanced chapters on Patreon!
🔗 https://www.pat-reon.co-m/c/Hollowborn
(Just remove the hyphen (-) to open the link!)
💬 Enjoying the story? Drop a review!
Your support really helps the series grow—thank you!