Chapter 138: First Experience
Sakura felt very unaccustomed to her first Anbu mission.
When Team 7 was on a mission, with Naruto around, there was never a shortage of noise. Non-combat missions were always completed amidst laughter and jokes. Even combat missions were not this oppressive.
Along the way, Yūgao and Shino didn't say a word, just focusing on rushing ahead. Around noon, Shino found a hidden patch of woods, waved for them to stop and rest. Everyone hid in the shade of the trees, drank a little water, ate some dry rations, and sat for a few minutes. Still, no one spoke, all maintaining their vigilance.
Sakura felt an unprecedented tiredness. Not a physical exhaustion, but a mental one from not being able to adapt. She had held her tongue for the entire morning and felt incredibly stifled.
As expected of the "Dark" Division.
However, she still endured it and slowly adapted to this rhythm.
She kept her lips pressed together, feeling them start to go numb.
After a short rest, Shino signaled for everyone to set out again. This time, they quickly passed through the woods and arrived at a small, unnamed town. Shino skillfully led the two of them to an unremarkable house in the town, which was a Konoha intelligence point.
After exchanging the secret codes, Squad 14 obtained the latest intelligence. The three Sound ninja they had discovered had already left here yesterday, heading north.
It seemed that the Sound ninja were indeed just passing through, but Squad 14 still carefully patrolled the vicinity as per the order's requirements.
Sakura created two hundred combat clones at once and conducted a carpet search of the suspicious areas where the Sound ninja might be. This greatly accelerated the investigation. In one afternoon, they had already investigated one-third of the suspicious areas.
As Shino had predicted, there were no discoveries.
After the sky darkened and the visibility was too low, the patrol mission could not continue. Squad 14 suspended the mission and went to a small outpost in the suburbs to rest.
"Tobi, you must have been bored to death today, huh?" As soon as he entered the outpost, Shino took off his mask and asked Sakura with a smile.
Haruno Sakura did not answer him immediately. Instead, she followed his example, took off her mask as soon as she entered the door, and let out a huge sigh of relief.
"Phew~!" she said, shaking her hair and rubbing her slightly swollen eyes. "Hn, I haven't said a single word all day! It feels very strange, like I've gone mute."
She complained with a sense of helplessness.
This had basically broken her record for the longest period of silence. In any case, she couldn't remember a time when she had gone a whole day without speaking.
Anbu missions were not only dangerous and tedious but also very dull. She hadn't understood what "dull" meant before, but now she had finally seen it.
Shino explained, "When carrying out a mission, speaking can easily cause distraction and lower one's vigilance. Many Anbu have made such mistakes in the past, being ambushed and killed while talking. These are all lessons paid for in blood! So when we're on a mission, we generally don't talk if we don't have to, and we maintain our vigilance at all times!"
Sakura pouted and made a helpless expression. "I can only slowly get used to it."
"You can do it!" A hand reached out from behind and patted the girl's shoulder. Sakura turned her head and saw that Yūgao had also taken off her mask. She gave her a gentle smile and said, "It's like this at the beginning. You'll get used to it!"
Sakura was instantly moved by her gentle, healing smile. My new teammates are quite considerate. Bullying the rookie together last night must have been because they drank too much!
However, her感动 didn't last for even a second.
"Mwah~" Yūgao, imitating her posture from last night, blew Sakura a kiss. "Work hard, little kitty!"
Then, watching the blushing and angered Haruno Sakura, she burst out laughing.
"What the hell is 'little kitty'?!" the pink-haired girl said, waving her hands vigorously and refuting, "I've never had that nickname!"
She said with forceful emphasis, word by word, "Nev-er! Had! It! That nickname is so cringey!"
"That's right, you're Tobi, a little birdie. How can you be a little kitty?" Shino said with a cheerful laugh.
"Yo, so you're a little birdie~"
"Aaargh, a kite is a fierce bird of prey! How is it a little birdie! Yūgao-san, I'm going to kill you~!"
"Hehe~ alright, alright, I won't give you random nicknames anymore!"
"Ahem, alright, alright," Shino interrupted the two's squabbling with a laugh. "In any case, we still have to thank Sakura's clone jutsu for today!"
"Yeah, it's a really useful jutsu! It finished one-third of the workload at once. At this rate, we can go back and report tomorrow," Yūgao also put away her teasing expression and said with emotion. "Sakura, this jutsu isn't too much of a burden on you, is it? Don't force yourself just because it's your first mission. Anbu missions don't have to be completed by tomorrow!"
"That's right... if this jutsu causes a burden like the Shadow Clone, then don't use it tomorrow. We can just patrol the normal way."
A warmth spread in Sakura's heart. My new teammates are quite reliable.
She then briefly explained the characteristics of the combat clone. This jutsu did not feed back experience, so the burden on her was not great. It just consumed some chakra when the clones were created.
Squad 14 chatted for a while, had dinner, and then went to rest.
A night passed without a word.
The next day's mission went smoothly with the help of Sakura's clones. The morning's search did not reveal any clues.
Just as Haruno Sakura was thinking that this intelligence was just a false alarm...
A situation arose during the afternoon's search.
"Are you the ones who destroyed my ice clone?" Sakura asked coldly, standing on a rock and looking down at the two Sound ninja below her feet.
After she had started the search with her ice clones, it hadn't been long before she had sensed a battle near one of the clones. However, by the time Squad 14 arrived at the battlefield, the battle was already over, and the ice clone had been destroyed.
But fortunately, the enemy had not yet left—no, it should be said, had not all left.
The three Anbu of Squad 14, each guarding a direction, had the Sound ninja surrounded.
"The intelligence said we would encounter three Sound ninja. It seems it's you guys. I didn't expect you to still dare to linger here. But one has already escaped..." Shino said, recalling the mission brief and confirming that they were Squad 14's targets. "If you are willing to tell us where the one who escaped went, I can spare your lives!"
The two Sound ninja looked at each other, then turned around, standing back to back and looking at the few of them warily.
"Are you Konoha's Anbu? Your skills are indeed extraordinary. Even a little girl's clone is so strong! We are indeed no match for you..."
One of the ninja said with a wry smile.
"However, even if we die... we will not betray Lord Orochimaru!"
After speaking, the two of them simultaneously took out a scroll from their clothes and released a ninjutsu, wanting to destroy it on the spot!
"They're trying to destroy the intelligence!" Shino's pupils suddenly shrank. "Stop them!"
"...Wait, leave one alive!"
—However, Shino's reminder was too late, for both things.
As a white water line and a crescent of silver sword light suddenly appeared on the battlefield, the heads of the two Sound ninja simultaneously flew into the air.
Shino hadn't even finished speaking.
"Damn it... none of us are sensory-type ninja. Now that we've killed them all, we'll never know where the remaining Sound ninja escaped to!" Shino's tone was a little gloomy.
He jumped down and nudged the scroll on the ground, which had been burned to ashes, with his foot. "And the scroll in their hands has also been completely destroyed."
"There's nothing to be done. The mission can only be like this. It can be considered completed, at least we have some gains. The mission is over. Let's go back and report!" Shino sighed.
In this situation, it could only be continued if there was a sensory-type ninja in the team. But sensory-type ninja were rare, and the village treasured them dearly. Even if they went on missions, they wouldn't participate in such boring, small missions.
There was no point in dragging it out any longer, so Shino decisively announced the end of the mission.
Yūgao walked over and said with a hint of apology, "Sorry, my coordination was off."
"No, no, it was me who acted too hastily," the girl with the cat-face mask said, jumping down from the rock and also expressing her apology.
Actually, it was mainly Sakura's problem. Her ninjutsu was released too quickly. The normal combat rhythm should have been for the taijutsu-type Yūgao to charge up and slash people first, with her providing support from behind with ninjutsu, or for her to launch a strong attack when Yūgao's attack failed.
In fact, Sakura didn't mention one thing. When she had dealt with the first Sound ninja just now, she had almost wanted to turn around and take out the second one as well. In that case, she might have accidentally injured Yūgao.
However, Squad 14 had only just been formed. They had only briefly discussed how to coordinate verbally and had not yet truly practiced teamwork. It was normal for a small mistake to occur.
"It's fine," Shino said, waving his hand dismissively as he bent down to seal the Sound ninja's heads into a scroll. "We just need to take the heads back to the Interrogation Division. The Yamanaka's secret techniques can still obtain intelligence even if they're dead, as long as the head is left."
A fire jutsu destroyed the remains of the Sound ninja.
"As for the coordination problem, let's find some time to practice teamwork after we get back! After all, we've only just started to team up!"
"But these two Sound ninja, why did they appear in this kind of place? I'm a little curious..."
Sakura shrugged. "Could it be that Orochimaru is up to some little tricks again? Anyway, it won't be another Konoha Crush plan."
Then the three of them directly rushed back to Konoha.
The mission, which was originally expected to take a week to complete, was completed by Squad 14 in two days. The higher-ups were very straightforward and gave them a few days off for the time they had saved.
Sakura used this time to finish the runes for the Yin Seal. She had also seen from this mission that Anbu work indeed often left a lot of unused chakra.
A few days later. In a hidden room in Konoha.
A girl with shoulder-length pink hair was wearing only her undergarments, lying motionless on the floor.
(End of chapter)
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