Chapter 400: Argument
"Of course I won," Haruno Sakura said carelessly while fiddling with her shoes. "Otherwise, would you still be standing here?"
After not hearing Sasuke speak for a while, Sakura looked up and saw the black-haired boy looking at her very seriously.
"You won?"
The girl blinked: "Okay... actually, there was no winner."
She put down the shoes, tilted her head slightly, and smiled, "We just exchanged a wave of skills, and since neither could do anything to the other, we each retreated."
"I couldn't just leave you alone..." Sakura spread her hands and looked at Sasuke, "and chase after him by myself!"
She didn't tell the whole truth.
So when saying this, Haruno Sakura felt a little ashamed. Except when joking, Sakura rarely lied to others about serious matters. She hated being deceived, so she didn't want to become the kind of person she hated.
It's just that Uchiha Itachi's matter involved the secrets of the village and might also have a bad impact on Sasuke, so she intentionally omitted the parts that couldn't be told to Sasuke and answered him by avoiding the important points. Haruno Sakura used to hate people making arrangements for others or deceiving others in the name of "I'm doing this for your own good." She always felt that the parties involved had the right to know and choose, but when Sakura truly faced this kind of thing...
"Sure enough, I'm just an ordinary person too."
The girl sighed inwardly.
"Liar," Sasuke frowned and said calmly, "Sakura, every time you lie, you like to look into others' eyes with very sincere eyes while speaking."
"Too much is as bad as too little. Doing this reveals flaws instead and makes it seem very fake!"
"Eh, is that so?" Sakura immediately laughed dryly in embarrassment, not knowing what to say.
The black-haired boy shook his head: "Sakura, the Sharingan can clearly capture the micro-expressions on your face. You can't lie in front of me... Tell me the truth. Regarding that person, you know a lot of things I don't know!"
Haruno Sakura waved her hand and said seriously: "Anything else is fine, but this is the only thing I can't agree to!"
"Why?" Sasuke frowned deeply, his voice uncontrollably raised a few degrees, "Why can't you tell me?! What exactly do you know?"
Haruno Sakura frowned slightly, looked at the somewhat agitated Sasuke, and sighed. Usually, he was fine, but as soon as Itachi's matter was touched upon, Sasuke would always lose his calm and easily become extreme.
Especially since he had just been severely beaten by his own brother, knocked unconscious directly by a merciless Tsukuyomi.
This made it easy for him to become a bomb that explodes at the slightest touch.
She understood Sasuke's feelings very well. It was just that there were some things Sakura really couldn't explain clearly to Sasuke—leaving aside that she hadn't fully figured out Itachi's matter herself, just considering that she owed Itachi a big favor in the battle with Danzo, she couldn't just turn around and put Itachi's request aside, right?
The matters of these two brothers and the Uchiha were a tangled mess. Before figuring it out completely, Haruno Sakura didn't think interfering arbitrarily would bring any good results.
"Sasuke, calm down..." Sakura pressed her temples and said somewhat helplessly.
"I can't calm down!" The black-haired boy shouted with a tense face. He walked over in a few steps and glared at Haruno Sakura, "Because the one whose whole family was exterminated seven years ago wasn't you! Because the one who was almost killed by the last relative just now wasn't you!"
"So you can always be calm!"
"But I! Can! Not! Calm! Down!"
He roared as if using all his strength, venting his emotions like a volcanic eruption, mixed with complex emotions such as unease, anger, pain, and so on!
Haruno Sakura looked at him with complex eyes.
"Tell me about Uchiha Itachi!" He stepped forward, grabbed the girl's white wrist, panted heavily, and stared firmly at Haruno Sakura's face, saying, "Otherwise..."
"Otherwise what?" Haruno Sakura looked back at him silently, "Although I wasn't the one who experienced those things, I am the one who fought side by side with you, and I am also the one who fought desperately to defeat strong enemies to protect you!"
"And then you talk to me like this?"
Haruno Sakura glanced at the wrist he grabbed, her voice a little tired.
Sasuke was suddenly stunned: "I...!"
Although he was extremely angry, he was actually just venting his pent-up emotions. After the catharsis, facing Sakura's face and thinking that he was just saved by her again, Sasuke's heated head was quickly cooled down as if splashed with a basin of cold water.
"Sasuke, I want to say sorry to you... but some things are not that I don't want to say, but I can't say."
Sasuke lowered his head.
After a long silence, he let go of his hand and said slowly: "No, I'm the one who should say sorry..."
"I'm sorry, Sakura." The black-haired boy said with a bit of shame and formality.
"Alright," the girl rubbed her wrist and laughed indifferently, "I forgive you!"
"But I won't give up pursuing the things hidden by you guys!" Sasuke suddenly raised his head and clenched his fist forcefully, "One day, I will discover the truth of everything!"
Seeing his somewhat chunibyo demeanor, Haruno Sakura shook her head secretly. She suddenly had an idea: perhaps hiding the inside story like Itachi did so he wouldn't discover it was the best choice for Sasuke?
However, Sakura didn't think Itachi's "I'm doing this for your own good" style of concealment could be carried out to the end. Sasuke was not a child who would be manipulated by others! After all, Haruno Sakura was willing to cooperate with Itachi this time only hoping that Sasuke would encounter fewer things that would destroy his worldview before it was finalized!
As for the Uchiha clan extermination, Haruno Sakura never dared to comment on it rashly; especially after she traveled through time and personally experienced the night of the extermination, she felt that the water inside this matter was extremely deep. Probably even Konoha didn't truly understand the whole truth of this matter, although it happened inside the village.
"Whatever you like!" Sakura was too lazy to pay attention to him for the time being. She looked at the sandal in her hand with dried glue, put it on her foot, tried to stand up, and stomped on the ground.
Seemed effective?
However, she laughed too early: then Sakura tried running back and forth using the taijutsu-style Body Flicker Technique, but the shoe cracked again when she exerted force on the sole the second time, and the girl almost knocked Sasuke flying headfirst.
"Who told you not to wear dedicated ninja shoes, liking to be vain!" Sasuke, who had recovered emotional stability after venting just now, mocked while supporting her arm.
"It's not like the issued ninja shoes haven't been worn out..." Haruno Sakura rolled her eyes at him. With her way of exerting force, any shoes were consumables. After all, she used the Monstrous Strength Technique to kick the ground. Huge force stepped on the ground through the shoes; no matter how sturdy the shoes were, they couldn't withstand dozens or hundreds of tons of force pressing down like this!
Even with chakra enhancement protecting the shoes, they would wear out sooner or later.
"Ignore the shoes for now." Sasuke pressed Sakura's hand and said, "I want to know about your battle with him earlier—after I fainted."
"Hn?" Bright emerald eyes blinked.
"How did you deal with his jutsu, like Susanoo and Tsukuyomi? How big is the gap between my strength and his?" Sasuke asked seriously.
"These questions, you can tell me, right?"
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