Chapter 55: Forcing Sakura to Grow
Naruto also understood what Kakashi meant: they just needed to protect Tazuna, and leave those two to Sasuke and the others.
Naruto wanted to give Sasuke some hints, but he was stopped by Kakashi.
Fine! This was another test for the rookies. But then again, after traveling for so many days, they were indeed a bit tired, so it was good to give them a wake-up call.
However, what Naruto and Kakashi didn't expect was...
Sakura saw the puddle in the middle of the road and jogged ahead of Kakashi and the others, staring intently at Naruto and Kakashi.
Even Sasuke took out a shuriken and went on alert.
Naruto smiled and said to Kakashi, "It seems our Team 7 is quite excellent!"
Kakashi smiled and said, "Indeed, quite excellent. I thought they had become slack!"
After Kakashi finished speaking, he looked at Sakura and Sasuke and said, "Since you've discovered it, I'll leave it to you. Naruto and I will back you up. You two have no objections, right?"
Sasuke nodded and began to form hand seals.
When Sasuke performed the Great Fireball Technique, the puddle immediately turned into two people, who jumped away to dodge.
"Damned brats!"
The two Ninja who had turned into the puddle also knew they couldn't defeat Kakashi and the others in a head-on fight, so they could only kill Tazuna as quickly as possible.
So, with unspoken coordination, the two ignored Sasuke and Naruto and charged straight for Tazuna, pulling their chains.
Sasuke was no slouch either; he threw a Kunai and pinned the chains to a large tree. Sasuke and Sakura then directly confronted the two Ninja.
Naruto smiled and looked at Tazuna, saying, "Old man, if we kids didn't care about you, would you have been slaughtered by those two Ninja?!"
Just as the old man, trembling, looked at Narutoand was about to speak...
Naruto looked at Kakashi again and said, "Since he hid the mission rank like this, if we were to abandon this mission, would it be equivalent to directly completing a C-rank mission?"
Kakashi glanced at Tazuna, shook his head, and said, "That would only count as abandoning the mission, though the mission reward would still be given to us."
"Oh! I don't understand that. He's the one who hid the mission details first, so why wouldn't it count as completing the mission?"
Kakashi said with a chuckle, "It's his fault for hiding the mission, but the fact remains that you didn't complete it!"
"Fine! I didn't expect there to be so many issues involved."
Kakashi smiled and said, "You've only been graduated for over half a year; there's still a lot to learn! Take it slow!"
Naruto and Kakashi's back-and-forth banter frightened Tazuna quite a bit.
Sasuke and Sakura soon captured the two Ninja.
Sasuke did reasonably well, wounding one of them.
Sakura, however, was a bit hard to watch; only with Sasuke's help did she manage to take down her Ninja.
Kakashi clapped his hands and looked at Sasukeand Sakura, saying, "Sasuke, you were excellent. Sakura... although you were a bit lacking, you still did quite well."
Panting heavily, Sasuke arrogantly turned his head away without saying a word, but the slight curl of his lips made it obvious to anyone that he was happy.
Naruto naturally saw that Sakura was dissatisfied with Kakashi's evaluation.
Naruto smiled, took a Kunai out of his ninja tool pouch, handed it to Sakura, and said, "Go over there and kill them!"
Sakura's eyes widened in disbelief as she looked at Naruto.
"Do you even know what you're saying? This is murder!"
Naruto smiled and tossed the Kunai to Sasuke, saying, "Kill one of them!"
Sasuke didn't even catch the Kunai Naruto tossed; he directly pulled a Kunai from his waist and, with a skillful flick, redirected the Kunai Naruto had thrown. It stabbed straight into one of the Ninja's necks, and the Ninja died on the spot.
Seeing this, Sakura looked at Sasuke and Naruto in shock and swallowed hard.
Naruto looked at Sakura and said, "We're not playing a Ninja game. Once we leave the village, death can happen at any time. Your mercy could end up getting everyone killed. Go over and kill him."
Naruto said these words so calmly that Sakurafound it hard to accept the current Naruto. Usually, while Naruto wasn't exactly sunny and cheerful, he wasn't this ruthless and terrifying.
Sakura looked at Kakashi somewhat timidly, hoping he would say something.
But Kakashi looked at Sakura indifferently and said, "Naruto is right. If you don't even dare to kill someone, there's no need for you to stay in Team 7. I will apply to Hokage-sama to have you transferred out of Team 7. But that's fine too; it's good for a girl to stay in the village and perform some d-rank missions."
Sakura looked at Kakashi in disbelief and said, "You want me to kill someone too?"
Kakashi nodded heavily. His meaning was clear: if Sakura didn't draw blood, he would definitely have her transferred out of Team 7 upon their return.
Sakura pulled a Kunai from her waist, swallowed hard, and was about to throw the Kunai to kill the Ninja.
But Kakashi interrupted Sakura.
"I want you to go over and kill him with your own hands."
Her chin trembling, Sakura looked at Kakashi and stammered, "Is... it... ab-absolutely... necessary... to do... this?"
Kakashi looked at Sakura with indifferent eyes and said, "It must be so!"
Sakura gripped the Kunai tightly and walked toward the Ninja with tears in her eyes. Just as she was about to strike and kill the Ninja...
Naruto suddenly said, "Stop!"
Sakura gripped the Kunai tightly and looked at Naruto, wanting to hear what else he had to say.
Naruto looked at Kakashi with a chuckle and said, "You don't seem to have interrogated them yet! They were coming for our client. If we kill them now, the evidence will be gone. What if he tries to deny it again?"
Kakashi smiled and looked at Tazuna, saying, "Mr. Tazuna, are you still unwilling to tell the truth?"
Hearing Kakashi's question, Tazuna's legs went weak and he sat directly on the ground. In fact, he had realized long ago that Naruto and the others already knew he had hidden the mission rank.
It's hard to say what Tazuna was thinking, but after adjusting his emotions, he began to complain about his hardships, and after that, he resorted to guilt-tripping.
After listening, Naruto's mouth twitched as he looked at Tazuna and said, "You don't have money to post a mission, but you have money to drink. Heh! We may be young, but that doesn't mean we're easy to fool."
Sasuke and Sakura were actually moved by what Tazuna said and felt some sympathy for him.
But after hearing Naruto's words, they also realized the truth. Sakura said fiercely, "How could you lie to us!"
Kakashi smiled and looked at Sakura and Sasuke, saying, "Now it's up to you to decide: continue the mission, or abandon it and go back. Don't worry, abandoning the mission this time won't be recorded in your Ninja files."