Chapter 194: Shocking! The Akatsuki is Actually the Ninja World's Most...
The talented always attract more hatred than the hardworking. This rule not only applied to Sakura in relation to Naruto and Sasuke, but also to the envy, jealousy, and hatred other girls felt for Haruno Sakura.
Relying on her medical ninjutsu and Ice Style chakra, a certain someone could now gradually claim to be naturally beautiful. Even without a touch of makeup, her appearance could be considered pretty and charming. She naturally had the capital to go out and meet people without makeup.
Therefore, in terms of makeup, Haruno Sakura still maintained the personality of her previous life. She didn't like girls wearing too much makeup, whether it was others or herself. Perhaps she had seen too much poor makeup technique. From a distance, it was fine, but up close, the unnatural skin tone would always make her feel a little awkward, although she had never quite figured out the difference between a "nude look" and no makeup...
To be honest, as a ninja, to spend too much time on dressing oneself up was a sign of being unqualified. At least, that's what Sakura herself thought.
The two chatted for a bit, fully exchanging their respective opinions on makeup, and deepened their understanding of each other...
Let's pause the diplomatic doublespeak for now. In short, in the end, Sakura was not persuaded by Hinata to accept the matter of wearing makeup when going out.
However, in selecting a gift for Haku, Sakura completely accepted Hinata's opinion.
First, lip gloss was passed over.
There weren't many colors here, only those relatively bright and solemn deep red tones, which were not suitable for someone with fair skin like Haku. According to Hinata, people with the Ice Style Kekkei Genkai had skin that was fair and cool-toned. Their lipstick color should be a brighter, girlish type, such as light pink, peach, or the like.
Sakura didn't know where all these particularities came from, but she decided to believe her for the time being.
Next were eyeshadow, blush, foundation, and the like. After wandering around, they didn't buy anything. Instead, Hinata spouted a lot of theories, but Sakura felt completely confused and didn't understand...
She suddenly understood what Sasuke had felt that day after listening to her explanation.
Walking in front of the nail polish, Sakura's spirits were suddenly lifted.
It wasn't that she had finally encountered a cosmetic she was interested in, but she had suddenly thought of that Akatsuki organization where even the men wore black nail polish—this was her deepest impression of the Akatsuki, and also one of the few impressions of them she had left after so many years.
A group of grown men carrying around a bottle of nail polish, having to apply it every few days. Doesn't that mean this Akatsuki organization is super gay and full of bromance?
Haruno Sakura suddenly fell into deep thought.
Shocking! The strongest underground organization in the ninja world is actually... the ninja world's largest gay-friendly organization?
"Do you like this color? You can try it," the shop owner, who had been huddled to the side, said, walking forward when he saw her staring at the few bottles of dark-colored nail polish. He had been much more honest after being glared at by Sakura. A little bit of killing intent leaked from Sakura was enough to make him not dare to be presumptuous.
"No, no, no, I'm just looking," Sakura said, quickly moving away from the counter.
"This black color is a classic nail polish color. Your hand shape is very good, and your skin is also very fair. This color will look very good on you," the person said, taking advantage of her much gentler attitude to press on. "If you don't like a style that's too bold, you can also try this nude, girly style. It's the kind of cute nail polish that isn't too dazzling and is very suitable for your dressing style!"
He took out a few bottles of nail polish specifically for trying and placed them on the counter, signaling that Sakura could try them at will.
She shook her head repeatedly and was just about to leave when she was stopped by Hinata. "Are you looking at this color? Not bad taste!"
"This... seems a bit too bright. It's not very suitable for Haku, is it?"
"Not at all. The temperament of this black color is steady and dignified... Forget it, you don't understand anyway. Just shut up and give me your hand to be a hand model!"
Hinata glared, her willow-like brows raised high. Her small expression was extremely intimidating, and Sakura quickly extended her hand to let her do as she pleased.
She let her apply several colors to her own nails. "What do you think? Which color looks better?"
"This one, after it's applied, you can't even tell the difference from not applying it. Bad review!" Hinata said, shaking her head directly.
You can't see the difference at all? A thought suddenly stirred in Sakura's heart.
Oh right, besides being decorative, this thing also has a concealing effect...
Then, the last piece of the puzzle for that matter seems to be this.
Two days later.
She had originally wanted to celebrate Haku's birthday, but she didn't expect the situation to suddenly change. The reconnaissance troops seemed to have discovered Orochimaru's main base, and Sakura's leave was declared to be over.
She left the gift—two bottles of nail polish, one coffee-red and one transparent—and rushed off, leaving a very confused Haku with a head full of question marks: Haruno Sakura would actually give this kind of gift? Does she really know what color suits me?
This time, Squad 14 still gathered in the Hokage Tower.
"We've discovered several underground caves that might be Orochimaru's main bases..." Tsunade said gravely, holding several mission briefs. "Your mission is still the same as last time. One squad is responsible for one area. Explore and destroy these bases. This mission is much more dangerous than the last. Although the reconnaissance troops still haven't found any trace of Orochimaru, there may still be other Sound ninja remaining in the base. With your strength, it shouldn't be a problem, but you still have to be careful. When infiltrating Orochimaru's main base, we can't say for sure whether you'll encounter a surprise counterattack from him suddenly returning..."
She read the mission intelligence while looking at the Anbu who were standing before her, motionless and unwavering, and nodded secretly in her heart.
"If it goes smoothly, this mission might have a lot of gains. So, in order to bring back as many valuable things as possible, please take these scrolls," she said in a loud voice, jutting her chin to signal the Anbu to come and get the equipment issued for this mission: a pile of huge sealing scrolls.
"Each person take one and tie it to your back. It might hinder your movement a bit, but please try to overcome it," Tsunade reminded. "Remember to take off the scroll when you encounter a battle."
The last sentence was directed at Haruno Sakura.
Among them, her combat experience was the weakest.
At the same time, her combat power was possibly the strongest.
Haruno Sakura felt Tsunade's gaze, nodded slightly, took the scroll that Shino handed her, and with Yūgao's help, tied it to her lower back.
It felt heavy. A scroll thicker than her thigh was indeed easy to get in the way of her movements. It looked like it would get stuck with the slightest carelessness. Sakura tugged at the scroll, a little puzzled as to how Jiraiya could move so freely with such a large scroll on his back every day.
Our hardware is different... that rough uncle's thigh is thicker than my waist...
"Finally, the same words as last time: once you find Orochimaru in the vicinity, everyone is to immediately abandon the mission and retreat!"
Tsunade said in a deep voice.
"Set out!"
Deep in the Land of Wind, in a valley with a peculiar landscape.
A magnificent grand canyon was sandwiched between high rock walls. Picturesque and bizarre peaks and stone pillars stood on the dark red ground of the valley floor.
A great river had once flowed here. After the climate changed and the seas turned into mulberry fields, only these long canyons, washed by the river water and the wind and sand, and the various and colorful rock pillars in the valley were left.
The scenery was extremely vast and beautiful.
However, the climate here was dry, and it was rarely visited by people. For a hundred miles, there was no sign of life.
The only two figures that could be seen, however, had no thought of admiring the beautiful scenery.
No, not just not admiring... The shorter, yellow-haired boy among them was constantly trying to condense a chakra ball in his hand and test its power on the stone pillars in front of him—
Boom! Boom!
Amidst the intermittent roars, a small patch of the stone forest had already been ravaged into a messy pile of rubble by the yellow-haired youth. The beauty of nature had thus been mercilessly destroyed by him...
"Huff, huff!" The youth with the six fox-whisker-like marks on his face stopped, panting heavily. His overexerted hands were already trembling slightly.
"Damn it, I still haven't succeeded!" He wiped the sweat that was constantly dripping from his forehead, took a break, and then turned his head to look at the white-haired old man who was still writing and drawing in the distance, and complained, "Pervy Sage, stop writing your erotica and come and give me some pointers!"
The burly man he called the Pervy Sage was precisely the "Yellow" of the Yellow-Gamble-Poison trio—the man known as the Mad Demon of the Sea of Desire, the Lewd Ghost of Lust, the Mad Demon Jiraiya!
Ever since Jiraiya had taken Naruto away from Konoha to travel the various countries, constantly training and gathering intelligence along the way, it had been more than half a year.
Jiraiya's material-gathering operation for "Icha Icha Paradise" had also been progressing smoothly—cross out this sentence.
Jiraiya's intelligence gathering work had also yielded many results—the writing and drawing he had just been doing was definitely not writing, but very seriously recording intelligence!
Seeing Naruto walk over, Jiraiya quickly put away the paper and pen in his hand—after all, top-secret intelligence belonging to adults could not be seen by children!
"You rest for a bit first. I'll come and guide you in a while! I have to send a letter first."
Jiraiya took out a letter from his clothes that recorded the intelligence on the Akatsuki, thought for a moment, added a few more sentences, then put it in an envelope and sent the envelope back to Konoha with a summoning jutsu.
"Alright, let me talk to you first! You should be not proficient enough in the wind nature transformation, which is why you can't smoothly inject the nature transformation into the Rasengan."
The white-haired old man said with a serious expression.
"Is that so? I remember Sakura-chan added the wind nature transformation very easily before!" Naruto said, touching his chin and wrinkling his face.
"She is her, you are you. It's not the same. Sakura is a genius. And you, well, while you're not an idiot, you're not a genius either."
He said, patting Naruto's shoulder.
The hard life of the past six months had stripped much of the childishness from Naruto's face, and he was gradually taking on the prototype of a tenacious and sunny youth.
"So, don't be in a hurry to get the Wind Style: Rasenshuriken out. Use your shadow clones to practice the wind nature transformation again!"
"Ah? Again?" The sunny youth's face immediately turned into a bitter melon.
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