Chapter 238: Why Should I Not Fight?
"What has been going on with Lady Tsunade lately? Her mood has been so strange."
The idle chatter from the neighboring table caused Pakura to pause while eating her dango.
The two women were wearing nurse uniforms, appearing as though they had just finished their shifts. Pakura hadn’t paid them any mind at first; the affairs of Konoha had little to do with her.
However, the name "Tsunade" was too prominent to ignore.
One of the Sannin, the Princess of the Senju, and the strongest medical ninja in the shinobi world. Even back when Pakura was in Sunagakure, that name had been legendary.
"Keep your voice down! Is Lady Tsunade’s business something we should be gossiping about?" the other nurse whispered, though she couldn’t dampen the flame of curiosity.
"What’s there to fear? I’m just saying what I saw. A while ago, I went to deliver some documents—guess who I saw? Jonin Kitahara! He was standing right outside Lady Tsunade’s office!"
Pakura felt a sudden ring in her ears.
Jonin Kitahara.
In all of Konoha, could there possibly be a second person with the surname Kitahara?
Without realizing it, her hand lowered, the bamboo skewer still held tight.
"What’s so strange about standing there for a bit?"
"Standing there for a bit isn’t strange, but he went there for a week straight! Every single day! It was like he was being forced to stand in the corner as punishment, and Lady Tsunade didn’t let him in once!"
"Really? Did they... have a fight?"
"Who knows? Probably..."
The bamboo skewer in Pakura’s palm bent slightly under the pressure of her grip. The faint sweetness of the dango vanished completely from her tongue.
She suddenly remembered that day. When she told him she would visit Konoha often in the future, why had his reaction been so indifferent?
She had been foolish enough to make excuses for him, telling herself that he was simply a busy person. Now, it seemed it wasn’t a matter of personality.
He already had someone better by his side.
And that person was Tsunade.
Pakura felt a suffocating tightness in her chest. She had met countless people and believed she was second to none. But her opponent was Tsunade.
The granddaughter of the First Hokage, one of the Sannin, and the pillar of Konoha’s medical system. Those titles alone were enough to crush anyone’s confidence.
And what about her?
A missing-nin abandoned by her village, who didn’t even know where her home was anymore.
Tsunade didn’t even need those borrowed memories to make Kitahara Kaede willingly wait outside her door for a week.
Pakura slowly lowered her head. She suddenly found herself unable to distinguish the truth. Was her affection for Kitahara Kaede because of who he was, or because of the memories of him saving her life?
If those memories were gone, what would be left between them?
A missing-nin from Sunagakure and a Jonin from Konoha? How could she possibly compare herself to Tsunade?
A wave of bitterness washed over Pakura, so bitter that she almost wanted to laugh.
She was truly pathetic. She had fought and bled for years in Sunagakure, only to end up with nothing. The village was unreliable, and her future had been a dead end. She had finally managed to grasp a piece of driftwood to save herself, only to find that someone else was already clinging to it.
The nurses at the next table had already moved on to another topic, but Pakura didn’t hear a single word. She sat there, her mind a chaotic mess.
Should she give up? If the other woman was Tsunade, it wouldn’t be shameful to concede, right?
But the moment that thought surfaced, a spark of anger ignited in her heart.
’Why should I?!’
When had Pakura ever been a coward? When she was treated as a disposable pawn by the entirety of Sunagakure, she had found a way to survive on her own!
Now, just by hearing a name, she was expected to admit defeat and surrender? What kind of joke was this!
Pakura snapped her head up, the confusion in her eyes replaced by a fierce determination.
So what if Tsunade was powerful? It wasn’t as if they were together yet! If they weren’t, it meant there was still a chance!
And that Terumi Mei... if she wanted to steal him too, then let her try!
Everyone would fight based on their own merits!
Pakura no longer wanted to wait passively for a result. Things that one simply waited for were never reliable. Sunagakure had already taught her that lesson in blood.
She placed the bamboo skewer back on the plate and fished a few coins from her ninja tool pouch to leave on the table. As she stood up, her back was perfectly straight.
She walked out of the dango shop without a single glance back, heading straight toward the village entrance.
She couldn’t go to Kirigakure right now, but she could return to Amegakure, do what she needed to do, and accumulate her own leverage.
When Kitahara Kaede returned, she would demand a clear answer from him face-to-face!
If he hadn’t chosen yet, she would fight for him until the very end!
***
Pakura’s figure disappeared around the street corner.
In the alley diagonally opposite the dango shop, Tsunade stepped out from the shadows, her arms crossed. She watched the direction Pakura had gone, her expression complex.
Tsunade found her own behavior absurd. She was actually stalking another woman like some teenage girl.
Yet, she couldn’t help herself. She wanted to know exactly what relationship this woman had with Kitahara Kaede.
As a result, she had first seen Might Guy run over to deliver a message to the woman.
"Kaede asked me to tell you that he’s on a mission. He told you not to worry and that he’ll be back soon."
At that moment, Tsunade had been so angry she nearly crushed the wall beside her.
’You bastard, Kitahara Kaede!’
He went to a godforsaken place like Kirigakure and didn’t say a word to her before leaving, yet he was thoughtful enough to send a messenger to this woman? Truly impressive!
Tsunade had genuinely wanted to rush out, grab the woman by the collar, and demand an explanation. But she had forced herself to endure.
Then, she watched Pakura enter the dango shop, and she watched how Pakura’s entire demeanor shifted the moment she overheard the nurses’ gossip.
That face—first shock, then a gradual paleness, and finally a numb emptiness.
Tsunade had seen it clearly from across the street. The woman didn’t look happy to see a romantic rival struggling, as Tsunade had imagined. Instead, it was a look of despair and helplessness, the kind one feels when their most precious treasure is easily stolen.
’Damn it.’
Why did that reaction feel so familiar? Hadn’t she felt exactly the same way every day for the past month?
She wanted to see him, but couldn’t bring herself to lower her pride. She waited for him to explain, yet feared hearing the answer she dreaded most.
The look on that woman’s face was practically a mirror of her own.
The anger in Tsunade’s heart inexplicably dissipated. She looked at the empty seat in the dango shop, her frown deepening.
Something was wrong. The whole thing felt off from start to finish.
Kitahara Kaede had spent most of his time in Konoha; when did he have the time to develop such a deep relationship with a woman from Amegakure? Yet, the woman’s reaction just now was definitely not faked. That kind of heartfelt care and pain couldn’t be lied about.
Tsunade begrudgingly admitted that the woman called Pakura truly held Kitahara Kaede close to her heart.
But what about Kitahara Kaede? What on earth had he done to make a female Jonin from Amegakure travel all the way to Konoha just to find him?
Tsunade recalled the scene she had witnessed outside the clothing store. The way the woman looked at him was hot enough to burn.
And him? Though he looked guilty, he hadn’t explicitly pushed her away.
He definitely knew something. But he hadn’t mentioned a single word to her.
The more Tsunade thought about it, the more frustrated she became. Previously, she thought the answer was simple: Kitahara Kaede was just a flirtatious bastard who played around behind her back. But now, it seemed things were far more complicated.
If he were just a liar, that woman wouldn’t have reacted that way.
Tsunade felt she might have been too hasty in her judgment. The secrets hidden within that man were like a tangled ball of yarn.
Hagoromo Kaede, the Blue Fluorite necklace, the sudden emergence of the arms plan, the woman from Amegakure, and now a specific mention from Kirigakure...
These clues had to be connected. She just hadn’t found the key thread yet.
Tsunade’s expression remained grim. She was still angry. Kitahara Kaede had made her wait, made her suffer, and left her to spiral into overthinking without a single explanation.
This debt was far from settled!
But she didn’t want to keep guessing. When he returned, she was going to pin him against a wall. No matter what, he would have to explain everything to her, start to finish!
Tsunade turned and strode back toward the hospital.
"You bastard... just what the hell are you playing at?"