Danzo's Inscrutable Intentions

"What are your orders, sir?"

Danzo silent, offering no answer to her question. His hawk-like eyes simply stared at her calmly, his sharply etched face showing no change. He waved his hand behind him, and another ninja wearing an animal mask stepped out.

"Chunin Sakura Haruno, in accordance with the Lord Hokage's order to strengthen investigations and eliminate traitors due to the large number of spies found during the Chunin Ninja Exams, the Anbu has been ordered to obtain some information from you. Please cooperate." The animal-masked figure stepped forward, took out a stamped order, and held it up where Sakura could see it.

Hmph, using someone else's name to make a big deal out of nothing... You old fox.

"Is that so? This order requires suspects to unconditionally cooperate with the Anbu's investigation," Sakura said calmly after reading the order. "Then may I ask, am I a suspect?"

The man paused for a moment, then said, "Of course you are not a suspect. The Anbu simply needs to investigate a few things during your background check, and we hope you can cooperate."

"Really? Then do I need to go back to the Roots base with you for questioning?" The girl's lips curled into a mocking smile.

The Anbu Ninja maintained his calm tone, glancing at the empty alley. "If you don't mind, you can ask here."

The girl fell silent.

She wasn't afraid of being confronted head-on like those two ninjas earlier; but this Root ninja kept backing down, and Danzo was using Tsunade's previous order to investigate spies as leverage, making it difficult for her to refuse. Danzo was quite adept at using a trivial matter as a powerful command.

But... given this situation, what other tricks could Danzo possibly pull besides actually interrogating her?

"Then ask here. I'll answer everything I know," she said.

She simply wouldn't dwell on things she couldn't understand; that's always been her easygoing personality. Perhaps Danzo truly did suspect something was wrong with her, which is why he resorted to such underhanded methods to thoroughly investigate her?

Upon hearing this, the animal mask readily took out two scrolls.

"You should know what the Silence Barrier and the Yamanaka Secret Technique Scroll are... We're going to use this next, any questions?" He unrolled the scroll and glanced at the girl.

"No," the girl said, staring at the scroll.

Sakura certainly recognized the two scrolls.

Silence Barrier was unnecessary; that Secret Technique scroll wasn't uncommon in Konoha either. It contained a Secret Technique of the Yamanaka Clan, which, when applied to the recipient, produced an effect similar to a lie detector, commonly known as the Truth Scroll. Because of its remarkable effectiveness and the fact that it didn't harm the recipient or pry into their privacy, only determining the truthfulness of their words, it was widely used. The Anbu's use of this during important exchanges was a matter of routine; Sakura had nothing to hide, so she couldn't refuse and didn't need to.

However, such scrolls are quite expensive and are usually only used for important and serious matters. Unexpectedly, Sakura's status as Hokage disciple also qualified her to use this scroll. However, this was within Sakura's expectations, and besides, she didn't need to lie to deal with this kind of investigation—after all, she hadn't done anything to betray the village.

The Yamanaka Secret Technique Scroll was activated by the Anbu. A weak Chakra invaded Sakura Haruno's brain, locking onto several locations. Then, a faint green light appeared on the scroll.

The animal mask glanced at the scroll and began to ask questions.

"During the third round of the Chunin Ninja Exams, when you led your team out of the venue, why did you leave on your own halfway through? What did you do afterwards, and who did you come into contact with?"

"When we were ordered to support Sasuke, we discovered that we were being pursued by enemies. So I stopped by myself, wiped out all the pursuers, and then rejoined the group. We didn't encounter anyone else."

Green light.

The Anbu Ninja then asked, "During the second Chunin Ninja Exams, in the battle against Orochimaru, did Orochimaru say anything to you? What was your response?"

"Orochimaru that Konoha was detrimental to my growth and wanted me to Konoha to his village, but I refused."

"Did you say anything else?"

That's all.

Why did you reject him?

"Because my family and companions are all in Konoha, and I can't grow up if I'm with him."

Green light.

Anbu recording Sakura's words, the ANBU looked up at her and asked the next question.

Most of the questions were trivial, such as whether you had come into contact with external forces during a mission in a certain month of a certain year, whether you betrayed Konoha's information to a certain foreign ninja you encountered, whether you killed Konoha Ninja you knew who died, and so on. In short, they were just confirming whether she had contact with foreign enemies, whether she had betrayed Konoha's information, and whether she had harmed her fellow countrymen.

Sakura's answer was always no. She didn't even refuse to answer a single question.

The scroll's reaction was also green light, green light, green light... a continuous stream of green light.

Ask any ninja who doesn't have ulterior motives these questions, and the answer will clearly be a path to ruin.

Sakura never secretly ran away from the village to kidnap Kimimaro and Haku, nor did she sneak in and gouge out the eyes of the Uchiha Clan Massacre, nor did she secretly join the Akatsuki...

Aside from the time travel itself, she had no secrets to hide, so she could naturally face any scrutiny openly and honestly.

Of course, she also knew that the transmigration itself was the biggest anomaly. Her strength, which far exceeded that of the original work, and her unusual Ninjutsu would easily attract the attention of someone like Danzo. People who are used to doing covert work have this problem: they are suspicious of everything. Danzo always thought that Sakura's Ninjutsu was a reward for being bribed by the enemy.

Thus, this interrogation completely proved that Sakura had developed all those Ninjutsu herself, and Danzo could only admit that the girl in front of him was truly a genius.

Sakura answered crisply and decisively, and the questioning progressed quickly, reaching the last question in less than two minutes.

"Well then, one last question," the ninja wearing the animal mask turned to the last page of the interrogation manual, "You were also present on the night of your graduation from the Ninja Academy when Naruto stole the Scroll of Seals. Did you peek into the contents of the Scroll of Seals?"

Was it the incident of stealing the Scroll of Seals? Sakura recalled the past and felt a moment of disorientation.

The incident of Naruto stealing the Scroll of Seals happened less than two years ago, but it feels like a very long time ago. So much has happened in the short time since she graduated from the Ninja Academy that she's almost forgotten what she was thinking at the time—why didn't she take the opportunity to glance at the Scroll of Seals? Actually, she did have the chance.

Oh, she'd already forgotten how she felt back then. But she remembered the other details clearly. Perhaps it was because she felt such questions were no longer important? After all, she now had the right to access the Scroll of Seals —Scroll of Seals yet she now found the Ninjutsu within it unappealing.

Her initial caution paid off; otherwise, she would still be having a headache over how to handle this problem.

She reminisced about the past, sighing for a long while, before finally saying frankly, "No."

The green light emanating from the Secret Technique scroll remained completely still.

The animal mask quickly scribbled a few words, put away its paper and pen, looked up at Sakura, nodded, and said, "I've finished asking my questions."

He bent down to pick up the scroll spread out on the ground, stopping the Chakra supply of the Yamanaka Secret Technique, when suddenly Danzo's voice rang out abruptly.

"Sister Sakura Haruno, Root has excellent experimental facilities and a wealth of data, enough to support your development of any Ninjutsu. Root's principles also align with your ideas and your desire to protect Konoha. As the leader of Root, I sincerely invite you to join Root. Are you willing?"

Sakura was suddenly surprised and turned to look.

Danzo stood quietly on the street corner, leaning on his wooden cane. His half-open, cloudy old eyes seemed to flash with a sharp light as they locked onto Sakura's figure.

"I'm sorry, I don't want to."

She said it instinctively.

The green light dimmed briefly, then the scroll finally exhausted its remaining Chakra, returning to darkness.

A gentle evening breeze swept by, stirring up a few withered leaves from early autumn.

"I've disturbed you. Farewell."

Danzo nodded almost imperceptibly. He tapped his wooden staff on the ground, and along with the other ninjas, vanished before Sakura's eyes in a few afterimages.

Sakura watched them walk away and took a deep breath.

She wiped her forehead, and a few drops of cold sweat had unknowingly trickled down her cheeks. The early autumn evening breeze blew by, and Ying suddenly felt a chill.

By this time, the sun had completely set, and the lights in each house began to Little Star.

She leaped onto the roof of a house and immediately smelled the rich aroma of dinner. The smell stimulated her stomach, which reflexively growled a few times.

"I'm so hungry..." she said, rubbing her stomach and pouting.

Gazing at the lights of her home not far away, the girl leaped a few times and disappeared into the night.

That night, Sakura hid in her room, experimenting with the second stage of Cherry Blossom Impact using her Ice Clone, while thinking about what had happened before.

What exactly was Danzo's intention? Was it a gesture of goodwill? Or a show of force?

Why would they try to recruit her into Root even though they knew she was Hokage's disciple?

What kind of conspiracy is behind this? Or is she overthinking it, and other people's intentions have already been made clear, but she's simply turning a blind eye?

He Danzo his brains, but still couldn't figure it out. Perhaps, people like Danzo are simply incomprehensible.

The experiment went very smoothly: Cherry Blossom Impact - Stage Two was already able to last for one or two minutes on Ice Clone.

However, the feedback left Sakura sweating profusely from the pain all night. The method of drastically increasing reaction speed in Phase Two would put enormous stress and damage on the nervous system. "Cherry Blossom Impact" could completely destroy the clone's nerve cells in just a few minutes, causing the clone to collapse and die.

To master it to the point where it can sustain a battle harmlessly for an extended period of time, it will probably take another month or two of practice.

The following day, Sakura passed her political vetting.

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