"That bastard Orochimaru." Jiraiya took the scroll off his back and leaned it against the table leg. He reached for the sake jug on the table, and this time Tsunade didn't stop him. "He had Sasuke's dog bitten by a Cursed Seal."
Tsunade's hand paused as she poured the sake.
She set the jug down and looked from Jiraiya to Sasuke, then back again.
"Bitten by what?"
"A dog." Jiraiya filled his cup, lifted it, and took a gulp. His Adam's apple bobbed twice. "A black dog. Sasuke's summoning beast."
Tsunade's eyebrows rose. She turned to stare at Sasuke, opening and closing her mouth.
Jiraiya thumped his cup down on the table.
"Orochimaru snuck into Konoha and tried to give Sasuke the Cursed Seal of Heaven."
"Sasuke wouldn't let him bite him, so he had him bite the dog instead. Then three Tomoe appeared on the dog's neck, exactly like the ones on Anko."
Shizune's fingers tightened around Tonton. The pressure woke him, and he let out an annoyed grunt.
"Wait." Tsunade raised a hand. "When did that guy Orochimaru become so reasonable? Sasuke wouldn't let him bite him, so he went and bit a dog?"
"He wouldn't let him bite him." Sasuke picked up the story. "I fought him."
The air in the room fell still.
Tsunade stared at him, her lips moving a few times. She wanted to ask what he'd been thinking, fighting Orochimaru.
But in the end, she gave up. At least he was standing here, safe and sound.
"Then what?"
"Then he finished putting the Cursed Seal on Black Dog and left."
Tsunade was speechless. How much had he skipped over?
Tonton hopped off Shizune's lap and crouched on the floor. Shizune leaned forward and explained:
"The Cursed Seal is a forbidden technique. Once someone receives it, their chakra will be continually eroded if it isn't controlled. And there's also Orochimaru's mental—"
"When Anko received the Cursed Seal, I'd only recently left Konoha." Tsunade set down her cup and rubbed her neck.
She knew all too well how the Cursed Seal eroded the body.
"I couldn't completely remove it. Medical Ninjutsu and sealing could only slow the erosion. What do you mean by 'treated'? To what extent?"
Jiraiya shrugged. "The Cursed Seal has become a pure enhancement. It won't run wild anymore. Anko's treatment was the same; her symptoms have basically disappeared."
Tsunade slammed both palms down on the table.
The sake jug jumped, and Shizune quickly reached out to steady it.
Tsunade stared into Sasuke's eyes.
"That's impossible."
"The Cursed Seal isn't an ordinary poison or a disruption of chakra."
"Orochimaru mixed something else into it. The mental erosion is beyond the reach of conventional Medical Ninjutsu."
"Even my Medical Ninjutsu can only ease physical damage. Anything on a mental level—"
Tsunade spoke quickly, without her usual languor. She sounded more like she was talking to herself.
"The Cursed Seal is essentially like him leaving a part of himself inside someone else. That kind of damage is undoubtedly beyond anyone's control."
Shizune picked up where she left off, her voice much quieter.
"Lady Tsunade, when you say a part of him, do you mean an actual part?"
"That guy's even crazier than we thought." Tsunade's fingers tightened against the tabletop.
"He must have cut off part of his own soul and sealed it inside the Cursed Seal. This isn't a forbidden technique. It's—"
"An evil art," Jiraiya finished for her.
Sasuke stood in the corner, watching the expression on Tsunade's face shift from doubt to calm.
Tsunade fell silent for a while and took a few deep breaths. At last, she looked a little more composed.
"Sasuke, summon your dog so I can take a look. I want to examine the Cursed Seal."
Sasuke lowered his eyes to the shadow at his feet. The patch of darkness beneath the low table began to roil and spill outward.
Black sludge surged out of the shadow and gathered in front of her, forming the outline of a Black Ninja Dog.
Black Dog stepped out of the shadow, shook his fur, and surveyed the surroundings.
"Hm? Lots of people."
"Show her the Cursed Seal," Sasuke ordered.
Black Dog walked up to Tsunade, tilted his head, and exposed the Cursed Seal on the side of his neck.
Tsunade studied it for a long time, then reached out and pressed her thumb against its edge.
She closed her eyes as chakra flowed from her fingertip into Black Dog's network of pathways.
Tsunade opened her eyes, her gaze full of bewilderment.
"Good grief... I've never seen anything like this."
Shizune leaned in to take a closer look, too.
Tsunade shook her head. "There's no point in examining it any further. Let's look at the one doing the treatment."
Sasuke lowered his gaze to his shadow again.
This time, the shadow roiled far more violently than before.
Black sludge spread outward, forming a black disk nearly two meters across in the middle of the room.
Round Deer's enormous form slowly rose from the shadow.
He lowered his head to look at Tsunade, who was sitting cross-legged on the other side of the low table, then glanced at Jiraiya and Shizune beside her, as well as Tonton, who was crouched on the floor and staring at him in terror.
All four of Round Deer's eyes started twitching.
He pawed at the wooden floor twice with his front hooves, then took a step back.
"So many people," Round Deer said in a muffled voice. "I've never seen this many people before."
Shizune stared with her mouth open. Tonton ducked behind her, leaving only his tail visible.
Round Deer lowered his head, all four eyes fixed on Tsunade.
"Hello. My name is Round Deer." His voice was taut with tension.
Tsunade stared at Round Deer in a daze, then looked at Sasuke.
"Why is he so nervous when he talks to me?"
"He's afraid of people. He has social anxiety."
Round Deer lowered his head, walked past Tsunade and Shizune, and silently made his way over to the table, facing Black Dog.
He lowered his head to examine the Cursed Seal on Black Dog's neck. His four eyes stopped twitching and locked onto the target.
"He has social anxiety, but he gets focused pretty quickly," Sasuke explained.
A pale blue light radiated from the antlers atop Round Deer's head.
The light fell on the Cursed Seal on Black Dog's neck, and the outlines of the three Tomoe began to tremble slightly.
Gray-white markings spread outward and then contracted. The parts of the Cursed Seal that didn't belong to Black Dog were slowly being stripped away.
Tsunade stared at the blue light from Round Deer's antlers for about thirty seconds.
Then she reached out and tapped Sakura's knee.
"What do you see?" Tsunade asked.
Sakura was startled, then turned her attention back to the light shining from Round Deer's antlers.
"That isn't chakra. Chakra is refined by mixing physical and spiritual energy, but its energy doesn't contain any physical energy."
Tsunade raised an eyebrow.
"Go on."
"It's pure positive energy, generated directly from his body without going through a refining process." Sakura's voice grew serious.
"As the blue light radiates from his antlers, chakra is converted in reverse at an incredibly fast rate. It's like the process in Medical Ninjutsu that breaks chakra down into pure physical energy, but in the opposite direction—and it's even purer."
Jiraiya frowned as he, too, focused on the blue light from Round Deer's antlers.
He knew how Medical Ninjutsu worked, but Sakura's explanation had gone completely over his head.
"He isn't using chakra to heal, right?" Sakura paused and tilted her head toward Sasuke.
Round Deer lifted a hoof and nudged Black Dog closer to himself, all four eyes fixed on the Cursed Seal on Black Dog's neck.
Tsunade looked at Sakura and fell silent for a moment.
Then she smiled, her expression as warm as an examiner's after a successful test.
"You said no one taught you?"
"No one taught me," Sakura answered honestly, then added, "Sasuke-kun did tell me the basics of chakra control."
Tsunade leaned back in her chair.
"Kid."
"Huh?"
"Aren't you teaching yourself Medical Ninjutsu? Your abilities must go beyond that."
Tsunade reached out and gently tapped Sakura on the forehead.
"Would you like to learn something that suits you better?"
Before you continue