Anko: "I'll take responsibility!"

In the early morning, rays of sunlight drifted down, scattered like stardust.

Anko's eyes were hazy with sleep, her eyelashes fluttering gently. Her slightly flushed face was filled with an unprecedented sense of peace.

The faint, fresh scent of grass lingering at the tip of her nose and the soft, comfortable bed made her subconsciously forget her worries, allowing her to relive the high-quality sleep she used to get during those incomprehensible theory classes at the Ninja Academy.

Wait, I feel like I've forgotten something. This doesn't seem to be my home...

In that instant, Anko jolted awake from her dream. She looked around instinctively, finally fixing her gaze on the familiar figure beside her. Her lips twitched, and she asked in a trembling voice.

"You... what are you looking at?"

"Hmm... a landscape that is neither ripe nor raw, green and tender—perhaps it could become one of the most beautiful sights in the world, hehehe."

Subconsciously pulling the quilt over herself, Anko looked at him with a face full of suspicion, feeling a dull ache in her head. After peeking from beneath the covers, she asked without even showing her face.

"What... what happened to us?"

"What happened? In this short half-night, many unforgettable memories were made, and I tasted the brilliance of the raw and the beauty of the unripened..."

Before Uchiha Hanazuki could continue, Anko, still under the covers, stiffened for a moment, overcome with shame and rage.

"You wretched guy, who told you to be so detailed! Pay the price—Hidden Shadow Snake Hands!"

Four brown-black pythons suddenly lunged out. Before they could bind Hanazuki, the next words caused the little snakes to droop powerlessly.

"Eh? Wasn't it you who said you'd rather take responsibility than let me be handed over to someone else? Who would have thought that Anko, who always loves sweets, would have zero resistance to liqueur chocolate. Hahahaha."

Hearing this, Anko, who felt a faint headache, finally remembered that she seemed to have eaten something extraordinary last night, after which she had completely lost her memory.

In a daze, she recalled her face burning like fire, grabbing Uchiha Hanazuki by the collar and saying something shameful, and then... they had rolled together.

"Wait! Liqueur chocolate—why does a jerk like you have that in your house?"

After poking her head out, Anko couldn't help but glare, baring her teeth in an expression that looked like she wanted to bite Hanazuki to death.

"You mean the liqueur chocolate? It was a gift from Kurenai to celebrate me officially becoming a Jonin. Didn't you bring three-color dango that day too?"

Hearing Hanazuki say this, Anko remembered that this guy in front of her had become one of the only two in their class of ninja students to reach the rank of Jonin.

The other was their senior by two years, Hatake Kakashi—the hero of Konoha, the son of the White Fang.

"I see. Then I definitely can't let you off! Damn Kurenai, why send liqueur chocolate for no reason? It's an anomaly among desserts, and it caused me to..."

Gritting her teeth, Anko stared fixedly at that handsome, clear face, which wore a lazy, half-smiling expression.

Sunlight spilled down, casting a glow on her flushed little face. Anko's chest heaved, and she finally made up her mind.

"Hmph, I suppose I've fallen into your hands. Fine, then. I, Lady Anko, will take responsibility in a dignified manner. From today on, you are my man."

"If you dare to go flirting with others again, I'll... I'll cry until you can't stand it!"

Realizing she probably couldn't beat him and had no way to stop him, Anko could only bare her teeth and utter a threat that sounded nothing like a threat at all.

"Is that so? Then you'll be crying for a lifetime. Do you need to borrow an embrace?"

"You! Pervert, deviant, playboy..."

Leaning against that chest, which wasn't particularly broad, and gently inhaling that comforting scent, Anko wanted to sleep a little longer, her expression lazy and filled with charm.

It couldn't help but make Hanazuki sigh; the expressions revealed inadvertently were the strongest weapons for seducing men into sin. Unfortunately, he could only look and not eat. Hanazuki didn't want to carry the reputation of a "Dragon King" across the Ninja World...

Days passed. After being warned by Sarutobi Hiruzen, Orochimaru chose to pull back on the surface, but no one knew his secret intentions—not even Danzo.

With the Land of Earth's supply lines cut near Kannabi Bridge, the successive failures of the Mist Village, and Orochimaru's outward restraint, the Third Shinobi World War gradually drew to a close.

However, small-scale battlefield conflicts continued. It wasn't just Konoha and other villages; the other villages were also tripping each other up, keeping the Five Great Nations in a state of relative equilibrium.

Anbu, 'Root'.

Intelligence gathered by the Root Anbu was placed on Danzo's desk, one report after another. After Danzo flipped through them, his long-standing ninja intuition led him to notice an insignificant movement within the Land of Rain.

"Akatsuki? An organization founded by a few youngsters? They want to bring peace to Amegakure?"

His eyes flickered. To the Five Great Nations, a mercenary organization of this level was nothing more than children playing house. But as Konoha's 'Root', any existence that could threaten the interests of the Great Nations was a target for surveillance.

After a moment of contemplation, Danzo marked the file as intelligence worthy of attention, then looked up and scanned his surroundings, his eyelids drooping, his expression shifting.

There were many skilled operatives in Root, but because the cultivation of ninjas often required a great deal of time, the secrecy of 'Root' and the special nature of its missions meant it could not be 'semi-transparent' like Sarutobi Hiruzen's Anbu.

"A lack of talent. If that old stubborn Sarutobi Hiruzen could transfer Uchiha Hanazuki into Root, this childish Third Shinobi World War wouldn't have dragged on until now."

Above the 'Root' headquarters, withered leaves drifted, and a touch of autumn wind blew away the scorching heat of summer.

At the Hokage Office Building, in the Mission Assignment Hall.

Having recently withdrawn from the front lines and been helping at Konoha Hospital, Nohara Rin was summoned to the hall to accept a mission.

Medical mission to the front lines... I have to go to the front again. Will I see people I know this time? I'd rather not, after all...

As a Konoha ninja and a rare female medical Chunin, Rin had no resistance to missions that required stepping onto the battlefield. She had learned to live on while carrying the blessings of her friends, but she still did not wish to experience the same pain again.

Without realizing it, Rin walked aimlessly along a small path.

The sky gradually grew dim, and a light, drizzling rain fell onto the grass blades that refused to bow, accumulating bean-sized droplets that slid down the stems to nourish the earth.

On the outskirts of Konoha, near a rarely visited training ground, Rin stopped in her tracks without realizing it. She looked at that familiar back, and a brilliant smile appeared on her hesitant face.

"Hanazuki? Is that you, Hanazuki? What are you doing here? Training?"

The figure sitting on the riverbank turned his head. Beneath the familiar Three-Eyed Demon Fox Mask, a brilliant smile bloomed.

"If you were to use a flower to represent a person, what would you be?"