Ever since Naruto and Hinata had gone out on missions with Tsunade, Team 7 had been left with just two poor souls: Sasuke and Karin.
As for that, the poor little sister abandoned by her big brother declared that he really was a jerk, actually going off on a honeymoon with Hinata under the guise of a mission.
But there was nothing she could do about it. After all, she wasn't as strong as those two.
Besides, after returning from the Uzumaki Shrine, she had gained a huge pile of materials and documents, with plenty of useful things in them.
Undoing the Mask of the Shinigami's seal hadn't fallen to her, though.
She had heard that Itachi had taken the Mask of the Shinigami, apparently planning to use his Mangekyō to control a spy and have him perform the Reaper Death Seal to cut open the Shinigami's belly himself.
Yes, Karin's verdict on that was that her big brother was simply awesome.
But... there was a juicy bit of recent gossip she couldn't tell Sasuke directly, and keeping it bottled up was driving her crazy.
"Karin."
Inside the Konoha Library, Sasuke gently poked Karin's shoulder, snapping her out of her daze.
"Huh! Ahem, um, what is it?"
Karin instinctively startled, then recovered a moment later and turned to meet Sasuke's puzzled gaze.
"Has something happened to you lately?"
He looked at Karin and asked with some concern.
After all, even when she spaced out before, she had never reacted this strongly to being poked.
And lately, the way she looked at him had always been so... strange.
"No, it's really nothing major."
Karin really wanted to share the story her big brother had sent back, but she couldn't say anything. It was so annoying.
But to Sasuke, that meant something