章 107: Is There a Medic-Nin in the Room!?

Getting a firm hold on Tsunade's massive bosom was proving much more challenging than Sakura had erstwhile thought— for the Munamori clan's secret breast-absorbing massage to function, Sakura needed to lay her palms on Tsunade's breasts.

However, unlike Neji or Hinata, Sakura couldn't see through the back of her own skull to see what her hands were up to behind her back; and furthermore, Tsunade's breasts were so big and so soft that she had no idea what she was touching, either!

'They just keep slipping through our fingers,' said Inner Sakura in annoyance. 'Keep still, would you? Unless you want to end up lopsided… There!'

Sakura hastily rolled away from Tsunade the instant she felt a warm tingle in her own chest. She only needed to harvest a little bit of breast chakra for the System to give her the prize— the world would have been a much bleaker place indeed, without Tsunade's swaying heavy hangers in it…

"System, give me the reward!" Sakura hissed to herself.

The System is currently undergoing a software update, please stand by. Thank you for your understanding.

The System began playing some elevator music in Sakura's head, but before she could start raging at her useless Windows Vista of a System, she realized that she could now feel a sliver of her own chakra again. As for why? Well…

Tsunade hadn't passed out because she had drunk a drug along with her wine, but rather because of the wine's alcoholic content itself! She had basically rendered herself immune to most common poisons after warring with the Hidden Sand years ago; using her chakra to subconsciously denature toxins in her bloodstream had become second nature to her!

And every time Sakura absorbed breast chakra, it would get converted into breast tissue possessing the unique properties of its original owner's cells; which was how Sakura could increase her nature affinities. As such, the new breast tissue currently growing in Sakura's chest was entirely drug-free, because it had the same properties as Tsunade's!

'To transmute chakra into fire chakra,' Inner Sakura said, repeating the mantra of fire nature, 'Make your chakra collide with itself!'

Sakura sent her spiritual power into these new cells, extracting their physical energy and combining both energies into chakra. She then collected the newly formed chakra into her stomach, turning it into fire attributed chakra, sending it at last to her fingertips, before clicking her fingers to ignite it.

"Ouch!" Sakura yelped, as her fingers burst into flames.

There was a reason why most people used Fire Style Ninjutsu as projectile attacks, instead of gathering it on themselves Chidori-style— Fire was hot!

The flames leapt to the very flammable ropes binding her wrists and quickly burned through them, allowing Sakura to free her limbs to undo the rest of her bindings. She had accomplished what she had set out to do— except that she was now slightly on fire, which had not been part of the plan.

In an attempt to put out the flames, Sakura rolled around on the ground; in the process setting fire to the other women who were patiently waiting their turn to get sacrificed. Sakura ended up rolling too far, and she plopped into the scalding water of the geothermal source, extinguishing the flames licking at her body.

"HOT!"

With the amount of noise that Sakura was making; yelping, getting set on fire and splashing around the water, the cultist obviously noticed what she was up to.

"What the—" Ryūki screeched, finally wheeling around. "Fire!?"

But the moment he turned his back to the tunnel leading out of the cavern, his head burst apart like an overripe watermelon, showering the black-robed women standing in a circle behind him with crimson blood.

One by one, they shook their heads in confusion, as they came to their senses…

"Sakura-chan, is that you?" said Shizune shakily, as she removed the ceremonial paper veil covering her face. "Wha— what are we doing here? I can't remember…"

"Everything's going to be all right, Shizune-chan," said Sakura, as she glanced at the impact crater behind her. "Help is on the…"

Sakura's voice trailed off.

Buried in the very centre of the impact crater was the very projectile that had split the cultist's head in half; a large yellow arrow attached to a thick thread of spider silk. Sakura didn't know much about shinobi from Yugakure, but she distinctly remembered having seen this sort of arrow before!

"Can you infuse your chakra, Shizune-san?" Sakura whispered.

Shizune shook her head, before discreetly checking her arm— the poisonous senbon shooters strapped to her forearm were gone. As for Sakura, she could feel her new cells flushing the chakra-inhibiting drug out of her System, but she was still far from her peak state— even though she was feeling weirdly energetic.

Four figures suddenly flickered around them, spooking the civilian women, who had no idea how they had ended up here. There were one eight-limbed, one female, one fat and one two-headed… all wearing Sound-nin forehead protectors.

"Who are you lot?" asked Shizune warily, as she slowly put her back to Sakura's. "Something tells me you haven't come here with noble intentions in mind…!"

If Orochimaru's arms had indeed got injured during his fight with the Third Hokage, then shouldn't he have gone after Tsunade himself? And what on earth were the Sound Four doing here? Weren't they supposed to be stalking Sasuke and looking for an opportunity to take him away from the Hidden Leaf?

"Judging by your clothes," said Sakura, "You should be Orochimaru's people… or am I wrong?"

Sakura obviously already knew who the Sound Four were, but she needed more time to eliminate the chakra-suppressing drug from her system, so she decided to engage them in a friendly match of Talk-no-Jutsu…

"From the Sound Five," said the six-armed boy. "Kidōmaru, of the East Gate."

"Aren't we the Sound Four, now?" asked the fat boy. "Jirobo, of the South Gate."

"We'll be back to Five, if this young lady can indeed cure Kimimaro," purred the two-headed boy. "Sakon, of the West Gate, by the way..."

"Also from the Sound Five," said the sullen-looking girl. "Tayuya, of the North Gate."

This was the girl that Sakura had once confused for Kin Tsuchi! Sakura searched her exposed skin for her Curse Mark greedily. In theory, her chakra ought to possess some form of nature energy within it; so, if Sakura could absorb some of her breast chakra, perhaps she'd be able to master Sage Mode ahead of time…?

"I, er… I like your make-up," said Sakura, racking her brains for something to say. "What kind of eyeliner do you use?"

…

"Are you for real, right now?" asked Tayuya in disbelief.

Talk-no-Jutsu was an SSS-grade Hiden Jutsu, known only to Naruto and his direct descendants. How could Sakura have ever hoped to convince anyone on such short notice!?