A/N: So here's another chapter, what I never understood is that later on in the series we learn that Sakura has shinobi parents but they somehow never taught her any jutsus or trained her. Sakura has shinobi parents that raise her like a regular civilian. Anway, R&R!
Chapter Two: There is no dieting.
It's two months after becoming Team Seven that Sakura finds herself in Training Ground 5; it's a muddy terrain that Kakashi-sensei insisted they train on. They booked the place two weeks ago and they were finally getting around to use it, Sakura was hungry but her diet wasn't over and so she drank water. Little sips because she didn't want to make herself sick later on during training.
Naruto and Sasuke-kun arrive soon after and together they start stretching, they have been more friendly and helpful to Sakura since she got her haircut and they actually looked forward to training with her. Sakura wasn't stupid, she still wasn't at their level but she could hold her own now and because she knew her strength was in smarts, she started to read more books in hopes of developing her own style. As such, now she was becoming stronger and today during their training, she would show them what she had been learning for the past month.
"My cute little students! Good morning!" Kakashi-sensei was dangling from a branch upside down. Sakura raised her hand in a wave and wondered when she would be able to do that. Naruto and Sasuke-kun also seemed to think that.
"Now let's start with some light exercise," He was going to make them run in the muddy field, she just knew it. "40 laps around the field, you have half an hour to complete it."
Sakura hated running but she followed after Naruto and Sasuke-kun, she was still a bit on the slow side but she was able to finish in time and she was only out of breath. Her endurance was growing.
"Better time Sakura-chi! Now for the sparring, Naru-chan and Sakura-chi give it your all." Kakashi-sensei ruffles her hair, she quickly swats his hands away because she cares very much about her hair and she didn't want him ruining it.
Sakura knows that Naruto is a powerhouse, his stamina is incredible and he can keep a fight going for as long as he can. Which is usually an hour or so but Sakura has low stamina and she can't last in a fight long, this time they're both allowed to use chakra and she can see her chance coming.
Naruto has a fighting style that is all his own, it's wild and complicated and follows a pattern that only he knows but it works and Sakura is immediately on the defensive. She uses her lighter frame to dance out of punches and kicks, and when he's close to landing a kick on her face, she raises her arm and concentrates. She knows that there are shinobi that can use their chakra as a shield, the Hyuuga use that technique but so can she, of course she doesn't know how they do it exactly but she gathers chakra all over her forearm and with quick reflexes, she blocks it, her chakra forming a cushion so that his leg barely touches her skin.
Naruto looks surprised and out of balance but she takes this opportunity and jumps into the air. Lady Tsunade was said to be able to concentrate chakra into her hands and when she released it, she could level mountains with her monstrous strength. Well, she knows the basics and Sakura knows that there is probably some fault with the technique but as she concentrates, she forces her chakra into a tight ball around her fist and just as she's about to land a devastating punch on Naruto, he rolls away and she's forced to release the power onto the muddied ground.
The ground doesn't crack as she knows it should, instead she literally makes an earthquake. The ground trembles beneath her hand and she watches as seismic waves roll out from her and away, the earthquake was small, not dangerous to the village but when Sakura had read about the great feats of Lady Tsunade, she had decided to follow but with a different technique. When Lady Tsunade released her power, she made it so the chakra would literally dig into the ground and force the dirt up, explode in simpler terms. Sakura didn't want that, it wasn't subtle and she didn't want to be the second Lady Tsunade.
Instead, when she released her chakra she released it in gentle waves that if landed on an opponent would cause their chakra to scramble, disrupt the flow by natural causes while still causing devastating damages from the initial release. But if it hit solid ground, the waves would only cause seismic reactions, similar to that of an earthquake.
"What the hell, Sakura-chi?!" Naruto is covered in mud and looking at her with wide incredulous eyes. She looks to Kakashi-sensei and Sasuke-kun and finds them looking at her with the same expression. "You totally made an earthquake! How did you do that?!"
Sakura smiles wide but the match is still on and she's not done yet, she has another trick up her sleeves. This time she waits until Naruto is coming at her again, he's a bit more forceful and when he goes to grab her wrists, she lets him and just as he's about to throw her over his shoulder and across the field, she forces chakra to her feet. She knows that in theory, one could mold chakra into different shapes such as scalpels or protective barriers and with this simple theory; she worked on creating spikes on the soles of her feet. The spikes keep her solidly in the ground and no force on earth is going to force her to move. When Naruto goes to lift her, she's stuck on the ground and he gapes at her in astonishment, she immediately grasps his wrist and with reinforced chakra on her hand, she delivers a straight punch to his stomach and watches as he crumbles right before her eyes.
The fight is over, she has no more chakra and can't create new techniques but Naruto can keep going and so she raises her hand as a sign of defeat and collapses on the mud.
"Sakura-chi, where did you learn to do that?" Kakashi-sensei walks to her and pulls her up from the ground, she barely reaches his chest but she feels so big in that moments because he's looking at her in a new light; a new possibility.
Sasuke-kun stares at her. "I want to spar with her next time."
"That's a first!" She gratefully takes the water that Sasuke-kun hands her and gulps some down. "I created it all on my own, I read in a book how Lady Tsunade was able to have her incredible strength but I changed it and if I had landed that first punch, Naruto's chakra would've been disrupted. I read a medical book about how to scramble chakra."
They all sit around her and she wonders if she said something wrong, but she wanted to be on the same level as them and she wanted their approval. Maybe she wasn't meant to be creating techniques on her own and she should have run it by Kakashi-sensei first. She could've leveled the whole village if she had made a mistake!
"You learned all that from a book?" Kakashi-sensei asks her, he sounds surprised and she can't blame him, if anything she would be too if she were him.
"Yes, I know I'm not as strong as Naruto or Sasuke-kun so I've been working on it for the past two months. Did I not do good, Kakashi-sensei?" She's wringing her hands on her lap and feels tears prickle her eyes but she stubbornly holds them back. Sakura doesn't have anyone to teach her at home or anyone to spar with but she wants to be strong and she wants for them to acknowledge that she can be on the same level that they can go all out on her when they spar instead of holding back. If she has to create her own techniques to achieve that then she will.
"You did more that good Sakura-chi, not a lot of Genin are able to use chakra in its raw form like that."
Sakura feels her chest bloom at his approval and smiles because she will be on their level soon.
"Let's have Sasuke-chan take a turn with Naru-chan and then we'll go celebrate, okay?"
She watches them fight with no restriction and no abandon, Naruto and Sasuke-kun always look so happy when they spar together. Their fighting is like no other and she so wishes she were able to join them but if she did, she would interrupt the intricate dance they had.
They're all so muddy by the time they're done training but Kakashi-sensei keeps his word and leads them to a barbeque place with outdoor seating, they don't want to get anything dirty. Sakura watches anxiously as they order so much meat that they might not be able to finish it but she also worries because she's not supposed to be eating at this hour but she can't deny the food because it's all for her.
"What's wrong, Sakura-chi?" Naruto looks at her empty plate suspiciously, his is laden with a ton of food and even Sasuke-kun and Kakashi-sensei have a good deal of food on theirs but hers only contains one small piece of meat and nothing else. "Are you not hungry?"
She's starving and practically salivating but she's so close to her weight limit that she doesn't even want to put the meat in her mouth. Ino said her diet was going great and was close to her ideal weight and she wasn't about to lose to that pig.
"I'm on a diet…" She blushes when they all look at him. "I'm not supposed to eat after a certain hour…"
Kakashi-sensei puts down his chopsticks and looks at her with a stern look on his face. "And what exactly does this diet consist of?"
She fucked up and shouldn't have said that but now it's out and she can't exactly lie about it. Her diet is extreme if she was honest with herself but she lost weight fast and she was happy with the results, although now she wasn't so sure. "No breakfast and only light things for lunch and no dinner after seven p.m."
Sasuke-kun starts to take food from his plate and onto hers, he's frowning but isn't looking at her in the eye and she can't look at anyone.
"Sakura-chi, a young girl your age, especially a shinobi, has to have more than that to be able to sustain themselves. It's no wonder you have such low reserves if you don't give your body the proper food to create and replenish." Kakashi-sensei raps her lightly on the head.
"I didn't know that…"
"You should be having a total of four meals a day on average but since from what I saw today, I would say perhaps six meals if you keep creating your own techniques. Naru-chan and Sasuke-chan eat six times a day to be able to keep up with their bodies and the amount of chakra they create and use."
Sakura is blushing because that makes sense, if anything it should have been more than obvious but how was she supposed to know, it's not like anyone at home would have told her that!
"Ino is also on a diet!" Well she's not going to go down by herself.
"I wouldn't exactly call it a diet since she eats four times a day, her father would smack her silly if she tried to eat less than that." Kakashi-sensei says and makes her pick up her chopsticks so she can start eating. He doesn't stop looking at her until she has a big mouthful. "Not only that but the food she eats is specifically for improving cognitive development since her family specializes in mind jutsu."
Naruto gives her his bowl of rice and she reluctantly starts to eat it because they all won't stop staring at her unless she's chewing something.
"Hinata east five meals a day since her family uses raw chakra as part of their jutsu and those jutsu eat through their reserves fast but they eat just as much to be able to replenish not only that but the Byakugan uses a surprising amount of chakra in a short amount of time."
All the meat in her plate is gone but there is more soon enough and she starts to eat a little less guilty.
"There is no such thing as dieting for shinobi, training and missions is enough to keep us in shape not only but if you have no chakra and no strength then you're better off being a civilian." Kakashi-sensei looks at her from the corner of his eye and she forces herself to keep chewing. "Tomorrow, I will hand you a new eating regime that you must follow until I deem it necessary for you to stop. Do you understand Sakura-chi?"
She nods and keeps eating with more gusto, she will not be a regular civilian after having tasted the life of a shinobi.
