AN: Sufficient Velocity and Space Battles are super far ahead, and the Pa tre on is on CH 110. You can find the link on my profile if you wanna just get there.

I'ma update this more often than normal for a couple of weeks to catch it up, but you know, go elsewhere if you want the chapters now.

Formatting on FFN has been pissing me off lately, you should really be reading somewhere else, this site sucks. It's not saving spacing anymore for some freaking reason? I'm willing to bet I'm messing up fixing it and it's hard to read.

"Sakura, what is this?" She shouldn't know what's in front of them, but she does. It couldn't be anything else.

There's a sphere floating in the center of the room, held aloft by air alone. The air glows blue, and is insightfully pulsing. The stone flooring and walls and even the ceiling is lit up by bright blue runic lines that travel all around in every direction. Pipes are built into the infrastructure, flowing towards the sphere, and the best she can tell, the entire world all converges on this point. Some would falter, some would be confused, some might consider a room like this a malus and a sign of a wretched curse from ancient times. Sakura?

"This is my new life." Sakura answers with all the weight on her shoulders, footsteps taking her to it quickly. Anticipation, trepidation, none of it matters before the circular object that holds everything. She should probably bow, but she won't, that'd really freak Ino out and it's probably not sentient anyway.

"What does that mean?" Ino follows after her, approaching it with a different sort of caution. She doesn't know, Sakura doesn't want her to know, and yet in a moment she will. The room has no door so to leave they definitely need to interact with it. It's a core memory in a different kind of way, a representation of a journey started without her consent, and yet the most precious part of her existence.
She's not a normal Genin anymore, and this is why. Her palm lands on the object, cool to the touch, and yet so bright it should feel like the sun. She feels a surge of power flow through her, before she's classified as just another object in this world.

[Sakura Haruno
Party Contribution Level: 28
HP: 165
Chakra: 55
Strength: 54
Constitution: 55
Dexterity: 58
Agility: 60
Mental: 102
Control: 222
Charm: 22]

Her stat screen pops up in full view, showing itself to the world. More importantly, it shows itself to Ino, letting her see all she's accomplished and all she is. She's not sure when she got so strong, it must have all been in that dungeon, but she didn't feel herself grow that much inside it. She'll admit she should check on herself more, but it feels so nice to suddenly look at her status and find she's grown a lot. It's not like she doesn't grow between checks and it's all applied at once, so there's no harm in staggering out her attention. Well, not much harm. She has no idea when she got to twenty two charm, but it's beautiful. To think not too long ago she wasn't even able to recognise basic conversational convention. She was intentionally antagonizing a Jonin and then getting surprised when he hurt her. She's a little ashamed to admit that one, actually…
And now-

[Ino Yamanaka
Party Contribution Level: 15
HP: 90
Chakra: 26
Strength: 33
Constitution: 30
Dexterity: 32
Agility: 32
Mental: 60
Control: 70
Charm: 110]

Sakura looks to the side, to see Ino's hand on the sphere, and the most important revelation in recent history clicks in her head for her. "It's not locked to just me." Her reality swirls a little.
That's good to know, not bad. She knows it's valuable info, knows it's a good thing, and yet it's hard to breathe. She finds a pressure building inside of her, swarming her from all directions and cutting off oxygen as much as it clouds her vision. She's always had to deal with moments like these, when the world is too much and she's not sure how to deal with it all.

She thought she was special, but what if she's not? What if this power could be harvested from her? Would the Hokage realize? Would he tear her apart to take it if he found out? Anxiety is like a plague, black and insidious, and it swallows her whole. It hurts, but it's easy to move past when she knows at the end of her attack she'll always find herself on her knees, knowing life moves on and it was all in her head.
In this world deep inside her mind, that's not true. She finds the room beneath her filling up with a shadowy mist. The stones beneath her feet shake and tremble, Ino's lifted up from the danger by a light that protects the girl, and that allows Sakura to focus on herself. The darkness surrounds her, attacking her, giving a physical component to the panic beyond the tightness of her chest and the desire to vomit. These moments have always been painful, but they've never burnt her skin and shredded her flesh. She's never found herself in an unwinnable battle. Yet here she is, begging it to stop while helpless to do anything but curl into a ball.

It's stupid, it's not that big a deal, it's a good thing probably! But that knowledge doesn't make it hurt any less. Her pains don't care about rationality, only what's deep inside. Reality only gets her so far when the world vibrates around her and rocks fall out of nowhere, landing on her stagnant form from above and bruising her fragile body. She's about to close her eyes and ride it out, when a ray of light cleanses the air in front of her. She looks up to see what's battling the miasma, and finds it's golden and beautiful. It shines with a radiance that forces the darkness away from her. Ino's wreathed in solidified purity, her desire to protect her crafted into a golden light that envelops her fully. Shields float around her, scribbled into existence with shimmering power and an obsession with yellow shades that cannot be understated. "I didn't make these." Ino points out dryly, despite the mood, and despite Sakura's amazement.

"I know." Sakura shakes her head, pulling herself out of her trembling place on the floor and forcing herself to stand. It's shaky, unbalanced, but she can't focus on what just happened or it'll start again. Instead, she takes in Ino's statistics hanging damningly above the power sphere. A better friend would express gratitude, she knows that, but it feels so natural for Ino to be there supporting her that thanking her for it feels so awkward it threatens to push her down again just thinking about it.

She's spoiled by her best friend being, well, her friend. She'll fix that later, she'll make an active effort outside of the hellscape where her anxieties are razor blades.

Ino's stats are remarkable in that they're very bad. Well, she'd trade so much of her power for that much charm, and yet, she can't help but look down on her friend after just a glance. She's thought how dumb turning her friends into numbers is before, and she does her best to move past it, but it bothers her seeing her statistics that low. Just how much time has she been wasting? Why is she so weak? She's barely better than an academy student! She's spent her last week butchering people as strong as Ino like they weren't even there.

Why is a clan heiress pathetic?

No, that's not the right question. Ino's not pathetic, she could be weaker than a baby and on her deathbed, and Sakura would consider her greater than a 's the physical manifestation of her anxiety bubbling up and making her think things she doesn't mean. A better question is why is her Ino weak? It's harder to move past after her rather awkward moment, just a few seconds ago. The tightness in her chest hasn't actually left yet, nor have the racing thoughts and the overwhelming need to latch onto anything sturdy and strong.

Seeing Ino as weak doesn't help, even if she understands analytically that for the terms of their friendship, it literally doesn't matter.
"As in, you made these." Ino explains, the tone of her voice still dryer than sandpaper.

"Yes, I'm aware." Sakura looks Ino's sheet over again. Contribution level fifteen? She's as weak as she was in Wave, weaker maybe if it counts Charm highly. Sakura's been focusing on her physical stats because she started with high mental stats, it seems like Ino's been doing none of that. She's stronger, smarter, better in every way except the one thing that matters in society, Charm.

If Ino was a merchant, she'd be overwhelmingly happy for her. Her best friend could serve an empowered life at the top level of some trading guild and happily make her life meaningful in the safest way possible. But as a ninja, that's a death sentence, and that hurts her deep inside in ways she can't fully describe. Will Ino be okay? Should she learn a way to protect her at all times? Should she ask to be transferred to her team in some way, maybe she can stay with her until she's strong…

"Why did you make equipment for me but not you?" Ino asks, "no, forget the sword, why did you make shields for me but not you? We were both attacked just now…" There's a tremble in her voice that Sakura chooses not to acknowledge. Ino knows the answer to her question, it doesn't need to be said aloud.

"Ino, have you been training?" Sakura asks.

"Yes! I just got out of some crazy nonsense before I came here." Ino scoffs at her, "answer the question."

"I don't want to," Sakura admits, "I'm far more concerned with why you're so weak."

"Because I don't hate myself!" Her blonde friend shouts at her, stomping on the stone beneath her feet and splashing some of the dark fluid aside with a beam of light that spreads all around her. Her presence is a balm for the darkness, Sakura can understand that. "I love me, and I love you, and I push myself but I do it in a way that'll let me stay happy. Whereas you consider pushing yourself beyond reason so important you won't even protect yourself in your own damn mind! I've seen you get attacked by spikes at the entrance, an earthquake that sent you to your knees, and some sort of evil misty bitey nonsense isn't enough cause for you to do anything but give up. Your skin is burnt, Sakura, and yet despite being right next to you, I stand here perfectly fine. Better than fine even, I'm being cradled by the love deep inside you that should be reserved for you."

"I don't hate myself." Sakura scoffs at her, raising her arms to cover her chest and think about all this..

"You shoved glass into your eyes for a small advantage!" Ino shouts in retort, her voice echoing in the now broken stone room.

"It had to be done, you would have done the same." Sakura argues with her, trying not to look at her, she doesn't want to see that disappointed face.

"No I wouldn't have!" Ino throws her hands into the air, clenching her fists in clearly formed irritation. It's enough to draw a little of Sakura's gaze, but nowhere near as much as the rage that sparks inside of her.

"Then you would have died!" Sakura growls at her, glaring with her shiny reds. Weak stats is one thing, that just means she hasn't trained, but hearing she wouldn't do what she needs to for survival? She boils inside, her gaze taking in her best friend wilting behind shining shields. She takes a step towards her, but finds she can't move any closer than that, the floating barriers she automatically created to protect Ino from her panic attack earlier converge in front of her and block her path to her friend.

"I'd rather die than hate myself so much that my own mental protections consider me an invader," she can hear Ino sniffle behind the glowing shields, but she can't see anything beyond them, "some numbers inside your head tell you that you're strong, but you've never seemed weaker to me."

"..." Sakura has nothing to say to that. The frown on her features speaks louder than her voice ever could. She looks back to the sheet, looking into Ino's abilities, and finds she barely has any traits or skills, and what she does have is taken up by stuff like "Bold and Confident, Incredibly Cute, Fashion Nerd… What is this?"

It feels wrong to judge her friend's character sheet, she'll admit it feels dirty to change the subject, but when that friend is in the same dangerous line of business as her and could meet a fucking vampire on a random mission, it feels justified to at least panic a little.
What does she do with this information though?
Discard it? Forget it?
Use it despite the clear violation?

She's distracting herself, she does that too often, she needs to learn to focus on what's important. She shakes her head, vowing to ignore the sheet until they're out of here. For now, she needs to figure out what to do about these damn shields still blocking her off from seeing Ino.

She wonders if there's a clear bright side here. What if she can use this to bring Ino back here regularly and help her figure out what to work on? She could fix the issue easily that way, and they could support each-other! The thought almost makes her smile, before less than a few seconds after vowing to focus on the shields, she realizes she's already managed to distract herself again with the issue she's trying to ignore. None of that matters while Ino's standing behind a wall of her own making. "I'm sorry." She croaks out, letting out a hiss through her teeth.

"To who?" Ino asks, a well earned quiver in her speech that Sakura can't help but pity.

"I shouldn't have gotten angry with you about something that you don't even understand," Sakura explains, "it's one thing to say something but it's another to actually experience it, and you don't have the same experience so why would you get it?"

She actually watches her Charm raise to 23, and yet.
"That's so not the problem that it's not even funny." Ino tells her she's wrong.
Does that mean Charm isn't related to being right about social things?
She's thought it was, which has implications she'll need to explore.

"Then what is the problem?" Sakura asks, palming the angry shields and trying to push them aside, only to watch them get bigger to make up the gap she's creating.

"That these exist, that they're here, that they consider you a threat in the first place," Ino explains, "none of that is okay."

"Well, how am I supposed to fix that?" Sakura grumbles, knocking on the metal that spawned from the depths of her mind..

"I have no idea." Ino's never sounded so downtrodden before, let alone so distant.