Preventing The Inevitable

Chapter 12

Sakura's top priority at the moment was to avoid detection. She shouldn't bother taking on huge goals if she was going to be caught before ever achieving something. So stealthiness, it was.

That included hiding that this four-year-old Sakura Haruno had been swapped with her, a grown adult. She was confident in her ability to act the part because of experience (years of pretending to be unbothered by sly remarks about her upbringings, acting like she was supposed to, a collected and reliable medic, as if she wasn't slowly breaking apart, every death to her name a weight crushing her shoulders—), and she still had a cover story, 'Keito', to back her up.

But most importantly, she needed to keep the people aware of her training to a minimum, which she had already semi-failed at. Well, only technically speaking.

She couldn't have prevented Shisui and Itachi from knowing in order to secure another way to expand her skillset. And although Yūta was a stranger to her, not to mention someone she couldn't predict reactions of since he never existed in her timeline, she had somehow managed to evade his suspicion. Of course, that was assuming she had successfully tricked him.

So, strictly speaking, she had yet to be caught and had only got really close to it.

Besides, Shisui didn't know the full extent of her abilities—not even a fraction of it, actually. Only knowing the things Sakura had accidentally shown him and whatever she would decide to showcase to him in two days' time, at their first training session, he wasn't a threat yet. The most he could do right now was accuse her of being a child prodigy, which she would prefer over being found out as a time-traveler slash dimension-hopper any day.

However, her own personal training—which she wasn't going to lessen now that she was going to receive training separately—along with her rapid improvement and understanding of chakra and the workings of the human body—all of which she couldn't excuse as prodigal talent.

She took out the notebook she had bought with her pocket money the day before.

Starting a list, encrypted in a code that only the commanders of the Shinobi Alliance knew, of course, she wrote down:

Goals:

Underneath that,

• Prevent Kaguya, the war, save the world.

Her pen stilled as she reread the words and actually took them in.
A few days ago, when she had first woken up here, she had, immediately and without hesitation, decided to take this path to uncertainty and save everyone. But, honestly speaking, Sakura hadn't truly thought this out yet.

Writing it down like this made her wonder.

Isn't that too grand of a goal? Preventing Kaguya, a goddess? It was just like she had once said herself, years ago. Back when they had been able to afford to idly chatter and waste away time.

It's inevitable.

Theorizing with Kakashi and the others had been nice, but what did all of that, all of her new-found determination matter, if it was all going to happen anyway? Could she, a lowly and short-lived human, really save the world? Wasn't this goal too far above her?

And then a thought crossed her mind.

No, not just a thought. It was the thought. The one she had locked away, had been pushing down every time it threatened to bubble up and ruin everything. And suddenly, her hands were moving, all on their own.

• Go back home

Sakura sucked in a sharp breath, hissing as if she had touched fire.

Her mind was numb; everything she had been carefully stocking away for later, when she was strong again, suddenly meaningless. Only one thought, one idea, kept moving in circles around her mindscape.