SUA... Healer - Ch 6 (Adv) - Progress (Patreon)

Tenten

Can’t believe I did that, Tenten thought for what must have been the dozenth time, her face still flaming as she settled into the bath. She didn’t regret it at all, but it was still a bit of a jump from what their relationship had been.

Still, she couldn’t help her eyes from drifting sideways as Naruto climbed in as well. He wasn’t as hard as before, but he was still breathing heavily and eyeing her with a mixture of hesitation and hunger that made her heart skip a beat. Fuck, that’s hot.

He’d sat down a meter or so away from her and didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands. Eventually, he let out a quick breath and rested them on the edge of the tub behind him. Pushing past the part of her that wanted to hesitate, Tenten promptly slid over until she was pressed up against him.

Naruto twitched, but a shy smile spread across his face, and he wrapped an arm around her shoulder instead. The silence felt more comfortable then, as the two of them took in the beautiful view before them. Between the karesansui stones, live bamboo shoots, dark-stained wood, and the rolling green countryside and distant woods out the narrow window, there was a tremendous sense of peace and calm here in Ubame-chou that ninja rarely had time to appreciate.

As much as I love Konoha, it’s nice to get out of the bustling city for a while, Tenten mused, feeling the warmth of the bath relaxing her muscles almost as well as Naruto’s massage had done. Or maybe better, since it’s not riling me up in a different way.

It was Naruto who eventually broke the silence, mumbling, “So am I like… your boyfriend? Because I don’t…” Tenten’s heart sank before she realized he had trailed off before ending his thought. “…I don’t really know… how to…”

Taking a steadying breath, Tenten reminded herself once again that Naruto’s upbringing was far from normal. In that light, admitting he doesn’t know something is probably a big sign of trust, huh?

“Don’t worry about what you know or don’t know how to do for a moment,” she said aloud. “Think about what you want. There’s not a wrong answer, so just let your thoughts out.”

“I want…” Naruto almost seemed like he was going to sink down in the water, but couldn’t because he still had an arm around her. His face reddened, but he started talking again. “I want… to keep being your friend?”

Let him finish! Tenten scolded herself when her heart once again jumped to the conclusion that Naruto didn’t actually like her.

“I want to keep training and sparring and talking and stuff. And I want to spend time with you, too. Outside of training, I mean. Just like… hanging out. Maybe get some ramen. That’s a date, right?”

“Hanging out doesn’t mean a date, but you definitely hang out with someone you’re dating,” she replied, more calmly than she felt.

“It doesn’t? I thought a date was just spending time with someone?”

“Calling it ‘a date’ means spending time with someone with the intention of developing a romantic relationship,” Tenten clarified. “Well, usually romantic. Some people do go on dates just as a prelude to s-sex.” I am a grown kunoichi, I can talk about sex, dammit! “But even in that case, the people dating are feeling each other out to see if they can have whatever sort of relationship they’re aiming for. So, again, usually romantic.”

“…Shit, no wonder Sakura-chan got so pissed at me in Academy,” he muttered, eyes wide as he stared at nothing.

“Did you not have a crush on her?” Tenten asked curiously. She’d heard about Naruto pestering Haruno for dates throughout the year they had shared a class, and the girl’s frustration at his persistence after she told him she wasn’t interested.

Naruto shrugged, looking self-conscious. “I thought I did. I thought she was pretty, I still do, but… if I misunderstood ‘date’, maybe I misunderstood ‘crush’ too?”

“‘Crush’ does specifically mean you’re interested in someone as a romantic partner.”

“What if you just… really want to be friends with someone?” he mumbled.

“I’ve heard a different word applied to that, a ‘squish’,” said Tenten. “I’m not sure where it came from, but I liked the idea of having a separate word for it, so I remembered it.”

“Can you have both? Like, on the same person?”

“I think so,” she said. This isn’t quite how I pictured this conversation going, but at least we’re talking. “Finding someone attractive and wanting to… f-fuck is another separate thing, but I don’t know how anyone can have a romantic interest in someone without being friends with them too.”

Naruto nodded. “Then… I think I have both a squish and a crush on you…” he whispered, glancing at her and then away just as quickly. “A-and I think it’s obvious I find you attractive, so–”

Tenten’s heart felt ready to burst out of her chest. See what happens when you let him explain instead of jumping to conclusions? “Well, good news,” she said giddily. “I feel the same way.”

“Really?”

Tenten couldn’t help the giggle that escaped her. “We’re cuddling naked in a private bath and you’re surprised by that?” Naruto sputtered, and she smirked up at him. “Yes, really.”

Before Naruto could muster a reply, she leaned up and pressed her lips to his. He startled, but in less than a second he was pulling her closer to kiss her back.

Maybe we did things a bit out of order, Tenten thought, shifting with Naruto’s help to sit across his lap and kiss him again. But this isn’t a half-bad first kiss, and we’ve got a nice dinner to look forward to, so we’ve hit all the important beats regardless.

Naruto

“You’re sure you don’t want me to…?” Naruto asked softly. One would think that he’d feel less awkward following his second sexual encounter, but it all still felt very new to him, even if the conversation in the bath had gone well and they’d been able to talk completely normally at dinner.

“I’m sure,” Tenten whispered back, tightening her arms around him where she was lying with her head pillowed on his chest.

“Okay.” If she was sure, he’d respect that. Still, she didn’t seem opposed to him touching her in general, so he hesitantly ran a hand through her unbound hair. From the way she all but purred and burrowed into his pectoral, it seemed she liked it, so he kept doing it, enjoying how soft it felt after being washed.

The lights were off, but moonlight crept into the room from through the shaded window. Still, I’ve been looking for a moment to have a personal conversation, and I guess this is about as perfect a moment as it gets, huh?

“There’s something I need to tell you.”

Tenten cracked one grey eye to peer up at him. “Are you okay with what happened?”

“Eh?” He blinked. “Yeah, why?”

“Hearing ‘there’s something I need to tell you’ isn’t exactly the most soothing pillow talk.”

“Oh! No, it’s not about that. I was… probably gonna tell you this tonight anyway. It’s just… classified, I guess?”

Tenten’s brow furrowed, and up close like this he could see a small scar he hadn’t noticed before, splitting her left eyebrow. “You guess?”

“You’ll understand in a moment,” Naruto promised. “Do you remember me saying I get my chakra reserves from my mom’s side?”

“Yeah, you said you only found out who your parents were a few weeks ago.”

“Do you recognize the name Uzumaki Kushina?”

Tenten shifted, her attention sharpening. “I think so… she was a pretty well-known kenjutsu specialist. Akai Chishio no Habanero.”

Naruto couldn’t suppress a snort. “Haven’t heard that name before… They put that in the bingo book?”

Tenten smirked. “Heh, no. Konoha’s enemies called her Youkoushi. I actually have an old Kumo bingo book with her in it.”

“Red Death, huh?” Or was it a pun on Youko…?

“Because wherever she fought was left coated in her enemies’ blood,” Tenten nodded. “…She was your mom?”

“Yeah.” His throat was dry.

“So… how come no one told you?” Tenten frowned. “She wasn’t world-famous or anything, but she was pretty well-known in the village. I think she taught Yuugao-senpai, and there must be other people who remember her.”

“A couple reasons,” Naruto said heavily. “One…” He swallowed. “…Needs to stay classified, for now. I… I wanna tell you, but I’m… not ready.”

“It’s fine, Naruto-kun. Tell me when you are ready.”

“But the second,” he forced himself to go on. “Was because of her husband.”

“Your dad,” she surmised.

“My dad,” Naruto agreed. “You probably know him too; he was definitely well-known in Konoha,” he added, reaching up to tug at a lock of his own blond hair. “Anko-sensei says I mostly look like my mom, but I got my hair and eyes from dad.”

“Is that a hint?” Tenten lifted her head to squint at him in the moonlight. “There aren’t a lot of blonds in Konoha. Mostly the Yamanaka clan, but you don’t have their eyes or bone structure at all. Tsunade-sama has blonde hair, but that came from her mother being a Funato, and she didn’t have any siblings or children herself… Really, the most well-known blond of Kushina’s generation was… was…” She trailed off, eyes widening in shock. “The Yondaime?” she breathed.

Naruto gave a wry smile. “That was pretty much my reaction, too, when Ero-sennin told me.”

“Iwa would have been sending hit squads every week if they’d known,” said Tenten at once. “And… I never figured out why, but Kumo definitely had some interest in your mom. Her bingo book entry specified her bounty was only for if she was captured alive, and that’s not very common.”

I bet I know why… but I still don’t think I’m ready to talk about the Fox tonight.

After a moment, Tenten lowered her head back to his chest, and tightened her arms around him again in what was clearly a hug. “Thanks for telling me,” she whispered. “I can see why it was kept secret… so I’m happy you trusted me.”

Naruto didn’t know what to say to that, except… “Me too.”

The next morning after breakfast, they checked out of the Ryokan, the staff gathering behind the elderly owner to help them back into their shoes and bow them goodbye. “Come again, dearies!”

“We will, Obaa-san!” Naruto called cheerfully. Once they were outside his expression soured slightly. “I guess we’d better go find Ero-sennin.”

“Yeah, where could he be?” Jiraiya drawled from right behind them, causing both him and Tenten to jump. “You both need some awareness drills,” he tsked. “But that’ll have to wait. I have a fresh lead on a pair of women travelling with a pet pig in Tanzaku-gai. It’s not the direction I’d have expected her to go, so we’ll have to hoof it to get there before they move on.”

“Let’s go, then,” said Naruto, nearly bouncing on his toes in anticipation.

Jiraiya looked between him and Tenten, seeming to gauge something, then nodded. “Naruto, you and I need to go over something. I suggest we have Higurashi-kun take the sweep position for a while.”

Naruto blinked, confused, until Tenten-chan nudged him. “On your order, taichou.”

Oh, right! Naruto suppressed the urge to facepalm. “Sure, hang back and keep us covered, Tenten-chan.”

“You’ve got it!” She saluted, then pulled out a kunai to spin around her finger while he followed Jiraiya up into the trees.

A few minutes later, they had left Ubame-chou well behind, but Jiraiya didn’t speak up.

“Well, what is it?” Naruto asked. “Why’d you have Tenten-chan way back there?”

He wasn’t sure he liked the smirk that crawled over Jiraiya’s face.

“I was just thinking you had a real pep in your step when you came out of that ryokan. Did something good happen last night?”

Yep, knew I wouldn’t like it. “Shut the hell up!” he hissed. Glancing back, Tenten-chan was just barely in sight, following along a couple hundred meters behind them.

“That wasn’t a no~” Jiraiya nearly sang. “You had a room to yourselves and a private bath; I’d be disappointed if nothing happened.”

“Nothing did happen!” Naruto lied belatedly, and Jiraiya’s widening grin made it clear the man didn’t believe him. “And even if it did I’m not gonna tell you about it!”

“In all seriousness,” Ero-sennin spoke over the end of his sentence, suddenly back to the same tone he’d used in Takanaka-san’s barn. “While I’m the last person to tell you not to pursue someone, I did want to make sure you at least thought through the fact that, at least for this mission, you are her commanding officer.”

“I know…” Naruto mumbled. “Iruka-sensei taught us about fraternization regulations and why they exist… But…”

“Those regs are barely relevant for field shinobi,” Jiraiya said dismissively. “This is Konoha; we don’t discourage relationships unless it’s going to compromise missions. The question is, can you continue to place the mission first when it’s required?”

Naruto didn’t answer right away, but it seemed Ero-sennin wasn’t done, because he went on.

“And even that’s not actually what I wanted to talk about. You said you wouldn’t hate it if Higurashi-kun was your girlfriend, but there are lots of ways to define a relationship. It can be a crush, one-sided or mutual. You can decide individually or together to pursue something, or not. You can have a one-night stand, or an ongoing relationship as friends-with-benefits if that suits you both. Or, of course, you can make an attempt at a romantic relationship…” he summarized. “…which is something young people tend to romanticize, ironically.”

Naruto hesitated, but ultimately forced himself to ask, “Could you… explain that last bit?”

Thankfully, just like the night before last, Ero-sennin didn’t tease him before answering. “Romance is tricky at the best of times, trying to balance the needs and desires of different individuals, and that’s just for civilians. Ninja have so many more things to consider, the most prominent of which is that this simply isn’t a safe profession. Ninja die on missions. In Konoha we do our best to mitigate it with teamwork, but mistakes, bad intel, and ambushes still happen. So plenty of field nin try to stay casual or just visit the red-light district rather than put themselves or someone else through that grief.”

“So… do you think it’s a bad idea to–?”

“No, and you’ll never hear me say that,” Jiraiya interrupted him firmly. “My entire point is that I want you to think about it. Some will argue that relationships like that are a potential distraction that could make a shinobi prioritize their lover over the mission. I don’t agree, but I can see their point. I happen to believe it’s up to each ninja to make that choice for themselves.”

After another kilometer or so, Naruto spoke up again. “What other things?”

“Hm?”

“You said Ninja have many more things to consider with relationships. Like what?”

“Separate duty rosters, mismatched schedules, missions apart that can last weeks or months, sometimes clan politics,” Jiraiya ticked off on his fingers. “Hell, sometimes inter-village politics get involved. If you wanted to start a relationship with a foreign kunoichi, you’d have to seriously ask whether she was willing to move to Konoha — it’s not like you can move, can you?”

“How would I even start dating someone from another village?” Naruto wondered.

Jiraiya chuckled at that. “It’s not as difficult as you’d think. Get deployed alongside or against a certain village enough times, and you’ll start to recognize your opposite number. Especially as you move up in rank. There’s only so many chuunin, much less jonin. Sometimes you’ll be temporarily allied with someone that used to be an enemy, someone who knows some of your weaknesses… and sparks can fly. Or, maybe you get tapped for an arranged marriage to seal a treaty; that’s a tradition from the Warring States period that hasn’t completely gone away.”

“Huh!?”

Jiraiya shrugged expressively. “It’s why Uzumaki Mito married the Shodai, y’know? Don’t get me wrong, they knew each other beforehand and agreed to it, and by all accounts they had a happy and loving marriage… but Mito-sama was one of several nieces and daughters of Uzumaki Ashina who were selected for omiai with Hashirama-sama. Even today, it’s still considered one of the best ways to secure a peace treaty, since traditionally both candidates come from the ruling families and thus both states theoretically have a vested interest in maintaining the treaty.”

“I… guess…” Naruto was kind of torn, because on the one hand that did make sense, but on the other… “Seems weird to have someone else tell you who to marry, though.”

“I wouldn’t be shocked if it gets brought up in the negotiations to resecure our alliance with Suna,” said Jiraiya. “Not saying it’ll definitely happen, but I think chances are good someone will at least consider it, and since Suna owes us reparations it’ll probably be one of the Jinchuuriki’s siblings that gets tapped. If negotiations go that way, my money’s on the sister; Suna guards the Puppet Corps much more jealously than the Gale Dancers. But we’ve come a long way from my point.” He fixed Naruto with a serious look. “Can you reconcile your new relationship with the mission?”

Naruto had spent what felt like half the night considering that very question, so he had his answer ready. “I can value them both.”

Jiraiya raised an eyebrow, inviting him to elaborate.

“I just…” Naruto grimaced. He knew what he felt in his heart, but finding the words for it was hard. “I’ve always fought best to protect my precious people. Having more of those… having someone more precious to me… that can only push me forward. Kakashi-sensei taught us from the very beginning that a ninja who abandons his mission is trash, but one who abandons his comrades is worse than trash.” Somehow, when he wasn’t searching for the words, they seemed to come much easier. “I love Konoha. I love my teammates, not in the same way, but they’re still my precious people. My first real friends. And I… I don’t know if I love Tenten-chan like that, but I love her as a friend and that’s already enough to make me fight for her.”

“I see.” Jiraiya’s face and tone were unreadable… but only for a moment before his eyes crinkled. “Personally, I also think having someone in particular that you fight to protect, that you fight for, just makes you fight harder to come back to them. Or more than one person, but I’m probably not the best example to follow there… Still, as cheesy as it might sound, I come down on the side of believing that love is worth it, and it sounds like you do too. I’m proud of you, Naruto.”

Naruto’s face was burning, but he couldn’t help the proud, tremulous smile on his face, and he knew Jiraiya’s words would be echoing in his mind for quite some time. Ero-sennin might be a gigantic perv, but… he’s not so bad.

“All right, enough of the sappy stuff,” Jiraiya clapped his hands. “Call your girlfriend up here and let’s get to work while we run.”

“Okay lovebirds,” Ero-sennin began as soon as Tenten-chan rejoined them, and Naruto nearly missed his next jump.

I take it back, he’s the worst!

Tenten blushed, about as much as Naruto himself, and only the tiny smile on her face kept Naruto from kicking Ero-sennin right in his stupid smirking face.

“Here, think fast.”

This time Naruto caught the water balloon immediately, cradling it so it wouldn’t burst.

“You’re almost done with the first step,” Jiraiya said before Naruto could do more than glare. “Make sure you only use one hand this time, though. I understand using the other hand makes it easier, and in a pinch I like your trick of using Kage Bunshin to do it faster, but being able to do this with just your raw chakra control will help a lot.”

“Got it,” he grumbled, let his legs follow Tenten-chan’s jumps as he put most of his focus on the balloon.

“Remember, the first step is about mastering rotation.” Unlike last time, Jiraiya seemed intent on talking him through it again. “You need to be able to create and maintain multiple threads of rotation. Keep it going, now. If you can manage that, we’ll move on to step two.”

The balloon writhed in his hand, but didn’t burst.

“You’re not trying to go counterclockwise again, are you?” Jiraiya needled. “You need to follow the direction of your natural chakra flow like I told you–”

“I am, dammit,” Naruto barely managed not to snap.

“Then try adding one more thread.”

“It’s not that easy!”

“If it was easy, everyone would be doing it,” Jiraiya retorted. “This jutsu took three years to develop, you know?”

Naruto paused, letting the chakra flows in the water disperse as he parsed that. Three years… A genius like the Yondaime took three years to make this… Rather than be discouraged, however, that realization just lit a fire in him. Of course, that makes sense. Three years to develop it from scratch, with no teacher. Hell, my Oiroke no jutsu took almost that long from the first idea. But…

Resolved, he created a bunch more chakra threads and set to churning the water once again. “I bet it took the Nidaime tons of time to create Kage Bunshin, too, and I learned it from the scroll in one night; this’ll be a cinch, dattebayo!”

“That’s the spirit, Gutsy-kun!” Tenten-chan cheered.

“Heh, that’s your mom’s attitude, all right,” Jiraiya laughed, before his mirth faded into a much more melancholy smile. “Right down to the verbal tic. She’d be furious you inherited that… but damn if it isn’t nice to hear it again after all these years.”

“Uzumaki-san said that too?” Tenten-chan asked, which Naruto appreciated because he was still trying to burst that damn balloon.

“Something very similar,” Jiraiya confirmed. “And good on you for telling her, Naruto. At least you managed to do one thing I told you.”

I know he’s just trying to piss me off… but unfortunately, it’s working! Gritting his teeth, Naruto pushed the swirling chakra threads even harder, and with a focus he didn’t know he possessed, he managed to add one more. The water churned violently, like the whirlpool on his sleeve, and he zeroed in on that image, pushing the rotation faster and harder until finally, the rubber split and the water splashed out.

“Hey, you did it!” Tenten-chan exclaimed, adjusting her next jump so she was soaring alongside him. Then, soft enough that he could barely hear, she murmured, “And here I was going to offer to let you splash me again for encouragement.”

“I’ll be damned,” Jiraiya muttered, pulling out his notebook and jotting something down. “All right, color me impressed. I really thought it was going to take you a good while longer to get that down, but it seems like you’ve figured out the rotation.”

“Hell yeah!” Naruto shook the scraps of balloon off his hand and wiped it dry on his pants. “I told you, don’t underestimate me! Now what do I do next, huh? Huh!?”

“All right, bring it down a notch,” Jiraiya dug a pinky in his ear. “Rotation is only step one; step two is much harder… at least for most people. Step two is power. You need to do the same thing, creating a swirl of rotating chakra threads with pure shape manipulation, but you need to use much more chakra, and make it much denser. Here.”

Rather than a water balloon, he unsealed a pair of rubber balls that were about the same size the balloons had been. Tossing one to Naruto, he held up the other.

“This is your next goal: repeat step one with enough power to destroy the ball. As you can see, it’s much thicker than a balloon, and just breaking the rubber wall isn’t enough. You need to produce enough power to completely destroy it.” With a small flex, the ball in Jiraiya’s hand disintegrated, briefly leaving behind a small sphere of swirling chakra that Naruto imagined was the final form of Rasengan. “This is tough in a different way, because as a genin you’ve never had to force this much chakra out through your hands, or control so much while it’s outside your body. Let me know if you start getting chakra burns — Don’t ignore it if that happens! You can heal from a lot, but if you don’t give yourself time to recover you’ll damage your tenketsu, and those can’t be repaired.”

“Got it…” he said, looking down at his own rubber ball. There’s no water to move this time, I’ve gotta move my chakra in the same pattern without it. And then power it up… He repeated the number of threads that had burst the balloon, and he could feel the rubber ball vibrating as his chakra moved within, but there wasn’t so much as a nick in the substance of the rubber. …Power it up a lot, he corrected. Considering how well even the Step 1 version worked against Gaara’s sand, I should probably keep practicing that, too. Maybe if I do get those chakra burn things… which… I should probably ask Tenten-chan to explain tonight…

“Keep at it while we run,” Jiraiya said, turning to look forward again. “And in the meantime while you’re busy… Higurashi-kun, based on what we discussed yesterday, I think we can take your seal in one of two directions…”

Itachi

“They’re just running all over the country at random,” Kisame complained, not for the first time.

Itachi closed his aching eyes — they were always aching, these days — and suppressed the urge to sigh, knowing that the former Kiri-nin was looking for just such a reaction.

“No doubt they have a specific goal in mind that we don’t yet know,” he droned. Which should be obvious to anyone spending any amount of time thinking about it. “Perhaps you could pretend you’re a shinobi and look for more information.”

“Does it matter? We know the junchuuriki’s capabilities, he can barely draw chakra from the bijuu at this point, and he’s the ranking chuunin on this mission. We don’t need to do all this boring spywork.”

“We can’t say that for certain. All we know is that the container left the village, not who accompanied him. Making assumptions without enough information was my last partner’s fatal flaw,” he reminded Kisame, causing the man to revert to facetious griping.

“Hardly a fatal flaw when you didn’t even kill him,” Kisame grumbled. “And you could at least let me silence the ants we interrogate so they can’t give us away.”

“As I’ve told you at least thrice now, leaving a trail of bodies leading straight to where we capture the Kyuubi Container will simply draw unnecessary attention against Leader-sama’s direct orders,” Itachi replied.

Just why the man calling himself Pain ordered them only to refer to him as ‘Leader’ when he was plainly already using an alias was one thing Itachi hadn’t managed to figure out.

“But Leader-sama doesn’t care when the other teams do it, un,” Kisame whined.

Itachi knew full-well that it was an affectation considering the verbal tic was plainly imitating Deidara, and merely rolled his eyes where Kisame couldn’t see. “Our remit at this time is merely to gather funds in advance of the true plan, we are only to take the jinchuuriki the opportunity presents itself. We are investigating if that opportunity exists.”

He could sense the shark-man’s pout even without looking.

“I’ve already agreed you can eliminate whatever squad the boy is traveling with once we find them,” he repeated. “Just make it look like an Iwa hit squad.”

“With relish and pleasure,” Kisame cackled. There was a creaking of cloth, and Itachi was sure Kisame’s sword was wiggling in equal excitement.

They were approaching their current destination now, so Itachi braced himself for the minor strain of actively using his sharingan. “Stay out of sight so I don’t have to erase even more memories.”

Kisame thankfully held his silence, and Itachi stepped forward with Shunshin no jutsu to alight just in front of the town’s sole ryokan.

“Oh my, another shinobi!” the old woman behind the desk tittered. “Just one moment and I’ll bring you some slippers.

“Hello, obaa-san,” he murmured, meeting her gaze with his spinning sharingan. “There’s no need for that. Tell me about the other shinobi you met.”

A/N: If you’re enjoying this story, feel free to check out my discord server at https://discord.gg/H6V854Fvbg

This chapter almost started at Naruto’s POV, but on reflection I think it was worth backing up for the dreaded DTR conversation.(It shouldn’t be dreaded. Communication isn’t something to be afraid of. If you can get naked with someone you should be able to bare yourself in other ways — if you get burned, that fucking sucks but it also means they were a poor match and you can do better. Far preferable to learn that early on.)

I don’t actually know if there’s a distinction between ‘crush’ and ‘squish’ in Japanese, but as this story is written in English I don’t think importing the terms to the Elemental nations is too immersion-breaking.

Tsunade’s parents are never even mentioned in canon that I (or the wiki) can recall. Seeing as she bears the name Senju, I’m presuming that her father had to be Hashirama and Mito’s son, leaving room for a blond mother. Since this was still earlyish days of Konoha, when they were trying to put the Sengoku period behind them, I’m proposing that her father married a foreigner from the Funato clan (of Mizu no Kuni).

And Tenten knows this because learning about strong kunoichi (and Tsunade in particular) is a hobby/special interest for her.

Glossary

Akai Chishio no Habanero (赤い血潮のハバネロ, ‘Red Hot-Blooded Habanero’) – Kushina’s canonical nickname that I’ve always thought sounds way too stupid to exist outside of Konoha.

Yōkōshi (洋紅死, lit. ‘crimson’ + ‘death’) – Kushina’s ‘serious’ epithet in my headcanon (and hopefully now yours). The etymology is a little bit of a walk: yō here can mean ‘ocean’ or by extension ‘a vast distance [as across the ocean]’; kō is a shortening of the reading くれない (pronounced ‘kurenai’, amusingly). Together, yōkō means ‘Western Red’ (or ‘[across the] Ocean Red’), referring to either the crimson dye produced by the safflower (Carthamus tinctorius) that came to Japan from China (hence ‘West’) or sometimes the the safflower itself — which in this case could easily be a plant from (or originally imported through) Uzu no kuni.

↳Also, as Naruto notes, there’s a second pun on Yōkoshi (妖狐死, ‘Yōkai fox’ + ‘death’).

-gai (街, read as がい) – including this because it confused me; this is an alternate spelling of 町 (‘-chō’ or ‘-machi’; see Chapter 2’s A/N) which can also mean ‘town’, but is officially translated as ‘quarter’ in the sense of ‘district’. My guess is that it is used in Tanzaku-gai as a section of a castle town under the Jōbō system of city planning borrowed from China sometime around the tail-end of the Asuka period (circa late-600s CE).

Omiai (お見合い, lit. [respectful particle]-‘look-meet’) – a traditional, formal marriage interview, sometimes facilitated by the candidates’ families and/or a nakōdo (仲人, ‘matchmaker, marriage broker’).