29 - Hearstrings

Sakura and Chiyo duelled Sasori's hundred puppets, while Hoka worked on recovering her chakra, which basically meant she did nothing. She did have a jutsu that could be used, a relatively low-chakra one, but it would still drain her pretty dry.

Hoka was sent here to help in taking down the Akatsuki. She had to do something against the 100 puppets, just to make an opening for Chiyo or Sakura to attack.

The fiery haired girl scowled, taking a few breaths to channel her chakra properly. "Fire Style: Flaming Field."

Dark orange fire erupted from the ground, scorching a few dozen puppets to ash. Sakura threw a lion head, a chakra sealing one, defeating Sasori for once and for all.

Just kidding, he revives again.

Sakura rushed towards Chiyo and Hoka, ready to use the antidote on the former and heal the latter, only for a red haired figure to stumble towards her, blade in hand.

"Watch out!" Hoka managed to shout out, but it was too late. The blade, instead of hitting Chiyo, pierced Sakura's torso. Sakura was now poisoned as well as Chiyo, and Hoka had absolutely no chakra left, not even enough for a technique that largely relies on blood instead of chakra, and the fiery haired girl had absolutely no punching skills.

Things looked grim when Sasori stepped towards Sakura once more, his brown eyes completely void of life as he prepared to finish them all off.

Until he was stopped by his 'father' and 'mother'. Blades pierced the 'heart' area on his puppet-body torso, genuine blood spilling out.

"I guessed right," Chiyo chuckled dryly, no amusement in her voice. "Some part of you is still human."

The old woman quickly worked on 'reviving' Sakura with her own jutsu, although it's not like the pink haired medic was actually dead. With everyone now at least in no risk of death, the kunoichis' turned to Sasori once more.

"Why would anyone risk your life for someone else? I do not feel, and I do not want to." the red haired puppet questioned quietly. "I have absolutely no regrets, not even after killing thousands of people, not even if my own grandmother dies here and now."

Hoka twitched at the end of his sentence, raising a fist, but Sakura beat her to it, punching a hole in his wooden face, earning a scoff from the red haired puppet.

"...you did beat me, so I'll tell you what you want to know. A spy of mine who works for Orochimaru is meeting with me on Tenchi Bridge. I... won't be able to make it."

And it was over.

Once the three kunoichi were gone, only the broken puppets of Sasori of the Red Sand remained on the battlefield. That was until a female figure stepped onto the ruined area.

Dark blonde hair was tied into a ponytail, and a fuchsia dress with white gloves covered her entirely. A beret of the same color sat on her head, with her face concealed by a veil. In other words, it was someone who did not look like she belonged in a bloody post-battlefield, or in this world altogether.

"What a waste of good puppets. They're all broken." A scoff escaped 'her'. "I should send her back now. It would be a shame if somebody broke Aster."

The voice died out, and the woman turned and dashed off.

Hoka had left Sakura and Chiyo earlier, having done what she came here for. However, as she turned around, she noticed the woman in purple observing the puppets, before running off quite quickly.

Most people might be confused about a strange purple lady appearing after a fight. Hoka, however, knew exactly who that was, or rather, what that was. After all, Kyomu had especially instructed Sun Star to watch out for her.

'She just had to run off,' the fiery haired girl scowled to herself, standing up from the rock she hid behind and dusting off her legs. 'I should tell Kyomu-san.'

While the Hoka girl was off in Suna, Tsunade and Shizune explored Sun Star's cave. Kyomu said that it wasn't their main base, but frankly, the place was far too advanced for a cave.

Kessho and Rina were constantly cursing at each other, arguing about something like statues and forks, which the blonde Hokage quickly learned to ignore. Henka seemed alright for a while until he started commenting on Tsunade's sense of fashion ("Blue would be far better an option for your haori compared to green, however that would mean changing your entire color scheme and light blue is unsuitable for your hair color."), causing the blonde to ignore him and walk away.

Kitanai seemed to be the most normal of the bunch, making random shapes with the sand-dust-whatever on the ground of the cave with an entirely bored expression, and he seemed to also be the expert in ignoring Rina and Kessho.

"Tsunade-sama, didn't they mention someone named Yurei earlier?" Shizune asked as the two kunoichi walked through a quiet area of the cave.

"Yes, apparently he doesn't give people a good impression," Tsunade replied, her eyes settling on a door. Yes, this cave had doors. A wooden plate on the door read 'Yurei'. "Shall we?"

Shizune nodded, lifting a hand and knocking softly on the door.

"Come in."

The two kunoichi exchanged one last glance, before opening the door. They were greeted with a crayon drawing. A very realistic crayon drawing, but one nonetheless.

The cavern was a perfect square, with a bed, closet and small desk on one side of the room. The other side had a larger desk with several jars of what looked suspiciously like internal organs, as well as more surreal crayon drawings of the most random things.

At the end of the room, facing the door, was a surprisingly non-scary large crayon drawing of a graveyard.

Yurei himself sat by the desk, crayons in hand. He had long pale lavender hair tied into a crude ponytail and black eyes, dressed in a plain light purple kimono.

"...hello?" Shizune tested.

"Hello."

"..."

"..."

Tsunade sighed. She was starting to understand why Yurei didn't go participate in the meeting. Although frankly, the contents of the room was worse than Yurei himself.

"We'll... see you," Tsunade said politely, before turning tail and getting out of the creepy room ASAP. Shizune followed suit, the two only stopping their speed-walk when they were a good distance away, back at the main cavern.

"Well, that was that," Shizune said, wiping sweat off her forehead. Kitanai cast the two kunoichi a glance. "Did you go into Yurei's room?"

"Yes," Tsunade responded. "What are some of those things in there?"

"Don't worry, he only takes stuff from corpses," Kitanai replied idly, swirling his sand around in boredom. That did not make things any better, but Tsunade was stopped from saying any more by Hoka walking back into the cave.

"You're back quickly," the Hokage commented. Suna was a few days away.

"One of Kyomu-san's weird jutsu tricks, I dunno," the fiery haired girl replied, walking deeper into the cave. "The puppet guy from Akatsuki's dead."

Kyomu could sense Hoka's return by her chakra. He taught Sun Star members a pseudo-jutsu he came up with, a variation of Summoning Jutsu but it's in reverse, where the user can 'summon' themselves to certain set locations with a scroll. Basically, it's teleport points from video games.

Yes, Sun Star had a video game console. Hoka is usually hogging it, other times Rina and Kessho fight over it.

"Did you take one out?" the red haired man asked as Hoka's chakra signature entered the room.

"Yep, red-haired puppet freak. Sasori or something," the fire jutsu expert replied. "And also... I saw her. Purple. Blonde."

To normal people, that would make absolutely no sense. Kyomu knew exactly what that was. "Purple again. Did you manage to get anything?"

"Nope, I was hiding and she ran off really quickly." Hoka responded, shrugging. "She was observing all the broken puppets. But I did see her."

"Makoto of the Masquerade."