Gaara looked across.
Blood from Sasuke's eyes slowly dripped down his cheeks, blooming into dark red flowers on the sand.
His whole body trembled, whether from pain, or fear, or… humiliation.
Gaara looked at Sasuke, who could no longer resist, was silent for a few seconds, then raised his right hand.
Five fingers spread, then gently clenched into a fist.
The quicksand binding Sasuke turned back into loose sand.
Gaara turned around, preparing to leave.
"W-Wait—"
A hoarse, tearful voice came from behind.
Sasuke propped up his upper body with trembling arms, struggling to crawl out of the sand.
He raised his head, his face covered in sand and blood, his eyes red and swollen, but in his black pupils burned a mad obsession.
"You bastard… tell me… where is she!"
He was asking about Mikoto's whereabouts.
But Gaara sensed something wrong in his tone. Not longing, not yearning, but an anger of being betrayed, a questioning of 'why did she abandon me'.
He didn't even call her 'mother' anymore, just 'her'.
Just like when he spoke of Itachi.
Gaara stopped.
He didn't turn around, just slightly turned his face, glancing at Sasuke behind him with the corner of his eye.
That boy knelt in the sand, his whole body disheveled, but his eyes were fierce as those of a wounded beast.
The seed had been planted.
And it had sprouted faster than expected.
Only, this sprout seemed somewhat… to have grown twisted.
"If you want to know—" Gaara sighed slightly in his heart, but his tone remained cold.
"Go ask her yourself."
With that, Gaara lingered no longer. With a movement of his body, he had already appeared on a sand dune not far away.
Temari and Kankuro also quickly broke free from their respective opponents and gathered at his side.
"Let's go," Gaara said.
The three leaped simultaneously, landing on a tree trunk in the distance. A few bounds, and they had disappeared into the dense depths of the forest.
Sasuke watched the direction they had disappeared, his teeth grinding audibly.
Sai and Shigaraki, supporting each other, walked over.
Their conditions were not much better than Sasuke's. Sai's left hand hung unnaturally, clearly fractured. Shigaraki had a deep cut on his face, running from his left eyebrow to the right corner of his mouth, the flesh turned outward, blood flowing ceaselessly.
In this battle, their defeat had been without any suspense. The gap in strength was like a heavenly moat.
But they had survived.
The other party had clearly not intended to kill them.
This made Sasuke feel even more humiliated than being killed.
"Sasuke—" Sai began.
But Sasuke abruptly raised his hand, stopping him.
He stood up, staggering, his eyes fixed on the direction where Gaara had disappeared, forcing out the words one by one through clenched teeth: "Next time… I will definitely defeat you!"
"I will definitely make you… tell me!"
His voice echoed over the empty sand, then was scattered by the wind.
…
Deep in the forest.
Gaara, Temari, and Kankuro quickly darted among the tree canopies, moving lightly toward the central tower.
In that brief but fierce battle just now, their Chakra consumption was minimal, and their physical strength remained plentiful.
This was the gap.
"Hey, Gaara."
Kankuro broke the silence first.
As he jumped, he turned his head to look at Gaara, who was leading by a body length, a confused expression on his face. "Sasuke's strength… didn't seem as strong as I imagined? Didn't Aunt Mikoto say he was very talented? But just now—"
He paused, then finally spoke his thoughts: "Why don't we just tie him up directly and take him back to the Star City to see Aunt Mikoto? She'd definitely be happy."
These words were very direct and also very naive.
He had been adopted by Mikoto as a child, felt the motherly love he had once lost, and deeply longed to help Mikoto fulfill her wish for mother and son to be reunited.
Temari rolled her eyes next to him, wishing she could hit this younger brother on the head with her fan.
"Do you have puppet lubricating oil for brains?" She said irritably. "How many pairs of eyes do you think are watching Sasuke right now? Didn't you feel them?"
Kankuro was startled: "Eyes?"
"Those two teammates," Temari lowered her voice. "That one named Sai has strange Ninjutsu and decent Taijutsu… at the very least, elite Chunin level. The other guy's combat style is completely Anbu-style… ruthless, efficient, no regard for cost. Would such two people be assigned as teammates to an 'ordinary Genin'?"
Kankuro scratched his head, recalling the fight just now.
Sai's secret techniques were indeed troublesome, and his reaction speed was extremely fast. Even in a surprise attack situation, he could counter quickly and even almost damage Kankuro's puppet.
Shigaraki was even more obvious. Every move that guy made was a killing blow. If not for the wide range of Temari's Wind Release forcing him to only defend, it would be hard to say who would win in close-quarters combat.
"You mean—" Kankuro hesitated, "Konoha sent two Anbu, nominally as Sasuke's teammates, but actually as surveillance?"
"What else?" Temari snorted coldly. "After the Uchiha 'Massacre', Sasuke is Konoha's only pure-blooded Uchiha. The value of the Sharingan… those old farts in Konoha's high command know it better than anyone. Would they let Sasuke grow freely? Would they let him easily leave Konoha?"
She glanced at Gaara's back.
Gaara still silently led the way ahead, as if he hadn't heard their conversation.
But Temari knew he was listening.
"So what Gaara said to Sasuke just now wasn't to anger him, but to—" Kankuro suddenly understood. "To plant a seed of doubt in his heart? To make him find a way to leave Konoha on his own?"
He looked at Gaara's silent, somewhat lonely back ahead and seemed to understand something.
Why Gaara had to provoke Sasuke again and again, to make him see the gap, to tell him that Mikoto was still alive, yet not tell him her specific whereabouts.
Because there were some things that couldn't be said outright.
Only by letting Sasuke 'figure it out' himself, by letting him 'decide' to leave on his own, would he be cautious, would he plan, would he wait for the right opportunity.
"Looks like you're not completely hopeless," Temari nodded, her eyes complexly looking at Gaara, her voice lowering a few points. "Only by letting Sasuke develop doubt and distrust toward Konoha from within will this seed truly sprout."
"Whether it's a month from now or a year from now, as long as the timing is right, he will naturally find a way to seek the truth and leave that 'cage' that imprisons him."
She sighed softly, as if remembering something from the distant past, her tone carrying a hint of sadness. "Just like… our uncle back then, right?"
The moment her words fell…
Gaara's body, in the middle of jumping between branches, trembled almost imperceptibly.
Although he quickly regained his balance, that instant of stiffness was clearly captured by Temari and Kankuro.
Kankuro also fell silent.
He thought of that man.
Yashamaru.
Their mother, Karura's, younger brother, their uncle.
That man who always smiled gently, who would make them desserts, who would stay by Gaara's bedside when he had nightmares, who would hum softly to lull him to sleep.
Also the man who, when Gaara was six years old, accepted the order of the Fourth Kazekage, Rasa, and attempted to assassinate Gaara with explosive tags.
That night, Gaara's uncontrollable roar.
That night, the words Yashamaru said to Gaara before he died: "I never loved you."
From then on, Gaara changed.
He became cold, became closed off, became trusting no one.
Until they were brought to the Land of Stars, until they were adopted by Mikoto.
That Uchiha woman, gentle as their own mother, little by little pried open Gaara's hard shell.
She told Gaara that the words Yashamaru said before he died might not have been sincere.
"When people are about to die, to protect the people important to them, they can say anything," Mikoto had said, stroking Gaara's head gently. "Maybe he was using that way to make you hate him, to make you stop trusting others, so that… you wouldn't be betrayed again, wouldn't be hurt again."
Gaara hadn't spoken at the time.
But Temari knew he had heard her.
Because from that day on, Gaara began to secretly investigate what had happened back then.
He wanted to know the truth…
To know whether Yashamaru had truly hated him…
To know why his father, Rasa, had given such an order.
But Rasa, after his defeat in the Land of Wind, had been imprisoned by the Land of Stars.
As the Kazekage of the defeated nation, he had lost his freedom.
There was only one way for Gaara to learn the truth.
Become a high-ranking member of the Land of Stars.
Become a Jonin, earn enough merit, obtain sufficient authority, to have the right to access those sealed files, to have the right to visit the imprisoned Rasa.
So over the years, Gaara had worked harder than anyone.
Training, missions, combat… he was always at the forefront, always pushing himself to be the best.
And now, facing Sasuke—
Temari looked at Gaara's silent back and suddenly understood.
Gaara saw in Sasuke his former self.
The self who had been kept in the dark, deceived, used, unable even to trust his closest family.
So he couldn't directly tell Sasuke the truth.
Couldn't gently guide him the way Mikoto had.
He could only use the cruelest method to let Sasuke discover for himself, struggle for himself, and… make a choice for himself.
Just as Yashamaru had used the cruelest method to 'protect' Gaara back then.
Temari said quietly: "Some truths must be discovered by himself... some paths must be chosen by himself to walk. Forcing intervention from outside might actually harm him."
Gaara did not respond.
He simply increased his speed, his body flickering a few times among the tree canopies, leaving Temari and Kankuro behind by some distance.
Temari watched her younger brother's back and sighed softly.
"Let him be alone for a while."
Temari also increased her speed.
The forest fell behind.
Wind howled in his ears.
But in Gaara's mind, it was unusually quiet.
Yashamaru's face, Sasuke's face, alternately emerged.
That gently smiling uncle, and that angrily questioning boy.
The words 'I never loved you', and the words 'Where is she'.
Different times, different people, the same despair of being 'abandoned' by one's closest.
'Protection—'
Gaara silently recited this word in his heart.
If it was protection, why did it have to be done through hurting?
If it was love, why did it have to be spoken as hate?
He hadn't known before.
But after seeing Sasuke, he gradually understood the feelings Yashamaru might have had back then.
That helplessness of 'I can't tell you the truth, because the truth would kill you'.
That determination of 'I'd rather you hate me, as long as you live'.
"Sasuke—"
Gaara looked up, through the gaps in the canopy, at the grey sky.
"Hurry up and become stronger."
"Strong enough to see through Konoha's lies, strong enough to protect yourself, strong enough to—"
His gaze became firm.
"To come to the Land of Stars and ask Aunt Mikoto yourself why she didn't take you with her."
And before that—
Gaara would also continue to become stronger.
Strong enough to have the right to know the truth about Yashamaru's assassination attempt, strong enough to have the authority to visit his imprisoned father Rasa, strong enough to… protect everything he now had!