[Red Sands: In Search of the Scarlet Dawn]

Her excitement at learning new things had been rekindled, it seemed, or so Sakura mused to herself as she finished up with her tutor her brother had brought over first thing in the morning. She had dragged herself over to the main study to be greeted with the sight of a woman who was quaking in her boots all too literally. It hadn’t taken much to guess that the lady had evidently tried to teach her before, and so her seeming sudden change in personality hadn’t gone unnoticed. Not that she was trying to hide that much.

There was no turning back, after all – no way for the personality she had supposedly once had to make a reappearance. She was a Duke’s Daughter rather than a shinobi, and that was forever how it would stay, what with the nonexistence of the job role she had once had in that world. A world she was slowly gaining a passing familiarity with as each day came and went.

Her family were clingy, and perhaps, ever so slightly, overprotective. Though given they thought she had been tortured to gain those memories of hers… Sakura tilted her head, wondering on that fact then. She had never thought she would be someone who could forget memories of torture, horrific as it was – and apparently as her family thought it had been for her.

She wasn’t completely convinced, even if she was slightly more accepting of the idea that she had gained memories. Either way, her family seemed to love her – both the girl she had apparently once been and the being she was right then and there.

“When is my next tutor coming?” she offhandedly asked Ichiro after he had finished seeing Dame Amane out. The number of titles and how they were inherited or obtained were still things she needed to figure out for herself. She hardly wanted tutors for the basic things, what with how embarrassing it would undoubtedly be to have to say that she had some form of amnesia to people who would undoubtedly judge her for it. A shiver curled down her spine, memories of her so-called condemnation event still vivid in her mind. Part of her felt as though she might as well have been a rabbit amongst wolves sometimes. Though, if that were the case, then the rest of her family were undoubtedly rabbits with razor sharp teeth ready to rip out the throats of those wolves. Her eyes narrowed, hands clutching at thin air as if she could grab a hold of her dream and sharpen her own fangs while she waited.

“You have fifteen minutes,” Ichiro answered, watching as she finished writing her notes in one of the many new journals which had mysteriously appeared on her desk the day before her first tutor had come to call. “Are you sure you’re fine for this?” he asked, the familiar concern appearing then, and Sakura barely resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “This is quite a heavy schedule for you to follow, sister. Rest is important.”

She waved a hand at him flippantly. “I can tone down the amount of lessons once I’ve learnt the basics,” she answered. “I still have those exams at the end of the year, and I need to pass them with flying colours.”

“You only need to score above a certain threshold, you know,” he said, looking at her ever so forlornly. “I… I do not want you to burn yourself out,” he stated, blue eyes boring into her with the force of a thousand suns. “I worry, sister – we all do, especially as of late.”

Sakura scowled. “So sorry to worry you,” she muttered, shoulders sinking as she heard the phrase the had to have heard a thousand times since she had woken up in that household in her stupidly large four-poster bed.

“Sakura,” Ichiro spoke sharply. “You know I don’t mean it like that.”

Her shoulders sunk a fraction more, anger subsiding all too quickly as she looked at the figure her brother cut against the doorway. “Yeah,” she muttered. “I know. Now leave me be – I only have thirteen minutes left to relax before my next lesson.”

Ichiro sighed, looking as if he bore the weight of the entire world for a moment. “Very well,” he said softly. “I will see you later for sword practice – father has moved back the time so we can all train together from now on.”

“Oh.” Sakura blinked. “I thought he’d just get another instructor to teach me…” she mumbled to herself even as Ichiro saw himself out – only appearing some twelve minutes later with her next tutor – a Count Yamanaka.

Or, as she recognised him, Yamanaka Inoichi.

He was surprisingly similar to what she remembered of him from Konohagakure, not that she had known him all that well. She had been a child when she had interacted with him the most, and then she had tread down a different path which had never really coincided with her best friend’s father. Then he’d died, and Ino had been inconsolable for a while. Her heart skipped a beat, part of her wondering if there was a Yamanaka Ino there too. Then she remembered that even if there was she would hardly know her. Ever did that place seem to like reminding her of her loss.

Ever did it like unbalancing her emotions and making that dark, pitch-black smoke curl lovingly around her fingers. She gritted her teeth together, trying to wrangle the misery she felt under control for once. Her hands were tucked below her desk in an instant, and Sakura was grateful for the fact that the Yamanaka Inoichi before her was nothing like the sharp-eyed man she had once known. He would have noticed the move, and discovered in an instant that she was suffering from Negative Mana Reflux. The man before her didn’t, and that only helped to iron out the differences between them.

It had been different when she had encountered Sasuke. It had been different when she had encountered her father and her brothers – if only because she hadn’t had brothers before and her father looked far too different from what she remembered. The man before her was too similar in both appearance and in the way he spoke to her. As if he was what a different Yamanaka Inoichi could have been without the need to grow up through war and work in T&I. A soft breath escaped her, hands unclenching in her lap as she sat there, black miasma still curling around her fingers as she focused her attention instead on the lesson he was setting out.

“Healing?” she mumbled, wondering exactly why she had been expecting an alternate version of Tsunade to have appeared to teach her just that. She wondered if an alternate version of Tsunade even existed. Her brothers were new elements in comparison to before. Who was to say that some elements hadn’t been removed?

“Yes,” Inoichi answered her, a smile curving at his lips even at the words which only proved she hadn’t been listening to anything he’d said for the past five minutes whilst she’d been freaking out over his existence. “That is what the Yamanaka Family specialise in – within our lands, at least,” he said, looking oddly wistful then. “The Holy Lands are the place where you will find the best of the best at the healing arts, but they are very selective about who gets to venture there – and who they take on as both students, holy knights, and saintesses.”

Sakura stiffened, abruptly reminded then that she was technically supposed to be a saintess candidate, though she doubted she would get the opportunity to go to those infamous Holy Lands if they caught wind of what had gone on in the academy all too recently. Not that it mattered. She would find a way to do what she loved, no matter what. That was what she had done… in a different life. She swallowed thickly at that thought.

“Though before you can even begin using magic to heal, it is better to learn more manual methods along with the composition of the body – along with the varying types of injury,” he informed her, and Sakura could only hum, blinking as her new teacher procured a thick stack of pages which landed in front of her with a heavy thud. “Which is why I will be giving you this comprehensive exam, and I will begin teaching you more practical application, such as stitches and sutures, only once you are able to complete that exam.”

She risked a glance down at the thick paper, eyebrow arching up as she realised that she knew the answers to everything on the front page, at least. In fact, she was willing to bet that, aside from magical maladies like Negative Mana Reflux, she would be able to complete a vast amount of that exam in one sitting.

She was still dressed in the only outfit she found acceptable for exercise as she stood side-by-side with her brothers. All three of them were dressed far more appropriately than her, and that was a matter which she hoped would be rectified soon enough with the arrival of the tailor scheduled in two days time. Though she had the strangest feeling they would probably be arriving with dress designs rather than the clothing designs that she actually wanted. Whilst dresses were pretty and nice to wear, she found pants to be far more practical, what with how much more active she was becoming as the concern over her health began to subside somewhat. It meant she had less to do behind their backs. A snort escaped her at the thought, even as she took the simple wooden training sword which was given to her for practice.

“Ichiro, you will be helping your sister through the exercises I give her – it’ll be of more use to you to learn how to teach others,” their father said, nodding at the eldest of them, and Sakura could only resign herself to being under her brother’s careful watch. “Ren. Itsuki. You can both spar for today. I will mediate, but bear in mind I also have to keep an eye on your sister – so preferably don’t go too wild today. Ichiro will not always be here to patch you up, and neither will your sister, once she inevitably learns healing magic.”

Sakura tilted her head, fighting to keep the slight smirk which wanted to curl at her lips at how her father had phrased it that it was all but inevitable that she would learn to heal. Idly, she wondered if Inoichi had informed him of just how far along she was in regards to theory work, baffled as the older man seemingly was.

“Well then, sister,” Ichiro said, stirring her from her thoughts. “I suppose we ought to begin with our warmup – it’s to prevent—”

“I know what a warmup is for, and what a cool down is too,” she said, cutting him off before he could try to explain further. She had been very active before along with being a medic who knew how to avoid the more basic, easily preventable injuries. “You should speak to Count Yamanaka about my theoretical knowledge when it comes to injuries—and also, on another note, can you go through the noble ranks with me again later? I’m still… confused by them.”

Ichiro smiled. “Of course,” he said, ushering her along as they broke into a steady jog around the plot of land which was seemingly allocated for training purposes. Itsuki and Ren were ahead of them, finishing their short warmup before them, and then she was greeted by the repetitive thuds of training swords colliding with one another as her brothers began their first bout.

She was only a short while behind, soon beginning learning the basics of swordsmanship in those lands. Though she could safely say the most experience she had with swordsmanship before had been poking at the grip of a katana in a weapons shop with a person who she didn’t want to think about right there and then. Because he was lost to her, irrevocably and eternally so.

“There are eight basic attacking angles that you’ll need to be familiar with,” Ichiro spoke, gesturing for her to watch him. “I will demonstrate them now – slowly, so that you can watch. In a real fight, they’d be more like”—he jerked a thumb over in the direction of their brothers—“that.”

Sakura blinked, staring at the oddly savage grin on Itsuki’s face as he battled against a far more composed Ren. It was almost hypnotic, the way his pink hair seemed to dance back and forth as he blocked, dodged, and attacked.

“Ren will win that bout, at least,” Ichiro said matter-of-factly.

Sakura blinked. “How do you know that?”

“Because he’s in control – notice how Itsuki is reacting whilst Ren is calm. I hate to say this but our brothers give themselves away by their reactions and facial expressions whilst fighting. That’s how I can tell, at least, but father can probably tell by the way that Ren is both anticipating Itsuki’s moves and leading him into the position he wants. Itsuki has an unfortunate tendency to fall into a rhythm, and that is something you don’t want to do, since it makes you predictable and easy to block. Ren has a habit of capitalising on that weakness of his, and I have little doubt he’ll find a new weakness once Itsuki rectifies that habit of his. He’s a crafty one, that brother of ours.” Ichiro sighed. “But never mind them.”

She took that as the cue it was to focus back on her eldest brother, watching as he swung his wooden blade carefully, eyes darting over to her at the end of each strike as if to check she was still watching.

“Ten repetitions of each for now, sister,” her brother commanded, and Sakura totalled that up to eighty strikes – and that was only to begin with.

“Okay,” she mumbled, settling herself into a solid stance which her brother thankfully felt no need to correct as she started going through the motions. Magic, she mused as the sweat began to drip and her arms began to ache, was seeming much cooler than sword fighting in that moment. She’d be damned if she didn’t learn both though, what with how much the title of magic swordsman tickled her fancy.

She just needed to get started properly on the magical side of things, fickle as her control still was over the dark gate which had apparently been pushed open forcefully within her mana core. Idly, she wondered when Inoichi would begin teaching her to heal with magic, and could only muse that it would be at least a few weeks or a couple of months before she could start on that aspect of her training.

“Stop daydreaming, sister, and focus,” her brother called, jolting her from the rabbit hole in her thoughts she had fallen down. “Unless you’re—”

“I’m fine,” she grumbled, cutting off the all too familiar question before it could be finished, focusing then on swinging the wooden blade as precisely as she could. Slow repetitions until she got used to the motions it was, and then, one day, she would hopefully be at a similar level to where her brothers were right there and then.