Chapter 1: Year 3
The sun shines happily over Konohagakure no Sato without a cloud in the sky. The sun shining upon the faces on the Hokage Mountain gives an illusion of upturned lips on their stony faces on this day of peace. All the trees awaked from their winter slumber are abloom in green, except for the sakura trees which are instead joyfully bright with their pink petals falling ever so slowly in the wind. The birds in the trees are happily singing their songs.
"Hehehehe."
And a little girl giggles as she runs with her arms outstretched through the falling pink petals. She spins in circles under the sakura trees during this spring day without care.
Then the little girl falls giggling onto her back upon the blanket of pink petals under the trees, her hair as bright and pink as the petals she lays upon. She sees the sun shining brightly through the branches and petals of the sakura trees above her.
She beams holding up one hand to block the bright sun and her bright green eyes lock onto a lone sakura pestle drifting slowly through the air. She smiles watching it twisting and turning trying to desperately stay afloat, going farther and farther from its brethren leaving them behind.
However, it too soon falls but it instead lands alone in the dirt below far from the pink blanket of its brethren. At that the little girls smile froze and then morphed into a frown looking at the lone petal in the dirt in confusion.
'Something…'
"Sakura!" She is interrupted from her thoughts and she looks up, "Sakura!"
The little girls whose name is the same as the trees under which she had been playing saw her father calling her with his hand waving above his head. Next to him are her mother and uncle.
Her smile is back again. She hops up and runs over to her parents.
"Daddy!" She runs up and tackles her dad's legs in a hug.
"Hey Sakura." He smiles, picks Sakura up under her arms, and holds her against his chest.
"Mommy! Uncle!" She turns her head towards them, smiles, and gives a little wave.
"Hey little petal\Sakura." Her mom and uncle reply smiling back at her.
Her dad then turns back towards her uncle. "So Tenchi… are you ready?" he asks her uncle.
"Ha ha," her uncle laughs back jovially, "Who is older one here? I should be the one worried about you, not the other way around."
He pats her dad's shoulder, then he smiles at Sakura in her father's arms and ruffles her pink hair to her displeasure. "Sakura be a good girl for your parents while I'm gone. Maybe if you're good I'll bring you back a gift."
"A gift!" Sakura cries out excitedly in joy, then she puts on her most serious face and nods back. "Ok, I will be the best girl, I promise."
Her uncle gives a laugh at how cute she looked when she was trying to be serious. However, her dad continues to give his brother a worried look and her uncle reassures him.
"I have been trading for longer than you. In fact, dad started teaching me before you were even born. I know the trade routes even better than you. No worries, I will be completely safe. I even have these fine ninja protecting me. Isn't that right?"
At that moment, Sakura noticed three men with forehead protectors and flak jackets nearby her uncle's cart.
"Do not worry, we are chunin, we can easily protect your brother from simple bandits." Says a tall ninja with brown hair. The two other ninja behind him all nod.
At that her uncle jumps onto his cart, and gets the cart moving. Before going to far he turns back and waves which Sakura happily returns.
-=-=-=-=- -=-=-l=l-=-= -=-=-=-=-=-
White.
White everywhere.
Everywhere except for a huge stone gate far in the distance.
Then the stone gate teleports closer, then closer and closer. Faster and faster.
Then in an instant two huge doors with intricate patterns inscribe on them is upon her, right in front of her, towering over her. The patterns should look pretty, however, they instead seem to emanate an aura of deep apprehension.
With great foreboding, they slowly open showing complete darkness between the doors.
Without fully opening the gate then rushes forward almost faster than she can see and swallows her into the darkness within.
"AHH!"
Sakura bolts upward in bed with a scream, breathing quickly. Her heart pounding inside her chest.
"Sakura!" her mom is seemingly there in an instant rushing towards her with a hug.
At that Sakura busts into tears hugging her mom.
"Mommy!" she sobs into her mom.
"Shh, it is ok now, little petal." Her mom gently pets Sakura's back and head comforting her.
"M-mommy, it was so scary. Th-there was this-this b-big gate." Sakura mumbles sobbing.
At that Sakura's mom gives Sakura a weird look. However, Sakura could not see it pressed against her mom.
"Shh, shh, it's alright, there is no scary gate here." Her mom continues to comfort Sakura without even a second look of doubt at the weird statement of Sakura's nightmare being about a big scary gate of all things.
Just then there was three knocks on the front door downstairs.
This interruption caused Sakura to completely forget about her nightmare cutting her tears short.
Her mom takes one last look to see if Sakura is ok before going out of her bedroom and halfway down the stairs to see who it is. Sakura follows her mom in curiosity.
Her dad answered the door which had a shinobi on the other side with a forehead protector as a belt, a flak jacket, and short spiky black hair.
"Ah, shinobi-san… it's quite late…" Her dad says with a questioning tone of voice.
"Haruno-san… it's about your brother…" The shinobi replies seriously but somewhat hesitantly.
At that Sakura's dad goes completely white, stiff as a board, with a look of shock on his face. Sakura's mom holds one hand in front of her mouth in shock while her other hand tightly grips the guard rail to keep herself from falling down the stairs. Sakura just stands quietly next to her mom on the stairs looking between the three adults in confusion.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
The_Tower
The_Tower If you enjoyed this chapter this is my patr eon, nothing is behind a paywall, this is just donations.
https://www.patr eon.com/The_Tower
Delete the space in patr eon
Webnovel won't let that word on their website.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone