Anime Girls are Moist

Chapter 1117 1,116: The Fairness of Trade, Everything is Voluntary

Pink hair, cut short. And on her forehead, that unmistakably familiar diamond-shaped mark—

the Strength of a Hundred Seal.

Tsunade stood at the doorway, her brows instantly knitting tight.

The girl had her back to her. Her frame was slender, yet there was an unnatural, prematurely "mature" air to her—her shoulders trembling slightly.

A strange smell hung in the air.

And along with it, a sticky, deeply uncomfortable sound.

Tsunade's expression darkened at once.

What the hell is this?

Just then—

The pink-haired girl seemed to sense something. She turned her head slowly, dazedly, as if she couldn't quite process what was happening.

Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes glassy with moisture—she looked completely not fully awake.

Then—

Her gaze slammed straight into Tsunade's eyes.

"…"

Time seemed to freeze.

The girl's foggy, emotion-soaked expression looked like it was violently erased with an eraser.

Gone—in a flash.

Replaced by a level of sheer terror like she'd seen a ghost.

Her eyes flew wide. Her pupils shrank to pinpoints. Every trace of color drained from her face until she was pale as paper.

Her mouth fell open, and a warped, broken scream squeezed out of her throat.

"T-Tsunade-sama?!!"

Her voice cracked, nothing but trembling panic—mixed with the humiliation of someone stripped bare and thrown into the street.

Tsunade didn't answer. Her frown only deepened.

Who is this girl?

She knows me?

There were too many ninja in Konoha—Tsunade couldn't place that face.

But the girl recognized her, and that reaction… was far too wrong.

And even more wrong was this messy, messed-up scene in front of her.

The anger in Tsunade's gut flared with a sharp whoosh, laced with a cold sense of being played.

She didn't even spare the girl—who looked like she might faint from fear—another glance. Her knife-sharp stare pinned itself on the other person in the room.

Rei Ao.

"Rei Ao."

Tsunade spoke, voice pressed low, every word wrapped in ice.

"You'd better explain this clearly. What is this supposed to mean?"

Only then did Rei Ao turn his head, unhurried.

Meeting Tsunade's almost flaming glare, even the faint smile on his face didn't change—steady enough to make her even angrier.

"Scared her, did you?"

His tone was as casual as discussing dinner. With one arm, he casually pulled the stiff-as-stone pink-haired girl a little closer against him.

"Relax. Let me introduce her—Haruno Sakura."

He patted the girl's shoulder, and the body under his hand jolted with a violent shudder.

"One of my trading partners. Same as you—she traded herself to me."

One of his trading partners?

Those words were like poison-tipped needles stabbing straight into Sakura's ears.

Her whole body jerked, and everything from yesterday came crashing back into her mind, uncontrolled.

Sasuke's retreating back—decisive, ice-cold, not even looking back once.

Her crying. Her begging.

All of it shattered into the wind.

It felt like the world collapsed.

And then that eerie chat interface had popped up, floating in front of her eyes, glowing with a dim, ghostly light—

like a final straw.

She'd practically lunged at it and grabbed on, her mind reduced to one frantic, insane thought:

Make him stay. Make Sasuke stay in the village!

What would it cost?

She hadn't thought it through at all. Or rather—she didn't care anymore.

Not until the trade was complete.

Not until this man named Rei Ao appeared before her and looked at her like an item being appraised.

Not until now.

And everything that happened in that stretch of "stillness" where her sense of time completely broke… over and over, again and again—too many times to count. She didn't even dare to count.

It was like her soul had been branded, clearly and unmistakably:

You no longer belong to yourself.

At first, that realization had made her so desperate she wanted to die.

But later… later it got strange.

Her body seemed to accept reality faster than her mind, even disobeying what little will she had left in certain moments.

And it wasn't just her.

Hinata. Ino…

They were in other rooms—probably going through something similar.

Those chaotic thoughts spun wildly in her head—

until Tsunade appeared, and everything shattered into dust.

All that remained was shame, crashing down like a tidal wave.

Why did it have to be Lady Tsunade?

The person she respected most. The person she wanted to become.

And now Tsunade had to see her like this… like this humiliating, unbearable mess.

Sakura bowed her head hard, nails biting into her palm, wishing she could shrink into a single point and vanish from the world.

It was too humiliating.

So humiliating her whole body went numb, her fingertips turned icy, and she forgot how to breathe.

What would Lady Tsunade think of her?

She'd think she was shameless—dirty trash…

It was over.

All of it was over.

Meanwhile, the moment Tsunade heard the words "one of my trading partners," her pupils tightened slightly.

Her gaze swept over Sakura's paper-white face again—her tearful, on-the-verge-of-breaking expression, the way she looked like she wanted to die on the spot, and the awful situation playing out in front of them.

That vicious heat in Tsunade's chest shot straight up to the top of her skull.

A trade?

This is how he conducts trades?

She looked back at Rei Ao—at those eyes that usually carried a lazy warmth and a faint smile.

Now, to Tsunade, they looked bottomless.

Cold.

Inhuman—filled with the chill of rules that didn't care who got crushed.

And Tsunade suddenly realized something.

That contract she'd agreed to last night—that "trade" she'd stepped into—

might be far, far more than a simple "equal exchange."

This was a whirlpool.

A dark whirlpool that ground up a person's dignity, sanity, past, and future—and swallowed it all.

And Haruno Sakura, trembling on the edge of collapse, was probably nothing more than a tiny splash of foam in its waves.

"'One of' your trading partners?"

Tsunade's voice was cold enough to shed ice. She stepped forward, and the sheer pressure of her presence made the air in the room grow heavier.

"How many people have you made this kind of 'trade' with?"

Rei Ao smiled, not answering directly.

"Does it matter?"

he asked instead, idly twirling a sweat-damp strand of Sakura's pink hair around his finger.

"The contract is valid. The price has been paid. Fair and reasonable."

"Fair?"

Tsunade practically forced the word out through clenched teeth.

"You call this fair?"

"This?"

Rei Ao finally lifted his gaze. The calm in his eyes was frightening.

"Tsunade, the contract terms were written clearly."

"She chose it herself—fully aware, completely lucid—voluntarily offering everything as the price, in exchange for the outcome she wanted."

"I didn't force her. I didn't deceive her."

"That is the most absolute kind of fairness."