[The scene begins in the Land of Grass, inside a small, dimly lit thatched hut.]
[A young girl is crying as she argues with her sick mother.]
[It isn't that the girl is being unreasonable. On the contrary, she's far too mature for her age. She knows her mother is ill and shouldn't be going out to complete those missions.]
["Hey! Hurry up. Don't waste time." A Grass ninja stands at the door, his voice cold and indifferent.]
[The mother can only gently rub the girl's cheek and explain that using her ability to help the Grass ninja is the only way they're allowed to keep living in the village. She has no choice but to go.]
[Still, she promises the girl that she'll be back soon.]
Watching the woman in the image turn and leave, Naruto suddenly felt a tight pain in his chest and spoke without thinking.
"Will she… really come back?"
After all, his own mother had never returned. That dark room of his had never once been visited by someone he could call "Mom."
"..."
Beside him, Karin lowered her head.
[In the image, a crescent moon hangs in the sky. The girl sits there with her head buried in her knees. She has waited all day, but her mother still hasn't returned. Then the same Grass ninja who took her mother away forcibly drags her off.]
["Where is this?" the girl asks.]
["The hospital." The Grass ninja replies, "We were ambushed. There are heavy casualties on our side. There are too many injured in the village now… your mother alone isn't enough."]
[Later, in a room inside the hospital—more precisely, the morgue—the girl sees her mother again.]
[That's when Karin realizes something. The mother who always wrapped herself tightly in thick clothes was covered in bite marks all over her body.]
[The girl vomits violently.]
"What the hell is this, Dattebayo?!" Naruto shouted angrily. There was fury in his voice, but also fear at the woman's tragic death. "Why are Karin and her mom covered in so many wounds?!"
Gaara was just as furious as Naruto. Sand drifted slowly around him, ready to burst through the door at his command and shred the still-living Grass ninja being guarded outside by other chunin.
Sasuke and Sakura already knew the answer.
They had seen with their own eyes how those two Grass ninja treated the red-haired girl. Karin had even let Sakura bite her in order to save her.
Seeing Sasuke and Sakura avert their eyes, clearly unable to tell him, Naruto grew even more confused. In the end, he could only sit back down with a huff and continue watching the image.
Uzumaki Mito, sitting beside him, wasn't as loud or childish as Naruto. But when she saw the scene of Karin's mother's death, the chill in her chakra made Tobirama beside her recall the terrifying years when he and his older brother lived under Mito's authority.
[In the image, inside the hospital of Kusagakure, a medical ninja coldly makes life-and-death decisions.]
["Send chakra over here! Don't bother with that one—he's already useless! Hurry up, hurry up! Stop dragging your feet. Next!"]
This method of abandoning comrades and judging life by value was suffocating.
At least among the Konoha ninja present, this wasn't something they had ever been taught.
[In the image, one injured ninja after another bites into Karin, rapidly recovering by absorbing her chakra.]
Naruto finally understood.
This girl from the same clan as him possessed such a strange ability.
But that very ability had brought disaster upon her and her mother.
A tiny seed of darkness quietly sprouted in Naruto's heart.
Karin's mother had died because of this power.
Then what about him?
Why had Uzumaki Naruto's mother died?!
Among everyone present, only three people noticed that Naruto's bright blue eyes had lost their usual light.
Iruka.
Sasuke.
And Gaara.
For once, Naruto kept the question to himself instead of blurting it out like he normally would.
As he continued watching the images, he grew much quieter, no longer his usual loud and energetic self.
"That's so cruel…" Sakura murmured, referring to the war missions in the Land of Grass, where countless injured soldiers with severed limbs lay waiting in agony for rescue.
Kakashi told her, "That's what chunin and jonin have to face during wartime."
Then he smiled lightly and tried to comfort her.
"Still, the Land of Fire has had very few war missions in the past decade or so. As genin, you won't run into situations like this."
[In the following scenes, Karin becomes like a walking medical supply pack, carried by Grass ninja across various battlefields.]
[The Grass ninja grab her clothes, dodging danger as they drag her straight into the center of battle.]
[The sight shocks Karin. Dozens of jonin from the Land of Grass lie here barely clinging to life. Some have countless kunai stuck in their bodies, while others lie motionless on the ground, their fate unknown.]
["Go!"]
[More mouths sink into Karin's body.]
[By the time they return, her body is covered in bite marks. No one knows how much pain she endured.]
Looking at the bite marks on Karin's body, Sakura realized the situation was far worse than she had imagined.
Many of the older marks had probably already healed. The countless ones visible now were likely inflicted within the past year—or even the past few months.
"How could they do this…" Sakura's voice trembled as she asked in disbelief. "How could they do something like this?"
"Because that's reality!"
Sasuke, Sakura, Gaara, Iruka, Kakashi, and the others all turned in surprise.
They never expected such an angry yet rational voice to come from Naruto.
Karin noticed something too.
Uzumaki Naruto's chakra had changed.
It felt like a moonlit forest—harboring an unfamiliar chill.
Naruto was furious because of what had happened to her.
Extremely furious.
[Grass ninja of Kusagakure: "In the next Chunin Exams, I plan to have you participate as well."]
[Karin doesn't understand what he means.]
["One of the purposes of the Chunin Exams is to judge the strength of each ninja village based on the abilities of their genin," the Grass ninja explains. "You could also think of it as a competition for military resources, supplies, and reputation between villages!"]
["Your job will be to heal the other two." The Grass ninja gives her a contemptuous look. "The village feeds outsiders like you and your mother. Especially you. After your mother died, the village still raised you. If you know how to repay kindness, then bring back good results! You outsider!"]
[In the image, Karin appears brainwashed, becoming even more insecure and powerless.]
Outside the image, Naruto—who had been sitting cross-legged—suddenly shot to his feet and kicked over a decorative flower pot beside him.
"Where are those Grass ninja?! I'm gonna beat them up!! I'll keep hitting them until I knock some sense into them!!"