Naruto Shares New Details About Sakura’s Apprentice Years

Naruto has been exploring a part of its universe that never made its way to the anime adaptation proper, with a new spin-off manga seeing Sasuke and Sakura team up in the time that took place after Naruto: Shippuden but before Boruto: Naruto Next Generations. While Sakura has learned a lot while studying under the former Hokage, Tsunade, during her ninja career, the latest chapter of the manga spin-off focusing on both her and Sasuke revealed some other “tricks of the trade” she’s added to her repertoire.

The original trio of Jiraiya, Tsunade, and Orochimaru would become the respective teachers, in a sense, to Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke, with each of the young ninjas learning quite a bit from their senses. While Naruto learned the Rasengan from Jiraiya and Sasuke learned more than a bit of “dark ninjutsu” from Orochimaru, Sakura learned more about healing techniques from the previous Hokage of the Hidden Leaf, with the latest manga chapter revealing that she gleaned some other beneficial tricks. In the recent installment, Sakura is faced with a conundrum where she must gamble for what she needs and shows Sasuke how Tsunade’s gambling addiction came into play here.

Sakura The Gambler

In attempting to achieve their mission, Sakura is presented with a game of Star Lines, which the Team 7 member is able to claim victory, detailing later on in the chapter just how she was able to win:

“Those cards were all worn down, so they must have been pretty old. Each card has its own unique nicks and scratches, so I memorized the back of each one while pretending to check out the fronts. It’s a trick I learned while training with Lady Tsunade. You know how she’s such a sore loser, right? Early on, I tended to humor her and let her win, but then she’d get a big head about it! She never wanted to back out when she was on a roll. I realized if all we did was tie, she’d just get bored.”

Of course, the biggest news of this chapter is that readers are able to see Sasuke give Sakura a ring that bonds them together. While this spin-off has yet to receive an anime adaptation, previous spin-offs have made their way to the official Boruto anime adaptation, so it might just be a matter of time.