It took all of Sakura's courage to cross the pavement in front of her dorm. Everyone was staring at Uchiha-senpai, but the problem was that Uchiha-senpai was looking at her.

Which meant everyone started staring at her, too.

That got her moving like nothing else would. "Should we go?" She smiled brightly at him with more courage than she felt.

Sasuke nodded, gesturing to the back of his bicycle. The handle was already up, and since Sakura was wearing a pair of jeans this time around, she hopped on without any hesitation.

"What happened to your car?" She asked.

"Left it at my brother's. We're not going that far."

Sitting back, Sakura tried to enjoy the ride while ignoring the stares. I'm going to have to get used to this. It didn't take her very long to realize that the stares were diminishing though, since they were leaving the campus.

"Where are we going?" Sakura frowned. We can't be going to his brother's right? I've never been to a guy's house before. Isn't this too early? Am I ready? What kind of underwear did I put on today? Oh no, did I forget to change my underwear after the hospital? Shannaro!

"Sakura?" Sasuke's voice broke into her thoughts. They had stopped at an intersection, and he'd turn around to watch her carefully, a small frown of concern on his face.

"Hm?"

"We're going to my office. Is that okay?"

His office! Brain out of the gutter, Haruno. "Huh? Yeah. Your coworkers won't mind?"

"We just finished renovating, and the rest of the company hasn't moved in yet." Sasuke explained, "We have a kitchen and wifi for you, and I need to get some work done."

"That works then."

When they arrived at the office, however, Sakura couldn't help chuckling. "I'm not sure how much work you're going to get done here." They were standing outside the internet cafe, the one she had used so many months ago to participate in the war against The Forest of Death clan. That feels like a lifetime ago.

Sasuke glanced at her, then casually poked her forehead. "We're upstairs." He led her around to the back of the building.

Flustered at the casual contact, Sakura covered her forehead with her hands in a delayed reflex, but she nonetheless followed him obediently. There was a nondescript door there, facing the small parking lot in the back. The first floor was just a small lobby, but when they came out of the elevator, Sakura's eyes widened.

The open plan office looked enormous, clean and spacious with clusters of tables just waiting for their occupants. A small kitchenette counter lined one wall, a platform elevated a meeting table a foot higher than the rest of the office, and a couple of doors with large windows gave her a glimpse into a couple of spacious offices. The space was nice, and it terrified her with all its pristine efficiency; she was afraid someone would arrest her if she marred it.

"Follow me," Sasuke tilted his head towards one of the offices that he opened with his own key. "Make yourself comfortable."

Uneasily, Sakura sank onto the couch and hesitantly pulled out her laptop. His office was spare, almost spartan, but for a few large calligraphy scrolls he had framed on his wall. She'd known his family background, but she hadn't really appreciated it until this moment, sitting in his office. Everything felt expensive, from the calligraphy to the plush carpet under her feet. She'd tutored Sasori long enough to hear the wealth whispering all around her. To Uchiha-senpai, this was probably just stuff lying around that no one else was using.

She was so engrossed in examining all the details of the office that she hadn't noticed Uchiha-senpai slip out. When he came back and handed her water in a mug, she almost dropped it in surprise.

"Everything okay?" Sasuke asked as he held her hands to steady the mug.

"Yeah, I'm just- I'm okay. Sorry," Sakura sighed. Her hands felt hot from where his fingertips slightly brushed hers. To distract herself and to keep her from making any more stupid gaffes, she quickly took a sip more to break eye contact than out of thirst.

Looking down, though, her eyes widened when she saw the figure screen printed onto the mug. There, just as he had looked the day she had met him and married him in game, was Meister - or at least, his in game avatar. Delighted, she asked, "Where did you get this?"

"Extracted the model myself and ordered it from a place that does print on demand."

"It's so cool!" Her eyes sparkling, she looked up at him and asked, "can I keep it?"

"Hn," he responded - somehow, she knew that was an affirmative - but then added, "so long as I can keep this one."

As Sasuke casually took a long sip out of his mug, Sakura realized that he'd not only printed his own figure, he'd printed hers as well, and now he was drinking out of it. Somehow that idea made her blush.

"Give me that!" In her embarrassment, Sakura put down the cup she was using and grabbed for his, but she was a step too slow, because Sasuke simply lifted it out of her reach above her head. She tried to go up on her tiptoes to snatch it from him, even jumping a little, but he still managed to keep it out of her grasp, simply by stretching a bit. So focused was she on the mug, she didn't notice how precarious her position was until she lost her footing and accidentally stumbled into Uchiha-senpai, who quickly steadied her.

"I really need to stop doing this," Sakura muttered, flushing bright red at their proximity. They were so close, she could feel his breath on her ear.

"I don't mind," Uchiha-senpai's magnetic voice was so low, she almost thought she was hallucinating. Uchiha-senpai is a major flirt! Who knew? Shannaro! This man is too dangerous.

Flustered, Sakura quickly disengaged, but she also gave up any hope of stealing her cup. She was just going to have to settle for his. Lifting the cup again, she examined his figure carefully, running a finger over the raised screen-printed face. "But really, how did you get this image? It doesn't look like a screenshot."

"Data mining. When we started putting together a demo for the sequel, we needed models to work with since the artists hadn't had a chance to do anything yet. So we grabbed our own character models to work with for now."

"Wait wait wait - Demo for the sequel? Way of the Ninja's getting a sequel and your studio is going to work on it?" Sakura goggled at him

"We're putting together a demo. They're in the RFP stage now."

"RFP?"

"Request for proposal. We're not going to be the only one's bidding for it."

"Wow," Sakura marveled, "You're a new game studio and you're already competing for the sequel to one of the biggest MMOs in the last decade. That's insane. Do you think you have a shot?"

Uchiha-senpai gave her a look, "Of course."

For some reason, that look made her snort with laughter. He was so deadpan yet cocksure, that it suddenly made her think of Meister.

Then she remembered that Uchiha-senpai was Meister.

"Part of the reason I came into the office today was to check the new models that the artists have sent over. Do you want to see?" He offered as he moved to unlock a drawer and pull out a laptop.

"Of course!" Sakura's eyes lit up and she bounced over without any hesitation. Leaning on his chair, she watched eagerly as he downloaded a file, plugged in an encryption key, and opened up a 3d modelling software and slowly started paging through the models.

"Are these the default uniforms?" Sakura asked, studying the female model dressed in a sensible pair of trousers and sleeveless top.

"Yes, but we'll add customization options fairly quickly. Look," Sasuke flicked through a few more options. The female figure's outfit changed to a traditional robe, a long sleeve top and skirt, a dress, and various coats.

It took Sakura a minute, but when she realized what had felt unexpected, she smiled and remarked, "None of these are super skimpy or revealing."

"Yes, the artist did a good job at following the brief. We'll have to make him a full-time offer." Sasuke observed.

"I remember feeling kind of awkward when I first started playing Way because the new player female character always had such a short miniskirt. It takes a stupidly long time before you can buy your first pair of pants,"" Sakura reminisced. "You can tell it's the kind of game built assuming most of its players will be male."

"And yet women make up 46% of the potential market." Uchiha-senpai said. "There's a lot of money left on the table."

Sakura snorted, "Because women don't exist on the internet." Seeing Uchiha-senpai's questioning look, she explained, "Someone told me that when I started playing Way. They followed me around and quizzed me on stupid girly things until they found something I didn't know, then they accused me of faking being a girl for equipment. It was dumb."

"Sorry that happened to you."

Sakura shrugged, "It could be worse. A senior at orientation told me that I would have an easy time finding a job because I could be the diversity hire, since I was a woman. I also had a classmate tell me that I must've only gotten the scholarship because the school felt sorry for me, since I didn't know the difference between a front-end, backend, and full-stack developer."

"I'm not sure the industry knows either," Uchiha-senpai said.

Sakura smiled at that. Having spent a semester looking for an internship and reading job postings, she had to agree with his assessment.

"Which student told you that?"

"He dropped out at the end of first year. Couldn't meet progression requirements. Guess who got another scholarship instead?" Sakura grinned impishly. Uchiha-senpai's lips quirked up slightly in response.

Flushed at the effusive praise (from him), Sakura quickly looked for another conversation. "So how are you planning on making money while you're developing Way 2?"

"New Way of the Ninja," Sasuke corrected her, "we launched a mobile game half a year ago, and it's been doing very well. Ramen Delivery Dash?"

"I've seen ads for it! My neighbour was addicted to it."

"We spent the past couple of months looking for a partner to work with to officially launch it. We've done very well in the beta phase. Ideally the partner has lots of intellectual property that shares a similar target audience."

"Oh I see," Sakura nodded, "you can expand your user base, reuse events with different IP's, and keep your user satisfied while you slow down development of the base game. Interesting."

"Hn," Uchiha-senpai glanced at her.

"Does that make enough money to finance new development though?" Sakura side-eyed him, "it's not one of those loot-box games that get people addicted and then bankrupt them, is it?"

Uchiha-senpai flicked her forehead. "Of course not. Ramen Delivery Dash makes enough money that we can hire a maintenance team and rent these premises. As part of the transaction, we were looking for an investment from a larger company so we could finance New Way. We only wanted to give up a minority share though. 20% would've been ideal. However, one of the much larger companies insisted on trying to buy us out in an acquihire, and they scared off anyone who was originally interested in the smaller share, leaving them as the only option."

Sakura hissed, "that's playing dirty."

Uchiha-senpai shrugged, "It's business."

"So did you give in? I hope you didn't."

"No. In the end, the Uchiha Corporation gave us an angel loan."

"What does that mean?"

"It means we can fund the demo of New Way, but if we aren't successful and don't win the contract to actually develop it or any future contracts pretty soon after, we owe Uchiha Corp a lot of money. Worst case scenario, I may lose my collateral."

"Your collateral?"

"Hn. My trust fund."

Sakura gasped. Her parents baked bread for a living, and scrimped to save for her tuition. She struggled to get scholarships to cover her own living expenses for the semester. She couldn't fathom the amount of money it would cost to employ the number of people who would be needed to develop a demo in a few short months, nor could she really fathom having a trust fund. "Isn't that risky?"

Uchiha-senpai shrugged, "Some risks are worth taking."

Some risks are worth taking. Those words stayed with her as she let Uchiha-senpai get back to work and she finally started studying. Before she did, though, she sent Hinata a message to let her know where she was. Then she hesitated, and added that the three of them should not expect her for dinner. Some risks are worth taking.

As she worked through her notes for her History of Encryption class to put together a cheat sheet, she couldn't help looking over at Uchiha-senpai when she reached the section on the application of the RSA Algorithm, remembering how she'd had to go back later to make up her notes since she'd been so flustered by him that class.

Uchiha-senpai must've felt her staring because he looked up at the same time and met her eyes. Even if his lips didn't move, the corner of his eyes crinkled into a small smile. He made the butterflies in her stomach go crazy even with the smallest gesture. She blushed, smiled back, and desperately fought the urge not to hide under her papers.

In the dead silence of the office that followed, with only the fans for ambient noise, she heard Meister in his quiet chuckle. Slowly, imperceptibly, and very, very hesitantly, she started to relax.

┐(￣∀￣)┌

After a long and companionable silence and just as she was taking a break, Sakura remembered a very important issue she had to resolve by the next day. "By the way, Uchiha-senpai-"

"You can call me by my first name."

"Eh?"

"I call you Sakura. You should call me Sasuke."

"Then... Sasuke...senpai," His name felt painfully intimate on her tongue, so she couldn't resist the honorific. "What's up with the video? You said it was complicated?"

"Aa," Sasuke-senpai took a break from his computer to give her his full attention again. I wish it wasn't so intimidating when he did that, because this man is seriously sexy. "We're partnering with BLOOM Corp for Ramen Delivery Dash, and they're the ones that will be judging the bid for New Way. If they knew I was involved in this movie, they'd want the rights to the movie as a stretch ask in our negotiations. I'm actually flying out to Iwakagure tomorrow to sign the final agreement and formally enter us as a contender for the New Way Bid. That's why I wanted to see you today."

Sakura blushed at his straightforwardness. I'm going to have to get used to this feeling around him. His flirtatious words delivered in that deadpan manner always caught her off guard. "So what should we do?"

"You should just accept the contract and sell the rights. If it's just in your name, there won't be any hard feelings afterwards."

"But that's not fair to Old Man and the others, is it?" Sakura asked hesitantly.

"They won't care," Sasuke-senpai glanced at her, "Take it as a meeting gift."

"It's too much as a meeting gift," Sakura protested

Sasuke-senpai replied without missing a beat, "What about a wedding present, then?"

Sakura blushed, remembering the dowry joke she'd made to Meister the day they got married. It was enough to make her go back to her keyboard, typing away to make herself seem busy.

Sakura still wasn't sure how to deal with the whole situation. On one hand, $2000 was a lot of money. On the other, it didn't feel right to keep it to herself. Instead, she gritted her teeth and made a decision. She'd extort legendary pets from the devs, ones that would increase the value of her account should she decide to sell it in the future. Legendary pets were a cash shop item for high rollers only, and depending on the exchange rate between currency and in-game currency, could go for over $300 a piece. She could extort seven pets, one for each of them, and it would have the same value to her but cost the company nothing but a few lines of code. It was a win-win, really.

Besides, Sakura thought darkly to herself, This way Sasuke-senpai can't treat it like a bride price either.

(*￣▽￣)b

The sun was setting when she took another break, having just finished the cheat sheet. Looking at the sky outside, it seemed like a good time to wrap things up and head home, but she was reluctant. Sasuke-senpai noticed her movements and raised an eyebrow at her, as if asking her what she wanted to do next.

"I think I'm gonna grab some dinner now," Sakura said, intending to lead into saying goodbye for the day.

Instead, Sasuke-senpai reached for his phone and asked, "Why don't we order in? My treat."

"You don't have to do that," Sakura protested, "You got lunch yesterday and breakfast today. This time should be my treat."

"Hn," Sasuke-senpai agreed easily. Too easily. Sakura narrowed her eyes. She just realised that In saying that, she'd agreed to have dinner with him instead of leaving like she meant to. Shannaro! Sneaky... But I kinda like it.

This time, they actually ordered ramen from Ichiraku, instead of fish head soup or anything else odd and off the menu. True to her word, Sakura e-transferred the cost to Sasuke-senpai on the spot. In the process, she also got his real email address, not just the one through Way. He really doesn't have any defenses against me, does he?

As they waited for the food to arrive, the two of them sat in taut silence. It wasn't because she was uncomfortable with him, per se, but the silence made her feel itchy, like a kitten was scratching at her heart. She opened her mouth and blurted the first thing that came to her mind, something that she had been curious about for a while.

"That day on the bridge..." Sakura started hesitantly, "How did you know it was me?"

"Because of this place." Sasuke-senpai tapped on the table. When Sasuke-senpai realized that she was still looking at him in confusion, he elaborated, "this Internet café belongs to one of my brother's seniors from his PhD program. That senior also happened to study under Naruto's father. After he left academia, he created his own startup and was quite successful for a while, even selling some software to ROOT Corp. Then one day, he decided that instead of developing something else, he would open his own Internet café downstairs and lease his old offices up here to new startups. However, he never actually ended up leasing these offices to anyone."

"He sounds like quite the character."

Sasuke-senpai snorted, "he just wanted more time to read his novels. It's not like he needs to work anymore."

"So how does that lead to you recognizing me?"

"Naruto knew we were looking for space since we were graduating, and he'd heard about this place from Kakashi before, so he decided at the beginning of the year that we were going to be Kakashi's first renters. He spent all of the first semester doing all kinds of bullshit challenges and tasks to convince Kakashi to rent to us, but Kakashi never agreed."

"How did you get him to agree then?"

"I asked my brother for blackmail material. We were signing the agreement in under a week for a very reasonable price."

Sakura cracked up. The poor owner probably got fleeced.

"The day we were here signing the contract, I happened to see you fighting that clan war. I was impressed by your speed. You have a very good