Nonō Yakushi

A white coif frames Nonō's face and hides most of her light brown hair, which falls to her shoulders. Her eyes are a bright green, and she favors a loose black gown worn beneath a white apron, with plain sandals on her feet. Round spectacles once sat on her nose until she handed them to Kabuto, after which she switched to a squared pair he gave her in return. When she slips into Iwagakure under cover, she trades the nun's habit for that village's flak jacket and headband.

Warmth and composure define Nonō. She pleads for Kabuto to stay at the orphanage even when funds run short, and she parts with her own glasses without a second thought to help the boy see. Danzō observes that her inability to bury her feelings is exactly what makes her a poor match for Root, the very trait that later leaves her open to being manipulated.

Before the orphanage, Nonō serves in Root, Konoha's covert Anbu branch, where she earns a reputation as one of its finest intelligence gatherers. She walks away from that world to care for orphaned children instead. One day she finds a wounded boy near an abandoned village, heals him, and brings him home; because he remembers nothing, the staff name him Kabuto after the helmet he arrived in. Nonō raises him as her own and passes on her mastery of medical ninjutsu, skills that become the foundation of his fighting style.

Three years later, Danzō pressures her back into service, ordering her to infiltrate Iwagakure, and she relents only when Root threatens the orphanage. Kabuto secretly volunteers to accompany the spies. What Nonō never learns is that Danzō has marked the now-accomplished young spy for death and engineered her as his executioner. Over years he brainwashes her with staged photographs and a substituted double, so that when she finally attacks Kabuto in Iwagakure she no longer knows his face. Her own chakra scalpel leaves her mortally wounded, and the horrified Kabuto flees when she fails to recognize him. Kitsuchi, aided by a fellow Iwa shinobi, discovers her afterward.