The sky over Amegakure was still mourning.
For as long as the village had existed, the rain had never stopped—not truly. It wasn't just weather. It was a constant lament, a sorrowful symphony that masked the weeping of the wounded and the silent cries of the lost. But today, even the ever-present storm felt heavier. Colder. As if the village itself remembered what had been burned away.
Nagato stood at the apex of a rusted tower, the Rinnegan in his sunken eyes scanning the gray horizon. The sound of thunder rumbled in the distance, yet his ears were attuned not to the sky, but to the far-off voices of his people—what was left of them. Ashes floated through the air, drifting like black snowflakes in the wind. Smoke rose in curling tendrils from the remains of battle.
Amegakure had endured another assault. And it had barely survived.
The Hidden Rain had become both fortress and prison. Once a hidden jewel of the Elemental Nations, it had been reduced over the years to a militarized wasteland—its skyline punctuated by metal spires, satellite dishes, weaponry, and endless canals. The wars had eaten at its heart, and now it breathed only through the will of Pain.
Nagato's will.
---
It hadn't always been this way.
Nagato remembered when the buildings were still homes, not watchtowers. When the people who roamed the streets were dreamers, not refugees. When Yahiko had walked beside him, laughing about peace like it was something they could reach just by wanting it hard enough.
But the dream had withered long ago. Burned away with everything else.
Now there were only ashes.
---
The most recent assault had come from a faction loyal to Hanzo's surviving followers—those who believed Nagato's vision was not peace, but tyranny.
Konan had sensed the attack before it began. Her paper butterflies had returned to the tower in droves, their wings shimmering with chakra as they disintegrated midair, a signal of enemy movement. As always, Konan had remained calm, her eyes never betraying the storm that she too carried inside.
"They approach from the north," she had reported, kneeling before Nagato in his sanctum. Her blue origami cloak fluttered gently around her. "Heavily armed. Twenty shinobi. Elite."
"Let them come," Nagato had replied, his voice low but absolute. "Their hatred will be answered."
And so it was.
The Six Paths of Pain descended upon them like retribution from the heavens. Deva Path—once Yahiko's body—led the charge, manipulating gravity with godlike precision. Shinra Tensei repelled enemy attacks with devastating force, flattening entire city blocks in a single pulse.
Asura Path tore through armored reinforcements, its mechanized arms splitting into missile batteries that painted the skies with fire. The Human Path ripped the memories from a captured enemy's mind to extract intel. No mercy. No hesitation. The assault had lasted only minutes, but the devastation remained.
Now, the streets of Amegakure were quiet again—but it was not peace. It was absence.
---
Nagato remained silent as he watched the embers glow below. With each battle, he felt further from the boy he once was—further from the image of the kind, hopeful child who cried when he killed the Iwagakure ninja to save his dog, Chibi.
Back then, his tears had meant something.
Now, there were none left to cry.
His body—emaciated, frail—sat suspended in a mechanical life-support chair at the heart of a spire, linked by dozens of chakra receivers. The price of power was steep. The Rinnegan gave him control over life and death, but it consumed his vitality daily. The Six Paths were his hands, his eyes, his wrath. But he remained here—withered, haunted, immobile—while they walked the world in his name.
But today's massacre had sparked a flicker of discomfort in him.
Not guilt—he had learned to kill that feeling long ago—but unease. A fear that his message was no longer being heard. That the pain he inflicted was not teaching. Just destroying.
He turned to Konan, who stood in silence at his side.
"They keep coming," he said.
"They always will," she replied. "Hatred breeds more hatred."
"Then perhaps I am failing."
She met his eyes. "No. You are not failing. You are changing them. Slowly."
Nagato wasn't so sure. The people they'd saved—what few remained—looked to him with awe… but not love. They bowed in fear. Whispers of his name carried in the alleys like rumors of a god who punished sinners with storms and fire.
He did not want to be worshipped.
He wanted to be understood.
---
Nagato's thoughts were broken by the approach of Pain's Deva Path. Yahiko's corpse, now animated with Nagato's chakra, walked toward them without expression. Its piercings glinted in the fading light.
"Mission complete," the Deva Path intoned. "No survivors."
Nagato looked at the face that had once smiled beside him in their youth. The face that had declared peace in front of an army, unshaken even when Hanzo betrayed them.
He had turned Yahiko into a weapon. A symbol.
And sometimes, he feared that symbol had replaced the man.
---
That night, Nagato closed his eyes and reached deep into his own memory—a place he rarely visited. He saw Yahiko standing in the rain, arms raised, shouting to a group of starving villagers.
"We don't have to fight each other! We can fight the ones who want us to hate each other! We are all victims of war!"
The villagers had hesitated—but listened.
That had been the Akatsuki's original power. Not jutsu. Not fear. But hope.
When had they lost it?
Was it the day Yahiko died?
Or the day Nagato stopped believing that hope alone was enough?
---
He woke from the memory with a sudden jolt—chakra flaring faintly around him.
Something was wrong.
Konan noticed it first. "Nagato?"
He frowned. "The Preta Path has been destroyed."
Konan's breath caught.
"Impossible. No one even knew the Paths were deployed."
Nagato's Rinnegan pulsed with sudden focus. Through his remaining Paths, he scanned the area of the most recent battlefield. The rubble still smoked, but a new presence had emerged from the west. Faint… but familiar.
A chakra signature pulsed through the ashes.
Red chakra. Wild. Primal. Swirling like a beast caged too long.
It couldn't be…
"Uzumaki," Nagato whispered.
---
Far across the battlefield, a lone figure stood atop the remains of a broken wall. Blond hair whipped in the wind. His orange jacket was scorched from fire, but his blue eyes burned brighter than ever.
Naruto.
He had arrived in Amegakure.
And he had destroyed one of Pain's bodies.
Nagato watched through the Animal Path's eyes, stunned.
How had he found them?
What drove him to walk into the belly of the storm alone?
But more than that—why did Nagato feel… fear?
He gritted his teeth. "So… he's come."
Konan turned, her voice low. "What will you do?"
Nagato stared at the boy on the battlefield, the descendant of the same clan that gave him life—the same boy Jiraiya once called 'the child of prophecy.'
"I will test his conviction," Nagato said, his voice a whisper beneath the thunder. "If he seeks peace, let him walk through pain to prove it."
He closed his eyes, focusing all his chakra. The Five remaining Paths moved in unison, descending through the smoke, surrounding the boy in a ring of judgment.
Naruto didn't flinch.
---
And above them all, from the broken spire of Amegakure, Nagato stared into the storm—his eyes glowing, his soul alight with questions.
What had he become?
A god?
A villain?
A lesson?
The answers were buried beneath the ashes of the rain.
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