The two month period passed. Zemaria was allowed to lead Naruto, Sakura, and Sai once more. Jiraiya insisted on tracking down the leader of the Akatsuki and defeating him. He headed in the direction of the Rain Village. It had been rumored that the leader of the Akatsuki was living in the Rain Village. Jiraiya arrived at the Rain Village.

He hid himself inside of a toad and gained entry without being noticed at all. He stealthily moved about the Village and ended up in a pub. Sitting down at the bar, he observed the people there.

"Hi there, I'm looking to find information about the leader of this Village. You wouldn't be able to help me out would you?" He asked the bar keep.

"Not much is said about our leader. You're not from around here I see," he responded.

"You're eye is keen. I'm not from here. Last I remembered, the Salamander was the leader of this Village. Is that not the case anymore?" He asked him.

The bar keep started getting suspicious, "No one has spoken of him in years. It's best that you leave here."

Jiraiya nodded, "All right then. I'll take my leave." He stood up and walked out.

Two rain Ninja followed him out. He caught them with ease and trapped them inside of the toad he hid in originally. He had them restrained to the walls of the toad.

"Now, tell me what you know about the leader of this Village," Jiraiya politely started.

"Why would we tell you anything?" The first one asked.

"Well for one, the longer you stay inside of this toad, the more likely it is that you will turn into a toad," he said.

He interrogated them for a while until the one Ninja did exactly what Jiraiya said would happen; he turned into a toad. The other ninja stared at his companion in shock as he stared up at him as a toad. Jiraiya had warned them and they refused to talk; now one was a toad.

"Okay! Okay... I'll talk. His name is unknown but it's said that he lives in the tower closest to where the dead are cremated. That's all I know though," he said, "Please don't let me turn into a toad!"

"Alright then. That'll do," he told him. He left the toad returning to his normal size and sent it off with a message for Tsunade back at the Village.

Jiraiya stealthily makes his way through the Village. Little did he know, Pein was already aware of his presence. He sent Konan out to track him down and take care of him. He also sent the four other Peins with her. Konan had them hang back in the shadows and approached Jiraiya on her own first.

She used her paper jutsu to attack him. He dodged and was shocked to see her there. The last he knew, all three of his former students; Konan, Yahiko, and Nagato were all killed years ago. He had no choice but to fight back. It pained him to have to fight his former student.

"Konan? How are you alive and standing before me? Last I was told, you three had all been killed!" Jiraiya managed to ask her.

"Jiraiya-Sensei, it's been quite a long time hasn't it?" She asked.

She attacked again and Jiraiya barely dodged it, "You didn't answer my question! Is Yahiko and Nagato- are they still alive too?"

After another line of attacks, she answered, "Yahiko is dead."

They had a conversing type of battle; fighting along with talking involved. He pointed out how she had become a beautiful woman like he told her she would when she was a kid. She never clarified if Nagato was still alive however. As they attacked each other, Jiraiya came up with a plan. He used an oil type of jutsu which put her jutsu out of commission.

The four Peins appeared. The one leading them told Konan to leave the rest to him. She was in no condition to continue fighting him. She nodded and disappeared. This Pein had really long red orange hair tied back in a ponytail. He wasn't the same one Zemaria dealt with on her mission. However, he and the others all had the same feature in common; rod piercings in various places on their bodies.

The four Peins readied for battle. Jiraiya calmly assessed his opponents. The first thing he noticed was their eyes; they all had the Rinnegan Kekke Genkai. It couldn't be though. Only Nagato; as far as Jiraiya was aware, had that Kekke Genkai. Each one possessed a different technique specifically for the Rinnegan.

Jiraiya summoned one of his toads to help buy him some time. He was going to go into Sage mode but he couldn't do it himself. He needed the help of the elder toads; Ma and Pa. However, summoning those two would take time and for that, he needed to keep his hands joined together. The toad he summoned was to help keep him from separating his hands.

Jiraiya brought out attack after attack but nothing seemed to do too much damage to any of them. In fact, it was as if they all knew what who he was going to attack and how to avoid getting hit. Once he was close to being able to summon the elder toads, he used substitution in order to summon them a safe distance away from the Peins. Ma and Pa appeared on either of Jiraiya's shoulders.

"Jiraiya boy, it's been a long time since you've summoned us," Pa said.

"What's this all about?" Ma asked curiously.

Jiraiya explained as quickly as he could, "I need to go into Sage mode. My opponent possesses the Rinnegan. To make things worse, there's four of them. Somehow or another, they all know when and how I'm going to attack."

He explained in more detail as they tried to maneuver to a more open area to fight the four of them. When they finally found a good area, all four caught up. The battle was long and fierce. Jiraiya was taking a pretty good beating. For a while it seemed like the four Peins had the upper hand.

Then, he got another idea. He decided to separate all four and take each one on, one at a time. He'd figured out that their eyes were all connected and they were able to cover each others blind spots. That was how they knew how to counter his attacks to well. He told Ma and Pa they had to use their genjutsu song.

Ma was embarrassed. She hadn't sang their song in so long. They were old toads now and she worried it would take too long to synchronize with Pa. Jiraiya ran as fast as he could through the old tunneling system. It was formerly used when Orochimaru was part of the Akatsuki. Ma and Pa warmed up their voices.

It didn't take too long for one of the Peins to find them. They were just about ready. Jiraiya had initially thrown them of the trail but using clones of himself in different directions to confuse them. Before long, Ma and Pa used their genjutsu.

Each Pein was caught in it. They ended up in the same place. Jiraiya used one of his summonings in order to take them all down at once. Each was impaled with a giant staff from four different toads. That was it; they were all dead. Jiraiya was out of breath. Being in full Sage mode took a lot out of him.

Jiraiya was about to leave when there was an explosion. It caused him to fly straight out through the whole it made, taking his left arm with him. He had blood pouring out from the shoulder area. When he landed, he was standing on a large body of water panting and barely able to focus his vision. The four Peins appeared before him along with two additional ones.

One of them was formerly Yahiko; the one Zemaria knew about. This confused Jiraiya further. Konan had told him Yahiko was dead; and what was worse, he had the same Rinnegan as the other four and Nagato. What was going on here? He continued fighting them all as much as he could.

As the fight dragged on, his chakra was depleting more and more. He finally managed to officially kill the one with the super long ponytail and realized he had fought him in the past. Slowly, the great toad Sage started to lose consciousness. He was able to deduce that the real person possessing the Rinnegan was not among the six before him. He attempted to use what little chakra he had left to create a giant Rasengan but the attack affected absorbed by the one Pein who was able to use that technique of the Kekke Genkai.

Panting heavily, Jiraiya had Ma go back home. Pa stayed though. The stubborn old pervert Sage tried one last attempt to take down the six Peins before him. It was a valiant effort but there was one problem; it left him on his stomach, windpipe crushed and impaled by long black rods. He thought about his time as a Shinobi and how he grew up to become a Sage and a writer. Was this the end of Jiraiya the Gallant?

Then, he thought about Minato, Yahiko, Nagato, Konan, and Naruto; especially Naruto. Naruto, the kid who wants to become Hokage. The one who will save the Shinobi world one day. He would never give up even if it meant his life. Forcing himself to move his arm, Jiraiya branded a coded message into Pa's back. He immediately disappeared to the Leaf Village.

With all of his might, Jiraiya forced his body to move again. What kind of a teacher would he be if he let himself just give up? Naruto would be disappointed in him. The six Peins were certain the last attack had killed him. They stopped and realized he wasn't quite dead yet. The Peins delivered one final blow that caused a massive explosion. Jiraiya flew backwards and sunk down into the blue water.

He sunk down... further and further. Deeper into the darkness of the water. As he gracefully floated down to the abyss of the cold, dark water, he thought his ending was a good one. The perfect ending to The Tale of Jiraiya the Gallant.

Yeah, this is how my story will end. Now, what should I call the sequel? Oh, I know. I'll call it The Tale of Naruto Uzumaki. That will work. He thought as everything faded to black.

Back at the Hidden Leaf Village, Zemaria had the most awful feeling hit her like a punch straight in the face. The glass in the frame of the photo with her, her parents, and Jiraiya... cracked. This was a bad omen. She immediately raced off to her mother after seeing it crack. Along the way, she whooshed passed Sakura almost knocking her over. She flung the door open but... Tsunade wasn't in her office.

Running out, Zemaria searched the Village until her mother's heartbeat was in range. She ran as fast as she could in the direction she heard it coming from. After almost fifteen minutes, she finally found her. By now, she had been running so fast that she was almost out of breath. Panting and shaking, she collapsed in tears in front of Tsunade.

Tsunade solemnly turned to face her, "You felt it too, huh?" Her voice was soft and upset.

"Mother... I-," Zemaria couldn't bring herself to admit what they both knew.