A/N Man Naruto has it made, just chilling up in the Pure Land with Kurama and having tea. All hell's broken loose down on Earth, however. And for those of you that don't know that last chapter was taken directly from the first story, Red Dawn Rising.
Chapter 36 - Legacy
Nagato hit the ground hard, wincing when he felt several of his ribs break. Sarada ran over to him and helped him up, her condition no better than his. Her left eye was closed and crying blood while there were three huge gashes in her right arm along with various other cuts and bruises. He looked around and his heart and throat constricted at the sight of all his friends on the verge of death. Even Hashirama and Madara weren't doing very well.
"Why don't you try that again?" roared Oshoku as he eyed them carefully, his stare alone enough to send terror piercing through their minds.
"We can't keep going like this…" uttered Nagato with a horse breath as Oshoku drew closer and closer, coming in for the kill.
"We can't give up!" said Sarada with a grunt before Oshoku fired ten beams of chakra from his tail's heads, her Susano'o automatically activating to shield them.
It broke apart the moment it was struck and the resulting explosion sent both of them flying back, their heads hitting the ground and jarring their vision for a few seconds.
"Die!"
He roared as he manifested a tentacle and sent it screaming at Nagato in a final attempt to be rid of him. Nagato shut his eyes and held his arm up so as to not see it coming, but the only thing this struck his skin was blood. He slowly opened his eyes and his heart skipped a beat at the sight of Sarada standing where he had once been, back turned to Oshoku, with the tentacle meant to kill him impaled through her gut. His brain processed what had happened a second later and he realized that she had used her Rinnegan's ability to switch places with him at the last second.
"I'm not...letting you die yet…" she said with a shaky smile before coughing out blood, her entire body shuddering as Oshoku retracted his limb and let her fall onto her knees, Nagato catching just before she hit the ground.
He quickly put a hand up to her neck and felt relieved when he felt a pulse. She was alive, but just barely.
"Any last words?" asked Oshoku as he watched them, Nagato closing his eyes and physically accepting his fate.
"Use this only as a last resort."
They shot open when the memory passed through his mind and he quickly reached into his back pouch, pulling out the scroll his mother had given to him the day everything went to hell. He quickly unraveled it and threw it out, a seal instantly appearing that already contained two wrapped up bodies prepped and ready to go.
"This is…"
The technique's name and required hand seals passed through his thoughts and he mimicked them with his one remaining hand, slapping his palm on the parchment last to activate it. "Kuchiyose - Edo Tensei!"
"Hm?" thought Oshoku as the seal glowed brightly and instantly dust and ash started to gather around the bodies, swallowing them up whole and reshaping into the form of two humans, males considering the shape of their build.
The first to finish taking shape was on the right, Nagato and Sarada gasping when the Akatsuki cloak,unbuttoned down to the waist ,materialized around his body. His hair was orange in color, spiked up at the front and slicked back the rest of the way and his red eyes radiated with pride in his name and power.
"So this is what it feels like to be reincarnated...strange." he said as he looked himself over then noticed the two pairs of eyes watching from behind.
"Who are you?" asked Sarada weakly, the unknown Akatsuki member grinning as he walked over to them and sharing some of his chakra with them to give them some strength back.
"The name's Kurama."
Nagato's eyes widened even farther when he recognized the name.
"Kurama? The Kurama? As in the Kyuubi?!" he sputtered, Kurama snickering before he pointed at the other reincarnated shinobi with his thumb.
"Not anymore I'm afraid. But if you think it's surprising that I'm here, take a look at my colleague here."
They gazed at the other reincarnated shinobi as his features finally settled in and they took in what he wore. He wore grey sandals that reached up to his calves, navy blue pants, a grey sweatshirt with red stripes...and a white cape with red flame-like motifs around the edges. His heart soared and a small smile dawned when he read the Kanji for 'Nine Tails' written vertically down his back.
"You're…!"
"Hey there Nagato. It's been awhile, hasn't it? The last time I saw you...you were just promoted to Chunin." said the man as he looked back at him and smiled, showing them his whisker-like birthmarks and red slit eyes.
"Granddad…" said Nagato before he coughed vigorously, the man's smile turning into a scowl as he looked back at Oshoku and bared his fangs.
"You're going to pay for every single scratch, bruise, cut and that arm of his." he snarled as he slowly let his chakra seep out from his skin, Kurama doing the same until they mixed and only grew in power.
"You guys sit back and relax for a few. We'll handle this." said Kurama with a smirk as he stood up and walked up to the man, standing beside him with his arms crossed and his eyes glued on Oshoku.
"Ready Naruto?"
Naruto grinned as he brought up both hands, holding out the index and middle fingers of each, and crossed them over his chest. "Tajū Kage Bunshin no Jutsu."
A ring of white smoke popped up instantly around Oshoku and he growled when it cleared, revealing hundreds of shadow clones wielding massive crimson colored Rasengans above their heads. Naruto grinned as he lowered his hands and glared at the beast.
"Wow…" uttered Nagato at such impressive chakra control before Naruto blinked and in a matter of seconds took in a copious amount of natural energy and entered Sage Mode, something he hadn't used in a long time.
"Watch and learn!" he said before leaping up into the air, forming his own giant Rasengan in the process without any effort whatsoever.
"Senpō - Chōōdama Rasen Tarengan!" he shouted as he and his shadow clones moved as one, thrusting their arms out and pummeling Oshoku with all of their attacks, around two hundred, all at once and created a massive explosion that shook the earth and lit up the sky.
"Show off." said Kurama, rolling his eyes before he leaped into the fray, guns blazing.
"That's Naruto for you." chuckled Nagato with a cheesy smile as he helped Sarada up and threw her arm over his shoulder to keep her supported.
He turned and walked back to the group of his friends huddled in a small alcove of stone, talking with her on the way back on their next course of action.
"Who is that?" asked Torazame after observing the devastating attack from his position up against a boulder.
"There's only one person I know who could create that many clones at once." said Genkaku before he glanced at Nagato. "It's Naruto, isn't it."
"Yep. That scroll my mother gave me was the seal required for the Impure World Reincarnation technique to bring him and Kurama back."
"Kurama too?! Hell yeah!" said Naoshi before he barked out in pain from the several cracked ribs he obtained.
"You guys stay here. We're going back out there." said Sarada as she wiped the blood from her chin and lips and formed her Susano'o Yin Chakra Armor to keep herself going and to take her mind off the hole in her gut.
"You can't! Nagato's lost an arm and you got impaled through your stomach!" exclaimed Genbu as Nagato stood up and activated his Six Paths Sage Mode.
"We have to seal Oshoku. He has to pay for what he's done."
"But how? Didn't you lose the arm that-"
Nagato interrupted Seiryu by holding up his remaining arm and smiled, showing them the sun-like symbol on his hand that represented the Six Paths Yang Power he inherited from Menma.
"Turns out I can switch it from one hand to the other if I needed to."
He turned to Sarada and nodded once, the two hopping back over the rock wall and sprinting towards Oshoku, seeing Kurama pound into him with several Demonic Release techniques while Naruto and five of his shadow clones got ready for another attack.
"Alright, let's roast this sucker." he said with a smirk as he, with the assistance of his clones, created a massive crimson sphere of chakra, about three times bigger than his already abnormally large Ultra-Big Ball Rasengan, and added shape and nature transformation to it that gave it its iconic shuriken-like shape.
"Senpō - Sōgō Chōōdama Rasenshuriken!" he yelled before he and his clones threw the technique with all their might, the clones dispersing once it left their hands while Naruto braced himself against the hurricane-strength winds produced by the rapidly rotating technique as it flew right for Oshoku.
After Kurama ducked out of the way when he sensed the chakra the technique contained, Oshoku looked over and gasped at the sheer size of the ball flying right for him. He didn't have to time to evade and instead braced himself as the giant ball of chakra struck him full force, engulfing his entire form in a sphere of wind and chakra that attacked every corner of his body on the molecular level, destroying his cells in a matter of seconds.
"Nice one!" shouted Nagato over the fearsome winds when he landed with Sarada beside Naruto and Kurama, the two looking at them with baffled expressions.
"Why are you two back here! You're in no condition to fight!" said Kurama before he noticed the chakra shrouds covering them and the determined expressions on their faces.
"Leave them be, Kurama. We've got bigger things to deal with." said Naruto when he noticed a fraction of Oshoku had managed to escape his technique and growled as he rebuilt himself in his humanoid form once again.
"As expected from the former Kyuubi. And I see you've mixed senjutsu chakra in with your attacks...very good. But-"
"How about you just shut your trap? If you don't already know, that kind of talk doesn't work on me!" said Naruto with a smirk, Oshoku growling at the sudden interruption.
"Fine then. You've only quickened your deaths!" he roared before rushing at the group.
"Nagato, come here." said Naruto quickly, his grandson taking a step to his right to allow Naruto to place a hand on his shoulder and absorb some of his chakra.
"Kurama."
"Gotcha." he replied as he stood closer to Naruto and received some of Nagato's tailed beast chakra, the two remembering the feel of it circulating through their systems for only a few moments before they began to create their own.
"Nagato, you can transform into Tailed Beast form correct?" he asked with a smirk as his skin started to peel away to blood red fur.
"Yeah, why?" he asked.
"Care to join us?" asked Kurama before all of a sudden he and Naruto transformed into their tailed beast forms and roared, the sheer power of their combined cries blowing back Oshoku several yards.
Nagato grinned before he transformed into his own unique tailed beast mode similar to Menma's, his body made of chakra instead of flesh and bone, and along his back limbs and head were intricate black symbols. He grinned as he took his place beside his predecessors, Oshoku growling when he saw all three foxes glaring at him.
"Don't forget about me! Isō - Susano'o!" said Sarada as she manifested her complete body Susano'o and draped itself over Nagato's body, cloaking it in her chakra and giving it shoulder pads and a spiked forehead protector-like piece of armor just underneath the jewel Sarada levitated inside on his forehead.
"Nice!" said Nagato as he held his arm out and Sarada manifested a long sword in his hand while Naruto created a large crimson Rasengan in the palm of his hand and shared it with Kurama.
"Damn them all…" thought Oshoku before he transformed back into his colossal form and fired his chakra beams at them once again.
Nagato and Sarada moved as one, darting out in front of Naruto and Kurama and protecting them with a larger version of Sarada's Susano'o's Yata Mirror and negating the attack in the blink of an eye.
"Go!" they yelled, Naruto and Kurama leaping over them and extending their arms out to smash their Rasengan deep into Oshoku's body until it burst apart once again, sending his human form flying right into the Ama no Hoko.
Sarada and Nagato rushed at him and brought their sword back, stooping down low and swinging it around to cut right through Oshoku's waist and through the entire base of the massive tower, splitting it and causing a massive explosion to erupt out its side. As Oshoku stood there dazed Naruto and Kurama came back around and created a massive Tailed Beast Ball, aiming it right at him after it reached its peak size.
"Bijuu-Dama!" they both roared as they fired the ball, grinning as it struck the tower and detonated, enveloping both it and Oshoku in a massive fireball that lit up the sky and sent devastating shock waves out in all directions.
Nagato and Sarada ran around the dome and stood beside them as they watched the chakra fade away, revealing the twisted remains of the Ama no Hoko and the crumpled remains of Oshoku resting at its base. Half his face had been blown off and the entire right side of his torso was reduced to ooze that formed a puddle beside him.
"It's...time…" he said with ragged breaths as he slowly picked himself up and recreated his other arm, steam rolling off his skin when the new limb grew in from his shoulder blade.
Nagato, Naruto, Kurama and Sarada tensed up when they felt his chakra levels start to grow exponentially, most noticeably around his third eye and hands. He growled when his hair began to stand on end and various particles of dust and pieces of rocks began to levitate around him, the Earth on the other beginning to violently shake as if an earthquake the likes which have never been seen before had just appeared.
"What's going on?!" yelled out Kurama while trying to maintain his balance, Nagato narrowing his eyes as Oshoku clasped his hands together.
"Finally...after a thousand years in the making…" he started before blue and red fire engulfed his hands and he slapped them onto the ground. "Doom to the world...Sekainoowari!"
The shaking stopped for only a second, all eyes resting on Oshoku, before all of a sudden the Ama no Hoko disappeared within a massive column of magma that erupted out of the ground. It reached up high into the sky as the Earth began to shake even more than before, Nagato looking around and watching as more magma came out of the ground.
"Oshoku, what did you do?!" yelled Naruto, the dark being laughing as he removed his hands from the ground, the column of magma behind him falling back down into the hole it created.
"With my chakra alone, I have ruptured the core of this wretched planet and started the endgame. It's only a matter of time before the planet implodes, and when I return from my dimension I will use the leftover pieces to create a new Earth and start anew." said Oshoku with a devilish sneer, another devastating shockwave creating multiple cracks along the ground as the planet itself slowly began to die on the inside.
Nagato bit his lip for a second before he returned to human form and rushed Oshoku, catching him off guard and getting around behind him, binding him by wrapping his arm around his throat and morphing one of his Gudōdama into a staff that he rammed through his collar bone, through his shoulder blade and out his lower back.
"Sarada! Do it!" he yelled as Oshoku struggled to break free, Sarada absorbing her Susano'os chakra and sprinting at the two of them with her hand held back, black lightning already crackling around her extended fingertips.
"I demand that you let go of me!" snarled Oshoku, but Nagato's grip held strong when Sarada finally reached them and reared her arm back.
"Rikudō Raikiri!" she said as she threw her arm forward, Oshoku's eyes widening before he turned his palms outward in a last ditch effort to save himself.
"Shinra Tensei!"
They were both thrown back, Nagato and Oshoku falling over the edge of the massive hole and careening towards the center of the Earth while Sarada skid to a halt before Naruto and Kurama, coughing out blood when she felt the pain from her gut.
"I'm not through yet!" she thought before, without saying anything, Naruto picked her up and tossed her towards the hole after assuming what she planned to do just by her expression.
Oshoku managed to kick Nagato off him and he grabbed the staff stabbed through his shoulder, slinging it back at Nagato and missing by a couple of inches. He quickly activated his Six Paths Sage Mode to protect himself from the intense heat arising from the core below as it neared the end of its timer.
"There's nothing else you can do now! Just die already!" snarled Oshoku as he created several bone spears and fired them at Nagato.
"Like hell that would happen!" he yelled back as he evaded each fragment, smirking when Sarada, already cloaked in her chakra armor, appeared out of nowhere and rammed her elbow into his jaw.
"Amaterasu - Kagutsuchi." she said darkly, an orb of Amaterasu spawning within Oshoku before she used shape transformation to have it lance out in all directions, impaling him through every corner of his body and igniting him with the unquenchable flames.
Oshoku divided himself up and reformed away from the fire, holding out his hand at her and narrowing his eyes. "Bansho Ten'in."
She grunted when she was yanked towards him against her will, Oshoku already morphing one of his Gudōdama into its blade form and swinging it at where her throat will be. All of a sudden Nagato appeared underneath his arm, slicing it off with one of his staffs and then kicking Oshoku in the face to disorientate him. As he flew back a few feet he used another Gudōdama as the sphere and compressed it down to a smaller size before adding on wind to create its signature spiralling rings.
"Chō Mini Bijuu-Dama Rasneringu!" he yelled before ramming his hand deep into Oshoku's gut, the man's face contorting in pain before the technique exploded, sending him flying back and right into the walls of the hole.
Nagato then spun around and caught Sarada, stopping her and holding onto her hand as they got nearer to the Earth's core.
Suddenly Oshoku rocketed out of the wall and widened his third eye while manifested the lance form of two Gudōdama. "Rinbo - Hengoku!"
"Shadows all around!" shouted Nagato as he evaded a kick from one of Oshoku's shadows and moved away from Sarada, who had manifested black lightning around both of her hands and flinched in pain before swiping through the neck of one of the shadows.
Oshoku noticed the slight reaction and he glanced at Nagato, seeing that he too was experiencing the effects of chakra exhaustion and the pain radiating from his severed arm and various other injuries both exterior and interior. They wouldn't last long if he kept hounding them, he deduced.
"Give up! You're not going to last long with injuries like those!" he shouted as another one of his shadows got stabbed through the gut by Nagato.
They didn't even respond to him as they passed by the mantle, give or take, and entered the outer core layer of the planet. It got worse as they travelled farther down, with magma oozing out from the hole's walls and cascading around them, and the heat was just unbearable with sweat droplets forming on their foreheads and drenching their clothes.
Oshoku rushed at Nagato and threw a punch at his jaw in tandem with his shadow going for a kick to the gut. He blocked Oshoku's punch and twisted in the air to avoid the shadow, leaping back and channeling Shukaku's chakra through him.
"Go kid!"
"Senpō - Jiton Dai Rasenringu!" he bellowed as he created a medium sized sphere that was decorated with fuuinjutsu surrounded by a ring of sand and smashing it into the back of the shadow.
As the shadow was bound and restrained by the fuuinjutsu Oshoku lunged at Nagato with one of his Gudōdama lances, the Uzumaki barely dodging one and only sustaining a cut on his left shoulder. He created a new staff and parried each of Oshoku's lunges and swings, twirling it around in his hand and swinging at Oshoku's throat.
"Shinra Tensei!"
Nagato gruted as the invisible force blew him back, Sarada jumping in to take his place with her Six Paths Lightning Cutter formed. He flipped back to avoid the first lunge and he stabbed down at her back, her Susano'o's Yata Mirror appearing above her to block the attack while she maneuvered herself and rushed at him again. She stabbed her hand through his shoulder and he snarled as he kicked her back and sneered as he morphed his lance into a sword and aimed for her arm.
His eyes widened in shock as the blade phased through her and he glanced up, seeing Nagato with his hand on her shoulder and his Mangekyo Sharingan active, cursing his eye ability as he pushed himself away from them.
They passed by the final layer of the earth and entered a large circular cavern with magma coating the walls and a large sphere in the center with strings of lava attached to its molten surface and the walls of the cavern. Nagato noticed that there were other holes like the one they had fallen through and guessed they didn't have much time left.
"Nagato!"
"Yeah?"
"Since Oshoku used his Rinne-Sharingan to start this technique, I think my Rinnegan can dispel it! We just have to deal with him first!" yelled Sarada, Nagato nodding before they looked down at the core and noticed Oshoku landed feet first on its surface
They hit the core soon after and instantly felt a massive heat wave hit them from the deteriorating core, Oshoku grinning as he stood just a few meters away from them with his arms by his side and his Gudōdama forming a ring behind his back. The Earth shook once more and Nagato fell to his knees, instantly jumping back up when the heat got too much for him to bear.
"I foresee you two dying down here, unable to save your friends from imminent destruction." he said with a sneer while Sarada pulled down her facemask and wiped the blood from her lips, Nagato grinning as he closed his right eye and coughed.
"Yeah? Well…I'd say you're a pretty shitty fortune teller." he replied as he used his last Gudōdama to create a staff and gripped it tightly while Sarada's right eye cried blood when she formed an orb of Amaterasu and shaped it into a sword.
"It's you who's going to die. You killed my father and Nagato's parents...and that was a very, very bad decision." she snarled as Nagato encased his staff with his chakra and created a chakra arm that stretched his fingers apart and began to manifest a spiralling ring.
"Careful now...too many hits and this entire place goes boom." said Oshoku with an evil laugh, Nagato clenching his jaw muscles in frustration.
He was right. They were standing on the core of the planet. They couldn't afford to use powerful techniques or risk destroying the core and themselves in the process. But he looked at Oshoku again and smiled, feeding more chakra into his technique instead of dispelling it and making it grow larger and larger.
"You're still going through with it?"
"That's the difference between you and me. You see...I'm not afraid to die if it means I'll get to kill you." said Nagato before he took off sprinting, Oshoku hesitating.
"Fūton - Ōdama Rasenringu!" he bellowed before throwing the technique with all his strength, his chakra shroud flickering for a moment as he tossed his staff after it.
Oshoku's eyes widened as the staff pierced the chakra sphere and detonated it prematurely, blinding him and allowing Sarada to swing around and go for his blind spot.
When the explosion of chakra faded away Oshoku squinted through the smoke and saw Nagato running at him with a chakra arm wielding a trio of spiralling rings while Sarada came at him from behind with her entire arm encased in black lightning and the black flames of Amaterasu, the technique taking on the shape of a wolf.
"Kongō Fūsa!"
"What?!" gasped Oshoku when golden chakra chains shot out towards him from the hole above, Nagato looking up and grinning when he caught sight of Naruto standing near the rim with his feet and arms planted in the rock face.
"Keep going!" he yelled as he ensnared Oshoku and kept him restrained for them.
"My family is awesome." he thought before he reared the chakra arm back at the same as Sarada extended hers out.
"Wakusei Rasenringu!"
"Raikiri!"
Oshoku's eyes widened as their techniques struck his body on either side, Nagato's ripping apart his chest and reaching his heart while Sarada's hand stabbed through his back and met Nagato's technique in the center, the two opposing forces grinding against one another before a bright light flash out followed by the conflicting chakras expanding out as a sphere that engulfed and destroyed anything caught in its blast radius.
Naruto held an arm up and nearly fell off the wall when the chains he used to restrain Oshoku disintegrated and the whole core of the Earth shook as the chakra sphere got bigger and bigger until it finally exploded, blowing back air and fire through the holes created as a result of Oshoku's world ending technique. Beams of chakra shot through the crust after travelling the entire length of the Earth's interior and Kurama quickly covered everyone with his chakra and own body when a beam got close to hitting them.
It took a full minute for the chakra sphere to start to die down,Naruto lowering his arm and opening his eyes afterwards to survey the damage. To his surprise, when the sphere fully dissipated, the core was totally intact and for the most part undamaged due to the fact that, unbeknownst to Oshoku, he had cast a simple Genjutsu that made him believe they were standing on the core itself, but in actuality he had layered four of his Gudōdama over the core to protect it from the resulting explosion.
"Smart." thought Naruto as he leaped down onto the protective shell, which had been blown away up to its final layer, a close call if you could call it that, and ran to Nagato and Sarada.
He kneeled down beside them and looked them over, Nagato's eyes fluttering open when he sensed his presence next to him.
"Hey…" he said weakly, Naruto smiling before Nagato glanced over at Sarada and nudging her shoulder to wake her up.
"Ugh...shit, are we dead? I can't feel my left arm…" she muttered, Naruto sucking in a breath that drew her gaze up to him.
"It's gone...isn't it?"
Naruto nodded, and she lifted her head up, laughing a little at how she and Nagato sat next to one another, but it was most likely due to the blood loss. The red liquid had started to seep out of Nagato's wound once again and now that her left arm had been severed at the elbow, the blood had mixed together and gave off the appearance that they were holding hands.
"Come on, let's get you guys out of here." said Naruto as he held a hand out to both of them and picked them up, keeping them balanced enough so they could stand.
They were about to leave when the Earth quaked once again and an ominous chakra appeared behind them, the three whirling around to see Oshoku pick his misshapen body off the core and rebuild it until it was whole once again.
"How...how do you keep beating me?!" he demanded with a snarl, Nagato smirking as he raised his one hand up, Sarada doing the same and together they formed the rat hand seal.
"Like I said, you and I are different. You were all alone, trying to do everything *on your own. Me however...I had friends to back me up. And no matter how many times either you hit me or them down, we would pick each other back up again." he said as he and Sarada channeled their last reserves of chakra and to Oshoku's further enragement disabled his technique, the core of the Earth stabilizing as a result and the holes that had formed because of it began to fill themselves up, including the one they had used to reach the core.
"You…you ruined everything!" roared Oshoku as he created two Gudōdama and launched them at the two, Naruto reacting too late to the surprise attack.
A bright light appeared before them and the two black spheres were batted aside, Oshoku's eyes widening in shock when the light faded into two figures dressed in full-length kimonos with patterns of six red magatama across the chest. In their hands they carried a sword and a shakujo, respectively, and they looked like just when they did in their younger years.
"You…it's…!" sputtered Oshoku as the two figures turned around and glared at him with anger clearly expressed on their faces.
"Hey there Old Man Hagoromo, Hamura." said Naruto with a smile.
The Sage of Six Paths and his brother, the two who had taken the Juubi head-on and defeated it, glanced back at him and returned the gesture, Sarada gasping at their eyes.
"Greetings Naruto. I'm guessing that's your grandson and Kakashi Hatake's daughter? It's a pleasure to meet you two." said Hagoromo with a smirk before he looked back at Oshoku and gripped his shakujo tightly.
"You've done enough. We've seen and heard everything that you've done to our mother and our descendants. They are our legacy." said Hamura as he pointed his sword's edge at Oshoku, their father snarling at them before two more orbs of light appeared beside them and took on the forms of two other men.
"You're gonna pay for what you've done grandfather." said the second son of Hagoromo, Ashura Otsutsuki, when his body manifested itself first and stood beside his father with his arms crossed.
"I used to think and act like you...but not anymore. Being around Menma...he changed my way of thinking." said Indra himself, his chakra having been freed from Oshoku's control after the last technique, as he appeared and stood beside Hamura, the four Otsutsuki Clan members becoming a wall that stood between him and Sarada, Nagato and Naruto.
"Tch...you will all perish." he snarled before he quickly clasped his hands together and surrounded himself in a sphere of blackish red, orange and yellow chakra, the Earth's core beginning to crack and release enormous amounts of energy that Oshoku passively absorbed into his body. The Gudōdama that Nagato created to protect the core shattered, Naruto quickly grabbing onto Sarada and him and leaping up towards the hole above them. Hagoromo, Hamura, Indra and Ashura quickly followed behind as the sphere surrounding Oshoku grew larger and larger, lava and magma beginning to shoot out of the deteriorating core of the planet as he absorbed more and more of it into his own body.
"What's going on?!" sputtered Hashirama as the world shook even more violently than before, the entire planet seemingly starting to save in on itself when Naruto and company flew out of the hole and rolled away as a massive beam of chakra shot out from within it.
His question was answered when an arm twenty times the size of Oshoku's hydra form raised up out of the hole and slammed down onto the ground, a second arm following suite until they pulled out a huge body comprised of magma, black ooze and pure chakra. A bright red crystal was poking out of its chest and inside it levitated Oshoku, his body tethered to the inside like a spider web does its prey. From its body grew eleven tails each with a dragon head protruding from the tip, their glowing red eyes and sharp fangs sending shivers down their spines, and several wicked spikes and protrusions that gave the creature an overall look comparable to that of the Juubi.
At its shoulders grew a large serpentine neck that moved this way and that, its head that of a vicious hydra creature with two faces, an extended jaw filled with three rows of sharp teeth and multiple eyes. Two rested on either side of his head, and one, his Rinne-Sharingan, sat in the center of his forehead surrounded by horns that curved up and around his skull like a ram's.
"I have transcended beyond even God himself...I am no longer Death, I am no longer God...the Juubi would run in fear away from me! Up until now, I've only been using a fraction of my real power!" he roared with devastating fury as his very voice sent forests miles away blowing back.
"Jesus…" uttered Nagato in true terror as Oshoku glared at them with a toothy grin, Hagoromo and Hamura clenching their fists before turning to Nagato and Sarada and approaching them.
"Ashura, Indra, you two know what to do." said Hagoromo as he walked behind Nagato with his younger son while Hamura got up behind Sarada with Indra.
"What are you planning on doing?" she asked with a glance at the four chakra incarnations, Hamura smiling as he and Indra placed their hands on her back, Hagoromo and Ashura doing the same with Nagato.
"You'll see." he replied before they closed their eyes, Nagato and Sarada gasping as each Otsutsuki sent their own individual chakra into them, mixing and fueling their own reserves to their highest points.
Sarada looked down at the palm of her hand and saw the moon-like mark of the Six Paths Yin Power appear once again, followed by several other markings that spread up her body as her Susano'o chakra armor formed once again. A quadruplet of small wings formed on her back and tucked themselves in while two tufts of her hair raised up to give off the look of horns. She closed her right eye and let her Rinnegan blaze with unrivaled power.
Nagato on the other hand had activated his Six Paths Sage Mode and formed a small ring of five Gudōdama around his wrist, grinning as Hagoromo and Ashura's chakra mixed with his. Instantly the two were enveloped in their respective chakra and in the blink of an eye formed their chakra titans, Sarada in her perfect Susano'o and Nagato transforming into his massive chakra tailed beast form. He held his arm out to Sarada and his chakra avatar changed, its head splitting and gaining three more faces while his arms grew two more at the shoulders. Sarada did the same with her Susano'o and they grasped each other's hands, connecting their chakra for their final technique.
It was all or nothing.
"Do not mock me!" snarled Oshoku as he opened his jaw out wide in three distinct sections and started to create three massive Tailed Beast Balls, all eleven of his tails opening their dragon heads and following suite with their own.
In total he was making fourteen of the massive chakra spheres, a testament to his overwhelming power.
Sarada cloaked her Susano'o over Nagato's body once again and she joined his inside his avatar's head, grinning as its now four wings unfurled themselves out, their chakra mixing and gaining the same markings Nagato's chakra mode wore all across their combined body. His chakra titan's six arms connected with her Susano'o's shoulders and clenched their fists as their morphed body took on the appearance of a fox-human hybrid with long flowing hair, a horned forehead protector stretching across its forehead coupled with its signature scar over its left eye, and finally nine glowing tails sweeping left and right out from its body.
With Nagato's six arms they created two massive spiralling rings, one comprised of the chakra of all the Bijuu as nine separate smaller spheres organized in a nucleus-like sphere, and the other comprised of their predecessors chakra. Sarada meanwhile with her Susano'os two arms manifested massive amounts of black lightning around one and the black flames of Amaterasu surrounding the other.
They raised their arms into the air and combined the attacks into one, the Bijuu chakra spheres orbiting the larger sphere like a mini solar system while the black lightning and fire split up and spread out over the core in several larger rings, giving it the overall look of an atom.
"Together now! Rikudō Budda Modō - Senpō - Fuhen Dai Rasenringu!" they shouted together before their ethereal being brought the technique down and rushed at Oshoku while he compressed all fourteen Tailed Beast Balls into one massive sphere, shrunk it down to the size of a Gudōdama and immediately ingested it.
His cheeks puffed up for a fraction of a second before he released a bright beam of chakra that swept anything in its way aside, turning the sky dark as it raced for Nagato and Sarada.
They braced themselves as the beam struck their combined technique full force, pushing them back several yards while the shockwave upturned the earth around them in a crescent shaped crater. Oshoku's eye's narrowed when they wouldn't give in, his attack's power equalling theirs, so he increased the chakra he poured into the beam.
Still, however, they pushed back against him.
"How is this possible?! You shouldn't be alive!" roared Oshoku as all eleven of his tails reared back and spit out their own beams of chakra to add to the the larger stream, increasing its power eleven fold to try and overcome them.
Yet again, they held their ground for a fraction of a second before to Oshoku's delight, he could see tiny portions of their ethereal armor start to chip and break away.
"I can see it...your chakra is wearing thin. Slowly your life's grip on this world is slipping away. You are growing closer to death with every passing second." he said, Nagato and Sarada getting their teeth and pouring their chakra and remaining strength into defending against Oshoku's overwhelming power. They couldn't give up here. Even if they die in the process, they had to defeat Oshoku at all costs.
"Come on now! Giving up already?! Show me the power you said you would use to kill me! SHOW ME!"
Oshoku once again increased the chakra going into the technique and created a large bulge that ran along the beam's length until ramming into Sarada and Nagato full force, causing another devastating shockwave that pushed them back and completely ripped off half of their Buddha Mode's arms and large portions of its body.
"No...it can't...end like this…!" grunted Nagato when he felt his body start to give out on him, his gaze drifting to Sarada beside him, who was feeling the exact same way.
Their final technique grew smaller and smaller before finally it burst apart into excess chakra, the beam it had been holding out against all this time finally striking them dead square in the chest and carving out a massive hole through their Buddha Mode titan. It stood there, paralyzed, Sarada and Nagato huffing and puffing within its still intact head.
"You two are special...however…" started Oshoku before massive black tentacles erupted from the ground all around them and wrapped around the ethereal being's arms and legs, restraining them and restricting their movement.
Smaller versions came out of the earth around their friends on the ground and tightly wrapped their bodies around them and immediately began sucking out what chakra they had left, leaving them exhausted and barely able to keep their eyes open. Hagoromo, Ashura, Indra and Hamura stood helplessly when domes of Oshoku's chakra appeared around them and trapped them, allowing them to only watch as he tore into Nagato and Sarada.
"Darker, darker, yet darker...the darkness just keep growing." said Oshoku as he watched Nagato and Sarada struggle inside the deteriorating Buddha Mode. "And you know what? There's nothing you can do to stop it. Your lives will end here...enjoy your last few moments of life before you fade away into nothingness."
Nagato looked up at Oshoku's monstrous form and glared at the red crystal protruding from his chest, his real body resting within it peacefully with his arms by his side and his eyes closed. He thought of everything that their most hated enemy had said as of yet, about how he wanted to remake the world, and than back in the lava dimension when he had shed tears at seeing a similarity between Sarada and him to his sons. In that moment he had an idea, one that was just crazy enough to work.
"Nagato! Stop!" shouted Sarada before she coughed vigorously when Nagato shot himself out of the head of their chakra titan and sprinted along the tentacle that restrained it.
Oshoku was surprised at how much chakra he still had and begun to sprout smaller tentacles from the main body that would lash out and attempt to cut down the Uzumaki as he made his way toward him.
Nagato however ducked under and avoided every attempt he made to stop him in his tracks, the Uzumaki's eyes still glued to the crystal on Oshoku's chest. He followed his gaze and he realized what he was going for, taking measures to prevent whatever he was thinking of doing by beginning to retract the crystal and his real body into his chest. Nagato picked up the pace and dug his feet into the ooze-like skin of the tentacle, using the last of his strength to propel himself through the air and extend his remaining arm out.
Several tentacles shot out at him and he spun around through the air, one of them managing to slice through part of his shoulder before the bottom of his feet hit the crystal and he smashed his hand through its surface and pushed with all his might through its jelly-like interior until finally his palm touched Oshoku's chest.
Suddenly an explosion of white chakra shot out after contact and engulfed Nagato, Oshoku's eyes widening in shock when he felt his body grow warmer and warmer.
"Huh? What are you doing…!? STOP!" he roared before the light consumed him and the entire area.
Nagato, still firmly connected to Oshoku's body, was suddenly besieged by a swarm of memories from when the world was still young and when Kaguya had put a stop to mankind's endless wars. He saw what he assumed to be Hamura running around with a big smile on his face and Oshoku bending down to embrace him. Fast forward and his heart clenched up and tightened in his chest when he realized that in fact it wasn't Hamura, but another child around five years old one that he assumed Oshoku and Kaguya had before him and then later Hagoromo. The child was lying down on a bed with his eyes closed, a man he assumed to be Oshoku sitting in a chair beside him with a hand on his chest.
It took him a moment to realize that the child was dead, and that Oshoku was crying tearfully with his face buried in his arm. The cause, from what he could tell, was that the child had been killed not by natural causes...but by a stab wound. Through another memory he discovered the child had been kidnapped out of revenge and in a confrontation he had been fatally stabbed by a knife. The memory travelled forward in time once again to when Hamura was first born and how Oshoku was silent, staring intently at him with a hardened gaze.
It was then that he realized the truth.
The light faded and Nagato dropped to the ground, Sarada and everyone else gasping when Oshoku let go of all of them and fell silent, his eyes wide open and swimming with all of the emotions he had locked away fro such a long time.
"Wh...what did you do…?" he asked as he glanced down at Nagato and watched as Sarada limped over to him. "What's this feeling…? What's happening to me?"
"I used my chakra to see your memories and understand why you were doing this. I never thought of doing it before...but I guess in a moment of delusion it just popped into my head." explained Nagato as Hagoromo and Hamura ran over while the others remained behind.
"I know what happened to you early on when you first married Kaguya...how you two had a son and that he died when he was five years old because someone who didn't like what Kaguya and you had done. They kidnapped him and when you tried to save him, he was stabbed fatally by a knife."
"W-What…? Is that true?" asked Hamura in disbelief as he and Hagoromo looked up at their father, who remained silent.
"No...No! I don't need anyone!" he snarled before his dragon headed tails emerged from behind his massive form and fired several beams of chakra down at them, Nagato responding by holding up his hand and protecting them all with a barrier of chakra that repelled the attacks.
When the smoke cleared and he saw the determined look on his face he bared his sharpened teeth and roared, "Stop resisting! Do you hear me?! I'll rip you limb from limb!"
He attacked them yet again with stronger beams of chakra and Nagato formed the barrier once again to protect them. All of a sudden a stronger source of chakra emerged behind them and reinforced the barrier tenfold, negating the chakra beams almost instantly. Nagato turned around and smiled as Kaguya herself stepped forward past her two sons and glared up at Oshoku with a slight scowl.
Seeing her made him curb his anger and he sighed deeply, his dragon tails falling back and his muscles relaxing.
"Kaguya...all of you...do you want to know why I'm doing this…? Why I keep fighting to make my dream a reality…?"
Kaguya and the others remained silent, Oshoku closing his eyes and suddering as the old memories and the emotions that accompanied them flowed back into him like a torrential river that couldn't be stopped.
"I'm doing this...because watching my first son, the one thing I cared about most in the world, die in my arms was the worst thing to ever happen to me, or to anyone for that matter. I wanted to make sure no one would ever have to experience pain like that ever again." he said sadly, Kaguya lowering her gaze and shivering while Nagato and Sarada clasped their hands together and listened.
Suddenly Oshoku growled slightly and he looked straight them when a sorrowful gaze in his eyes.
"No...that's not just it. I...I...I'm doing this because I care about you, Kaguya, and my two sons more than anyone else in the world. I wanted to create a world where there were no wars, no worries or troubles, one where they could never die and that they could be happy." he continued on, his words digging deep into his sons and Kaguya, so much so in her that she started to shed a tear.
"I'm not ready for this to end. I don't want my dream to end, all I want is for everyone to be happy." he began again before, to their surprise, tears began to emerge from the corners of his eyes and his tails emerged once again and spread open their maws. "So please…stop doing this...AND JUST LET ME WIN!"
Each tail manifested a massive chakra sphere and combined them together to fire another massive beam straight down at Nagato and company, fully engulfing them within it and seemingly vaporizing them. However, much to Oshoku's dismay, they were perfectly fine thanks to a durable chakra barrier produced not by Kaguya, but by Nagato once again. Remarkably it was withstanding everything that Oshoku put into it, and soon enough Kaguya joined in, then Hagoromo and finally Hamura as well.
"No! Stop! STOP IT NOW!" he bellowed as he continuously fed more chakra into the stream, but at the same time the barrier that defended against it grew stronger as well to counter it.
This power struggle continued on for another minute before Oshoku finally gave up the will to fight and lowered his gaze and closed his eyes, his massive body beginning to shrink as a result. Kaguya began to walk towards him as he grew smaller and smaller, being followed by her two sons while Nagato and Sarada stayed back.
"Kaguya…" said Oshoku in almost a whisper when he returned to his humanoid form, his gaze still lowered. "I'm so...alone…"
She slowly smiled when she realized that the man she had once loved had finally returned, and to show her gratitude, without saying a word, she walked right up to Oshoku and embraced him, his tearful eyes widening in shock at the compassion he was being given even after all that he had done.
"It's okay…" she whispered into his ear, further soothing his twisted soul.
Suddenly his black skin began to disintegrate and drift off into the air, revealing his old self from within as if he was shedding all of his sins and being reborn. His sharp teeth returned to normal, the third eye in the middle of his forehead closed, remaining as a visible slit, and the three horns protruding out of his head turned to dust.
Still in her embrace he returned back to his old self, his eyes slowly opening and with a warm smile appearing on his face he hugged her tightly and felt warmth in his once cold heart once again.
As they stood there with Hagoromo, Hamura and now Ashura and Indra watching them from a few feet away, Nagato and Sarada stood side by side with heavy breaths emerging from their tired lungs. It was here when their bodies finally gave in and they began to feel the effects of chakra exhaustion all at once. Nagato coughed out a copious amount of blood and fell to his knees, Sarada falling down beside him and smiling weakly.
"Heh...we did it…" he said in almost a whisper, Sarada nodding slowly before she grunted and hacked out blood, the wounds she sustained finally overwhelming her willpower.
Her eyes rolled up and Nagato's eyes widened as she fell onto her side and ceased all movement.
"Shit…" he uttered before he gave into his own wounds, his head hitting the soft dirt beside Sarada's and his fingers falling inches away from hers.
The last thing he saw was her face and a group of blurry outlines moving towards them before his vision faded into black.
- 1 Hour Later -
"Look, they're waking up!"
"Thank god."
Nagato's eyes fluttered and he groaned as he slowly picked himself up with his remaining arm, rubbing his temples to soothe the headache he had. He looked over just as Sarada woke up, the two quickly discovering their injuries had been healed to an extent, meaning the really severe ones like the hole in Sarada's gut had been taken care of.
"Ugh...my head's killing me…" she muttered, Nagato blinking a few times and smiling when she looked at him.
"Same here. It feels like Natsumi just punched me in the head. Multiple times." he replied, Sarada and their friends laughing at his joke.
"What you guys just did was nothing short of amazing." said Hashirama as he kneeled down beside Nagato and helped him up, Naruto clapping him lightly on the shoulder a few times while Hana and Torazame lifted Sarada to her feet.
"Wait...where's Oshoku?" she asked, Natsumi pointing over her shoulder to a group of white figures standing a few meters away.
Nagato nodded before he started to walk over there with Sarada by his side, a smile being shared between them. They reached the group and saw Oshoku for the first time as he would've been like when he was first alive. His eyes had remained as red versions of the Rinnegan, but his clothes had changed to the color white with red magatama markings around the cuffs of his sleeves and collar bone area.
Kaguya turned and saw them stand beside her sons and she nodded, turning back to Oshoku and placing a hand on her hip. When he saw her take that stance he sighed deeply and walked past her, going right up to Nagato and Sarada.
"Listen...I'm dreadfully sorry for doing what I did for all this time. I'll never be able to forgive myself for doing it. I was clouded by my own selfish desire to make everything right." said Oshoku regretfully, Nagato and Sarada remaining silent.
"I...I understand if you can never forgive me. I understand if you hate me. I hurt and killed so many people…and with that in mind, there's only one thing I can do."
Oshoku took in a deep breath and brought his hands up from his sides, Nagato and Sarada raising their eyebrows in intrigue. He formed the ram hand seal first, and to Naruto's surprise clasped his hands together in the snake seal.
"You…"
"Yes, I'm going to try to bring everyone that I had killed back to life. With my chakra, I don't know how many I'll be able to revive...but you'll never know until you try, right?" he asked with a small smile before he widened his eyes, activating the technique.
"Gedo - Rinne Tensei no Jutsu."
The ground erupted behind him and the King of Hell emerged from the ground, extending high up into the air just like it had when Naruto witnessed Nagato, the original Pain, perform the technique all those years ago, and open its mouth wide to release all the souls Oshoku could muster. A cloud of green light flowed out of the King of Hell's mouth and spread out in all directions, encompassing the whole globe in a matter of minutes.
As he did so his arms started to shake and his black hair turned white, his life force slowly fading away as per the technique's consequence. Soon enough he expended all of his chakra up to a certain point and his hands dropped, the King of Hell closing his mouth and disappearing in a puff of smoke, Oshoku coughing and hacking out saliva vigorously.
"And now...for the final...piece…" he said, exhausted, before he clasped his hands together and looked to the pitch black sky, Nagato and the others looking skyward and gasping when the sight they had been yearning to see started to unfold before their very eyes.
Oshoku, using the last ounce of chakra he had left, deactivated the large Gudōdama that he had encompass both the Earth and Moon, it's from slowly giving way to allow sunlight, the first seen in a very long time, to shine over the world once more.
"It's morning...I've never seen a more beautiful sunrise…" said Natsumi in awe of the luminous orb of light as it appeared over the horizon, bathing them in its glorious glow and illuminating their skin.
Then with that done, Oshoku grunted as he split apart the Juubi inside of him and unsealed the Bijuu from inside his body while he kept the Juubi's husk, the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path.
"There...it's finished…" said Oshoku as he fell to his knees and coughed again, Kaguya, Hagoromo and Hamura rushing to his side as he slowly died
"I'm...so sorry that I caused all of this...I just wish…"
"You don't have to say anything." said Hamura with care as Kaguya held his head in her lap and looked into his eyes.
He took his advice and instead of speaking, he closed his eyes and died with a smile on his face, Kaguya shedding a single tear as she laid him to rest and stood back with her sons, his body slowly growing into a beautiful tree that bore white flowers that fluttered in the soft breeze blowing around them.
As the sun shined and the blue skies began to return once more...the Curse of Hatred was finally broken once and for all.
A/N Jutsu Translations
Kuchiyose - Edo Tensei / Summoning - Impure World Reincarnation
Tajū Kage Bunshin no Jutsu / Multiple Shadow Clone Technique
Senpō - Chōōdama Rasen Tarengan / Sage Art - Many Ultra-Big Ball Spiralling Serial Spheres
Senpō - Sōgō Chōōdama Rasenshuriken / Sage Art - Mega Ultra-Big Ball Spiralling Shuriken
Isō - Susano'o / Majestic Attire - Susano'o
Bijuu-Dama / Tailed Beast Ball
Sekainoowari / World's End
Rikudō Raikiri / Six Paths Lightning Cutter
Shinra Tensei / Almighty Push / Heavenly Subjugation of the Omnipresent God
Amaterasu - Kagutsuchi / Heavenly Illumination - Added Tool Earth Lord
Bansho Ten'in / Universal Pull / Heavenly Attraction of All of Creation
Chō Mini Bijuu-Dama Rasneringu / Super Mini-Tailed Beast Ball Spiralling Fear Wheel
Rinbo - Hengoku / Limbo - Border Jail
Senpō - Jiton Dai Rasenringu / Sage Art / Magnet Release Great Spiralling Fear Wheel
Fūton - Ōdama Rasenringu / Wind Release - Big Ball Spiralling Fear Wheel
Kongō Fūsa / Adamantine Sealing Chains
Wakusei Rasenringu / Planetary Spiralling Fear Wheel
Raikiri / Lightning Cutter
Rikudō Budda Modō - Senpō - Fuhen Dai Rasenringu / Six Paths Buddha Mode - Sage Art - Universal Great Spiralling Fear Wheel
Gedo - Rinne Tensei no Jutsu / Outer Path - Samsara of Heavenly Life Technique