Opening - Courage by Haruka Tomatsu
X
"Nagato, they're here."
The remaining ongoing battles between Pain and Konoha's strongest shinobi on hand became background noise, the bulk of Nagato's thoughts went toward solving a vastly more important problem without hesitation.
Question one: How many of them?
not important right now this is a paper clone
"Konan, get back here right now."
She started shaking her head.
expecting to die
wants to buy me time
persuade her
"The only way we get out of this alive is if you make it back to this tower."
actually not a lie
I can work with this
Nagato took a deep breath and only trembled slightly. He could chalk part of that up to the chill of Ame's cold wet weather, seeping in through the door Konan had left open. She herself was looking at Nagato with total confusion, under which there was a tiny flicker of hope. "...H-How? What do you mean?"
"Even assuming the Hokage is here just to kill us, which is one of two major possibilities, he definitely isn't here to burn Ame to the ground. We can leave, and he might decide to occupy the village but at least he won't go around murdering civilians. Pain is still active in Konoha; I have everything I need to get us to safety."
"I can level Konoha with Shinra Tensei at maximum power, then deal with any Konoha-nin who keep attacking with my remaining Paths. I'll summon the two of us into the crater with the Animal Path, and we'll have to run from there."
The despair on Konan's face lessened and the hope flared brighter.
"And we have another option too," he went on. "If the Hokage gets here before I've made Konoha safe for the two of us, I'll need to have a Path online here. I need you to apply my chakra stakes to one of the spare Path bodies in the basement; you can use this clone for that but you have to send the real you back here. Let a paper clone fight the Hokage or something, not you."
"G-Got it," she nodded, still shivering with adrenaline. "What's it l-like in Konoha right now?"
Nagato hesitated. "...It's... not a not going well. Telling you really wouldn't help your emotional state right now though; twenty seconds ago you were in heroic sacrifice mode and I don't want you looping back into that. Who did the Hokage bring with him?"
"Hinata Hyuuga, the Kazekage and his right-hand, and a boy with the Ice Release. I don't recognize him, but he made an ice dome that covered all of Ame before I broke it."
"...Okay... that's bad but not guaranteed death bad. We can still get out of this, keep that in mind no matter what. Where's the real you now?"
"On my way," she assured him and took a shaky deep breath. "Give me a chakra receiver so I can set you up with another Path."
Nagato nodded and held out his hand, producing a circular plate of black metal with a spike on one flat side. Even as Konan began to reach for it, he had already turned his attention to Konoha and settled into character as Pain once more.
X
The first sight he noted through the Animal Path's eyes was his centipede summon falling before a team of Kimimaro, Juugo, Suigetsu, and a solid two dozen of Karin's shadow clones. Their combined efforts had left gashes and cracks throughout the centipede's shell, most of which were concentrated at the points on its body nearest the ground. There were only a few thinner cuts along its back plates from where Karin's clones had scaled attacked it from above.
At some point during the battle its other eye had been messily destroyed by another thrown sword, and its face had been caved in by a tremendous blow from Samehada which meant it must've lowered its head to attack at some point. Its right mandible was now dangling from the side of its face and a few chunks of its shell had detached completely away. This particular blow had likely hastened its demise by several minutes.
But only now did it finally fall with a sound somewhere between hiss and groan, too much inhuman blood lost, too much pain suffered, perhaps the blow to the face had caused bleeding inside its brain in addition to the scratch damage across the rest of its entire body. Regardless, it fell still and erupted into smoke mere moments after Nagato returned his attention to the battle.
This made it somewhat hard to keep up the emotionless stony expression that Pain needed to wear at all times, but he managed.
Options?
The Naraka Path can try using the King of Hell on the enemy, but he'd have to move into harm's way for that. The Animal Path is the only way to go here.
Assets on hand?
Summons. Lots of summons, including the King of Hell if we're desperate.
Assets needed?
Time to summon them.
Plan?
Pick one summon specifically to buy time for the others.
Approved.
The Animal Path started moving, dropping into a crouch while hidden from Taka by the chakra smoke from the dispelling centipede. With no need to waste time on drawing blood or shaping hand seals, the Rinnegan Summoning Jutsu was superior in speed and convenience. Fresh chakra smoke bloomed up around the Animal Path, and then she hopped backward into the open mouth of a giant chameleon.
Its mouth closed around her, but the heat, darkness and unpleasant air did nothing to bother Pain.
Problem: the Sharingan will still be able to track me.
Solution: block Sasuke's line of sight with another chakra silhouette.
"Summoning Jutsu."
Across the battlefield, a pair of red-on-black eyes followed the upward growth of the smoke cloud obscuring the Animal Path. It's larger than the others he's called, Sasuke noted, about the same size as Aoda. He glimpsed a patch of fur through the smoke, bright orange of a similar shade to the color Naruto preferred most.
"...What the hell is that?"
Its eyes, hugely wide and unblinking, had yellow sclerae with eerily glowing red irides. It seemed to lack pupils entirely. Below these eyes dangled a flexible trunk over its mouth, smaller than an elephant's only when compared to the scale of the rest of its body. Its ears were as colossal as its face and were firmly upright; it likely had phenomenal hearing which suggested its sight could be subpar, but there was no guarantee there.
Its face and the insides of its ears were bare of fur, covered instead with exposed pale skin. Much of its body was otherwise wrapped in a coat of attention-grabbing orange and yellow, including its limbs long and slender enough to appear frail at a first glance, but not a second. Its forearms each ended in two long and deeply curved black claws, while its hind paws had much smaller, more ordinary ones.
Its belly and throat were lined with paler grey fur, as was the underside of the webbing that suddenly stretched taut between all four of its limbs, revealing it was capable of stunted flight.
The monster shot toward Taka, targeting Aoda and Sasuke among them specifically. The pair of scarlet starbursts in Sasuke's eyes flickered and spun around, analyzing the oncoming attack in hopes of finding a way out of it. Aoda darted ahead even before the mantle of Susanoo assembled over his scales, but by the time he clashed with the airborne lemur he was fully armored by Sasuke's chakra.
"It's using chakra!" Sasuke called, straining his voice to be heard over the frantic howls of the beast attacking Aoda. "It can fly using the Wind Release!"
"Use those black flames on it," Aoda suggested just before twisting aside to dodge a sweep of the orange thing's claws. "None of Pain's other summons have been able to counter them."
"Hn," he nodded and cast a glare at the monster, blasting its face with lightless flame. The thing screamed and frantically backpedalled away from Aoda, scratching at its burning face.
Sasuke's eyes went wide then, taking in the sight of the lemur's chakra surging toward the flames on its face and twisting under the surface, spiralling away throughout its head and neck. I know that jutsu. I remember it! "Aoda, pull back! We need to regroup!" The snake hissed in alarm and quickly moved to follow his order, taking care to dodge the Water Fang Bullet the lemur fired from its trunk after them.
"What the hell was that!?" Sakura landed in a crouch next to him atop Aoda's head.
"It's a chakra absorption jutsu," Sasuke spoke up loud enough for Taka to hear. "An invention of Kabuto's; only for use by beings with access to all five natures. Remember the silver snake he used on us back in Iron?" she nodded, piecing it together. "Whenever it gets hit with an elemental jutsu, it can apply another nature with the upper hand over it, water trumps fire and so on. It takes control of the offending chakra and redirects it, forms it into a projectile and shoots it back."
"So how do we counter it?" she sized up the giant lemur and pulled another black egg from her pouch, wondering if it would do any good. "Jakuzure was able to kill that snake with a non-elemental jutsu; will that work for us?"
"Hn," he nodded. "But this thing doesn't seem to have the healing ability that snake had, so any damage our elemental attacks can do before they get absorbed will stay there. The burn on its face isn't gone; only the flames are. But be careful... if it has a counter to the elemental attacks I specialize in, it might have other counters for all of our jutsu."
"I can think of a good way to find out," she answered and whipped her projectile at the abominous lemur's face. It produced a quick chirp that seemed completely at odds with its appearance and size, raising its trunk and aiming it at the oncoming black egg. The thing fired a burst of water caged together with shape transformation, sniping Sakura's egg out of the air.
Sasuke brought forth the Sword of Totsuka next, aiming it at the monster's center of mass and extending the blade with lightning speed. The thing at least tried to lean aside, but the liquid blade only pierced its chest somewhat off-center as a result.
He pulled, sucking the lemur into the twisting seal within the liquid and returning the blade to a proper length at the same time. "Hn. That should do it."
One must note, however, that some seals are vastly stronger than others. A Tailed Beast can be restrained by a seal such as the Eight Trigrams, but certainly not by a basic storage seal. Pain's newest summon was admittedly nowhere near as powerful as Kurama, but it still wasted no time beginning a destructive tantrum within the seal on Sasuke's sword.
Despite the modifications Totsuka had made to it, that seal was ultimately not much stronger than an ordinary one; it had been meant to cage human shinobi likely no more powerful than Jounin. Sasuke had the briefest of moments to realize this before the lemur exploded free of the sword, scattering the liquid blade and crushing Aoda downward under its sudden weight. Sasuke and Sakura were both thrown from the snake's back, though Sasuke at least managed to keep a grip on the hilt of the legendary weapon.
Within the smoke cloud that had been unsealed along with Pain's summon, he was unable to see the approaching ground until it was very nearly too late. With the slow-motion sight of his Sharingan he was just able to react, to roll with the hard impact. He tumbled onto his back, not quite able to control his momentum enough to stop on his feet.
The damaged ancient blade slithered back toward its hilt through dozens of trickling streams, which mildly surprised Sasuke. He sat up with a groan and lifted the blade to inspect it with his Sharingan.
"...Damn." Not even his eyes were fast enough to read the fuinjutsu script in motion through the surging sword, but he could see that there were far fewer passages of eldritch text floating through the alcohol. It didn't take much effort for him to guess why. The storage seal is gone; that thing broke it and now there's nothing left.
The glow in his eyes flicked left, drawn to the sound of three bursts of fresh chakra smoke in quick succession. More of them. He tested the remaining ability of his fluid sword, extending it a few feet and calling it back with no trouble. "Hn." He turned the sword to his left and gathered his chakra, then whipped it to the right while extending it to reach those chakra clouds.
His blade sliced through something thick and heavy before passing back into the open air, he had cleaved entirely through one of Pain's summons. The second, however, completely brought the blade's momentum to a halt. Sasuke grimaced and retracted his sword to a normal length; he unfurled his wings and took to the air with it in hand.
He burst through the upper reaches of the smoke and took aim at a thinner spot in the cloud where Aoda and Pain's monster were clashing and thinning the air of smoke with each blow. He was about to let loose a burst of Amaterasu and simultaneously lance into the thing's back with the Sword of Totsuka, but he stopped himself just short of interrupting Sakura's bone-crunching right cross to the thing's face.
Kami, that's hot.
He waited another second or so for her momentum to carry her past the lemur, then set it on fire and rapidly stabbed it several times with the retracting and extending liquid sword. It reared up and roared, the sound oddly filtered through its trunk rather than its open mouth. Aoda seized the oppurtunity to twine his armored body around the lemur and sink lightning-coated fangs into its neck.
The thing spat out a shaped burst of wind, but hit nothing with Aoda's redirected and reshaped chakra. Sasuke landed near Sakura and tucked his wings back but kept his Cursed Seal active. "Nice shot," he commented.
"Heh." Sakura grinned, hearing the admiration in his tone since he wasn't trying to hide it. "I think I broke something important with that one."
"Hn."
"Sasuke-sama," Aoda called, still restraining the orange-furred lemur, "I can handle this creature long enough for you to attack Pain; stop him from summoning anything more!"
"He already has," Sasuke noted, turning to look at the two additional summons now visible through the faded chakra smoke. The one that had apparently stopped his blade was a gigantic panda that appeared almost chiseled from stone, down to each strand of its fur unruffled by the breeze. Next to it stood a similarly huge crab with a dull red-orange shell. Neither was comparable to the lemur and Aoda in size; they were still threats but not Bijuu-sized ones.
Behind those two he was able to spot Pain's chakra silhouette, but he could only see open air giving off that chilling blue glow. "...He's hiding inside another summon." His first instinct was to form Susanoo and fire an arrow of black flame at the invisible chamber containing the Animal Path, but his ethereal armor was already assigned to protect Aoda from the frenzied attacks of the lemur summon.
He settled for taking aim with the Sword of Totsuka instead, but when he shot it toward the invisible summon it was promptly caught by an outstretched paw from the panda, who once again was left unharmed by the blade. Sasuke retracted it and glanced just below the thing's paw, igniting the front of the invisible summon with Amaterasu as a third option.
Somewhere behind Sasuke and to his right, Karin brought up her hands in a single seal. Now's our chance! "Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Along with three hundred and forty-nine clones, the real Uzumaki sprinted forward with her swords low at her sides. She made certain to pass close enough by Sakura that she could call out to her and be heard over the stampede. "Sakura I need you to punch it straight upward!"
For a moment, Sakura at first questioned what Karin's plan could possibly be. Then she decided that she didn't have time to waste musing why she needed to help, and she lunged forward along with the army of clones.
As the three hundred and fifty-one kunoichi approached with killing intent, the chameleon gave up trying to hide itself since the flames on its face revealed its position easily enough. In addition, Pain was aware that Karin possessed a minor doujutsu allowing her to see the chameleon's chakra regardless. Its mouth opened wide to unveil the Animal Path perched on its rolled-up tongue, poised to jump.
Sakura couldn't be sure whether Pain intended this move as an attack or an escape, but either way she picked up speed and raised her fist. "You're not going anywhere!" The Animal Path's eyes widened slightly but perceptibly, only now spotting the pink-haired girl among a dense crowd of redheads. She was at the head of the group now, sprinting even faster toward Pain while the flock of Karins actually slowed down.
The huge panda summon that had blocked Sasuke's sword twice now moved to catch Sakura's punch as well, but she would have none of it. She let her feet slip forward out from under her, skidding on her back under the panda's legs even as its weight came crashing down, just barely too late to block her. With chakra control she stuck the soles of her boots to the dirt, her momentum violently springing her to her feet as a result. She resumed her charge and delivered her uppercut to its intended target without slowing down.
"CHA!"
The chameleon's jaws were brutally forced shut hard enough to crush the Animal Path between its tongue and the roof of its mouth. The entire huge summon was fired into the air as well, setting the stage for whatever plan Karin had in mind.
She risked a glance over her shoulder at the clones and wasn't disappointed. The real Karin crouched with her palms to the earth, channeling a wave of chakra downward before calling it back up beneath the airborne summon as a cluster of chakra chains. Sakura at first expected the bladed tips of the chains to stab into the chameleon directly, but instead they phased into its scales without drawing blood. The creature took on a soft silvery glow, and at the same time Karin's chains vanished.
She turned her chains into a fuinjutsu? Sakura peered up to confirm that the chameleon was held perfectly in place, completely motionless and awaiting the next phase of Karin's attack. It wasn't supported by any structure Sakura could see, but gravity appeared to have no effect on it. Yeah, that's definitely a seal!
Three hundred and fifty Uzumakis reached skyward with their right hands and shot additional silver chains at the suspended chameleon, this time piercing its outer carapace more directly. The chains shortened roughly, yanking all of the clones up toward the defenseless summon.
"You won't get out of this one!" The shadow clones all converged on the summon each with their left-hand blades extended for their first slash. Upon impact the silvery glow holding the chameleon shattered, allowing it to screech in response to the hundreds of gashes now laid across its belly. "Uzumaki Hidenjutsu: Seven Hundred Swords!"
Her right-hand swords came sweeping up next, leaving a fresh set of three hundred and fifty slices in the chameleon's flesh. With a collective battlecry they switched back and forth from left sword to right and back, another thousand and fifty strikes. The chameleon was already dead at this point, but Karin landed a sixth wave of slashes before the summon dispelled to expose the Animal Path. The seventh wave struck Pain directly, and with their task accomplished Karin's clones dispelled en masse.
Two thousand, four hundred and fifty cuts in however many seconds that was... that's definitely a new record.
As she began to fall, she cast a glance over her shoulder at the ongoing battle between Aoda and Pain's largest summon. The two were quite evenly matched; the lemur wasn't able to do much damage with Sasuke's Susanoo cushioning its blows, but at the same time Aoda's lightning jutsu were useless and his physical attacks weren't fazing the creature.
In addition, the smaller panda and crab summons were still present and unharmed as of yet, not counting the pair of scratches the panda bore from contact with the Sword of Totsuka. The Naraka Path had kept its distance from the Animal Path's battle; she noted this with some confusion just before she hit the ground. She rolled with the impact, but it had been a hard enough fall to still knock the wind from her lungs.
On top of that, the prolonged battle was starting to wear her down. As an Uzumaki she still had chakra to spare; the shadow clones and chakra chains had been taxing but not crippling. The more pressing problem was her physical exhaustion; the overdose of adrenaline pumping through her veins was taking its toll. Even her mind felt sluggish and sore at this point, which worried her the most out of it all.
"You're like me. An Uzumaki."
She had plenty of adrenaline left to jump at the sound of Pain's voice however, and she made it to her feet almost in time to escape his next move. She spun to face him and raised her swords, but his cold hand latched shut on her throat. She raised her cutlasses regardless, but he stabbed his darker piercing weapon through her belly before she could follow through with her slashes.
"I thought I was the only one with this mutation-"
you're talking out loud revealing your secret ability to the enemy this is something a manga villain would do
THINK
thinking is what you're good at so DO IT
Nagato stopped short of finishing his sentence; he shook his head and pulled the weapon free of Karin's chest. She fell while he turned his mismatched doujutsu on the remaining members of Taka, already aware that he was doomed to lose this Path as well.
With the time I have remaining, my objective is now to determine why the King of Hell failed to answer my call just now.
That won't take long; the answer is obvious. The other side of the conversation brought up a snapshot of a memory from decades ago; his first encounter and discussion with the King of Hell. It's a summon shared among all Rinnegan users, so it'll never take sides in a fight between them.
But that girl had chakra chains, therefore she couldn't have awakened the Rinnegan. That only leaves the Hokage as the one responsible for this. That doesn't make sense; I was able to call the King to regenerate my leg a few minutes ago. What changed since then?
Maybe it's because you're mentally prepared for battle with Naruto now; you know he's in Ame and you intend to kill him.
I've intended to kill him for years, Nagato countered, and I've known since this morning that he's on his way to attack me.
But a few minutes ago that wasn't the foremost thought on your mind. Now you're fighting this battle with the explicit intent of gaining an advantage against Naruto; that wasn't the case when the King grew back your leg.
...True, Nagato admitted and glanced over his shoulder. Behind the Naraka Path, Karin let out a groan of pain with her teeth sinking into her left wrist. Before Pain's eyes, the stab wound in her chest was sealed.
Huh. That's new.
A sword each of thick bone and ancient sake both pierced the Naraka Path's chest at almost the same time, and Karin managed to whip one of her swords through his ankles for good measure. Keeping in mind that Karin had just survived a wound similar to the one Pain had now taken, Kimimaro lifted his longsword and whipped it through the air with all the might of his fully active Cursed Seal. Pain flew along the arc of his horizontal slash, meeting a tree in the distance hard enough to smash it down.
"Karin!?"
"I'm fine," she panted, dropping her blood-slick swords at her sides. "I'm exhausted, not dying."
Kimimaro spun and caught a punch from the giant panda on his shield, but his feet slid back over the earth far enough to force Karin to scramble away, for fear of him tripping over her which would provide an opening for the summon's next punch. Her heart resumed pounding in her throat and she snatched up her swords once more.
"Two down," Suigetsu noted to her left. She jumped at his voice and very nearly moved to attack him before she recognized it. "Not bad, lovebirds. Not bad at all."
"I don't suppose you have an idea for taking this thing down?" Kimimaro grunted and shoved the panda back with his shield. He risked a quick jab with his sword next, but this only confirmed that the thing was as impenetrable as ever.
"Its durability might be from a defensive jutsu," the boy hefted Samehada with far less trouble than one would expect, "so I might be able to eat through it."
"Go for it!" The knight blocked the panda's next earth-shaking punch, then stepped aside to allow Suigetsu an opening. The aspiring Swordsman of the Mist lunged without hesitation, a huge sharp grin splitting his face.
X
Itachi's first move upon meeting the Human Path several minutes prior was to set him on fire with a glance. When his Amaterasu dimmed and flickered out after a few seconds, leaving a hole charred across the front of Pain's robe and chest, Itachi carried on to his next weapon of choice instinctively and without pause. His Mangekyou Sharingan whirled and trickled blood to lay Tsukuyomi over Pain's senses.
"I imagine your Rinnegan will help you in your efforts to break this genjutsu," said he, "but I know from experience that Tsukuyomi has a solid chance of trapping a Sharingan wielder. I at least have a chance."
"...Itachi." Pain's assymetrical eyes drifted from left to right, sizing up the depth of Tsukuyomi's illusions for the first time. "I guess it doesn't hurt for me to admit that I've wanted to see this genjutsu for years. And it's convenient that it slows down time to this extent, since I want to talk to you and I don't have much time."
Itachi hesitated; the difference in Pain's speech patterns was rather apparent. The so-called God was no longer making an effort to speak formally and forcefully, and along with this his expression had changed, was less lifeless now. This was Nagato Uzumaki, a man Itachi had never talked with before. "I don't think there's anything for us to talk about, unless of course you're offering terms of surrender."
Nagato chuckled just once, a brief stunted sound. "Sorry, but that's off the table. I was actually going to start by asking you to rejoin Akatsuki... it's obviously a waste of time, but thanks to your jutsu we have plenty of that."
"That's true... but I'll keep my reply short even so. My loyalty has always been to Konoha and the Hokage, and it will remain so until I die."
Nagato shrugged. "Thought so." he took a step forward, but that was as far as he made it before hundreds of barbed chains twined around him and pulled him back against a wooden crucifix that rose from the ground behind him. "Ya know, we actually have the same motive, Itachi. Peace. I think if we'd managed to agree on the path to that goal at any point over the past few years, you and I could've been good friends."
"Unfortunately," Itachi replied, "what you call peace is really just a dystopian dictatorship."
"What makes you say that?"
The Mangekyou Sharingan went wide; his illusion had gone from completely intact to completely eradicated in an instant.
"What evidence has led you to make the observation, 'Akatsuki's plan will lead to the creation of a world worse than this one?' What do you think you know, and how do you think you know it?"
"...In summary," Itachi began and the surprise faded from his face, "Your intent was formerly to subjugate the entire world with a chakra weapon of mass destruction. You intended to use this weapon to level a small country on a regular basis, to keep the survivors in line..."
"Hold on."
"...Hn?"
"You... honestly thought that was the real plan? Ever? Itachi, I'm genuinely let down by that. You know me, you know I'm not stupid, so you know I'd never do something like that. I'm sure you could even figure out why I bothered with a cover story in the first place, if you take a few seconds to think about it now."
"Ah," said Itachi, and he found that Nagato was telling the truth. In hindsight it was obvious. "Easier to pitch a story like that to the lunatics we worked with."
Nagato nodded. "Cases in point, Hidan and Deidara. I weighed the options and concluded they'd be much more likely to support a plan like that instead of the Eye of the Moon."
"Hn. That brings me to my next point regardless. Your true goal is to brainwash everyone on this planet with a genjutsu that will act much like a surrogate reality, discarding this true world."
"I really don't like how people always use words like that when they first hear the plan," said Nagato. "'True world.' Like the Infinite Tsukuyomi would be an untrue one."
"It would be," said Itachi, now mildly confused.
"No," Nagato shook his head. "That's wrong; it shouldn't matter that the people of this world live in a utopia set in a virtual reality as opposed to this physical one. The new world will be populated by the same human minds with their hopes and dreams intact, even fulfilled. Everyone will be sharing this same world; they won't be imprisoned and kept from each other in any way. Meanwhile in this world, their bodies will be protected from harm by the true form of the Juubi, so tell me. What problem do you see with the Infinite Tsukuyomi?"
"I can name a few without even needing to think. First and foremost, how will the entire world's population be physically sustained while they dream in your genjutsu? And second, how do you know the Infinite Tsukuyomi will function as you've described? It's never been cast before so far as I know, and I can't even imagine the complexity of a genjutsu that would connect hundreds of millions of minds like a Yamanaka mindscape. It would take more than just a chakra supply from the Ten-Tails, it would take a superintelligence."
"And third... that better world you're looking for can be achieved without resorting to the Infinite Tsukuyomi, and it'll truly be more meaningful when we achieve it through our own free will."
"Free will... look at what we've done with free will, Itachi. Through our own free will, we've built an eternal cycle of hatred and death. I won't stand for that."
"It's not eternal, Nagato. The cycle of hatred is not infinite and it will be broken."
"On that last point," Pain's voice went cold, "on that much we can agree."
"Unfortunately, it seems like that's all." The air between and around the two doujutsu users began glimmering faintly with chakra, the beginning of a mirage genjutsu being woven by Itachi.
Nagato was gone then, the intentionally blank and lifeless face of Pain was now scanning the mist of chakra to determine its purpose. To figure out a strange plot, look at the result and ask who benefits. Except we already know that this genjutsu is supposed to help Itachi kill me; the question remaining is how?
It's a genjutsu; it's meant to make me doubt my senses. That much is obvious; Itachi thinks that he can fool the Rinnegan if he uses genjutsu cleverly enough.
...Can he?
Itachi is smart. Smart enough to convince me and every other member of Akatsuki that his true allegiance was with us. Even without his Sharingan he's a master of genjutsu, and he knows what they look like through a doujutsu, the way they glow. It's not a question of him being smart enough to figure out a way to use genjutsu on a doujutsu, it's a question of whether it's possible at all. If it is, he's definitely taken the time to figure out how.
And the fact that he's even trying to do it is all the evidence I need to know he'll pull it off.
Which means I have to stop him.
All of this flashed through Nagato's mind in an unnaturally brief instant, and then he was sprinting toward Itachi with all the speed the Human Path could muster. He didn't make it even halfway to his former teammate before Itachi broke apart into a murder of screeching crows.
genjutsu or crow clone
That's why he set up the chakra mist, the air is glowing. The crows are glowing too, but Itachi's summons have chakra so they could still be real. Through this light in the air, I can't tell if it's the glow of a genjutsu or a chakra silhouette.
So figure it out another way, said the devil's advocate, resurfacing without hesitation. Could Itachi cast his doujutsu through a genjutsu?
No. Definitely not.
Through a crow clone?
...Highly likely.
Are there any other ways he could have used Amaterasu and Tsukuyomi on me?
A genjutsu clone would have no substance and he's sufficiently skilled with illusions to make it transparent from the back, from his point of view. He could've been standing behind it and cast his doujutsu through it, along the same line of sight so I wouldn't know-
Oh come on, remember the complexity penalty! For that to work, Itachi would've had to hide his own chakra silhouette from the Rinnegan. It'd be easier for him to use a clone and he knows it. But we don't have to settle for a good guess, not when it's so easy for us to test the theory outright.
Pain turned and shot a thick black senbon from his left palm, lancing through one of the crows in mid-flight. The chakra he felt through the receiver was purely Itachi's, lacking any trace of chakra from a crow summon.
Itachi is also too smart to make a move that would be transparent and obvious to me. He chose the more complex attack intentionally.
Nagato clapped his hands together in a Snake seal, his scarlet eye flickering back and forth at such speeds that the purple one being carried along saw nothing through the blur. It was a disconcerting effect of using the Sharingan and Rinnegan at once; he had spent weeks getting comfortable with the vertigo.
there
He turned and aimed at Itachi, whose chakra silhouette was disturbingly not visible through either of Pain's doujutsu. "Water Release: Water Fang Bullet."
His chakra silhouette is suppressed somehow, hidden. Likely an Uchiha seal of some kind, hiding his chakra rather than suppressing its flow. He's still able to use jutsu so the silhouette is still there, I just can't see it.
Itachi's own water jutsu, cast in a perfect mirror of Nagato's motion, collided with its counterpart and exploded into chakra-laced mist which the Human Path sprinted through. The Uchiha raised up the most basic form of his Susanoo, a cocoon of red-orange chakra bones that shielded him from all sides. At the same time he took a tremendous leap backward and raised his hands in another seal, this time a Tiger.
Nagato started with another Snake seal instead, matching Itachi's Great Fireball with a smaller Water Bullet. His hands kept shifting while he spat out the water projectile, blurring through the shortest seal sequence he could readily think of.
He chose the Water Scattershot, a volley of a few dozen small orbs of shaped water spraying forward and apart. Itachi parried with the Phoenix Flower Jutsu; each ball of fire met its Water Release counterpart and reduced both to smoke and steam.
A fistful of scattered shuriken flew past those bursts of mist, having been concealed within the Phoenix Flowers. Nagato reacted on instinct; he swept his open hands forward and let loose a brace of chakra receivers no longer than the average senbon, one to knock each shuriken from the air and six more to target Itachi.
As lightning-fast as the Sharingan could glance from one target to the next, each receiver was burned from the air with a tiny burst of black flame. The Mangekyou Sharingan turned then on the Human Path, just barely hidden in time by a rising wall of rough grey stone. Itachi set that on fire instead, intent on burning a hole through the solid rock for a glimpse of Nagato preparing his next water jutsu.
An oversized Water Dragon Bullet soared up over the top of the Earth Wall. Itachi's accelerated sight had no trouble spotting the Human Path within its head, blitzing through another string of hand seals. He cast six Sharingan genjutsu on Nagato, the last of which was Tsukuyomi, and then set the water dragon's face on fire for good measure.
Nagato's jutsu split into seven smaller dragons just as Itachi felt his illusions being ripped apart by precisely guided chakra pulses. His Sharingan whirred between them all, searching for Nagato and instead finding seven identical clones within the dragons' heads, all with the same Ram seal held upright.
"Wind Release: Drilling Air Bullets!"
The ribcage of Susanoo caved in from all sides, absorbing the impact of the wind jutsu but crunching inward at the same time. The glowing bones crumbled into red-orange smoke, leaving Itachi open to the approaching eighth wind attack from the real Human Path, now visible through the hole burned in his Earth Wall.
The Drilling Air Bullet slammed hard into Itachi and hauled him off his feet. His scarlet eyes were able to keep track of his flight until he shot through a brick wall and into a Konoha civilian's kitchen; he closed them instinctively at the moment of impact.
Susanoo's skeletal left arm came up and manifested the Yata Mirror to block the hole in the wall, an attempt to buy a second or two of extra time to stand up and brace for Pain's next move. A lightning jutsu of some kind struck the ancient shield; he felt its nature type switch to wind at precisely the right moment. He stood without grimacing, without showing any trace of the pain he felt in his chest from the wind attack. Something was broken or otherwise badly damaged there, but he wasn't dead from it and so he disregarded it.
An Earth Bullet ripped a hole in the roof across the room and then blasted a crater into the floor as well. Itachi shifted the Yata Mirror to block Nagato's next move, but the Human Path stood at the edge of the hole in the roof and watched Itachi through the shield instead.
"I have one last question to ask of you, Itachi."
"Hn?"
"The village has been successfully evacuated; this much I know. But where did you move everyone? Somewhere outside the village walls?" Itachi opened his mouth to reply that he had no reason to reveal such sensitive information, but Nagato cut him off. "Wait, no, that's ridiculous. You wouldn't move tens of thousands of civilians outside the safety of the walls into a wilderness where they could be targeted from any angle by an invading force. A stronghold within the village, then. Under the Hokage monument?"
Itachi remained motionless and silent, then realized only a moment too late that he'd made a mistake in saying nothing instead of no.
"I suppose that'll work," said Pain. "I wish we could've agreed, Itachi, I really do. But this is goodbye."
The Human Path collapsed, looking for all the world like it had never been anything more than a corpse.
Itachi was then free to turn a pair of wide, horrified eyes on the supernova of a chakra silhouette lighting up the sky above Konoha.
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