A/N: So, I fell out of love with reading, writing, and anime, along with many other things I used to enjoy a while back and it's felt like I've been up the creek without a paddle for a few years now. But in an effort to get back into the swing of things, I made a New Year's resolution to finish what I had started, and after starting this story nearly four years ago, I figured it was about time I finished it.

I'm surprised that there was a time when I could write over 200,000 words regardless of how long it took, but with three or four chapters to go, I hope I can do my past self justice. And maybe get back into writing in general, even if it's just one-shots and shorter stories. I'm also going to lift the curtain a bit and say I remember having the entire story planned and written out but that was on an old PC that I do not have access to anymore, so even though I vaguely remember how the story was supposed to end, apologies if I don't resolve every loose end I started before.

XXX

CHAPTER FORTY

Pain!

XXX

A few hours later, Naruto sat up and screamed, first out of panic then out of agony. He was half-naked and covered in bandages and chakra-deprivation seals. Every inch of movement reverberated throughout his body. He was in pain, but the pain at least proved he was alive.

His mind was cloudy and his senses were foggy. He needed a moment to take in his surroundings. He was in a tent. It was cold and dark and didn't give him any room to stretch his legs. He looked down at his right hand – so heavily wrapped with bandages that he could barely form a fist.

Suddenly, it all came back to him.

"Sasuke…" Naruto whispered.

The last thing he remembered was interlocking fingers with him after their battle destroyed a large portion of the Valley of the End. "What happened then?" Naruto asked himself. He tried to stand up but the pain shot through his body, sending him back down.

He lay there for a few minutes, just taking the pain in. There was no time to complain about pain though. Once his body had adjusted to it, he stood back up again and stumbled through the tent flap out into the world.

What he saw when he ventured through that curtain was a world at war.

"Ame…" he said to himself, staring out at the battlefield in front of him. He was in a near-empty war camp several metres behind the frontlines. In front of him was an acre or two of mud, barbed wire, and shrapnel which had been left behind, along with a few hundred bodies, by the Battle for Ame – which was still underway. He squinted to catch a glimpse of the edge of a lake. Bodies had washed onto shore, both belonging to White Zetsu and to his allies. The lake bled red.

Naruto took a few steps forward before stumbling back into the tent. He sat under the tarp and looked up at the sky. Something was wrong. He held his hand out and let the rain land on his palm.

"You feel it too, huh?" Fuu asked, walking around craters to get to the blonde man. She was holding an umbrella. "The rain. It's sapping our chakra – too slowly for most shinobi to notice, but quickly enough to hinder our efforts."

"What's causing it?" Naruto asked.

"We're not too sure ourselves," Fuu said.

Naruto's attention returned to the battlefield. He couldn't see the actual fighting but he could hear metal clashing in the distance and whenever a chakra cannon fired, it would illuminate the surrounding area. "How long was I out?" he asked. The screams of dying shinobi echoing over the otherwise silent lake.

"About eleven hours."

"How long has the fighting been going on?"

"About two hours. We just managed to break through the gates and our shinobi are taking the city, building by building."

"Sounds cumbersome," Naruto said. She nodded furiously. He wondered why she was here then, "Where are the other jinchuuriki?"

Fuu explained that an argument had broken out while Naruto was out. Everyone had agreed on a plan beforehand, but once they reached the village and felt the rain starting to drain their chakra, they knew they wouldn't be able to win a war of attrition.

"So?"

"So Gaara came up with this idea," Fuu said, massaging her elbow. "I can't quite explain it the way he did, but essentially, he said that when two jinchuuriki transform at the same time instead of cancelling each other out, each explosion complements the next… sets off a chain reaction, ssu."

She told him that the idea drove a wedge between the jinchuuriki. His plan was going to lead to the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent people. "And what did Gaara have to say about that?" Naruto asked.

"He said sacrifices had to be made in the name of peace."

"Where is he now?"

"He's in his tent. After a few minutes of arguing, they eventually came to an agreement. Gaara gave everyone three hours to either evacuate the village or liberate it. If the battle isn't over by then, he's going to enter the village with B, and Roshi, and turn everything to dust." Naruto asked about the other jinchuuriki – the ones she hadn't mentioned, "Well, we've already exhausted two of our three hours, so Yugito and Han entered the village with the kage to help end the battle as quickly as possible."

Naruto sat in silence to think about what he wanted to do next. "And what happened to Sasuke?" Fuu remained silent. It was her way of telling him not to worry about that for now. "Is he at least safe?"

"He's a prisoner of war, Naruto. He'll be kept as safe as any other prisoner."

"I'll go speak to him," he said, stepping out of his tent.

Fuu pushed him back in. "No, you won't. You're in no condition to walk around in this weather. You're very chakra-deprived. That rain will have you on your ass by the end of the hour."

"So what I'm hearing is…" Naruto ripped off all the chakra seals and bandages as he walked out into the rain, "... I've got 59 minutes."

Fuu tried to bargain with him at first, but quickly realised there was no use. She followed behind him as they reached the prisoner's area – a large clearing lined with chakra suppressant seals. Naruto stepped over a dozen shinobi who were bound and gagged, and made a beeline for his best friend turned rival turned friend again.

Sasuke was sitting on a bench covered in bandages and chakra deprivation seals. The prisoner's area didn't have a roof over it, so even though the chakra deprivation seals were supplying him with a steady stream of chakra, he was losing just as much if not more chakra to the downpour.

"Give me your umbrella," Naruto said.

"Excuse me?"

The raven-haired man looked like a shell of himself, sitting on the bench staring into nothing. His left eye was covered with bandages, leaving his right eye soulless and deprived of light.

"I need to protect him from the rain so he can actually recover some chakra. Give me your umbrella," Naruto said. Fuu handed it to him and he held it over Sasuke for a few minutes.

He started to blink again. The light returned to his eyes. Sasuke took a deep breath in, filling his lungs with the cold, crisp Ame air. He shook himself back to reality before looking up at Naruto. "You look like shit," he said, before doubling over in a coughing fit.

Naruto grinned. "Good to see the pot still calling the kettle black."

"Naruto, I'm cold," Fuu said, already drenched.

"Let's get inside then," Naruto said.

Fuu cocked a brow. She looked at Sasuke. Naruto looked down too. The man was bound by chains and tags. Some of the tags – which Naruto thought were for chakra deprivation – were actually for restricting movement and preventing the flow of chakra.

"Why is Sasuke bound like some sort of animal?" Naruto asked.

"Because he's a prisoner of war, Naruto. I don't care what your relationship with him was like before the war, for as long as I've known Sasuke, he's been a maniacal psychopath. And he tried to kill you at the Valley of the End. So, while we're at war with the organisation he's been affiliated with for the last few years, we can't let him walk around like a free man just because you can vouch for him, ssu!" Fuu said before ripping her umbrella from Naruto's hand.

Sasuke confirmed what Fuu said. "I'm a prisoner of war, Naruto. I need you to go out there and end this conflict. When this is all over, we can catch up over a bowl of ramen."

Naruto protested but Sasuke refused to listen. His eyes remained fixated on the skies above. He gave Naruto some insider information. The rain that was falling on the village was actually an ability called the Rainmaker Jutsu. The clouds, the rain, the mist, all of it was Pain's doing. He could not only use the rain to drain people's vitality but he could also use it for perception.

To stop the rain, he needed to kill Pain.

"Do you know where he is?" Naruto asked.

Sasuke stared into the mist. He explained that hidden within the mist was a tall tower with four humanoid faces on it. It was the tallest tower in Ame, and from its peak, Pain watched over his domain.

Naruto nodded. "Thank you," the jinchuuriki said. He turned to an irritated Fuu and asked, "How many minutes left?"

XXX

Ten minutes later, in the tallest tower in Ame, Pain stood atop his perch looking down at the battlefield. The battle within the city had appeared to split into three main operations: the five kage, Kakashi, A, Kurotsuchi, Mei, and Temari against Tobi and Orochimaru in the city square; the two jinchuuriki and majority of the army against the wall of White Zetsu in the village's business district; and less than a thousand shinobi going from house to house clearing the village of its citizens within the residential zone.

"What could they possibly be up to?" Pain whispered to himself, focusing on his opponents' rescue efforts. They weren't killing any of the people they found in the residential areas. They were pulling them out from their homes and racing them to the village gates, one after the other.

Konan flew up to the orange-haired man and told him to duck. He did. She launched a volley of paper kunai into the darkness.

.

.

.

"Have you sensed something I didn't?" Pain asked.

"Not sensed… felt, luckily. He managed to get past all our sensors but stepped on one of my papers three floors down. His chakra signature is unlike anyone else's," Konan said, landing beside Pain. "He's a jinchuuriki."

Pain turned to face the darkness. "A jinchuuriki, huh? A lone jinchuuriki wanders into my home uninvited. For what purpose, hoping to claim glory, end the war, write your name in lights? I don't know what you expected would happen, but you are a calf. A lone calf who has wandered into the abattoir." Pain's pupils dilated as he reached his hand out. "Bansho Ten'in."

A demon wind shuriken flew towards him – drawn by his own gravitational force.

He dodged.

Naruto flew out of the shadows, shirtless with a robe fluttering behind him.

Pain evaded him. Naruto leapt out through the window and grabbed Konan. They both went down and crashed into a neighbouring skyscraper. Naruto grabbed Konan and flung her into a wall. She struggled to stand. He didn't give her a moment to breathe.

It was intense. It was a flurry.

He kicked and punched and elbowed her until she finally started fighting back. She sent him back into Pain's Tower with a volley of papers. He rolled to his feet and disappeared into the shadows. Naruto clung to a steel pipe as two figures entered the room.

Naruto gasped. One of the figures seemed way too familiar. "That bastard…"

Utakata, his hair now orange and piercings running through his body, turned to stare at Naruto. Konan stood beside him, clueless as to where the Uzumaki had run off to. But the deceased jinchuuriki's eyes never left Naruto's gaze. Utakata lunged at the man, who slipped further into the darkness.

Naruto knew that there were six Pains. He also understood that the one with short spiky hair was the main guy. As he climbed from pipe to pipe using the shadows as his greatest weapon, he read the information Fuu had written for him on his head: Deva = Gravity. Preta = Absorption. Asura = Weapons. Anima = Summons. Human = Soul. Naraka = Hell.

There were six Pains, and Naruto needed to take down all six of them in forty minutes. That meant about six minutes for each Pain – nothing more, nothing less.

"Rasengan!" And he started with a bang. He slammed two Rasengan orbs into the back of one of the Pains. The entire room cracked and slabs of concrete came down from above. This Pain had orange hair, much like the others, but it was longer than Utakata's and his body much slimmer. All his bodies, save for the Deva Path, had been destroyed by Hinata, so there was no way of knowing which Pain this was. Naruto rolled him over and pulled the rods from his body.

Naruto threw them out a window. "That should buy me some time."

This had to be his tactic if he was going to survive. Each Pain was as powerful as the last so there was no way he was going to go toe to toe with all six of them, plus Konan, at the same time. He needed to be a shadow. He needed to dismantle them as quickly and as quietly as possible, still sticking to the forty-minute deadline.

"Summoning Jutsu!"

Naruto dodged a giant panda, which came crashing through the ceiling and continued down for a few more storeys. Naruto looked down to catch it slamming into the earth down below. He looked up to see Utakata looking down at him.

"Summoning Jutsu!" the jinchuuriki yelled. A giant bird flew towards him.

"Animal Path, huh?" Naruto jumped onto the bird's beak and raced up its back. Utakata braced for an attack but Naruto slipped past him and punched Konan. The angel flew back into a wall. Naruto tried to climb through a hole in the ceiling. Utakata grabbed him by the leg and pulled him out. Naruto kicked him in the face over and over until he let go.

Naruto disappeared into the darkness.

"Summoning Jutsu!" clouds poured through every pipe. A multi-headed dog slammed Naruto into the roof and broke the slab of concrete he was kneeling on. The room leaned to one side. Naruto slid down it before popping out and falling. The dog followed him down. Naruto landed on a pipe and swung around it. The multi-headed hound tried to snap at him but fell past him and crashed into the panda from before.

"Did I lose them?" Naruto asked before looking around. He saw Konan's silhouette in the corner of his eye. He ducked into another set of pipes as the room exploded from beneath him. The bird was back, and it continually tried to tear open the rooms Naruto had just been in.

All six Pains were visually linked, which was bad enough, but Naruto had to get Konan off his back because as long as she was in the air, she could catch him moving between floors. She was a pest. An annoyance. "Flying Raijin!" Naruto launched a kunai that stapled another Pain to a wall by his trench coat. "Level Two! Rasengan!" He pushed a spinning orb of chakra into the man's face. It ground through his skin, then his muscles, then his skull. Naruto pulled away when there was nothing but a neck left.

"I wonder if he saw me coming…" Naruto said, putting his hands on his hips. He was starting to breathe heavily. Time was running out. "It would help if I didn't announce my techniques when trying to sneak up on someone," he chuckled. His laughter was cut short by catching Konan staring at him through an opening in the wall.

"Vermin!"

Naruto looked over his shoulder. A tall, pale Pain stood behind him. He turned his arm into a cannon which gathered great volumes of chakra. Naruto leapt out of the way. The second Pain was obliterated by the Asura Path's chakra cannon.

Utakata joined them.

Naruto cloned himself. The clone cloned himself. They grabbed hands and swapped wrists as more clones cloned other clones. The clones launched clones at the Paths. They both withstood the barrage.

It was all a distraction.

Naruto wrapped his arms and legs around a pole and slid down to the ground level, where a chubbier Pain awaited him, along with the skinny Pain Naruto had taken out first. "Well, that's just not fair," Naruto quipped. He raised his left hand. "You, big guy, you must be the Naraka Path. I thought throwing away the other guy's rods would have made it harder to revive him but you've proven me. Why don't you throw me a bone and tell me who's who? I already know Utakata is the animal path and–"

"HELP!" Konan's screams cut through the rain. Both Pains turned to see Naruto, with four tails, mauling Konan. As she turned to paper, his claws cut through her cloak and poisoned the pages. She disappeared and reformed elsewhere, disposing of the poisoned pages, choosing to lose some of her cloak. "His skin is toxic!" she screamed.

Naruto turned to the other Pains. Utakata and the Asura Pain came down from above. And finally, Deva Pain joined them.

One Pain was missing. The one that'd had their skull obliterated. The four-tailed Naruto grinned. "What's wrong? Missing one?"

"Summoning Jutsu!" A rhino lumbered towards Naruto. With minimal effort, he tossed the charging animal up and over him. It crashed into a skyscraper and brought the entire building down.

"Bansho Ten'in!" Deva yelled. The other four pulled long rods from their robes. Naruto stumbled forward at first before being thrown towards Pain.

He erupted in a mess of poisonous spikes and arms. Deva Path leapt away. Three of the four Pains stopped but the Asura Path went in for the kill. Naruto stabbed him with his massive spikes before grabbing him with a Kurama hand and slamming him into the dirt.

It left a mark.

He jumped out of the toxic mess and put some distance between himself and the Pains. He turned his attention back to Konan, who sent a volley of shuriken at him. He reached into his pouch and countered with kunai knives.

Naraka Pain rushed in to retrieve Asura Path's body. Naruto teleported to the body first, "Flying Thunder God," and used the Pain's rod to stab Naraka Pain. He lifted him into the air before slamming Pain into the dirt.

"Shinra Tensei!"

Naruto was sent flying into a building.

"Shit, this is exactly what I wanted to avoid," Naruto growled, lifting himself from the rubble. "I have about twenty-five minutes to go. I'll have to go all out!"

Naruto generated a Rasenshuriken. He flung it immediately – at Konan.

A Pain ran to her to absorb it.

"That's the Preta Path!" Naruto noted. He flung the next one at the Deva Pain.

The Pain destroyed it with gravity. He told Naruto that that was his greatest problem. He was too predictable. Using a move once was a surprise, using the exact same move twice in a row was pathetic. He needed to be more inventive, more creative.

"Rasenshuriken!" Naruto came down from above and slammed a Rasenshuriken into the revived Pain.

"Where…?" Deva Pain looked up at the skies. The original clone that they'd chased down to the ground floor had managed to sneak into the shadows for half a second, but half a second was all they needed. The Rasenshuriken expanded. Deva turned to stare at Naruto. Another Rasenshuriken was coming his way.

"Four! Three!" Naruto counted him down. He could not use another gravitational ability for five seconds. There was a Rasenshuriken growing behind him and Preta Pain was preoccupied with saving Konan. "Time's up!"

Bubbles erupted from Utakata. They absorbed both Rasenshuriken and sent Naruto flying over one building and into another building. "Summoning Jutsu: Six-Tails!" Saiken – the Six-Tailed Slug – roared to life. Naruto rose from the rubble and stared at what they'd turned the Six-Tails into. They'd punched rods through the tailed beast's soft body, and its eyes reflected those of its master – the Rinnegan.

"You monsters!"

"I'll handle this…"

"Kurama…"

The fires consumed Naruto. Kurama crawled from the rubble and landed on Saiken. They wrestled with each other for a few moments, going back and forth. Kurama biting on Saiken. Saiken dissolving Kurama's fur.

Kurama picked Saiken up. Konan turned to paper. Kurama slammed Saiken onto Preta Pain before loading it up with so much chakra that it turned into a bubbling white acidic mess. Kurama leapt into the air and grabbed onto Pain's Tower.

"Tailed Beast Bomb: Barrage!" Kurama shot blast after blast at Saiken and Pain and Konan. "CANNON!" He combined the last few balls and used them to obliterate the battlefield. If this were chess, he'd just chosen to flip the table and take the board out with it. The energy and anger were so intense that as he lifted his head, the ray continued to shoot through the village over the water and into the distance.

Explosions rained down from above.

Naruto dispelled Kurama and fell into the smoke. He hit the ground and breathed heavily. He was exhausted. Even near-infinite reserves could run out, especially with all this rain that was falling. "Wait… how is it still–?"

"Raining?" Tobi appeared in front of Naruto, his voice now deep and gravelly. He crouched to Naruto's level. "Do you remember me, Naruto Uzumaki?" The Uzumaki remained silent. The rain stopped and the skies cleared. Deva Pain limped out of the smoke, holding his arm. Konan reformed next to him, asking if he was okay. Deva Pain asked Tobi what took him so long. "I was preoccupied with the five kage," he said.

"And how did that battle end?"

Tobi looked to the skies. "It had an unfortunate ending. In his final moments, Orochimaru started questioning my plan… questioning my motives, and questioning my identity. So, I had to seal his body and bring his madness to an end," he explained, "But before that, I put him in the Izanami and had the snake perform one last resurrection for me."

A fourth pair of footsteps emerged from the smoke. The figure was dressed in red and slowly regenerating as he approached the scene. Naruto's gaze rose to meet that of the strange figure. He had long black hair, deep red eyes, and a pale, cracking complexion. "Madara… Uchiha?" Pain said.

"You know me?" Madara asked.

"I know of you," Pain said.

Tobi punched Naruto, silencing everyone. "Now, what was that you said the last time we spoke?" Tobi chuckled. "You said that my life was in your hands? You said I should tell everyone you let me live? You said I should tell the Akatsuki that you were going on the offensive, huh? Dattebayo! Come on, dattebayo! Go on the offensive, dattebayo! How's being on the offence working out?" He punctuated each sentence with a punch or push. He stood up straight and kicked Naruto.

The jinchuuriki sprang into action.

He leapt towards Pain and – Madara snatched him out of mid-air and slammed him into the dirt.

Tobi laughed. He doubled over in laughter, even falling to the ground. He dared Naruto to try that again.

Naruto jumped to his feet; Madara tripped him. He swung a fist. The Uchiha caught it. He spun Naruto around and kicked him into Pain, who grabbed him by the wrists and pushed him into the earth. "Again!"

Naruto got up. He punched Pain. Konan nailed him to a wall with paper shuriken.

"Again!"

Naruto cut himself on the shuriken just to get his hands on Konan. Madara grabbed him by the ankle and dragged him through the mud before picking him up and kicking him into a wall.

They formed a circle around him.

"Again!"

Naruto jumped to his feet, desperate to fight until the very end.

The four shinobi, each one an elite foe one-on-one, took turns reminding him just how futile it was.

"Again! Again! Again! Again! Again!"

Naruto lay on the floor for a few seconds. He slowly pulled his arms to his side and tried to stand but he'd run out of chakra. He had entered the battlefield with less than a tenth of his reserves available – he was spent. Tapped out. There was no more chakra to draw from, unless he was willing to die for it.

And die for it he would. "AHH!" Naruto rolled to his feet and headbutted Tobi, cracking his mask. They would have to kill him if they wanted the attacks to stop. He stood with his forehead pressed against Tobi's cracked mask. He leaned on him, using his enemy as a supporting frame. Tobi took a step back – genuinely surprised. Naruto collapsed. A piece of Tobi's mask collapsed with him, revealing the lower half of his face.

"Well, it's been fun. Unfortunately, it looks like we'll have to retreat from here," Tobi said. He picked Naruto up. "We may have lost the battle but we can still hold onto our post in the Mountains' Graveyard. And we have the Iron Village to call upon for reinforcements."

"No," Pain said.

"What?"

"This is my village. I'm fighting until there's nothing left." He stood up straight and pushed Konan towards the pair. "Take Konan with you. I'm willing to die here but she doesn't deserve to."

"How sweet," Madara said, rolling his eyes with his arms folded over his chest.

"I don't care who deserves to do what. We have a war to win and we need you in the Mountains' Graveyard, so get back to your actual body and let's get out of…"

Pain exploded. Black flames erupted from every orifice. He rolled along the ground, screaming in agony. "It burns!" he cried. "It burns!" He crawled desperately to a puddle to try and extinguish the flames but there was no respite. He crawled into a ball and died.

Tobi stood in silence and watched. Konan reached for the burning man but Madara stopped her. He warned her that the black flames of Amaterasu loved the taste of flesh. They would eat at you forever until there was nothing left, before proceeding to burn for another seven days and seven nights.

"Leave him," Sasuke said, standing next to Fuu.

He was shirtless and pale. He looked like he was still chakra-deprived, but they couldn't tell. He had one hand tucked into his pockets and the other on the hilt of his sword. As he lifted his head to stare into Madara's eyes, his Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan came to light. Except, it was different from the Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan Naruto had fought before. It was more jagged – squarish even. A deathly purple aura consumed Sasuke as he gave them one last warning. "I won't ask twice."

Madara threw his hand out in front of Tobi. He told him to drop Naruto. "We're not outrunning him with a jinchuuriki in tow. I'm not worried about the Amaterasu, anything he burns will simply regenerate. It's you that I'm worried about."

Tobi obeyed. He threw Naruto at Sasuke and Fuu. Sasuke caught him. When he looked up, both Madara and Tobi were gone, leaving a burning Pain and a crying Konan.

The blue-haired woman jumped to her feet. Sasuke stopped her but she told them that she wasn't running away. She told him that the real Pain wasn't here and they needed to get to him before Madara and Tobi did. She promised to take the pair to where Nagato, the real Pain, was. "Why should we trust you?" Sasuke asked.

"Because they want his eyes," Konan yelled, "I have nothing more to lose! Please!"

It took less than five minutes to get to the top of Pain's Tower. Konan ran through a hole that had been broken in the wall and fell to her knees. They were too late, she said. Sasuke entered the dark room first, followed by Naruto, who was being propped up by Fuu.

"Who's that?" Naruto asked, staring at a gaunt red-haired man who was long dead, his eyes having been ripped from their sockets.

"Who was that?" Sasuke corrected him.

"That was Nagato Uzumaki. The real Pain," Konan said, "He was meant to guide us into an era of peace. He was our last hope. Now that Tobi has the Rinnegan, who knows how this ends."

XXX

A few hours later, Naruto returned to the camp. You would have thought they had won the war with how much celebrating was going down. At least three different people offered Naruto a beer as he slowly made his way through the crowded base. He rejected them all. There was still a war to be won. Tobi and Madara had escaped. Unless Tetsu had sent a treaty with concessions and a ceasefire – and Naruto hadn't heard of it – there was no reason to celebrate.

Even then, Madara Uchiha was back and he'd left for the Mountains' Graveyard with Tobi. Those two alone were powerful enough to wipe out an entire village. Forget the armies of shinobi, forget the samurai, forget the White Zetsu. Madara and Tobi were on the loose.

Naruto met up with the Kage and jinchuuriki. They had gathered in a large tent, which had come to be dubbed 'the war room', to discuss what to do next. They'd managed to recover Utakata's body from the debris, and with Pain's influence no longer affecting it, they could finally transfer ownership of Saiken to Hotaru.

Naruto reminded them of Madara's revival and how even though Ame had been conquered, Tetsu was going to present an even bigger challenge, being at the top of a snowy peninsula.

Han placed his hand on the Uzumaki's back and told him it was okay. The tides of war were heavily in the Allied Force's favour. The end was around the corner and thanks to Gaara, they had a brand new plan that was going to revolutionise warfare.

"A technique so powerful that no wars will ever be declared again," Gaara called it. He was certain. He'd seen the cancer that was war cause too much damage and tear too many families apart for his liking. He reassured Naruto that once this technique was used, the Age of Warring States was going to end.

It was okay, they told him, the war was ending soon.

One way or another.

Naruto relaxed a little. "Okay… okay, I trust you."