Nagato

**Nagato** (長門) is a shinobi of Amegakure and descendant of the Uzumaki clan. Forming Akatsuki alongside his friends (and fellow war orphans) Yahiko and Konan, Nagato dreamed of bringing peace to the violent shinobi world. However, following Yahiko's death, Nagato adopted the alias of **Pain** (ペイン, *Pein*) and, along with Konan, began leading a new Akatsuki — one that would force the world into peace using any means necessary.

## Background

Nagato lived with his parents: Fusō and Ise on the outskirts of Amegakure. When he was very young, Madara Uchiha secretly transplanted his Rinnegan into Nagato without his or his parents' knowledge. Sometime later, during the Second Shinobi World War, Nagato and his parents took shelter in their home to avoid the fighting going on around them. One day, two Konoha shinobi broke into their home looking for food and Nagato and his parents tried to sneak out unnoticed. When they were discovered, his parents attacked the shinobi so that Nagato could escape. The Konoha ninja killed his parents in self-defence and, upon realising they were only civilians, tried apologising to Nagato. Overcome with grief, Nagato used Madara's Rinnegan for the first time to kill them and avenge his parents.

After burying his parents, Nagato, now an orphan, was forced to leave home and begin wandering in search of food and shelter. With resources scarce due to the ongoing war, no one he met would help him until Nagato, who had collapsed from hunger, was found by Konan and Yahiko, orphans like himself. They banded together, acquired food to survive through any means, and shared dreams of a future where they were in charge and could use their power to eliminate war. Yahiko was particularly passionate about this point, which inspired Nagato to adopt the same goal. In order to accomplish this, the three would need to become ninja. With few options to choose from, they approached Konoha's Legendary Sannin and asked to be taught ninjutsu. Orochimaru offered to kill them in order to end their suffering, but Jiraiya, guilty over his participation in the war, offered to teach them how to look out for themselves.

Jiraiya found a place for them to live and taught them how to fish, but he would not teach them ninjutsu. While the orphans were out one day, they were found and assaulted by an Iwagakure chūnin. Fearing for his friends' lives, Nagato used his Rinnegan to kill the Iwa-nin. When Jiraiya arrived on the scene to help them, he noticed Nagato's eyes for the first time and was reminded of the legends of the Sage of the Six Paths, the original possessor of the Rinnegan. Because of this, Jiraiya changed his mind and began teaching them ninjutsu. Nagato was remorseful for killing the Iwa-nin, but Jiraiya convinced him that sometimes violence and personal pain was necessary to protect others. In time he even shared his belief that Nagato was the Sage of Six Paths' reincarnation and that, like the original Sage, Nagato would use his Rinnegan to usher in a world of peace.

Jiraiya trained the orphans for three years. Because of his Rinnegan, Nagato easily mastered everything he was taught. Once they were able to defeat one of his shadow clones in a fight, Jiraiya decided they were ready to forge out on their own and he returned to Konoha, confident they would bring reform to the country. The three formed an organisation they called Akatsuki, with Yahiko as its leader, and began advocating an end to war. Their message proved popular and they gathered many followers; even Jiraiya would sometimes hear news of their exploits. During the Third Shinobi World War, they were approached by a disguised Obito Uchiha. Introducing himself as Madara Uchiha, he offered to help them in their pursuits and show Nagato how to unlock the full potential of his Rinnegan. Yahiko refused the offer, suspecting Tobi only meant to use them.

Throughout their quest for peace, Akatsuki's ranks swelled and became known throughout Amegakure, so much so that Hanzō of the Salamander, the village's leader, began to feel Akatsuki threatened his rule. He approached Akatsuki, offering to work together with them to help negotiate with the other warring villages. The next day, at a meeting to finalise the arrangement, Yahiko and Nagato were ambushed by Hanzō and his men, with support from Konoha's Danzō Shimura. Using Konan as a hostage, Hanzō threatened to kill her if Nagato did not kill Yahiko. Unwilling to let Nagato have that on his conscience, Yahiko impaled himself on Nagato's kunai, using his dying breath to state his faith that Nagato would change the world. Enraged by Yahiko's death, Nagato took Konan back from Hanzō, though his legs were badly damaged in the process. He then summoned the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path and, upon linking with it, used it to slaughter Hanzō's men, though Hanzō himself escaped. Afterwards, Nagato severed his ties with Amegakure by slashing the village's symbol on his forehead protector, no longer wishing to be affiliated with Hanzō's village.

Yahiko's death ultimately convinced Nagato that his philosophies about achieving peace were foolish; the world would never willingly end the cycle of death and hatred it had operated on for so long. Only through direct experience of war and all the losses and agonies it brought could anyone truly desire peace. Intending to personally bring that level of despair to the world, Nagato took on the name of "Pain". As the damage he'd received from Hanzō's attack and the link with the Demonic Statue left him frail and immobile, Nagato created the Six Paths of Pain out of corpses that he controlled remotely. For the Deva Path he used Yahiko's body — still wanting him to lead the organisation in spirit — and for the other five he used the corpses of other miscellaneous shinobi that, without his knowing it, had met Jiraiya when they were alive. Pain began leading Akatsuki in a new direction, secretly accepting Obito's earlier offer of support. Akatsuki composed itself with S-rank missing-nin and started offering its services as a mercenary group to ninja villages, earning the money necessary to fund its long-term plans.

Years later and still loyal to his own version of Amegakure, Pain and Konan began a civil war in the village to overthrow Hanzō. Much of the village rallied behind Pain, believing him to be a god because of his immense power. The Six Paths of Pain eventually cornered and killed Hanzō, earning control of the village, but not before expressing his disgust with how Hanzō had fallen from the man he admired and the fact he cannot even understand how, in his self-preservation, his skill and conviction have diminished. In order to prevent anyone from challenging him, Pain proceeded to eliminate everyone even remotely connected to Hanzō, from members of his family to distant acquaintances. Because of Amegakure's already secretive nature, news of Hanzō's death never made it outside of Amegakure and the village was believed to still be divided by the civil war. Pain embraced the villagers' idea of his being God and single-handedly crushing remnants loyal to Hanzō whenever they surfaced. Every Sunday, Pain would make it rain within Amegakure or if he had to be away.

## Personality

Nagato was a sensitive child, prone to crying over the sufferings of himself and others. When he met Yahiko he tried to break this habit by following Yahiko's philosophy that crying wouldn't change anything, but the attempt was unsuccessful. Jiraiya later pointed out to him that his sensitivity was actually a strength, as it allowed him to understand pain better and, in turn, be kinder to others. This view resonated with Nagato and caused him to realise that he wanted to take on all of his friends' pain so that they wouldn't have to. It also finally succeeded in ending his crying; when Jiraiya left their group it was Yahiko who cried to see him go, while Nagato only thanked him for all the guidance he'd provided.

In one form or another, Nagato spent his entire life placing the needs of others before his own: his main motivation for becoming a ninja in the first place was so that he could protect Yahiko and Konan; he viewed his role in the original Akatsuki as a powerful tool meant to help Yahiko bring peace to their country; as leader of his own version of Akatsuki, he felt it was his responsibility to save the world from itself, inflicting pains of such magnitude that nobody would ever harm anyone else ever again. While this indicates a growing self-importance Nagato regarded himself with, it was encouraged by the similarly growing esteem others regarded him with due to his Rinnegan: Jiraiya believed he was the reincarnation of the Sage of the Six Paths; Yahiko and the rest of Akatsuki believed he was the "Saviour of the World"; the villagers of Amegakure believed in him as if he were a "God".

As a child that grew up in the middle of other countries' wars, Nagato did not like killing and was horrified by his early acts of violence against those who had harmed his friends and family. He supported Yahiko's Akatsuki because it wanted to end the wars and deaths that he hated so much. After Yahiko's death, Nagato compromised his aversion to killing to a large extent, believing the deaths of specific individuals or even hundreds at a time could be justified if it served a greater and/or long-term purpose. But Nagato remains very clear in this distinction, as he shows mercy to those willing to cooperate with him and discourages others from defying him because it will only force him to strike them down. Minato Namikaze believes that, at some point along the way, Nagato's views were corrupted and subsequently manipulated by Tobi.

As leader of Akatsuki, Nagato projected a great charisma through his public mask of the Deva Path so that even Akatsuki held him in great awe. Despite his power and self-appointed divinity, Nagato was incredibly patient with defiance from the group, likening Hidan's open threats against him to those of a child who needed guidance. Utterly confident in his own abilities, Nagato showed no hesitation in fighting even the strongest opponents, nor in asserting himself against powerful Akatsuki members when need be. When speaking of Akatsuki's goals, Nagato demonstrated a contemplative side as to the nature of war and peace, matching his belief that war was the inevitable result of the nature of humanity. While he declared his godhood to his enemies, Nagato would privately admit that he was never anything more than an ordinary man who was seeking peace through the best means he knew how. When encountering enemies who disagreed with his philosophy, Nagato would often request their own solution to the problems of the world before almost inevitably being dissatisfied with the response due to his low opinion of human beings as a whole. Despite this, Nagato is stated to have gone as far as kill anyone from Amegakure who even questioned his ideals and even went as far as to kill infants of people who were even remotely associated to Hanzō.

When leading the Akatsuki, Nagato could also be possessed of a cold, wrathful side. He showed no hesitation in attempting to kill his former teacher Jiraiya, stating that all love for Jiraiya had long since died. When he attacked Konoha, Nagato demonstrated cold fury at Tsunade for defying his proclamations as to the justice of his attack on the Leaf. Believing that the only way humans could understand one another was through shared pain, Nagato showed no hesitation in obliterating the Leaf village or attempting to kill Hinata Hyūga when she came to Naruto's defence in order to demonstrate a lesson on pain and the inability of human beings to understand one another. Despite this, he had a high value in comrades as he chastised Kisame for speaking ill of Hidan and Kakuzu.

One further constant in Nagato's life was the esteem he placed in his childhood friends. Nagato viewed himself as having inherited Yahiko's will to change the world and kept Yahiko's corpse as his most treasured and powerful Path of Pain. Konan, his partner and childhood friend, remained his most ardent supporter. Nagato likewise demonstrated equal esteem and concern for her, with Konan as one of the few who could sway or influence his decisions to the extent that Tobi confided in Zetsu a fear of what Nagato might do without Konan's calming influence on him.

Despite the number of personal changes Nagato went through during his life, he always remained fundamentally kind and respectful. With his fellow members of Akatsuki, he mourns those who die in the pursuit of Akatsuki's goals and disapproves of name-calling amongst peers. He extends similar courtesies to his opponents, being honoured to meet one so strong as Kakashi Hatake, despite also being determined to kill Kakashi because that very same strength would inevitably interfere with Akatsuki's plans. For all his kindness, Nagato has a certain prejudice against Konoha because its ninja have played a role in a number of his life's tragedies. He tried to change this opinion because of Jiraiya's positive influence, but ultimately decided that Konoha's successes were predicated on the misfortunes of others.

Despite his conviction in Akatsuki's goals, Nagato is re-convinced of his former pacifism by Naruto Uzumaki, who believes the struggle for peace is worth any personal cost to the point of sacrificing his life to atone for his actions. Recognising the person he once was, Nagato decides to believe in Naruto's answer for peace, also regaining his faith in Jiraiya. Upon his revival, Nagato demonstrates a far friendlier side, joking with and praising Naruto. Before he is sealed away, Nagato reveals that he has gone from viewing himself as a god to viewing himself as the failed middle volume of a trilogy started by Jiraiya and ended with Naruto. He also regains his high regard for Jiraiya as he referred to Jiraiya was the "perfect first volume".

## New era / Glad you Came

A mysterious force revived Nagato, and still under the alias and body of Pain, married a woman named Ayane and would have a son, Naoto

## "Very Important We" Music Video

In 2023, Adaru32 posted a video featuring Kisame Hoshigaki, and Obito Uchiha with audio from "Very Important Creature" from The Land Before Time: The Stone of Cold Fire. Performed by actors and voice actors Michael York (Pain) , Jim Cummings (Kisame), and Rob Paulsen (Obito)