A new arrival and it's about Itachi God. So, do give it a go.
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***
Upon hearing this, Minato's murderous intent intensified.
However, he knew he couldn't stop the masked man or Pain, who was floating in the sky not far away.
If he were alone, he could still try to engage them, but not only had Itachi behind him reached his limit, but Minato could sense that Shisui's chakra was also nearly depleted.
Otherwise, when the masked man appeared before Itachi, with Shisui nearby, Minato wouldn't have immediately rushed to defend him.
Of the two enemies before him, Pain was merely a puppet being manipulated, and the masked man's abilities were even more formidable.
Without the certainty of defeating them, Minato certainly wouldn't gamble with the lives of Itachi and Shisui.
Bang!
At this moment, the stones that Itachi, Minato, and the others had stood on thumped heavily onto the devastated ground.
Minato grabbed Itachi's shoulders and leaped back, landing beside Shisui.
"Hokage-sama."
Shisui and Itachi shared a gloomy look, both clearly knowing that Minato was hesitant to act rashly out of concern for their safety.
The masked man's eyes drooped beneath his mask, then he raised his gaze to Pain in the sky.
Pain, a corpse, remained expressionless, looking down at Itachi with a cold glint in his eyes.
However, this had no effect on Itachi.
Swish!
Pain exchanged a glance with Minato before darting off toward the distant horizon.
In front of Minato and the other two, the masked man's gaze was fixed on them, his figure retreating continuously.
Only after gaining a considerable distance did the space in front of his right eye begin to distort.
Whoa!
The swirling space distorted, quickly pulling his body in, eventually vanishing.
Only after the space in front of them calmed down, as they stared intently at the space ahead, did Minato and the other two withdraw their gaze.
Seeing the enemy gone, Itachi and Shisui's tense nerves finally relaxed.
Then, a strong sense of dizziness washed over Shisui, nearly causing him to lose consciousness.
But he had been prepared.
As the dizziness set in, Shisui bit down hard on his tongue, blood seeping from between his teeth.
Shisui had already consumed a significant amount of chakra in his initial battle with Pain, and even suffered a backlash when using illusions.
Although he later activated his Mangekyo Sharingan, he had repeatedly used this newly awakened power, a power he wasn't particularly familiar with.
While Itachi had merely depleted his chakra, Shisui was now completely exhausted, relying solely on his willpower to hold himself together.
Itachi knew the reason he was clinging to consciousness, unwilling to collapse.
Shisui turned and slowly walked deeper into the deformed earth.
Minato frowned, knowing what Shisui was planning.
Bang!
He formed seals with his hands, summoning two shadow clones.
Whoosh!
The clones glanced around before darting off in a certain direction.
After a while, Minato's shadow clone returned, clutching the bodies of several ANBU ninjas.
Meanwhile, deep within the boulder-strewn earth, Shisui could not find the body of the ANBU ninja he had been carrying.
Finally, he found a broken dagger in a crack.
Picking up the broken dagger, Shisui's body trembled.
A look of deep sorrow crossed his bloodstained face.
"I can't find it!"
Minato, standing behind Shisui, murmured.
He had learned from Itachi and Shisui that Pain was merely a puppet, and despite his perception, he could not detect the chakra of the person controlling Pain.
"It seems he's been blocked by some special method," Minato muttered, stepping forward and patting Shisui's shoulder.
"Hokage-sama, I..."
Shisui didn't dare turn to look directly at Minato.
His lips were tightly pursed, his voice choked with sobs.
"The enemy this time is beyond the capabilities of your team, so there's no need to blame yourself."
"I believe you should understand that being sad at this moment is useless. As a living person, you carry the will of your dead comrades on your shoulders. Live on bravely."
Minato knew that Shisui had a strong sense of responsibility.
As a squad leader, he could only watch his comrades being killed without being able to stop the enemy.
It was precisely because of this immense sorrow that Shisui's Mangekyo opened.
"Yes."
Shisui nodded.
Of course he understood this.
He slowly turned around and saw the bodies of the other ANBU that Minato had retrieved.
He felt relieved, then he could no longer hold on and fainted.
Minato immediately supported him.
"Let's return to Konoha first. You both need medical ninja care," Minato said, supporting Shisui and looking at Itachi beside him.
Itachi nodded.
He couldn't rush back to the Land of the Moon right now.
Moreover, if he remained in his current state, Shikaku would surely notice his weakness by tomorrow morning.
So, Minato left a clone to monitor the bodies of the several Pains defeated by Shisui and Itachi.
Then, using the Flying Thunder God Technique, he carried the two and the remains of the ANBU back to the village.
Upon returning to the village, Minato immediately rushed Shisui to the Konoha Hospital.
At Itachi's request, Minato summoned medical ninja from the ANBU to treat his injuries.
After making sure Shisui's condition was not life-threatening, Minato returned to the place where Itachi was being treated.
Minato's clone also brought the bodies of the Pains back to the village.
In a room in the Hokage Building.
"Hokage-sama, how did you arrive so suddenly?" Itachi asked, looking at Minato.
Upon returning to the village, he immediately used summoning to summon the crow he had sent out earlier to call for help.
The distress scroll he had written to the Fourth Hokage was still in the crow's stomach.
Although Shisui possessed the Fourth Hokage's Flying Thunder God Kunai, he was unable to relay the news of the distress back to Konoha in time.
Otherwise, Shisui wouldn't have called for his help.
"It was Kushina. She sensed the powerful chakra released by Pain earlier," Minato replied.
"Aunt Kushina?"
Itachi was stunned.
While he knew Kushina, as the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki, possessed considerable abilities, he had never known her chakra perception to be so profound.
The chakra released by Pain's earlier jutsu was indeed powerful, but the distance between the Land of the Moon and the Land of Fire was considerable.
However, this made sense: Kushina, sensing Pain's powerful chakra release, would naturally inform Minato.
The latter then sensed the direction in which Shisui carried the Flying Thunder God Kunai, the kunai's mark formed from Minato's chakra.
Minato looked at Itachi and said, "So, Shisui must have sent you an urgent request for help, right?"
...
"Yes," Itachi replied, looking at Minato with a hint of relief.
If it weren't for Kushina's powerful perception, which had enabled the Fourth Hokage to notice the battle in the Land of the Moon and arrive in time, even if he and Shisui had managed to escape thanks to Pain's ninjutsu, the masked man who arrived shortly after would have left them helpless.
Itachi wasn't afraid of death, but he certainly didn't want to fall into the hands of his enemy.
He still had much to do.
"Shisui-senpai, how is he?"
Itachi asked with concern.
"Although his eye power and chakra have been severely depleted, his injuries are not fatal. He will recover slowly after some rest," Minato replied.
"Hokage-sama, thank you and Aunt Kushina," Itachi said sincerely.
In reality, he should also thank Kushina, but of course he couldn't do it in person.
Minato waved his hand, saying, "I should be the one to thank you. If you hadn't arrived in time, Shisui would have been..."
Shisui was one of Minato's most valued people, and that was why he had entrusted him with the task of gathering intelligence on the Akatsuki.
"Looks like I'll have to find a way to improve the Flying Thunder God Technique," Minato muttered.
"Is your body alright?"
Minato had marveled at the immense power Itachi had wielded with his Mangekyo Sharingan, but he also knew the immense strain it would exact on Itachi.
"It's just excessive chakra consumption, it's nothing serious," Itachi said.
In the past, using the Mangekyo's power so quickly would have severely impaired his vision.
However, after his rebirth, his mental strength continued to grow.
Therefore, this level of exertion wouldn't place the same heavy strain on Itachi as before.
"That's good," Minato said, relieved, but then his expression turned serious again.
"Now, could you please explain the information you have about the Pains?"
Itachi nodded, then began recounting the moment he sensed Shisui was in danger, reporting all the information he had gathered to the Fourth Hokage before him.
"Is this the power of the Rinnegan? It's truly incredible."
Minato marveled.
Taking into account the information Itachi had described about the six Pains' abilities, it seemed they had absolutely no weaknesses.
While their combined abilities might seem to enhance their overall strength, weaknesses still existed within the caster.
The six Pains, while formidable, were not invincible.
If confronted without knowing their abilities, any formidable figure in the contemporary ninja world would be in great danger, let alone defeat them.
Itachi had previously shared this thought, but witnessing Minato's attack on Pain, using the Flying Thunder God Technique, had left him deeply shaken.
It was clear that Minato hadn't used his full strength in his previous encounter with him.
The Fourth Hokage, master of the Flying Thunder God Technique, was arguably the only person in the ninja world who could fully grasp Pain's abilities and potentially defeat him in battle.
"Once you understand these abilities, the next encounter will be much easier," Minato said.
Judging from the outcome of Pain's ambush, Konoha not only gained complete knowledge of his abilities, but Shisui also unlocked his Mangekyo Sharingan.
However, he felt no joy at all.
This was all earned by the sacrifices of ANBU ninja, as well as the lives of Shisui and Itachi, who risked their lives.
Furthermore, Itachi's abilities were exposed to the enemy.
"I think by now, that masked figure has learned the truth from five years ago," Minato said gravely, looking at Itachi.
Within the territory of the Land of the Moon, in a cave.
!!
Space distorted at the cave entrance, and the masked man's figure emerged.
He slowly walked deeper into the cave.
Even though it was utterly dark, the masked man's eyes were naturally unaffected by this level of vision.
Before him stood a thin, red-haired man, his body seemingly fixed to some kind of machine.
Beside the red-haired man stood a woman in Akatsuki robes.
The woman had beautiful short violet hair and wore a white origami flower on her head.
"I never thought that Six Paths Pain would be reduced to such a state," the masked man said.
"But as long as Tendo is unharmed, you probably won't care about anything else."
The masked man knew that Tendo's body, as Pain, held great significance to the two before him.
That was why he had appeared before the Fourth Hokage, Itachi, and Shisui.
The red-haired man raised his eyes.
Even in the darkness, those violet eyes, shimmering with circles of reincarnation patterns, held an unspoken sense of oppression.
"I was a bit careless. I didn't realize that besides the Fourth Hokage and the Sannin, Konoha actually had such a formidable individual."
He spoke with a hint of surprise.
The person he was pointing at wasn't Uchiha Shisui, the target he had initially planned to kill.
Instead, he pointed at the Uchiha boy who had come to reinforce him, a teenager who looked only about ten years old.
Not only did he possess the Mangekyo Sharingan, but he could use it perfectly.
For someone his age, this was simply incredible.
"Yeah, I underestimated that boy, too."
The masked man's eyes darkened.
Although he didn't know the Uchiha boy's name yet, he clearly remembered the moment in Konoha's cemetery five years ago.
Now, the boy's rejection by him seemed unbelievable, but it seemed to be a reality.
His failure in Konoha five years ago was inextricably linked to this Uchiha boy!
Even as he was horrified, a giant pitcher plant slowly emerged from the cave wall beside him.
The pitcher plant opened, revealing a black and white figure within.
"We've found out. The boy is Uchiha Itachi, the eldest son of the Uchiha clan leader. He's ten years old this year!"
"Ten years old?"
The masked man's face trembled upon hearing this.
Because by that calculation, the boy named Uchiha Itachi should have been only five years old five years ago.
No matter how powerful his talent was, at that age, opening the Sharingan was already a unique event in Uchiha history.
Moreover, using the power of the pupil to hinder his control of the wooden man.
At this time, Black Zetsu's hoarse voice also sounded extremely heavy, and he continued.
"Five years ago, after the night of the incident in Konoha, Uchiha Itachi suffered some serious injuries and was in a coma in Konoha Hospital for two years."
....
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