Chapter 276: Severance : Belief
After recovering from the initial shock of his forced transference, Nagato lowered his head, his expression darkening as he asked, "What happened, you ask? You abandoned us, Sensei...if you had remained or taken us with you, our comrades and Yahiko-kun would still be alive..."
"That was your kids' decision," countered Jiraiya, shaking his head before reminding, "The three of you were adamant about bringing change to your home, and you couldn't have accomplished that as Konoha Shinobi. I had my own home—"
"Are you listening to yourself!?" exclaimed Nagato, tears streaming from his glowing amethyst eyes as he cried, "We were children! We didn't want to burden you, so we couldn't ask you to stay after you had already done so much for us! But that's not the worst thing...!"
Clenching his teeth hard enough to make his gums bleed, Nagato stated, "You taught us how to defend ourselves and filled our heads with absurd ideas about how we could inspire others and become beacons of hope for a world without war. Then you left us in a despotic, war-torn country ruled by the man who anointed you one of the Legendary Sannin. If even three legends couldn't beat him, and you knew the kind of person he was, how could you fill our heads with such ideals and then leave us to oppose him? You—Konoha radicalized us to destabilize Ame from within without having to imperil their own Shinobi...!"
"You know that's not true..." asserted Jiraiya, his brows furrowed and jaw briefly clenching as he conceded, "But you're also right that I could have done more for the three of you. The true reason I didn't take you with me is because of those eyes of yours, the Rinnegan. With the Uchiha, Hyuga, and certain opportunistic individuals present, Konoha wouldn't have been a safe place for someone bearing a mythical Dojutsu tied to the founding of the Shinobi World..."
"So you left us here to protect us...to protect me...?" growled Nagato, the air tensing and space appearing to distort around him as he trembled with near-insuppressible fury.
"Nagato...please calm yourself..." muttered Konan, attempting to sound monotonous, but she couldn't prevent an emotional tremble from tinting her tone. Jiraiya's words aside, it didn't change that she and Nagato had chosen to remain in Ame because Yahiko, the one who had brought them together even before they underwent Shinobi training, had inspired them. His—their desire to change Ame stemmed from them being war orphans. It wasn't an idea Jiraiya had implanted within them. It was a sentiment he nourished to give them hope...
With Konan positioning herself between him, Jiraiya, and Minato, Nagato suppressed his urge to attack and instead lowered his gaze to meet her's, a tense silence hanging between them before he asked, "Are you worried that I won't be able to defeat them? Even the so-called Demigod, Hanzo, was nothing before my power..."
"Nagato-kun..." started Konan, her voice flat but eyes full of concern as she asked him plainly, "How did we get here...?"
"..."
'She has a point...' Nagato conceded to himself. Without knowing how he and Konan had been transported in front of the Konoha duo, they were at a technical and informational disadvantage. Minato was famed and feared for his use of the Hiraishin no Jutsu(Flying Thunder God Technique), but if that were the Jutsu used to transport them, it wouldn't have bypassed the seals protecting his and Konan's respective chambers.