"There's no need to hide our identities; the Akatsuki Organization does not act like people in the shadows!"
"I want to openly tell everyone that the Akatsuki Organization is not an existence that the Five Great Nations can bully at will."
"They, the Five Great Nations, have no right to pin their blame on the Akatsuki Organization!"
Pain's tone was cold, carrying a hint of anger.
Yes!
He called himself a god.
This point alone was enough to see his pride; his confidence in his own strength and the power of the Akatsuki Organization was almost mysterious.
Now, with the death of Kumogakure's Fourth Raikage, it was clearly internal strife among the Five Great Nations, yet they insisted on dumping the mess onto him?
Heh!
Did they really think that he, this 'god', was someone the Five Great Nations could mold at will?
Although he wasn't clear about which of the Five Great Nations had done it, he knew he had to strike back forcefully. While the Akatsuki Organization couldn't go head-to-head with the Five Great Nations at this stage, he wanted them to understand a basic principle.
The Akatsuki Organization must not be insulted!
Beyond that, it was about deterrence.
After all, the resurrection of the Three-Tails and the Six-Tails would still take some time. He had to secure a period of peace for the Akatsuki Organization, and as long as the Allied Shinobi Forces couldn't be formed normally, the Akatsuki Organization wouldn't fear any single country among the Five Great Nations.
Including—Konoha!
After all, he wasn't aware of the several Edo Tensei Strongmen in Konoha, and on the surface, Konoha's only strongest individual, Uchiha Jin, appeared to be just a Mangekyo Expert. Nagato naturally didn't take someone of that level seriously.
Therefore...
He decided to take the initiative against the Five Great Nations this time to thoroughly establish the Akatsuki Organization's fame. While making the Five Great Nations wary of the Akatsuki Organization, he would also buy time for the day the Three-Tails and Six-Tails were resurrected...
As long as they could wait until that day, the Akatsuki Organization would no longer need to remain in hiding!
Thinking of this, he suddenly added a sentence.
"All Akatsuki Organization members will act in pairs."
"Hidden Mist, Sunagakure, Kumogakure, Iwagakure..."
"You can pick your targets from these four hidden villages as you wish. You can act against whichever village you want."
"As for Konoha, which is claimed to be the strongest, leave it to me and White to handle!"
"That is all. Dismissed!"
With Pain's words, he left immediately after finishing.
Konan, who held the position of 'White', naturally followed closely behind Pain and left the area.
After all, she had no personal friendship with the others in the Akatsuki Organization. In fact, if not for the desire to realize Yahiko and Nagato's dreams, she would have wanted to kill the current members of the Akatsuki Organization directly.
It couldn't be helped!
These members of the Akatsuki Organization were basically not good people.
While Konan considered herself a good person, she only temporarily associated with these members for the sake of the Akatsuki Organization's grand goal.
Deidara spoke up directly: "Sasori, where are we going?"
"Let's go to Iwagakure," Sasori said calmly.
Deidara nodded: "Fine, it's time to let those idiots see what true art is!"
"Hmph, how can explosions be considered art?" Sasori curled his lip, his face full of disdain. "Only eternal puppets can be called art!"
"What did you say?" Deidara was very displeased.
Sasori looked dismissive and didn't even bother to respond to Deidara.
Meanwhile, on the other side.
Hidan also looked at Kakuzu: "Which country are we going to? I suggest going somewhere crowded; I must let everyone know the greatness of Lord Jashin!"
"Which country?" Kakuzu's eyes flickered, and then he coughed: "As for—this matter..."
"I think we shouldn't make a decision for now. Let's head to the Underground Bounty Station first."
"We'll go to whichever country has more mission requests!"
Hidan had no objection to this.
Anyway, as long as he could spread the followers of Jashin, he had no complaints.
Kisame Hoshigaki looked at the Masked Obito: "Lord Madara, what about us?"
"Whatever, anywhere is fine." Obito's expression was normal, not caring about it at all.
In any case, it didn't matter where he went as long as it wasn't Konoha.
It couldn't be helped.
His last trip to Konoha had put too much pressure on him.
Unlike Nagato, he was very aware of how powerful Konoha's strength was!
Uchiha Jin wasn't some Mangekyo user at all; he was a damn Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan user, and his Dōjutsu was bizarre to a troublesome degree.
Besides that...
Fugaku, Shisui, and the others were not to be trifled with!
Adding in Edo Tensei Strongmen like Senju Hashirama, Senju Tobirama, and Sakumo Hatake, Obito even felt that even if all members of the Akatsuki Organization moved out, they likely wouldn't be a match for the current Konoha!
Of course.
He didn't tell Nagato this. In his view, letting Nagato suffer a bit was also a good thing, to save him from always putting on that 'I am a god' act, so that he could better cooperate with Nagato in the future.
As for Nagato failing and being killed?
Obito wasn't worried about that!
Although the current Konoha was indeed very powerful, Nagato after all had Madara's Rinnegan. Even if Nagato couldn't unleash the full power of the Rinnegan, there wouldn't be much of a problem if he just wanted to escape.
Not to mention that he would also be hiding in the shadows...
If Nagato truly reached a moment of extreme danger, he would naturally step in and take Nagato away!
...
Inside this underground cavern, the members of the Akatsuki Organization discussed among themselves.
Everyone split into several factions, mostly chatting about topics they were interested in, not caring at all about Konan and Pain's departure.
Yes!
Just as Konan looked down on them, they looked down on Konan and Pain even more.
They also had their own dreams; they only temporarily chose to join the Akatsuki Organization because of Pain's strength and his non-interference with their dreams.
To put it bluntly...
Most Akatsuki members didn't care at all about the so-called core goals of the Akatsuki Organization, like the tailed beast deterrence plan or Ninja World Peace.
Success was fine, failure was fine.
In short: whatever!
On the contrary.
With Pain and Konan gone, when the people present chatted, they were actually more relaxed than before!
It wasn't until half an hour later that the Akatsuki members left one after another.
Half a day later.
As numerous Akatsuki Organization members left the Land of Snow, this naturally fell into the eyes of Uchiha Tianyong, who immediately passed the news to Uchiha Jin in Konoha through the Ninja Cat Clan.
Uchiha Jin: "..."
Looking at the letter in his hand, his brow couldn't help but furrow slightly.
He was a bit confused and indeed couldn't figure it out.
After all, he knew the core goal of the Akatsuki Organization very well, but the problem was that all the Tailed Beasts in the Ninja World, except for Konoha's Nine-Tailed, had already been obtained by the Akatsuki Organization.
Ordinarily, the Akatsuki Organization should be lying low.
But now?
They had actually launched a collective action again. So, what was the Akatsuki Organization's goal?
Could it be—Konoha?