Chapter 301: The Death of Konan
Having successfully swapped places with Inner Sakura via the Flying Thunder God Technique to escape the God-Realm Paper Art Technique, Sakura now had Konan's slender, fragile throat gripped from behind.
Konan trembled, watching Nagato rushing to save her.
It wasn't fear of death that made her shake.
It was hatred.
Hatred of her own weakness.
Hatred of her own helplessness.
Hatred of her own inadequacy.
"Take one more step, and she dies~"
"Such a slim little neck, after all. Must be so fragile~"
The pink-haired woman held Konan's throat with one hand from behind, the other wrapped securely around her waist — keeping her from plummeting out of the sky now that her chakra was spent.
The pose looked, on its surface, rather intimate. But no one present had any inclination to read it that way.
"Na... Nagato..."
Konan stared at the man before her, silent, none of her usual cool composure left, a tremor unmistakable in her voice.
Right now, she'd rather die than become a burden on her comrades at a moment like this.
But behind her stood the single strongest medical shinobi in the entire shinobi world.
Whether she lived or died was no longer Konan's decision to make.
"You... what do you want."
Nagato stared, unblinking, at the scene before him, his voice hoarse.
"What do I want?"
"Isn't it obvious?"
At the words from behind her, Konan felt the blood drain from her hands and feet.
This Hokage. She wants the Rinnegan.
By now, the Wind-Earth-Rain coalition had been all but crushed, half its forces annihilated. What else, among the coalition, could possibly interest this Hokage?
Nothing but Nagato's eyes.
"No — Nagato, don't do this!"
"The Rinnegan is the Land of Rain's treasure!"
"It can never fall into outsiders' hands!"
Konan tried to struggle, but with her chakra completely spent, there was no breaking free of the Hokage's grip.
Or rather — even at full strength, there'd have been no escaping this situation regardless.
Nagato's Rinnegan stayed fixed on the Hokage behind Konan, unblinking, a long silence stretching between them.
His heart ached. Bled. Tore itself apart.
He thought of the past. Of Yahiko. Of who had stood beside him, through everything, all this way.
He thought of the entire purpose behind everything he'd ever done.
"Nagato..."
"Don't..."
Amber eyes brimmed with tears, and Konan shook her head at Nagato, desperate to stop him.
She'd spent over twenty years at his side. She understood his character too well.
Right now, Nagato was genuinely torn — between her, and the Rinnegan.
Sakura made no move to stop Konan's pleading. If anything, she gently, almost tenderly, wiped away the tears from Konan's face, her expression full of practiced sympathy.
"See? What a thoughtful man. Even now, still thinking of you."
"Can you really bear to watch her die here?"
"Look at her — enough to break anyone's heart, isn't it~"
Sakura's words struck Nagato like an arrow through the chest, and he stared, trembling, at Konan, tears streaming freely down her face.
"I... I..."
Nagato had always believed he could give up anything for the cause he'd sworn himself to.
But right now, he understood—
He couldn't.
He simply couldn't do it.
Next to Konan—
That so-called peace—
Meant absolutely nothing at all!!!
He wanted to save her. He needed to protect her.
He needed her to live. To go on living.
Not just for Yahiko, who'd entrusted her to him all those years ago. For himself, too.
He—
Loved Konan.
Twenty years, side by side, day and night. Whatever bond existed between them was worth more than anything else in the world.
"No, don't..."
Konan's whole body shook, desperate to stop him from choosing this.
"I... I accept."
"But — you have to keep your word!"
Nagato ground his teeth, staring at the Hokage before him.
In the end, he made the choice that came from his heart.
Compared to Konan, the Rinnegan meant nothing.
"A real man's word is his bond."
"Ask Han over there, if you want proof of my credibility."
The Hokage said, glancing toward Han, watching from a distance.
Nagato stared at her, resolve already settled.
"Let her down first..."
His voice came hoarse, strained.
Even with Konan still signaling for him to stop, Nagato had nothing left to spare for anyone else's protests.
Sakura had no objection to the request. As the two of them slowly descended, both sides — without a word exchanged — instinctively fell in behind their respective leaders.
"LORD HOKAGE!"
Seeing their Hokage safe, the Konoha shinobi could barely contain their excitement.
A single person had stood alone against thirty thousand soldiers, killed four of the enemy's top fighters — including the famously formidable Third Tsuchikage — and captured a fifth.
How could they not feel it, watching this?
Exactly as she'd said, before the fighting even began.
In this era, she truly was the God of Shinobi.
"Are you really going to do this?"
"Over one woman..."
Kitsuchi stood behind Nagato, watching his back, eyes narrowing slightly.
However this played out, after paying such a staggering price, giving up now for the sake of a single woman felt unbearable to him — especially with both the Tsuchikage and Deidara already dead.
But Nagato paid him no attention at all. His eyes remained fixed entirely on Konan.
"Down now. As long as you keep your word."
"I'll guarantee both your safety."
The Hokage glanced at the group behind Nagato, her tone carrying a sharp edge.
That left both Kitsuchi and Han visibly tense.
"...Fine."
Nagato looked deeply, one last time, at Konan, still restrained in the Hokage's grip.
Konan, seeming to have already accepted her fate, said nothing more, only crying silently.
Nagato raised both hands, ready to gouge out his own eyes—
Konan, unable to bear watching, closed her eyes and turned her face away, lips pressed white.
And then—
Everything changed.
A distorted vortex tore open out of nowhere!
Obito Uchiha!
Having been informed by White Zetsu of the situation on the Land of Rain front, Obito had rushed here in a desperate hurry, meaning to stop all of this.
The Rinnegan was the core of the Eye of the Moon Plan. It could not be lost, under any circumstances.
The black Yin-Yang Release rod, sparking with crimson lightning, shot straight toward the Hokage!
But the Hokage merely let out a cold laugh, and with Konan still gripped in one hand, simply shifted her body to the side, dodging the strike effortlessly.
"Obito Uchiha!"
Nagato's expression twisted with fury and alarm.
Whatever else happened, he had to protect Konan, no matter what.
"Shut up!"
Obito had no patience left for arguing with Nagato. He simply pressed the attack, driving the black rod straight at the Hokage.
"Looks like you can't even keep your own subordinates in line."
"In that case, I won't bother holding back either."
The Hokage glanced at Nagato, let out a cold laugh, and a kunai materialized in her hand from nowhere — and in an instant, before Nagato's horrified, despairing eyes, it drove straight through Konan's body.
With her absolute understanding of human anatomy, that single, ordinary kunai tore through Konan's vital organs completely, snuffing out her life in an instant.
!!!
"Na...gato..."
In her final moment, Konan's eyes settled on Nagato — carrying no anger, no fear. Only release.
A quiet, total acceptance of everything.
Konan...
Nagato stared, frozen, his outstretched hand paralyzed in midair.
Blood spread across Konan's chest, staining Nagato's vision along with it.
Nothing else existed in his field of view anymore — only that familiar figure, stumbling forward, taking two unsteady steps toward him.
Two steps toward Nagato.
Blood welled at the corner of her mouth, staining her pale, colorless lips red.
"ATTACK!!!"
At that moment, Kitsuchi and Han finally lost all restraint, driving their forces forward against the Konoha shinobi ahead of them.
Obito, meanwhile, activated Kamui immediately, avoiding drawing the Hokage's focus onto himself.
His whole objective had been to ensure Konan's death.
Rescue a hostage from the Hokage's grip?
Don't be absurd.
Even Hashirama Senju couldn't have pulled that off.
Given how well he understood the Hokage, she was exactly the kind of overwhelming, dominant force who might look harmless on the surface, but was, underneath, ruthlessly decisive.
Or worse — she might simply have wanted to watch Nagato squirm, forced to choose between the Rinnegan and Konan, purely for her own entertainment.
But none of that mattered to Nagato anymore.
He looked down, trembling, at the woman collapsed before him, and gently, carefully, gathered Konan into his arms.
Looking at that face — so familiar, and now carrying a trace of pain — Nagato felt, in that instant, as if nothing else in the entire world mattered to him anymore.
He'd once believed his heart was vast enough to hold the whole world.
But now he understood — his heart was, in truth, terribly small.
Only large enough to hold one person. Konan.
"So this is how it is. People only learn to treasure what they've already lost."
"Just like light — something an ordinary person takes entirely for granted, but to someone blind, it becomes something worth trading everything else in the world for."
The Hokage walked toward Nagato, step by step, each word landing like a blade in his ears.
"You... you never intended to spare her at all..."
Nagato lifted his head, feeling, once again, the full weight of this world's cruelty.
This wretched world...
This world without Konan in it...
It shouldn't...
It shouldn't even exist.
"Not at all. I genuinely meant to make the trade with you."
"Saving a little chakra is still saving chakra, after all."
"But the moment Obito Uchiha showed up, I changed my mind."
"After all — did you really think he came here to save Konan from my hands?"
"If he wasn't here to save her, then what exactly was he here for?"
"That's really quite the puzzle, isn't it~"
The pink-haired woman looked at the trembling man before her, a corner of her mouth curling upward — a smile laced with pure, deliberate cruelty.
With that, the sixteen-year-old girl before him tapped a finger thoughtfully against her own head, as if genuinely troubled.
"So — who do you suppose actually killed her, in the end?"
The words drifted through Nagato's ears like something whispered by a demon.
And at that moment, Obito — who'd meant to use Kamui to make a swift escape — felt every hair on his body stand on end.
He understood, suddenly, with total clarity.
He'd walked straight into a trap.
One with no way out at all.
(End of chapter.)
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