But when Kaede Kitahara wrote that the Sword of the Thunder God had earned its humiliating record because it was smashed by him and Uzumaki Naruto, Sasuke could not help feeling a bit dissatisfied.
What did he mean, humiliating just because they broke it?
As for Kaede's claim that a jonin from a small village was roughly equivalent to an elite chunin from a major village, the others all agreed.
The remaining three had all traveled extensively and were rich in experience. They understood very well just how uneven strength could be across the shinobi world.
They were all ninja villages, sure, but how could they possibly be the same?
"But the Hidden Rain Village…"
Uchiha Itachi frowned deeply, because this involved the Akatsuki.
Akatsuki was based in the Hidden Rain Village. As far as he knew, several of its founding members were natives of the Land of Rain. In other words, the Hidden Rain Village was secretly under Akatsuki's control. Outsiders simply did not know it.
Thinking of that, his mind turned to Akatsuki's unfathomable leader, the Hidden Rain ninja known as Pain.
When he recalled the video from before, the horrifying scene where Pain rose into the sky and erased all of Konoha with a single strike, the wariness in his heart deepened even further.
With his absolute loyalty to Konoha, if he were actually capable of defeating Akatsuki's leader, he would probably have drawn his blade and gone for it on the spot.
A villain destined to destroy Konoha in the future was someone he wished dead more than anything.
[Probably no one expected that a small, seemingly unremarkable village like the Hidden Rain would be hiding such a terrifying final boss. Akatsuki is lurking right there. A real dragon growing in deep waters.
Akatsuki's current strength might fall short of overturning the entire shinobi world, but if any one of the Five Great Villages went head-to-head with them, the odds would not look good. If Kara does not appear, who can stand against them?]
Another earth-shattering secret exploded out of the diary, leaving everyone stunned.
It was obvious that before this, aside from Uchiha Itachi, no one had known Akatsuki was hidden within the Hidden Rain Village.
Without a doubt, this was a bombshell of the highest order.
"The Hidden Rain Village…" Jiraiya suddenly thought of something. His former students had been in the Hidden Rain Village back then, had they not?
He had never returned afterward and had no idea what that place had become.
What weighed on him even more was the fact that the powerhouse who destroyed all of Konoha in the earlier video, despite his face being studded with piercings, was someone Jiraiya recognized from those familiar contours.
Yahiko.
It was Yahiko, one of his students.
He had never imagined Yahiko would become like that, going on about making people feel pain.
From what Jiraiya remembered, Yahiko had been the most cheerful of the three, the one who embodied the Will of Fire the most, who wanted everyone in the shinobi world to understand one another.
He never expected it to turn out this way.
What troubled him even more was that Yahiko's eyes held a pair of Rinnegan.
Those were Nagato's eyes, were they not?
When Jiraiya had first seen those eyes, said to belong only to the Sage of Six Paths from myth, he had been shocked. He had even tried every way he could think of to teach Nagato how to control his Rinnegan.
Now those eyes had appeared on Yahiko's face. That could only mean one thing.
Something massive must have happened that Jiraiya did not know about, something that led Nagato to transplant the Rinnegan into Yahiko.
Such things were not unheard of in the shinobi world. Had Hatake Kakashi not gained Uchiha Obito's Sharingan through a similar means?
If that was the case, then Nagato was probably already dead.
And who had Nagato died at the hands of? Judging from Yahiko's attack on Konoha and his opening words about pain, it was likely inseparable from Konoha itself.
Otherwise, Jiraiya could not imagine how such a naive, bright child could have become this.
There was also the matter of how Akatsuki could hide in the Hidden Rain Village for so long without being discovered. Even though the Hidden Rain Village was closed off to the outside, it possessed a terrifying existence of its own.
Hanzo.
The Demigod of the shinobi world.
In that era, his strength was absurd. Even among the Five Great Villages, there were very few kage who could stand on equal footing with him.
It was widely acknowledged that he was on the same level as the Third Tsuchikage, Onoki, and the Third Hokage. Even among kage-level fighters, he stood at the very top.
He had once defeated the not-yet-fully-grown Sannin of Konoha with ease and had the right to bestow upon them the title of the Legendary Sannin.
Although the three of them considered that title a humiliation, a constant reminder that the three of them together had failed to defeat a single man, to outsiders it was an honor that could bring glory to one's ancestors.
After that, under Hanzo's pressure and humiliation, the three Sannin all broke through to kage level.
Now, whenever Jiraiya thought of Hanzo, he admitted to himself that even at his current peak, he might not be able to defeat the Hanzo of that time.
Hanzo's strength clearly surpassed other kage by an entire tier.
That was something only those who had reached kage level themselves could truly feel. To those below that level, all kage seemed equally invincible.
But among kage-level fighters, everyone knew there were differences. The gap between the strongest and the weakest could be far greater than most people imagined.
Jiraiya knew he likely had not yet reached the height Hanzo once stood at. He was still some distance away from the absolute top tier of kage, even if they would not find it easy to kill him either.
Precisely because he knew of Hanzo's existence and how terrifyingly strong he was, Jiraiya could not understand how the Hidden Rain Village had fallen into Akatsuki's hands.
What about Hanzo?
What exactly was Akatsuki's relationship with him?
Did they overthrow Hanzo and take his place? Or was Hanzo himself actually the founder of Akatsuki?
If the latter was true, then Hanzo's ambition was far too great. Back then, he had already wanted to develop the Hidden Rain Village into a sixth great village, which was why years of war had erupted.
After so many years, Jiraiya had thought Hanzo would have abandoned that dream. Could it be that Hanzo was now secretly gathering strength, preparing for the Hidden Rain Village's eventual rise?
If that were the case, Hanzo's scheme would be truly terrifying.
"Kara? What is that?" Hatake Kakashi keenly picked up on the mention of yet another new organization in the diary.
This was the first time Kaede Kitahara had ever mentioned Kara, but the fact that it was spoken of in the same breath as Akatsuki, even with the line about who could stand against them if Kara did not appear, was proof enough that Kara's strength was certainly no less than Akatsuki's.
If Akatsuki's standard for recruitment was kage level, or at the very least elite jonin, then Kara could not be much different.
What he could not understand was where these organizations found so many powerful individuals.
Kage-level fighters were incredibly rare in the shinobi world. Even in a major village, there were only a handful. In a small village, having even one was enough to be considered a national pillar.
Where were all these monsters coming from?
No wonder Kaede was always so cautious, always talking about how deep the waters of the shinobi world were.
And what were these organizations planning to do by gathering so many kage-level powerhouses?
It could not possibly be a cat-and-dog lovers association.
It had to be for some objective, one so enormous that it required the collective strength of multiple kage-level fighters. Just thinking about that made him uneasy.
Especially after seeing the terrifying scene in the video where a member of Akatsuki destroyed all of Konoha in a single attack. In that context, he could not afford not to take this seriously.
"Akatsuki is in the Hidden Rain Village. That means Itachi is in the Hidden Rain Village too." Uchiha Sasuke immediately seized on the information he cared about most.
Itachi's whereabouts.
He knew a little about the Hidden Rain Village, mostly from textbooks that briefly introduced the shinobi world. They focused on the Five Great Nations and the Five Great Villages. Smaller countries and villages were barely mentioned.
This was the first time he had a real lead on where Uchiha Itachi might be hiding.
If he were not completely unable to defeat Itachi right now, he would already be thinking of a way to sneak into the Hidden Rain Village and pick a fight with him.
In the end, it all came down to his strength not being enough.
So even when he knew certain things, he could not act on them. All he could do was endure.
Sasuke clenched his fists, staring fixedly at the diary as if he could force something out of it through sheer will.
Kaede Kitahara had no idea that his casual mention of Akatsuki and Kara had stirred such turbulence in so many hearts, each person extracting the information they most wanted from it.
As for Kara or Akatsuki, he had no intention of touching either. With his current strength, at best he could be exceptionally recruited by one of them. By exceptional, he meant dragged in despite not being strong enough, just to make up the numbers.
[Akatsuki is terrifying, but Kara is even more so.
At best, Akatsuki's leader Nagato only has Super Kage Level strength. He barely brushes against the level once reached by Uchiha Madara and Senju Hashirama. But Kara's leader, Otsutsuki Isshiki, can beat down even Six Paths Level opponents.
At their peak, Naruto and Sasuke together still got completely overwhelmed by Otsutsuki Isshiki. Literally overwhelmed in the physical sense. Isshiki's strength is downright invincible.
And yet someone that powerful still got outplayed by Otsutsuki Kaguya.
Come to think of it, this shinobi world is really cursed. Members of the Otsutsuki Clan roam the stars, invincible wherever they go, yet one by one they end up taking losses here, getting beaten half to death. Some even die outright, getting slapped in the face by the so-called inferior lifeforms they looked down on.
In the end, they all turn into living batteries, just like the Tailed Beasts. Right, Momorama?]