Tale of Naruto Uzumaki

Nagato wraps up his account, explaining that after Yahiko's death he scored a single line across his forehead protector and took command of the Akatsuki. He presses Naruto for his answer on how true peace can be reached. Naruto admits he has no formula yet, only the conviction that he will someday break the world's cycle of hatred. Nagato is stunned, because those are the very words he once spoke to Jiraiya during a bout of writer's block. Naruto reveals he lifted the line straight from Jiraiya's novel, The Tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi, whose hero shares his own name, given to him by Jiraiya himself. He resolves to live as the book's sequel and carry their teacher's ideals forward.

Nagato dismisses Jiraiya's philosophy as outdated and asks how Naruto can be trusted not to fall into despair once pain strikes, the way he did. Naruto answers that suffering already found him early, scorned since birth as a jinchuriki, deepened by his loss of Sasuke and the harm he caused Sakura. He confesses he still carries buried grief and would never truly forgive Nagato, yet he chooses Jiraiya's hope over vengeance and pledges to bring peace to Amegakure once he becomes Hokage.

Nagato, seeing his younger self in the boy, decides to place his faith in him. He spends the last of his chakra on the Outer Path technique, Samsara of Heavenly Life, to undo his crimes, which Konan realizes will cost him his life. At Mount Myoboku, Gamamaru marvels to Gamabunta that two Children of the Prophecy exist and that Jiraiya's book proved so vital to saving the world.

The episode adapts chapters 448 and 449 and belongs to the Pain's Assault arc of Naruto Shippuden. It aired in Japan on August 19, 2010, and in English on March 30, 2013. The opening theme is A World That Was Transparent and the ending theme is Transient Fireworks.