Rain. It never does. Every drop that falls on my skin reminds me that I'm alive… and that I'm still weak.
Several weeks have passed since we found our shelter. Within walls repaired with mud, paper, and sheer willpower, we achieved something I thought impossible: a little peace. Konan smiles more often. Nagato no longer wakes up screaming in the night. And for a moment, the Land of Rain seems less hostile. But I… I'm not at peace.
I can't forget what I saw in my past lives: the absurd strength of the great ninjas, the monsters disguised as men, the gods who crush villages with a single glance. I don't have a Rinnegan. I don't have special blood, nor a beast sealed within me. I only have my body, my chakra, and the determination not to die before seeing the two I love happy.
So I decided to train. Not for glory, nor revenge, nor power… but for love.
Dawn is barely visible through the gray clouds. I leave the shelter in silence, leaving Konan and Nagato asleep. I walk to a mud-covered clearing where the water reaches my ankles.
I extend my hands and take a deep breath. Chakra surges within me like a raging river. I feel it flow, crashing against my limits, as if my own body were denying me power.
I start with the basics: physical strengthening. I strike a tree trunk again and again, until my knuckles split and bleed. I'm not seeking perfection, just endurance. Each impact is a question I ask myself. How far can I go? What am I willing to sacrifice to keep them safe?
My body trembles, but I continue. I use Earth Release: Earth Release Technique, a technique I'm just learning. My goal is to become as light as a leaf… but every time I try, I lose my balance and fall. The chakra disperses. The mud swallows me.
I fall once, twice, three times. Until I stop and smile, panting.
"No matter how many times I sink. I'll do it until the mud learns my name."
When the body can take no more, the spirit must take over. I recall the fragments of scrolls I studied about Lightning Chakra Mode. A technique from the Land of Lightning that enveloped the user in electrical chakra, multiplying their speed, reflexes, and physical strength.
I can't fully master it—I lack the training and natural affinity—but I can adapt it. My goal is simple: to create an incomplete version, a chakra armor that won't destroy me from within.
I channel the chakra into my nervous system, and a buzzing sound courses through my body. Electricity crackles in my arms, but the pain is unbearable. My muscles tense, my vision blurs. I fall to my knees.
"Tsk... shit..." I mutter through gritted teeth, panting. "If the Raikage can do it, so can I. I don't need to be a god to wield lightning."
I try again. This time, more slowly. I regulate the flow, visualizing the current surrounding my muscles, not passing through them. The chakra sparks, soft, barely visible, but steady.
I take a step, and my body moves faster. Another step. A gust. Mud leaps up behind me. I laugh, almost incredulous.
"So this is what it feels like… to break a chain."
Suddenly, a natural flash of lightning illuminates the sky, and for a second, I feel the storm responding to me. I'm not a Raikage. I'm not a chosen one. But for an instant, the rain seems to recognize me as one of its own.
When I return to the shelter, Konan is waiting for me with a towel and an angry expression. "You left again without saying anything." "I didn't want to wake them." "And if you didn't come back, what was I going to tell Nagato? That you went off to train until you died?"
No answer. She sighs, takes my hands, and wraps them in clean paper, absorbing the blood. Her chakra is warm, gentle. I feel the tenderness in every movement, and a mixture of guilt and gratitude washes over me.
"I don't have to do this alone, Yahiko." "Yes, I do," he replies, looking into her eyes. "Because if I'm not strong enough, all of this will fall apart."
She lowers her gaze but doesn't reply. Silently, she continues healing my wounds, and for the first time in days, I let her take care of me.
That night, Nagato accompanies me outside. He says nothing, only watches as I repeat the exercises. When my chakra control falters and I stumble, he comes closer and places his hand on my shoulder.
"You're using too much chakra on the outer points." "And how do you know?" "I can feel it. Your chakra is like a dispersing current. Try concentrating it in the center of your sternum, not on your extremities."
I obey. The result is immediate. The electrical current stabilizes, my movements become more fluid.
Nagato smiles slightly. —"You see… sometimes strength isn't about carrying everything, but about letting others help you bear it."
His words resonate with me. I, who always believed I had to be everyone's shield, am beginning to understand that even shields can be supported.
We decide to train together. He practices RinnEgan control.
lifting small stones, manipulating the environment without tiring—while I perfect the balance between Keijūgan and lightning chakra. When we synchronize our movements, the air distorts. For a moment, it seems we are part of the same energy: earth and lightning, calm and storm.
As the days pass, a movement pattern begins to emerge. I reduce my body weight with Keijūgan, concentrate electrical chakra in my muscles, and use short bursts of energy to multiply my speed. Each attempt improves. Each fall teaches.
My muscles ache, but the pain becomes part of the rhythm. Konan watches us from afar, sometimes joining in to launch paper projectiles that I must dodge. Her accuracy is perfect. Each blade that slices through the air forces me to move faster, to think more clearly.
"If you're going to protect me," Konan says with a faint smile, "you're going to have to do better than that." "Oh, really?" I reply, panting. "Then it doesn't hold you back."
Training becomes a game. Nagato measures my chakra, Konan tests my agility, and I learn to anticipate, adapt, and endure. The rain falls relentlessly, but instead of weakening me, it gives me rhythm. I strike, I dodge, I breathe. The sound of the water blends with my own breathing. And then, without realizing it, I smile.
"This… this is happiness too."
On the seventh day, my body can take no more. I close my eyes and collapse onto the mud, exhausted. Konan rushes toward me, but I raise a hand.
"I'm fine… just tired." "Yahiko, you're going to break." "If I don't break, I'll never know what I'm made of."
She kneels beside me, soaked, and looks at me silently. Nagato, behind her, clenches his fists.
"I don't want to lose you again." "—he says in a low voice, almost trembling. I look at him. He doesn't know it, but those words pierce my soul. Because I already know how to end all this.
He helps me up with effort, and I smile at him. —"You won't lose me. Not this time. Not while I still have breath."
I look at my hands covered in mud, blood, and electricity. I am not a god. I have no sacred lineage. But these hands… these hands can still build.
At dawn on the eighth day, I repeat the entire training from the beginning. But this time, something changes. The chakra flows naturally. The Keijūgan responds effortlessly. The lightning envelops me like a second skin, and for the first time, I feel no pain.
I leap and hang suspended for a few seconds above the mud. I throw a punch, and the electrical burst shakes the ground. I am not a Raikage. I am not a sage. But I am Yahiko, a man who defied fate and forced it to retreat.
Konan and Nagato watch me from the shelter. She claps, smiling. He simply nods, with that quiet glow only Nagato has when he believes in something.
I walk toward them, my body covered in scars and my heart light. For the first time in a long time, I feel no fear of what's to come.
"Perhaps peace will never come. Perhaps the world will never stop fighting. But here, in this gentle rain... I found my purpose."
That night, as the wind blows through the rubble, the three of us sit by the fire. Konan makes tea with filtered rainwater, and Nagato listens to an old radio he managed to repair. The news reports tell of battles, of death, of hatred. But inside our shelter, there is only silence.
"Do you think you'll ever be as strong as the greats?" Konan asks. "I don't know," I reply with a tired smile. "But I don't care about being great anymore. It's enough for me to be enough."
She rests her head on my shoulder. Nagato closes his eyes. And the rain, once again, falls upon us… not like a curse, but like a song only we understand.
"Perhaps happiness lies not at the end of the war… but in learning to live within it."