Chapter 250: The Rain That Returned Home

What does it feel like to stand again beneath the rain, breathing the air of freedom? Perhaps there is only one word for it: survival after disaster.

There was no great mourning, no overwhelming grief, no endless crying or screaming. Among the fewer than three hundred survivors, nearly all were incomplete in some way, some blind, some missing arms or legs, but in this moment, none of them had reason for despair.

The return of the Akatsuki meant the return of their faith. And after what they had endured, nothing would ever be as dark as those nearly three years again. So they cheered. So they cried out. So they surged forward with emotion they had long been denied.

Kita wiped the corner of her eye and looked at Konan. Her eyes were still closed, and his concern was genuine. “Angel-sama, your eyes.”

Konan shook her head. “It’s nothing.”

People slowly stepped into the rain, breathing in what felt like freedom itself. The Akatsuki’s return was as silent as their departure had once been.

Tenten never even had time to understand how they arrived. One moment she saw villagers rushing out into the rain, and the next she saw Konoha’s shinobi being forced into retreat. Red clouds on black cloaks filled her vision. She didn’t have time to distinguish who was Sakura or who was the leader. She only had time to swing her kunai.

BOOM! Her strike deflected a deadly attack.

“Gah, who the hell?!” Hidan was sent flying back, his scythe knocked away, fury erupting instantly. “YOU BASTARD!!! WHO DID THAT?!”

In truth, standing in front of the Akatsuki’s red-cloud cloaks was suicide. Nagato saw her immediately. He also saw her missing eye, and her forehead protector. Konoha. Hidan’s follow-up attack was stopped, not by Tenten, not by Kakuzu, but by Nagato himself.

Tenten never imagined she would see the Akatsuki again like this. She had expected a storm, chaos, terror, something she could only run from. Not silence. Not this.

She had planned to escape back to Konoha. Quit being a ninja. Open a toy shop. Live quietly. But reality did not care about her plans. The Akatsuki returned without warning. And just like that, everything collapsed.

One by one, attackers fell. Later, the prisoners were freed. Tenten ran again, breathless, not thinking, only fleeing the idea of more killing.

Then a single kunai left her hand. BOOM! It struck its target and knocked Hidan’s weapon aside.

She stood there, exhausted. “I, I’m from Konoha’s stationed ANBU oversight division, Tenten.”

Silence. Everyone looked at her like she was absurd.

Sakura spoke, confused. “Tenten, why are you here?”

“I.” The words stuck in her throat. She wanted to say she was here to help. But help had already arrived too late. She looked at the ruined village. The blinded. The limping. The broken. Was this help? Or destruction?

Nagato answered calmly, “Konoha ninja.”

Sakura could not understand why her former classmate was here at this moment. Tenten forced herself to speak again. “I am the ANBU overseer assigned to this Amegakure outpost. Everything that happened here was under my command. My team was acting on my orders. They are only following instructions, please let them go.”

Nagato was not foolish. He saw it clearly, she had risked her life to protect what little remained.

Sakura trembled. Tenten. It was impossible for her to hate Konoha completely, even after everything. Because somewhere in that village, there was still light.

“I will not run,” Tenten said.

And then silence ended. A blade pierced her chest. A comrade’s blade. Not an enemy.

“TE, TENTEN!!” Sakura screamed.

The attacker withdrew the blade. Tenten staggered. Blood mixed with rain. The attacker collapsed moments later, poison already claiming him. His body dissolved into liquid, disappearing into the ground. No trace remained. Only the weapon stayed behind.

Tenten was still alive. Barely. Her vision blurred as she looked toward Sakura. And something finally clicked in her mind. Her forehead protector slipped down. Konoha’s symbol came into view. So that’s how it is.

Her breathing grew weaker. She tried to look one last time at the girl with amber eyes. “Y, u, g.” Breathing was too hard.

So this is how you understood my village? Get out. Go cry somewhere else. Even if you die here, it won’t undo what you’ve done. Those words echoed. Not from now, but from the past.

She had never forgiven her. And she had never been forgiven. Tenten’s lungs failed her. Blood spilled with every breath. I’m sorry. If I wasn’t your enemy. If we were in the same village. If I never hurt you.

“Sorry, Aji, sa, i.”

But the girl did not cry. She did not show pain. She only looked down with calm, amber eyes, just like the first time they met.

She had always seen Tenten as an enemy. A temporary ceasefire enemy during the Chunin Exams. A renewed enemy during the invasion. A prisoner afterward. Enemy and enemy. Never anything else. A ninja must not pity the enemy. That was the rule. And she had broken it once. That was why the village fell. That was why so many died. So she would not break it again.

“Konan-sama, she invaded the village, harmed my comrades, I.” She knelt. Tears fell. “I couldn’t defeat her, but.”

Konan gently touched her face. Cold tears met her fingers.

“Sakura.” And with that word, everything felt suddenly lighter.

Konan stood in the rain. “What is this feeling, standing in your own home again?”

The survivors flooded out, crying, laughing, collapsing into the rain like they had forgotten how to breathe. Konan said nothing. But her silence was not empty. It was heavy. It was home.