Creeping Shadow

Summary

Being informed by Kakashi that the orphans he trained are now attempting to bring about change in the Hidden Rain Village through dialogue, Jiraiya expresses hist satisfaction with his students' progress. At the Hidden Rain Village, Kyūsuke brings letters of requests for the Akatsuki's aid to Yahiko, who intends to surpass Hanzo one day. Having learned of the Akatsuki's existence from one of his men, Hanzo expresses his approval for an organisation that shares his ideals. Meanwhile, Yahiko, Konan and Nagato head to a small village that was earlier attacked and meet a group of people who want to attack the Hidden Stone Village. Though the Akatsuki insists solving the issue through peace talks, it ended with the three leading members being attacked by Hidden Stone ninja with an enraged Nagato unconsciously summoning the Gedo Statue in response to seeing Yahiko and Konan injured. Luckily, the two manage to stop Nagato in time and leave with Danzo and his ANBU finding the corpses of the Hidden Stone ninja. As Yahiko and his friends depart with the remainder of their group following, Danzo proceeds to disguise some of the Hidden Stone ninja as Hidden Rain ninja to convince Hanzo that the Akatsuki are a threat to his authority.