Jiraiya

The self-styled Toad Sage brings Naruto home after their training journey, then resumes spying on the Akatsuki. A novelist, a fool and one of the Leaf's strongest ninja, Jiraiya is haunted by the orphans he once taught in Amegakure. His infiltration of the Hidden Rain leads to a fatal confrontation with Pain, and the coded message he leaves behind sets Naruto on the path to Sage Mode.

A towering, broad-shouldered man with a spiky white mane worn loose down his back and red markings running from his eyes down his cheeks. His forehead protector bears horns and the character for oil, marking his ties to Mount Myoboku. He dresses in a green short-sleeved shirt and pants beneath a red haori with yellow trim, mesh armour, hand guards and wooden sandals, with a scroll strapped across his back. In Sage Mode his nose broadens, warty ridges form around his eyes and his features take on an unmistakably toad-like cast.

Loud, theatrical and shameless, he introduces himself with elaborate posturing and is an unrepentant peeper who researches his adult novels in bathhouses. The buffoonery hides one of the sharpest minds in the shinobi world: a spymaster who can read political currents across nations and a teacher who deliberately provokes students into finding their own strength. He carries enormous guilt over the pupils he failed and the teammate he could not turn back, and he chooses self-sacrifice without hesitation when the alternative is letting others pay. He believes stubbornly that people can change, that giving up disqualifies you as a shinobi, and that the next generation should surpass him.

A student of the Third Hokage alongside Orochimaru and Tsunade, he earned the Sannin title when an enemy warlord spared the trio during the Second Shinobi World War. Training on Mount Myoboku, he was told by the Great Toad Sage that he would guide a child destined to change the world. He mentored three war orphans in Amegakure, among them Nagato, whose eyes bore the Rinnegan. Later he taught Minato Namikaze, who became Fourth Hokage, and he named his own godson Naruto after the hero of his novel. After Orochimaru's defection and years spent abroad running Konoha's intelligence network, he returned to train Naruto directly.

1. Kazekage Rescue

   Returning to Konoha with Naruto after their long training journey, he reports on Akatsuki's movements and the organisation's pursuit of the tailed beasts. He cautions Tsunade about the scale of the threat, then resumes travelling to chase down rumours about the group's elusive leader.

2. Itachi Pursuit and information gathering

   His spy network narrows Akatsuki's base to Amegakure and identifies the leader by the name Pain. He infiltrates the rain-soaked country using an old contact, gathering the intelligence that will decide whether Konoha can survive the coming attack.

3. Tale of Jiraiya the Gallant

   Inside Amegakure he discovers that Pain is his own former student Nagato, then fights all six of the Paths at once. Mortally wounded and unable to escape, he works out the body-count secret behind the technique and encodes it on the back of a toad, sending it home as his last act.

4. Pain's Assault and legacy

   Though dead, he shapes the arc that follows: Shikamaru cracks his coded message, Fukasaku brings Naruto to Mount Myoboku to complete the Sage training Jiraiya never mastered, and Naruto confronts Nagato with the belief in change that his teacher refused to abandon.

Naruto Uzumaki

Godson and student

He named the boy after his own novel's hero and trained him for nearly three years, passing on the Rasengan, the toad contract and a conviction that stubbornness is a virtue. Naruto's grief over his death drives much of what follows.

Nagato

Former student

He raised the orphan and taught him ninjutsu, believing the Rinnegan marked him as the child of prophecy. Meeting him again as Pain destroys him, and he dies still refusing to condemn the boy he once protected.

Tsunade

Teammate and lifelong love

His affection for his fellow Sannin is constant and mostly unreturned in the way he wants. She sends him on the Amegakure mission and is devastated by his death, having nearly forbidden him to go alone.

Orochimaru

Former teammate

The teammate he failed to stop. Jiraiya blames himself for not killing or reclaiming him when he had the chance, and that regret shapes how he handles both Nagato and Sasuke's defection.

Minato Namikaze

Student

He trained the future Fourth Hokage, who repaid him by teaching him the Rasengan and asking him to be godfather to his son, entrusting Naruto's future to his teacher before dying.

• He entrusts Naruto to the toads and Konoha before departing alone for the hidden village of rain.
• He confronts Pain and recognises his old pupil Nagato behind the attack.
• He fights six opponents at once in Sage Mode, losing an arm and his voice in the battle.
• He deduces the secret of the Six Paths and etches a coded message onto a messenger toad's back as he sinks.
• His unfinished novel and the name he gave Naruto are revealed as the origin of his godson's entire identity.

• He is the author of the adult novel series Kakashi is never seen without.
• His first, poorly selling book featured a never-quitting hero whose name Minato borrowed for his son.
• His forehead protector bears the character for oil, referencing the toads of Mount Myoboku.
• He addresses himself with grandiose self-introductions and dance-like poses whenever he makes an entrance.
• His body is never recovered, which is why he cannot be brought back through reanimation during the war.

• Naruto Uzumaki
• Sasuke Uchiha
• Sakura Haruno
• Kakashi Hatake
• Sai
• Tsunade

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