Naraka Path


 * Name:
 * Type: Kekkei Genkai
 * User: Nagato
 * Debut (Manga): Chapter 379

The was the sixth of Nagato's Six Paths of Pain to be shown. It was incapacitated during the invasion of Pain by Naruto Uzumaki's Sage Technique: Rasenrengan.

Appearance
When it was alive, the Naraka path belonged to a tall, stocky, muscular man. The anime showed him to be somewhat of a holy man in a small village, strongly emphasizing the power of prayer among his religious disciples. The Naraka path, like all of the Six Paths, possessed Nagato's Rinnegan eyes. It had a spiky mop of orange hair, which had been a gray-brown color while it was alive. It had multiple body piercings, such as a circular stud on its upper nose, a diagonal row of studs on each of its cheeks, three spike piercings in each of its ears, and a stud on each of its shoulders near its neck.

Abilities
Although it was physically strong enough to lift a man with one hand, the only ability exhibited by the Naraka path lay in the use of summoning the King of Hell. The King of Hell is a large head which sprouts out of the ground surrounded by black flames and possesses Rinnegan eyes. The King of Hell could fulfil two purposes: interrogation and resurrection. To interrogate, the Naraka path need only catch hold of a person and ask them a question. After an answer was given by the target, the King of Hell's mouth would open to release tendril-like arms that force out the life force of the victim from his/her mouth. If the person was lying or refused to answer the questions, the King of Hell would remove their life force and eat it, apparently killing them. However, if they told the truth, they would be spared, although left extremely exhausted.

The second ability the Naraka path posssed is the ability to repair other paths. It could do so by ingesting any part of the damaged body with the tendril-like arms from its mouth, and then, after some time, the dead person would emerge from its mouth, completely restored and healed. The King of Hell also has the power to resurrect the dead, though it is unknown if the Naraka path has access to this ability.

In all situations where Pain's bodies were shown in a combat formation, the Naraka path always took a rear position with the others protecting it, behind even the Deva path. This indicates that the Naraka path was one of Pain's most important bodies.

Influences
In Buddhism, the Naraka realm, or "hell realm", is a plane of rebirth, based on strong states of hatred cultivated in a previous life or lives. The Naraka, imp-like humanoids, are continuously tortured to death and then revived, so that the torture can continue until their negative karma is entirely spent and they can reincarnate into one of the higher planes.