Pain begins his assault on the Hidden Leaf Village, while Naruto learns the Sage Arts.
Tropes associated with the Invasion of Pain arc:
- Armor-Piercing Question: Nagato delivers one so piercing to Naruto that not even he could answer at the time. Basically, Pain wanted the answer to true peace demanding for Naruto to tell him if there is a solution. Naruto didn't have a direct response and all he could say is that he'll just follow the path that Jiraiya wanted him to go. Fortunately, this causes Nagato's faith in humanity to be restored and he sacrifices his life to revive all of those whom he killed during his attack on the Leaf Village.
- Anyone Can Die: Subverted, while Kakashi, Fukasaku, and Shizune do die, they are resurrected by Nagato's Redemption Equals Death.
- Anguished Declaration of Love: Hinata finally confesses to Naruto after she jumps in to rescue him from Pain.
What happens next... - Asshole Victim: After having Yahiko kill himself, Hanzo was eventually killed by a very pissed-off Nagato. Considering Hanzo is pretty much the reason why Nagato became Pain in the first place, his death is definitely not tragic.
- Badass Longcoat: Naruto after learning the Sage Arts.
- Big Damn Heroes: Pretty much Naruto finally entering the battlefield with three large toads, a badass longcoat with a giant scroll behind him, and already in Sage Mode.
- Also Hinata for saving Naruto from being captured by Pain.
- Also the spirit of Minato, the Fourth Hokage, stopped Naruto just in time before the latter ripped off the seal to release the Nine Tails.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Pain vs the entire Leaf Village is very one-sided, with only Kakashi and Konohamaru being able to briefly bring down a body.
- Curb Stomp Cushion: Naruto put up a very good fight against Pain managing to destroy 4 out of the 6 Pains. However, Naruto is soon taken down by Deva Path after he manages to kill Fukasaku and uses his dead body as a distraction.
- Darkest Hour: The majority of this whole damn arc is considered this. Pain destroying the Leaf, Kakashi and other important characters dying, Naruto seeing Hinata seemingly killed in front of him and going absolute apeshit, and almost actually releasing the Ninetails from the seal. Thank goodness the spirit of Minato was there to stop Naruto or things would've gotten way worse.
- Defeating the Undefeatable: It has been stated by Zetsu that Pain has never fully lost a match until Naruto came around.
- Disc-One Final Boss: Pain serves as a sort of "ultimate challenge" for Naruto despite the series not being close to ending. Pain was the leader of the Akatsuki (despite Tobi recently declaring himself as the true leader), killed Naruto's Parental Substitute who was also his teacher (not to mention Pain's former one making it even more personal), and even has an extremely powerful ability that makes him nearly God levels in strength. Especially with Naruto putting all of the stops in order to bring him down. It's clear that Pain was served as a final step for Naruto who would eventually become his village's hero.
- Face Death with Dignity: Pretty much every one of the leaf village would rather die than rat out Naruto's location. Even one guy told Pain to his face to go to hell for thinking he will sell out Naruto. True Companions indeed...
- Fastball Special: After killing Fukasaku, Pain tosses his dead body at Naruto which causes him to catch it, drop his guard, and get pinned down.
- How Pain's invasion begins. The Asura Path launches the Animal Path into the village, right through the sensing barrier
- Heel–Face Turn: After having his faith in humanity restored thanks to Naruto, Nagato, decides to put his faith into Naruto, sacrifices himself to revive all of those that were killed during his attack on the leaf.
- Hidden Agenda Villain: While the Leaf Village was busy being destroyed, Danzo and his men were sitting in the shadows watching the destruction. Turns out Danzo was doing this to show that Tsunade wasn't capable of running the Leaf Village so that he may become the Hokage himself. When they try to bring back Naruto to the village, Danzo kills the messager frog. Even if it seems like he's doing it to keep Naruto safe from Pain, as it's later revealed, Danzo was only doing this so that the Nine-Tails wouldn't fall into the Akatsuki's hands as he eventually wants to take control of the Nine-Tails himself. Oh, and Danzo is the true mastermind behind Nagato becoming Pain (long story short, he lied to Hanzo thinking the Akatsuki at the time were out to get him instead of wanting to form an alliance and Hanzo tried to kill them off before they become a larger group).
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: His beatdown of the Leaf notwithstanding, his assault on Hinata is especially this in the Adaptation Expansion.
- Person of Mass Destruction: Pain proves to be this when destroying the entire foundations of the Leaf Village.
- Pet the Dog: After Nagato's death, Konan gives Naruto an origami-shaped bouquet so that he uses it with a small memorial he made for Jiraiya.
- So Proud of You: Everyone toward Naruto after defeating Pain and becoming the Hero of the Leaf. But shout out to Iruka who was driving to tears on how far Naruto came.
- Super Mode: Thanks to his training with Lord Fukasaku, Naruto is finally able to use the perfect version of Sage Mode.
- Took a Level in Badass: Naruto, after learning to use Sage chakra, is now effectively on par with Kage-level ninja, able to use the Rasen-Shuriken as an actual shuriken and use several large Rasengans with ease. Not to mention after defeating Pain and having everyone else brought back to life, Naruto became known as the "Hero of the Leaf."
- Also Konohamaru for mastering the Rasengan and actually taking down a Pain!
- Took a Level in Kindness: The Leaf Village was already starting to warm up to Naruto but damn! This arc shows that they are willing to die for him saying he's a true comrade to their village. Their kindness for Naruto only goes up dramatically when Naruto manages to defeat Pain and they declare him the Hero of their village.
- True Companions: Everyone in the Leaf Village refused to tell Pain where Naruto is hiding saying they'll never turn on a comrade even if it means dying. Ebisu, who originally despised Naruto, spoke this very clearly to Pain that NO ONE is going to turn on Naruto.
- Used to Be a Sweet Kid: Nagato definitely! Nagato used to be such a sweet and timid boy to a Nihilist who is willing to bring about world peace by any means necessary including kidnapping and murder.
- Wham Episode: The Reveal of Nagato's true body, Naruto almost releasing the Nine-Tails, and the destruction of the Leaf Village.
- Worf Effect: Asura Path is defeated in one fell swoop by Naruto, to demonstrate how strong he has become.
