"...Before that, let me talk about something else."
Menma did not immediately answer Nagato's question about his "purpose." Instead, he chose to begin with a topic closer to the foundation of Nagato's understanding.
"Your plan is to capture all the Tailed Beasts and create an ultimate weapon powerful enough to destroy nations. Then, rather than using it to conquer directly, you intend to start a war of controllable scale, yet one brutal enough to make the world taste enough pain through real sacrifice and destruction. That way, people will develop a fear of war rooted deep in their souls. You will use that fear as a deterrent, forcibly suppressing the ambitions and conflicts of every nation in exchange for a period of... relatively peaceful respite."
"This is the answer you reached after personally witnessing your parents' tragic deaths, the loss of your closest friend, and your country being ravaged by war. Using greater pain to cover up and suppress the scattered, unceasing pain."
Nagato was not surprised that the other party knew of his plan, but hearing it recounted so clearly and calmly still gave him a cold sensation, as though he had been completely dissected.
"True peace... does not exist at all."
Nagato's voice was hoarse. "As long as humans exist, desire, greed, fear, misunderstanding... all of these will continually nurture hatred. In this cursed, endlessly repeating world, pursuing permanent peace is itself an illusion."
"Mm, that's right."
To Nagato and Konan's surprise, Menma did not refute his pessimistic conclusion. Instead, he nodded in agreement.
"It cannot be achieved." He repeated it without mockery, his tone calm. "That is why, deep down, what you seek has never been some eternal Utopia. It is merely... one hundred years. Using the power of a god to extort one hundred years without