The Asura Path (修羅道, Shuradō) grants the user the ability to augment their own body to summon mechanised armour and various ballistic and mechanical weaponry.[2] During his lifetime, Nagato channelled the Asura Path through the body of a ninja puppeteer.
This man was a ninja Jiraiya met during his journey to find his disciple.
History[]
In the anime, the Asura Path was shown to be a wandering puppeteer with insight to the world. His body was used by Nagato years later as the Asura Path.
Appearance[]
The man was tall, bald with an unusual body shape, possessing a very thick neck, no ears and a large jaw. He also had part of his face obscured by a rice hat in the anime, possibly hiding a headband that had not been shown in the manga, as Jiraiya quickly discovered that he was a ninja. The Asura Path's unnamed puppet was made to look like a baby, and was capable of emitting infantile cries.
The Asura Path was the only body of the Six Paths of Pain to not have orange hair, simply because it had no hair at all. It had a vertical ring piercing on its nose, six spike studs all around its head, three studs on the top and bottom of each of its six arms, an enormous cylindrical stud on its chin, and two vertical studs on each of its upper cheeks. The body had three faces, each with a different expression, and two of which appeared from the sides of its head only when it removed its cloak in a fight: happy (its normal face), angry, and neutral. It also had a long, saw-like "tail" which stretched from his back over his head. As a mark of Nagato's control, the Rinnegan appeared in its eyes.
Abilities[]
In the anime, when alive, he showed the ability to control a puppet with threads made out of chakra.
Jutsu[]
- Bazooka Arm: After the body modification done by the Asura Path, this technique launches a detached part of an arm, using it as a projectile weapon. With a small-scale explosion, caused by chakra collected in the cut end of the wrist, the hand portion gains propulsive power and flies off in a straight line with tremendous force. Its destructive power is great enough to easily break through even thick bedrock. The hand portion is protected with chakra, which allows it to remain unscathed. The chakra in the wrist draws the hand back like a magnet, reattaching it again.
- Shura Attack: With the body modifications of the Asura Path, the user can open parts of their body to reveal a cannon that fires a massive blast of chakra with explosive power strong enough to devastate an entire area.[1] When Nagato used this through his path, he opened the body's head to reveal the chakra cannon, and when he did so himself after his reincarnation, he used an arm-mounted cannon.
Legacy[]
As part of the Six Paths of Pain, the Asura Path is used for a number of different purposes over the years: all six Paths are used to overthrow and kill Hanzō; when Jiraiya infiltrates Amegakure in order to find out more about Akatsuki, the Asura Path fights him and ultimately contributes to his death; in the anime, the Human Path assists in the capture of the Six-Tails; it participates during Pain's Assault, and like the other Paths it is defeated by Naruto Uzumaki.
Usage []
Through the Asura Path, the user is able to form up to four additional arms and two additional faces, as well as a folded, serrated blade-like sash around their waist. These additional appendages, as well as the user's body as a whole, are augmented with a variety of mechanical weaponry, which they can access at will. The user canfire their forearms as long-range projectiles or pull them off to reveal and fire a cluster of segmented missiles at targets. They are also able to protrude a set of flexible blades and drills or a series of mechanical tendrils from their arms, as well as quickly propel themselves forward by emitting a burst of chakra from holes in their feet. The user can also release a powerful chakra blast, which is capable of destroying numerous buildings at once, either by transforming one of their hands into a cannon or by opening the crown of their head.
The body through which Nagato channelled the Asura Path displayed enough raw physical power to rip Jiraiya's arm off and crush his throat with basictaijutsu, as well as to throw the Animal Path all the way into Konohagakure from the outskirts of the village. Additionally, the Asura Path was able to survive otherwise fatal damage due to its mechanised insides. All of these abilities befitted the "warring demon" name that the Asura Path held, whilst giving it a considerable degree of versatility.
Influences []
In Buddhism, the Asura realm is the plane of semi-divine warring demons which people are reincarnated in due to actions based on jealousy, struggle, combat or rationalisation in a previous life, and though powerful, live in constant violence and conflict to which there is no resolution nor peace. Following a common depiction of Asura, this ability allows the user to possess six arms and three faces, each of which display a different emotion. Like Deva, Asura are also a race of supernatural beings. They are featured in Hinduism as the lowest tier of divine beings, and are known to live a life pursuing power, while indulgent and representative of materialistic and carnal pleasures. Both depictions play in the abilities of the Asura Path.
It also draws inspiration from Hinduism, where Asuras in mythology purportedly had the ability (calledAstra) to use magical equivalents to modern day biological missiles.
Trivia[]
- The kaiwan (怪腕) in Kaiwan no Hiya can be translated in two ways. The first and most common way is the idiomatic way: "an amazing or remarkable ability". The second way is by translating the kanji directly: "mysterious or suspicious arm", making the name a pun.
- While unnamed in the manga and anime, this technique was explicitly named in Naruto Shippūden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3.