Yūmei Kokūzō

Yūmei Kokūzō (幽明虚空蔵, Kokūzō Yūmei) is the Fifth Hokage (五代目火影, Godaime Hokage; Literally meaning "Fifth Fire Shadow") of Konohagakure and a S-rank shinobi. He is the foster child of the late Fire Country's daimyō, pulled the strings of the pseudo Akatsuki's, and was the founder of Genesis prior to its merge with the Leaf.

Enter: Yūmei Kokūzō
The foster son of the Fire Country's daimyō, Yūmei was raised to become a diplomatic tool. He received home tutoring when he was placed under the tutelage of his adoptive father when he was only a toddler, which was the best education for somebody so young who showed great analytical promise. Yet however he was segregated from the world outside, his knowledge of it bleak as he remained home-bound. He was also known to be an expert in shōgi, his tactical prowess emanating whenever he brought down somebody older than him. Having been born straight into nobility, loyalty in the eyes of the Fire Country's denizens, the only genuine social interaction Yūmei has was with his half-brothers and sisters. The walls to his fantasy had only begun to crumble.

He was in line to become the next daimyō after his foster father prior to his beloved, foster mother's assassination. A seven year old Yūmei confronted the daimyō afterward and accused him of leaving his foster mother defenseless, even going as far as renouncing his entitlement to his aristocratic position. In response, his father banished him to Konohagakure, where he was to be used as a political hostage. However this only lasted for several months as the Land of Fire consequently abandoning Yūmei as a diplomatic tool and forcing him to go into hiding. His adoptive mother's death and his foster father's apparent lack of concern in regards to it were huge blows to Yūmei. He always felt that it was unfair for his mother and himself, and therefore made it his goal to pursue a better world for the sake of the world. He also sought to discover the true reason for his foster mother's death.

Upon reaching Konoha, Yūmei sought help from the Mayakashi household, who were his foster mother's allies. They enrolled him into the local academy, where he graduated from several months later, his genius-level of intellect surpassing that of even the teachers. This was no enough for him. He possessed the hatred and the determination required to kill his adoptive father. However, he lacked power. Although he was was a master of the most basic forms of ninjutsu, Yūmei lacked any elemental chakra affinities, which granted him a mighty disadvantage against higher-ranked shinobi in terms of raw power.

A year later he began to plot against his father, further honing his prowess in genjutsu, which did not rely on his possession of an elemental chakra affinity. However there existed many Kekkei Genkai well acquainted with the style, such as the Sharingan and the Byakugan that could see through such illusions and force him into a disadvantaged position. As he was training, Yūmei experienced a chain of unsightly images which haunted his mind with mental trauma. That was when he came to realize the power he required all along, just required that little acknowledgement, in order to become a reality.

When Yūmei reopened his eyes, a whole new world was presented to him. He felt power unlike anything else. He felt as though he could utilize any elemental chakra affinity existing to a substantial-extent. A ripple-like pattern around the pupil had formed, possessing a light purple iris and sclera. It is said to be the most powerful of Great Three Dōjutsu (大三瞳術, Daisan Dōjutsu; Literally meaning "Great Three Eye Techniques"). It was admired as being able to bring forth all ninjutsu. The holder of these eyes can completely master the six nature transformations that form the basis of ninjutsu. It was said that in times when the world is in disorder, a person is sent down from the heavens to become either a "God of Creation" who will calm the world, or a "Destroyer" who will reduce everything to nothing - Yūmei had awakened the Rinnegan, an ancient power sealed until he was ready to harness its abilities.

Not wishing to draw attention to himself, Yūmei had himself made through a request to the Mayakashi Family a pair of customized contact lenses which concealed the entirety of his eyes with a pseudo mask resembling their previous appearance. Yūmei successfully completed missions consecutively, his prowess in all five basic elements when combined with his genius-level intellect made him invincible on the battlefield. At the age of 11 he was promoted toin the village's special regime, the ANBU Black Ops. This was just as he had planned; thanks to his awakening of the Rinnegan, Yūmei had brought his goal closer than ever before to completion.

A convention was to be held between the Land of Fire and the Land of Water later that year with Yūmei assigned to act as the daimyō's bodyguard along with several ANBU while the diplomatic proceedings were carried out. On the evening prior to the event, he murdered the ANBU and the daimyō, his foster father, in cold blood. The man pleaded for his life after claiming he knew nothing about his wife's death. Knowing he would be held accountable for his treason, Yūmei defected secretly defected from Konohagakure under the guise he had been kidnapped.

The more Yūmei wandered the continent, the more he was subjected to the grave injustice being performed on a daily basis. He witnessed murder, lies, rape, homicide and theft. The world was black and white, black because his eyes shut out the light, white because he came to forget the other colours. It was during this time he developed an inclusive extension of Yin–Yang Release, Feng Shui Art (風水芸術, Fūsui Geijutsu), enabling him to devour everything within a certain radius in a phenomenal amount of compressed chakra, fend himself from chakra-based techniques and bind his opponents with relative ease. He possessed the power, but now he lacked purpose. That was when Yūmei decided to take action against all of creation, against the humanity which polluted the world with vulgar treatment and mindless exploitation of its natural resources.

From Dawn to Twilight
Hence he formed the criminal organization to be known as the Akatsuki. Enlisting a number of S-ranked criminals, Yūmei worked behind the scenes while his associates performed his dirty work. However their antagonism to the world proved to be a hindrance to his careful planning, dastardly slowing down his progress of casting the world into oblivion.

Later disbanding the Akatsuki, Yūmei and a selective amount of his most prized associates went into hiding in a past hideout. The more time progressed, the easier it was for the outside world to forget their existence, hence was why they began to operate as a secret society. The organization Genesis was birthed as a result. No longer focusing on capturing the tailed beasts which the villages on the surface continued to bicker over possession of, Yūmei placed his attention on more pressing matters: Sparking a revolution that would captivate the world enough to tear a rift in the fabric of reality - a paradox no less, to revert everything back to its primordial state. Although this served as his main objective, he possessed an alternative - to subjugate the entire shinobi population under his divine rule.

Ascension of the Godaime Hokage
Becoming the Hokage following Shiizuki's removal, he integrated the forces of Genesis into Konoha's ANBU force, greatly increasing the village's military power. He also later developed a seal granting him similar, if not better, effects of Orochimaru's Cursed Seal of Heaven, of which left him in a coma for multiple days.

Following Kumogakure's declaration of war was made on Konoha, Yūmei further closed the margin between his power and that of the Sage of the Six Paths. He meditated so as to unlock the true potential of Yin–Yang Release as well as his own ability to rule over life and death as the Outer Path in a form unaffected by either. This training session led to the creation of, and inspired the future creation of many other extraordinary abilities. He at that point, abandoned his previous persona as an aristocrat of sorts, and began to don that of an individual exhibiting both the Will of Fire and a much more wiser demeanor, even titling himself 'The Sage Incarnate'.

Personality
Yūmei is a highly intelligent indiviual who is also calm, sophisticated, and slightly arrogant due to his aristocrat upbringing. When donning the role of a leader, his true feelings are expressed; his charisma and ideals gain him the trust and respect of many warriors and leaders. While Yūmei is righteous and noble by nature he is more than willing to do acts that go against his morality; this is due to his belief that he must commit evil to destroy the greater evil. His desire to destroy and recreate the world comes from his revenge for his mother's apparent death, however in time he came to realize that his goal is not just for her, but for the entire world.

Yūmei has a habit of accepting responsibility for actions which he has no fault in. This may be his tragic flaw. Yūmei seems to have an average amount of concern for innocent lives, while he does oppose the concept of terrorism, he does not (or at least not openly) display a great amount of remorse for the collateral of his endeavours. While Yūmei can be ruthless and often merciless in battle, he can be a rather compassionate person to his friends and loved ones. At first glance, he seems to have relatively little concern for the wellbeing of his subordinates, but in reality he does care about them, seeing them as valuable allies. Although, he has made exceptions on numerous occasions.

Appearance
Its immediately recognizable feature was a spiky black and indigo mask, completely hiding Yūmei's face when worn — appearing opaque from the outside, but transparent from the inside. By unknown means, a small part of the mask could be signaled to slide down to reveal his eyes, although this is done on rare occasions. Notably this mask prevented genjutsu from being directly cast upon Yūmei being that his facial features, notably his eyes were concealed behind a continuous, perception-manipulating barrier ninjutsu - however this also prevented him from casting visual genjutsu on his foes glimpsing at his eyes, rendering the Seifukushagan's influential prowess redundant when direct eye contact could not be made. There also existed a miniature microphone on the lower end of the mask's interior designed to deepen the wearer's voice for identity-safeguarding purposes.

His new, and present appearance consists of him wearing an onyx robe with gold- trimmings, along with a large, white, flowing toga draped around his main body and across his chest. His ebony hair sticks upwards at the top, although he from time to time reverts back to possessing his past hairstyle. He also wears the Yasakani no Magatama, a necklace possessing six red magatama's on a coil of an unknown material.

After having spent an extensive period of time developing a seal, his efforts had proved to be a success with the implementation of the Blessed Crest of Yatagarasu on his chest over where his heart is supposedly located.

Abilities
As the Hokage and previously the leader of Genesis and Akatsuki, Yūmei is an extraordinarily powerful shinobi, and recognised as the most powerful member of the previously mentioned criminal organizations, as well of Konohagakure as his new title suggests. It should be noted he possesses great stores of chakra, being able to cast a long chain of S-rank techniques without tiring.

Intelligence
Even without the Rinnegan, Yūmei is a formidable opponent. He is highly intelligent, possessing a genius-level intellect, and is capable of devising and executing strategies with incredible speed and precision. The conspicuous appearances of Yūmei and knack for evading hostile confrontation demonstrate his mental acuity; ranging from his superb skill in playing shōgi, to when figuring out the identity of an individual he can only acknowledge mentally, Yūmei instantly comes up with fourteen different possibilities for the former's identity - including the correct one.

Rinnegan
Yūmei's incredible power stemmed mainly from his kekkei genkai, the legendary Rinnegan. This was originally possessed by the Sage of the Six Paths, the world's first ninja, and the founder of modern ninjutsu. Yūmei mastered all six nature transformations, something that was completely unprecedented, and is well versed in all the mainstream ninjutsu, mastering them at a young age. It is believed the Rinnegan allows Yūmei to use any technique he wishes, which had led to his invention of Feng Shui Art, as well as Primitive Reincarnation. Yūmei is highly proficient in genjutsu, evidence of this being his masterful usage of Ephemeral, which doesn't require him to cast any hand seals. He can also use the Rinnegan to install mental barriers and traps in his minions' minds to prevent others from accessing secret information. The Rinnegan also enhanced Yūmei's vision of chakra in a similar manner to the other great dōjutsu, allowing him to see the chakra of barrier techniques around the perimeter of his location, and the chakra gathered at a shinobi's feet. Using the Outer Path's ability, he can create chains which can control tailed beasts and are very difficult to remove.

Animal Path
The Animal Path (畜生道, Chikushōdō) grants Yūmei the ability to summon various creatures. The Animal Path's main abilities revolves around summoning various animals and creatures to aid him as the summoner in battle. Each creature serves a different purpose in battle, much like every path is also different from the others. Each animal summon also has the Rinnegan and as such Yūmei is able to see through their eyes as well. Each animal had various body piercings as well, suggesting that they are under his control.

Asura Path
The Asura Path (修羅道, Shuradō) grants Yūmei the ability to summon mechanised armor, augmenting their body with extra limbs and various robotic weaponry. The Asura Path allows him to fire one of his left forearms off as a long-range projectile, and can pull out his arms to reveal and fire a cluster of segmented missiles at its targets. It can quickly propel himself forward with a burst of chakra from its boots, and can protract multiple blades and drills from his right arm in combat. Also, he can open up the crown of its head to release a powerful chakra blast that is capable of destroying numerous buildings at once.

Deva Path
The Deva Path (天道, Tendō) grants Yūmei the ability to manipulate attractive and repulsive forces. His main abilities associated with this path revolved around the manipulation of attractive and repulsive forces, allowing him to repel or attract objects or people. However, he could not perform techniques such as Banshō Ten'in and Shinra Tensei in rapid succession, leaving it vulnerable for a short period of time after each use. This period of time between usages varied from five seconds to several minutes, depending upon the force of the repulsion or attraction that the Deva Path had used. Yūmei's mastery over the power of this path has lead to the creation of techniques such as Kami e no Fukujū and Chakra-Empowered Devastation.

Human Path
The Human Path (人間道, Ningendō) grants Yūmei the ability to remove the soul of any target he touches as well as read their mind. Through the Human Path, Yūmei possesses the capability of mind reading simply by placing his hand over the target's head, and can extract any information or secret being hidden by the victim against their will. However, using the technique will inevitably pull the soul out of the target's body, causing instant death.

Naraka Path
The Naraka Path (地獄道, Jigokudō) grants Yūmei two main abilities: interrogation and restoration, by using the King of Hell. To interrogate, he needs only catch hold of a person, causing the King of Hell to appear before them. With the victim seemingly paralysed, Yūmei begins questioning them. After answers are given, the King of Hell will unzip its mouth to release tendril-like arms and would draw out an apparition of the victim's life force energy in the form of an enlarged tongue. The King of Hell then proceeds to pass its judgement. If the person was lying or refused to answer the questions, the King of Hell would remove their tongue and consume it, apparently killing them. However, if they told the truth, they would be spared, although left extremely exhausted. The second ability Yūmei through the Naraka Path possesses is the ability to repair any damage. To do so he has the King of Hell ingest the damaged body with its tendril-like arms into its mouth. Then, after some time, the destroyed body will emerge from its mouth, completely healed and rejuvenated.

Outer Path
The Outer Path (外道, Gedō) is the ability granted to Yūmei to revive the dead. Said to live outside the realm of life and death, Yūmei could use the Outer Path: Samsara of Heavenly Life Technique to revive people that he recently killed. His ability to absorb the Yin chakra of all living organisms within a specified radius complements his rapid development into one of the most powerful, wise and terrifying shinobi on the continent.

Preta Path
The Preta Path (餓鬼道, Gakidō) grants Yūmei the ability to absorb an infinite amount of chakra in any form using the Blocking Technique Absorption Seal. This path's "chakra absorption" ability is primarily defensive, since Yūmei is capable of absorbing any ninjutsu-related technique with it, thereby nullifying its effect. This technique can also take the form of a barrier around his body, allowing him to absorb attacks from all directions. In addition to its defensive properties, this body's ability possesses offensive capabilities, as Yūmei can potentially absorb all the chakra out of any person that he touches or grabs.

Ninjutsu
Possessing the Rinnegan, Yūmei possesses all five of the basic chakra affinities, and is in possession of the kekkei tōta as a result of his implied experimentation on moulding together various chakra natures to apply devastatingly-destructive effects to usually intermediately-ranked ninjutsu. He has also created a number of ninjutsu augmented into his fighting style, granting him a high level of versatility when on the battlefield. Yūmei's techniques also often involve usage of crows, both in ninjutsu and genjutsu. This is seen amongst others with his creation of a clone that dissolves into crows and using crows to hide shuriken in them.

Power Release
Power Release (力遁, Rikiton; Viz "Energy Style") is an advanced nature kekkei tōta, an advanced version of kekkei genkai, which is created by combining the fire, lightning, and yin natures. Most of the techniques of this nature initially form as or are charged with as a catalyst, what appears to be red bolts resembling lightning. This element allows Yūmei to manipulate an unfathomable amount of energy in the form of said lightning to pulsate throughout both matter and chakra, usually accompanied with an emission of red light, making it superior to both Lightning Release and other Kekkei Genkai requiring it, being that there is no limit to the amount of energy that may be expelled, and the fact that even one charge can disrupt the neurons and disperse the electrons of matter. It is due to this that making the absorption of this particular chakra nature extremely lethal in the presence of Yūmei who may amplify the ferocity of the matter at will and inflict a grevious amount of damage to the absorber; if a particular seal absorbed a technique affiliated with this chakra nature, it could potentially be destroyed as a result of the previous example.

Space–Time Ninjutsu
Yūmei is known to be highly-skilled with manipulating the space-time continuum, as demonstrated through his creation of a number of techniques capable of of utilizing it for a variety of purposes. Jigen-Tou allows him to pass through any physical object (or person) and destroy it, enabling him to "delay his own existence", essentially cutting through the space-time continuum. With such power, very little can stop a jigen-tou from cutting its target once it makes contact. This technique in particular makes him extremely dangerous in close-quarter combat, where with a few swings of his arm, he could potentially slice his opponents into three pieces. He is also capable of travelling through the space-time continuum to reach a variety destinations almost-instantaneously, as demonstrated whenever he uses Secret Technique: Pedestal of Time to reallocate himself from Konohagakure to his secret hideout beneath the village.

Trivia

 * His name means "dark and light, the Receptacle of Void".
 * Yūmei's Pre-Sage character design is predominantly based off of Lelouch from Code Geass. His Post-Sage character design is heavily influenced by Zeref from Fairy Tail.
 * If Yūmei were to be featured in a databook, it would say:
 * He has completed 113 official missions in total: 4 D-rank, 20 C-rank, 23 B-rank, 48 A-rank, 18 S-rank.