Faced with the Seven-Tails' charge, Uchiha Yuan casually threw Shisui aside, then used teleportation to disappear from the spot the moment the Seven-Tails hit him. Caught off guard, the Seven-Tails crashed directly into a mountain.
It knocked itself unconscious and slid down from the mountainside to the ground.
Uchiha Yuan couldn't help but laugh at the sight, and hearing his laughter only enraged the Seven-Tails further.
It flew back into the air and scattered a large amount of phosphorus powder down toward Yuan's location.
The overwhelming cloud of phosphorus powder blocked Yuan's vision as the Seven-Tails began forming a Tailed Beast Ball mid-air.
Unfortunately, the Seven-Tails didn't realize that Uchiha Yuan had activated his Mind's Eye, and everything it was doing was crystal clear to Yuan.
Yuan activated his Sharingan, triggering the Insight ability, and instantly locked onto the Seven-Tails' weak point.
Then he teleported again—appearing right in front of the Seven-Tails—and slammed a Lightning Release: Rasengan directly into the identified weak spot.
The attack caught the Seven-Tails completely off guard. The violent lightning chakra of the Lightning Release: Rasengan paralyzed its body, and since Yuan had struck a weak point, the Tailed Beast Ball the Seven-Tails had been forming was disrupted and dissipated.
The blow also threw the Seven-Tails off balance, causing it to fall from the air.
But Yuan didn't stop there—he teleported down to the ground along with the falling beast, formed hand seals, and used Water Release: Great Waterfall Technique to further suppress the Seven-Tails' movements. Then, another burst of Lightning Release technique struck the beast like electrotherapy.
Smoke began rising from the Seven-Tails' body as it was electrocuted.
Despite the pitiful appearance, Yuan could clearly sense with his Mind's Eye that none of these attacks had caused any substantial damage to the Seven-Tails.
It swung its tail again, scattering more phosphorus powder to cover Yuan. This powder was naturally shed from its own body and didn't obstruct the Seven-Tails' vision.
After the earlier exchange, the Seven-Tails had realized this human was completely different from the Takigakure ninja—he was truly a threat.
The Seven-Tails began to feel the urge to retreat and activated its phosphorus-based attack.
Yuan suddenly sensed the powder around him emit a blinding light, followed by a chain of explosions.
Startled, he quickly teleported out of the blast radius, while the Seven-Tails took the opportunity to fly into the sky—and vanished in an instant.
The Seven-Tails had escaped, but Uchiha Yuan wasn't the least bit anxious.
With its enormous chakra, no matter where it hid, it would shine like a beacon to Yuan's Mind's Eye.
Yuan formed hand seals and summoned Lightning, then jumped onto its back and had it begin searching for the Seven-Tails' trail.
But to Yuan's surprise, even after circling the area, they found nothing.
"Ran off pretty fast, huh…" Yuan muttered, instructing Lightning to expand the search area.
Yet, even after sweeping a wide radius, there was still no sign of the Seven-Tails.
Given Lightning's speed, they had already covered more than half the Land of Waterfalls.
If the Seven-Tails wasn't anywhere in that large area, there were only two possibilities: one, its flying speed was extremely fast and it had already fled the Land of Waterfalls; or two, it had a way of hiding its life force.
At that moment, Yuan suddenly recalled that in the original series, the Seven-Tails indeed had the ability to conceal itself.
Realizing this, Yuan's face darkened—the mission was about to become a lot more complicated.
He began to regret not going all-out earlier to finish it in one blow.
Still unwilling to give up, Yuan searched the area once more but came up empty. Left with no choice, he returned to Takigakure.
The villagers and ninja had evacuated to a location not far from the village, and they had clearly witnessed the battle between Yuan and the Seven-Tails.
Seeing how Yuan had temporarily suppressed the beast made them extremely excited. Although the Seven-Tails escaped in the end, they were no longer worried. With someone as strong as Yuan around, the beast no longer posed a threat in their eyes.
"Senior Yuan, are you alright? Are you hurt?" Shisui didn't immediately ask about the Seven-Tails, but rather, concerned himself with Yuan's well-being.
Yuan smiled, "I'm fine—though it's a shame that Seven-Tails got away."
Relieved to hear Yuan was unharmed, Shisui let out a breath. After sensing the enormous chakra of the Seven-Tails at such close range, he had been worried whether Yuan could actually take it down—but now, it was clear that worry was unnecessary.
"Senior Yuan, it shouldn't matter that the Seven-Tails escaped, right? You said it yourself: with chakra that massive, it can't escape your detection," Shisui said.
Yuan sighed. "Well, if it were any other Tailed Beast, sure. But this one seems to have the ability to hide its chakra and life force. This mission just got a lot harder."
"It can hide itself? That really is troublesome. The Land of Waterfalls is so vast. We don't know how long it would take to search the whole thing—and even then, the Seven-Tails definitely won't stay in one place," Shisui analyzed.
Yuan knew all of this too, but they had no better options—searching was all they could do.
After discussing the situation with the Takigakure leader, the village's ninjas began working with Yuan and Shisui to track down the beast.
Unknowingly, night had fallen. They had searched nearly all of the areas around the village and still found nothing.
"If only the Seven-Tails would come out on its own…" Shisui said with frustration.
That one line made Yuan's eyes light up.
Right! If they couldn't find the Seven-Tails, why not lure it out themselves?
"Shisui, I have an idea. I'll leave for a bit. You stay hidden—don't give the Seven-Tails a chance to ambush you!" Yuan said, then vanished before Shisui's eyes.
He teleported several times and arrived at a nearby mountain.
Then he formed hand seals, activated the Annihilation technique, and used the Mangekyō Sharingan technique Magatsuhi to create a massive fireball.
Yuan's plan was simple—it could be summed up in one phrase: like a moth to a flame.
Chōmei's true form was an insect, and insects were naturally sensitive to light—especially at night.
With the fireball he created being so massive, it might just draw the hidden Seven-Tails out of the darkness.
(To Be Continued...)