"Jin, it's basically over. Dodai and the remaining dozen Cloud shinobi have surrendered."
A few minutes later, Hyuga Hizashi raised his hand, signaling the Hyūga archers to cease fire, and reported calmly to Uchiha Jin.
"Good. Keep watch for me."
Jin nodded. With a casual wave, he extinguished the towering wall of flames. Then, in a single leap, he landed atop the massive head of the Two-Tails.
Hizashi made a hand sign.
The surrounding Hyūga clan members immediately dispersed in all directions, forming a tight perimeter around Jin and the fallen tailed beast.
Only then did Jin begin examining the creature beneath him.
A Beast of Blue Flame
Unlike most tailed beasts that possessed tangible flesh-and-blood bodies, the One-Tail and the Two-Tail were unique.
Shukaku existed as chakra-inscribed sand, its body formed from grains infused with cursed seals.
Matatabi, on the other hand, was composed entirely of blue chakra flames.
Jin neither knew nor cared why this anomaly existed.
What interested him was the flame itself.
For someone who wielded the power of the Flame-Flame Fruit, these blue chakra flames did not burn him.
Instead—
They felt familiar.
Welcoming.
He drew a wisp of blue flame into his palm and examined it closely.
The temperature alone far surpassed ordinary fire—tens of thousands of degrees even in a stable state.
But heat wasn't its only trait.
It carried an explosive property that greatly enhanced combustion force.
And beyond that—
There was something else.
A faint… sentience.
That trace of spiritual presence made the flames easier to manipulate, capable of subtle, semi-autonomous movement.
Jin had seen similar phenomena before.
Certain ninjutsu could imbue constructs with limited intelligence.
Like Sai's Super Beast Imitating Drawing—his ink creatures moved with animal-like instincts.
Or Yugito's Fire Rat technique, which chased targets with mouse-like behavior.
"This blue chakra flame… in another world, it would qualify as a Heavenly Flame."
With a thought, Jin's entire body erupted in the same blue inferno.
For him, flame was conceptual.
Once he had touched it—
He could generate and control it effortlessly.
He smiled.
The flame was merely an appetizer.
The true prize lay beneath his feet.
Assessing the Seal
Jin crouched and placed his palm on Matatabi's forehead, closing his eyes.
"The sealing formula isn't terrible," he murmured. "At least it prevents chakra leakage and insomnia."
"But compared to Konoha's fūinjutsu… crude. Brutal."
If Konoha's sealing methods were elegant prisons with layered security systems—
Kumogakure's approach was stuffing a beast into a jar and hammering the lid shut.
No wonder the great villages once joined forces to annihilate Uzushiogakure for its sealing techniques.
Without fragments of Uzumaki knowledge, Cloud likely wouldn't even manage the jar.
Jin formed a single hand seal.
"Tail-Severing Release."
The formula unraveled instantly.
Clean.
Smooth.
The Two-Tails was stripped from its host without resistance.
He couldn't help but admire it.
"Madara truly was a genius."
Uchiha Madara had created this technique specifically to extract tailed beasts for the Eye of the Moon Plan.
It was the same method used to remove the Nine-Tails from Kushina in canon.
With a dull thud—
Yugito Nii's body fell from Matatabi's core.
Like all jinchūriki, she died the moment the beast was removed.
Her life faded instantly.
Matatabi remained motionless, still bound by Jin's Mangekyō control.
A Different Path
Jin summoned a massive scroll in a puff of smoke.
A contract scroll.
He had no intention of becoming a jinchūriki.
He had no desire to share his body with anything.
Instead—
He would do what Madara once did.
Turn a tailed beast into a summoning.
He formed another seal. Two orbs of chakra shimmered in his palm.
Reaching into Matatabi's core, he extracted a blazing cluster of chakra—the beast's essence.
He unfurled the scroll and slammed the chakra into it.
"Contract Seal—Bind!"
White smoke billowed.
On the first page appeared a crude, ferocious feline head drawn in ink.
Jin bit his finger.
With blood, he wrote his name across the first line.
Below it, he pressed down five fingerprints.
The contract was complete.
He rose slowly and looked at the massive, silent cat.
The connection was established.
But control required something more than seals.
It required negotiation.
And Matatabi—
Was not known for obedience.
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