Nine-Tails Unleashed!

Yamato calls the rest of Team Kakashi to Tenchi Bridge, where Kabuto and Orochimaru take amused note of Naruto and Sakura's return. Already stirred by the Nine-Tails' chakra, Naruto slides into his one-tailed state, and the energy pouring off him alarms Sakura and Sai. When Orochimaru speaks Sasuke's name, a second tail sprouts and Naruto blurs forward to smash him through a line of trees. As Orochimaru returns, the struck part of his face peels away to reveal the host body Gen'yumaru beneath, which he reseals with his Face Copying Technique while remarking that the boy is finally behaving like a true jinchuriki.

Yamato remembers being briefed by Jiraiya, Tsunade, and Kakashi about the cloak's peril. Jiraiya described how Naruto's mounting anger draws out the fox's chakra tail by tail, and how consciousness holds only through three tails, since a fourth surrenders his mind to pure fury. In that four-tailed shape the chakra sears his skin away, then heals him afterward, a violent cycle that steadily eats at his lifespan. Jiraiya blamed the weakening of the Fourth Hokage's seal, and the three named Yamato the only one able to restrain Naruto, thanks to the First Hokage's power in his blood.

On the bridge, Orochimaru boasts that his old experiments made this possible, recalling how he once transplanted the First Hokage's cells into infants, all of whom died except one, who grew up to be Yamato. That inheritance gave Yamato the ability to control tailed beasts, which is why Konoha assigned him to watch Naruto. When Naruto demands Sasuke back and is told he left willingly, his fury births a third tail, and the surging chakra begins forming a vortex above the bridge.

Naruto's anger at Orochimaru pushes him from one tail up to three of the fox's cloak. Orochimaru's face is momentarily broken to expose his host body Gen'yumaru. Jiraiya's remembered warning details the lethal four-tailed form and the fraying of the Fourth Hokage's seal. Orochimaru reveals Yamato is the sole survivor of his First Hokage cell experiments, explaining his role as Naruto's overseer. A third tail forms and a chakra vortex rises above Tenchi Bridge.

The episode belongs to the Tenchi Bridge Reconnaissance Mission arc and adapts chapter 291, pairing the opening Distance with the ending Your Story. Jiraiya's account ties Yamato's Wood Release directly to Orochimaru's forbidden research.