That day, Yechen flew out of Konoha and headed toward the Land of Waterfalls.
As for why, Kakuzu had recently sent word that Takigakure seemed to be planning to seal the Seven-Tails inside a Jinchūriki.
Now that he had news of a tailed beast, Yechen naturally would not let the opportunity slip by. As for sparking a war, he did not care.
Takigakure lay deep within the Land of Waterfalls. With its many mountains and waterfalls, the country's terrain was extremely complex, so no major nation had invaded it during the past three Shinobi World Wars.
This also meant that, unlike other small hidden villages, Takigakure was not forced to take sides, and faced far less pressure to survive.
Precisely because of this, Takigakure's fighting strength was rather mediocre.
After all, without conflict, there was no pressure. Without pressure, where would motivation come from?
For the same reason, infighting was frequent in Takigakure, and the village's cohesion was extremely poor.
Thus, Yechen had recruited several informants using only crude methods.
With their help and his memories from his previous life, he had easily deduced the village leaders' intentions from their movements.
Now was the time for him to infiltrate the village and investigate.
After waiting patiently for a short while, he saw a Takigakure jonin lead three genin out of the village, apparently heading off on a mission.
Without any hesitation, he followed them. Rather than act immediately, he chose to trail them and see exactly what mission they were carrying out.
Two days passed in a flash.
That afternoon, the sun sank toward the west.
In a dense forest still some distance from Takigakure, four figures-one large and three small-made their way through the trees.
From time to time, their voices could be heard as they talked among themselves.