Ritsuka didn’t choose to stand her ground.
Instead, she turned and fled.
There were too many pedestrians around her current location.
Although these people seemed unable to see the monster, the magecraft she used was visible to ordinary eyes.
With zero knowledge of this world, it was best to keep as low a profile as possible.
The monster pursued her closely.
Amid the chase, she soon spotted a deserted alleyway.
She immediately turned and ducked into it, and the monster followed without hesitation.
She still had no idea why the creature was so relentlessly pursuing her.
But now, far from the crowd, she could finally cut loose—
Shadow Servant, summon!
Without a word, the moment she initiated the summoning, the command seals on the back of her right hand glowed faintly red.
In the next instant, a figure shrouded in black mist materialized before her.
Shadow Servants were the shadows of the Servants bound to her by fate.
They were temporary existences, summoned on the spot, possessing no autonomous consciousness and requiring her commands to act.
However, like real Servants, they could unleash Noble Phantasms.
They were one of her most important combat assets.
The Shadow Servant she summoned would be cloaked in thick black mist, obscuring its features and attire from view.
But the three-meter-long banner-spear in its hands—towering far beyond its own height—and the great flag billowing in the wind silently declared the identity of the one who had answered her call.
This time, Ritsuka had summoned the Shadow Servant of Jeanne d’Arc.
Since she had no idea of the monster’s strength or attack patterns, a conservative approach was wisest.
Jeanne was already a top-tier Servant, and in terms of defense, she was an almost unassailable existence.
With Mash not by her side, Jeanne was undoubtedly the optimal choice for executing a defensive strategy.
Under Ritsuka’s direction, Jeanne took a defensive stance before her, waiting for the enemy to charge in.
Confronted with the black, shadowy figure that had suddenly appeared in front of Ritsuka, the monster’s advance faltered for a moment.
It stared at the Shadow Servant before it, as if unable to comprehend where she had come from.
Yet, that very moment of hesitation was all the opening Ritsuka needed.
“Now!”
Ritsuka gave the order.
But even before she spoke, in the instant the thought had formed in her mind, Jeanne had already moved.
The three-meter-long banner-spear erased the seemingly considerable distance between her and the monster in an instant.
The thrust tore through space and arrived in a flash, giving the monster not even a shred of time to react.
With a sickening squelch, the spearhead pierced straight through the creature’s body and burst out from its back.
Immediately after, the monster’s body, along with the blood on the ground, slowly turned to ash as if consumed by flames, before finally scattering into the wind.
Everything returned to calm.
“Eliminated?”
Seeing the monster destroyed, Ritsuka let out a breath and cut off the mana supply to the Shadow Servant.
The black-mist-shrouded Jeanne dissipated along with the smoke.
From the looks of it, the monster that had attacked her was fairly weak.
Summoning a Shadow Servant probably hadn’t even been necessary—a single Gandr shot might have done the job.
But even so, better to err on the side of caution.
Back to the matter at hand.
This monster attack made Ritsuka realize that this world was not like the world of Conan.
This was a world where supernatural forces existed.
Still, she couldn’t figure out why the monster had abandoned its original target the moment it saw her and attacked her instead, without a moment’s hesitation.
Simply because she could see it?
Clap, clap, clap.
A series of casual yet loud claps came from above, interrupting her thoughts.
She looked up.
A young man with white hair, wearing a black blindfold and an all-black uniform, was descending from the sky, landing lightly before her.
“Whew~ I thought I’d stumbled upon a princess in need of rescuing, but instead I got to witness something this interesting.
Kinda gets me excited, y’know!”
The man wore a flippant grin.
He rattled off a whole string of words as if no one else were around, his mood soaring all on its own, leaving Ritsuka utterly bewildered.
He didn’t seem hostile toward her.
Probably not an enemy.
And, this appearance seemed somewhat familiar…
“So, my lovely young lady—”
Suddenly, he turned his words toward her, closing the distance rapidly.
He peered at her curiously through his blindfold.
Only then did Ritsuka realize just how tall this man really was.
“What exactly was that cursed technique just now?
Why couldn’t these eyes of mine see even the slightest flow of cursed energy from it?!”
The man’s face rapidly filled her field of vision.
The excessive proximity made her involuntarily step back.
He paid her small retreat no mind, instead lifting the black blindfold that had covered his eyes, revealing beneath it a pair of eyes as clear and blue as the sky. The source of this chapter is g.com.
Now his features were fully exposed to her sight.
She had to admit, he was remarkably handsome.
But her attention wasn’t on that.
It was fixed on those exquisitely, almost bewitchingly beautiful azure pupils, which seemed to possess some kind of arcane allure.
Magic Eyes?
And considerably high-level ones at that.
Also, the “cursed energy” the man kept mentioning nagged at her mind.
Most importantly—
“Um, may I ask who you are?”
Hearing the girl’s question, seeing the unfeigned confusion in her expression, the man who had been acting so casually up until now paused, clearly taken aback.
“For real?!
You seriously don’t know me?
You’re not a jujutsu sorcerer?”
Ritsuka smiled, a little troubled.
“Actually, this is the first time I’ve ever heard the term ‘jujutsu sorcerer.’ I don’t understand anything about this ‘cursed energy’ you mentioned either.”
“Aaah, well now, this is something.”
Gojo Satoru pressed a hand to his temple.
His ever-present irreverent grin betrayed a hint of surprise.
He wasn’t surprised that she didn’t know him—well, alright, that did surprise him a little—but what truly surprised him was the mysterious technique she had displayed in battle, and the flawless sense of timing, as if she were a seasoned veteran of countless fights.
It was precisely that mastery of timing that had led him to the misjudgment that she was a fairly accomplished jujutsu sorcerer.
Though, that did explain why she had put on such an extravagant display against a mere Grade 4 cursed spirit.
He’d wondered if it was some new kind of play, or some peculiar quirk unique to her.
After all, in the world of jujutsu, such eccentrics were plentiful.
He himself was one of them.
But that aside—if she really was just a total novice who knew nothing, then everything she had just demonstrated could only mean one thing…
An unimaginable prodigy!
At this thought, the grin on Gojo’s face grew even more unrestrained.
He took a step back, and in a sudden shift of tone, offered Ritsuka an exceedingly gentlemanly bow, smiling as he said, “How terribly rude of me, lovely young lady.
Allow me to supplement my belated self-introduction.”
“My name is Gojo Satoru.
I am the strongest jujutsu sorcerer in the world, as well as an outstanding educator of the next generation.”
“Pleased to make your acquaintance~”