“Why didn’t you mention something this critical earlier?”
Kashimo glared at Julian, his fingers tightening around his iron staff until the metal groaned.
If he didn’t still require Julian’s knowledge of the other colonies, he would have slapped the kid across the face.
Seeing the ancient sorcerer bristling with static energy, Julian immediately held up his hands.
“I know you’re in a hurry, but don’t lose your head!” Julian reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a sleek key fob.
“There’s a luxury sports car parked in the garage downstairs.
The rule just went live, so if we leave right now, we can reach Sendai before any of those four heavyweights realize they can step outside!”
They were staying in an abandoned luxury residence, and Julian had spotted the imported car the moment they entered.
Kashimo took two deep, steadying breaths, forcing the crackling ozone around his arms to settle.
Sendai was a considerable distance from Tokyo.
Without flight capabilities, a high-speed vehicle was undoubtedly the fastest way to travel.
“Where is the garage?”
“Right this way.
Follow me!”
Julian led him down the side stairwell, sliding into the driver’s seat of the sleek vehicle moments later.
But as soon as his hands touched the steering wheel, he froze.
Kashimo climbed into the passenger side, pulling the door shut.
“Well?
What are you waiting for?”
“Uh…
Kashimo?
We have a minor structural issue.”
“Is the tank empty?”
“No.
The tank is full.
The problem is I don’t actually know how to drive.”
Julian had passed his driving test years ago in college, but he hadn’t touched a steering wheel since.
His road instincts were completely non-existent.
Kashimo let out a slow, sharp breath.
“You can’t drive, yet you sat in the primary seat?
Get out.”
Julian scrambled out, unbuckling his strap and rounding the hood.
He had meant to take the passenger side from the start, but because the vehicle was built for Japanese roads, the steering wheel was on the right side, throwing off his reflexes.
As Julian settled into the left seat, he watched Kashimo smoothly click his seatbelt into place.
It was a surreal sight—an ancient thunder god from four hundred years ago properly adhering to basic traffic safety.
“I didn’t realize you knew how to operate a modern car, Kashimo,” Julian noted, leaning back against the leather interior.
Kashimo kept his eyes fixed forward, his expression cold.
Though he was an ancient sorcerer, his incarnation granted him full access to the vessel’s muscle memory and neural knowledge.
Driving was as natural to him as walking.
Julian raised his thumb and forefinger to his lips, making a zipping motion to show he was closing his mouth.
Kashimo engaged the ignition, set the GPS route for Sendai, and stepped on the gas.
The sports car roared out of the subterranean garage, cutting through the quiet residential streets.
Sitting in the passenger seat, Julian looked out the window and noticed scattered groups of civilians walking along the sidewalks.
Their Cursed Energy was practically non-existent.
Julian understood their movement immediately.
The moment Rule 9 broad-casted across the barrier, removing the spatial lock, non-combatants instinctively sought an exit to flee the territory.
A few kilometers out, the dark, towering veil of the Culling Game barrier appeared ahead, rising straight into the night sky like a wall of solid obsidian.
Julian tensed slightly, half-expecting the vehicle to crumple against an invisible force.
But as Kashimo maintained speed, the car passed through the boundary without a whisper of resistance.
Once they hit the open arterial roads of Tokyo, Julian relaxed, taking in the city lights.
Before his transmigration, he had never traveled abroad.
But the novelty wore off within minutes.
Despite it being early evening, the metropolis was eerily quiet.
The streets were deserted, devoid of foot traffic or nightlife.
Kenjaku’s ritual had effectively hollowed out the capital.
Just as Julian felt his eyelids growing heavy, the car decelerated sharply, coming to a sudden halt.
Ahead, the main road was completely choked with overturned sedans, shattered concrete blocks, and fallen utility poles.
The path was entirely impassable for a low-clearance vehicle.
“Looks like a warzone,” Julian muttered, scanning the surrounding shadows for movement.
Kashimo didn’t care about the destruction.
His mind was entirely focused on reaching Sendai to face the four heavyweights Julian had listed.
He glanced to the side, zeroing in on an elevated pedestrian walkway to their right.
The sidewalk was broad, clear of heavy debris, and wide enough to fit the car.
Kashimo turned the wheel, mounting the curb and accelerating down the concrete walkway.
Before they had gone fifty meters, a figure stumbled out from a side alley ahead.
It was an office worker in a torn suit, sprinting toward the oncoming car with a face pale with absolute terror.
“Help!
Someone help me!”
A second later, a massive Cursed Spirit—over four meters tall with distorted, asymmetrical limbs—burst through the brick wall behind him, roaring as it gave chase.
“Holy shit!” Julian flinched back against his seat.
“That thing is huge!”
He looked over at Kashimo.
The ancient sorcerer showed no surprise, only a flicker of irritation.
With his acute senses, Kashimo had detected the curse long before it breached the wall.
But he had zero interest in stepping out to save a civilian.
Wasting time on a low-grade curse was beneath him.
Just as Kashimo raised a hand, gathering electrical energy to blast both the curse and the pavement clear out of his path, two figures leaped into view from the roof above.
A young male high school student descended from the air, his right fist glowing with a dense, heavy concentration of blue Cursed Energy.
He drove his fist straight down into the creature’s crown.
Boom!
The sheer kinetic force slammed the four-meter curse directly into the asphalt, cracking the concrete beneath it.
Under the weight of the blow, the spirit shrieked once before dissolving into gray ash, scattering into the wind.
Julian’s jaw dropped.
“Unbelievable…”
He stared at his own palm, then looked back at the high schooler standing over the crater.
They were technically both classified as Jujutsu Sorcerers, yet the gap in physical output was astronomical.
At his current Grade 4 level, taking on a curse of that size head-on was suicide.
Kashimo, however, didn’t spare the display a second glance.
To a monster from the Edo period, a basic physical strike reinforced with Cursed Energy was standard baseline.
He stepped on the accelerator, driving the car straight past the crater.
Ahead, the young man was helping the trembling civilian to his feet when he heard the engine roaring toward them.
He pulled the civilian back, dodging out of the path just as the sports car brushed past.
“Hey!
Watch it!” the youth called out, frowning at the reckless driving.
The older man accompanying him was far less forgiving.
He shook his fist at the retreating tail lights, shouting over the engine roar.
“Where did you learn to drive?!
You almost hit my Yuji!
Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?!”
The pink-haired youth patted his companion’s shoulder.
“It’s fine, brother.
They’re probably just trying to evacuate.”
Kashimo didn’t bother looking in the rearview mirror.
Julian, however, froze in the passenger seat.
The name echoed in his ears.
Yuji.
Julian whipped around, staring out the back window.
The glass was tinted, obscuring the finer facial details of the two figures standing under the streetlights, but one feature stood out immediately.
The youth in front was wearing a dark red hood pulled over his uniform collar.
Julian’s eyes went wide.
“Holy shit…
it’s the hood.”