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“Not happening!”
Wind howled across the battlefield as dirt and shattered stone flew through the air.
Just as Mahoraga’s enormous pale hand was about to close around Atsushi’s fragile-looking body, already weakened further by [Glass Cannon], Todo’s furious shout exploded across the battlefield.
Todo moved like lightning.
Clap!
The sharp sound of his hands meeting cut through the chaos.
Boogie Woogie once again demonstrated just how overwhelming it could be in a group fight.
Space seemed to distort.
Atsushi, who had been caught in midair with no way to change his momentum, vanished instantly.
In his place appeared Mahoraga.
Todo had forcibly switched their positions.
“Take this!”
Yuji’s eyes sharpened.
There was no chance he would waste the opening Todo had created.
Every muscle in Yuji’s body tightened like a drawn bow, while cursed energy surged violently into his legs.
In the next instant, he launched himself forward.
His body shot through the air as he twisted at the waist and whipped one leg toward Mahoraga’s exposed lower body.
The kick carried enough force to smash through reinforced concrete.
Yuji intended to knock the massive shikigami straight off its feet through raw power alone.
“So hard…”
His pupils contracted.
“No way…”
“It didn’t even move?!”
The principle behind Yuji’s Divergent Fist wasn’t limited to his punches.
The same delayed cursed energy impact followed his kick.
First came his raw physical strength.
Then, a fraction of a second later, the second wave of cursed energy struck.
Two separate impacts crashed into Mahoraga’s pillar-like legs.
And yet…
All Yuji got in return were two heavy, unpleasant thuds against Mahoraga’s pale skin.
Mahoraga was still in midair with no ground beneath it for leverage.
Even so, its enormous body remained nearly immovable.
It didn’t lose its balance.
It wasn’t knocked back.
It didn’t even turn its eyeless face toward Yuji.
The instant its massive feet hit the ground again, Mahoraga reached out with that enormous pale hand once more.
Like a predator that had already chosen its prey, it stubbornly ignored everything else and reached for Atsushi again.
“You’re just a shikigami.”
Todo’s deep voice thundered across the battlefield.
“Don’t get full of yourself!”
Dark blue cursed energy erupted around his enormous right fist like boiling flames.
Todo smashed the ground beneath his feet and launched himself upward like a cannon shell.
His body twisted perfectly into an uppercut.
The punch drove straight toward Mahoraga’s massive jaw.
BOOM!
Highly compressed cursed energy detonated at the point of impact.
The surrounding air was blasted outward into a violent shockwave.
Fueled by Todo’s rising fighting spirit, the punch was every bit as powerful as the earlier strike he’d delivered after switching places with a high-speed projectile.
Mahoraga’s head snapped upward.
Its enormous body was ripped off the ground and launched back into the air.
The positions had completely reversed.
Clap!
Another sharp sound rang out with perfect timing.
Todo’s transitions were almost artistic.
This time, Boogie Woogie switched Mahoraga, suspended helplessly in midair.
With Atsushi.
Atsushi had already flooded Dragon-Bone with boiling blood, staining the Special Grade Cursed Tool completely crimson.
Both hands tightened around the hilt.
Like an executioner falling from the sky, Atsushi used gravity and the physical enhancement of Flowing Red Scale to bring Dragon-Bone straight down.
The blade carved from Mahoraga’s head toward its feet.
Once again, it looked as though the shikigami would be split perfectly in half.
But…
The instant Dragon-Bone cut into Mahoraga’s pale flesh, caution flashed through Atsushi’s eyes.
His true damage still worked.
Even after Mahoraga’s second adaptation, Dragon-Bone unquestionably cut through its nearly indestructible body.
But something was wrong.
It didn’t feel the same.
[Glass Cannon] granted Atsushi fifteen percent bonus true damage.
Because of the way the system calculated that damage, the fifteen percent applied to the attack itself rather than simply allowing him to cut fifteen percent of the way through a target.
Mahoraga had now developed an overwhelming adaptation to slashing attacks.
Atsushi’s true damage still allowed the blade to cut through its body.
But the wound didn’t last long enough.
Before Dragon-Bone could finish passing all the way through Mahoraga’s enormous frame…
The first section of the wound had already begun closing.
Atsushi watched in disbelief as the flesh sealed itself almost the instant the blade passed through it.
So it can’t adapt to true damage itself…
But it can completely adapt to the way that damage is delivered.
Slashing.
At this rate, I can’t deal enough lasting damage to trigger a third adaptation.
Yuji noticed the same problem almost immediately.
The instant Atsushi’s ineffective slash ended and Mahoraga’s wound disappeared, Yuji charged without hesitation.
His right fist had already been drawn back to its limit.
He drove it toward Mahoraga’s freshly restored head with everything he had.
The result was no different.
Yuji’s attack struck with two separate impacts, physical force followed by delayed cursed energy.
But against Mahoraga’s pale head, it created little more than a faint ripple across the skin.
Not even the slightest knockback.
And Mahoraga had no intention of remaining a passive target forever.
After being repeatedly harassed by Todo and Yuji, its instincts recognized that both of them were interfering with its attempts to kill Atsushi.
So it retaliated.
Mahoraga’s enormous fists suddenly blurred.
It began hammering the ground and surrounding area with a storm of punches.
Every strike ripped through the sound barrier with an explosive boom.
At the last possible instant…
Clap!
Boogie Woogie activated again.
Mahoraga’s rampaging figure vanished from the middle of the three fighters.
BOOM!
A massive explosion erupted in the distance.
The already devastated Goodwill Event grounds shook as though they had been hit by an earthquake.
Mahoraga’s missed barrage smashed a crater more than ten meters deep into the earth.
Cursed energy and debris blasted upward in a towering cloud.
Todo had saved them at the absolute limit.
He had switched Mahoraga with one of the cursed-energy-infused stones he’d left behind earlier while moving Fushiguro Megumi.
That single decision had dragged all three of them back from the edge of death.
“Listen carefully, Itadori Yuji!”
There was no time to breathe.
Todo’s voice struck Yuji like a bell.
“You’re the vessel of Ryomen Sukuna.
There’s no way this is the limit of your potential.”
“There’s a fatal gap between the moment your physical attack lands and the moment your cursed energy follows it.”
“That’s why your attacks feel strange, but lack the power they should have!”
“If you want to beat that monster, you need to overcome that!”
“Your physical strike and cursed energy have to connect almost simultaneously.”
“Within 0.000001 seconds.”
“Only then can you draw out the full potential of your cursed energy!”
Atsushi stood on the other side of the battlefield, Dragon-Bone stained red in his hands.
Flowing Red Scale was still active, forcing both his heart and brain into overdrive.
He heard every word.
His pupils widened slightly.
So the timeline still corrects itself.
Todo’s teaching Yuji.
Black Flash.
After finishing with Yuji, Todo slowly turned toward Atsushi.
His eyes, still burning with fighting spirit, carried a trace of regret.
“You’re a suspicious curse user with no clear background.”
His voice was low.
“But I’ll admit you’re strong.”
“Still, that shikigami has completely adapted to your slashing attacks.”
“And from what I’ve seen, hand-to-hand combat isn’t exactly your specialty.”
“So no matter how strong you are…”
“You can’t deal meaningful damage to it anymore.”
Todo turned away, leaving Atsushi with his broad back.
“Leave the rest to us.”
“Keep Hanami alive.”
“And make sure neither Hanami nor Fushiguro dies.”
He didn’t wait for Atsushi’s response.
Todo steadily advanced toward Mahoraga as it climbed out of the distant crater.
At the same time, he continued explaining the principles behind Black Flash to Yuji.
The two of them walked forward through the drifting dust without hesitation.
Cursed energy.
Impact…
And the gap between them.
Atsushi appeared to be standing still.
In reality, Todo’s words were repeating over and over inside his head.
He looked down at Dragon-Bone.
Until now, [Glass Cannon] and its true damage had meant Atsushi never needed to care much about perfectly synchronizing cursed energy with the physical moment of impact.
In his mind, landing the attack had always mattered far more than maximizing its power.
Mahoraga had changed that.
It couldn’t adapt to true damage itself.
But it had adapted to slashing attacks so completely that any cut Atsushi inflicted regenerated almost instantly.
In another sense, that adaptation had rendered his attacks useless.
So what now?
Register Dragon-Bone with the system and use the value toward an anti-healing item?
Atsushi opened the Hextech System’s shop.
His eyes settled on two options.
Mortal Reminder.
Oblivion Orb.
Both could apply forty percent Grievous Wounds, but each cost 800 gold.
Atsushi hesitated.
Even reducing Mahoraga’s regeneration by forty percent wouldn’t let them defeat it.
The real question was whether Grievous Wounds would register as a new phenomenon and force Mahoraga into a third adaptation.
It probably would.
Atsushi ran through the possibility in his head.
The logic was simple.
Mahoraga adapted to phenomena that threatened it.
If its regeneration were suddenly suppressed by a completely different effect, its adaptation would likely respond to that interference as well.
As long as Atsushi could damage it enough to apply Grievous Wounds, he might be able to slow its recovery and force another adaptation.
That would mean more EXP.
More gold.
But…
Atsushi slowly raised his head.
In the distance, Yuji had listened to Todo’s instructions and abandoned every unnecessary thought.
The slightly awkward-looking teenager had entered a state of absolute concentration.
Flow.
Nothing existed except himself, his cursed energy, and the opponent in front of him.
Yuji walked fearlessly toward Mahoraga.
BOOM!
Then Atsushi saw it.
Yuji’s clenched fist struck Mahoraga’s pale chest.
Space seemed to distort.
Cursed energy flashed black.
Black Flash.
So…
Should I buy Grievous Wounds, stay at range, and use Piercing Blood to keep the effect applied until Mahoraga reaches its third adaptation?
For someone treating this like a game, that would obviously be the safest and most efficient strategy.
It would be enough.
But when Atsushi watched Itadori Yuji land the first Black Flash of his life and knock Mahoraga backward with a single punch…
A different thought surfaced.
Because if I do that…
I’m the only one getting left behind.
Think.
Why am I fighting in the first place?
Just to do “enough”?
No.
Absolutely not.
0.000001 seconds.
Right?
Atsushi slid Dragon-Bone back into its sheath.
Then he removed the entire weapon from his waist and dropped it onto the ground.
The blood coating Dragon-Bone flowed back into his body.
Atsushi rolled his shoulders.
His joints cracked sharply one after another.
Then he looked toward Yuji, who had just landed the first Black Flash of his life and was now fighting Mahoraga beside Todo with overwhelming momentum.
That’s right.
Mahoraga adapted to slashing.
Not true damage.
Atsushi slowly clenched both fists.
So I’ll land a Black Flash too.
And after Mahoraga’s wheel has already turned twice.
I’ll use my bare hands to tear that slash-adapted body apart all over again.
(To be continued.)