“Well, well…
Looks like things got pretty rough down there.”
High above the battlefield, a light breeze swept past the shattered edge of the black Curtain and stirred the man’s snow-white hair.
Standing in the sky over the Goodwill Event grounds, Gojo Satoru quietly surveyed the destruction below.
He had already pulled down his blindfold.
Those brilliant blue eyes, the Six Eyes, took in the entire battlefield with almost effortless clarity.
The Six Eyes were an extraordinarily rare trait inherited through the Gojo Clan.
Only once every several centuries would someone possessing them appear.
Their perception extended far beyond ordinary human vision.
Walls, dense forests, smoke, physical obstructions…
None of them could truly conceal cursed energy from Gojo.
Even across enormous distances, the Six Eyes could precisely identify targets and read the flow of cursed energy surrounding them.
The wind tugged at his black Jujutsu High uniform.
Reflected in those brilliant blue eyes was the devastated forest below, ruined by the battle involving Atsushi and Mahoraga.
“Good.”
Gojo’s gaze swept rapidly across the wreckage.
He reached his conclusion almost immediately.
“The students scattered around the area have extremely weak cursed energy signatures, but they’re all still alive.”
“And Shoko’s already waiting outside the grounds.”
The tension at the corner of Gojo’s mouth eased slightly.
“Looks like there’s still time to patch everyone up.”
Then his eyes narrowed.
His attention returned to the center of the battlefield.
“Assuming I deal with the problem first.”
Only two figures were still actively involved in the life-or-death struggle below.
The first was an enormous monster that remained alive despite having already lost its head.
Gojo recognized it immediately.
Mahoraga.
The strongest and most dangerous shikigami of Fushiguro Megumi’s Ten Shadows Technique.
And standing opposite Mahoraga.
Was Atsushi.
One arm was drenched in blood, yet he stood there confidently forming a hand sign.
“Is he the one behind all this?”
Gojo considered the possibility for less than a second.
“No.”
The Six Eyes immediately penetrated the crude cloth bundle tied around Atsushi’s waist.
Inside it was the severed head of a Special Grade cursed spirit.
Hanami.
Its presence was extremely weak, but cursed energy still remained.
A cursed spirit…
And a powerful one.
Fushiguro probably summoned Mahoraga because of that thing.
If the taming ritual includes both Fushiguro and that curse.
Gojo’s expression shifted slightly.
“He kept the curse alive so Fushiguro wouldn’t die.”
A faintly amused look appeared on his face.
“So he’s actually protecting him?”
Gojo’s eyes remained fixed on Atsushi.
There was no fear on the boy’s face despite standing alone against Mahoraga.
Instead, he looked exhilarated.
Almost euphoric.
Like someone who had finally understood something he’d been chasing for a long time.
But what surprised Gojo most wasn’t Atsushi’s expression.
It was his cursed energy.
Through the Six Eyes, Gojo could see the tremendous amount of cursed energy racing through Atsushi’s body in near-perfect synchronization.
I see.
The scene below suddenly reminded Gojo of something from years ago.
That summer.
The summer when he had become the strongest.
Yes.
Just like back then.
This kid had awakened.
“Didn’t expect to find a sorcerer like this outside Jujutsu High.”
The corner of Gojo’s mouth lifted.
“Still…”
“Making someone who hasn’t fully developed yet fight that thing is asking a little too much.”
The wind stopped.
For an instant, Gojo’s Six Eyes seemed to pierce through the entire battlefield.
Then, still suspended high above the ground, Gojo slowly brought both hands out from his pockets.
Perhaps Atsushi’s condition had stirred up an old memory.
Gojo usually carried himself with an almost careless ease.
But now, facing the situation below, the strongest sorcerer of the modern era dropped that casual attitude.
For once…
He decided to use overwhelming force.
Hummm…
A terrifying amount of cursed energy began gathering high above the battlefield.
A dark blue sphere formed in Gojo’s right hand.
“Cursed Technique Lapse: Blue.”
The Limitless produced an artificial point of impossible attraction.
Then a completely different force began gathering at the fingertips of his left hand.
“Cursed Technique Reversal: Red.”
A brilliant crimson sphere appeared.
The reversal of the Limitless.
Pure repulsive force.
Blue and Red.
Attraction and repulsion.
Opposite infinities began overlapping in Gojo’s hands.
Then his voice echoed across the sky.
“Nine Ropes.”
“Polarized Light.”
“Crow and Declaration.”
“Between Front and Back.”
Gojo brought his hands together.
“Hollow Technique…”
“Purple.”
The sky lit up.
A deep violet mass was born from the collision of two opposing infinities.
An imaginary mass capable of tearing through everything in its path.
Far below…
Atsushi had already gained enough EXP from Mahoraga’s third adaptation to reach Level 6.
He had originally intended to use the Domain Expansion he had just unlocked to try ending the battle himself.
His instincts were screaming at him.
Mahoraga’s fourth adaptation was close.
If he couldn’t finish the fight before that wheel turned again…
Mahoraga would kill him.
But then…
Atsushi felt the cursed energy gathering above.
And immediately changed his plan.
He grabbed Dragon-Bone from the ground.
His crimson figure vanished from the center of the battlefield.
The instant he cleared the area…
A massive purple light descended from the sky like divine judgment.
It swallowed everything.
Gojo’s unrestricted Hollow Purple crashed down upon Mahoraga.
The enormous violet column completely engulfed the pale body of the shikigami that had already completed three adaptations.
For a moment…
Time itself seemed frozen.
From a safe distance, Atsushi turned and watched.
What happened next was almost more shocking because there was no explosion.
The violet mass simply passed through Mahoraga.
Then continued downward.
As though nothing had been capable of resisting it at all.
Several seconds later, the light faded.
Mahoraga…
The seemingly invincible strongest shikigami…
Was gone.
Completely erased by a single attack from Gojo Satoru.
The dust slowly dispersed.
The forest that had once occupied the battlefield no longer existed.
In its place was an enormous crater dozens of meters across, as though a meteor had struck the earth.
And at the bottom…
There was only darkness.
A hole so deep it looked like an entrance to hell.
The scar carved into the earth told everyone exactly how overwhelming that attack had been.
So this is Gojo Satoru…
The strongest sorcerer of the modern era.
Atsushi secured Dragon-Bone back at his waist.
He had always known how powerful Gojo was.
He knew the story.
He knew what the strongest meant.
But actually seeing that power with his own eyes…
Produced something else entirely.
Joy.
Unlike the four-finger Sukuna Atsushi had fought around earlier…
Gojo represented the genuine embodiment of the strength Atsushi had been pursuing.
Atsushi had just touched the core of cursed energy during his battle with Mahoraga.
The awakening had left him with an almost intoxicating sense of omnipotence.
And after successfully landing Black Flash, cursed energy was still surging through his body like a raging river.
For one dangerous moment…
Atsushi wanted to challenge Gojo.
Right here.
Right now.
To see how much farther he still had to climb.
His eyes burned with excitement as he slowly raised his right hand and began gathering power.
Then he looked at it.
His hand was a wreck.
Earlier, while trying to destroy Mahoraga’s head, Atsushi had used Blood Manipulation’s close-range explosive technique, Supernova.
Countless puncture wounds now covered his palm.
Blood was still leaking from them.
Then Atsushi’s body suddenly swayed.
The world spun violently.
[Glass Cannon] had reduced his maximum health enough that anemia had always been a constant concern.
Until now, Atsushi had dealt with it by avoiding Blood Manipulation techniques that consumed large quantities of blood.
Even when using Flowing Red Scale: Stack, Guardian’s Horn had helped offset the damage and keep his body functioning.
But Supernova had changed that.
Atsushi had consumed a huge amount of blood in an instant.
Worse, his palm had been punctured in dozens of places.
With so many wounds, controlling the bleeding had been difficult.
He had continued losing valuable blood after the attack ended.
Now his brain wasn’t getting enough oxygen.
Just remaining upright was becoming difficult.
“So that’s it for today…”
Reason finally overpowered his urge to challenge someone stronger.
Atsushi lowered his voice.
“Hanami.”
“Your turn.”
He lightly tapped the cloth bundle hanging from his waist.
Keeping Hanami’s head alive hadn’t only been necessary to preserve the taming ritual and keep Fushiguro Megumi from dying.
Atsushi had another reason.
Hanami had already infiltrated the heavily protected Jujutsu High grounds once.
To do so, it had secretly created a network of plant tunnels beneath the barriers.
Atsushi needed Hanami to locate that escape route again.
Once the Goodwill Event ended, those tunnels would give him a reliable way to leave with everything he’d gained.
Atsushi injected cursed energy into Hanami’s head.
Even reduced to nothing but a head, cursed energy could still stimulate a cursed spirit, a creature fundamentally composed of negative energy, back into consciousness.
A faint sound came from underground.
Roots burst through the soil beneath Atsushi’s feet.
They moved like living serpents, rapidly twisting together.
The roots formed a thick enclosure around his weakened body.
Slowly, they began pulling him downward toward the underground tunnel.
“Convergence.”
Atsushi suddenly spoke.
Then he raised his voice.
“Gojo Satoru!”
High above, Gojo immediately heard him.
His brilliant blue eyes shifted downward.
And in the next instant…
A thin crimson streak appeared before him.
“Piercing Blood!”
Even while escaping, Atsushi hadn’t forgotten the task Kenjaku had assigned him.
But that was no longer the main reason he attacked.
After touching the core of cursed energy, Atsushi wanted to personally test a theory.
A question that had been growing in his mind.
Piercing Blood erupted from his hand.
With Atsushi’s potential currently drawn out to 120 percent after Black Flash, the compressed stream crossed more than a hundred meters almost instantly.
It shot directly toward Gojo.
And then…
It stopped.
Atsushi stared upward.
His black pupils contracted.
The attack that carried his seemingly unstoppable true damage…
The fifteen percent of its force converted into true damage…
Had frozen in midair.
Not against Gojo himself.
But against the invisible space created by the Limitless.
Exactly.
Infinity works by bringing the convergent infinite series behind Achilles and the tortoise into reality.
The distance between Piercing Blood and Gojo can keep getting smaller forever…
Without ever actually reaching zero.
The Limitless manifests that concept in real space.
Atsushi understood.
It looked like the experiment had failed.
It looked like even his “true damage” couldn’t reach Gojo through Infinity.
It looked like the answer had already been decided.
The roots had already swallowed half of Atsushi’s body.
Hanami’s tendrils were about to wrap around his arms and drag him completely underground.
But then…
Atsushi changed the target of his technique.
Not Gojo Satoru.
The space around Gojo Satoru.
The realization had come from Mahoraga.
Instead of treating only Gojo himself as the target…
Atsushi expanded the target of his true damage to include the supposedly harmless space between them.
If he couldn’t cross the Infinity in front of Gojo.
Then he would treat Gojo and that Infinity as part of the same target.
The infinitely divided space was pierced.
Gojo only needed to tilt his head slightly.
Infinity had delayed the attack long enough for him to avoid it.
But the crimson line carrying that fifteen percent true damage.
Passed through.
For the first time.
A hostile attack had cut through the untouchable space surrounding Gojo Satoru.
A killing light had pierced Infinity.
(To be continued.)