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CHAPTER START---
'Holy shit,' was all Taiyo had time to think as the Cursed Energy washed over him.
The instant Nanami kicked open the door, the world around them changed, and the four Jujutsu Sorcerers found themselves standing in the ruins of a massive, destroyed building, surrounded by shattered piles of concrete.
Above them, the bright sunlight was shining down, through the destroyed roof of this building, a perfect and even more destroyed recreation of the children's hospital.
All the negative energy of the victims and their families fed into this Cursed Spirit, and they blamed both the earthquake and the falling rubble for their misfortune, compounded by the events or fate that brought them to the hospital in the first place.
Which means now, they were fighting a Special Grade Cursed Spirit, within its Domain Expansion.
This was the situation, but Taiyo barely processed a fraction of this information. He was marveling at the area around him, at the change in the world, and had yet to notice the Cursed Spirit in the middle of the room, a golem of shattered concrete and steel beams, standing upright like a human, 9ft -270cm- tall.
Due to his inexperience, Taiyo was the last to react.
The first, reacting within 0.10 seconds of the change, and the first to sense anything happening, was Atsuya Kusakabe.
---The First 0.10 Seconds…
He instantly leaped forward and took a defensive stance.
'New Shadow Style: Simple Domain!' Kusakabe releases a ring of blue Cursed Energy for 5m -150cm- in every direction around him, covering the entire group.
Simple Domains are called a 'Domain for the weak', created to defend against the sure hit effects of true Domain Expansions, and can be used to weaken simplistic Innate Techniques, such as direct projectiles, even those that are invisible.
However, only Kusakabe can create a Simple Domain beyond the standard 1m -3ft- radius, which is the perfect range for striking with a sword, as intended.
The disadvantage of his Simple Domain, is that it takes much more training to get to this extent, and can open gaps in your defenses if your body tries to react to things beyond your sword swing range.
However, he is Atsuya Kusakabe, and not only did he overcome the need for a Binding Vow to program his Cursed Energy to automatically counterattack, which allows Jujutsu Sorcerers to slash projectiles and such.
He is even able to program his Cursed Energy to flow through his entire body, not just his arms and blade, allowing him to automatically reposition to accommodate his extended range.
This is a feat, that not even Satoru Gojo has been able to replicate.
And all of this happens within 0.10 seconds.
He leaped forward, took a defensive stance, and cast his Simple Domain, all before even Kento Nanami could rush forward.
And in that same instant, rubble manifested where the ceiling should be and fell directly onto the Jujutsu Sorcerers.
Kusakabe moved faster than anyone else could react and slashed all the rubble, his Simple Domain weakening and intercepting the projectile before it smashed into their heads.
—The First 0.30 Seconds…
After Kusakabe smashed all the rubble of the Cursed Spirits' sure hit effect, Nanami rushed forward.
While Kusakabe is the best defensive Grade 1 Jujutsu Sorcerer, Kento Nanami is among those with the heaviest blows.
He rushes forward as the Cursed Spirit drops more rubble from the ceiling, but with much more speed and power than the attacks that were affected by Kusakabe's Simple Domain.
But Kusakabe did more than enough. The time he bought by preventing them all from instantly dying, was enough for Nanami to understand the sure hit effect and adjust his fighting style.
Keeping his head down, he watches the shadows which appear to match the falling rubble, and as they fall, he smashes them apart without looking away from the Cursed Spirit.
He clears almost 15ft -5m- before Ino reacts, then the Battle Truly Begins.
Ino snaps into action while Nanami is already halfway to the Cursed Spirit and rushes forward, flowing Cursed Energy into his mask, which then manifests into his right hand and forms a spiraling cone-shaped horn in front of his fist.
"Now!" Ino yells as he punches forward, launching the horn like a missile.
Hearing his protégé, Nanami jumps forward, blocking the Cursed Spirit's view of the projectile before tilting his head to the left, and the attack slams into the Cursed Spirit's rubble face.
Stone, steel, and concrete break off the Cursed Spirit's face as Nanami spins in the air and brings his blunt blade down on top of its head.
He connected after finding the ratio point of 7:3 across the top of the Cursed Spirit's head, landing a perfect hit.
Yet he only broke off more rubble and steel while sinking it an inch into the ground, purely from the force of his attack pushing it down.
Nanami's eyes widen slightly as he pushes off the Cursed Spirit's chest and leaps away, twirling in the air and destroying some falling rubble along the way.
'Shit,' both Kusakabe and Ino realize it at once. 'Nanami is in overtime, putting him at 110% power, and still, his Ratio Technique didn't crack its skull open…'
"Let's move!" Kusakabe orders as he rushes forward behind Ino, and Taiyo snaps out of his surprised state and follows him.
"Reiki!" Ino calls out as his mask radiates Cursed Energy once more, and then a thin layer of Cursed Energy flows across his body like water, increasing his mobility and dexterity, along with cushioning his body from attacks.
Nanami fights while backing away, and the Cursed Spirit raises its arms and rapidly fires rubble, like bullets, at the approaching Jujutsu Sorcerers.
Kusakabe gets to Nanami's position and opens another Simple Domain, giving the man a moment to breathe.
IMMOLATION!
A thin beam of heat fires over their heads and into the shoulder of the Cursed Spirit, slamming into its shoulder, but due to its Cursed Energy Reinforcement, it only staggers back.
The Cursed Spirit's shoulder glows slightly from the heat, but it then continues its assault.
This time, however, it is lumbering forward, and with each step, the Domain Expansion experiences an earthquake.
The ground around them begins cracking, forcing the Jujutsu Sorcerer to keep moving and leave Kusakabe's Simple Domain, while in the back, Taiyo is firing heat beams into the Cursed Spirit.
"Ino, split its focus!" Nanami orders, and the boy immediately rushes to the back of the Cursed Spirit.
The Cursed Spirit aims one of its hands at Ino, which eases the pressure on Nanami and Kusakabe, while Taiyo has to avoid or destroy falling rubble between his shots.
"Taiyo, get into the fight!" Kusakabe yells as he and Nanami rush forward.
In their two weeks of training, Kusakabe had insisted on training the absolute basics first.
The universal aspects of Cursed Energy.
Reinforcement, Enhancement, sensing Cursed Energy, and close combat.
These are things that no Jujutsu Sorcerer can avoid using for their entire life, and oftentimes, those with incredible Innate techniques ignore them compared to their Innate Techniques.
But all it takes is one person figuring out a way to nullify or avoid your technique, and you're dead.
Kusakabe and Taiyo know that Satoru Gojo is not one of these people.
His Innate Technique is peerless, but his close combat skills and mastery of these universal aspects of Cursed Energy, are also the absolute best.
That's part of what makes him the strongest.
That's why he, is Satoru Gojo.
So Taiyo understood immediately and never once argued when Kusakabe pushed aside training Immolation in favor of these things.
And as a Special Grade, well, he has enough Cursed Energy to make even Satoru Gojo seem normal, so regardless of his inefficiency.
He's still a little monster.
In the time it took Nanami and Kusakabe to get within striking range of the Cursed Spirit, Taiyo shows the fruits of his training.
He crosses the distance between the entrance of the Domain Expansion, gets ahead of both Grade 1 Sorcerers, and punches the Cursed Spirit with immense force.
The entire Cursed Spirit shakes and stumbles backward, but his attack barely has any effect, just like Nanami's.
"Hazy Moon!" Kusakabe coats his blade in cursed energy, widening it by extending the edge as he slashes into the golem's left leg.
Enhanced by such precise Cursed Energy, it slashes deep enough to draw blood, but not enough to cut off the limb.
At the same moment, Nanami charges in from the side and slams his blunt blade into the golem's arm, hitting the ratio point near its elbow, and breaking off some of the concrete and steel before leaping away.
Both he and Kusakabe defend themselves from the falling rubble while Ino does the same, throwing dozens of futile punches into the Cursed Spirit's back.
"Knees!" Kusakabe says, noticing the earthquakes only happened while the golem was taking steps, and that the Cursed Energy of the quakes made it difficult to fight.
Taiyo lands five hits to its chest, causing it to stumble back before he dropkicks it in the chest and pushes himself away.
Ino slides out of its path before spinning and kicking the left leg of the golem, directly on the side of its knee.
His kick shakes it, but barely does anything, so he deactivates the flowing Cursed Energy around his body and fires another spinning horn at the side of its knee.
At the same moment, Kusakabe layers Batto Sword Drawing, which is an application of Cursed Energy that flows the energy around his blade, causing it to accelerate by building independent momentum, further increased by him actually swinging the blade.
This, combined with his Hazy Moon, causes the enhanced blade to slash from the inner leg to the middle of the kneecap, cutting a thin line through it.
Seeing this, Taiyo rushes forward, dodging some falling rubble and firing a heat beam at a massive piece of rubble falling atop everyone.
The Cursed Spirit had bet on flattening them all while tanking the hit with its durability, but he blasted it apart in an instant.
At that time, Ino fires another spiraling horn at the knee, weakening it further.
And an instant later, Taiyo reaches them and kicks the inside of the leg with all his might, finally pushing the sword through and slicing it off.
The Cursed Spirit screams and launches all the rubble off its body like a bullet storm.
All the Jujutsu Sorcerers use Reinforcement to harden their bodies, but are sent tumbling away with varying levels of injury.
Ino has the most injuries, with some pieces of rubble hitting him like bullets even through his reinforced defenses, punching holes through his arms and left shoulder.
Kusakabe, having been in the middle of retrieving his blade, couldn't deflect any of the rubble from this reflexive attack, and was pushed back with minor bruises and some holes in his clothes.
Nanami and Taiyo, however, were completely fine.
Because they were in better positions and had already prepared to defend their bodies instead of exerting Cursed Energy, they were only pushed back by the attack.
Seconds later, they all look up to see the rubble fly back to the exposed stone-grey body of the Cursed Spirit, armoring it once more.
Taiyo fires a heat beam at its head, but the armor reforms faster than his inexperienced brain could realize what was going on.
But the attack slammed into its head all the same, slightly annoying it.
Taking this moment, Nanami races forward, and is once again outrun by Taiyo, who overtakes him as they both begin laying into the Cursed Spirit.
The golem is forced to kneel because of its missing limb, and they take advantage to more easily reach its head, only for the armor on its arm to grow and become sharper.
Taiyo's fists start bleeding as he's barely breaking the armor, while Nanami is still searching for an opening.
Until something changes, a blessing that hastens their victory and allows them to conserve their blood and strength.
Nanami lands on hit on the Cursed Spirit's back as the armor continues growing, hitting the ratio point.
But unlike all his previous attacks, this one is accompanied by black and red sparks exploding off of it.
BLACK FLASH!
The entire Cursed Spirit shakes and pieces of armor fall away from it, causing it to wail in pain and bleed onto the floor.
Like a man possessed, Nanami unleashes another hit, aiming at the length between its neck and the shoulder he stood at.
BLACK FLASH!
The entire shoulder breaks off, exposing the bleeding Cursed Spirit below that was now missing an entire arm.
Taiyo was stunned and confused as suddenly Nanami was moving faster than him, and hitting harder than anything they'd done until this point.
As if sensing the boy's disbelief, Nanami provided more proof, and spun around.
He spins to build momentum, then brings his blunt blade down like a guillotine, onto a line from the base of its neck to the top of its head.
BLACK FLASH!
The Cursed Spirit's entire head is sliced off, and the Domain crumbles, returning them to the dark basement room they were in before.
Nanami takes a moment to catch his breath while Taiyo is just standing there, staring at him in amazement.
"What the hell was that?" Taiyo asks, an excited smile on his face…
END CHAPTER---
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pat.reon: Keanu_Eugene [Read ahead & support me]
You.tube: @KeanuEugene [Giving away all my writing knowledge]