Naoya took a deep breath.
The domain slowly faded, as if the universe itself were settling back after being distorted by his will. The colors returned to normal. The air was still. Not a single insect dared to buzz. Only he remained, covered in minor wounds, with a satisfied smile.
"How disappointing," he muttered, twisting his neck to ease the tension. "This was a higher-ranking spirit?"
He walked through the remains of what had once been the battlefield. Pieces of the destroyed temple, broken trees, Yashiro's black blood slowly evaporating.
"Hmph. Well... this will be enough to silence the elders for a while." He looked at his right hand, still dripping with cursed energy. "And to make Naobito open his eyes."
He pulled out a piece of the spirit's remaining core. His plan was simple: take that symbolic "head" and bring it before the Zen'in clan elders as proof of his absolute power.
He was about to take the first step back when—
SHHHHHK.
A stabbing pain shot through his back to his chest.
"Ugh…!" Naoya spat out blood and fell to his knees, feeling something hot soak his abdomen. He turned his neck slightly… and then he saw it.
A deformed figure, taller, more grotesque, with multiple eyes open along its torso. It was Yashiro, reborn.
"No… way…," Naoya growled through gritted teeth.
The cursed spirit spoke in a deeper, more broken voice.
"You opened your domain too soon, arrogant child. You only struck at my pent-up form. Now… you will see what true hatred accumulated over a hundred years is."
Naoya tried to get up, but his back burned. The wound was deep.
"Damn..."
"I'm no longer Yashiro. I'm now Yashiro Kankai, the avenging spirit who devours his own time."
The temperature dropped suddenly. The field was covered in mist, as if time itself refused to move forward. The clock was broken.
Naoya stood slowly, panting, his hand pressing against the wound.
"So this is really interesting," he muttered, his eyes flashing madly. "Come on, monster. I'll show you why only three people in this world can beat me."
Yashiro Kankai let out a roar, and the second round began.
Part 2: The Time Warp
The first blow was brutal.
Naoya dodged it on instinct, but he still felt the air vibrate with the pressure. Every time Yashiro attacked, he left a temporal void, a split second where Naoya felt his body slow down.
"Are you interfering with my temporal perception?" Naoya frowned, enduring the pain. "Interesting… but useless."
He activated his Time Skip Technique, inspired by Hit.
0.5 seconds forward.
He disappeared.
He reappeared behind the spirit and launched a kick reinforced with cursed energy directly at its neck. But he missed.
The spirit moved with an unnatural movement, almost as if going back in time.
"Are you imitating me?!" Naoya shouted.
"No. I am perfecting what you only copied. I am pure time… fractured, but eternal," Yashiro said.
The exchange was fierce. Both disappeared and reappeared in different positions, colliding with devastating blows. Trees fell, the ground split. It was like watching two divine entities fighting on different planes.
Naoya gasped. Blood continued to flow. His muscles ached. For the first time in a long time, he felt something he didn't want to admit.
Fear.
"If I had faced this a year ago... I'd be dead," he thought.
A flurry of cursed projectiles grazed his cheek. Naoya used the leaping technique once more, but his body began to fail him. His physical limits were taking their toll.
He fell to the ground. Yashiro Kankai approached slowly, with a crooked smile.
"You're going to die... without a trace."
Naoya looked up at the sky.
He remembered Gojo Satoru. Sukuna. Touji.
He remembered how weak he still was compared to them. How far away he was.
And then he understood:
"Weakness is a sin..."
One last chance.
Part 3: Broken Clock, Unbreakable Will
Naoya stood up. His legs were shaking. His breathing was erratic.
But his eyes… his eyes blazed with fury.
"I'm going to kill you. And I'm going to take your head to the elders. I'm going to show them what the true future of the Zen'in Clan can do."
He raised both hands. And for a moment, the world seemed to stop.
"Domain Expansion… Time Cell Moon Palace," he hissed.
"Again?!" Yashiro roared, raising his arms.
"It's not the same."
A smaller version of the domain emerged. A floating, more compressed clock, surrounding Naoya and Yashiro like a mobile cell.
"I don't need to control you. I only need to control myself."
Inside the mini-domain, Naoya controlled his own time. He slowed it down in some places, sped it up in others. He corrected the trajectory of his blows. He struck beyond prediction.
Yashiro, for the first time, missed a counterattack.
Naoya hit him once, twice, three times. A flick of the wrist. A false leap. A kick straight to the center of the skull.
—RAAAAHHH!!!
The spirit screamed, and this time its body truly began to decompose.
—NO! I WAS THE ETERNAL! I CAN'T—!
—Time is mine, Naoya whispered. —And you, Yashiro Kankai… you are dust.
One last, sharp blow. The spirit exploded in a burst of cursed energy.
Silence.
Naoya fell to his knees, panting, covered in sweat, blood, and pride. Slowly, he crawled to what remained of the spirit's core, still warm.
"I did it..." he smiled.
He stored the still-pulsing piece of the core in a special sealed container. Then he looked up at the sky.
"Naobito... clan elders..."
He stood up with difficulty.
"Prepare your speeches. I... I am the next leader of the Zen'in."
And he began to walk, leaving a trail of blood, but without stopping.
Because now, not even death could reach him.