Benimaru and Rei managed to land several solid hits on the Saint.
Benimaru's fists and kicks blazed with his fire technique, each strike sending sparks scattering through the air. Meanwhile, Rei's needles whirled around her like a deadly swarm of miniature missiles, darting toward Gojo again and again without pause, and Rei throwing her own strikes in gaps.
I could see a glimmer of relief beginning to soften Rei's features… before—
SPLURT.
Gojo's attack came without warning, striking Benimaru in the neck. Blood spurted in a crimson arc as the force of the blow drove him backward.
He staggered, clutching at the wound as a harsh cough tore from his throat, blood spilling from his lips.
"Brother!" Rei cried, moving to rush to him—
But Gojo was already on her.
"Sayōnara!" she declared, her fist swinging toward the unprotected side of Rei's torso.
In that instant, Benimaru appeared behind her, his arms locking around her small frame.
And for the first time, Gojo's composure cracked. She had assumed he was already dead from her earlier strike.
"Don't you dare lay a finger on my Rei!" he roared. Literal flames burst from his eyes, and his pure white hair began to turn a deep crimson. "[Ninpō: Enjin no Jutsu]!"
Immediately, an enormous pillar of fire erupted, engulfing both Benimaru and Gojo. The heat was so intense that the very ground beneath them began to melt, and the air filled with the acrid stench of burning flesh.
"Rei, do it now!" Benimaru shouted from within the inferno, his own body writhing in the flames.
Rei's face twisted with anguish at the sight of her brother burning alive. But she gritted her teeth, forcing herself to act.
"I'll always love you, Brother!" she cried, forming the hand seals. "[Ninpō: Tetsubishi]!"
In front of her, countless thin black needles materialized from the air itself. With a sharp hiss, they tore forward, slicing through the wind as they sped toward Gojo.
"Hmph."
In a blur too fast for the eye to follow, Gojo seemed to ignore Benimaru's burning hold entirely. With a swift, precise kick, she struck…
Several of the incoming needles somehow reversed, every single one of them, even those untouched by her kick, flew back through the air.
They switched course in an instant, rushing toward Rei like a deadly gale.
Her dark red eyes widened in horror, tiny red capillaries bursting within them.
The needles pierced through her in a blink.
Rei stumbled back a single step, her long silver hair swaying, before her body collapsed to the ground.
"GRAAAAWWWLLL!"
Neko's scream shook the battlefield.
Her black hair turned stark white in an instant.
Her pupils narrowed into sharp blue slits, her fingernails lengthened into razor claws, and from her lower back, a tail burst forth.
Her body shifted, her face warping into something feral and predatory.
She had entered Jibaku mode—[Byakko no Jikako].
In this form, Neko could withstand Gojo's fists and brutal blows, and even return a few of her own.
Tanaka-nii-san, despite having only one arm left, and Kuro, both rushed forward to join the struggle.
It was in that moment I realized the horrifying truth: everyone else was already gone.
Not even an hour had passed, and only five of us remained alive.
Benimaru, his body scorched and battered, began to crawl toward his fallen sister. His face was half-charred, streaked with soot.
The fabric of his clothing had been burned away almost entirely, and from his elbows down, both arms were gone.
Still, he inched forward until he finally reached Rei and managed to pull her gently into his embrace.
Her mouth hung open, drawing in shallow, ragged breaths, thin streams of blood streamed from her eyes.
After several agonizing seconds, both of them went still.
Zaki, too, had reached her limits.
She had stood and watched as one by one, everyone fell, and all the while her attacks had barely slowed Gojo down.
Her hands trembling, she loaded a silver bullet into another weapon far larger than the one she had been using before.
This was no ordinary gun; it resembled a sniper rifle, but with a barrel thick enough to accommodate a small missile. The bullet itself was not meant to simply kill.
It was a silver bomb.
Upon impact, it would detonate three times in rapid succession, followed by the release of a toxic, suffocating gas to ensure absolute, irreversible death.
Gojo drove her knee savagely into Neko's stomach, forcing her to double over and clutch her abdomen in pain.
From the scorched ground beneath them, dark shadows surged upward—twisted silhouettes shaped like people—grabbing hold of Gojo's limbs.
It was Kuro's technique: [Kage no Jū].
Seizing the opportunity, Tanaka-nii-san began slamming his only remaining hand into her again and again, each impact so forceful that the earth beneath them began to sink, forming a deep crater.
For a brief moment, Gojo stayed still, twitching inside the impact pit.
Then, without warning, she rose in a blur of motion, driving her slender arm straight through Tanaka-nii-san's chest.
Up on her perch, Zaki's eyes widened. Her breathing quickened. She flinched, then squeezed the trigger.
"Wait!" Kuro shouted, his voice desperate, trying to stop her. But it was too late.
BOOM-BOOMM-BOOMMM!!
The blast sent Tanaka-nii-san's body hurtling through the air before crashing into a pond several meters away.
The entire area within a thirty-meter radius erupted into an inferno, the heat blazing even from the distance I laid.
Silence followed.
The smoke trailed heavily, and no movement stirred within the explosion's midpoint.
It had basically been point-blank range. That bullet, powerful enough to obliterate helicopters, had struck Gojo directly.
Even for her, a devil beyond reason, it should have taken time to recover from that.
THWIP!
Just as Zaki exhaled and allowed her tense shoulders to ease, a sharp, elongated object shot out of the flames.
It pierced cleanly through her left eye.
She toppled from her vantage point atop the statue, lifeless before she hit the ground.
And in that moment, I understood…
That projectile had been… someone's rib.
Neko's scream ripped through the battlefield, raw and unrestrained.
She mourned her twin with a grief so pure, so overwhelming, that it pressed down on the soul of anyone close enough to hear it.
Her voice carried the weight of loss, and of a sadness too deep to be contained.
Gojo Kowai walked out of the fire, not even a single thread of her clothes burnt.
She looked displeased, holding the neck of a person — Kuro — half of them nothing but a skeleton now.
She dropped the corpse without care and started walking toward the girl who was crying.
Neko ignored her, still weeping.
That's when it hit me; a bit funny most of us here hadn't cried in years, yet we finally found something strong enough to rip the tears right out of us.
Gojo opened her palm, aiming it straight at Neko on the ground.
And then, I saw it—