After Suguru spoke, he extended a hand toward Mahito, who was still in his Instant Spirit Body of Distorted Killing form.
A powerful force of attraction, directed solely at Mahito, formed within his palm.
"Ahhh!"
Mahito let out a miserable scream.
Clutching his head, his entire body began twisting violently. It looked as though an invisible giant hand was trying to crush him into a ball.
Just like when Suguru had absorbed him in those mountains before, his body was torn apart by an overwhelming distortion. The fragments then broke down into scattered cursed energy and streamed toward Suguru's palm.
In the blink of an eye, the human-sized cursed spirit vanished without a trace, and only a faint glow remained in Suguru's hand.
"I see. Extracting and directly using a cursed spirit's technique ensures the highest possible precision," Nanami adjusted his goggles and explained the situation to the stunned students beside him.
As a special grade sorcerer, Suguru's control over cursed energy far surpassed that of a newborn cursed spirit. No matter how talented Mahito had been, he was still only at a level where Suguru could crush him effortlessly.
"Maki, I may be able to use this technique to alter your body and give you a chance to become someone like Toji-san."
Suguru finally spoke. As Mukuro's closest friend, he had long since figured out the structure of that inhuman body.
Mukuro's physical body had become so powerful that it completely overshadowed the soul itself. Yet because of their relationship, Suguru had been able to gradually understand it over time.
As a result, when reshaping Maki's soul, he could accomplish things Mahito never could. That was why he had willingly sacrificed a special grade cursed spirit just to extract this technique.
After glancing at Yuji and Maki, who stood on either side, his gaze settled on the latter.
"But I need to warn you. That cursed spirit itself never specialized in that kind of physical talent. Even I can't guarantee success. If it fails..."
He didn't continue. The fate of the players and soldiers Mahito had used as test subjects was still fresh in everyone's memory.
Making a body completely incapable of possessing cursed energy was unimaginably difficult. According to Master Tengen, throughout the thousand years since the Heian Era, only the Fushiguro brothers had been born as "monsters" whose bodies could not contain cursed energy.
In a way, Kenjaku's lies to the world's governments had actually contained some truth. Cursed energy really was a form of energy. Aside from Mukuro and Toji, every single person possessed cursed energy. The only differences were the amount they had and whether they could use it.
Heavenly Restriction was, at its core, a binding vow. One flaw in exchange for overwhelming enhancement elsewhere, and with bindings, what was lost and what was gained were usually proportional.
Mukuro was a special case. But even someone like Toji possessed combat power worthy of special grade status in one-on-one battles. In other words, if Mukuro and Toji hadn't lost their cursed energy because of Heavenly Restriction, their cursed energy reserves and techniques would likely have been extraordinarily powerful as well.
Talent mattered. Otherwise, for an ordinary person, losing cursed energy led to only one outcome: death.
If Mukuro hadn't personally said that Maki possessed that kind of talent, Suguru would never have allowed one of his juniors to take such a risk.
"Maki!"
The moment Suguru finished speaking, silence filled the room. The first person to break it was Mai. As twins, she could tell exactly what her sister was thinking just by looking at her expression, and she couldn't accept it.
"Please don't do this again, okay? Let's just keep living like this. I'll work harder. I'll become stronger. I won't hold you back anymore..."
The girl spoke with a trembling voice. The usually strong and stubborn Mai had actually said those words.
This was the curse of twins. As long as she refused to desperately pursue strength, Maki's efforts would never produce significant results because the two of them were considered one person.
The younger sister's existence suppressed the elder's cursed energy, while the elder sister's existence prevented the younger from obtaining her complete physical potential.
Mai hated pain, so she had never pushed herself too hard. But now, she was even more afraid of losing her sister.
"It's okay. Trust me." Maki removed her glasses and turned around with a smile.
She couldn't rely forever on the legacy left behind by her cousins to become the future head of the Zenin Clan. In the world of jujutsu, strength was everything. Only personal power truly mattered.
Now that there were things she wanted to protect, she wanted to seize them with her own hands.
She gently held Mai's hand and wiped away the tears gathering at the corners of her eyes. "I'll protect you, just like always."
Mai said nothing more and silently stepped back.
"You two, come here."
Seeing this, Suguru stretched out both hands and placed them on Yuji and Maki's arms.
"Idle Transfiguration."
The technique extracted by Suguru could only be used once. But that "once" referred to a single activation, not a single target. Therefore, the technique activated on both of them simultaneously.
Yuji stared in disbelief as the pinky finger Sukuna had torn off suddenly began growing back. Although he always claimed not to care and even viewed it as a form of punishment, the feeling of recovering something once lost still filled him with joy.
Compared to him, Maki appeared unchanged on the surface.
Silence filled the room as almost everyone held their breath. Every eye was fixed on her, and no one dared miss even the slightest abnormality.
"Looks like it went smoothly." Suguru finally withdrew his hands. As Idle Transfiguration ended, he let out a long breath.
"Open your eyes and take a look."
Looking at the girl keeping her eyes tightly shut, Mukuro reminded her.
"Mm..."
At this time, Maki was extremely nervous. The overwhelming tension prevented her from even noticing the changes in her own body.
Slowly, she opened her eyes, and the world looked different. Things she had never been able to see before now appeared clearly before her. These were sights that only those two people had once been able to see.
She clenched her fist, and the terrifying strength contained within it felt unreal. Everything seemed like a dream.
"I told you. It would work." She looked at her sister and gave her a wink.
"Honestly..."
No longer bothering to act cold, Mai threw herself straight into Maki's arms. The emotional roller coaster had been so intense that she failed to notice something else.
At that very moment, her own cursed energy reserves surged dramatically. In terms of cursed energy alone, Mai had completely reached grade 1 level.
The curse of the twins had been broken. One became two, and the two sisters had finally become truly separate individuals.
"That's amazing!"
Whether it was Momo and the others or Nobara's group, everyone rushed over to congratulate their companion. What had originally been a strategy meeting turned into a lively celebration among the students.
"I did pretty well, didn't I?" Suguru quietly slipped away from the crowd and returned to Mukuro and Satoru.
"Just this once, I'll praise you. After all, even the most handsome teacher in history, Satoru Gojo, couldn't solve this problem," Satoru said with a grin, though it was hard to tell whether he was praising Suguru or himself.
"Of course it worked." Mukuro's response was much simpler. "Because it's you."
The teachers said nothing more about the Culling Game or Sukuna. They simply stood there, quietly watching their juniors laugh and celebrate.
For this brief moment, everything was peaceful.
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