A/N:
Hey guys, sorry for the late chapter had to study for a math exam, but here is the chapter hope you enjoy!
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"In terms of priorities, I'd like to learn Reverse Cursed Technique, then Hollow wicker basket, and or any barrier techniques you know." I reiterated what I needed to learn.
She tilted her head, seemingly considering those for a moment, "Reverse Cursed Technique is something I can give you a framework for, but it's up to you if you can even unlock it." I felt the same dual pulse as before, when her hand was enveloped in positive energy. "Same for domain expansion."
I stared transfixed at the positive energy, "How do you do it?" I asked before I could stop myself. "And you're willing to teach me how to get my domain?" If I was shocked at her openness to teaching before, I was downright flabbergasted now.
I had thought it would be a pipe dream to get her to teach me even the basics, much less get her to help me with my domain.
"Generate two flows of cursed energy at once in your brain, then bring them together at a single point," Uro explained as though she were recounting the weather.
"...Huh?" I said intelligently with a tilt of my head. "What do you mean by two different sources?" and is that really it? I thought it'd be harder.
She rolled her eyes, "I can't help you from there," she started, and I opened my mouth to ask why before she interrupted me, "It's something you learn instinctually, but there is one thing in common with every case of awakening it I have seen..." She paused for dramatic effect, "Desperation," she finished.
I scratched my head. That was both what I expected and what I feared. I sighed, "And Hollow Wicker Basket and Domain Expansion?" At least I can hope to get a start on those two.
"Well, Hollow Wicker Basket should be rather easy for a sorcerer of your ability." She said, "All you have to do is create an interweaving shell of cursed energy while visualizing it as a separate 'basket' to hold yourself away from the domain." She formed the handsign, and a soft sphere of interweaving cursed energy enveloped her.
I felt it, how she was maintaining it, how she formed it, and what it was doing practically. She was making an isolation zone with her cursed energy, like an air bubble. That made me furrow my eyes, because what she was doing was basically exactly what I had tried at the beginning.
But my eyebrows shot up when I realized the critical difference between how I was doing it before and how she was doing it. Her barrier created a 'zone' free from outside cursed energy, mine overlapped it, but didn't 'push out' the other cursed energy, so it was still present in the isolation zone.
I slapped a hand to my face at my own stupidity before forming the hand sign myself and focusing. I made a shell of interwoven cursed energy around myself, but this time I imposed the "condition" on the barrier to push and keep out any other cursed energy.
It took a LOT of concentration, but I felt as the cursed energy gradually left my barrier, leaving it 'hollow' on the inside and creating an exclusion zone. "Holy shit..." I heard her whisper and opened my eyes.
In front of me was a translucent sphere of interweaving cursed energy glowing softly. I grinned a manic grin, 'HWB is officially learned.' And with that, a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders. While I had Ressonance Cascade to break domains, I was helpless until I could analyze the barrier's frequency, so learning something that allowed me to survive to that point was imperative.
Plus, they made the same sign, so I could switch between the two at random or even activate them simultaneously if I got to that skill level.
This also confirms another theory of mine.
...I was a genius, there was no other way—
The barrier fell with my concentration, and I sighed disappointedly, 'Not that much of a genius, it seems.'
I shook my head and cleared the thought; my learning speed mattered far more when using it rather than just considering it.
With that in mind, I sent a smug look towards Uro and said, "So that was easy... What's next?"
She glared at me, "Domains," she growled out, clearly not expecting me to learn that quickly, "A domain expansion is using a barrier to project your inner domain onto the outside world." She explained
"I know that," I interrupted her, "I need to know how you do it technically."
She glared harder, "I was getting to that," she took a breath, "Every person's hand sign is different, unlike HWB, and it's not something I can help you find either. Really, the only thing I can teach you about it is the process of finding your own innate domain and making a barrier." She leveled me with an annoyed glance.
"And those are done how?" I asked impatiently.
Her eye twitched, "The domain barrier is an inherently different barrier than any other; it requires you to find your unique handsign. The barrier needs to project your technique all throughout the barrier, imposing your innate domain onto the reality inside the barrier." She took a deep breath.
I opened my mouth to ask how to find my innate domain and hansign, but she shut me up with a glare. "To find your innate domain is a process of deep introspection, usually done when either near death or in deep meditation." She started.
"But it's the shape and nature of your soul and your technique, the space that is you. Your handsign comes to you naturally." She finished and looked questioningly at me when I raised my hand to ask a question.
After several seconds of awkward silence, I realized that she probably didn't know that I was asking if I could ask a question. "I've seen someone change their domain handsign with a binding vow. Could you do that to cheat finding your real handsign?"
"Impossible," She said, devisively, before looking down in thought, "I didn't even think that such a feat was possible, to change your own handsign... Such a feat would be—"
"Divine?" I finished, and she nodded, looking questioningly at me.
"Who was that sorcerer, the one who could change their own domain's handsign?" She asked me.
There was only ever one man capable of that,
"Sukuna."
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Time Skip (3 hours)
We stopped training an hour or so after dark. Uro was exhausted from the day, and I was sick of meditating and precisely cursed energy control exercises that Uro showed me.
The result, however, was startling to say the least. Every single aspect of my sorcery vastly improved.
My reinforcement now clearly surpassed Uro, and I was stronger than her even without using our techniques. I could form basic barriers now and could hold HWB as long as I had the hand sign formed.
But I was still unable to perform the Reverse Cursed Technique in spite of my radical improvement.
It seems that no matter what I do. I can't learn RCT without that near-death experience, or that "Desperation" as Uro called it. I sighed walking to the bathroom and opening the door.
I stepped into the bathroom and stripped my clothes off. I got into the shower and turned it on, reveling under the hot water. I pilfered the soap and hair products of the previous homeowners to clean myself. I sat under the hot water a moment longer and watched the water drip from my hair and into a small puddle from the shower water.
I watched it ripple and watched another ripple from the shower collide with it. And an idea blossomed in my head uninvited.
My frequency stacking worked by redirecting the vibrations that would be leaving my body into strengthening the already present vibrations, creating an echo-like chamber that permanently increased my base speed, strength, and durability.
But what happens if I create two vibrations of cursed energy that destroy each other?
I originally threw out the idea entirely because I thought that the two streams would annihilate each other and leave me with nothing. But what if instead the vibrations would cancel and leave pure energy, or in this case, positive energy?
I brought my hands out in front of me, because no way was I testing this out inside my body first, and channeled my cursed energy into the space between them. I focused on matching the two vibrations' speed and amplitude. I tried hard, but I couldn't invert the phase of my cursed energy using control alone.
Thankfully, I can use my technique to cheat.
See, using my technique allowed me far, far greater control over the specifics of my cursed energy vibrations. The problem is that it is almost impossible to use your normal technique and reverse-cursed technique at the same time.
So I channeled my technique into my left hand and used it to invert the position of the highs and lows of the vibration.
I felt it instantly, at the point of contact, the two vibrations canceled fully, and all that was left was floating warm energy.
I opened my eyes and saw a white ball of floating energy in between my hands.
It was taxing on my reserves, but I could sustain this for a long, long time.
I let out an excited breath. I hadn't unlocked the Reverse Cursed Technique, but I had found an alternative to creating positive energy.
I moved the ball over a particularly nasty bruise Uro had given me in either our spar or our fight, I couldn't tell. I sighed in relief as I felt the energy wash over me, and my bruise vanished slowly.
I let out a short, disbelieving laugh, completely breathless.
My excitement was broken by a crash as the bathroom door was flung open, and the shower curtain was yanked to the side, "Shinji! Is there an enemy?! I felt your cursed energy spi—!" She stopped abruptly, taking in my current state of dress.
Or lack thereof, rather.
She looked me up and down, and I was too stunned to react for a moment. Everything was silent for a moment, and I felt my eye twitch. "Are you just going to stare all day, or are you going to leave?!" I asked in a grave tone.
She raised an eyebrow at me, "I figured it was only fair given your earlier observation," She started, and my cheeks dusted red for only a moment, and she continued, "Beside its not like you have anything to be embarrassed of."
My eyebrows shot up. Was she hitting on me? Before I could get an answer, she crossed her arms under her chest and moved her weight to one hip. "Now, why were you flaring your cursed energy? Was there not an enemy you were fighting?"
I resisted the urge to cover myself out of pride, instead crossing my own arms and answering. "There is no enemy. I was just testing a new technique." My eyes brightened, "And I was successful, wanna see?" She nodded, and I focused.
It took a couple of seconds of concentration, but the bubble of positive energy was formed between my hands again. Her pupils shrank, and her face broke into an emotion I hadn't yet seen from her.
Wonder.
She got far closer than was comfortable, given my lack of clothing, staring intently at the ball of energy.
"How?" Was all she asked, and I smirked smugly, forgetting my nakedness for a moment.
"All I had to do was use my technique along with my curse energy's vibrating nature to induce perfect phase change inversion, resulting in the cancellation of the negative aspect of the energy," I smirked harder at her dumb look.
"Whatever that means," She grumbled, but remained rooted in her spot.
I raised an eyebrow, "So are you gonna leave, or do you plan on joining me?"
She blinked, "Actually, I might," she said, and shock erupted from within me. Then I almost slapped my own forehead when I remembered that she was from the Heian era, and mixed baths were common practice.
I opened my mouth to hurriedly tell her that that was, in fact, a joke, but she had already started to strip out of her clothes. My jaw hung open in shock as she stepped in beside me, "How does this work?" She asked and looked at me expectantly.
"Uhh, well, you, uhh," I gulped, "You just... grab the soap and rub it on yourself," She looked expectantly at me, "What?" Did she expect me to wash her?!
"Where is the soap?" she asked me impatiently, and I took a breath. That was what she wanted. I reached and gave her the soap, and she quickly started to wash herself.
I stared transfixed, and she stared at me when she was finished, "What now?" she asked.
I shook my head, "Then you wash it out under the water." She took a step forward, nearly pressing against me to get under the water with me. 'Too close, WAY too fucking close.' I thought and blushed hard, but continued my thought, "Then you, uhh, you wash your hair with shampoo and conditioner."
"And what are those?" She asked with a tilt of her head, staring up at me.
I locked my eyes with hers and grabbed the shampoo with my right hand, the conditioner with my left, "These." I said simply, "You apply shampoo first," I jingled the bottle in my right, "Then conditioner," I shook the one in my left, "Making sure to work both through your hair gently, and washing them both out when you're done."
She took the bottle from my right, staring at it inquisitively, "How do you apply this?" I sighed and helped her to apply shampoo and conditioner before washing them out. slightly shocked at how fast my shock gave way to a... pleasant feeling.
Even though we were both naked, it wasn't a tense or sexual affair.
We were just... bathing together. It was honestly nice. I understand now why this was normal so long ago. Uro also seemed intent on ignoring my... reaction to our current state, so it wasn't very awkward. I turned the shower head off and wrapped my lower half in a towel, handing Uro her own.
She took it with a gentle, "Thank you," and wrapped herself in a towel as well. We walked out of the bathroom and past the broken door in non-awkward silence. We split off to our own rooms without another word, and I opened and closed the door to my room with a soft click of the doorknob.
I pressed my back against my door and sighed, 'What the actual fuck just happened?' I needed some time to process the last 10-15 minutes. Some time without thinking about the resident pinkette.
Fate, it seems, did not agree with my line of thinking as I heard a soft knocking on the door. I sighed and turned, opening the door, "What's up?"
"..."
"..."
"...How do you open the door?" She asked.
I smiled, always happy to help, "Grab the knob and twist it." I demonstrated, and she nodded in thanks before stalking off to her own room. I shook my head in bemusement and closed my own door, climbing into bed.
I barely had time to get under the covers before my eyes shut, and I knew no more.
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I awoke before the sun even rose, and a glance at my phone told me that it was 5:30 am. I rubbed at my eyes while getting out of bed and putting my clothes on.
I walked downstairs and opened the fridge to find something I could cook for myself and the still sleeping Uro. I settled on some eggs, sausage, and rice.
It was a simple breakfast and only protein and carbs, but it was all the home had after we ravaged the place last night. We needed to get some groceries today.
Uro rose with the sun, coming down the stairs at 6:03 am, breakfast was already done and cooling slightly.
"Hope you're hungry," I said, drying my hands after washing the dishes from cooking, "Cause I made breakfast." I slid her a bowl of rice, egg, and sausage.
She took the bowl and clasped her hands in a soft prayer before digging into the food before her. I had already finished my own breakfast by that point, so I was content to just watch her. "So what's the plan today, oh fearless leader?" She asked snidely, and I smiled a bit.
"Well, for starters, I was planning on going out points hunting for a couple of hours before trying to find some food for the house. Then after that..." I took a moment to sip a glass of water. "Another training session?" I asked, raising a brow.
She rolled her eyes, "I still don't understand your insistence on my teaching you," She started before taking another bite of her food, crushing my hopes slightly, "But I will still guide your training." She said haughtily.
I opened my mouth, a celebration on my tongue when I felt it.
A huge buildup of cursed energy rapidly approaching the house.
I jumped over the counter, draping myself over Uro and reinforcing my body to the max. Just in time for a flood of pink cursed energy to erase our humble abode, and impact squarely on my back.
I gasped out in pain, feeling the wave of destructive energy hit me, but I kept shielding Uro. My back felt like it was on fire, and my world was a tsunami of bright pink energy, but I held on.
The wave subsided, and I turned my head to look towards the culprit of the blast.
There stood a tall man with an immaculately shaped pompadour, an open fur jacket displaying his chiseled chest. A cigarette hung loosely from the corner of his lip, smoke wafting off it slightly, just as smoke was wafting off my own body from his blast.
"Are you my dessert?" He asked, tilting his head up appraisingly.
I looked around, noting the destroyed house, and turned to look down at Uro, who was glaring up at me before pushing me off her, "Why did you protect me?" She asked, "I was more than capable of surviving that blast."
'Geeze, next time I'll just let you get hit,' I thought to myself, scanning the ruins of our home.
I breathed in, yup, that settles it, either Ryu joins right now, or he's a dead man walking.
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A/N:
Aaaaaaand done, hope you enjoyed the chapter. The next chapter will be the Ryu fight. If you think the story is moving too fast or Shinji is progressing too fast, that's because he has insane talent with a willing teacher and outside knowledge over events, plus he's hit multiple black flashes so his insight into cursed energy is insane.
On the topic of Shinji generating positive energy, this is NOT RCT this is Shinji's own unique technique to generate positive energy that has it's own caviates. Like the fact that it can not be used in Reversal techniques, and can only be used to heal because it is made outside of the body. Shinji will eventually learn RCT and reversal, but I have a plan for that. This method is also even more draining than normal RCT and even cruder than that, so it's still balanced.
Had a lot of votes on the next fic idea, but I want to hear your guys' opinion on the one with the current highest votes: The Force in JJK
I am not saying that will be my next fic, just want to clarify if you guys think I should do it in the Heian era or the modern Era, if it should be part of the wider Star Wars Universe and I can just upscale all of JJK or what? And who would you like to see as a love interest in that? Personally, I'm partial to a female Gojo because thematically I think the two work brilliantly—one has the power that connects all things, the other has a technique that represents the uncrossable distance between them—but I want to hear your opinions on it.
Again, that is not a final decision; my decision will be my own while taking into account the votes as well.
Anywho, I hope you guys enjoyed, let me know what I can do better, and if you enjoyed it! I hope you have a great night!