A/N: Welcome to my latest story: Potential Man. Here we go with this one. Next three chapters are up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga) already if you want to see them early.
**November 22nd 2018**
"Domain Expansion..." we said at the same time, my hands coming together while he made a come hither gesture.
"Authentic Mutual Love"
"Dance of a Thousand Shadows"
Both our barriers began forming at the same time, and then the overlapping conditions fought for supremacy. I felt the tug of war as Okkotsu's power and control overcame mine in a matter of minutes. And then we stood in the field of swords that made his domain.
"Another loss for me," I said, reaching back and scratching my head.
"You're getting better, for sure. But so am I. If you want to beat me, you're going to have to improve faster than I am at this," he said. I nodded.
Both domains shattered. I sent my RCT into my brain as I fried and healed the part of my brain that contained my cursed technique. Shoko called the technique extremely reckless, but had still approved the approach for Okkotsu, Gojo, and I. She said it was because we were freaks of nature. It brought me some satisfaction to be considered on the same level as those monsters but the days I spent training with Okkotsu made it clear that the gap between us was still there.
It shrunk day after day but it was still there.
"Domain Expansion…" we started again.
— —
"Done with Yuta-senpai already?" Itadori asked as I walked up to his position on the field. He was with Hakari, and Panda. Their own training was much more physical than most everyone else's. Okkotsu had gone to join Maki and Kusakabe-sensei where they were in the inside dojo. He was practicing simple domain and swordsmanship with them. I was trying to get my hand to hand to the level it needed to be. Absorbing masters of the art like Kashimo and Jinichi meant I had the talent now. I just had to refine it.
"Yes. Three domains is still the maximum we can do," I said with some disappointment. Okkotsu seemed more likely to break the barrier behind getting to a fourth domain than I was at this rate and that would be another loss in my book. I still kept my cursed technique reversal as my hidden trump card but even that probably wouldn't be enough to beat Okkotsu if he tapped into Rika.
"Ready to get started?" I asked the others, stretching and sending my cursed energy to my body.
"Let's go," Itadori said, sprinting straight for me.
I ducked under his first punch and tried to sweep his feet out from under him. He jumped over the sweep and in the same motion sent a kick for my head. I leaned backwards, avoiding the blow and then getting caught off guard as Panda appeared from my side. His form had become much more muscular, showing that he had tapped into the gorilla soul or whatever he called it. I twisted and blocked the attack, getting sent rolling across the ground and into the distance. I stopped just short of leaving the field, digging my hand into the ground to halt my momentum.
I rose again and shot at them only for Hakari to jump in my way. He aimed a knee at my head, serrated cursed energy wafting off him like a particularly strong perfume. I logically knew— and had learned firsthand from pain— that his punches hurt. Not just punches. Any hits he landed were guaranteed to hurt like nobody's business. I twisted and launched a kick at his head.
He blocked. I brought my foot back down just in time to dance backwards from the punches he tried to unload into my head. Unlike him, I didn't have the luxury of the option of a good block. A block was just transferring the pain of where it hurt. I shifted to the side and brought my knee to bear. He took the hit to land a punch of his own once it was too late for me to abandon the attack. I went spinning from the blow, cheek smarting something fierce as he did the same.
With a roar, we launched ourselves at each other again.
— — —
The decision ended up being made that everyone else would focus on Swap training with Kusakabe-sensei and Ui-Ui. Yuta and I waited here in the dojo while Gojo trained. We were supposed to be training with him, but for the past three days, we just got the pleasure of watching him open his domain, close it, and then open it again for minutes on end.
Sometimes, we sparred physically but he was so far beyond us that even with the two of us working together, we could not beat him.
"How would you bypass my infinity?" He suddenly asked as his domain shattered for the fifth time. Being addressed by him so suddenly was shocking enough that it took me a second to come up with an answer.
"Domain Amplification and Domain Expansion."
"That, and Mahoraga," I added.
He nodded. "Assuming Sukuna and I are equally matched in Domain Expansions, there is a chance that he will be forced to only use domain amplification. If that is his only way past my infinity then I will win," he said.
"If," I said.
"Indeed. Shoko and I think it best that I operate under the assumption that Comedian would give him some way to bypass my infinity without domain amplification," he said.
"How?" I asked.
"I don't know. I don't know if the binding vows he will have to use to bring the technique to some level of useability will even allow for it so we must operate under that assumption," he said.
"So what do you think we should do then?"
"I must master fighting without relying on the Infinity or even considering it as an option. The two of you are here to help with that," he said, turning to face us now.
"Come at me, boys," he said, spreading out his arms.
— —
"I'm surprised you haven't asked yet," Gojo said, looking at me.
"I was waiting for the right opportunity," I said, looking away. It did not cross my mind once to ask what he was talking about. It was somewhat obvious considering we were watching Shoko and Tsumiki as the former worked the latter through the very basics of controlling cursed energy that now sat dormant in her. Not enough to make her a sorcerer, but enough to make her stand out to cursed spirits like a flame for moths.
"Might as well do it now."
"Kogane, transfer one hundred points to Yorozu," I said, transferring out of the bounty that had trickled my way in the last few days. Okkotsu had sent over more points, and then the Zenin clan had paid their due. Now I had the points required to do what needed to be done.
"Kogane, add a rule. Players may expend a hundred points to invite someone else into the game to replace them," I said, laying out the rule.
"A new rule has been added," Tsumiki's own shikigami said.
"Megumi Fushiguro has added a rule. Players may expend a hundred points to invite someone else into the game to replace them," it said.
She turned to look at us in shock, clearly able to connect the dots between the points I'd sent her and the rule I'd just added to the game.
"Let's get to it, Tsumiki-chan," Gojo said, walking forwards.
"What do I do?" she asked, looking up at him. He was so tall he towered over practically everyone not named Aoi Todo.
"Just ask me if I want to join the game," he said.
"Do you want to join the game?" she asked.
"Of course."
And then her point tally returned to zero before Kogane detached himself from her and then flew over to Gojo.
"Welcome to the Culling Game, Satoru Gojo, the rules are—"
"Let's skip that, shall we?" he said and the shikigami went mute much to my surprise.
"Kogane, transfer five points to Satoru Gojo," I said, fulfilling the requirement that his point tally change.
"So, now that we have your main worry over and done with, can we talk about why you've been holding back on me?" he asked.
"What are you talking about? I've been giving it my all," I said.
"I haven't seen the power that beat Mahoraga yet. Nothing you've shown me so far explains how you beat the Divine General. That means there must be a trump card you're holding back. And I've seen it in a few of our spars. Where you find yourself at the end of your rope and consider using a technique. I've seen that look in your eyes before. The look that you got the second you learned to summon Mahoraga and what it could mean," he said, leaning towards me. His eyes were clad in that blindfold of his, so why did they feel so piercing?
"I have something," I confessed. He went back to standing straight with a smile on his face and then he clapped his hands together above his head.
"Good. You can show me now," he said, grabbing my shoulder and taking me to the training field. I noticed Yuji, Todo, and Choso sparring on the other side of it.
"Is it going to affect them?" Gojo asked, following my gaze.
"No. It's not that kind of technique," I said.
"So what kind of technique is it?" he asked.
"You know how summoning Mahoraga and somehow surviving that suspended animation state led to an evolution in my technique, yes?" I asked, confirming that he was aware of the cover story I used.
"Yes. I've never seen something like that in jujutsu, but a technique like the ten shadows is probably a mess with so many binding vows that it's unclear how the whole thing comes together. It just works. Somewhat like how no one knows what makes a child be born with the six eyes. Just that it happens once every few generations in the Gojo clan," he said.
"Yeah, so my technique evolved in three ways, giving me three abilities. The first is the ability to control my own shadow and puppet anyone whose shadow I merge with mine," I said, connecting my shadow with his and waving at myself. He didn't fight the control but I could feel it clearly that if he wanted out of my hold, it would be child's play for him to do it.
"The second is that I can now solidify my shadow into constructs." My efforts over the past days showed as my shadow rose in a winding tendril that weaved in on itself to form a flower that I extended towards Gojo. He touched it.
"Shockingly solid," he said.
"Can't exist separate from my shadow, however," I shrugged. He nodded.
"The third is that it allows me to absorb people into my shadow," I said, telling the first person about my third ability.
"Absorb people? So that's what happened to Naoya," he said.
"Their cursed energy adds to my pool and I get an increase in my output as well," I said. He nodded, looking like he had already managed to figure out some of it.
"Of course, if I use positive energy for my technique instead of negative, I get my cursed technique reversal," I said, and from my shadow rose the shadowy version of Naoya with a flex of my will. Gojo for the first time looked actually shocked as he began to walk around the solid shadow.
"Can it separate from your shadow?" he asked.
That wasn't actually something I'd considered. I'd only ever used them in my domain, and in there everything was my shadow. I detached my shadow from Naoya and nearly dropped to my knees from the sudden drain to my cursed energy reserves.
"So that's how it works," Gojo said, hand on his chin as he looked at me.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"You should know that cursed energy reserves are fixed at birth. Much the same with output. Far as I'm aware, there's no way to increase one's reserves. Output can be increased with something like a binding vow crafted carefully like what Kento-san had. It can be restored by hitting a black flash even. But reserves never change. They are depleted with use and replenished with rest. That's just how it works. Now your technique seems to go against that, but it does not. Not really. When you 'absorb' someone, what you are essentially doing is turning them into a shikigami stored in your shadow. Except this shikigami is created with the reserves and output that the person they are modelled after. While they are stored in your shadow, you can access their reserves and output like they are yours. But the reserves and output remain theirs. That is why when you separated him from your shadow, you felt the loss to your reserves," he said, looking fascinated all the while.
The Six Eyes was cheating, I decided as I listened to him continue to speak more and more. Because how could he just with a single glance deduce my technique even better than what I had been able to figure out.
This was the gap between monsters like he and Sukuna and the rest of us. It was not just the power I lacked, but the true mind for jujutsu that allowed Sukuna to do something as dangerous as destroy and repair his brain after just watching Gojo do it, or to create a piece of jujutsu that could split the world itself and bypass infinity. This was what I needed to beat, not just the power.
Part of me shied away from it, but the rest of me? I just couldn't wait.
"I assume he isn't the only one you have in your arsenal?" Gojo asked, beginning to stretch. I nodded, and from my shadow rose my other six acquisitions: Kashimo, Yorozu, Jinichi, Ogi, Ranta, and Chojuro. Gojo looked around at them before nodding.
"Show me what you can do when you are truly trying, Megumi," Gojo called, spreading out his arms and inviting the challenge. Naoya shot at him, moving so fast that I could not trace him with my eyes. Gojo weaved through his attacks as he reached up and pulled off his blindfold. He was taking me seriously right from the bat now.
Ranta, Chojuro, Ogi, and Jinichi returned to my shadow while Yorozu and Kashimo were detached from it. I bore the loss better now as I could see it coming somewhat.
Around Yorozu formed the insect armour that she had used in the fight against me, and Kashimo began to shift as mythical beast Amber took effect. I formed a sign and Max Elephant rose from behind me with the Orochi totality. It was the size of a duplex now, so massive that it towered over everything and then some.
When it blew water out of its trunk now, it was a veritable tsunami that crashed against the infinity, passing around Gojo without effect but drenching most of the field we fought atop. And then Kashimo struck.
His shadowy form screamed, creating a blast of thunder that made my ears near bleed with their force. The force did nothing in the face of the infinity but Gojo did double over from the sound waves themselves. So sonic attacks could bypass the infinity? I noted that down and kept Kashimo in reserve. He was going to be my trump card for sure.
Yorozu closed the distance between Gojo and herself in a flash as Naoya's speed increased with every onslaught of attacks that he failed to land. Now that his body was shadow, he should be able to handle even more and more speed so we kept going. With every usage of projection sorcery, the user got faster up until no known upper limit. At least none that any user had been able to survive reaching. The body broke before the technique so now that there was no body, the technique could be used to its full potential.
Yorozu struck with a slash that stalled against the infinity. Gojo pointed his palm at her, and then Kashimo screamed. Except this time, nothing happened. A smirk appeared on his face as he blew Yorozu away with his blue. I scowled. He'd recalibrated the parameters of his infinity to take sonic attacks into account. Of course.
"Might as well get in there then," I decided, and Kashimo shot forwards, body turning from shadow into electromagnetic phenomena as he did so. He struck with the force of Zeus himself, hitting a lightning bolt so large I was blinking flashes out of my eyes from looking at it. But Gojo's infinity would not be deterred. The lightning bolt came to a functional halt as it approached, reaching some arbitrary point.
Naoya was creating sonic booms with his movements now, but still there was no chance of breaking the infinity. Automatic activation of cursed technique, the skill Gojo used to maintain his ultimate defence was still faster. We kept going then. From my shadow rose Tiger Funeral, adding to the onslaught.
**— December 9th 2018**
"Domain Expansion..." we said in unison for the third time today.
"Authentic Mutual Love"
"Dance of a Thousand Shadows"
This time both barriers formed at the same time— or so close to it that even I could not tell. I could feel my parameters clash with his and then the barriers clicked into place. We were in a world divided into two halves. One of them a world of shadow, and the other a field of katanas buried in the earth. Both our sure hits were cancelled.
"Evenly matched," I judged. Okkotsu nodded.
"Again?" I offered. And he nodded.
A/N: Training chapter. We cover some of the progress around getting ready for the fight with Sukuna and dealing with Kenjaku's technique.Next three chapters up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga) (same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.