"Kenmei-kun, you're here."
Kenmei had followed the Cursed Corpse created by Yaga-sensei to the eighth floor of Jujutsu High's largest lecture building. It was a space that resembled a shrine.
When he slid open the door and stepped into the secret chamber, Kenmei was instantly stunned.
Candles. Everywhere.
The altar, made of golden candlesticks, was densely packed with pale white candles, filling the air with the burnt smell of grease. The walls were adorned with vivid paintings of furious deities—whether Rakshasa or Asura, their eyes bulged with rage. They were so lifelike that the entire room felt indescribably oppressive.
"Uh... what's with this setup?"
Kenmei swallowed hard, feeling like he was about to face divine judgment.
Standing amidst it all, Yaga-sensei wore a solemn expression as he methodically lit the candles one by one.
Noticing Kenmei's arrival, Yaga stopped what he was doing and turned to him.
"Let's talk in the prep room outside."
In the adjacent prep room, various ancient exorcism tools were displayed—Vajra pestles, Soul-Calming bells, Gohei wands. Being in Jujutsu High's collection, these were undoubtedly the real deal.
Kenmei noticed a transparent crystal box on the table. Inside lay an incredibly tattered book.
It looked ancient. The text on the ragged cover had been eroded by time until it was illegible. Calling it a "book" was generous; it was more like a collection of fragmented, yellowed pages stacked together.
The flowing Cursed Energy indicated that the book in front of Kenmei was actually a book-type Cursed Tool. But why were there traces of burning, water damage, and even torn pages?
Masamichi Yaga put on gloves cautiously and gently opened the lid, acting as if the slightest touch might destroy the artifact.
"This book is called the Heian Chronicles. It's one of the few ancient texts passed down from the Heian period over a thousand years ago. This copy at Jujutsu High is the last surviving one."
"The author is unknown. It records events that occurred in the Heian capital, but most pages are missing, making interpretation difficult."
"Some pages in the 'Demon God Section' record the King of Curses from a thousand years ago: Ryomen Sukuna."
As Yaga turned the pages slowly, a projection-like image appeared above the book. It showed a blurry figure of a hideous monster with four arms and two faces. Before he even made a move, the ancient sorcerers around him were already dismembered.
However, the image was extremely fuzzy and dissipated in less than three seconds.
"Another section records the strongest Cursed Spirit of that era, the Lord of Catastrophe: the Nine-Tailed Fox, Tamamo-no-Mae."
Under the moonlight, a terrifying Cursed Spirit radiating monstrous evil roared at the sky. Its nine white tails, large enough to blot out the sun, caused massive waves and earthquakes with every swing.
The image quality was poor, but Kenmei recognized it immediately. It was almost identical to the vision he saw when he touched the Killing Stone.
But unlike his vision, the Nine-Tailed Fox recorded in these fragments seemed... healthier?
Kenmei didn't know how to describe it. Comparing the Fox he saw via the Killing Stone to the one in the book, the former felt weak, while the latter exuded the tyrannical aura of a ruler dominating the world.
What had happened to cause such a drastic change in this apex predator of Cursed Spirits?
Kenmei was confused about why Yaga was showing him this until the teacher magnified a detail from the Nine-Tailed Fox's image.
"Kenmei-kun, don't you think the tattoo on your arm looks like the pattern on the Nine-Tailed Fox's forehead?"
The pattern on the Fox's forehead was a complete symbol: twelve cherry blossom petal-shaped magatamas, intricately interwoven into a closed loop.
Although the tattoo Kenmei showed him earlier was incomplete—just a rough outline with a single petal—it successfully jogged Yaga's memory.
Research on this book had been ongoing since it was excavated early last century. It was a factual record of the two strongest monsters that left terrifying legends a thousand years ago: one "Human," one "Cursed Spirit."
When Yaga was young, he had seen the crest symbolizing the Nine-Tailed Fox in an illustrated guide but dismissed it as a fairy tale.
Only when his clearance level rose high enough to learn about the Heian Chronicles did Yaga realize that these calamity-level monsters truly existed a millennium ago.
Anything involving entities from a thousand years ago required extreme caution.
"This crest is called the Mark of Eternal Life. It was the symbol of an ancient sorcerer organization active a thousand years ago called the 'Tendoshu' (Order of the Heavenly Way)."
Yaga shared information found in another ancient text with Kenmei.
This group worshiped the Lord of Catastrophe, the Nine-Tailed Fox, as a god. Their doctrine was "Slaughter as the catalyst, Soul as the vessel, to attain Eternal Life." They conducted inhumane blood sacrifices everywhere, causing widespread panic.
With the disappearance of the Nine-Tailed Fox, the Tendoshu also vanished. But they left a prophecy: "When the Flower of Blood and Samsara blooms, and the path of Yin and Yang reverses, our Lord shall return."
Since the Tendoshu's god was the Nine-Tailed Fox, "return" meant the resurrection of the Lord of Catastrophe.
"Kenmei-kun, you haven't shown this tattoo to anyone besides those two brats and me, right?"
Hearing Yaga's question, Kenmei nodded.
Yaga let out a sigh of relief.
"Killing Stone," ancient texts... all signs pointed to the resurrection of the Nine-Tailed Fox being a catastrophic disaster.
Given the personality of those "old fossils" in the Sorcerer Association, if they learned Kenmei might be connected to the "Flower of Blood and Samsara" mentioned in the prophecy—and thus the resurrection of the Fox—there would be only one outcome: secret execution.
Some information couldn't be searched without attracting attention. Yaga was safe because he accessed physical archives within Jujutsu High. If he had used the Association's intranet to query sensitive data, even he would be flagged for review.
Simultaneously, Yaga suspected Kenmei's sudden surge in strength was related to the Killing Stone. Otherwise, gaining the power to effortlessly exorcise a Grade 2 Cursed Spirit in such a short time was impossible.
He knew the Association had conducted dangerous experiments attempting to weaponize the Killing Stone, all of which failed.
With Kenmei as a successful example, he would be in grave danger of being captured and dissected for research.
The Sorcerer Association was definitely capable of that.
After all, the Association was already "very interested" in Yaga's own Cursed Corpse research.
Fortunately, Yaga's inspection revealed that the mark on Kenmei's body seemed to be in its early stages. This meant there was still a chance to fix it.
Although Yaga and Kenmei weren't master and student, for the sake of his friendship with Azazel and in return for saving Nanami, Yaga wouldn't sell him out. Instead, he would do everything in his power to exorcise the curse latching onto Kenmei and strangle the danger in its cradle!
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