That Special Grade Cursed Spirit seemed to have fully entered the fourth-floor workshop, its massive meat mountain occupying nearly half the space.
Its tens of thousands of eyes seemed to lock onto Kasumi and Mai, who were collapsed by the textile machine like lambs to the slaughter, all at the same time.
Malice transformed into physical pressure, making the air thick and breathing incredibly difficult.
"Heh... heh..."
The largest mouth on the meat mountain opened, making a sound like a bellows being pulled, as thick saliva dripped down like a waterfall.
Following that, the meat mountain writhed violently, and more tentacles composed of arms and meat chunks, like giant octopus arms covered in suckers, lunged toward the two girls who had lost most of their ability to resist, accompanied by the whistle of tearing air.
...
On the floor below, Sukuna, who had just finished clearing out all the small-fry Cursed Spirits as if taking a stroll, was standing before a dark stairwell leading to the fourth floor.
He naturally sensed the sudden eruption of the massive Cursed Energy belonging to a Special Grade Cursed Spirit directly above him, as well as the auras of the two Jujutsu Sorcerers who were instantly enveloped in despair.
"Oh?"
An exaggerated smile—a mix of surprise, playfulness, and extreme pleasure—appeared on the face Sukuna was controlling, and his four crimson pupils flickered with the light of discovering an unexpected surprise.
"It seems two overconfident little mice have arrived upstairs? And they happened to wake up the watchdog while they were at it? They're making quite a racket."
He carefully sensed the composition of the Special Grade Cursed Spirit's Cursed Energy, his smile deepening.
"And this scent... that's right, my finger is indeed inside that lump of rotten meat. It absorbed the finger's power and underwent this deformed evolution? Haha, interesting."
Not only had he found the finger, but he also got a watchdog that could barely serve as a warm-up.
"Perfect, it saves me the trouble of searching floor by floor."
Sukuna licked his lips, revealing sharp canines, an expression that looked exceptionally eerie on Utaha's face.
"Wiping them all out in one go will save time and effort."
He was no longer satisfied with walking slowly. With a thought, he controlled Utaha's body, transforming into a black afterimage nearly impossible to track with the naked eye. Like a phantom that had broken free from the shackles of space, he shot up the steep stairs in a nearly vertical fashion toward the desperate battlefield on the fourth floor.
...
At the very moment those deathly tentacles were about to pierce through Kasumi and Mai—
Swish!
A sharp sound of breaking air tore through the heavy atmosphere.
A dark shadow shot out from the shadows of the stairway at a speed exceeding the limits of visual perception, appearing abruptly between the two girls and that Special Grade Cursed Spirit as if teleporting.
It was Sukuna.
Controlling Utaha's body, he landed steadily on the ground covered in rubble and dust. Utaha's long black hair moved without wind, and there was no expression on her face.
Those four crimson pupils, opened through cracks, gazed coldly at the massive, nauseating mountain of flesh that was the Cursed Spirit ahead.
Time seemed to freeze at this moment.
The Special Grade Cursed Spirit's thousands of malicious eyes instantly shifted from its dying prey to this uninvited guest. Its massive mountain-of-flesh body seemed to pause slightly, as warnings born of instinct shrieked frantically.
Danger! Extreme danger!
Within this seemingly insignificant human was a power that made its very soul tremble.
Those dark red tentacles that were originally stabbing toward Kasumi and Mai also came to a grinding halt just centimeters from their bodies, as if hitting an invisible wall, trembling slightly, unable to advance or retreat.
The heavy breathing of survivors was exceptionally clear in the deathly silent workshop.
Kasumi and Mai collapsed beside the cold machinery, eyes wide, looking at this sudden "reinforcement" in disbelief.
Who was it?
Reinforcements from Jujutsu High?
Impossible! This speed, this way of silently penetrating the Curtain...
Moreover, the faint yet far deeper and more terrifying pressure emanating from that girl than from any Cursed Spirit...
Sukuna paid no mind to the shock and suspicion of the two Jujutsu Sorcerers behind him. All of his attention was focused on the Special Grade Cursed Spirit before him. No, more accurately, it was focused on that finger of his, embedded in the core of the Cursed Spirit's flesh mountain, faintly emitting a familiar resonance.
"Heh..."
Sukuna controlled Utaha's vocal cords to let out a low, amused chuckle that sounded particularly eerie in the silence.
"I looked for so long, only to find it hidden inside such an ugly thing. Truly... what a waste."
Generally speaking, a fully developed Special Grade Cursed Spirit possesses a humanoid form and gains near-human intelligence. Aside from some personality flaws, it can already be considered an intelligent being.
But this Cursed Spirit was different. It possessed the combat power of a Special Grade Cursed Spirit, but its form and intelligence were like those of a beast, driven only by instinct.
"Is it because it didn't evolve naturally after swallowing the finger, or because it hasn't been long enough?"
Sukuna seemed to completely ignore the threat of the Special Grade Cursed Spirit, which would have forced even a Grade 1 Jujutsu Sorcerer to be on high alert.
Just then, the Special Grade Cursed Spirit seemed enraged by Sukuna's blatant contempt. Its massive flesh mountain shook violently, and countless giant mouths let out a deafening roar mixed with innumerable wails.
Following that, not just the stalled tentacles, but even more, thicker attacking organs composed of rotting arms and flesh chunks shot out from all directions of the flesh mountain like dancing giant pythons, bombarding Sukuna from all sides.
Each strike contained terrifying power capable of tearing steel and corroding Cursed Energy.
Facing this violent attack capable of leveling the entire workshop, Sukuna remained standing where he was, motionless.
However, in the next instant, a jaw-dropping scene occurred.
At the moment the attacks were about to hit....
Buzz!
A strange humming sound, as if space itself were trembling, rang out.
Within Sukuna's four crimson pupils, a sinister light lit up simultaneously.
In the center of each pupil, a brilliant white point of light erupted like a miniature star exploding, and around this white point, the crimson iris was like a boiling pool of blood, where countless finer, more eerie dark-red light patterns swirled and intertwined frantically, forming innumerable, ever-changing, bizarre runes.
That wasn't a simple visual enhancement, but the activation of a power on a more fundamental, rule-based level—Kamiutsushi.