Inside Malevolent Shrine, Satoru was facing an unprecedented bitter fight.
The characteristic of an open Domain meant that Sukuna's slashes could strike from any angle, ceaselessly.
Satoru's Infinity was temporarily neutralized by the Domain's inherent sure-hit effect.
A sharp slash grazed his cheek, drawing a string of blood beads.
His body instinctively activated Reverse Cursed Technique for repair, and new flesh rapidly healed the wound.
However, facing the relentless torrent of slashes, akin to a violent storm, the speed of repair gradually failed to keep up with the frequency of injury.
New wounds kept accumulating. Satoru's uniform was shredded into tatters, leaving him with many injuries that, while not fatal, looked quite disheveled, his clothes soaked in blood.
Sukuna gave him no chance to catch his breath. Relying on his absolute advantage within his domain, he closed the distance, engaging Satoru in fierce hand-to-hand combat.
As fists and feet clashed, the surging Cursed Energy caused the Domain's ground to continuously crack.
Sukuna's offensive was fierce, intending to further expand his gains in close combat.
However, the power of the Six Eyes extended far beyond merely discerning energy flow.
Under the dual pressure of high-speed offense/defense and enduring slashes, Satoru's brain was processing massive amounts of information with inhuman efficiency.
He keenly perceived that the source of this Domain's power, the origin point and core rule flow of those slashes, was not entirely concentrated on Sukuna's main body. Instead, it pointed more toward the Shrine condensed from bones and Cursed Energy at the far end of the Domain, which exuded an ominous aura.
That was the true Domain core and power nexus of the Malevolent Shrine.
'I see... the core is that thing?' Satoru understood in his heart.
To break the stalemate, he needed to deal with the endless slashes right now and buy himself time to fully recover and counterattack.
His thoughts raced, and he made a decision.
After taking another heavy punch from Sukuna head-on, Satoru used the force to retreat half a step, rapidly forming a hand seal in front of him with both hands.
A wave of Cursed Energy fluctuation, distinctly different from Infinity, suddenly spread out with his body as the center. This layer of Cursed Energy did not form a spherical barrier but rather resembled a thin, twilight-colored halo constantly flowing close to his skin.
This was the technique inherited from the New Shadow Style to counter Domains—Simple Domain.
This technique is hailed as the 'Domain of the Weak.' Its principle is not to clash head-on with a stronger Domain, but to construct a precise personal barrier to neutralize the sure-hit effect accompanying the opponent's Domain.
Unlike the full Domain Extension, which requires deploying a barrier and has restricted flexibility, Simple Domain focuses more on close-range defense, specifically used to carve out space for survival within a powerful Domain.
The effect was immediate.
The invisible slashes that had been attacking from all directions had their sure-hit rule effectively interfered with and weakened the moment they touched this thin, twilight-colored halo.
Although it failed to completely eliminate the power of all the slashes, most fatal attacks were deflected or neutralized, leaving only some residual impact force acting upon Satoru.
Satoru seized this precious moment of reprieve.
While the Simple Domain successfully contained the Domain slashes, another, more intricate operation within his body—the Reverse Cursed Technique—was elevated to its peak.
The Positive Energy imbued with vigorous life flowed through his entire body with unprecedented efficiency. Previous accumulated wounds healed at a speed visible to the naked eye. Deep, bone-visible marks rapidly closed, scabbed over, peeled away, revealing new skin beneath.
Maintaining the Simple Domain and running Reverse Cursed Technique at high efficiency simultaneously—this kind of dual-tasking, both requiring extreme Cursed Energy control, would be an impossible fantasy for ordinary Jujutsu Sorcerers.
However, Satoru, relying on the supreme insight and control precision granted by his Six Eyes, forced this impossibility into reality.
The Six Eyes allowed him to clearly see every bit of flow as he constructed the Simple Domain with his Cursed Energy, and also precisely guide the Positive Energy of the Reverse Cursed Technique to the exact injury sites needing treatment. The two operated in parallel, not interfering with each other at all.
In an instant, the majority of Satoru's injuries had healed.
He slowly raised his head, his vision, previously blurred by blood, became sharp and clear again. Through the halo of the Simple Domain, he locked onto Sukuna, who showed a hint of surprise, and the towering, unmoving Shrine behind him.
Sukuna, controlling Utaha's face, narrowed his four inhuman vertical pupils slightly, showing for the first time a hint of undisguised surprise, but more prominently, a deep seriousness.
Even though he temporarily gained the upper hand relying on his millennia of combat experience and the nature of his open Domain, the resilience and adaptability of the Six Eyes holder still exceeded his worst estimations.
'This guy's Cursed Technique... is indeed more advantageous than mine.' Sukuna coldly admitted internally.
Unlimited Void's corrosive attack targeting the consciousness and soul was a true ultimate weapon. One successful hit would be enough to secure victory.
His Malevolent Shrine, while ferociously aggressive, leaned more toward physical destruction and was slightly inferior in terms of trickiness.
What made Sukuna even more vigilant was the clear realization that his Domain was not invincible.
The advantage of an open Domain being able to destroy the shell of a closed Domain from the outside now ironically became a double-edged sword.
The core of Malevolent Shrine lay in its fixed Shrine. The Domain range was vast, but the core could not move.
And Satoru's Unlimited Void was a standard closed barrier Domain, whose range and form could be freely adjusted by the caster.
An extremely dangerous tactic instantly formed in Sukuna's mind, stemming from the concept of internal and external reversal and 'trapping the enemy within' associated with the Prison Realm in the original storyline.
'What if that Six Eyes brat realized he didn't need to clash head-on with my Domain, but instead instantly expanded his own Domain range to envelop my entire Malevolent Shrine, and then contracted the Domain to its limit...'
Thinking of this, even Sukuna felt a chill.
Once completely enveloped and compressed by Unlimited Void from the outside, his Domain would be forcibly pulled into the opponent's rule space for a direct Barrier Technique confrontation.
Losing the advantage of external attack, and purely competing on the precision and strength of the Domains without any room for trickery, facing Satoru—who was in near perfect condition and possessed the ultimate control granted by the Six Eyes—while he himself only had sixteen fingers' worth of Cursed Energy and his soul had not yet fully merged with the vessel...
The outcome was almost certain to be his defeat.
In that compressed Domain space, he would be forced into a genuine three-minute Domain standoff against Satoru.