"The more exalted the status, the more fitting the banquet must be... You... are pretty good..."
Ignoring Sukuna's words, Megumi Fushiguro realized his wrist had been caught instead, and quickly switched [Hachi-no-hire] to [Kusagusa-no-mono-no-hire]. Sukuna's hand was immediately shoved away by a strange force.
Megumi Fushiguro moved back a short distance and rubbed his arm hard.
To be honest, he did not know whether it was because he had gotten a little carried away after the Ten Shadows truly awakened, or because the immense Cursed Energy enhanced by [Iku-tama] gave him an unreal sense of confidence, but the Sukuna in front of him did not actually feel all that dangerous.
Even so, Megumi Fushiguro was used to planning around the worst possible outcome. He immediately pulled out his phone, sent "Sukuna" to the teachers' group chat, and shared his location as well... If there was a chance to gang up on him in the name of justice, then of course he would take it. There was no reason to worry about fairness when dealing with a Curse User...
Of course, Sukuna was not just standing there watching Megumi Fushiguro work his phone. It was simply that every slash he sent out was dispersed again by the [Hachi-no-hire] Megumi Fushiguro had switched back to...
So it was slashing. From the objects around him that had been cut to pieces, Megumi Fushiguro worked out the nature of the opponent's Technique. Simple, and therefore troublesome...
"0.7 seconds..."
Sukuna said it with a smile, naming a span of time that seemed to make no sense.
But Megumi Fushiguro's pupils shrank the instant he heard it... That was the shortest time he needed to switch Divine Treasures... And he had only switched twice in front of him.
"With this treasure... I summon..."
Megumi Fushiguro did not give in to the subconscious feeling that his opponent was not especially threatening. Sukuna's terrifying powers of observation alone were enough for him to summon Mahoraga without a moment's hesitation. In his eyes, summoning Mahoraga would be more useful than keeping [Yatsuka-no-tsurugi] in his own hand...
In truth, this was a gamble.
His defense against Sukuna's slashes depended on [Hachi-no-hire] powered by [Iku-tama]. But Mahoraga was special. To bring out its true power, it had to be summoned whole, which meant it would definitely take up one [Divine Treasure] slot.
That meant Megumi Fushiguro had to dismiss either [Hachi-no-hire] or [Iku-tama] before Sukuna fully understood his Technique, and use that opening to summon Mahoraga.
This time... his gamble paid off.
The moment Mahoraga appeared, it drew all of Sukuna's attention. Unlike Megumi Fushiguro, who in Sukuna's eyes had nothing but Cursed Energy and relied entirely on the effects of Cursed Tools, Mahoraga was an obvious threat.
If Megumi Fushiguro was a fully armed young lion, then Mahoraga was a rampaging war chariot...
The instant it was summoned, Mahoraga closed the distance and brought the Sword of Extermination down on Sukuna. Sukuna raised an arm reinforced with Cursed Energy to block it.
But with only the Cursed Energy of a single finger at his disposal, Sukuna could not fully withstand Mahoraga's blow, and his arm was severed clean off at the wrist.
The moment he saw that, Sukuna first used [Dismantle] to carve gashes across Mahoraga's body, then healed the wound at his wrist with an extremely refined Reverse Cursed Technique, intending to trap Mahoraga's weapon inside his body and counterattack.
But Megumi Fushiguro seized the moment from the side. First, he drove his strengthened hand into the back of Sukuna's head to keep him from using his Technique, then followed it up with a Cursed Energy-filled kick that sent Sukuna flying. Sukuna smashed through two buildings before finally coming to a stop...
"Cough... Heh... you really are troublesome..."
Instead of healing the several round holes above his neck, Sukuna healed his arm first, then reached into his own chest.
Inside his heart was a spherical object. Faintly visible on its surface were patterns like the face of a dried corpse.
This was a Cursed Object Sukuna had made by imitating Kenjaku's method, sealing fifteen fingers inside a Sokushinbutsu, then using that tube of blood as both the medium and one of the materials to draw the curse talisman.
By replacing his heart with this object and forcing it to fuse with him for a time, he could bring his body and the fingers into a certain level of compatibility. He just had not expected that after only two days of getting used to it, he would already have to force it open...
[It has adapted enough by now. Then I'll just make it part of the body's circulation directly!]
Sukuna crushed the sphere in his chest with one hand, and a terrifying amount of Cursed Energy burst out.
Then he swung hard at the two figures charging toward him. The air, compressed to an extreme degree by Cursed Energy, howled forward in a violent gale, with each finger dragging a blade-like slash behind it.
Even the ground that was only grazed by the edges was left with a series of shocking scars, kicking up countless grains of sand and broken stone...
Megumi Fushiguro sensed the incoming slashes through the changes in the environment around him and quickly ducked behind Mahoraga. As the web of slashes swept past, Mahoraga's body was carved open with even deeper and more brutal cuts than before.
But that result did not satisfy Sukuna. Judging from the effect of the first slash, that attack just now should have been enough to cut this Shikigami clean in two.
"Furube..."
Sukuna repeated the incantation Megumi Fushiguro had spoken to himself.
But Megumi Fushiguro gave him no time to think. He grabbed Sukuna's wrist again with a move like a short grappling hold, and with the boost in Cursed Energy provided by [Iku-tama], even Sukuna's movements stalled for an instant.
At the same time, Mahoraga seized Sukuna's body with one hand and swung the Sword of Extermination down with the other. In that split second, Sukuna twisted both arms to an angle that completely defied human anatomy, breaking free of Megumi Fushiguro's hold.
After avoiding the slash, he used [Cleave], which required direct contact but carried greater power, and cut off the arm Mahoraga had used to grab him.
"So in the end... as long as the output is high enough, that's all that matters, right?"
Sukuna looked at Megumi Fushiguro.
"Your development of your Innate Technique and your Cursed Energy are both pretty good... but in every other respect, you're still far behind..."
"Let me, and this little brat I'm using, show you... how a Technique is really supposed to be used!"
One of the purple markings beneath Sukuna's eyes, the ones representing miracles, suddenly disappeared. Then he raised both hands into the opening stance for [Dismantle].
Because "miracles" were a buff-type Technique to begin with, once he used one, he could release control of that Technique and switch straight into another.
A dense mass of slashes came crashing down with overwhelming force.
The good news was that this time, the slashes were visible.
The bad news was that each and every slash was wrapped in black lightning powerful enough to distort space...
In theory, Black Flash was the ultimate expression of synchronization between the body and Cursed Energy. But because it was entirely a matter of probability, it was normally impossible to develop or reproduce at will. Under the effects of "miracles," however, a "probability issue" was no issue at all.
What Sukuna had done was extend the state of Black Flash into the synchronization between "Technique activation" and "Cursed Energy."
...
This storm of slashes was vastly more destructive than any attack before it. Everything on the road vanished, and even the exposed ground was carved into pieces...
When the dust settled, Megumi Fushiguro was still standing there. Amid drifting steam and sizzling sounds, the eyes, muscles, and bones that had been cut open across his body were rapidly regenerating.
These slashes were not just overwhelmingly powerful. Each one also seemed to identify weak points on its own and strike at them automatically.
The moment Megumi Fushiguro realized Mahoraga probably could not endure it, he immediately withdrew it and switched to a different Divine Treasure.
Because the switching time was 0.7 seconds, he chose the healing of [Makaru-kaeshi-no-tama] rather than the dispersal effect of [Hachi-no-hire]...
"Oh? So what you're using isn't Cursed Tools, but a Technique? Then let me see what other interesting things you've got..."
After landing Black Flash, Sukuna was in superb condition and free to taunt as much as he liked, but Megumi Fushiguro had fallen into a dilemma...
The first thing that came to mind was to keep switching, repeatedly bringing Mahoraga out so it could adapt to Sukuna's Technique, then finish him off afterward. But the flaw in that plan was obvious. He had no idea whether Mahoraga would adapt first, or whether his own brain would give out first...
That pace of switching [Divine Treasures] had already started to make his head throb.
On top of that, countless possible [Divine Treasure] combinations flashed through his mind. But because he needed [Iku-tama] to provide Cursed Energy, every combination ended up falling into one of two outcomes. Either it could disperse the attacks but had no means of killing Sukuna, or it could kill Sukuna, but with a high chance that Megumi Fushiguro would die first...
"What do I do..."
Less than five minutes had passed since the fight began...
Even if Gojo-sensei, the fastest one in terms of mobility, saw the message immediately, in terrain like this it would still take him at least ten minutes to get here...
Maybe he could use [Hachi-no-hire] to disperse the slashes, pull back, and wait for reinforcements?
As Megumi Fushiguro searched for an answer, something Akira Zenin had once said suddenly flashed through his mind.
[Megumi, clear your head. What we use is the [Ten Shadows Technique], not the [Ten Shadows Shikigami]...]
"Right... If I want to strengthen the linkage, then why not fight with the [Ten Shadows] themselves?"
Megumi Fushiguro immediately switched [Makaru-kaeshi-no-tama] to [Chikaeshi-no-tama] and [Taru-tama].
At once, countless half-summoned Rabbits Escape burst out of his shadow, continuously fusing together into a gigantic semi-humanoid rabbit nearly thirty meters tall, wrapping Megumi Fushiguro inside it.
With [Taru-tama] condensing the shadows into form and strengthening shadow manipulation, and [Chikaeshi-no-tama] granting a soul to the shadows, the entire "rabbit giant" gleamed like black jade. Its crimson eyes, if one ignored the overall proportions, radiated an astonishing pressure of their own.
Megumi Fushiguro felt as though his soul had spread throughout the whole shadow giant. Controlling it felt utterly natural, as effortless as moving his own arms and fingers...
Sukuna laughed as he looked up at the colossal thing before him, nearly ten stories tall. He could not even tell which part of the shadow giant Megumi Fushiguro was hiding in. It was as if the sorcerer had turned his own body into this thing.
"Now that's more like it! It's rare for someone to amuse me this much. What's your name?"
From the giant's broadened field of vision and elevated vantage point, Megumi Fushiguro saw the area Sukuna had just flattened.
Even though his "flood" had driven some people away at the start, not everyone had managed to escape in time. In the end, there simply had not been enough time...
The shadow giant clenched its fist, gathering a surge of Cursed Energy so immense it seemed to pierce the clouds, then smashed it down at Sukuna with all its might.
"You only need to remember one thing. I'm the one who's going to pound you flat!"