October 31, 2018, Shibuya.
The fifth basement level of the subway station.
Dim, oppressive, and deathly still.
The pungent scent of blood and a thick residue of cursed energy intertwined like a dense fog, shrouding this lightless underground space.
"Ha... hahahaha!"
A bone-chilling burst of laughter shattered the silence.
Kenjaku, the thousand-year-old monster wearing Suguru Geto's gentle face, stood triumphantly in the center of the ruins.
In his hands, he held a cube that emitted an eerie glow and throbbed like a mass of living flesh—
The Special Grade Cursed Object, Prison Realm!
And in the center of the Prison Realm's dense cluster of blood-red eyeballs...
...was the white-haired man known as the 'Strongest of the Modern Era', who always stood tall as if he could never fall from his pedestal.
Satoru Gojo.
He was currently being tightly ensnared by countless nauseating, fleshy tentacles, with half of his body already forcibly dragged into that pitch-black sealed space.
His Six Eyes were still brilliant.
But the 'one-minute opening' caused by the extreme shock to his soul had already stripped him of any chance to break free from this absolute seal.
"It's over, Satoru Gojo."
Kenjaku stroked the Prison Realm, his eyes glittering with uncontrollable mania and greed.
"As long as you are sealed here, no one in this world will be able to stop my plan!"
"To hell with Jujutsu High and the higher-ups; they will all become fuel for the new era!"
He was far too excited.
He had planned for this day for an entire millennium!
Surviving since the Heian period, switching through countless bodies, and even going so far as to take over the body of this era's only Special Grade Cursed Spirit Manipulation user.
Everything had been for today!
Once Satoru Gojo disappeared...
...the mad script of the 'Culling Game' would finally begin!
However, on this night completely shrouded in darkness and despair.
The battlefield on the surface.
"Damn it... there's no end to them!"
Yuji Itadori was half-kneeling in the ruins. His hands were stained with dark red blood, and his ragged breathing made his chest burn with a searing pain.
Around him, countless grotesque transfigured humans, reeking of a nauseating stench, were surging forward in wave after wave.
Not far away, Kento Nanami's once-pristine suit was in tatters, and the short blade in his hand was beginning to dull.
Nobara Kugisaki leaned on her hammer, her face pale as her cursed energy neared exhaustion.
Despair.
This emotion was spreading silently through this dead zone sealed by the curtain.
"Are we going to die here?"
Yuji raised his head to look at the sky, which was so dark it looked like it was dripping blood. Suddenly, a blurred yet incredibly familiar red silhouette flashed through his mind.
Who was that?
Why... even though I can't remember his face, do I feel like we could never lose as long as he's here?
This strange sense of dissonance didn't just exist in Yuji's mind.
Kento Nanami, Maki Zenin, Mei Mei... every Jujutsu High sorcerer fighting in Shibuya felt as though their hearts were separated by a thick pane of frosted glass they couldn't break through.
They remembered that the jujutsu world once had a legend.
They remembered that this legend had cut through countless hopeless situations.
But what was his name? What did he look like?
And why were there no records of him in the jujutsu world's official archives for the past ten years?
It was as if some higher-dimensional power had forcibly erased that person's name.
At the moment when absolute despair and confusion intertwined.
Above the Shibuya subway station.
In the middle of the ruins where countless cursed spirits rampaged, turning the area into a slaughterhouse.
*Clang!*
A sword's hum, so sharp it seemed to pierce the soul, suddenly erupted from deep beneath the heavy rubble and dust.
It was a blade that had been buried by time and earth for half a year.
The blade that had once shone brilliantly at the Tokyo school, decapitated countless Special Grades, and been a thorn in the side of the higher-ups...
The Special Grade Cursed Tool, Shiranui.
At this moment.
This katana, which should have been silent since its master's disappearance, vibrated violently as if responding to a blood-linked summon.
Its blade began to tremble wildly, and a visible layer of dark red light began to swirl and gather—like a volcano that had been dormant for a millennium about to erupt!
It flowed and converged rapidly across the pitch-black steel!
"What is that sound?!"
Nearby, several low-level curses feasting on human corpses were startled by the sudden sword hum.
They that ugly faces as they instinctively tried to flee the area.
However, it was far too late.
*Boom!*
With a deafening explosion, the rubble burying Shiranui burst apart!
A terrifying heatwave rippled out in dark red waves like a tsunami, sweeping away from the sword in every direction!
This brilliant pillar of red light, bright enough to pierce the earth and light up the night sky for kilometers like it was broad daylight...
It erupted toward the heavens without warning!
The moment that light appeared.
The flow of cursed energy in all of Shibuya, and even all of Tokyo, came to a dead standstill!
In a tenth of a second, the temperature in the air spiked to an appalling degree!
*Screech!*
The low-level curses that couldn't escape didn't even have time to scream.
Their bodies, composed of pure negative emotions, were like butter thrown into a forge the moment they touched the heatwave.
Without even a chance to struggle, they were incinerated into black ash amidst a cacophony of hissing sounds!
Completely obliterated.
Not a single cursed spirit could leave behind even a trace of residue before this ultimate flame of pure yang!
*Rumble—!*
A grand resonance that transcended time, space, causality, and even life and death.
It exploded like a thousand peals of thunder in the depths of every Jujutsu High sorcerer's soul!
The frosted glass that had clouded their memories...
...shattered completely!
"I remember now..."
Kento Nanami's eyes, usually as cold as ice, were trembling violently.
A single crystalline tear rolled down his dust-covered face.
It wasn't sadness, but the sheer shock of finally seeing the sun after wandering through endless darkness for ten years.
He remembered that summer in 2006.
He remembered the red silhouette who, in the Land Deity's domain, had severed all tragedy with a single stroke, saving both Haibara and himself... a mentor and a friend.
"Yoru..."
Yuji Itadori suddenly stood up, his voice raspy as he shouted the name.
"It's Instructor Yoru!"
In that moment, all the dissonance vanished.
Under the power of the temporal merger, all memories snapped into place like a perfect puzzle!
And amidst the flying dust and sparks.
A slender, pale hand, containing strength that defied description.
It firmly gripped the still-burning hilt of Shiranui.
"Huuu—"
A rhythmic sound of breathing slowly echoed in the large empty space cleared out within the ruins.
Yoru slowly opened his eyes.
In that instant, two bursts of golden light, as blinding as the sun, erupted from his dark red pupils!
[SYSTEM: Host has completed the 'Past Timeline' causal loop. Memories from both time-spaces have successfully merged.]
[Synchronization Rate breaking through...]
[Congratulations: Yoriichi Tsugikuni Synchronization Rate has reached 55%!]
And on the left side of his forehead.
...the dark red mark, flickering like dancing flames, manifested and spread with unprecedented ferocity!
He was back.
Carrying all the combat experience accumulated over those ten years in the past, and filled with a heart full of rage toward this wretched world.
The King had returned!
The moment the Slayer Mark activated, Yoru's vision underwent a world-shaking transformation.
Transparent World.
It was no longer the half-baked state that required forced activation and came with massive exhaustion.
Now, having endured the life-and-death tempering of the past and the baptism of crossing time...
...his Transparent World had reached a new realm where it could be used at will with perfect coverage!
With a single glance.
The tactical situation of the entire Shibuya battlefield appeared in his mind like a perfectly dissected 3D blueprint.
He saw Yuji Itadori struggling.
He saw the heavily injured Nanami and Nobara, and the Special Grade cursed spirits slaughtering people in the corners.
And of course, he also saw...
...the core of the vortex buried deep within the fifth basement level of the subway station directly beneath him!
There, he felt the presence most familiar and dear to him—
Satoru Gojo.
As well as that disgusting entity occupying his best friend's body, reeking of decay!