As the old saying goes: a hundred days to master the saber, a thousand days for the spear, and ten thousand days for the sword.
Essentially, this means that even a total novice can learn to hack someone apart with a saber in a few months, whereas it takes years to learn how to properly skewer someone with a spear, and a lifetime to truly master the straight sword.
This is a result of the inherent design of the weapons themselves. Compare a saber and a sword: while both are bladed weapons, a saber is typically thicker and single-edged. Its design favors swinging and cleaving, where power takes center stage and technique plays a supporting role. It's all about crushing force and overwhelming momentum.
A sword, however, is double-edged with a sharp point. Its thinner blade means the user can't simply trade blows like a saber-wielder; instead, the style focuses on parries, thrusts, and precise slices. Generally speaking, in a duel between humans, a swordsman must rely on inflicting "death by a thousand cuts" or striking a vital organ to end the fight.
If two people with equal strength and talent—one with a saber and one with a sword—were to duel after only a year or two of training, the swordsman would have to worry about hitting vitals while also praying their weapon doesn't snap. The saber-wielder doesn't have to think nearly as much. They just swing with everything they've got. Whether they hit the weapon or the man makes no difference; either the opponent's blade breaks, or the opponent themselves is cleaved in half.
Of course, this applies to human-on-human combat. When it comes to Sorcerers and Curses, the rules change—but we'll get to that later.
In any case, ignoring the technical distinctions between a Japanese katana and a Chinese dao, Yuta Okkotsu—despite being a relative newcomer to the craft—was already a formidable close-quarters combatant.
Back on the battlefield, Yuta Okkotsu and Mahito exchanged a few brief words before the violence resumed. Despite Mahito being a "newborn," his malignant cursed energy and depraved personality made one thing clear: if he were allowed to escape, the casualty count would only continue to rise.
He's a Special Grade. I wonder if I can handle him alone. Yuta was currently in a "Qiao Feng" state—much like the legendary hero from Wuxia novels, he was absurdly powerful but completely oblivious to it, prone to overestimating his enemies.
Since he viewed himself as the "weaker" party, he naturally sought to seize the initiative.
In a flash, Yuta's right hand gripped his hilt while his left hand tightened into a fist. A surge of cursed energy erupted as he lunged forward.
"Nani?" Mahito was still busy acting manic on a tree branch when the trunk beneath him suddenly snapped. The top half of the tree, with Mahito still perched on it, went flying directly toward Yuta. Yuta's blade arrived at the curse's throat at the exact same moment.
There were no fancy forms here—just a strike backed by the speed of a gale and the weight of ten thousand pounds. It was a strike intended to decapitate.
The blade flashed through the air, and the two figures stood back-to-back.
Yuta had clearly sliced through the enemy's neck, yet his expression shifted. That didn't feel right. It was like I cut through air. No resistance at all.
He spun around instantly, his cursed energy flaring as he unleashed a reverse horizontal slash aimed at Mahito's waist.
This time, he saw exactly what Mahito had done. As the blade passed through him, Mahito's body split in two, moving like a mecha equipped with a DRAGOON system. His flesh acted like molding clay; as soon as the edge passed, the halves melded back together.
"You're actually pretty strong," Mahito said, that innocent smile still plastered on his face. His white teeth practically gleamed in the light. He spread his arms, and a viscous, disgusting sludge began to ooze from his palms. Within seconds, two more of those warped creatures—like the ones Yuta had just killed—took shape.
Mahito took a few steps back as his "brothers" stood in front of him. They were twisted, nightmarish things, but they didn't hesitate to shield him. This was psychological warfare.
"Now that you know they used to be human... do you still have the heart to kill them?"
Mahito maintained a facade of casual indifference, as if his opponent were a minor nuisance. In reality, Yuta's previous strikes—delivered under the assumption that Mahito was stronger—carried enough cursed energy to make the curse's skin crawl. If Yuta switched to pure energy blasts and tripled the output, Mahito realized he might actually be obliterated in a single hit.
By the way, how did he snap that tree earlier? Mahito wondered. Well, it doesn't matter. I'll just finish him with my technique before he can land a real hit.
Mahito's Innate Technique is well-known: Idle Transfiguration. By touching an enemy with his palm, he can freely alter the shape of their soul. Based on his philosophy, the soul precedes the body; thus, changing the soul's shape forces the flesh to follow. In short: if he touches you, it's game over. Only those with exceptionally powerful souls or unique physical gifts can resist.
As for what Yuta did earlier? Here is the "behind-the-scenes" explanation. After his previous battle where he saved Tanaka-kun and began to truly accept Rika, Yuta had finally grasped the essence of his own technique: Mimicry.
While his martial arts talent was average, his talent for cursed energy manipulation was nothing short of genius. When he copied Hasegumo's technique, he managed to learn that "Remote Cursed Energy Loop" almost instantly.
Unlike Hasegumo, whose control was refined and meticulous, Yuta possessed a bottomless pool of cursed energy—more than even the current Satoru Gojo. He didn't need to worry about efficiency. He simply used raw power to create "miracles." The intense pulling force generated by his over-saturated energy loop had simply snapped the tree and dragged Mahito toward him.
"Cheap tricks won't work."
Back in the fray, Yuta didn't hesitate for a second. A single horizontal sweep sent the two human-soul-turned-monsters to meet their maker. He followed up by raising his blade to parry a surprise punch from Mahito's elongated arm.
"What are you, Luffy?" Yuta muttered.
Mahito wasn't Luffy, but he was a master of the "shonen protagonist" comeback. He was adept at breaking his limits and learning new skills mid-combat.
However, he was still a newborn. His speed and power were entirely outclassed, and Yuta's sheer volume of cursed energy left him trembling with a primal sort of fear.
Faced with such an enemy, Mahito's first instinct was to bolt. But thanks to the Curtain, running wasn't an option.
Logically, to survive, he would have to kill Yuta, hunt down the other sorcerers in the barrier, and kill them too. Along the way, he'd probably have to break through several more times, learn a Maximum Technique, and maybe a Domain Expansion. Then he'd have to wait for the Curtain to drop and kill Satoru Gojo when he arrived. Only then would he be safe.
Could he do it? Of course not. If he could, the title of this story would have to change to The Legend of Mahito.
In truth, there were two people inside this Curtain capable of killing him. They weren't the two Kenjaku had named, however. Yuta Okkotsu certainly had the power to do it, but Aoi Todo was a different story. Due to the nature of their compatibility, Todo could hold his own against Mahito, but actually killing him was another matter.
Todo's technique, Boogie Woogie, allows him to swap the positions of two things with cursed energy by clapping his hands. It's a god-tier support ability, but it lacks offensive power. Todo usually exorcises curses with his bare fists—which isn't ideal against a soul-manipulator.
The second person capable of ending Mahito was the man Kenjaku couldn't track: Hasegumo, who was currently on a lake-side date inside the barrier.
Back to the fight. Mahito knew he couldn't run, so he had to fight.
Yuta wasn't in a hurry. They traded blows—blade against fist—exchanging over a dozen moves in seconds. Yuta couldn't land a "killing" blow yet, but Mahito's speed and strength were so inferior that he couldn't touch Yuta either. Yuta was content to stall; his cursed energy was infinite, and eventually, his teammates would be drawn to the commotion. Then, it would be a "righteous" gang-beating. He just needed someone to distract the curse while he charged up a finishing move.
As everyone knows, a "strong" character playing with their food or fighting with a "stall" mindset is the classic starting point for a "weak" character's comeback.
"I think I've figured out your technique," Yuta said, blocking a punch and backflipping away from a spike Mahito had sprouted from his foot. "Your intent is too obvious. You have the ability to defend, yet you're choosing to tank hits just so you can touch me."
"You're pinning all your hopes on that one touch, aren't you?"
"Is it some kind of one-hit kill?"
As Yuta applied psychological pressure, he unleashed a reverse slash. Like an axe splitting bamboo, he cleaved through Mahito's right arm.
But in that instant, the severed arm—despite its momentum supposedly being spent—suddenly defied the laws of physics. It extended further, surging toward Yuta's face.
Crap, he can extend the severed parts too!
It wasn't that Yuta hadn't anticipated an extension, but based on their prior exchanges, he assumed Mahito could only extend one body part at a time. Yuta figured that whether the left or right half of the severed arm lunged at him, he could just slice it again.
"Hehe~" Mahito's beastly grin widened. Yuta's sword was already near his shoulder; due to the reach of the weapon, it was physically impossible for Yuta to bring the blade back in time to parry. Whether he tried to block with his hand or retreat, he would never be faster than this pre-planned strike. "Now that you know, so what? Just die already!"
In that moment, Mahito believed he had won. And honestly, without outside interference, Yuta might have actually died.
Mahito had intentionally limited himself to one transformation at a time during the fight, setting a trap to make Yuta adapt to a false rhythm. He waited for the perfect moment to break that rhythm with a killing blow.
It was a brilliant plan. But the "interference" happened immediately.
Yuta had fully accepted Rika's power; using her for support no longer carried any mental burden. In his heart, he gave a silent command: Rika!
The power that reverses fates appeared instantly. Accompanied by the sound of tearing flesh, the Queen of Curses made her MVP entrance. A massive, razor-sharp claw manifested, slicing the unsuspecting Mahito into five vertical strips from head to toe.
Yuta Okkotsu stepped out from behind Rika, his blade reflecting a cold, murderous light.
He expected this to be the end, but the five segments of Mahito's body began to writhe and twist. They transformed into five smaller, miniature versions of Mahito.
"DON'T... HURT... YUTA!" A piercing shriek of soundwaves erupted from Rika as she swung another massive palm.
These mini-Mahitos were significantly faster than the original. They backflipped in unison, narrowly evading the strike.
"Soul Multiplicity: Polymorphic Isomer!"
Mahito was fuming. His perfect plan had failed, and his childlike innocence had curdled into rage.
Five Mahitos, ten hands. Cursed energy surged as they compressed the souls they had collected into dense spheres, firing them at Yuta like a Gatling gun. Every "bullet" carried the agonizing weight of a human soul.
"You scumbag... playing with women's emotions!" Mahito shrieked.