The curse stood up. It was easily nine feet tall, shaped like a hunched, overgrown gorilla but covered in hardened, bone-like armor plates.
Six glowing eyes blinked erratically on its face. The cursed energy rolling off it was so thick it made the air physically vibrate.
Megumi took a quick step back, his hands instantly forming a new sign. "Kugisaki, get back! The intel was wrong. This isn't a Grade 3. It's a high Grade 2, borderline Grade 1!"
"You think I'm running?!" Nobara yelled. She pulled a hammer and three nails from her skirt. She swung hard, launching the nails like bullets. They sparked with bright blue cursed energy, driving straight toward the curse's chest.
The curse didn't even flinch. The nails hit its bone-plated chest and bounced off with a dull clink.
It roared, a sound like grinding metal, and swiped its massive arm. Nobara barely brought her hammer up in time to block. The impact threw her backward like a ragdoll. She hit a concrete pillar with a sickening thud and slumped to the floor, gasping for air as her hammer clattered away.
"Kugisaki!" Megumi yelled.
The curse didn't stop. It pivoted on massive legs, launching its bulk directly at Megumi. Megumi braced himself, his hands locked in a sign, but he was entirely out of position. He wasn't going to be fast enough to summon anything that could take that hit.
Ren let out a slow breath
CRACK.
The floor tiles spiderwebbed under Ren's boots.
Megumi blinked. One second, the curse was inches away from tearing his head off. The next second, Ren was standing directly in front of him.
Ren raised his left hand and caught the curse's bone-plated fist.
The impact sent a shockwave of dust rolling through the lobby. Megumi's eyes went wide. The curse pushed, roaring in anger, but Ren's arm didn't budge a single millimeter.
The sheer kinetic force of the punch didn't just vanish. Ren's boots dug hard into the cracked linoleum, the rubber soles smoking faintly against the friction as the monster's momentum pushed him backward.
Jagged trenches tore through the lobby floor. He dropped his hips, bracing his back leg and shifting his weight to bleed off the momentum.
He slid for another three feet before finally coming to a complete, grinding halt right in front of Megumi.
Megumi stared at Ren's back, his mind completely stalling. He had watched this guy trip over a wooden practice sword just yesterday.
He had spent hours actively exploiting Ren's terrible footwork and nonexistent guard.
But right now, Ren's stance was flawless. His feet were planted precisely shoulder-width apart. His knees were bent at the exact angle needed to absorb the crushing impact without shattering his own wrists.
Gojo had claimed the guy absorbed Maki's raw physical strength, and Megumi had reluctantly accepted the bizarre excuse. But raw strength didn't teach you how to properly ground yourself.
Where the hell did this guy learn to brace for a lethal strike?
The cursed spirit shrieked, leaning its massive bulk forward to crush him.
Ren let out a short breath. He twisted his hips, wrapping his fingers tighter around the curse's bone-plated wrist, and violently shoved the arm upward and to the side.
The sudden, perfectly redirected force threw the nine-foot monster completely off balance, sending it stumbling backward to crash into a rusted reception desk.
"Son of a bitch!"
A loud, furious groan echoed from the other side of the lobby. Nobara pushed herself off the cracked concrete, spitting a mouthful of dust onto the floor.
She grabbed her hammer from the debris, her face twisted in pure, unadulterated rage as she glared at the stumbling curse.
"My new skirt," she hissed, aggressively brushing concrete dust off the dark fabric. She pulled three more nails from her pouch, the metal sparking with volatile blue energy. "I'm going to turn you into a literal pin cushion."
Megumi shook off his shock, stepping up beside Ren. His hands locked back into a hand sign, his shadow expanding rapidly across the ruined floor. He shot Ren a hard, calculating look from the corner of his eye.
"Your balance improved," Megumi noted flatly, his voice cutting through the dust.
Ren didn't take his eyes off the curse pulling itself out of the smashed reception desk. He kept his hands raised, playing off the perfectly executed block with a heavy exhale.
"I guess getting thrown into the dirt by you for four hours actually taught me something."
"Right," Megumi muttered. He didn't believe it for a second.
The curse ripped itself from the ruined desk, chunks of rusted metal and splintered wood falling from its bone-plated shoulders. It let out a screech that sounded like grinding gears, locking all six glowing eyes directly on Ren.
It planted its massive arms on the floor, preparing to launch its bulk forward like a silverback gorilla.
"Move!" Megumi barked from behind him.
Ren didn't hesitate. He dropped his hips, sliding his left foot out to lower his profile.
A massive bird wreathed in crackling orange electricity swooped directly over Ren's head. Nue crashed into the curse's face, its talons sinking into the bone plating.
Electricity discharged in a blinding flash, illuminating the dark lobby. The curse flailed wildly, its arms swinging blindly as it tried to tear the shikigami off its face.
"Break its guard!" Nobara yelled over the sparking electricity. She was already winding up her arm, three nails held securely between her fingers.
Ren pushed off the cracked floorboards. He closed the gap in a single, explosive stride, stepping cleanly inside the creature's massive wingspan.
As the curse brought a heavy fist down blindly toward him, Ren stepped slightly to the right, letting the strike slam harmlessly into the concrete floor.
He planted his back foot, twisted his hips, and drove a devastating upward palm strike squarely into the creature's exposed elbow joint.
The thick bone plating cracked. A sickening crunch echoed through the lobby as the joint inverted under the sheer force. The curse shrieked, its heavy arm dropping uselessly to its side.
A jagged chunk of its white armor chipped off from the impact, clattering across the floor toward the entrance.
Nobara didn't miss a beat. She stomped her heavy boot directly onto the severed piece of bone. She pulled a fresh nail from her pouch, rested the tip against the armor fragment, and slammed her hammer down.
"Resonance!"
Black and red spikes erupted directly from the curse's chest. The monster froze, its shriek warping into a choked gargle as the cursed energy violently expanded inside its torso, shattering its chest plating from the inside out.
"Now," Megumi said quietly.