The silence that came after the slaughter was heavy and thick. Renzo sat on the damp ground, his chest rising and falling in uneven rhythms. The metallic smell of curses that had dissipated lingered in the air.
It was an odd scent, reminiscent of ozone mixed with the smell of old parchment. He looked down at his hands again. They were steady now, but he could still feel the adrenaline humming through his veins.
'I'm really here,' he thought. 'This is not a dream!'
A soft chime echoed in his mind. It was less intrusive than before, almost like a polite notification.
[Level Up!]
[Level 1 -> Level 10]
[Rewards Acquired:]
Passive Skill: Black Flash (Subconscious Mastery) – There is now a higher probability of achieving a Black Flash. Your soul is attuned to the spark of cursed energy.
Form Unlocked: Hybrid Form – This is a partial manifestation of your true curse nature.
Renzo blinked. Black Flash? Even in the series he had seen, that was something most sorcerers could not do at will. It was a distortion in space, a strike that increased power. Having a higher chance to trigger it was a significant advantage.
"Show me the Hybrid Form," he whispered.
He felt sudden heat crawling up his right side. It was not painful, but it was uncomfortable. It felt as if his skin was being pulled tight. Then came the sound. A wet, squelching noise, similar to a lid being peeled back.
On his right shoulder, his neck, and down his arm, dozens of eyes started to open. They were not like the eyes on the monster that had consumed him earlier. These were his.
The sensory input was overwhelming initially. His brain struggled to process countless different angles at the same time. He saw the leaves behind him, the dirt at his feet, and the canopy above him all at once.
"Close!" he commanded, his voice trembling.
The eyes snapped shut in unison. The heat faded back into a dull thrum. He realized he could control them individually. He could open one on the back of his hand to see around corners or a dozen on his shoulder for 360-degree vision. It was a tactical dream.
'This is getting insane,' Renzo thought.
He tapped the screen to look at his stats. He had a pool of unassigned points now.
[Available Stat Points: 45]
He examined his current numbers. His Agility was the lowest combat stat. In a world where individuals like Toji Fushiguro or Sukuna moved faster than the eye could perceive, being slow was a death sentence. He also needed to increase his Focus to manage the mental strain of his new form.
'Do not be greedy,' he reminded himself. 'Balance is what keeps you alive!'
He allocated 20 points into Agility. He felt his legs becoming leaner, his muscles twitching with a new kind of explosive potential. He put 15 into Focus to stabilize his mind.
The remaining 10 went into Intelligence. If he was going to master complex cursed techniques, he needed the mental capacity to calculate the flow of energy.
[Updated Stats:]
Agility: 60
Focus: 70
Intelligence: 105
A new window appeared at the bottom of the screen.
[Notice: Stat and Skill growth have no upper limits.]
Renzo froze. He stared at the words until they began to blur. No limits? In every game he had ever played, there was always a cap.
'If there is no limit...' he looked at the sky. 'I could eventually reach a level where I am not just a nobody in this world.'
He thought about the titans of other worlds. Names he had read about in manga and watched in anime. Beings capable of destroying galaxies or rewriting reality. If he kept devouring, kept leveling, he could stand among them.
"I could actually do it," he breathed. "I could become something more than a monster."
Before he could finish that thought, the air in front of him started to ripple. It resembled heat haze on a summer road, but it was dark. Completely black.
A hole tore open in the fabric of space. It was a wound. A vacuum of pure nothingness began to pull at him. Renzo tried to dig his claws into the dirt, but the force was too great.
"Wait! I am not ready!" he yelled.
The void swallowed him whole. He screamed, but the sound died in his throat. It felt as if he was being stretched across lightyears.
His vision went white, then black, then a dizzying array of colors that did not exist in the human spectrum.
He hit the ground hard.
The impact knocked the wind out of him. He groaned and rolled onto his side. The earth felt different in this place.
It was packed hard and smelled of woodsmoke and old blood. He pushed himself up, his eyes scanning the horizon.
He was no longer in the forest.
He was standing on the outskirts of a village. But the buildings were not right. They were not modern. There was no concrete, no power lines, no distant sounds of traffic.
The houses were made of wood and thatch. Paper sliding doors were torn. Bodies lay in the street, ignored by the crows.
The sky was a deep, bruised purple. The air was dense with Cursed Energy. It felt so thick it was like walking through water.
'Where am I?' Renzo wondered. 'Or rather, when am I?'
He walked through the village. It was a ghost town. The architecture suggested ancient Japan. He passed a temple that looked freshly burned. The symbols on the remaining banners were old. Very old.
'This is not Yuji's time. Too primitive.'
He reached the end of the main path. A stone bridge crossed a small stream. On the other side, the atmosphere changed. The pressure became immense, as if a mountain rested on his shoulders.
Renzo's Hybrid Form reacted instinctively. Several eyes opened on his neck, moving quickly to find the source of the pressure.
He saw him.
Sitting on a pile of skulls and rubble was a man. He wore a loose, light-colored kimono. He had four arms, although two were tucked away.
His hair was a faded pinkish red, swept back. But it was the face that made Renzo's heart stop. Two sets of eyes. Tattoos that looked like carved scars.
It was Ryomen Sukuna. In his flesh.
This was the King of Curses in his original, prime form. The Heian Era. The bloodiest age in history.
Sukuna leaned his chin on one hand, looking bored. A pile of sorcerers' corpses lay at his feet like discarded toys. He noticed Renzo and slowly turned his head.
A wide, jagged grin spread across Sukuna's face. It was not a friendly smile. It was the look of a predator seeing a new kind of prey.
"Well," Sukuna's voice rumbled. It was smooth, but it had an edge that felt like a blade against the throat. "A face I do not recognize. And such a strange scent you have."
Renzo stood frozen. His system began to blare warnings, red screens flashing rapidly in his peripheral vision.
[WARNING: High-level entity detected.]
[Target: Ryomen Sukuna]
[Threat Level: Fatal]
Sukuna stood up, the movement fluid and terrifyingly fast. He did not even take a stance. He simply looked at Renzo with those four burning eyes.
"Do not just stand there, little curse," Sukuna said, his grin widening. "Show me if you are worth the effort of a single slash."