"Cockroaches are the one thing I hate most in this life..." Kaede ground out through clenched teeth. In the next instant, he snapped Mikazuki Munechika up to block the strike.
A heavy metallic crash exploded through the underground chamber, and the invisible shockwave spiderwebbed the surrounding concrete with fine cracks.
Mikazuki held the descending special-grade cursed tool in place.
But the Festering Life Sword, made from twisted flesh and clustered insect eggs, writhed the instant it met resistance, like a living slug. The sword bent at an angle that defied physics, slipped around the guard, and buried itself into Kaede's flesh.
A nauseating tearing sound followed.
No bright red blood sprayed from the wound. Instead, pitch-black pus-blood erupted from it like a burst sewer line.
Thousands upon thousands of tiny black cursed insect eggs poured out from the gash. The moment they touched air, they hatched into ravenous flies, their wings buzzing in a noise that set his scalp on edge, greedily devouring the cursed energy flaring around the injury.
"Damn it... so it's not just a physical attack. It's a direct attack on cursed energy itself?"
The next moment Kaede raised the blade and carved upward in a vicious countercut, slicing through Kurourushi's swollen body and forcing its massive bulk backward.
The Mikazuki Munechika Replica, slick with clinging water, traced a silver arc through the air and drove itself point-first into the rusted safety railing on the second floor.
Then Kaede vanished from where he stood, melting away like ice. Following the water flowing from the sword, he re-formed beside the upper railing.
As clear water ran over him, the gruesome hole in his chest and the filthy insect eggs attached to it were washed away almost instantly, while the flesh knitted back together at visible speed.
Far away, atop the roof of a ruined unfinished building, night wind snapped at the hem of a five-striped robe.
Kenjaku looked down, his narrow eyes tightening into a dangerous line.
"A physical strike specialized to target cursed energy... and he can still route the damage through flowing water and reconstruction to achieve something functionally close to absolute regeneration through reverse cursed technique?"
One long finger tapped lightly at the edge of the rooftop, and the hunger for analysis in his eyes deepened.
To him, the battle system displayed by the anomaly known as "Kaede" had already stepped completely outside the bounds of conventional jujutsu logic.
"A curse spirit...
Shame I still haven't fully mastered external output for reverse cursed technique. I could erase a special grade like this one with technique reversal, but the burden on me would be too high..." Kaede thought.
"So the burden of technique reversal alone is enough to cap his upper limit, since he hasn't mastered external reverse cursed output... what an interesting ecosystem.
Still, how long can a defense this delicate last against overwhelming numbers?"
Before Kenjaku's murmur had even faded, the underground battle surged again.
"New Shadow Style: Simple Domain."
The pale blue New Shadow Style: Simple Domain expanded in a sphere around Kaede. The approaching roach swarm hit the domain's edge and was shredded into black mist by an invisible law.
At once, high-density cursed energy descended over him like a burning film of water. Domain Amplification violently neutralized the lingering curse-eggs around him.
Several unconscious curse-user bodies were ripped free by Kaede's sheer strength and hurled through the shattered factory doors like discarded sacks, flung clear of the slaughterhouse the underground plant had become.
But that act of rescue created the briefest opening in his defense.
The black swarm collapsed inward again like an avalanche, swallowing Kaede whole.
Half a second of dead silence passed.
Then dense silver blade-light erupted from inside the cocoon of insects, tearing outward with brutal force.
Simple Domain carved a bloody path through the sea of insects. And at the end of that opening, Kurourushi was already there, raising the Festering Life Sword high before bringing it down again in a reeking execution strike.
"The density is insane. My reverse cursed output in one burst is still tiny, but I have to test it," Kaede thought, his body already moving.
The sword coated with amplification screamed against the Festering Life Sword as the two weapons ground against each other. In the moment of contact, Mikazuki slid and twisted, plunging straight through the special-grade curse's swollen abdomen.
A faint but perfectly pure white spark of positive energy was forcibly driven along the blade and into the curse's body.
Boom!
Positive energy violently rejected the curse's negative cursed energy, and nearly half of Kurourushi's body exploded apart in a burst of blinding white light, rancid black fluid spraying everywhere like rain.
But the special-grade curse's vitality was grotesque beyond reason. The remaining chunks of twisted flesh contracted inward like independent jaws of the abyss, and in the instant of detonation, they swallowed the cursed blade whole, trapping it deep inside the writhing mass.
"You filthy beast. Give me back my sword..." Kaede hissed, trying to wrench the blade free, but it would not move.
The raging ocean of roaches seized the moment and crashed shut over him again.
"I can't drag this out any longer!"
Then Kaede burst from the swarm as a streak of violent motion, shooting upward toward the crumbling ceiling of the plant.
"I can't afford to hold back anymore..."
Those four cold words hung in the air.
Domain Expansion: Rainfall.
The air pressure plunged off a cliff. Without warning, heavy black storm clouds condensed inside the cramped, enclosed space of the underground water treatment plant.
Rain came down in sheets, every drop carrying an absolute sure-hit law and terrifying weight.
Under that merciless downpour, the carpets of insects on the ground did not even have time to struggle before the rain smashed and dissolved them in patches, reducing them to black sludge.
Sensing the absolute law inside the domain, something capable of erasing it completely, terror flashed through Kurourushi's compound eyes.
It let out a shriek of raw panic and burned its remaining cursed energy in a frenzy, summoning the last of its vast roach horde into a thick black shield piled over its head.
Crash!
Its huge body kicked off and shattered a support pillar, launching itself upward like a black cannon shell.
"So it really is made of insects? No... it's probably not that simple..." Kaede thought as he immediately pursued.
The thick concrete ceiling exploded open. The special-grade curse, dragging shattered stone and desperate insect-shadow with it, burst into the night sky above the Harajuku outskirts.
But that was no escape.
"I'll just keep expanding it. I refuse to believe it can still outrun me..."
The domain expanded outward with Kaede's will, swallowing the night sky in an instant.
The endless rain became the deadliest pursuer of all. As the drops fell, they stretched and hardened into countless crystal-clear, razor-sharp water blades, which surged upward in a vast killing cloud toward the fleeing special-grade curse.