"My son! Where's my son!?"
Just as the three were about to enter the detention center, a tearful elderly woman suddenly rushed out from behind the security line. She was stopped by high-specialty personnel, struggling as she cried out desperately toward them.
Most of the surrounding residents had been evacuated, but this mother refused to leave because her son was still inside the detention center.
"Please, you need to leave quickly. Due to equipment failure nearby, toxic gas may spread to this area."
Ijichi Kiyotaka approached and tried to persuade the elderly woman to leave using the official line.
Watching the mother, who was concerned for her son, being taken away, Itadori Yuuji suddenly felt a tightness in his chest. His eyes hardened, and he clenched his fists, speaking resolutely, "We'll definitely save them!"
"Of course!"
Kugisaki Nobara said with a confident smile.
After forcibly persuading the unrelated people to leave, Ijichi Kiyotaka returned to the group, "Well then, I'll start the curtain."
He formed hand seals, quickly reciting the incantation, and a dark curtain slowly descended, covering the entire juvenile detention center. The already gloomy sky grew even darker.
"Divine Dogs!"
Fushiguro Megumi also made hand seals, summoning the white wolf shikigami. "Divine Dogs will notify us if any cursed spirits approach."
"Let's go."
He led the way, pushing open the iron door of the detention center's dormitory.
"Whoa!"
Itadori Yuuji followed right behind with a powerful slap of his fist, full of energy.
The three entered the dormitory, but the inside was completely different from what they had expected. Instead of dormitory rooms, there were twisted, complex pipes and old buildings everywhere.
"What's going on? Isn't this supposed to be a dormitory building!?"
Itadori Yuuji stared wide-eyed at the drastic change in the environment before him.
"This is… an unfinished domain expansion!"
As a second-grade sorcerer, Fushiguro Megumi, unlike Itadori who was new to the world of curses, recognized that "a first-grade cursed spirit couldn't achieve this level of distortion."
He suddenly realized something and quickly turned around. His pupils contracted. "As expected, the door we came through is gone!"
Itadori Yuuji and Kugisaki Nobara also turned around at the same time. When they saw the path they had come from vanish, they immediately panicked.
"Where's the door? Wasn't it just here?!"
"It's gone! Now we're in a horror movie set!"
Seeing the two of them panic, Fushiguro Megumi sighed and scolded, "Calm down! Yukinokami has already memorized the exit location. We just need to keep moving forward."
Hearing this, the panic on their faces immediately disappeared, and they happily patted the white wolf's head.
This is a special-grade shikigami! Why don't these two feel any tension? It's like they came straight out of a comedy manga.
He waved them to follow, and after passing through narrow, complicated pipes, they suddenly emerged into a wide open area.
They arrived at an open space, where a figure was slumped against the wall at the far end. The wall was splattered with bright red blood.
"Hey, there's someone over there!"
Seeing someone injured, Itadori Yuuji immediately rushed over.
"Hey! Don't be reckless!"
Fushiguro Megumi tried to stop him, but Itadori Yuuji's speed was too quick. Before he could finish his sentence, Itadori was already in front of the person. The others had no choice but to follow him quickly.
The person leaning against the wall was a man in prison uniform, and he was no longer breathing.
Itadori Yuji looked at the man whose eyes were wide open, devoid of light, his expression slowly becoming numb as though he had experienced great fear just before death.
Then he noticed the ID tag on the man's chest. It read "Okazaki Tadashi," and suddenly, the image of the elderly woman who had crossed the caution line earlier flashed in his mind—this was her son.
"He's already dead. Go find the other four," Fushiguro Megumi said as he glanced at the man and turned to leave.
He took two steps but stopped when he saw that Itadori was still standing still. "Hey, what are you staring at?"
"I'm taking this man's body out," Itadori said suddenly, his voice serious and firm.
"Huh!? Are you kidding me? This guy is already dead!" Fushiguro's face flashed with anger. He couldn't believe what Itadori was saying.
"Exactly because he's dead!" Itadori shouted, his fists clenched so tightly that his nails dug into his palms. "How could we just tell that woman her son is dead with nothing to show for it? How would she believe us?"
"Are you out of your mind?"
Fushiguro lost his patience and grabbed Itadori by the collar, glaring at him. "These people are criminals!"
"This guy, killed a little girl while driving without a license, and this was the second time! All five of them are irredeemable scum. I wouldn't care if they all died!"
"Even so, are you really going to save them just to satisfy yourself? Even if the people you save will hurt others again, does it not matter to you?"
"I…"
Itadori hesitated for a moment, then retorted, "Then why did you save me back then!?"
"Hey, can you two at least choose your arguments more wisely?"
Seeing the two getting louder, Kugisaki Nobara couldn't take it anymore and tried to step in.
However, the ground beneath her suddenly turned into an empty pit, and she fell into it, dragged by gravity. The ground quickly restored itself, as if no one had ever been there.
"Cursed spirit? When did that happen!?"
Coming to her senses, Kugisaki had already disappeared, and Fushiguro looked around in shock. "Wait, the Divine Dog didn't even give a warning…"
In the next moment, Fushiguro caught a glimpse of something white from the corner of his eye. He turned to see a white wolf's head embedded in a nearby wall, but its body was nowhere to be seen.
Fushiguro felt his breath stop.
A shadow appeared behind them, almost pressed up against them, and neither of them noticed.
The moment they realized a cursed spirit was in front of them, an overwhelming pressure, typical of a special-grade cursed spirit, suddenly filled the air. It was so heavy that they could hardly breathe, their bodies trembling in fear and becoming difficult to control.
Move! Move, body!
Itadori gritted his teeth, then quickly drew a butcher knife-shaped cursed tool from his waist and swung it toward the cursed spirit right in front of him.
Splat!
With the sound of flesh being sliced, Itadori's raised arm hadn't even landed yet before his wrist, holding the knife, was jerked upward and spun into the air, then dropped limply to the ground.
What happened!?
I couldn't even see its movements. This is special grade? How can we possibly win!?
In a split second, Itadori assessed the huge gap between their strengths and immediately held back the intense pain in his severed wrist. He gritted his teeth and shoved Fushiguro away.
"Yuji!?"
Fushiguro stumbled, but his body instinctively moved and regained his mobility.
"Go find Kugisaki! Get her out of there and signal me when you do. Then I'll release Sukuna!"
Itadori said urgently, "That's the only way we have a chance of surviving! Go!"
Fushiguro hesitated for a moment but quickly moved, calling out to Inumaki to help guide him to Kugisaki's location.
Behind him, where he couldn't see, Itadori gripped his right arm tightly, trying to stop his body from shaking any further.
"You sure know how to make things difficult, Fushiguro," he muttered with a bitter smile.
With Inumaki's help, Fushiguro quickly found Kugisaki surrounded by numerous cursed spirits.
"Frog!"
"Great serpent!"
After summoning a toad shikigami and using its tongue to pull Kinjaki back, Hayashizaki watched as a massive white serpent emerged from the shadows and lunged at the pile of cursed spirits.
"We need to get out of here!"
While directing the snake to attack the cursed spirits, Fushiguro Megumi shouted a warning.
Kinjaki, whose body was still in the toad's mouth with only her head sticking out, grumbled, "I hate toads..."
"Sorry about that!"
After releasing the snake shikigami, letting it dissolve back into the shadows, Fushiguro Megumi rode the toad and started heading for the exit with Kinjaki.
Luckily, the cursed spirits didn't catch up. With the help of the black dog, they made it to the exit. After breaking through with cursed energy, they were finally outside.
Fushiguro Megumi found Ijichi Kiyotaka, who had been waiting anxiously outside the curtain. He handed the injured Kinjaki over to him.
"Ijichi, please take him to the hospital first. I'll wait here for Itadori and Yukinoshita."
"Got it."
Ijichi Kiyotaka nodded, helped Kinjaki into the car, and quickly drove off toward the nearest hospital.
Fushiguro Megumi let out a slow sigh of relief but quickly became tense again.
"Tch, why is Hayashizaki taking so long... I'll signal to Itadori. Whatever happens next, I'm not getting involved."
After making the black dog howl, Fushiguro Megumi suddenly felt a pat on his shoulder.
"Sorry I'm late, the GPS is a bit stupid."
Hayashizaki appeared behind the short-haired boy and asked, "What's the situation now?"
"You are finally here."
Hearing the familiar, cool voice, Fushiguro Megumi turned around in surprise. "Itadori, my teammate is still inside fighting a special-grade cursed spirit!"
"I understand. Stay here."
Hayashizaki gave his shoulder a reassuring pat. "I'll be back soon, your teammate will be fine."
Watching him walk into the distorted dormitory building and disappear from view, Fushiguro Megumi let out a heavy sigh, sliding down the wall and sitting on the ground.
Now he could finally relax.
...
"Hey, did you know? We're both at the special-grade level. We're in the same tier."
Underneath the broken stone bridge, a special-grade imaginary cursed spirit, born from the cursed womb, had its limbs severed, its body and limbs deeply embedded in the wall. Itadori Yuji stood casually on the ground.
The roles were completely reversed.
Mysterious black markings appeared on Itadori Yuji's face, and Ryoumen Sukuna's second set of eyes opened.
The cursed spirit seemed to be enraged by Sukuna's mocking words, struggling to free itself from the wall. Its severed limbs began to regenerate rapidly.
"Not bad, special-grade!"
Sukuna grinned, encouraging it in a sarcastic tone, "Go on, keep going!"
The special-grade cursed spirit, fully recovered, landed in front of him, opening its mouth to reveal a set of sharp, white teeth.
"You seem really happy. Want me to praise you?"
Sukuna shrugged. "But unlike humans, cursed spirits can easily heal wounds with cursed energy."
"Both you and this kid know nothing about curses."
Sukuna chuckled, then raised his hands and formed a seal. "This is a great opportunity. Let me show you what true jujutsu is."
"Domain expansion..."
His pupils suddenly contracted.
Before he could finish, the special-grade cursed spirit in front of Sukuna froze. A blood mark appeared on its neck, as if a blade had slashed it out of thin air. Its head fell cleanly off.
"That was close. Almost had my head taken."
A voice filled with both relief and mockery rang out from above Ryoumen Sukuna.
...
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