Meanwhile, on the other side of Mahiko's battle, the people at Jujutsu High had only just now discovered that Nobara Kugisaki was missing.
In fairness, this wasn't really negligence on Jujutsu High's part — they didn't monitor everyone's location around the clock. It was Yuji who noticed Nobara was gone first, because no matter how many times he tried, he couldn't get through to her.
"She's nowhere to be found," Ijichi reported. "We've already mobilized people to search. What we can confirm is that she was seen this afternoon at a shopping mall with a blue-haired girl..."
Of course. Kenjaku was a cunning old fox. As long as his plans didn't kick up too much of a commotion, he almost never left traces. If he truly set his mind to abducting someone... there were very few who could stop him.
At least without Satoru Gojo, no one had yet found any trace of where Nobara was.
The Curtain Kenjaku had erected around the Ginza hotel where Mahiko and the others were had gone undetected as well. Because Kenjaku had layered the Curtains several times over — the outermost layer functioned something like optical camouflage, preventing anyone outside from perceiving the smaller Curtain nested within.
The crowds below the tower moved and flowed as normal. No one had any idea what was happening at the very top of that hotel. A hundred-odd floors was, after all, a genuinely unreasonable height.
And yet, in a certain alley below that same building — tucked into a corner — a small rabbit was pulling something.
It was the emergency alarm bell that Nobara had given Mahiko a while back. The one that looked like something a grade-schooler would carry.
The alarm rang out, and simultaneously emitted a positioning signal.
That signal would soon be picked up by nearby Jujutsu High personnel. They would come to investigate, and in time, they would begin to piece together the anomaly unfolding at the top of that building.
This, too, was part of Mahiko's arrangements.
And inside the Curtain —
This was bad. This was very, very bad.
A beam of light had punched clean through the girl's lower abdomen. Blood poured freely.
For Mahiko, a wound like this was manageable. But her scalp was crawling — because through the nature of that attack, she had just confirmed the identity of the cloaked figure below.
Ishiryuu.
A powerful sorcerer from antiquity, dragged into the modern era by Kenjaku. One of the Four Heavenly Kings who held dominion over the Sendai Colony during the Culling Game — the single greatest Cursed Energy output among all its players.
This was trouble. Real, serious trouble.
The agony of a massive surge of Cursed Energy punching through her gut was still blazing white-hot. Mahiko gritted her teeth, already fully aware that she had landed herself in a catastrophic situation.
She had miscalculated.
Mahiko had assumed that if Kenjaku wanted to deal with her, he'd send Rime and Jogo. But Kenjaku hadn't called Jogo at all — he'd called Ishiryuu instead.
That single deviation had multiplied the difficulty of escaping with her life by several times over. Because Mahiko had prepared countermeasures for Jogo — but not for Ishiryuu.
And on top of that, Ishiryuu was extraordinarily powerful. Just like Rime, he was an enemy that the current Mahiko couldn't hope to match in a straight fight — a sorcerer capable of reaching Special Grade evaluation.
Damn it.
Mahiko bit down and her mind raced frantically, searching for a way to break out of this — but while she was busy repairing her body from Ishiryuu's hit, the other attacks saw their opening and came flooding in from every direction.
The Cursed Spirits surrounding her launched a coordinated barrage of ranged attacks. Under normal circumstances, long-range strikes from Low-grade Cursed Spirits were beneath Mahiko's notice.
But now was different. She was repairing her body and had to protect Nobara at the same time. With no option to simply let the attacks land, she was forced to split her focus — mending herself while simultaneously shielding Nobara.
A storm of strikes hammered down on Mahiko's heavily armored Darting Hare exosuit. The sharp crack of metal on metal and the thunderous detonations of Cursed Energy blasting apart wove into a single roaring cacophony, sparks cascading in dense showers across every surface of the armor.
"Heh... still not used to your new body?" From below, Ishiryuu pushed back his hood. Centered at the very front of his head — at the core of the cannon-barrel hairstyle sculpted from his own hair — a blue light pulsed and blazed.
"Boring, perhaps. But as rehabilitation practice..." He grinned. "I suppose it'll do just fine!"
Pure, raw Cursed Energy — carrying no Jujutsu Technique whatsoever — erupted from the cannon-barrel atop his head. A beam the width of a fist fired again and struck Mahiko dead-on.
This time, Mahiko had deployed her Cursed Energy to guard Nobara — so the beam didn't punch through. But the impact still sent Mahiko, the armor, and Nobara crashing backward into the wall.
Then, with a tremendous crash, Mahiko, the armor, Nobara, and the debris of the collapsed wall all came tumbling down together to the lowest level — buried under rubble.
Ishiryuu was genuinely powerful.
He let the cloak fall entirely, revealing a tall, powerfully built man beneath. His muscles were honed sharp as cut steel. He stood with his hands in his pockets, completely at ease, his hair lacquered into the shape of that distinctive cannon barrel.
This was the body that Ishiryuu had taken possession of in the original story. Though slightly different — the incarnation didn't appear to be fully complete at one hundred percent.
Having only just incarnated, and without the aid of Idle Transfiguration during the process, he hadn't yet fully mastered control of this body. In other words, he hadn't yet reclaimed his original strength.
"...Hm?" But at that moment, Ishiryuu frowned, replaying something he'd glimpsed a moment ago. "Was that my imagination... wasn't that a child?"
Wasn't he here to kill a Cursed Spirit?
Why had he just seen — only a girl who looked about sixteen, and another girl who looked even younger?
"Hey! White-hair!" Ishiryuu craned his head up and shouted. "Weren't we here to kill a Cursed Spirit?! What does sending me after a little girl mean?!"
Rime was above, currently sprinting downward toward the lowest level.
In answer to Ishiryuu's challenge, Rime's reply was: "Behind you! Watch out!"
Huh?
Watch out?
Ishiryuu snapped his attention back toward Mahiko's position — and his pupils contracted.
He saw a flash of red. A single crimson thread shot out from the rubble, aimed directly at his forehead.
Blood Manipulation — [Arrow].
Fast.
A flicker of surprise crossed the man's eyes.
He had already grown wary the instant he saw the red flash within the rubble. But the speed of Mahiko's Piercing Blood was simply too fast.
All he could do was wrench his head to the side — barely enough. The Piercing Blood grazed his scalp as it shot past, carving a furrow across the top of Ishiryuu's skull as if a chunk had been scooped out. Blood splattered, and the cannon-barrel hairstyle was blown apart in the process.
Crash —
The heavily armored Darting Hare rose from the rubble. Shattered stone rained down around it.
The Shikigami armor slowly raised one hand. The palm cannon blazed to life, its searing Cursed Energy aimed directly at Ishiryuu — and fired.
Ishiryuu had just underestimated Mahiko and dropped his guard. The Piercing Blood had already caught him completely off-guard — and now he had absolutely no time to dodge the palm cannon's direct blast. The impact sent him flying.
It was only then that Rime came diving down, her expression livid.
"Glacial Incantation — Ice Picks!"
A sky full of ice picks crystallized into form and rained down on Mahiko like an overwhelming torrent of blades.
Not her most powerful technique — "Straight Torrent" — because while Ice Picks were weaker in raw hitting power, they were agile and fast.
Mahiko's gaze sharpened. She didn't panic. She adjusted her Cursed Energy output, running Jogo's Technique through the armor in overload mode once again.
The Shikigami armor's palm cannon swiveled upward. Overloaded and firing in reverse, it unleashed a torrent of fire — a towering wall of flame.
"Burn —"
Ice and cannon fire collided. Each cancelled the other out. Steam erupted upward, and a dense water vapor fog billowed and spread in an instant.
The mist was saturated with Cursed Energy and completely opaque — neither side could locate the other.
Tch.
Rime's brow knitted tight.
She'd been a step late because she'd needed a moment to use the Reverse Cursed Technique on the wound Mahiko had dealt her at the start — which had cost her precious seconds.
"You're not getting away!" she shouted, beginning to gather her Glacial Incantation.
This time, she'd hit Mahiko with something big.
If she didn't know where Mahiko was, she'd just cover every possible position at once.
Rime didn't know Mahiko's position — but then, Mahiko certainly didn't know Rime's either. In a situation like this, the advantage naturally went to Rime, who had the superior output values and an ability with the wider area of effect.
Rime's hands gathered an extreme concentration of ice-aspected Cursed Energy.
But then, in the very next instant —
A crimson thread burst through the water vapor fog, carrying the promise of death.
Another [Arrow].
Rime's pupils snapped tight. She jerked aside in an emergency dodge — but this [Arrow], launched blind without line of sight and with zero warning, was still far more sudden than she'd anticipated. It punched clean through her shoulder with brutal force.
Rime's face contorted in genuine pain.
"Damn it!"
Rime looked up. In a corner high above, there was a duplicate left there for observation — placed by Mahiko when Ishiryuu's first attack had sent her crashing into the wall.
No wonder the shot had been so precisely on target.
This woman... had she already been planning to use the water vapor as visual cover from the very moment she fell?
Rime hurriedly launched an attack, shattering that surveillance duplicate — but at the same time she was forced to pull back slightly from the wound left by the [Arrow], and began using the Reverse Cursed Technique to repair her shoulder.
And far away, Mahiko exhaled — just slightly.
Ishiryuu was strong. But compared to his peak from the original story, the current Ishiryuu wasn't quite at that level — at the very least, there was fighting room.
Rime was strong too. Head-on, Mahiko couldn't match her firepower. But having read the original story, Mahiko knew that Rime had one critical weakness —
Rime's poison resistance was essentially nonexistent.
Blood Manipulation's blood carried a toxin that could inflict devastating effects on Rime. And more importantly, Rime had no idea that Blood Manipulation's blood was poisonous — which meant using Blood Manipulation to poison her was a one-time trump card capable of dealing genuine damage and restriction to Rime.
The problem was that Mahiko hadn't had much time to train with Blood Manipulation since acquiring it, and these last few successive uses of Piercing Blood had been growing increasingly strained — like a muscle torn from overexertion.
She probably couldn't keep firing Piercing Blood consecutively anymore.
She'd wanted to pursue Rime with a rapid volley of Piercing Blood, stacking up the toxin — but that was no longer an option.
The poison in Rime's system still needed time to take effect. She had to keep stalling.
Mahiko waved her hand, directing the heavily armored Darting Hare while continuously generating small rabbits to harry Rime — tangling her up, keeping her occupied.
There was no time to breathe. Wind rushed past her ear.
Mahiko spun around — and there was Ishiryuu, charging toward her, laughing, a fist already swinging.
"Cursed Spirit! I underestimated you!"
That palm cannon blast had landed squarely on Ishiryuu — but in truth, beyond a dusting of grime, he hadn't sustained much damage at all.
He came at her virtually unscathed, Cursed Energy blazing in brilliant blue around his fist.
"Did you think that if you wrecked my hair, I couldn't release Cursed Energy anymore?"
He shouted as he drove his fist directly into Mahiko.
The moment the blow connected, Mahiko's body scattered into butterflies — but the sheer force of his Cursed Energy output crushed many of them outright, obliterating half of her body in an instant.
She was forced to burn even more of her soul's reserves to reconstruct herself, and Ishiryuu's assault didn't let up for a single moment.
Ishiryuu had roughly figured it out — part of the reason Mahiko had aimed that Piercing Blood at his head was to destroy his hairstyle. If it had connected, it would have punched straight through his skull and killed him. If it missed, it would at least disrupt the hair cannon.
But the thing was — the hairstyle was completely irrelevant.
Yes, Ishiryuu could channel his Cursed Energy output through that cannon-barrel hairstyle to fire concentrated beam blasts. But that was purely because he thought it looked cool and found it a convenient method — personal aesthetic preference, nothing more.
He didn't depend on it. Without the hairstyle, his Cursed Energy output was every bit as overwhelming.
Now, every punch Ishiryuu threw was wrapped in a torrent of Cursed Energy, and Mahiko was driven back again and again with each successive blow.
"Farewell, Cursed Spirit masquerading as a little girl!" With Mahiko finally cornered, Ishiryuu cocked his right fist back and let the blue Cursed Energy detonate in full force. "You are not the dessert I was hoping for!"
Mahiko had nowhere left to run.
And yet — the blue-haired girl cornered against that wall showed not even a flicker of panic. Instead, a small smile tugged at her lips, and she slowly raised one finger toward Ishiryuu.
At her fingertip, Cursed Energy and shadows coiled together in a spiral.
It was [Husk] — the shot she'd never fired. From the very first moment, quietly, steadily, Mahiko's [Husk] had been building up charge this entire time.
Even so, even with all that preemptive charging — the power in the [Husk] at Mahiko's fingertip, and the speed at which it continued to accumulate, still did not match Ishiryuu's Cursed Energy output.
The most rational play right now was not to clash with Ishiryuu head-on using [Husk], but to use it to blast open the dead end behind her and keep evading his pursuit.
But Mahiko didn't do that.
Her fingertip remained pointed squarely at Ishiryuu.
"Want to trade?" Ishiryuu said. The Cursed Energy blazing around his fist intensified further. "I'll take you up on that!"
"No, actually — you're right about part of it. Piercing Blood was aimed partly at your hair." She held his gaze. "Just... not to restrict your Cursed Energy output."
"Oh?" Ishiryuu paused, then a look of curious amusement spread across his face. "Then what for? You just didn't like the hairstyle?"
"Honestly, yes, it was pretty ugly — but that wasn't the main reason." Mahiko smiled back at him. "Go ahead, take a guess."
The Cursed Energy at Mahiko's fingertip blazed with radiant light.
[Husk] was about to fire.
And in that same moment, Ishiryuu's grin widened.
The instant Mahiko's Cursed Energy surged at her fingertip, Ishiryuu's fist — laden with terrifying Cursed Energy — swung toward her.
He didn't care.
Whatever little purpose Mahiko had been muttering about — it was all irrelevant.
Now that he'd confirmed she was a Cursed Spirit and not a human child, Ishiryuu had no psychological hesitation whatsoever about bringing the full weight of his power down on her. His current strength might not match his peak from when he was alive — but his numbers still far outclassed hers. Whatever she tried to pull, the prize at the end of this fight would belong to him alone....
——Or so he had believed.
But in the very instant his fist swung out, the corner of his eye caught someone at the periphery of the scene.
And his pupils constricted.
"Hey... you didn't forget about me, did you?"
Nobara Kugisaki — a strand of Ishiryuu's hair tied to the straw doll in her left hand, right arm raised high, dark-aspected Cursed Energy blazing like a held-aloft torch.
The nail spun through the air.
The girl was grinning, reckless and wild.
The hammer fell.
The nail hit the doll dead center.
"Straw Doll Technique ——— Resonance!!"
____
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