Drinking milk entirely on instinct while suffering from full-body paralysis was an incredibly awkward experience. Quite a bit of the liquid went down the wrong pipe, but Shin had no other choice.
"Cough, hack... I almost choked to death on dairy," Shin sputtered, rolling onto his side.
He immediately smashed a Splash Potion of Instant Health against the dirt. A wave of red particles washed over him, completely restoring his physical state and clearing the remaining numbness.
The Kamaitachi, however, was not faring well. While its severed legs had rapidly regenerated, the middle head Shin had decapitated showed no signs of growing back.
Furthermore, after violently expelling that massive payload of sensory-depriving venom, the entire Cursed Spirit had begun to physically wither.
The lingering Poison and Slowness debuffs were aggressively eating away at its Cursed Energy. It was incredibly weak and likely could not sustain its physical form much longer.
A Trident suddenly materialized in Shin's right hand. He took aim at the Kamaitachi's remaining leftmost head and hurled the weapon with all his might.
The Trident flew true, tearing a massive, gaping hole straight through the monster's chest.
"Is the Trident really that powerful?" Shin muttered to himself, blinking in surprise. "I thought its base damage was identical to the Netherite Sword. Did I remember the stats wrong?"
Not wanting to take any chances with a Special Grade's regeneration, Shin summoned a half-dozen blocks of TNT and hurled them at the dying beast.
A chain of deafening explosions rocked the courtyard. When the smoke finally cleared, there was absolutely no trace of the Kamaitachi left—only a massive, smoldering crater carved into the school grounds.
A cascade of pleasant chimes echoed in Shin's mind. Exorcising the Special Grade curse had granted him a massive influx of experience, leveling him up thirty-five times in a single burst.
However, since he had already unlocked every single block in the system encyclopedia, leveling up felt somewhat pointless.
"Wait, what is this?" Shin murmured.
A brand-new icon had quietly appeared at the very bottom left corner of his Creative Mode interface. When he focused his consciousness on it, his mind was pulled into an endless, empty void.
Before he could study the new interface, Satoru Gojo suddenly appeared beside them. The silver-haired teacher was holding his phone up, aggressively snapping photos of the crater and the exhausted students.
"Oh my! Have your injuries already healed?" Gojo asked, his tone dripping with mock disappointment. "What a pity. I wanted to show the second-years exactly how pathetic you looked!"
Megumi shot his teacher a withering sideways glare.
"Sensei," Megumi began flatly. "You didn't just arrive, did you? You have been here for a while, just watching us make fools of ourselves."
Gojo's cheerful smile stiffened for a fraction of a second. He quickly waved his free hand in denial.
"I literally just got here! Honestly, it is a miracle you were strong enough to win. Otherwise, I would have only arrived in time to collect your corpses."
However, as Gojo aggressively waved his hands to explain himself, his thumb slipped. His phone tumbled to the dirt, the screen landing face-up. Displayed brightly on the lock screen was a crystal-clear, high-definition photo of Shin covered in blood from the Kamaitachi's very first ambush.
Megumi stared at the phone in dead silence.
"Sensei," Shin sighed. "You were definitely here early. Where did you even find the lighting to take such a clear photo?"
Gojo scooped up his phone without a shred of embarrassment and forcefully changed the subject. He pointed dramatically at Yuji.
"Hey there, student! I can see you have remarkable bone structure. You look like you are perfectly cut out to be a Jujutsu Sorcerer. Are you interested in enrolling?"
Yuji stared blankly at the blindfolded man. Just as he opened his mouth to reply, Shin interrupted him.
"Wait, Gojo-sensei," Shin asked, genuinely surprised. "Do you mean Yuji actually possesses Cursed Energy? Enough to be a sorcerer?"
Gojo nodded cheerfully. "So his name is Yuji? Yeah, I can definitely see the Cursed Energy pooling inside him. It just looks like he doesn't possess an Innate Cursed Technique."
Shin lowered his head to hide his shock.
So Yuji didn't just gain Cursed Energy from eating Sukuna's finger? Shin analyzed internally. Actually, that makes perfect sense. Kenjaku engineered Yuji's birth, so his mother technically possessed Cursed Energy. It is completely logical that Yuji inherited a latent pool of it.
Megumi turned to Yuji, his expression deadly serious.
"Being a Jujutsu Sorcerer is an incredibly dangerous profession. You will face the constant threat of a violent death. Think about this carefully. You have every right to refuse."
Yuji looked down at his scuffed sneakers. His grandfather's dying words echoed heavily in his mind. Then, his thoughts drifted to Sasaki and Iguchi, who had been completely traumatized by the unseen monsters lurking in their own school.
If Fushiguro and Kagura hadn't shown up tonight, the three of us would have died without even knowing what killed us, Yuji realized.
"If I become a Jujutsu Sorcerer..." Yuji began slowly, his voice gaining conviction. "If I can save even one person from being harmed by a Cursed Spirit... then I am willing to do it. Even if I die, I will die knowing I chose the right path!"
Gojo happily slapped Yuji on the back.
"Welcome to Tokyo Jujutsu High! When are you planning to pack your bags?"
"...Could you wait a few days?" Yuji asked quietly. "I need to take care of my grandfather's funeral arrangements first."
"Of course," Gojo agreed smoothly. "I will leave you my contact info. Just give me a call when you are ready to move into the dorms!"
The group eventually returned to the Jujutsu High campus. After thoroughly scrubbing the grime off in the shower, Shin collapsed onto his dorm bed, entirely dead to the world. The day's events had completely drained him.
Now that he finally had a moment of peace, he closed his eyes and sank his consciousness back into the mysterious new void icon.
His mind drifted through the empty, black space. He mentally flew forward in a straight line until he suddenly hit an invisible barrier.
Is there a hard boundary limit to this void? Shin wondered. Can I build things inside this space?
The moment the thought crossed his mind, a Grass Block materialized beneath his spectral feet. Shin began rapidly placing a bridge of Grass Blocks outward until he hit the invisible wall again.
It is a perfectly spherical space with a radius of exactly forty meters, Shin deduced. This feels exactly like... a Domain Expansion!
Shin realized he could freely construct or place any block anywhere within this localized void. The only catch was that building inside the void actively consumed materials from his real-world inventory.
However, within this space, he felt like an absolute god.
He could manipulate the Trident to fly freely through the air via mental commands. He could manually dictate the exact fuse timer of his TNT. He could even pinpoint the exact spatial coordinates to detonate his Splash Potions without throwing them.
While the items drained his physical inventory, the actual Cursed Energy required to maintain the void was incredibly low. This meant he could theoretically open this Domain repeatedly for extended periods of time without risking Cursed Energy exhaustion.
Early the next morning, Shin tracked down Satoru Gojo and requested a highly classified private meeting.
Gojo led Shin into an empty classroom and casually dropped a localized Curtain over the room to block all eavesdropping.
"What's up, Shin?" Gojo asked, leaning against a desk. "You are being awfully mysterious today."
Shin pulled a purple, box-like container from his inventory and set it on the desk.
"Sensei, look at this. It is called a Shulker Box. Any item placed inside this container is transported directly into an isolated, dimensional pocket space. I am the only person in the world who can access it."
Shin paused, letting the implication hang in the air.
"Furthermore, if I am killed, the dimensional link dies with me, meaning the contents can never be retrieved by anyone else. Because of this absolute security, I want to be the one to hold onto the Sukuna finger we recovered yesterday. In fact, it would be even safer if you entrusted me with the other finger currently locked in the Jujutsu High vaults."
To demonstrate, Shin casually picked up a ceramic teacup from the desk, placed it inside the purple box, and then shattered the Shulker Box with a pickaxe.
Gojo instantly flared his Six Eyes to maximum output. He scanned the broken purple shards on the desk. He scanned the ambient Cursed Energy in the room. He even scanned the interior of Shin's physical body.
He found absolutely zero trace of the teacup. It had completely vanished from reality.
"Oh my," Gojo praised, genuinely impressed. "What a fascinating little box. If it truly works like this, then the Sukuna fingers would absolutely be safest in your care."
Gojo pushed off the desk, his expression dropping into deadly seriousness.
"However, you must swear never to let anyone else know about this storage method. If the conservative higher-ups find out you can permanently erase indestructible Special Grade Cursed Objects from existence just by dying, they will undoubtedly execute you to dispose of the relics permanently."
The heavy, grave tone hung in the air for a moment before Gojo's usual, carefree smile returned.
"But don't worry! Even if you accidentally spill the secret, I will always protect you. Here, take the two Sukuna fingers. Keep them safe for now."
Gojo tossed two talisman-wrapped fingers onto the desk. Shin quickly scooped them up and deposited them into a fresh Shulker Box.
"There is one more thing," Shin said, looking up at his teacher. "I need to trouble you to help me test a brand-new technique I unlocked last night..."