The Unknown Special Grade Cursed Spirit

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"Itsuki, my good son!"

"You gave your father one hell of a surprise tonight!"

Ogi was not mocking him.

As he approached again, his voice sounded painfully sincere.

He ignored Naobito completely. The way he looked at Itsuki was feverish, almost worshipful.

It had nothing to do with blood ties or fatherly love.

Those burning eyes looked at the boy as if he were an invaluable treasure.

"Ha."

"Hahaha..."

Hearing Ogi speak like that, ten-year-old Itsuki stood in the ruins, drenched in blood, and laughed until the sound turned wild.

"Looks like I still underestimated how disgusting you could be."

"Seeing you like this is enough to make me sick, Ogi Zenin."

Naobito was not surprised by the boy's vicious attitude.

Neither was Ogi, despite being his father.

He walked past Naobito and stopped five meters from Itsuki, then slid the katana in his hand back into its sheath. His voice softened as he explained himself.

"Itsuki, I know these past ten years have not been comfortable for you. I also know I failed to show you proper care."

"But from today onward, everything changes."

"Starting now, whatever you want, I will do everything in my power to provide it. The Zenin Clan will do the same."

"The Ten Shadows Technique is the strongest inherited technique our clan has passed down for a thousand years."

"Now that you possess it, my good son, you will be the undisputed heir to the Zenin Clan."

Ogi's voice rose with excitement. The light in his eyes grew brighter.

Not just the next generation.

His weakness in producing worthy children had suddenly been erased by Itsuki's rise.

If Ogi defeated Naobito openly, perhaps he could claim leadership for himself.

And if he could not defeat Naobito in public, then assassination was not impossible...

Either way, Itsuki Zenin was his biological son.

His son had mastered the Ten Shadows Technique.

That alone made Itsuki the unquestionable future head of the clan.

Under the dim moonlight, with broken walls and shattered buildings behind them, the father's face burned with greed and hope, while the son's face carried madness and killing intent.

The image was so wrong, so violently mismatched, that even Naobito felt a chill run through him from several steps away.

Seeing Itsuki remain silent, Ogi seemed to think his good son had been moved by the future he described.

He searched his memory for anything that might help repair their relationship. After a moment, he added with apparent sincerity, "Don't worry, son."

"The servants who insulted you before, and the sorcerers who mocked you, will all pay for it in blood."

After saying that, Ogi could not think of any other injustice or humiliation his good son might have suffered.

Silence stretched for a while.

Then Itsuki chuckled.

The sound finally broke the stillness.

"What about my mother?"

"What about the poor woman you personally threw into the depths of the cursed warehouse when I was six?"

Ogi's stunned expression made the boy's face go rigid.

"Ridiculous."

"Absurd."

Itsuki threw his head back and laughed.

He laughed until he coughed. Laughed until tears welled in his eyes.

Tears slid down his bloodstained cheeks as he whispered, mocking himself, "I actually hoped that animal might feel remorse. Maybe even guilt."

"Your mother?" Ogi looked genuinely confused. "She was only an ordinary human."

"A useless woman who could not even control cursed energy. Giving birth to you was the greatest contribution she ever made to the Zenin Clan."

The depths of the cursed warehouse that Itsuki mentioned referred to the Zenin Clan's underground vault for imprisoning cursed spirits.

Remembering the scene from back then, anger rose on Ogi's face.

"That wench deserved to die."

"She actually thought she could take you and leave the Zenin Clan."

Just thinking about it frightened him even now.

If that woman had really taken his precious son away, where would Ogi's chance at becoming clan head have gone?

"I see..."

"So Mother was trying to get me out of this hell."

Four years after it happened, the boy finally learned the truth of his mother's death from the mouth of his dear father.

And four years ago, when the only person in this hell who loved him suddenly died, Itsuki had awakened.

"Forget it," Itsuki said, his voice going flat. "Looking at you for another second makes me feel filthy."

The complex pattern in his scarlet pupils rotated.

Space suddenly opened beside his shoulder.

Two enormous hands burst out and slammed toward Ogi.

Boom!

The entire estate shook as if struck by an earthquake. The aftershock alone ripped the surrounding buildings apart.

Roar!

A monster crawled halfway out of the space beside Itsuki's shoulder, bracing both hands against the cracked ground and roaring at the sky.

Even with only its upper body exposed, it was nearly a hundred meters tall.

The pressure leaking from it was far beyond that of an ordinary special grade cursed spirit, and it swept across the estate like a physical weight.

"A special grade cursed spirit?!"

Naobito leapt aside, eyes bulging as the words tore out of him.

The empty husk of the Ten-Tails had wandered into the wrong universe: the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path.

'Wasn't that boy using the Ten Shadows Technique?'

'Then what is this cursed spirit control technique?'

As the head of the Zenin Clan, Naobito frantically searched through every cursed technique record in his memory.

Step.

Step.

Step.

Itsuki glanced at the old man, whose mind was clearly racing, then walked through the moonlight toward his dear father, who had been smashed into the ground and covered in blood.

The distance had been too short, and Ogi had not expected his good son to strike with such brutal force.

He only had time to wrap his vitals in cursed energy before the Gedo Statue's massive palm left him critically injured.

"Cough... cough..."

Curled in a gouge in the ground, covered in blood, Ogi looked nothing like the arrogant man he had been moments ago.

As his son approached, he struggled with all his remaining strength and staggered to his feet.

The bloodlust in the boy's eyes, the savage malice, and the grotesque cursed spirit looming behind him pressed down like a nightmare.

Only now, half crouched on the ground, did fear and confusion finally appear in Ogi's eyes.

He could not understand it.

She had only been a human.

Even if she was his mother, why would the boy be this furious over her?

If you are not a jujutsu sorcerer, you are not human.

That ancient creed had been carved into Ogi's mind long ago.

"So-"

He managed only one syllable before the world turned upside down and his vision began to dim.

"Wait-"

Naobito arrived half a step too late and sucked in a sharp breath.

Right in front of him, the instant the boy's gaze locked onto Ogi's neck, a surge of strange cursed energy erupted.

Then the space around Ogi's neck tore open and swallowed it whole.

'What technique is that?'

Naobito stared at the ten-year-old boy before him, his face smeared with blood and his expression calm.

Deep in the old man's eyes, a trace of fear flickered and vanished.

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