Name Your Price

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"Cursed Spirit Manipulation..."

"No wonder this excellent body caught your eye."

Itsuki put down his teacup and rose slowly, resting one hand on the coffin lid.

"Before Okkotsu appeared, the entire jujutsu world had only three officially recognized special grade sorcerers."

He paused, then smiled. "Right. Perhaps you should count me as a special-grade-level threat now too."

"But the easiest one to obtain..."

"Was Suguru Geto."

Seeing Kenjaku's expression darken, Itsuki continued with a smile.

"Is arrogance a common illness among sorcerers?"

"When it comes to monkeys without cursed energy, you really don't take them seriously at all."

Itsuki sat back down on the sofa.

"For an old monster who has lived a thousand years, that's a bad habit."

"Judging surveillance only by cursed energy residue..."

"You should change that habit. One day, it might cost you badly."

"After a thousand years of development, the monkeys' technology is not something to underestimate."

"I see."

Kenjaku lifted the hot tea from the table and nodded. "On the surface, you had sorcerers watching me. In secret, you also used surveillance that left no cursed energy trail."

"With disguised monitoring equipment, it would indeed be hard to notice."

"The Zenin Clan's Kukuru Unit..."

Seeing that Itsuki did not refute him, Kenjaku lowered his head and revealed a faint, shadowed smile.

"Well planned. You really did lead me by the nose."

During the period he had spent as Itadori's mother, Kenjaku had indeed observed Suguru Geto from a distance in secret.

The faint sense of being watched at that time must have come from the Zenin Clan's technique-less fighters in the Kukuru Unit.

No wonder this person had used Suguru Geto to stage such an invitation.

Kenjaku suddenly dipped his finger directly into the boiling tea and stirred it.

"So, old friend, after putting on this little performance-"

He stopped abruptly, and cursed energy erupted in an instant.

Boom.

Rolling dust filled the air. The sofa in front of him was reduced to drifting splinters.

A vast hole yawned open before him, so deep its bottom could not be seen, releasing endless darkness.

The earth continued trembling. Pebbles jumped across the ground. From the bottom of the hole came muffled, violent impacts, while Kenjaku's cursed energy swelled higher and higher.

Dense cursed energy became a surging black tide, carrying overwhelming gravity as it poured into the pit.

Two barriers away, on the second underground level, Naobito and Hisashi silently exchanged a glance as dust and sand shook loose from the stone ceiling.

The impact from outside and the unfamiliar cursed energy rising into the sky had both reached them.

Juzo Kumiya, forging a cursed tool, froze with his hammer in the air.

Haruta Shigemo, busy chopping apart cursed spirits, accidentally destroyed the core of the cursed spirit in front of him, reducing it to ash.

"Let me out..."

The wooden door across from Juzo's room slowly opened a crack.

"I truly did disregard non-sorcerers."

Kenjaku stood and looked down into the pit beneath his feet, sighing with narrowed eyes.

"But jujutsu sorcerers... especially a special-grade-level threat like you..."

"How could I come here seeking answers while knowing nothing at all?"

Information from the Kamo Clan. Reports provided by Jujutsu High's higher-ups.

Itsuki Zenin.

A genius sorcerer who had first appeared publicly at age eleven.

Confirmed by Shoko Ieiri and rated internally by Jujutsu High as special-grade-level.

Kenjaku had his own informants and unusual sources of intelligence.

The Ten Shadows Technique. A spatial technique. An unknown special grade cursed spirit.

There was no such thing as a flawless cursed technique in this world.

Every technique had a weakness. The only question was how large or small it was.

Take the phasing Itsuki had shown.

Combining what Itsuki had displayed during the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons, Kenjaku had drawn his conclusion.

Source of information: a Kamo Clan sorcerer who had participated in the Night Parade in Shinjuku.

According to that witness, Itsuki had stood high in the air on a shikigami. His upper body ignored the raging wind, while the fabric around his legs clearly moved.

Phasing. A method that could ignore any physical attack.

Weakness: the technique did not cover the entire body twenty-four hours a day.

Walking, moving, even lifting a teacup.

Those were all moments when flaws appeared.

If one seized that opening and used an attack large enough to cover the entire body, the phasing could naturally be broken.

Kenjaku walked around the hole and approached the coffin.

He had lost interest in Itsuki's purpose.

Once a person died, purpose disappeared with them.

That gravity technique just now, combined with the black tide he had released at full power...

If someone took it head-on, even a special grade would be reduced to pulp.

Except Satoru Gojo.

Kenjaku reached for the coffin lid, malice sharpening the smile at his mouth.

"That impatient?"

A teasing voice echoed from the bottom of the pit.

Terrifying cursed energy, erupting like a volcano, surged straight into the sky.

Countless withered branch blades shot upward like stars pouring backward across the heavens.

Boom. Boom.

Kenjaku's expression changed, and he drove his gravity cursed technique down with all his strength to resist the force rising from below.

A throne woven from withered branches slowly rose from the collapsed ground.

Itsuki sat with one hand propping up his head, scarlet eyes turning.

"Since you're already planning to change bodies, a little injury now shouldn't matter, right?"

"Technique Extension: Tremor."

Like ripples spreading across a lake struck by a stone, invisible waves moved through space and surged toward Kenjaku.

Kenjaku's expression shifted dramatically.

"Wait-"

He had barely opened his mouth in shock when his face twisted.

His lower body, legs, muscles, nerves, bones, even the blood inside them, all seemed to scream at once.

Bang.

Both legs exploded into a cloud of blood-red powder.

Without his legs to support him, Kenjaku fell forward into a pool of blood, facing Itsuki.

It looked like a condemned man kneeling before a throne: Itsuki looked down from above, and Kenjaku bowed low beneath him.

"I really can't underestimate you at all, Kenjaku."

Itsuki spoke without expression.

"Without these eyes, you might actually have caught me."

"Couldn't we have negotiated properly?"

"I prepared this gift for you from the start. There was no need to make such a mess."

Itsuki shook his head repeatedly, sounding almost regretful.

As a rule, someone who could use Reverse Cursed Technique was not necessarily a big player.

But every big player could use Reverse Cursed Technique.

Firelight reflected off Kenjaku's dim side profile.

The scraps of flesh, broken bones, and blood-colored skin still connecting the ruined legs visibly rebuilt themselves.

With no clothing covering them, the woman's long, straight legs were streaked with blood and disturbingly alluring.

As long as one did not look up at the face darkened like still water.

"State your terms."

Despite occupying a female body, Kenjaku did not care in the slightest that Itsuki's gaze swept across his lower half.

"See? Much better."

Withered branches stretched from the Kamui Dimension, flexibly carrying two brand-new sofas back into the pavilion.

Itsuki even thoughtfully prepared a pair of men's casual pants for Kenjaku's lower body.

Kenjaku might not care about being exposed, but Itsuki still felt a little awkward.

Above the bottomless pit, the two sat across from each other once again.

"Now then..."

Itsuki spoke first, his eyes faintly bright.

"Let's renegotiate the purchase of Suguru Geto's corpse."

Kenjaku brushed aside the hair over his forehead, his voice cold as ice.

"Name your price."

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