Chapter 86 — The Battle Begins!
With the last finger shoved into Itadori's mouth, Jogo settled back and waited.
"All ten fingers have been fed. Right now the vessel contains the power of at least fifteen of Sukuna's fingers," Jogo counted the enemy's potential.
Nearby, Nanako and Mimiko had survived—smoke from the flames still curled around them, but they were alive.
"You mean they lived?" Jogo blinked. He hadn't expected these two to make it. "Must be one of their techniques."
He lifted his left hand, aiming to finish off the two clueless girls once and for all.
Snap.
This time Jogo's arm was severed.
"Move. One second. Get out of here."
Sukuna opened his eyes; a faint red gleam shone within them.
Jogo felt an overwhelming pressure at once and leapt aside, joining Nanako and Mimiko. The mushroom-top cursed spirit literally broke out in a cold sweat—Sukuna's power felt nothing like Gojo's. It was raw, absolute evil: pure and crushing. Against Sukuna, any movement might be grounds for execution.
Nanako and Mimiko supported one another, gasping as if even breathing had become difficult.
"We should still be able to breathe… right?" Mimiko thought, praying silently that Sukuna wouldn't decide they'd earned death.
Sukuna rose and walked toward them; each step felt like a weight pressing on their chests. Time itself seemed to slow.
"You're standing too tall," he said, flipping his hair, expression indifferent.
At once both girls and the cursed spirit knelt without hesitation.
Sukuna's blade sliced through the air, trailing right past their heads and gouging a deep scar in the wall behind. Jogo—still partly kneeling—had a chunk cleaved off his volcanic head.
"Glurp."
"Did you think one knee would be enough?" Sukuna sneered at Jogo, then turned to the two girls. "You two kids probably have a favor to ask me. For the sake of one finger, I'll listen. Speak."
Free again, Sukuna appeared in a surprisingly good mood.
"There's a man with a stitched forehead wearing a priest's robe—please, kill him," Nanako and Mimiko pleaded, pressing their heads to the ground.
They'd mourned Getō's death, but they accepted that Gojo was Getō's friend and wouldn't go after him. What they could not forgive was someone who toyed with Getō's corpse.
Footsteps echoed slowly, the sound stark in the hush. A tall figure entered Sukuna's peripheral vision.
"Two kids begging Sukuna? Don't you realize that man with the stitched forehead and that guy are on the same side?" came a mocking voice.
Zen'in Shinsuke strolled up to Sukuna, smiling. Because of their height difference, Sukuna had to tilt his head to meet Shinsuke's gaze.
"Instead of begging me, maybe you should try to rescue Gojo—he's more reliable than that other fellow. Right, Sukuna?" Shinsuke leered down, wearing an oddly friendly smile.
The sudden arrival of Shinsuke made the two girls and Jogo swallow hard. Who speaks to Sukuna like that and lives? Wouldn't they all get dragged into whatever comes next? They wanted to run, now.
Sukuna didn't flare into instant rage—he didn't dismiss Shinsuke as small fry either.
"Don't get the wrong idea. This has nothing to do with Gojo. I was following this fire-pot fellow and thought I'd see what the King of Curses looks like," Shinsuke shrugged. "Pity it's not you at full strength."
"Heh. Even now I can kill you," Sukuna replied with a smile. A kill-glow had already crept into his eyes; he'd been provoked. Killing this irritating man now would remove any future obstacle—especially since the boy he'd fixated on, Megumi, was Shinsuke's nephew.
"If you're so eager to die, the two of you can attack together—since I'm here to dispose of curses, I might as well take a swing at you too," Sukuna added, voice laced with menace.
— and with that, the battlefield tightened like a drawn bow. The true fight had finally begun.
Zen'in Shinsuke glanced between Sukuna and the kneeling, trembling "firepot head" Jogo, a playful grin curling at the corner of his mouth.
"Well," he drawled, "I guess it's as good a time as any to stretch my arms."
Swish!
Without warning, an invisible lattice of slicing force shot toward him, cutting through the air like a net of razors.
Whoosh—!
But just as the countless blades of cursed energy were about to shred him to pieces, Shinsuke moved. His hands and blade flickered at a speed too fast for the naked eye to follow.
Every strike was parried, deflected, and destroyed before it could even touch him.
The sheer shockwave from his defense sent Nanako, Mimiko, and Jogo flying several meters backward.
When the air cleared, Shinsuke stood completely unharmed, casually raising the short reverse-edged blade in his hand—the Heavenly Inverted Spear (Tenrikubō).
"Hey now," he said mildly, "a little warning next time before you start throwing slashes around, yeah?
If you wanna fight, let's at least take it outside."
Sukuna's expression stayed unreadable. He eyed the short blade, the faint cursed glow running along its spiral-etched edge.
"I see… a fine weapon indeed," he murmured.
His sharp gaze took in its properties at once—the nullification of cursed techniques.
But even more intriguing was the man wielding it.
No cursed energy, Sukuna noted, yet he sensed my slashes and intercepted them by instinct alone.
He smiled—a slow, wolfish grin spreading across his face. "You're the first to do that.
Interesting. I think I might actually enjoy myself today. Try to last more than a minute."
The instant he finished speaking—
Both men vanished.
A deafening BOOM followed an instant later as their clash erupted outside the skyscraper.
The shockwave ripped through the building, shattering every window in an instant. Lights flickered violently, steel groaned, and the whole structure trembled on its foundation.
Razor-edged aftershocks tore through the air, carving deep gashes into walls and pillars alike.
Jogo's molten eyes widened. He turned and bolted toward the exit, his instincts screaming.
He needed to see this fight—to understand.
Everything unfolding now was far beyond their plan.
Why—why was there someone in Shibuya capable of fighting Sukuna head-on?
According to Getō (or rather, that thing wearing Getō's body), his own strength was said to be roughly equal to seven or eight fingers of Sukuna's power.
And yet this man—the one who'd slaughtered Hanami and Dagon—was holding his ground against a fifteen-finger Sukuna.
It made no sense.
When they first met, the man hadn't even seemed that strong—maybe around Jogo's level at best.
But now, faced with the truth before his eyes, Jogo had to admit it: Hanami and Dagon hadn't died unjustly.
They had been crushed by a monster wearing human skin.
Behind him, Nanako and Mimiko trembled in the ruined lobby.
"Mimiko, we have to leave—now," Nanako said, forcing her voice steady. "We'll find another way to reclaim Master Getō's body."
She pulled out her phone, snapping the two of them into her screen with her technique.
That other man's words echoed in her mind—"Sukuna and that stitched-forehead bastard are on the same side."
Maybe… maybe he was right.
Maybe rescuing Gojo Satoru was the only path left.
After all, Master Getō had been Gojo's dearest friend.
If anyone would rage at seeing his body defiled, it would be Gojo himself.
And as the sky outside split with light from the battle of gods, Nanako tightened her grip on the phone—
vowing that this time, she'd make the right choice.