The stench of iron was thick enough to choke the lungs. Within the skeletal remains of the city, blood flowed like a river, turning the cracked pavement into a glistening, crimson lake.
Emperor Sutoku sat suspended in the air, encased within an endless, swirling sea of red. Like Choso, the Emperor possessed the ability to convert his cursed energy directly into blood for the use of Blood Manipulation. However, the sheer scale was incomparable. Sutoku's cursed energy was a bottomless abyss, and the result was this hellish tide.
It was a terrifying demonstration of quantity becoming quality. Within this rushing flood of gore, even a Special Grade curse would find itself pulverized in seconds.
But the Emperor was not finished. His hollow eyes locked onto Suguru Geto, and he slowly raised a hand.
"Blood Manipulation: Army of Blood."
With that singular motion, the blood began to thicken and coagulate, shaping itself into the forms of armored soldiers, helms gleaming and spears sharpened. In the blink of an eye, a vast, silent legion of crimson specters stood before Geto.
One man as an army. One man to topple a nation. This was the pinnacle of a Special Grade—this was the true face of Blood Manipulation.
The reason the Kamo clan had never reached this height was simple: none of their descendants possessed such a monstrous reservoir of cursed energy. Just as the Limitless requires the Six Eyes to function at its peak, and the Ten Shadows requires the taming of Mahoraga to reach the summit, Blood Manipulation required a sea of energy to manifest the "Army of Blood."
The inherited techniques of the Big Three were all demanding mistresses. There were no "weak" techniques—only sorcerers who couldn't pay the price.
"KILL!!!"
The blood legion let out a roar that shook the heavens. Like a breaking dam, they surged forward. Cavalry charged on hissing, crimson steeds, their hooves striking sparks against the stone. Where they passed, nothing was left standing.
In the face of such a tide, an individual's strength would normally be ground into the dirt within seconds. Yet Suguru Geto did not flinch. Instead, a sharp, exhilarated smile spread across his face.
"So, it's going to be that kind of fight, is it?" Geto whispered. "Unfortunate for you... you've met your match."
"Cursed Spirit Manipulation: Technique Reversal—Bestow."
Geto slammed his palm into the earth. Shadows bloomed from his hand like spilled ink, spreading across the ruins. From that darkness, countless cursed spirits began to crawl—spirits of all shapes, sizes, and terrors.
Within moments, a rival army of monsters stood at his back.
One man as an army.
Geto ascended into the air, perched atop the back of a giant Pelican curse. He looked down upon the Emperor and his legion. Detecting the gaze, Sutoku looked up. In those once-hollow eyes, a spark of genuine "battle intent" finally ignited.
The two generals sneered at each other over their respective hordes. The war was on.
"CHARGE!!!"
"ROAR!!!"
The two armies collided with the force of two tidal waves crashing together. Meat met blood; steel met fang. The battlefield, already scarred by conflict, became a literal meat grinder. The fire and smoke of a medieval era erupted in the middle of a modern metropolis.
As the minions tore each other apart, the generals engaged. Geto dived from the sky, his mount screaming. Sutoku met him halfway, leaping with a shriek of his own.
"Blood Manipulation: Blood Meteorite!"
The Emperor compressed blood into a hyper-dense, hardened mass, shaping it into a massive war hammer. He swung it with bone-shattering force.
Geto didn't dodge. He was a close-quarters combatant at heart. He pulled the Special Grade tool, Playful Cloud, from his sleeve and swung with everything he had.
BOOM!!!
The war hammer shattered under the raw physical force of the three-section staff.
"Convergence: Piercing Blood!"
Sutoku fired a jet of blood like a sniper round. Geto summoned a giant squid curse to act as a shield, the ink absorbing the impact. Then, he counterattacked, a backhand strike from Playful Cloud sending the Emperor reeling. Cursed energy gathered in Geto's palm.
"Maximum: Uzumaki!"
The spiraling beam of high-density energy tore a hole through the Emperor's torso. But Geto didn't have time to celebrate. A sudden, suffocating pressure erupted from the wounded spirit.
"What is this...?"
The surrounding sea of blood rushed inward, enveloping the Emperor in a cocoon. It expanded, growing until it stood over a hundred meters tall.
It was a colossal figure with crimson skin, the face of a demon with an impossibly long nose, dressed in ornate robes with a great blade at its hip and wings that blotted out the moon.
"Technique Release: Crimson Great Tengu."
"A... Gundam?" Geto couldn't help but mutter.
The Great Tengu drew its massive blade and swung. The forty-meter edge whistled through the air, driven by a gale-force wind. Geto's mount was sliced clean in two before he could blink. The shockwave of the blade continued, carving a trench hundreds of meters long into the earth.
"Cursed Spirit Manipulation: Rainbow Dragon!"
Countless Rainbow Dragons burst from the shadows, merging into a singular, colossal beast nearly three hundred meters long. Geto stood atop its head, his eyes cold.
The Tengu swung again, aiming to cleave the dragon.
"Jogo!"
Geto summoned a miniature Jogo-like curse, which flew directly into the path of the blade and detonated. The explosion threw the strike off course, and the Rainbow Dragon lunged, coiling its massive body around the Tengu's limbs in a crushing embrace. The dragon's jagged maw tore one of the Tengu's wings from its back.
"ROAR—"
"SCREE—"
The two titans grappled, shaking the very foundations of the city. Geto blurred through the air, weaving between the thrashing giants until he reached the Tengu's chest.
"Maximum: Uzumaki!"
BOOM!!!
The Tengu's chest cavity was blown open. Geto reached into the gore and yanked Emperor Sutoku's core body out.
Deprived of its pilot, the Great Tengu collapsed like a toy with its batteries removed. Under the Dragon's final squeeze, it dissolved into a massive deluge of falling blood. Below, the Army of Blood vanished into ash.
Geto cracked his neck. "Looks like I win."
"Yes... it seems I've lost."
"Hmm?"
In his final moments, Sutoku's sanity returned. Geto landed on the Dragon's head, watching the spirit whose eyes were now clear and calm. "You've actually woken up."
Sutoku gave a tired, graceful smile. "A final moment of clarity before the end. You are strong. To have fought you as my life departs is an honor."
Geto nodded respectfully. "To have faced one of the Four Great Vengeful Spirits was an honor of my own."
"Vengeful Spirit? Ah... yes. Through my own curse, that is what I became." Then, the Emperor seemed to remember something. "Tell me... how is the current Emperor faring?"
Geto knew the history—Sutoku had been a puppet emperor, betrayed and exiled, dying with a curse on his lips to "disturb the heavens and make the people kings, and kings the people."
Geto blinked. "Uh... well... the current Emperor, his brother, and about thirty members of the imperial family... were all assassinated by Kenjaku recently."
Sutoku froze. Then, he began to laugh—a deep, resonant belly laugh.
"Hahahaha! Divine retribution! Retribution indeed!"
"Hahahaha!"
With the sound of laughter still echoing in the ruins, Emperor Sutoku dissolved into light.
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