Bang!
With a muffled gunshot, the signal flare released by Principal Gakuganji burst into a cloud of crimson smoke against the clear blue sky.
The Kyoto Sister School Exchange Event group battle had officially begun.
Within the dense forest, the atmosphere instantly became tense to the extreme.
Representing the elite young sorcerers of both schools, the students charged into the vast battlefield.
Yuji took the lead, his feet kicking off thick tree trunks as he darted through the forest like a nimble leopard.
After enduring the double hellish training sessions from Rin and Gojo Satoru, his control over his body was no longer what it once was.
Whoosh!
A towering figure crashed through the bushes ahead without any attempt to hide his presence, blocking Yuji's path like a heavily armored war chariot.
Kyoto Jujutsu High third-year, Aoi Todo.
"Come on, Tokyo first-year! Let me see how tough your bones are!"
Todo grinned broadly, the scar across his face twisting with excitement.
Without using his Cursed Technique, he threw a punch the size of a sandbag, violent Cursed Energy wrapped around his fist as it blasted straight toward Yuji's face.
Faced with the overwhelming strike, Yuji didn't retreat.
"Divergent Fist!"
The muscles in his right arm suddenly swelled, and the delayed burst of Cursed Energy exploded immediately after the physical impact.
Two completely different forces collided violently in midair, unleashing a deafening shockwave.
Bang!
The surrounding leaves were swept into the air by the violent gusts. Todo's massive body swayed slightly, while unprecedented excitement erupted in his eyes.
"Good! Your hand-to-hand combat fundamentals are insanely solid! But before I beat you down, there's one question I need answered."
Todo suddenly withdrew his fist and struck an unusually serious pose.
"What kind of woman is your type?"
Yuji froze, completely unable to follow this bizarre train of thought, but instinctively answered anyway.
"Tall girls with big butts, I guess... like Jennifer Lawrence."
Before he could even finish speaking, tears instantly filled Todo's eyes.
Inside his bizarre imagination, memories of a youthful school life that had never existed flashed by like scenes from a movie reel, showing the two of them spending their days together as best friends.
"So that's how it is... We are true best friends, brother!"
Todo roared toward the sky.
Just as the two muscle-brained idiots, who had somehow become "best friends," were about to start a passionate brawl, a sudden change occurred.
Hum—~~!
A vast mass of pitch-black Cursed Energy suddenly erupted from the edge of Jujutsu High's barrier, so overwhelming that it made the air feel suffocating.
Immediately afterward, a hemispherical curtain as dark as ink descended from the sky.
This Curtain operated under an extremely bizarre condition. Its barrier rules were exceptionally strict:
"Reject Gojo Satoru. All others may enter."
"What the hell? The sky turned black!" Yuji looked upward, already sensing the nauseating smell of blood spreading through the air.
The grin on Todo's face disappeared, replaced by the cold composure of a Grade 1 sorcerer.
"Intruders have entered. And... they're here to kill."
Meanwhile, elsewhere within the battlefield—
Megumi, Toge Inumaki, and Noritoshi Kamo stood back-to-back in a defensive formation, staring ahead as though facing a terrifying enemy.
Standing in the clearing before them was a bizarre Cursed Spirit with pale skin and tree branches piercing through its eyes.
Its left arm was wrapped in bloodstained white cloth. Every step it took caused the grass beneath its feet to instantly wither, only for twisted thorny vines to sprout in its wake.
Special Grade Cursed Spirit, Hanami.
"Return this forest to nature. Humanity is the ugliest disease upon this planet."
Hanami's voice did not travel through the air. Instead, it echoed directly within their minds, carrying an ancient heaviness and compassion that felt as though it belonged to the forest itself.
Yet its actions held no mercy whatsoever.
Swish! Swish! Swish!
Countless thick, razor-sharp wooden roots burst from the earth, weaving together like living creatures into an inescapable net as they strangled toward the trio.
"Bonito flakes!"
Inumaki yanked down his collar, revealing the Snake and Fangs seal on his throat as he spat out a mouthful of blood.
"Stop!"
The power of Cursed Speech rippled outward like an invisible shockwave.
The wildly expanding roots froze midair for an instant.
"Now! Divine Dog: Totality!"
Megumi formed a hand sign, and a massive jet-black wolf shikigami burst forward with a roar, its sharp claws tearing apart the thorny roots ahead.
Kamo moved in immediately after, biting his fingertip to activate Blood Manipulation.
"Crimson Binding: Convergence!"
Several arrows formed from compressed high-density blood shot forward with piercing sonic booms, striking Hanami directly in the face.
Boom!
Smoke and dust exploded into the air.
The three stared at the center of the blast while breathing heavily. With their coordination, that attack should have been enough to exorcise an ordinary Grade 1 Cursed Spirit instantly.
But when the smoke cleared, Hanami was still standing there silently.
A few shallow craters had been blasted into its face by the blood arrows, but under the circulation of its immense Cursed Energy, the wounds healed at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Hanami slowly raised its hand and tore away the white cloth wrapped around its left arm.
It was an arm made entirely of dead wood and twisted vines, with a massive budding flower parasitically growing from it.
"Futile struggle."
Hanami violently swung its left arm.
"Cursed Technique: Flower Offering!"
A shower of petals drifted down from the sky.
Yet accompanying the beautiful scene was a despair that drained away all vitality.
The instant the petals touched Toge, his eyes rolled back as he collapsed to the ground, coughing up mouthfuls of blood.
"Inumaki-senpai!"
Megumi's expression changed drastically as he rushed forward to save him.
But at that moment, a wooden dragon as thick as a water barrel suddenly burst out beneath Hanami's feet. It opened its massive jaws, bit down on Divine Dog: Totality's neck, and slammed the shikigami violently into the ground.
"Blood—"
Kamo tried to counterattack, but a sharp vine erupting from behind pierced straight through his shoulder, pinning him helplessly in midair.
The difference in strength was absolute.
In front of a truly battle-hardened Special Grade Cursed Spirit, the defenses of Jujutsu High's elite students collapsed instantly.
"Die. Return to the embrace of the earth."
Hanami walked toward the half-kneeling Megumi, raised the wooden thorn protruding from its right hand high into the air, and mercilessly thrust it toward his heart.
The shadow of death filled Megumi's vision.
He bit down on his lip, his hands rapidly forming signs as he prepared to forcibly summon the uncontrollable Eight-Handled Sword Divergent Sila Divine General Mahoraga and drag the enemy down with him.
Then, at that critical instant..
Zzzzzzt—!
A deafening screech of lightning erupted from deep within the forest, violent enough to tear apart eardrums.
A dazzling bolt of purple-black lightning descended from the sky at extreme speed. The air along its path was instantly vaporized by the overwhelming energy, leaving behind a straight vacuum trail.
Boom!!!
The purple-black lightning slammed violently into Hanami's raised right arm.
Rip!
A harsh tearing sound echoed through the battlefield.
Hanami's right arm was severed cleanly at the shoulder. The stump was charred pitch-black, crackling with lingering high-voltage arcs that completely suppressed its rapid regeneration.
"What?!"
The enormous force blasted Hanami backward repeatedly, carving two deep trenches into the ground.
Its branch-pierced eye sockets stared fixedly ahead as an unprecedented sense of fear rose within it.
The destructive force contained within that lightning did not belong to the Cursed Energy system at all.
It was pure destruction taken to the extreme, a fusion of overwhelming physical force and crushing spiritual pressure.
Amid the lightning-filled smoke and dust..
The crisp sound of leather boots crushing dead branches echoed slowly through the forest.
"A pile of rotten wood dares to bark nonsense here."
Rin held the Kusanagi Sword in one hand, his black trench coat fluttering in the fading currents of Lightning Release.
He stepped past the collapsed Megumi, his pitch-black eyes coldly locking onto Hanami ahead.
"Mr. Rin?!"
Megumi's eyes widened as though he had finally grasped a lifeline in the depths of despair.
"Step back. This thing's blood will stain your uniform."
Rin's voice remained completely flat, without the slightest emotional fluctuation.
Yet the arrogance in his tone, as though life and death were entirely within his grasp, made everyone's scalp tingle.
Hanami sensed the undisguised contempt.
As a Special Grade Cursed Spirit born from humanity's fear of forests, it possessed exceptionally high intelligence and pride.
"Arrogant human. Your flames and lightning are nothing more than crude blasphemy against nature!"
Hanami let out a low roar as its intact left arm slammed into the ground.
"Domain Amplification—"
It intended to unleash its strongest trump card and drag this dangerous man into its domain.
But Rin never gave it the chance to finish speaking.
"Too slow."
Within his dark eyes, faint purple ripples spread instantly, and six black tomoe locked into place within his pupils.
Amenotejikara.
Hum—~~!
Rin's figure vanished instantly, replaced only by a falling dead leaf.
At the same moment, he appeared directly above Hanami.
"What are you looking for down there, bonsai?"
The cold voice exploded beside Hanami's ear.
Hanami was instantly horrified. It tried to raise its head to defend itself, but Rin's right leg had already crashed down brutally onto the back of its head.
Boom!!!
A violent shockwave erupted outward in all directions.
Hanami's supposedly indestructible head was smashed directly into its chest cavity by that monstrous strength.
Its massive body was driven into the earth like a cannonball beneath Rin's stomp.
The ground within a hundred-meter radius collapsed with a deafening roar, forming a gigantic funnel-shaped crater.
The surrounding ancient trees were uprooted one after another, exploding into countless wood fragments that filled the sky.
"Wraaaagh!"
Hanami let out a piercing scream from the bottom of the crater.
Its body had nearly been flattened, and large amounts of Cursed Spirit blood poured out continuously.
Had it not possessed the terrifying vitality of a Special Grade Cursed Spirit, that kick alone would have completely obliterated it.
Rin landed steadily at the edge of the crater and looked down at the mangled mass below from above.
Slowly, he drew the Kusanagi Sword.
Purple-black lightning gathered around the blade once more, crackling violently with a piercing roar.
"Where is that stitched-up cripple controlling you?"
The tip of Rin's sword pointed downward at Hanami in the pit, his killing intent so overwhelming it felt almost tangible, locking the Cursed Spirit firmly in place.
"Tell him to crawl out here."
"Otherwise, I'll chop you into firewood, piece by piece."
___
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