The tendrils reached forward like the fingers of a dying god, curling through the ash until they brushed Sora's shoes. They weren't cold—they were dry, like old paper or brittle bone.
The woman turned without another word and walked straight into the shifting mass. She didn't sink or vanish; the world around her simply bent, as though reality made space for her to pass.
Gojo raised a brow at Sora. "Ladies first?"
"Funny," Sora muttered, stepping in before he could change his mind.
---
The instant he crossed the threshold, the air broke.
Colors bled away, sound thinned, and the ground gave a low, distant hum—like the earth was holding its breath.
The Hollow Veil wasn't darkness—it was half-light. Everything looked as though it was trapped between night and dawn. Towering silhouettes of buildings stretched into a sky that bent in impossible curves. The walls of the world seemed both near and infinite.
Gojo appeared beside him, hands in his pockets, surveying the warped skyline. "Looks like someone dropped Tokyo in a blender and forgot the lid."
---
The woman moved ahead, her coat flowing unnaturally behind her, as if the wind here obeyed her alone.
"This is the Veil," she said without turning. "A place where curses and memory overlap. It doesn't obey your rules… or mine."
Sora's skin prickled.
"Feels like it's watching," he said quietly.
"It is," she replied.
---
They walked for what felt like minutes—or hours. The streets weren't streets anymore; they bent in slow, spiraling arcs, folding into themselves. Shadows detached from the objects that cast them, crawling along the ground like spilled ink.
At one corner, Sora froze.
A shape stood ahead.
It was… him.
---
The other Sora was pale, lips cracked, eyes too wide. He stood in the center of the road, whispering something too faint to hear.
Sora stepped closer. "Hey—"
The double looked up sharply. His eyes were red. The same crimson as the heart in the Moon's Grave.
And then he spoke.
"They're lying to you."
---
Gojo's cursed energy flared for a split second, sharp enough to sting the air. The double turned his head slowly toward Gojo, smiled, and bled away into mist—leaving only the echo of his last words.
Sora's chest tightened. "What the hell was that?"
The woman didn't slow her pace.
"A memory. Or a warning. The Veil doesn't care which."
---
The ground rumbled.
From the mist ahead, a shape began to form—taller than a building, stitched together from pieces of blackened bone and steel. Its "face" was a hole, edges jagged like shattered glass.
Gojo sighed. "And here comes the welcome committee."
---
The woman stopped and finally turned to face them.
"You want the truth, boy? Earn it."
Before Sora could ask what she meant, the monster moved.
The sound it made wasn't a roar—it was the collapse of a hundred ceilings at once. Its tendrils lashed out, slamming into the road hard enough to shatter it.
Gojo stepped forward.
"Try not to die," he said lazily, and in the next heartbeat, he was gone—a blur of speed and precision, Infinity rippling around him as the tendrils snapped uselessly in his direction.
---
The woman glanced at Sora.
"You're not here to watch him. Fight."
Something inside Sora—maybe fear, maybe instinct—answered. The air around him grew heavy, and from the ground, black shapes began to crawl upward like shadows pulled from another world.
The monster shifted, tendrils swinging toward him now.
---
One struck the ground where he stood, ash and debris spraying. Sora dodged, the black shapes at his feet leaping with him, forming jagged spears that shot toward the creature's open "face."
It didn't flinch.
Instead, it ate them—pulling the black energy into its void mouth, making its form pulse darker.
The woman's voice cut through the chaos. "Careful. This place feeds on you."
---
Gojo's voice came from somewhere high above. "Kid—stop giving it free snacks and hit it where it can't chew!"
Sora gritted his teeth, focusing. Instead of attacking directly, he pulled the black shapes back into himself, letting them curl tight around his arms like armor. The monster lunged—too fast for its size—and Sora stepped forward, shoving his arm straight into the edge of its "face."
There was a snap, and the entire world seemed to shudder.
---
The creature reeled, its tendrils flailing wildly. The woman's expression didn't change, but her eyes narrowed just slightly—as if she'd just confirmed something.
Gojo landed beside Sora, Infinity humming faintly.
"Not bad, kid."
But before the monster could collapse, it burst apart—not into ash, but into dozens of smaller shapes, each with their own jagged mouths.
The woman's voice was calm.
"And now… we see if you survive the real fight."