Deep beneath Shibuya, the twisted and abandoned tracks stretched like the intestines of some colossal beast. Damp mold clung to concrete pillars, and the stagnant air reeked faintly of rust, dust, and blood.
Plink. A drop of viscous liquid seeped from a cracked pipe and hit the ground, its hollow echo slicing through the stillness.
"Oh dear…" A light, bored voice broke the silence.
Mahito sat cross-legged on the cold edge of the tracks, cheek propped on one hand, idly rolling a piece of broken concrete between his fingers. His stitched face showed no grief—only the detached amusement of someone examining a defective toy.
"Dagon is gone, Hanami is gone, and Jogo…" He tilted his head, the stitches pulling into a half-smile. "Oh? Still alive? But captured by those Jujutsu Sorcerers."
He pouted, and the debris in his fingers crumbled to dust. "He probably won't live much longer."
Then he stopped. His heterochromatic eyes flicked toward the shadows beside him.
"By the way," he said, his tone almost playful, "who exactly is that white-haired man, Geto?"
From the darkness, the monk's robe of Geto (Kenjaku) stirred slightly. The calm, knowing smile that usually graced his face was gone—replaced by a deep, solemn inkblot of thought.
His narrow eyes glimmered faintly as he murmured, "Nero… Japan's hottest top star for the past two years."
He absently brushed the hem of his robe, a gesture betraying his inner unrest.
"A complete normal person. No trace of Cursed Energy. No Cursed Technique. Just a singing star."
Mahito's eyes widened. The stitches at his mouth almost tore. "Huh?! A normal person?!"
He burst into incredulous laughter. "Normal enough to slice open Sukuna's Malevolent Shrine? To force the King of Curses back into Itadori's body?!"
He leaned in close, grin twisting. "Hey, Geto, that's not funny! That was Sukuna with fifteen fingers! Domain Expansion! You're telling me he got split—by brute force?!"
Kenjaku didn't respond. His gaze was distant, unreadable. For once, a trace of doubt clouded the ancient intellect that had manipulated centuries. Nero's face; his radiant figure on stage; that pale-blue sword light that had torn through the Shibuya sky—they replayed endlessly in Kenjaku's mind.
"His power…" Kenjaku's voice was slow, deliberate. "It's not Cursed Energy. Not Reverse Cursed Technique. It's purer. A will that erase space itself."
His eyes turned upward, as if seeing through the concrete to the smooth, glass-like plain that had once been Sukuna's domain.
"Sukuna's rules, his slashes, his reality—denied. That plain above is proof. And his humiliation."
"Denied Sukuna's domain…" Mahito's manic grin faltered into awe, then twisted again with feverish excitement. "That's amazing! So twisted! So interesting!"
He leapt to his feet, trembling with obsession. "Such a soul—such an existence! If I could just touch it—"
"Mahito." Geto's voice cut through his frenzy, cold and razor-sharp.
Mahito froze.
"Do not act rashly." Geto's tone was deadly calm, his eyes glinting with a chilling light. "He is the single largest variable beyond the plan—an existence that embodies absolute severance."
"Before your Idle Transfiguration even touches him, your soul—and the space it occupies—will be cut away. There will be no adaptation."
The warning sank deep. For the first time, Mahito felt genuine fear crawl up his stitched spine. "That white-haired man…" he whispered, trembling, "…he's really that dangerous?"
Kenjaku's silence was answer enough. "The variable is born," he said finally, voice low. "The situation has changed. We must—"
Buzz.
A faint spatial ripple brushed the air, like a dragonfly's wing on water.
Too fast. Mahito's pupils shrank to pinpoints— Instinct screamed.
Crack! Splat!
Bones twisted, flesh warped, and his body contorted backward in a grotesque reflex, insectoid wings bursting from his back just as—
Whoosh!
A pale-blue line shimmered where his head had been. The air itself was sliced clean, light divided, the cut so perfect it gleamed like a mirror before fading.
Mahito trembled violently, cold sweat pouring down his face. Just one instant slower, and he would've been bisected soul and all. He looked to where Kenjaku had stood—
Empty. Only faint spatial ripples remained.
"Geto ran away?!" Rage surged, humiliated and betrayed. "DAMN YOU GETO~!!!"
"Found you, Mahito."
The voice came flat, emotionless—a verdict from the abyss. At the tunnel's mouth stood a man bathed in faint red emergency light. White hair glowed like snow under moonlight.
One hand rested casually on the hilt at his waist, his eyes deep and still, regarding Mahito like an unsalvageable specimen.
"No, no! You can't kill me!!!" Mahito shrieked, his monstrous body convulsing. His soul burned with terror—the terror not of death, but erasure.
Taisai's expression did not change. "A curse that twists souls," he said quietly. "The most unrecyclable waste."
Buzz.
The Yamato unsheathed with a whisper. No aura. No explosion of energy. Just a flick of the wrist—
Clang.
A pale-blue arc flashed. Air folded. Space screamed.
Swish. Swish. Swish.
The sound of impossibility.
Mahito froze mid-transformation. Every cell, every fragment of his soul, was seized by a power beyond reason— and then—
Puff. Puff. Puff. Puff—!
Countless, microscopic cuts burst simultaneously across his body and essence. Not wounds. Deletions. Existence itself was pruning him from reality.
Mahito's mind blanked into nothingness. There was no pain—only the dawning horror of not existing. His body sagged, stitches slackening, eyes empty. Taisai Tensei gave him not even a final glance.
He sliced once across the air—
Rip!
A glowing cross split the void, revealing a cold night sky beyond. As he stepped through, his voice echoed through the tunnel, low and glacial:
"Kenjaku." The air itself froze.
"Don't disturb me. I'm not interested in your tricks— including your Culling Game."
He paused. "I won't stop Sukuna from regaining his power."
A faint smirk—no joy, only disdain. "But—"
The pressure shifted. Space itself halted. Droplets froze mid-fall. "If you disturb me… or the people around me—"
His figure faded into the pale-blue cross, leaving behind a single, chilling decree: "I will cut you down."
The rift sealed. Silence returned. Mahito's corpse cracked— crack, crack
—and then shattered. Billions of blue-glowing fragments scattered into dust.
No trace remained.