This entire training was pointless, fighting cursed spirits was a joke, the problem was finding them, even with my eyes I only found 3 cursed spirits so far.
The sun was already beginning to dip lower through the trees, painting the dirt path in long orange streaks. The evening was close.
I exhaled slowly.
At least I could head home now.
'Looks like I will have to waste another day hunting for a cursed spirit. Actually do I even have to, they never even told us how they track how much cursed spirits we killed'
That was when I felt it.
A presence.
Not a curse.
A Human. Deliberately concealed—but not well enough.
I slowed my steps.
The forest was supposed to be restricted today. Only clan members and authorized personnel should have been anywhere near these grounds.
Which meant whoever this was… didn't belong.
My hand drifted casually toward the pocket of my jacket.
"I know you're there," I said without turning. "You might as well come out."
For a moment, there was only silence.
Then slow, mocking applause echoed from behind a tree.
"Well, well… the little Kamo rat noticed me."
A man stepped onto the path.
Late twenties, maybe early thirties. Messy dark hair. Worn boots. A thin scar running across his cheek. He looked like someone who had lived more on battlefields than in classrooms—and lost more often than he won.
His eyes ran over me with open contempt.
"So you're one of them, huh?" he muttered. "Figures. Even a brat like you walks around dripping with cursed energy."
I studied him calmly.
"Why are you here? The clan forest is closed off to outsiders"
He laughed bitterly.
"Clan forest? That's rich. You clan types always act like everything belongs to you"
The hostility in his cursed energy was obvious now.
'He's angry'
"My name's Rei Kuroda," he said. "Nobody important. Just another sorcerer, the great clans chewed up and …"
"Don't care," I spoke out, cutting him off
"And," he snapped, voice hardening, "I hate the Kamo clan. Every last one of you."
His lips curled into something halfway between a smile and a sneer.
"I just planned on killing a few Kamo bastards today to blow off some steam. To think I would find some child all alone in the forest"
Unfortunate.
For him.
"Even if you aren't a curse you did just say you planned on killing Kamo sorcerers, if I take you down, it will probably count towards my the five curse assignment right?" I muttered inwardly before stating. "Just give up, I'm not good at holding back".
Kuroda stared at me for a moment.
Then burst out laughing.
"Give up? After finally finding one of you alone?"
He cracked his knuckles.
"Sorry, little prodigy. You drew the short straw."
He vanished from where he stood.
Fast.
Not fast enough.
His fist came for my face.
I stepped aside.
A kick followed—aimed at my knee.
I reinforced and blocked it without effort.
Kuroda's eyes widened slightly.
"Oh?"
Before he could retreat, I moved.
One step.
A straight punch to the ribs.
CRACK.
At least two ribs must have broken there.
The sound was clean.
He was sent flying off his feet, crashing into a tree trunk with a choked gasp.
"Gah—!"
I lowered my fist.
"Your movements are sloppy," I said. "You don't know how to fight, and with your cursed energy reserves, you can't reinforce yourself too much or you will run out of cursed energy"
He clutched his side, coughing violently.
For a few seconds he just knelt there, breathing hard.
Then he started laughing.
A thin, ugly sound.
"Of course… of course that's how it goes."
He pushed himself up shakily, glaring at me with pure resentment.
"Always the same story."
Blood dripped from the corner of his mouth.
"You clan freaks are all like this. Born with bottomless cursed energy. Perfect bodies. Perfect techniques."
His voice grew harsher with every word.
"People like me spend years scraping for scraps, risking our lives just to survive… and some twelve-year-old brat shows up stronger than we'll ever be just because he was born 'blessed.'"
He spat onto the ground.
"Disgusting."
I watched him in silence.
"... firstly I'm only nine, secondly…" I said. "Your problems with the world are not my problem"
"Not your problem?" he repeated, voice trembling with rage. "Of course it isn't. Nothing ever is for people like you."
His cursed energy surged violently.
Immediately after sensing his surge in cursed energy, I decided to rush in and finish him off.
"But that's fine."
A twisted grin spread across his face, disregarding all defense.
"Because I'm also a little special"
The atmosphere twisted.
"Domain Expansion—"
My instincts screamed as I immediately activated 'Falling Blossom Emotion' to defend myself against this domain.
"Rubix Space Dominion."
The world folded inward.
The forest disappeared.
The trees, the sky, the dirt path—all gone.
In their place stretched an endless flat plane of colored tiles.
Red. Blue. Yellow. Green. White. Orange.
A massive two-dimensional projection of a Rubik's Cube laid out beneath my feet like a board game.
The air was blank.
Featureless.
Empty.
Only Kuroda and I remained inside this artificial space. Kuroda no longer stood on the same level as me, he was on a podium above me.
He straightened slowly, eyes burning with spite while he looked down on me.
"Not so confident now, are you?"
"You're pathetic complaining about talent when you achieved domain expansion" I muttered annoyed.
'Why does some random sorcerer have a domain, he would have been a known figure in the cannon series'
"Actually my cursed technique is my domain expansion, there isn't any other aspect to it. When I awakened my technique at 16 years old I got a domain" He responded, completely relaxed, he seems confident in his domain.
Golden text began to materialize in the air between us.
I recognized the mechanism immediately.
An automatic rule-type Domain.
Just like Hakari's domain, it gave me the rules of it.
Kuroda spread his arms theatrically.
"Go on. Read carefully, prodigy."
The glowing characters finished forming.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
DOMAIN RULES – RUBIX SPACE DOMINION
1. The battlefield is a two-dimensional projection of a Rubik's Cube.
2. No physical contact between the domain user, and target is allowed.
3. The target must navigate the floor to "solve" the cube by aligning all colors to solve the rubix cube correctly.
4. Each movement of the tiles counts as a move.
5. Every move that isn't the most optimal move towards solving the Rubik cube will enact a punishment.
6. Must make a move every 30 seconds, or a forced punishment will be put on you.
7. Punishment: loss of cursed energy equal to one–twentieth of current reserves.
8. Five consecutive incorrect moves result in immediate 25% of total cursed energy being stolen.
9. Failure to act within the allotted time window is treated as an incorrect move.
10. The Domain remains active until the puzzle is solved or the target has 5 consecutive incorrect moves.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I read the rules carefully.
Then read them again.
"…Usually cursed techniques are based on the hobbies of their user, I'm guessing your a fan of Rubix Cubes"
Kuroda's smile was vicious.
"Yeah."
He pointed at the grid beneath me.
"No amount of talent saves you here. No lucky birthright."
"Just pure, miserable attrition."
I looked down at the colored tiles.
No brute force escape.
Every mistake would drain my cursed energy directly.
And inaction counted as failure.
A slow execution designed to grind opponents down.
Annoying.
'Maybe I should just let myself fail 5 times, then the domain will close and I can just beat him down. Even with 50% of my cursed energy he shouldn't be to difficult'
A timer appeared in the sky above the board.
Thirty seconds.
'But what if he is capable of opening his domain multiple times like Hakari, I'll be completely drained by the second domain'
Twenty seconds.
'Can falling blossoms protect me from the sure hit effect of having my cursed energy stolen?'
...
'Heh what am I thinking, this doesn't have to be a fair 1v1 fight'
*Hey Tomogui, I'm being attacked in the training grounds, this person is capable of using domain expansion, come over quickly and shatter the domain from the outside, then we can kill him*
Ten seconds.
Kuroda folded his arms, watching me with open malice.
"Let's see how special you really are without all that precious Kamo talent."
I stepped onto the first tile.
'I just have to get a few moves correct and stall time for Tomogui to arrive'
"Let the games begin!" He remarked while dramatically raising his arms up.
'Was he referencing something?'
Author Note:
A little lore about Rubik's cubes. No matter what position the Rubik's cube is in, the maximum number of moves it should take to solve one (assuming you make the perfect moves) is 20.
I know it might seem crazy randomly introducing a character with domain expansion. Especially since his domain is good, and he would be known in the original JJK verse. I'm gonna explain why he was some unknown in the next few chapters.