Fuin stood in the bathroom, hot water running over his shoulders. Blood and viscera washed down the drain in diluted pink streams. He'd scrubbed his skin twice already just to get the smell of blood out of his hair.
The new cursed technique sat in his body in a natural way. A new pathway in his cursed energy system, distinct from [One Percent]. It was engraved directly into his spine and wrists specifically.
He turned off the water and dried himself. Clean clothes, then back to the testing chamber. He needed to understand what he'd inherited before doing anything else.
The cursed object had been a ribcage piece. He remembered that clearly. A fragment of bone, yellowed with age, sealed inside a wooden box with deteriorating talismans. It was one of the laster remaining Grade 1 relics he had which he knew contained a cursed technique. The sealing marks suggested it had been contained for at least forty years.
He stood in the center of the testing chamber and channeled cursed energy into the new technique.
Information flooded his mind immediately. The technique was called [Dead Bones]. It manifested two types of shikigami, both formed from his skeletal structure.
'A shikigami technique, huh? I wonder how it compares to the Ten Shadows?' Fuin mused to himself. His memories of the show jujutsu kaisen were admittedly hazy, but he remembered things that where meme'd a lot.
The two shikigami's were: [Grime] and [Shigi].
He started with [Shigi] because it seemed less energy-intensive.
Fuin raised both hands and channeled cursed energy into his wrist bones. The sensation was strange, he watched as his wrists bent back with a sharp 'Clack', like bones snapping and two ghost-like skeleton hands grew out of his wrist bones, before falling to the ground and his hands snapping back into place.
Two skeletal hands emerged from his wrists.
Then they moved, they ran around on the ground just like how a human could finger walk their hand on a table or floor. They were... fast.
Faster than he expected. The skeleton hands hands darted around the testing chamber like little insects, moving independently of each other. One climbed the wall with spider-like precision. The other circled the bones of a dead lab mouse in curiosity.
One of the [Shigi] hands picked up a pen from the table, turned it over several times, then set it down and moved to a notebook. It flipped through pages slowly, as though reading. The other hand investigated a beaker, tapping the glass with one finger, then carefully lifting it and setting it back down in a different position.
Fuin gave no commands for any of this. The hands were exploring on their own.
He tested the limits of their autonomy.
"Organize the tools on that shelf," he said aloud.
Both hands moved immediately to the metal shelf against the wall. They worked in tandem; one hand would pick up a scalpel, examine it briefly, then place it in a specific position. The other hand arranged forceps, clamps, and syringes in neat rows. They didn't just stack things randomly. They sorted by type, then by size within each category.
The process took three minutes. When they finished, the shelf was more organized than he had ever kept it himself.
Intelligent. Diligent. Capable of understanding complex instructions and solving practical problems independently.
Fuin pointed at a locked drawer in the corner of the room.
"Open that."
One [Shigi] hand darted over to the drawer and examined the lock. It was a simple pin tumbler mechanism, nothing sophisticated. The hand's index finger extended slightly, and the bone seemed to shift—thinning and reshaping into something resembling a lock pick.
The hand inserted its modified finger into the lock and worked for fifteen seconds. Then the lock clicked open.
Fuin walked over and pulled the drawer out. Inside were old medical tools he'd stored away months ago. The [Shigi] hand had picked the lock without damaging it.
He tested their dexterity next. He placed a needle and thread on the table, along with two small pieces of fabric.
"Sew these together."
Both hands moved to the task. One held the fabric steady while the other threaded the needle on the first attempt. The stitches were even, tight, and professionally executed.
When they finished, he examined the result. The seam was as well done as if by a professional.
He had them write next. One hand picked up the pen and wrote his name on a piece of paper. The handwriting was shaky at first, but improved rapidly. By the third line, the script was cleaner than his own handwriting.
The hands could write, pick locks, sew, organize, and manipulate objects with surgical precision. They were autonomous enough to interpret instructions creatively and solve problems independently. They even seemed to have personality; one hand moved with quick, efficient motions, while the other was slightly more cautious and methodical.
Quietly mischievous, too.While Fuin was examining the sewn fabric, one of the hands had moved his notebook three centimeters to the left for no apparent reason. When he glanced at it, the hand froze, fingers splayed innocently.
Fuin allowed himself a brief moment of amusement.
Now for their second ability; possession ability.
Fuin grabbed one of the remaining lab mice from the cage. The creature squirmed in his palm, whiskers twitching.
He directed one of the [Shigi] hands toward a small mouse skeleton assembled in one of his dissection boxes. He mentally nudged the nearest [Shigi] to attempt to animate it. The [Shigi] seemed to take a running start and perform a majestic dive until its bones liquified and merged with the mouse skeleton. Small purple flames lit up in the skull of the mouse skeleton and its bones seemed to be held in place exactly how it had been in life.
The mouse skeleton stood up. Then it seemed to look down at itself and give itself a once over. The other [Shigi] came over and curiously poked the mouse skeleton, much to the other's annoyance.
He tested the limits. It seemed to just be an animated skeleton, perhaps the only value of this is that a walking skeleton could scare normal people?
Fuin dismissed both [Shigi] hands. They retreated into his wrists without resistance, and the rat skeleton collapsed into a pile of bones on the floor.
He'd learned enough about [Shigi] for now. Time to test [Grime].
This one would require more space. He left the testing chamber and walked outside into the backyard. The overgrown lot behind the Unmei family home stretched out in front of him; tall grass, a few scattered trees, and the remains of an old stone wall that marked the property boundary.
It was late afternoon. The sun hung low in the sky, casting long shadows across the yard. No neighbors were visible. The nearest house was fifty meters away, separated by trees and fencing.
Fuin stood in the center of the yard and channeled cursed energy into his spine.
The sensation was completely different from [Shigi]. This wasn't something being pulled out, it was something growing. He felt his spine extend, vertebrae multiplying and expanding beyond his physical body. Cursed energy poured into the technique, and bone manifested in the air behind him.
A skeletal torso emerged from his back. Ribs, sternum, clavicle—all formed from white bone that gleamed faintly in the afternoon light. Then shoulders, arms, and a skull. The upper body of a human skeleton, but scaled larger than life.
The technique's mechanics became clear as he channeled energy. [Grime]'s size, strength, durability, and density were all determined by the amount of cursed energy he invested at the moment of summoning. Once summoned, those properties were locked. He couldn't make [Grime] larger by feeding it more energy afterward.
But the initial investment could be as large or small as he wanted. In theory, there was no upper limit. If he had enough cursed energy, [Grime] could grow to mountain-sized proportions, continental scale, even planetary. The only limitation was how much power he could provide.
He canceled the initial bare minimum summon and resummoned him with more cursed energy.
10% cursed energy total. 20%. 40%... 60%.
He stopped at 60%. Just channeling this much energy had already taken him more than 45 seconds just to summon this guy. He was limited by his cursed energy output and this was definitely not something he could do mid-fight.
*CLACK*
The loud sound of bones snapping rang out as [Grime] exploded into existence from his spine. This time, he was not a 1 meter skeleton. He was Twenty meters tall.
The skeleton towered over the Unmei family home, its skull level with the second-story roof. The upper body was fully formed; spine, ribs, arms, hands, and head. It ended at the pelvis, where the spine connected directly to his back. Purple, smokeless flames burned in the skull's eye sockets.
His cursed energy reserves were only a little over 35% after this summon.
But that wasn't the only cost. [Grime] continuously consumed cursed energy just to remain manifested. The larger it was, the more energy it drained per second. At this size, he estimated he could maintain it for thirty minutes before exhausting his reserves completely.
That created a strategic tradeoff. A massive [Grime] dominated the battlefield through overwhelming physical power, but it left very little cursed energy for him to reinforce his own body, use Reverse Cursed Technique, or activate other techniques. He'd be committing almost everything to raw strength and durability.
A smaller [Grime] would be more energy-efficient, allowing him to fight alongside it with his own techniques. But it would sacrifice the overwhelming advantage of scale.
Every summoning required a decision: how much power to invest, and how much to reserve.
He walked forward, and [Grime] moved with him. It was an extension of him, not a separate entity. The weight didn't affect him at all, despite the skeleton's massive size and density.
He stopped and examined the bones. They looked like normal skeletal structure, but the material was clearly different. he picked up a metal pipe from the ground, reinforced it with cursed energy, and struck one of [Spine]'s ribs.
The pipe bent and the rib didn't even scratch. He had impacted the surface with enough force to crack concrete.
'This material might be a little less harder than diamonds.' Fuin thought with widened eyes.
[Grime] was functionally indestructible at this scale and energy input. Conventional weapons wouldn't damage it. Most cursed techniques wouldn't either. Unless there were some strange rule based or cheating type abilities.
The durability scaled with the initial energy investment. A smaller [Grime] would be proportionally less durable, but still far beyond normal bone. A larger [Grime] would be even more indestructible.
Fuin stepped back and mentally tried to move [Grime]'s arm.
The skeleton's right hand moved. He grasped a zelkova tree that had been growing there for at least thirty years. The trunk was thick enough that he couldn't wrap his arms around it.
[Grime]'s hand closed around the tree trunk. The fingers, each one the size of Fuin's entire body, gripped the wood carefully. Then the arm pulled.
The tree resisted for half a second. Roots that had been anchored in the soil for decades strained against the force. Then they snapped.
The entire tree came out of the ground in one motion. Roots tore free, dragging chunks of soil and rock with them. The zelkova tree, easily fifteen meters tall and weighing several tons, hung from [Grime]'s hand like a stick.
Fuin watched the dirt fall from the root system. The hole left behind was two meters deep and three meters wide. [Grime] had pulled the tree out effortlessly, without even straining the bone structure of its arm.
'This thing seems to just be an extension of my body and has almost no intelligence compared to [Shigi]. It's a pure stat monster type shikigami.' He thought to himself with some slight excitement.
Fuin dismissed [Grime]. The skeleton retracted, collapsing back into his spine in reverse. Bones dissolved into liquid, which flowed back into his body. Within three seconds, the massive skeleton was gone completely. Only the uprooted tree and the hole in the ground remained as evidence.
[Grime] had no supernatural abilities beyond its physical statistics. It couldn't fire cursed energy blasts, manipulate elements, or use special techniques. It won through crushing strength, immense durability, massive reach, and overwhelming weight.
His cursed energy reserves recovered slightly from the dismissal, but not fully. Summoning and maintaining [Grime] was expensive.
Fuin walked back toward the house. The sun was setting now, painting the sky orange and red. His shadow stretched long across the overgrown grass.
Little did he know that his 'ominous aura' he had always worried about had gained an even deeper shade, which would make people even more averse to him.
Author's note:
What do you think of this technique? Is it simple and easy to remember?