"Boom!"
Beneath Maki's sheer, ferocious physical might, the multi-meter-thick reinforced concrete ceiling of the air-raid shelter proved as brittle as a cheap cracker.
A deluge of crushed rock and rebar mingled with dense smoke and dust came crashing down, rocking the entire underground space violently.
Startled by the abrupt upheaval, several Special Grade Cursed Spirits who had been about to lay hands on Tsumiki Fushiguro whipped their heads around.
Their grotesque, misshapen faces still bore lingering gluttony and thirst for human despair.
Yet what greeted them was a dashing figure descending from above like a valkyrie.
"Well, well, well."
Maki pushed up the special sunglasses on the bridge of her nose that she used to see cursed spirits, a swaggering, cold smirk tugging at the corner of her lips.
"Sneaking into a basement to bully a little girl while everyone else is putting their lives on the line out there."
"Aren't you disgusting turd-faced freaks getting a little too big for your boots?"
The moment her words fell, Maki's silhouette vanished from the spot into thin air.
There was no booming surge of cursed energy, nor any flash of an activated cursed technique.
Inside this shelter teeming with the presence of cursed spirits, Maki was like a ghost entirely absent from this world.
Slash!
Without warning, a chilling flash of blade light suddenly cut through the air.
It was an all-black Special Grade Cursed Tool exuding a spine-tingling aura: Soul Splitter Katana!
Before the Special Grade Cursed Spirit closest to Tsumiki could even finish turning its head, its proud, hardened skull went tumbling across the ground.
Black cursed blood jetted skyward like a geyser, splattering all over the adjacent Special Grade Cursed Spirits.
"Roar!"
The remaining three Special Grade Cursed Spirits finally snapped to their senses, releasing terrified, enraged howls.
All three gaped their maw-like jaws as fearsome blasts of concentrated cursed energy coalesced instantly inside their throats, locking onto Maki's position.
"Too slow."
A flicker of dismissive mockery crossed the sharp gaze concealed behind Maki's sunglasses.
In her perception, the movements of these Special Grade Cursed Spirits were as ridiculously slow as a replay in slow motion.
Whoosh!
Maki's right leg surged with explosive force, shattering the concrete beneath her feet into a massive, cratered web of cracks.
Riding that monstrous recoil like an artillery shell, she cut through the air in an acute zigzag defying the laws of physics, instantly closing in on the second Special Grade Cursed Spirit.
The Soul Splitter Katana in her grip swept an immaculate full-moon arc midair.
Ignoring all physical defense, it cleaved straight through the soul.
Crack!
The second Special Grade Cursed Spirit's torso was cleaved smoothly in two from left shoulder to right waist.
Without skipping a beat, Maki channeled her momentum into a gorgeous spinning roundhouse kick midair.
Infused with the absolute pinnacle of power from her Complete Heavenly Restriction, her slender right leg slammed into the chest of the third Special Grade Cursed Spirit like a battleaxe.
Rumble!
Accompanied by a sickening crunch of shattering bone, the massive cursed spirit was hurled backward like a cannonball, blasting a gaping hole clean through the shelter's load-bearing wall and becoming instantly buried beneath the rubble.
Less than three seconds had passed.
In barely a single exchange, three Special Grade Cursed Spirits—each potent enough to push a Grade 1 Jujutsu Sorcerer to the brink—were left with two dead and one critically maimed.
This was the fully awakened Sorcerer Killer.
This was the sole invincible being in a world crawling with cursed energy monstrosities who, through a mortal vessel alone, had honed raw physical power to the realm of the gods.
"You alright, Tsumiki?"
Casually flicking the black cursed blood off Soul Splitter Katana, Maki turned to look at Tsumiki Fushiguro, who remained tied to a stone pillar, staring in sheer astonishment.
"M-Maki?!"
Seeing the short-haired girl before her radiating such an overwhelming aura that one dared not meet her gaze, Tsumiki's eyes instantly welled with tears.
"Don't be scared. Megumi is still fighting with everything he's got out there; I can't go letting his precious big sister get hurt."
Maki stepped forward, flicked Soul Splitter Katana lightly, and severed the thick cords of cursed energy binding Tsumiki in an instant.
Yet right as Maki prepared to escort Tsumiki away from this perilous place—
A familiar, colossal surge of cursed energy reeking of sickening stitches suddenly erupted from the deepest shadows of the shelter.
Rumble!
The entire shelter floor began to convulse violently as countless thick, barb-covered tree roots tore through the concrete like frenzied tentacles, bursting from the ground.
"What is this...?"
Maki's pupils constricted sharply as she reflexively shielded Tsumiki behind her.
Amid the flurry of rampant roots, a terrifying three-meter-tall figure clad in hardened bark, its left arm wrapped in white cloth, slowly emerged from the subterranean depths.
Two branch-like horns sprouted from its eye sockets, and across its chest lay an obvious, horrifying scar that looked as though it had been scorched by an intensely hot blade.
"Hanami?!"
Gritting her teeth, Maki recognized on sight the Special Grade Cursed Spirit that had nearly wiped them all out back at the Kyoto Sister School Goodwill Event.
Yet this made no sense.
Hanami had clearly been crushed to utter oblivion by Satoru Gojo's Limitless cursed technique during the Shibuya Incident.
"Hehehe..."
Right then, an eerie chuckle echoed from within Hanami's body.
It was Kenjaku's voice.
"Surprised, defective product of the Zenin family?"
Kenjaku's mocking voice echoed throughout the shelter.
"This is the ultimate stitched monstrosity I painstakingly cultivated using a remnant cursed object of Hanami, combined with Mahito's flawless Idle Transfiguration, plus the flesh and blood of countless plant-type cursed spirits!"
"Just in case that overly protective monster Yoru abandoned the unsealing to come rushing to the rescue, I specifically stationed this new Hanami, blessed with infinite regeneration, right here."
"Though a monkey like you with zero cursed energy throwing her life away was indeed beyond my expectations."
"No matter. For flora, a body bursting with such vitality makes for the most exquisite fertilizer!"
The moment those words dropped, the new Hanami's massive frame shuddered violently.
Boom!
Every plant inside the shelter went berserk.
Countless vines bristling with toxic spines lashed out like a dense sea of giant serpents, madly converging on Maki and Tsumiki from every direction.
"Tch. At the end of the day, you're just a stitched-face freak cobbled together from trash!"
Confronted by this all-encompassing death trap, Maki showed not a shred of fear.
Taking a deep breath, her muscles snapped taut with the sharp resonance of drawn bowstrings.
"Tsumiki, close your eyes and hold on tight!"
Hoisting Tsumiki onto her shoulder, Maki flourished Soul Splitter Katana with a fierce flourish.
"So you can regenerate endlessly, huh...?"
Across Maki's mind flashed the image of Yoru back in the dojo, unleashing that slash as dazzling as the sun.
"Then all I have to do is chop you into dust with heat hot enough to incinerate every last cell!"
Her eyes sharpened with unprecedented focus.
Wringing out every scrap of her godlike physical power to its absolute limit, she channeled every ounce of it into both hands gripping the hilt.
Buzz!
As Maki swung with speed far surpassing sound, the pitch-black blade of Soul Splitter Katana began to heat up furiously under the sheer, terrifying air friction.
In the blink of an eye, the cold steel turned dark crimson, giving off a suffocating, searing heat.
Though lacking Yoru's breathing technique that resonated with heaven and earth, Maki relied purely on the absurd physical friction granted by Heavenly Restriction to forcibly simulate the high-temperature state of a Bright Red Nichirin Sword.
"Pseudo Bright Red Nichirin Sword!"
"Now... break!"
With a thunderous cry, Maki became a crimson meteor, charging headlong against the rampant sea of vegetation.
Sizzle!
Carrying terrifying heat, everywhere the dark red Soul Splitter Katana passed, the peerlessly resilient venomous vines were parted as effortlessly as butter meeting a branding iron, inextinguishable scorched flames erupting along their severed edges.
Sensing mortal peril, the new Hanami frantically mobilized its cursed energy, attempting to stem Maki's advance with even thicker roots.
Yet it was all in vain.
Beneath Maki's blinding speed and the dual impact of the Pseudo Bright Red Nichirin Sword—ignoring defense and scorching the soul—
Maki forcibly carved a straight highway through that seemingly impenetrable thicket of death.
Splatter!
In the next heartbeat, Maki stood behind the new Hanami.
She straightened up slowly as Soul Splitter Katana gave a faint, strained groan, the dark crimson sheen along its blade steadily fading away.
Behind her, the three-meter-tall Special Grade stitched freak froze stiff.
A scorching, thin crimson line stretched from its left shoulder to its right waist, flawlessly bisecting the cursed core concealed deep within its body.
Rumble!
With an ear-splitting detonation and a chorus of agonizing shrieks, the new Hanami's massive frame, along with the repulsive stitched tissue inside it, completely disintegrated into a cloud of black ash.
A single strike, absolute death.
"Job done."
Resting Soul Splitter Katana over her shoulder, Maki looked out across the cleared shelter and let out a long breath.
Yet just as she was about to report the mission's completion to Yoru—
A faint ripple that made Maki's beastly instincts scream in alarm suddenly emanated from the far edge of the horizon.
"This feeling..."
Maki snapped her head toward the distant Tokyo Jujutsu High, her eyes narrowing sharply behind her sunglasses.
Over there, a cursed energy so immense it bordered on bending reality was swelling with hideous momentum.
"Just what kind of monster... is that bastard Yoru facing?!"