The blinding sunlight scattered across the sky, piercing through the shattered cavern ceiling.
The barrier was riddled with cracks, creating a patchwork of light and blood.
Looking at the center of the ruined main hall...
The unharmed figure of a god or demon stood calmly atop the crimson backdrop of absolute destruction.
Standing at the edge of the dilapidated hall, Master Tengen's projection clone was extremely shocked.
"What was that just now...?"
Tengen was the sole witness to the annihilation of everyone else.
Even though Tengen possessed a thousand years of experience and had seen countless powerful Sorcerers throughout history, she still couldn't comprehend Zenin Mirai's power that transcended dimensions.
The tiny Black Hole formed by the self-destruction of Yuki Tsukumo earlier...
In the instant before it fully took shape, a colossal, swirling spatial distortion had emerged from the void and suddenly swallowed it whole!
The mere sight of that spatial tear was enough to create a terrifying scene that blotted out the sky! An energy singularity powerful enough to destroy half of Tokyo... was just swallowed whole by Mirai's Kamui?
Tengen could vaguely hear the monster burping.
'Won't that upset his stomach...?' Tengen thought, stunned.
Looking into the churning void before him, Mirai sighed with regret.
In the original manga, Yuki Tsukumo's self-destruction was described as a move powerful enough to destroy the entire Earth. It was a taboo technique initiated on the premise of one's own death.
Mirai had specifically intended to set aside time to allow her to activate it so he could test his limits.
Unfortunately, she hadn't cherished the opportunity, intentionally limiting the Black Hole's power to only a small part of Tokyo to avoid destroying Japan.
If she had expanded it just a little further, she could have amplified its destructive power throughout the entire country. Perhaps then it would have been a real challenge.
Mirai shook his head, deciding not to think about it anymore.
Yuki Tsukumo was truly a madwoman who would rather destroy the world than let anyone kill her. It would have been bad if the setup had gone wrong or if his Kamui absorption had been slightly off.
Turning to face Tengen's projection, Mirai revealed a faint, polite smile.
"Well. That was quite a wonderful entertainment program, wasn't it?"
Once she regained her senses, Tengen's non-human face remained expressionless.
Glancing at the unconscious, bloated figure of Choso bleeding out in the corner, Tengen asked in bewilderment, "To be honest, you are the strongest Sorcerer I have ever seen in the past thousand years."
"Even in the Golden Age of Sorcery a thousand years ago, no one could rival you," Tengen admitted. "Even Ryomen Sukuna shouldn't be too difficult for you, right?"
Mirai nodded slightly. "That's right. That thing is only so-so."
To describe the invincible, millennia-old King of Curses as ordinary...
Tengen didn't think Mirai was being arrogant; on the contrary, Tengen nodded in absolute agreement.
"If you are so strong, why do you get involved in Kenjaku's game?" Tengen asked. "Actively entering the Culling Game, intentionally allowing Ryomen Sukuna to revive... allowing Kenjaku to initiate the Great Assimilation..."
Tengen shook her cylindrical head, indicating her deep confusion.
"It's normal that you don't understand," Mirai replied smoothly. "After all this time, you've only been engrossed in your teacher's barrier techniques."
As Mirai strolled leisurely into the depths of the palace toward the central tree, he unexpectedly found himself casually conversing with Tengen.
"You clearly had a premonition about everything that was happening outside for years, but you never took the initiative to contact Jujutsu High," Mirai observed. "Just like Yuta Okkotsu. You knew about his Michizane Sugawara bloodline long ago, but you insisted on letting Jujutsu High investigate it slowly on their own."
"You sat back and watched the disasters unfold! You watched Gojo Satoru get sealed! You watched Shibuya burn! Every disaster, you just watched!"
Out of the corner of his eye, Mirai caught the shock in Tengen's eyes. His tone grew full of sharp sarcasm. "Have you been hiding in Tantric Buddhism for so long that your brain has become rotten?"
"If you had continued as before, simply adhering to your own set of beliefs about fate and cause and effect... if you had insisted on not interfering with the operation of the outside world and didn't give Jujutsu High any final instructions today, then I could still think highly of you."
"But you couldn't," Mirai chuckled and sighed. "You couldn't bear to part with the barrier techniques passed down from Genshin. And you couldn't bear to give up your perseverance over the past thousand years."
"On the one hand, you wanted to stop Kenjaku from initiating his plan, but on the other hand, you were too much of a coward to dismantle the barriers yourself!"
"You really are a fraud, Tengen."
...
"Who... who are you?!"
Tengen's projection clone stared in absolute disbelief at the figure beside her, her four eyes trembling violently!
"Modern Sorcerers—no, even Sorcerers from a thousand years ago—don't know Master Genshin's name!"
Tengen was unaware that Mirai had just observed the entirety of Kenjaku's memories through the Infinite Tsukuyomi.
Mirai had seen exactly what Tengen was truly capable of.
As Mirai had predicted, Tengen clearly knew that Kenjaku was initiating a deadly threat to humanity with the Culling Game.
If Tengen simply abolished her Pure Realm barriers, the Culling Game would naturally collapse on its own. Kenjaku wouldn't be able to sustain the colonies.
But the consequences of abolishing the Pure Realm...
It wasn't just the ten barriers of the Culling Game that would fall. All the barriers that had existed in Japan for the past thousand years—including the barrier techniques that Tengen taught to all Jujutsu High Assistant Managers to hide Cursed Spirits from the public—would all be null and void!
Because all of Jujutsu society depended on the steady operation of Tengen's Pure Realm.
Throughout everything that happened in the past at Jujutsu High, Tengen was like the flowers, plants, and trees—merely a silent spectator.
Until Kenjaku finally threatened Tengen's own existence. Tengen then decided to help the students of Jujutsu High and handed over the back of the Prison Realm to them.
"A massive barrier capable of enveloping all of Japan... you must be just like your master," Mirai said softly. "It is only through extremely strict Binding Vows and constraints that the Pure Realm has been able to operate steadily."
"Yes..." Tengen stared blankly at Mirai, her thoughts racing.
The existence of the four Pure Realms was a Binding Vow imposed by Tengen on herself, exactly like the one imposed on Genshin a thousand years ago.
Never leave.
The near-immortal life form of Tengen, under the influence of this stringent constraint of isolation, was the only reason the Pure Realm's effects were so extraordinarily powerful.
Mirai walked through a long corridor and arrived at the center of the vast underground sea of trees.
Looking at Tengen's true physical form—a grotesque, thumb-like Cursed Spirit—curled up in the center of the tree tide, the void beside Mirai rippled.
"By the way, as for the purpose you asked me about earlier..." Mirai paused.
"Let's just say I want to shatter the void and ascend to the heavens."
Seeing the completely bewildered expression on Tengen's projection's face, Mirai smiled. "You will understand later. I'm still lacking something."
The surging Kamui void expanded, gradually swallowing the massive tree tide, including Tengen's main body, directly into the Kamui dimension.
"Then I'll see you next time, little girl," Mirai whispered to the ancient being.
...
"Dead..."
"They're all dead..."
He walked through the ruins, where vast bloodstains remained on the ground.
Choso had just woken up from his coma. He was bloated, severely injured, and muttering in a daze.
Sensing the tactile, invisible connection of blood, the bewildered figure gradually walked deeper into the remains of the main hall.
"This is..."
He found a side room that was still in fairly good condition.
On the wooden table rested a single book and six medical glass vessels.
The book left behind by Yuki Tsukumo contained her life's work: detailed research notes about the soul.
She had accepted Choso's identity as Yuji Itadori's older brother. This book was Yuki's final gift, prepared in advance for Yuji Itadori to understand Sukuna's soul.
But at this moment, Choso's mind was entirely focused on the Cursed Objects soaking in those six glass vessels.
"The remains of my brothers..." Choso gasped.
They were all the remaining Cursed Objects of the Nine Cursed Womb: Death Paintings. (Numbers 4 through 9).
This was exactly what Choso had been looking for. He couldn't find them anywhere in the Tomb of the Star during the three days they had waited. He had even inquired with Tengen, but was told they had disappeared.
Staring at the remains on the table, Choso suddenly realized the terrifying truth...
This was intentionally left behind by Zenin Mirai!
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