"With this treasure, I summon... (Furube Yurayura)
High in the distant sky, Satoru Gojo watched Megumi Fushiguro with a relieved expression as the boy stood with his left fist clenched in front of him and his right hand set behind him, chanting the incantation.
Megumi had finally adjusted his mindset. He no longer treated the Mahoraga subjugation ritual as a suicidal attack...
"Megumi, then let me see it... just what this so called surprise really is..."
"...Mahoraga."
As Megumi Fushiguro recited the incantation, there was not the slightest emotional fluctuation in his voice. His tone remained completely calm.
Even when he saw the giant cocoon containing Mahoraga appear, guarded by the toad Shikigami and the dog type Shikigami, he showed no surprise or fear...
There was only a trace of nostalgia and helplessness in Megumi Fushiguro's eyes.
After all, when he was in elementary school, it had been Akira Zenin's Mahoraga that walked him to and from school...
He still remembered how carefully Mahoraga moved so it would not bump into anything, and how it tiptoed around because it was afraid of cracking the ground...
Back then, since no one else could see Mahoraga, his classmates even mocked him for the weird way he looked "holding onto thin air"...
Of course, he beat up every one of them who dared to laugh.
Megumi Fushiguro did not wait around for Mahoraga to finish appearing. Without even thinking, he immediately formed hand signs with both hands.
"Domain Expansion. [Chimera Shadow Garden]"
A visible barrier appeared around him, then shadows clung to it, forming a black sphere that enclosed Megumi Fushiguro and the giant cocoon containing Mahoraga...
Then Megumi Fushiguro tossed the prayer beads in his hand into the air, and a beam of white light from the string of beads merged into the inner surface of [Chimera Shadow Garden].
Layer after layer of milky white barriers suddenly appeared, then slowly merged into Megumi Fushiguro's Domain. It was the initial form of Akira Zenin's Domain, [Ten Directions Sacred Realm]...
Double Domain.
[Chimera Shadow Garden] × [Ten Directions Sacred Realm]
Seeing this, Megumi Fushiguro finally let out a true sigh of relief. Now he could be one hundred percent certain that Akira Zenin was definitely still alive.
A Domain Expansion could not bypass the projection of an Innate Domain. He did not know how Akira Zenin had managed to embed his original Domain into the prayer beads, but if the person were dead, then projecting an Innate Domain would have been impossible...
"I remember that Akira-sensei's [Ten Directions Sacred Realm] can deploy Shikigami as Domains... When he gave me the prayer beads, he told me the first thing I should deploy was Nue..."
Thinking that, Megumi Fushiguro obediently called out at once,
"Shikigami Deployment. [Nue]"
A huge bird of indistinct color immediately burst from the shadow beneath Megumi Fushiguro's feet. Under the effect of [Ten Directions Sacred Realm], its body slowly dispersed, and in the end it became a strip of cloth covered in complex patterns that floated softly around Megumi Fushiguro.
As Megumi Fushiguro examined the scarf like thing, he suddenly realized something. Maybe because he was too familiar with Akira Zenin's Mahoraga, he had not felt the slightest sense of danger during the ritual.
So much so that he had not even noticed that the Mahoraga he himself had summoned had already stepped out of the giant cocoon...
By the time Megumi Fushiguro realized things were bad, Mahoraga had already rushed to his side, and the [Sword of Extermination] came slashing down straight at the top of his head.
But the moment Mahoraga's attack reached Megumi Fushiguro, its movement abruptly stalled, and its entire body was blasted backward by some kind of force.
Just as Megumi Fushiguro came back to himself, a piece of information surfaced from the shadows in his memory.
Divine Treasure. [Kusagusa-no-mono-no-hire (Scarf to Ward Off Various Things)]. Dispels physical attacks.
Megumi Fushiguro's eyelids twitched. Mahoraga's movement really had startled him just now. If Akira Zenin had not told him to deploy Nue as a Divine Treasure immediately, he probably would not even have had time to turn his body into shadow... If the prayer beads were not limited to a single use, he felt he definitely would have taken the time to fully figure out the effects of this Double Domain first...
But for now, before Mahoraga found a way to break through [Kusagusa-no-mono-no-hire], there was still some time...
"Great Serpent!"
The instant Megumi Fushiguro spoke, the Great Serpent Shikigami turned into [Iku-tama (Jewel of Life)] and imprinted itself into his heart. A spell mark suddenly appeared on his chest, expanding and contracting slowly with each heartbeat…
[Iku-tama] directly completed Megumi Fushiguro's Cursed Energy state, even forming an extra Cursed Energy circulation linked to it. Megumi Fushiguro felt his Cursed Energy surge sharply and flow without end.
After reinforcing his body with this new level of Cursed Energy, he was even able to keep up with Mahoraga's movements... Resisting the urge to rush in and fight Mahoraga barehanded after this sudden spike in power, Megumi Fushiguro took a deep breath and deployed the rest of his Shikigami one after another.
The [Makaru-kaeshi-no-tama (Jewel of Resuscitation)] formed from Round Deer entered Megumi Fushiguro's forehead, granting an automatic Reverse Cursed Technique.
The [Hachi-no-hire (Bee Scarf)] formed from Piercing Ox was also a strip of cloth, one that could dispel Technique based attacks.
The [Hetsu-kagami (Mirror of the Shore)] formed from Max Elephant circled around Megumi Fushiguro and allowed him to control water.
The [Okitsu-kagami (Mirror of the Deep)] formed from Toad resonated with [Hetsu-kagami] and allowed him to control sunlight.
The [Orochi-no-hire] formed from Rabbit Escape also floated beside Megumi Fushiguro and could dispel toxins and curses.
"Shikigami Deployment. [Divine Dogs]!"
When Megumi Fushiguro deployed little Black and little White, the two he was most familiar with, the cross formed by [Taru-tama (Jewel of Plenty)] and [Chikaeshi-no-tama (Jewel of Turning Back on the Road)] was imprinted directly onto the back of his right hand, becoming a spell pattern that extended up his arm.
In legend, [Taru-tama] represented a complete physical form, while [Chikaeshi-no-tama] was related to the soul.
When those two Sacred Treasures formed from the deployment of Divine Dogs entered Megumi Fushiguro's body, he suddenly realized that his shadow now seemed to have a "soul" of its own and could be used freely.
He still could not reach Akira Zenin's level of drawing talismans with shadow, but the shadows around him that were tied to him moved as naturally as an arm obeying the body or fingers obeying the arm. He could use them with complete ease...
"Akira-sensei was not just born able to use this kind of thing, was he..."
Megumi Fushiguro recalled Akira Zenin's unusual nature and could only shake his head helplessly. Even after activating [Taru-tama] and [Chikaeshi-no-tama], his control over shadows still did not measure up to Akira-sensei's...
Still, with the help of these Sacred Treasures, subduing Mahoraga should now be fairly safe...
Megumi Fushiguro looked at Mahoraga, which was attacking him while the wheel like ritual circle above its head slowly turned, then directly formed a giant hand from the shadows inside the Domain. Unlike the vague, intangible shadows from before, this hand, strengthened by an immense amount of Cursed Energy, seized Mahoraga's body as though it were a real physical object.
Even with [Sword of Extermination] in hand, Mahoraga could only scrape sparks off the surface of that giant hand...
[Akira Zenin: Actually, just like every Shikigami has its own unique subjugation task, subduing Mahoraga does not necessarily mean you have to defeat it...]
"I have restrained Mahoraga's movements for now. Including it, all [The Ten Sacred Treasures] are gathered... Then next..."
From beginning to end, Megumi Fushiguro never gave Mahoraga a chance to adapt. He immediately began chanting the "Furube" soul soothing song in a low voice.
"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten...
Furube, yurayura, furube..."
As the chant repeated, Mahoraga, trapped in the grip of the shadow hand, slowly stopped resisting.
Its body gradually turned into white light and flowed into the [Sword of Extermination] bound to the hand. The ship wheel like disk above its head embedded itself into [Sword of Extermination] and became the hilt, finally forming a bizarre sword with eight nearly equal blades extending in different directions.
And with that, the tenth Sacred Treasure returned to its place. The Sacred Treasure [Yatsuka-no-tsurugi], whose first blade analyzes and whose second blade kills without fail!