Chapter 48: Mixed Doubles
"It's you again!"
Mahito clutched the stump of his severed arm, his face twisted with resentment and fear.
Their last encounter had already scarred him badly enough. That searing pain, the sensation of his soul being burned alive, had carved itself deep into his memory. It was the first time since his birth that he had truly understood fear.
And now that monster had shown up again.
"Yami!"
Yuji Itadori looked at the figure standing in front of him, and relief instantly washed over his face.
For reasons he could not quite explain, that back always made him feel strangely secure. As if no matter how ugly the situation became, as long as Yami was standing there with a sword in hand, things had not yet reached absolute despair.
"You alright?"
Yami did not turn around when he asked the question. His gaze remained fixed on Mahito.
"I'm fine! This guy's annoying as hell. Normal attacks barely do anything to him!"
Yuji answered at once, wiping the blood from the corner of his mouth.
"I know."
Yami gave a small nod.
Then he raised Shiranui slightly, the black red blade angling toward Mahito's throat.
"So we cut his soul too."
Before the last syllable finished leaving his mouth, Yami moved.
Fast.
So fast that even Nanami Kento's eyes narrowed.
With his experience in close quarters combat, he could only barely catch the flicker of a trailing afterimage.
A body with no Cursed Energy at all, yet capable of explosive speed like this.
It was absurd.
"Total Concentration. Water Breathing. Fourth Form."
Yami's voice remained calm.
"Striking Tide."
His figure appeared in front of Mahito in an instant, his sword sweeping out in a series of flowing slashes like waves rising one after another. Each cut linked seamlessly into the next, cutting off every route of escape.
Though the stance was Water Breathing, the blade itself still carried the scorching destructive force of Sun Breathing.
This was something Yami had only recently begun to master after his synchronization had risen again. The fluidity and continuity of Water Breathing fused with the raw destructive power of Sun Breathing.
Gentle on the surface.
Lethal underneath.
"Don't look down on me!"
Mahito shrieked, his body instantly distorting.
Countless spikes burst out of him in all directions, turning his body into a grotesque mass of blades. He no longer cared about defense. He wanted to force a mutual exchange. He wanted to stop Yami's relentless approach, even if it meant tearing himself apart in the process.
But in those eyes that burned like living embers, all of Mahito's attacks were transparent.
Yami did not evade.
The rhythm of his blade shifted in an instant.
The smooth tide collapsed into a raging sun.
"Sun Breathing. Third Form."
He stepped in.
"Raging Sun."
Two deep crimson arcs flashed across the air.
Pffft.
Mahito's spikes were cut apart before they could even touch Yami. The slash continued through them and carved two fresh wounds across Mahito's body, opening him from shoulder to chest and from waist to ribs.
Dark purple blood sprayed across the shattered schoolyard.
Mahito was flung backward, his face contorted with pain.
Those wounds still would not close.
Golden red sparks crawled over them like hungry insects, scorching deeper and deeper into the flesh and into the shape of his soul beneath.
"Damn it! Damn it! Why can't I heal!"
Mahito's voice cracked.
The more damage he took, the more intense that burning sensation became. It was no longer just pain. It felt like something essential was being reduced to ash.
"Nanami! Now!"
Yuji seized the opening instantly and lunged in.
Since ordinary physical damage meant little, he would strike the soul instead.
As Sukuna's vessel, Yuji was one of the rare few who could affect Mahito on that level through direct contact.
"Piercing Fist!"
Boom.
Yuji's punch slammed into Mahito's face.
It did not leave a lasting wound the way Yami's blade did, but it still rattled Mahito's soul hard enough to make his entire body seize up for a fraction of a second.
And that was all Nanami needed.
"Ratio Technique."
Nanami blurred forward, his blunt sword flashing with surgical precision.
"Collapse."
His strike landed at the perfect weak point.
Mahito's legs were severed cleanly beneath the knee.
"AAAAAAH!"
Mahito crashed to the ground in a tangle of limbs, screaming like an animal dragged to slaughter.
For the first time since his birth, despair clawed its way into his heart.
In front of him stood Yami, his absolute natural enemy.
Behind him stood Nanami and Yuji, both relentless and merciless.
Especially Yami.
Every slash from that sword was burning away part of him. Weakening him. Stripping away his control.
If this continued, he would really die.
"I have to... I have to do something..."
Mahito's breathing turned ragged.
He tried to force himself back to his feet, but Shiranui's blade was already resting against his throat.
"It's over."
Yami looked down at him.
His red eyes held no pity, no anger, no satisfaction.
Only certainty.
It was the look one might give a pile of filth before burning it.
And under that gaze, something in Mahito's mind snapped.
Fear.
Despair.
The instinct to survive.
At the brink of death, those emotions twisted together and erupted into revelation.
His pupils shrank to needle points.
His understanding of the soul suddenly broke through a final limit.
It felt like a door opening inside him.
"Hah... hahahaha... HAHAHAHAHA!"
Mahito's laughter turned shrill and manic.
"I see now... I get it..."
"The true shape of the soul... the true essence of a domain...!"
Yami's eyes narrowed.
Without hesitation, he swung downward.
Whatever Mahito had realized, he had no intention of letting it bear fruit.
But just before the blade could reach Mahito's neck, a monstrous surge of Cursed Energy erupted from his body.
It was greater than anything Mahito had released before.
The air twisted.
The ground groaned.
Yami instantly disengaged and leaped back.
Nanami's expression changed sharply.
"Itadori, fall back! He's expanding a domain!"
Mahito rose from the ground with a grotesque smile on his face.
His hands moved into a seal before his chest. At the same time, two extra hands formed from his flesh and lifted to cover his mouth.
A domain seal.
A complete hand sign.
"Domain Expansion..."
Black hands began to emerge from the void around them.
Huge. Twisted. Countless.
They overlapped and interlocked, filling the space in every direction and sealing it off from the outside world.
Mahito's smile widened until it nearly split his face in half.
"Self Embodiment of Perfection."
.....
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