The pungent smell of mold and sickening residual cursed energy spread rampantly throughout the abandoned underground air-raid shelter.
After traversing a long, pitch-black tunnel, Yoru and Suguru Geto finally reached this hidden underground meeting place.
Dim candlelight flickered within the vast space, casting long, eerie shadows against the walls.
Hundreds of remnants from the Star Religious Group had gathered here.
Clad in matching white robes like fanatical cultists, they knelt in dense rows upon the cold, damp concrete floor.
Directly in front of their prostrate forms stood a crudely constructed makeshift altar.
Perched atop the altar was a massive, hideously deformed Semi-Grade 1 Cursed Spirit.
The creature was covered in pustule-like tumors, with countless distorted human faces struggling and wailing from within the growths.
It was a monster born from the intertwined guilt, fear of the unknown, and pathological fanaticism deep within the hearts of these Star Religious Group members.
"Praise the Great Deity..."
"Thank you for sending down divine punishment and purging that impure Star Plasma Vessel..."
"Please continue to protect us and drive away those hypocritical jujutsu sorcerers..."
A cult elder kneeling at the very front chanted the absurd prayer at the top of his lungs.
Below him, the hundreds of cultists erupted in waves of fanatical cheers and worship.
At that moment, the Semi-Grade 1 Cursed Spirit on the altar seemed to grow hungry. It suddenly lashed out with a tumor-covered tentacle, snatching a fanatical cultist from the front row.
With the sickening crunch of breaking bones, the curse stuffed the man into its twisted, gaping maw and began to chew.
Blood splattered everywhere.
Yet, what followed was truly chilling.
Instead of crying for help, the cultist being devoured shouted with a look of morbid ecstasy:
"I have been chosen by the deity! This is the baptism of divine punishment! I am ascending!"
The surrounding cultists ignored the scene entirely, prostrating themselves even more fervently. Their eyes were filled with nothing but envy and jealousy.
Witnessing this.
Suguru Geto, standing in the shadows, began to tremble uncontrollably.
He instinctively took a step forward, his foot making a light crunching sound on the debris.
"Who's there?!"
The cult elder whipped his head around, his cold gaze instantly locking onto the black Jujutsu High uniform Suguru Geto wore.
"It's a sorcerer! One of those filth who tried to protect the Star Plasma Vessel!"
"Unforgivable! How dare you interrupt the deity's ceremony!"
"Kill him! Use his blood to appease the deity's wrath!"
Like a pack of rabid dogs, the hundreds of cultists showed no fear of the man-eating curse. Instead, they snatched up stones and iron bars, charging at Suguru Geto with hideous expressions.
Absurd, ridiculous, and utterly revolting.
Were these the 'non-sorcerers' he had risked his life for, forcing himself to swallow countless nauseating cursed spirit orbs?
This pack of ignorant, beyond-redemption monkeys!
Far from feeling any guilt for driving an innocent girl to her death, they viewed a monster's feeding as a divine blessing.
Worse still, they were using their own ugliness and stupidity to endlessly breed new curses for this world, all while trying to turn their blades against the very people who protected them.
"If that's how it is..."
Suguru Geto allowed a stone to strike his forehead. Blood began to trickle slowly down his cheek.
He murmured softly, his voice devoid of any human emotion, leaving only pure coldness and silence.
'If these monkeys are the source of all curses...'
'Then if I just kill them all.'
'If I create a world for sorcerers only.'
'Then won't curses cease to exist?'
BOOM—!!!
As that thought took hold, the massive cursed energy Suguru Geto had suppressed for an entire year finally spiraled out of control, erupting violently!
Black cursed energy swept through the underground meeting place like a raging tornado.
"Come forth, Rainbow Dragon."
Suguru Geto stepped slowly from the shadows, his eyes as cold as if he were looking at the dead.
ROAR—!!!
A deafening roar followed.
A massive Semi-Special Grade Cursed Spirit covered in hard scales—Rainbow Dragon—soared from the vortex of black cursed energy behind Suguru Geto.
Its enormous body smashed through the basement's support pillars, sending a rain of debris falling.
"Aaaaah! A monster!"
"Help! Help me!"
The Star Religious Group members, who had just been worshiping fanatically, finally felt the terror of death.
They screamed and jostled each other, scurrying in all directions like frightened rats.
"Die, you monkeys."
Suguru Geto slowly raised his right hand, preparing to give the massacre order that would plunge him irrevocably into the abyss.
However, in that split second, just as fate was about to veer off course.
*Clang!*
The clear, high-pitched ring of a sword suddenly echoed through the chaotic basement.
Immediately after, the temperature within the space began to skyrocket at an unnatural speed.
A blindingly bright, dark red sword light streaked past Suguru Geto's cheek like a bolt of lightning tearing through the long night.
The light was impossibly fast, carrying an overbearing heat that seemed to incinerate everything in its path.
"Total Concentration: Sun Breathing, First Form - Dance!"
BOOM—!!!
A perfect arc of dark red flames bloomed in mid-air.
There was no world-shaking explosion or violent shockwave, only the most pure destruction and purification.
The arrogant Semi-Grade 1 Cursed Spirit perched on the altar didn't even have time to scream before it was instantly vaporized into nothingness by that dark red sword light.
Even the altar beneath it was sliced cleanly in half, dark red magma flowing from the cut.
Not only that.
That domineering sword intent and intense heat pinned the Special Grade Cursed Spirit, Rainbow Dragon, right where it was. The dragon let out an uneasy low growl, not daring to take a single step further.
The entire room fell dead silent.
Both the panic-stricken cultists and Suguru Geto, who was on the brink of losing control, were utterly awestruck by this miracle-like strike.
*Tap. Tap. Tap.*
Steady footsteps echoed from the shadows.
Yoru emerged from the darkness, expressionless, holding Shiranui in one hand as it radiated scorching heat.
He didn't look at the trembling cultists, instead walking straight up to Suguru Geto.
Within those deep, dark eyes was an absolute rationality that seemed to see through everything.
"Suguru."
Yoru slowly raised Shiranui and gently pressed the burning back of the blade against Suguru Geto's shoulder.
His voice wasn't loud, yet it boomed in Suguru's mind like a temple bell.
"Your blade is pointed in the wrong direction."
The scorching heat from the blade's spine made Suguru Geto flinch violently.
He stared fixedly at the man before him—a man of unfathomable strength who seemed to see into his very soul.
Years of conviction and the present ugliness clashed and spiraled wildly in his mind.
Should he pour out the suffocating grievance and despair that threatened to burst his chest, or should he draw his blade against his best friend on the edge of a total breakdown?
Suguru Geto's fingernails dug deep into his palms, blood quietly dripping between his fingers.
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