"What a persistent toy."
Sukuna stood beneath a shrine built of countless bleached bones.
Looking at Mahoraga—who was steadily approaching despite being covered in wounds within his domain—the impatience in Sukuna's eyes grew stronger.
The monster's adaptation speed had already exceeded the damage limit Sukuna could inflict within a 140-meter radius.
"In that case..."
Sukuna slowly lowered his hands, a chilling cruelty flashing in his crimson eyes.
"I'll expand the range. With denser slashes, I'll crush it completely before it can fully adapt—along with all the trash in this city."
As Sukuna's words fell.
"Malevolent Shrine: Extension!"
Rumble!!!
The domain, which originally covered a radius of only 140 meters, surged outward at this moment like a bursting sea of blood!
Two hundred meters!
Three hundred meters!
Four hundred meters!
This was the maximum limit of the domain Sukuna could currently control!
Within this terrifying area with a diameter of a staggering eight hundred meters...
All life and non-life would face a truly indiscriminate and devastating strike!
Swish, swish, swish—!!!
The sky seemed to be completely torn apart.
Countless slashes, so dense that even light could not penetrate them, poured down onto the earth like a storm at the end of the world.
"Boom! Rumble! Boom!"
Under this indiscriminate destruction...
Skyscrapers dozens of stories high, cast from reinforced concrete, were sliced into countless tiny fragments in an instant like paper blocks and collapsed.
The hard asphalt surface was plowed with thousands of bottomless ravines; underground pipes burst, and water columns intertwined with fire.
"Aaahhh!"
"Help! Someone save us!"
Ordinary people at the edge of the domain who hadn't had time to evacuate let out screams of extreme despair as they watched this hellish scene.
They scattered like headless flies.
But how could human legs outrun slashes that were everywhere?
"Damn it!"
Standing at the edge of the domain and struggling to hold his ground, Suguru Geto's face turned as pale as paper in an instant.
He could clearly feel the destructive storm of slashes spreading outward at a terrifying speed, about to completely swallow the innocent civilians behind him.
'If these slashes spread any further...'
'Tens of thousands of civilians will die here!'
In Suguru Geto's mind, memories of the ordinary people who died in the ruins because of his plan during the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons suddenly flashed.
Those despairing eyes and painful wails had haunted his nightmares countless times.
'I once... thought that as long as all non-sorcerers were eliminated, I could create a world without curses.'
'But in reality, I was just running away, using even greater slaughter to cover up my own powerlessness!'
Suguru Geto gritted his teeth so hard that a trace of blood seeped from the corner of his mouth.
He turned his head and looked at Megumi Fushiguro in the distance, who had forcibly summoned Mahoraga to protect everyone and was now in a state of suspended animation.
He looked at the ordinary people who were trembling in the face of death but still pinned their hopes on him.
"I can't back down..."
"This time, I absolutely cannot back down again!"
"For those... whom I failed to protect!"
Suguru Geto suddenly turned around, facing the storm of slashes that was sweeping in like a tsunami.
He closed his eyes and formed an extremely complex hand sign with both hands, one that exuded a solemn and sacred aura.
"Domain Expansion—"
When Suguru Geto opened his eyes again, there was no more confusion or madness in them.
Replacing it was a clarity and determination that saw through life and death, filled with great compassion.
"Lotus Garden of Pure Souls!!!"
Hum—!
As Suguru Geto's voice, which seemed capable of penetrating the soul, echoed over the ruins...
A massive amount of cursed energy, filled with peace and purity, erupted from his body!
At the edge of Sukuna's blood-soaked and murderous Malevolent Shrine, a completely different and strange space was forcibly pried open!
This was a boundless and pure Japanese lotus pond garden.
White mist flowed slowly on the ground.
Huge, glowing white lotuses bloomed quietly in the void.
No hideous cursed spirits, no bloody slaughter.
Only a profound Zen solemnity flowed through this space.
"What is... that?!"
Mei Mei, observing the battlefield from a distance with binoculars, showed an extremely shocked expression for the first time on her face, which usually bore a lazy smile.
"Suguru Geto's domain? He's actually protecting ordinary people?!"
Standing next to Mei Mei, Maki Zenin was so shocked that she almost dropped the Playful Cloud in her hand.
The man who once regarded ordinary people as monkeys and didn't hesitate to launch the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons to eliminate all non-sorcerers...
...was actually using his domain now to desperately protect the very people he once hated most!
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
Suguru Geto's Lotus Garden of Pure Souls and Sukuna's Malevolent Shrine collided violently!
Two completely different domain rules engaged in a brutal struggle at their boundaries.
Sukuna's slashes were like wild beasts, frantically tearing at the pure garden.
Meanwhile, the white lotuses in Suguru Geto's domain turned into indestructible shields, dead-locking the lethal slashes outside.
"Huff... huff..."
Suguru Geto gasped for air, blood continuously gushing from his mouth and nose.
In the domain battle, although his strength was formidable, there was still an insurmountable gap compared to a monster of Sukuna's caliber.
His Lotus Garden of Pure Souls had already begun to show fine cracks under Sukuna's indiscriminate and violent slashes.
"Everyone... get inside my domain!"
Suguru Geto endured the excruciating pain of his soul being torn apart and shouted loudly at the civilians around him.
At the same time, he dispersed all the cursed spirit phantoms within his domain that possessed special abilities.
These cursed spirits were no longer used as weapons for slaughter.
Instead, they became loyal guards, darting through the hailstorm of slashes to forcibly pull the ordinary people who were paralyzed with fear, one by one, into the protection of the Lotus Garden of Pure Souls.
"Quick! Faster!"
Suguru Geto's vision began to blur, and his body trembled violently.
Every slash that hit the domain caused another heavy blow to his soul.
But he still maintained the hand sign position firmly, like an unshakeable monument.
"I won't... let a single one of you die here!"
On this night in Shibuya, shrouded in destruction and death.
The curse user who once bore the title of the most evil was using his life to complete a tragic act of self-redemption.
And could his persistence hold out until the variable that would change everything arrived?
[ Author's Note : If you're loving the story, a power_stone, review or comment means the world!
Want 40+ chapters ahead right now? patre0n.c0m/Royal_ink ]