Azure pressure gripped the very heart of the barrier, crushing everything within.
The output of the Blue that Gojo Satoru unleashed was fundamentally different from before.
It wasn't merely at the level of pulling a single person; it forcibly shifted the center of gravity for the entire surrounding space. Pebbles rolling on the floor were sucked toward a single point, while dust, soil, and even shattered stone fragments were swept up into a violent, spiraling vortex.
The air inside the barrier let out a low groan. Invisible gravitational force was twisting the entire structure.
Yuji stood right in the center of it.
The fabric of his clothes was pulled inward, and the stone floor beneath his feet began to grind away, millimeter by millimeter. Fissures had already formed. Yet, he did not retreat.
Watching this, Gojo clicked his tongue briefly.
'He's not even being pushed back.'
Fine.
Then harder.
Gojo's left hand twisted ever so slightly. The focal point of Blue shifted a half-beat later. The direction of the gravitational pull twisted upward, then to the right, and finally spiraled downward.
It was a calculated maneuver: feigning a frontal pull to disrupt the opponent's stride, stealing their balance, and forcing them into his shortest effective range.
It was a level of micro-manipulation impossible for anyone without the Six Eyes.
However, the look in Yuji's eyes remained unchanged.
Very slowly, Yuji raised his right hand. A single drop of blood floated into the air.
The moment he saw it, Gojo reflexively calculated the next move.
Blood Manipulation—the inherited technique of the Kamo Clan. A technique that manipulates blood.
But at the same time, a nagging sensation surged within him.
The Blood Manipulation Yuji had shown thus far far exceeded any known parameters. The volume, the speed, the application, the precision. None of it made sense.
Outside, Geto Suguru's eyes narrowed as he watched the scene.
Crimson blood, followed by a slashing strike.
Blood Manipulation certainly seemed to follow the Kamo Clan lineage.
But that slashing strike... a thin, cold sensation crawled up Geto's spine.
'Surely not.'
It was an impossible hypothesis. Yet, the phenomena unfolding before his eyes continued to lean toward that very conclusion.
The strongest sorcerer known to history.
The one even hailed as the King of Curses—was this the same Cursed Technique as Ryomen Sukuna?
Geto didn't voice the thought. He felt as though too many things would irrevocably change the moment he spoke it aloud.
But he could no longer look at Yuji's technique the same way as before.
It wasn't simple strength. It was something that existed outside any structure he understood. Inside the barrier, Yuji opened his mouth.
"Piercing Blood."
The drop of blood vanished. The result arrived before the sensation of it being fired even registered.
BOOM—!
The entire right outer wall of the barrier site was blasted through.
The thick reinforced wall and the stone structure behind it were pierced in a straight line; only then did the shockwave spread, causing the wall to collapse outward. Stone dust billowed like a thick smoke screen, and severed fragments of rock were sent flying all the way out of the forest.
Gojo barely managed to slip past the trajectory by tilting his head.
It grazed him instantly.
The pressure passing by his cheek carved into his skin. Even though it hadn't landed a direct hit, it stung.
What was even more chilling than its power was the fact that after Piercing Blood had grazed him, it had precisely punctured only the structure itself.
The piercing power wasn't excessive. It was perfectly controlled.
Gojo's lips curled upward.
"This is getting more and more interesting."
He moved immediately.
He utilized martial arts and Blue simultaneously.
He made the thickness of the Limitless extremely thin, layering it just barely outside his own body. It wasn't absolute defense, but a high-level application used solely for micro-adjustments of distance.
Gojo Satoru was now squeezing out everything he had without reservation.
He didn't approach in a straight line.
He dropped his gaze for a split second, lowered his shoulder, and in the next moment, snapped his trajectory using only the strength in his ankles.
The first feint was for the eyes. The second for the center of gravity. The third for the rhythm.
Usually, anyone would get caught at some point.
Yuji easily parried the first two moves.
He pulled his shoulder back before the punch arrived, twisted his waist before the knee rose, and moved his toes just half an inch before Blue could dig in.
But Gojo didn't stop there. This time, he inserted distance manipulation of the Limitless between his martial arts strikes.
Gojo had pre-emptively induced the very path Yuji would use to evade.
It was a masterful move.
Yuji's body was a fraction of a second late. Gojo's fist grazed Yuji's jawline.
CRACK.
It wasn't a direct hit. It truly only grazed him.
And yet, the air inside the barrier exploded. Gojo's Cursed Energy was condensed at his fingertips, and the collision controlled by the Limitless could tear flesh even with a mere graze.
Yuji's head was snapped slightly to the side.
A streak of blood.
A thin red line formed along his left jaw. Outside the barrier, Riko instinctively sucked in a breath. Kuroi also widened her eyes for the first time.
Geto's expression didn't change, but his gaze was fixed much more sharply than before.
Gojo did not miss that small effective hit.
'I touched him.'
It was minuscule. But he had clearly reached him.
That single sensation completely erased any lingering hesitation within Gojo Satoru. He wasn't thinking about actually winning. What he needed now was something else.
The certainty that he could reach what was beyond. And the despair of knowing he hadn't reached it yet.
Yuji wiped the blood with the back of his hand.
"This... this was unexpected. I didn't intend to let you hit me."
"I think I can turn the output up a bit more."
At that moment, the air inside the barrier quietly settled.
No—it didn't settle, it became heavier.
Geto was the first to realize it.
Until now, Yuji had been threatening enough. However, that threat was, at best, a blade adjusted to a level Gojo could withstand.
Now, it was different.
The density of Yuji's Cursed Energy increased just a fraction.
Because of that tiny increase, the barrier site was the first to scream.
CREAK.
Cracks radiated from beneath Yuji's feet.
Starting from a single point, the fractures spread like a spiderweb in an instant. They split the center floor, spread to the half-collapsed right wall, and climbed up the supporting pillars. Dust fell slowly from the ceiling.
It wasn't intentional destruction.
Simply by standing there, he had exceeded the structural capacity the building could handle.
Gojo's expression stiffened ever so slightly.
Yuji looked up.
"Did you know, Gojo?"
Gojo narrowed his eyes, catching his breath slightly.
"Know what!"
Yuji's voice was calm.
"I have a technique that can even cut through the Limitless."
A brief silence.
The words lingered in the air. Riko didn't fully understand the meaning. Geto, however, did.
His gaze immediately fell to Yuji's right hand.
Dismantle.
A slashing strike.
The technique of the King of Curses, passed down only in records.
Geto's throat felt dry.
'Could it be, really—!!'
Gojo laughed.
But his laughter was different from before. This time, it wasn't a joke, but almost an instinctive reaction.
"Wow."
And his next words were attached softly to the end of his laugh.
"That really pisses me off."
Instead of replying, Yuji raised his right index finger.
Dismantle (Hae).
He didn't even say it aloud this time.
Just a single fingertip moved minutely, but Gojo felt a chill run straight down his spine.
The Limitless was active. Yet, he didn't feel safe. It was a bizarre sensation.
He immediately adjusted the thickness of the Limitless to be even tighter. He didn't wrap it like a wall as usual; instead, he divided the layers finely and overlapped the intervals densely. He shifted his method from simple defense to a mode meant to counter severing forces.
In that instant—the air was severed.
Gojo twisted his body reflexively.
He was too late.
Outside the Limitless—one layer, two layers, three layers. The invisible layers of distance were minutely torn apart.
Then, Gojo's left sleeve split. Blood erupted a moment later. His entire arm hadn't been severed.
It was a thin, long wound carved across the outside of his upper arm.
It wasn't a fatal injury.
However, Gojo's face hardened visibly for the first time.
'He... cut through the Limitless?'
More accurately than being pierced, it was cut. The very distance that prevented contact had been severed. It wasn't just a strong slash.
It meant the target of the technique was not his body, but the distance itself created by the Limitless.
Kuroi, watching from the side, covered her mouth with her hand. Even Geto lost his voice in that moment.
"...Satoru."
His voice was very low, but it was thick with unmistakable shock.
Even Riko could tell now.
What just happened was not normal. Even Riko vaguely knew that Gojo Satoru was someone who allowed no one to touch his body.
Yet Yuji's attack just now had touched even that which prevents touching.
Inside the barrier, Gojo inhaled very slowly.
His left arm stung. Blood was flowing. He didn't have the Reverse Cursed Technique yet.
That wound would remain.
But strangely, it wasn't just fear he felt. Rather, for the first time, everything became incredibly vivid.
'Yeah. This is it.'
This was exactly what he had wanted to see.
A fight where he could be reached despite having the Limitless. A power that crushed his common sense.
And now, an opponent with that power was looking him in the eye and saying, 'Come if you think you can.'
Gojo slowly pulled the corners of his lips up.
"Fine."
Ignoring his wounded arm, he raised both hands.
The output of Blue surged again.
This time, it was rougher and broader than before. The phase of delicate pulls was over. Now, he was twisting the entire barrier site itself—no matter what position Yuji took, the position itself would be destroyed.
The barrier floor rumbled.
BOOM—!
The central stone slabs surged upward in their entirety.
Broken pillars, wall fragments, and the cracked ground were all sucked into the air, swirling in a vortex. Even the upper support lines of the barrier distorted, causing sunlight to blur as if passing through shattered glass.
The structure could no longer hold out. If there were only cracks before, now the supports themselves were buckling.
Seeing this, Yuji took a step forward.
CRUNCH.
It wasn't just beneath his feet this time.
Fissures spread along the direction he moved. The floor split, the side walls fractured, and a portion of the upper barrier layer tore thinly, allowing the light of the outside sky to peek through the gaps.
The rising output was crushing the entire structure with sheer pressure.
Yuji raised his right hand again. Crimson blood spread thinly across the back of his hand.
Dismantle and Blood Manipulation overlapped naturally, as if they were one body. Seeing this, Geto's heart sank into a cold chill.
Blood Manipulation.
And those slashing strikes.
If they truly, truly were the same—it meant that the inherited technique of the Kamo Clan and the calamity of the Heian era were being manifested simultaneously within a single human being.
It didn't make sense. And yet, it was right there in front of him.
Gojo unleashed Blue like an explosion.
At the same time, Yuji's index finger sliced through the air.
Azure pressure and black slashes collided head-on at the center of the barrier.
And in that instant—one entire side of the barrier site's ceiling came crashing down.