"Is this how you usually train?"
Watching Naoya Zenin give his wounds only the most basic treatnt, Yuki Tsukumo could not help frowning as she spoke.
"Yeah."
Naoya Zenin answered coldly.
"...You're pushing yourself too hard. Keep this up and you'll get yourself killed sooner or later."
At Yuki Tsukumo's exaggerated gasp, Naoya Zenin lifted his eyes and glanced at her. His voice carried its usual impatience and arrogance.
"I can't exactly afford to waste my energy on pointless things all day like you do."
The two of them were already seated inside.
Yuki Tsukumo folded her arms and stared at the hastily wrapped bandages on his palms, then clicked her tongue.
"I seriously don't get why you're pushing yourself this hard. You're not actually expecting to get stronger by relying on those hidden weapons, are you? With that much effort, you'd be better off spending more ti studying Cursed Techniques."
Naoya Zenin did not answer right away. He rely turned his head and looked out at the patch of sky frad by the courtyard wall, a faint loneliness flickering through his eyes.
Only then did he speak, tone flat.
"Yuki Tsukumo, not everyone is like you. Not everyone has that much talent to squander. As far as I'm concerned, as long as I can stay alive, I don't care what kind of thods I have to use."
"Before you worry about surviving, try taking better care of yourself first, idiot."
Yuki Tsukumo decided not to keep trying to persuade Naoya Zenin.
Everyone had their own path.
For a selfish, self-serving jujutsu genius like her, it really was hard to empathize with Naoya Zenin's situation.
He was clearly the young master of the Zenin family. His strength had already reached the level of a Special Grade 1 Sorcerer. He had been born with a road leading straight to Ro.
And yet he still insisted on hurting himself like this, as though he owed sothing to the world, burning away his life with everything he had.
Yuki Tsukumo simply could not understand that kind of self-destructive mindset.
It seed that he and Satoru Gojo would probably have a lot to talk about.
But then again...
It was precisely because the jujutsu world still had people like Naoya Zenin and Satoru Gojo in it that Yuki Tsukumo felt its darkness had not yet reached the point of swallowing everything whole, and that humanity might still have so hope left.
That was why, after Naoya Zenin's harsh wake-up call that day, this Special Grade Sorcerer chose to believe him and started investigating information related to [Ryon Sukuna's Finger].
And sure enough.
Yuki Tsukumo found that thing's trail.
The calamity that had already existed before the Heian era, the legendary figure born in the Nara era at the very dawn of jujutsu, from the sa age as Tengen-sama, the immortal demon that had lived for over a thousand years without aging or dying.
That was [Mara (Demon)]. Kenjaku!!!
"According to legend, Kenjaku has a thousand faces. It delights in manipulating hearts and leading the masses astray. It can take on anyone's appearance, and say exactly what anyone most wants to hear."
There was no trace of Yuki Tsukumo's usual lazy joking tone now. With the daylight from outside falling across her face, she looked unusually solemn.
"So say it was the evil monk Dōkyō, who pleased Empress Kōken through bedchamber arts, proclaid himself Dharma King in the Nara period, and forged divine oracles in an attempt to seize the throne."
"So say it was Matsunaga Hisahide, who murdered Shogun Ashikaga Yoshiteru, burned down the Great Buddha Hall of Tōdai-ji, and pushed the Warring States era completely out of control."
"So say it was Saigō Takamori, who overthrew the shogunate and created the iji Restoration, only to betray the revolution afterward, raise troops in rebellion, and launch the greatest civil war, the Satsuma Rebellion."
The Special Grade Sorcerer's tone was incomparably grave.
"In just about every major event in this country's history, there are traces of Kenjaku. At tis it is a righteous patriot. At tis it is a bloodthirsty fiend. Sotis it wears monk's robes and speaks of saving all living beings. Sotis it holds a butcher's blade and drenches the land in blood. No one knows what Kenjaku is really after, and no one knows what it truly wants, but one thing is certain."
Yuki Tsukumo's expression darkened abruptly.
"Wherever Kenjaku appears, chaos follows!"
"It is a Mara, and what it loves most is putting others through demonic trials. Kenjaku will beco the thing you desire most, say the words you most want to hear, and carefully peel open the scars in your heart you do not dare touch. If your resolve wavers even a little, it will exploit that opening, and from that mont on, you will beco its puppet, one more face among its thousand!"
"...?"
Naoya Zenin unconsciously stiffened.
Mara.
That naturally referred to the Demon King Papiyas.
The enemy of Shakyamuni, the one who used intimidation, temptation, and every other ans to obstruct the Buddha's cultivation. The embodied symbol of inner demons.
If Satoru Gojo was the Buddha who alone stood supre above heaven and earth, then Kenjaku, the one who sched to seal him, truly did deserve the title of Mara.
And Kenjaku was completely different from the usual final boss in other works.
If the final bosses in other shounen manga were born evil, or fallen from grace, or wanted to save the world but chose the wrong path.
Then Kenjaku was more like Aizen from Bleach.
A genuine thrill-seeker who acted purely for amusent, following a code that belonged to no one but itself.
But its ending was completely different from Aizen's.
Kenjaku's death in Jujutsu Kaisen had been downright absurd.
It got stalled by Takaba, a codian who had only just beco a jujutsu sorcerer, then was killed in one careless mont by Yuta Okkotsu.
Kenjaku never completed its thousand-year plan, nor did it ever show its full strength.
It just exited in a hurry, took its death, and disappeared.
Still, that made sense too.
Because Jujutsu Kaisen was practically called Sukuna Kaisen already. One Sukuna was hard enough to deal with. If you added a Kenjaku at full power on top of that, the manga could only have ended in a Bad End.
Maybe Kenjaku had originally been the ultimate boss in so discarded draft.
But because the story needed to wrap up quickly, it got killed off by the plot instead.
If Ryon Sukuna was the final boss of Jujutsu Kaisen, then Kenjaku was the hidden boss of Jujutsu Kaisen's true ending.
Fortunately, though.
After a whole chain of butterfly effects, Naoya Zenin finally had the chance to see Kenjaku appear as that hidden boss.
If this transmigrator were still just a manga reader, then he was certain he would be ecstatic.
Finding out your favorite series actually had a true ending left to uncover was exactly the kind of thing fans loved most. He would definitely have laughed his head off.
But right now, Naoya Zenin could not laugh.
He really could not laugh, brother.
Running into a hidden boss in the starter zone. Was that seriously fair?
To be honest.
Even if Naoya Zenin had not been hacked to death by his psychotic little cousin, Kenjaku would probably have gotten him sooner or later anyway.
The transmigrator felt his vision darken.
His life had already been hard enough. Now it had to get even worse and turn into hell difficulty?
But at least there was one piece of good news.
Yuki Tsukumo was no longer slacking off. She had finally started helping.
"According to my investigation, aside from Jujutsu High, all the other [Ryon Sukuna's Fingers] that ended up out in the world are being recovered, little by little."
Yuki Tsukumo lit another cigarette.
"If Kenjaku really does have a way to revive Ryon Sukuna, then we need to prepare for the worst. Other than the six fingers being kept at Jujutsu High, which are still relatively safe, there's a good chance Kenjaku has already recovered all the rest. In other words, if the King of Curses from a thousand years ago is revived in the modern era, he'd be able to handle us with one hand."
"How many of Sukuna's Fingers worth of strength do you think you have?"
"...?"
The Special Grade Sorcerer took a deep breath.
"To be honest, Naoya Zenin, there's sothing I need to make clear. I'm not on the sa side as Jujutsu High. Strictly speaking, I'm not your ally. As for whether Kenjaku can revive Ryon Sukuna, that isn't sothing I need to worry about. That's sothing Satoru Gojo needs to worry about."
"Even if that King of Curses ends up slaughtering every human being?"
"I'm not that heartless. If things really co to that, of course I'll step in."
Yuki Tsukumo flicked the ash from her cigarette.
"But until then, I'm going to cast a long line and wait things out. I'm just an ordinary beauty who wants Cursed Spirits to disappear from this world for good."
"Can you really face Tengen openly and without sha?"
Naoya Zenin's blunt question left Yuki Tsukumo silent on the spot.
"...Ever since I defied the fate of the Star Plasma Vessel and refused to rge with Tengen, I haven't been able to face Tengen."
She let out a long sigh.
"Naoya Zenin, let ask you sothing. Do you think Tengen is still human?"
"Tengen has protected the Jujutsu World for a thousand years with an immortal body. Without Tengen's Barrier techniques, all of humanity would be under attack from Cursed Spirits."
Naoya Zenin shot back,
"Are you saying that after all this ti, Tengen has already lost the resolve to protect humanity?"
"For all these years, I've been observing the relationship between Cursed Spirits and humans, thinking about what real peace would look like."
Yuki Tsukumo folded her arms.
"If all we do is kill Cursed Spirits, we just stay trapped in the vicious cycle where Cursed Energy gives rise to more Cursed Spirits. Instead of throwing everything we have into pointless effort, we should step outside the rules and look for a real way to end the conflict."
"What exactly are you trying to say?"
"What if, back then, Tengen hadn't set up Barrier techniques in Japan, and had instead let that Cursed Energy spread throughout the entire world? Would the world look different now?"
Naoya Zenin had not expected Yuki Tsukumo to be carrying around thoughts like that.
Then again.
Yuki Tsukumo was a force of nature herself. It was only normal for her to co up with sothing that outrageous.
If Naoya Zenin was a reformist who supported changes to modern jujutsu, then Yuki Tsukumo was the kind of traditionalist who thought even the reformists were far too conservative.
No, seriously, sis.
What wire in your brain got crossed here? You see the patient is deathly ill, then turn around and kill the doctor?
Tengen had spent a thousand years diligently protecting the Jujutsu World. Whatever good or bad Tengen may have done, overall the rits still outweighed the faults, didn't they? And now you want to get rid of the one true old guard?
If people start fighting because they stand on different sides, there's still hope. But if they start fighting because they're walking completely different paths, then I'm absolutely the first one running.
"Yuki Tsukumo, do you really think everything Kenjaku is doing is right?"
"Well..."
Yuki Tsukumo clasped her hands behind her head and mumbled around the cigarette between her lips.
"I'd have to et Kenjaku first before I could say. If Kenjaku is chasing the sa idea I am, then working together isn't out of the question."
"If that's how you feel, then why help investigate information on Sukuna's Fingers?"
"I'm not all-knowing."
Yuki Tsukumo shrugged.
"I'm just trying, in my own way, to change this world one step at a ti. Naoya Zenin, I'm humanity's ally, but not Jujutsu High's ally. How could I possibly know in advance whether what I'm doing is right or wrong?"
"So you're planning to use as... a yardstick to judge right and wrong?"
"Smart boy."
The blonde beauty blew him a kiss.
"The things you said to back then really pissed off. But what pisses off even more is that, when I thought about it afterward, I realized you weren't wrong."
Yuki Tsukumo continued,
"I'm already sick of the way the Jujutsu World does things. But when I think about idiots like you and Satoru Gojo still throwing yourselves into life-and-death battles, I can't help feeling that by standing on the sidelines, I've left you with too few choices."
Yuki Tsukumo had always kept her distance from the Jujutsu World. Even as a Special Grade Sorcerer, she never obeyed assigned missions and instead acted alone.
She was doing it for the sake of her own dream, but because no one else understood what she was trying to do, she had naturally lost the energy to explain herself.
I'm doing what I need to do. If you don't get it, then you don't get it. That's your problem, not mine.
That kind of shaless attitude might have worked on everyone else, but she ran headfirst into a wall with Naoya Zenin.
Naoya Zenin had gone way too hard on her.
Hard enough to make even Yuki Tsukumo blush.
Slacking off and checking out had gone a little too far. Far enough that even Yuki Tsukumo's own conscience couldn't let it slide anymore.
It still wasn't enough to shake her convictions, but since Naoya Zenin was so good at tearing into her, Yuki Tsukumo could not help growing curious. Just what gave Naoya Zenin the right to co at a Special Grade Sorcerer like her that aggressively?
So Yuki Tsukumo quickly made up her mind.
She decided to test just how deep Naoya Zenin really was.
Of course, not that kind of physical test.
She would simply follow his lead for the ti being and see where his line of thinking took her, just to find out whether there were any surprises in store.
And the result was shocking.
The mysterious figure steadily collecting [Ryon Sukuna's Fingers] was actually the legendary demon, Kenjaku.
It was a deeply mysterious na, one she had only ever heard ntioned in passing by Tengen.
A real figure of legend. She had never imagined Kenjaku was actually still alive in this world.
Yuki Tsukumo had already beco intensely interested in Kenjaku. She wanted to find that thousand-faced demon and talk with Kenjaku about humanity's future.
But before that, she felt she needed to co pass the information along.
Without Naoya Zenin, she would never have been able to track Kenjaku down.
And while she was at it, she also wanted to hear what kind of brilliant take Naoya Zenin would have after learning about Kenjaku.
But judging from how things looked now, this handso guy really did not have much to offer.
After all, he did not seem to have ever even heard the na Kenjaku, much less be capable of analyzing what Kenjaku was thinking.
Naoya Zenin was still stuck on the level of deciding whether or not Ryon Sukuna's revival should be stopped.
Compared to soone like Yuki Tsukumo, who could see straight to the core of the problem at a glance, he was worlds apart.
There was no comparison at all.
"What if Kenjaku is reviving Ryon Sukuna specifically to deal with Satoru Gojo?"
Naoya Zenin fell silent for a mont before speaking to Yuki Tsukumo.
"If Satoru Gojo loses to Ryon Sukuna, then what happens to humanity after that?"
"You're telling that blindfold weirdo would lose to so King of Curses from a thousand years ago?"
Yuki Tsukumo rolled her eyes.
"Don't make stupid jokes."
"What if he does?"
"Then I'll step in."
The Special Grade Sorcerer flashed a suprely confident smile.
"I'll defeat Ryon Sukuna!!!"
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