"Tengen, I still have one question. Since the Culling Game has barrier borders, can't we use the Inverted Spear of Heaven to erase the boundary, or even the game itself?" Mukuro shifted the topic as he spoke.
Strictly speaking, barrier techniques were also a kind of cursed technique. That was why the Inverted Spear of Heaven could break open the Prison Realm. By the same logic, the barriers of the Culling Game should also be removable.
"Sadly, I already considered that." Tengen shook his head, denying it once.
The true nature of the Culling Game lay in the word "game." Because Kenjaku did not have enough cursed energy, and because he made binding vows, he was only able to quickly create so many powerful barriers in such a short time.
The barrier boundaries were merely the "skin." The true "bones" and "flesh" were the players who entered the Culling Game.
But the Inverted Spear of Heaven could not undo bodily changes caused by Idle Transfiguration. In other words, it could not alter the "bones and flesh," because those were already completed techniques. Its effect only canceled techniques that were currently active.
And the Culling Game was not born because of the barriers. The barriers only existed to support the death rules created through binding vows. So even if the Inverted Spear of Heaven destroyed the barriers, the vows protecting the game's rules would likely recreate new barriers instantly.
And that was only the best-case guess.
If things went badly, the barriers might disappear while the game continued unchanged. The actual range would remain the same, but the barriers would no longer be visible. That would instead create trouble for sorcerers inside, and for outsiders affected by what they could no longer see.
The worst result would be if the barriers were forcibly destroyed this way and the Kogane judged that the Culling Game could no longer "continue." Then, according to the rules of the game and the vow that players could only enter but not leave, it might forcefully end the game on its own.
That meant removing techniques from those already chosen, as well as any new players who entered.
"So we can only move step by step..." Suguru muttered, holding his chin.
From what they knew now, because of binding vows and the nature of the techniques involved, even people as strong as them had to follow the path Kenjaku laid out. They simply did not have enough information to find a better solution.
"In theory, yes." Tengen's reply came after a slight pause, as if he had thought about it for a moment.
He did not tell them everything. In truth, he still held some initiative against the Culling Game.
At its core, the Culling Game barriers were Bon Barriers drawn using his Pure Barriers as blueprints.
The so-called Pure Barriers were highly advanced barriers placed in key locations across Japan, while the Bon Barriers were an even higher-grade barrier system.
Tengen created the Pure Barriers to suppress the birth of cursed spirits and greatly improve the precision of barrier techniques used by assistant managers.
That was why assistant managers, though not talented enough to go far in jujutsu itself, were often highly skilled in barrier arts.
Among them, four Pure Barriers were especially important.
They were the Pure Barrier centered on the Imperial Palace, the Yamakuni Mausoleum Pure Barrier in Kyoto, the sacred land of jujutsu, the massive Holy Mountain of Hida Pure Barrier that divided Japan into eastern and western halves, and the land beneath their feet now, the Tombs of the Star Corridor Pure Barrier, once considered a candidate site for Japan's capital.
Which meant that from the very beginning, Tengen had the authority to decide whether the Culling Game should exist at all. He only needed to destroy the Tombs of the Star Corridor Pure Barrier beneath them.
Though Pure Barriers were extremely strong, Tengen, as their creator, could naturally destroy them with ease. And once the Pure Barrier was destroyed, the Bon Barriers built from it would also vanish.
Unlike using the Inverted Spear of Heaven to forcefully remove the Bon Barriers, this would destroy the very foundation of the Culling Game itself. The game would end immediately, and the rules formed through binding vows would fail at once.
But Tengen could not do that.
The Pure Barriers were not something that could be built in a day. If they were destroyed, then while the Culling Game would certainly end, the effect on the entire world would be enormous.
Many things accumulated over the past thousand years through the endless war between sorcerers and cursed spirits would become useless. The development level of barrier techniques throughout the jujutsu world would fall back nearly a thousand years.
Most importantly, Tengen himself would lose the ability to gather his soul and appear like this for a period of time. The barriers of the jujutsu world would also enter a temporary state of damage and weakness.
Its impact would reach far beyond one mere Culling Game. So unless things truly reached a dead end, he would never choose such a method.
"Alright, alright. Leave the rest to us." Satoru took off his blindfold, his Six Eyes seeming to shine.
"I'm counting on you." Tengen nodded.
"Then we'll take our leave, Master Tengen."
With Suguru's words, after learning everything currently known, the three special grade sorcerers left the Tombs of the Star Corridor.
* * *
The group walked along the path inside Jujutsu High.
"Master Tengen is the foundation of the jujutsu world's barriers. If something happened to him, the whole world would fall into chaos. What you said earlier was really rude."
Suguru was unable to hold back his complaint about what his best friend had almost asked earlier.
Even if Satoru had not asked, he already knew the answer. If even a "low-level technique" like God Feeding Art could temporarily call upon Master Tengen, then there was no need to think further about his Cursed Spirit Manipulation.
With his own strength as a special grade sorcerer, the moment he touched Tengen's true body, he would probably refine him immediately.
That topic had already crossed into threatening Tengen's life.
"I didn't say anything rude. I was just curious." Satoru placed both hands behind his head, looking innocent.
"You really are impossible." Suguru sighed helplessly.
Soon, they reached a fork in the road and stopped.
"Master Tengen is hiding something from us," Satoru said suddenly.
Perhaps it was the extreme perception granted by the Six Eyes, but he had sensed a trace of hesitation whenever Tengen spoke. It was as if he wanted to say something, yet each time the words reached his lips, he held them back.
"Doesn't matter. If Master Tengen chose not to say it, then it means the time hasn't come yet," Suguru replied calmly, not denying it.
As the strongest figures who had spent years in the jujutsu world, the three of them naturally noticed something was off. And Tengen, as the creator of barriers, had protected the world for a thousand years. None of them would look at him with suspicion without reason.
"I'll head into the Culling Game through the Tokyo barrier first and take a look. Megumi and the others should be nearby too."
Mukuro did not join that topic. Instead, he spoke of his next plan.
At present, he was the most suitable person to move in and out of the barriers.
"Then I'll go find someone too. The jujutsu world is seriously short on manpower lately..." Satoru added as he prepared to leave as well.
"See you." Suguru waved his hand.
The three who had been called the strongest since their student days each took a different path at the crossroads.
Different roads, same destination.
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