"You're quite arrogant, calling Special Grade Cursed Spirits a rabble." Geto Suguru's voice was cold as steel. The runes along Yōtōhime's blade blazed with crimson light as his grip tightened.
*"Break!" *
A crescent of sword qi erupted from the demon blade, slicing through Kenjaku's water wall like tissue paper. The barrier exploded into mist.
Kenjaku's eyes widened. He stomped, and a surge of water lifted him just as the sword qi passed beneath—close enough to leave a thin line of blood on his ankle.
Before he could recover, Inugami and Nekomata burst through the dissipating mist, their forms blurring with speed. They flanked him, cutting off escape routes. Geto surged forward, Yōtōhime singing through the air.
Kenjaku was once again surrounded.
Geto pressed the attack, each strike of Yōtōhime carrying the weight of killing intent. The blade hummed, cursed energy flaring with every swing. Kenjaku twisted and dodged in the cramped space, water constructs forming and dissolving around him.
Inugami lunged, jaws gaping, fangs aimed at Kenjaku's leg. Kenjaku's response was instant—a vicious kick to the beast's jaw that sent it stumbling. But the opening cost him.
Nekomata's claws raked across his sleeve, leaving deep gouges in the fabric—and the flesh beneath.
Kenjaku roared. A torrent of water exploded from his palm, sweeping toward all three opponents. Geto sidestepped, Yōtōhime splitting the stream in half. Inugami and Nekomata were less fortunate—the current caught them, tumbling them backward.
For one breath, Kenjaku had space.
He used it.
Cursed energy erupted from his borrowed body. Water coalesced, shaped, solidified—two clones materialized beside him. One wielded a pitch-black long staff, the other a pair of jagged dual blades. They launched themselves at Inugami and Nekomata without hesitation.
Kenjaku himself formed a spear of compressed water, its tip radiating killing cold, and charged directly at Geto.
Geto's eyes narrowed. He didn't retreat.
He moved—a hair's breadth evasion that let the spear pass within inches of his heart. Then Yōtōhime swept around in a devastating arc, the wind of its passage howling like a trapped soul.
The spear-wielding clone engaged Inugami in a furious dance—staff spinning, striking, blocking. Inugami's jaws clamped down on the shaft, and with a savage twist of its massive head, hurled the clone away like a discarded toy.
The bladed clone and Nekomata exchanged a blistering sequence of attacks—claws against blades, sparks flying with each collision. Neither could gain advantage.
Kenjaku's spear became a living thing—weaving, striking, retreating, striking again. Geto matched him blow for blow, Yōtōhime and water spear meeting in explosions of force that cracked the ground beneath them.
'This is taking too long,' Geto realized. 'He's stalling. Why?'
He made his decision.
Yōtōhime Release: True Form of the Demon Princess. *
Behind Geto, space tore. A colossal figure materialized—Yōtōhime's true form, a towering demon princess wreathed in malevolent beauty. Her eyes opened, ancient and terrible, and the weight of her presence pressed down on everything within the domain.
Inugami and Nekomata responded in kind. Their cursed energy erupted simultaneously, overwhelming the water clones and dissolving them into scattered droplets.
Geto gripped Yōtōhime's hilt with both hands. Behind him, the demon princess mirrored his motion.
The blade descended.
Kenjaku had nowhere to run. No space to dodge. He planted his feet, gripped his spear, and threw.
The spear transformed mid-flight—lengthening, thickening, becoming a massive water dragon with jaws wide enough to swallow a house. It roared, a sound like crashing waves, and met Yōtōhime's descending blade.
BOOM.
The collision sent shockwaves across the domain. Fox statues cracked. Mist scattered. The ground beneath them buckled and split.
Water and cursed energy fought for dominance, each refusing to yield.
The collision of Yōtōhime's true form and Kenjaku's water dragon sent shockwaves rippling across the domain. The air itself seemed to ignite, brilliant light flaring as energy surged in wild, uncontrolled waves.
Kenjaku had survived—barely.
His chest heaved. Sweat poured down his borrowed face. The water dragon had dissolved, and with it, a massive portion of his cursed energy reserves. He stood gasping within Tamamo-no-Mae's oppressive domain, the fox statues seeming to mock him with their silent stares.
'Too much. This is costing too much.'
Every movement felt heavier. Each defense required more effort. The domain's suppression was relentless, a constant weight pressing down on his soul.
He couldn't sustain this.
Then he saw it—the barest flicker in Geto's stance. A moment's relaxation, the natural exhale after a successful overwhelming attack.
It was all Kenjaku needed.
Domain Expansion: Endless Abyss. *
Darkness exploded outward.
It wasn't light or shadow—it was absence. A sphere of absolute nothing consumed everything in its path, swallowing Geto, Inugami, Nekomata, and the remnants of Tamamo-no-Mae's domain in an instant.
Geto felt the world fall away.
No light. No sound. No sensation but the crushing pressure of infinite depth pressing against his skin. He was floating—or sinking—in an abyss without bottom, without end.
His senses were gone. Completely stripped. He couldn't see his own hand before his face. Couldn't hear his own breathing. Couldn't feel the Yōtōhime's hilt in his grip except as a distant, fading memory of touch.
And his cursed energy—it was draining. Pouring out of him like blood from a wound, consumed by the hungry darkness around him.
Then came the feedback.
A撕裂 in his connection. A Cursed Spirit, gone.
Tamamo-no-Mae.
Her domain had shattered the moment Kenjaku's expanded. And in the abyss, she had been hunted. Marine creatures—twisted, deep-dwelling nightmares—had swarmed her from every direction. She had fought, briefly, beautifully. Then they had torn her apart.
Inugami and Nekomata fared little better.
The creatures came from everywhere and nowhere. Fanged horrors with too many rows of teeth. Whip-tentacled things that struck faster than the eye could track. Bloated masses spraying mucus that burned where it touched.
Inugami fought with savage grace, its electrified fur crackling in the darkness, each claw strike finding purchase. But for every creature it tore apart, two more took its place. Blood—its own—began to mat its fur.
Nekomata was a blur of motion, its forked tail lashing, claws extended, moving with the fluid precision of a natural predator. But the abyss had no end, and neither did its inhabitants. Weariness crept into its limbs.
Geto stood in the center of the storm, blind and deaf, feeling his power drain away second by second.
And somewhere in the darkness, Kenjaku watched. Waiting. Smiling.