The moment the Shura Transformation took form, Tsuchigumo's fists came down again.
The thickest of its six arms, the upper two, clenched into fists and slammed down from both sides simultaneously.
But this time, Shinji did not dodge.
The six-meter-tall bone-lightning body raised its arms, and not just two. On the outer skeleton of the Shura Transformation, the power of Bone Soul Change had broken the limits of the body.
White bone spurs extended from the shoulders, elbows, and arms simultaneously, building two auxiliary arm-like skeletal supports outside the original arms.
Four arms crossed in a block.
Boom!
The shockwave exploded at the point of contact. The ground beneath both of them collapsed two meters. Rubble and soil were thrown into the air by the blast.
Shinji's body was pushed back five steps.
But only five steps.
Not the pathetic bouncing three times after being kicked away before. Five steps, his feet gouging trenches in the earth, then standing firm.
Steady. Blocked.
The green light behind Tsuchigumo's bone mask flickered.
"Blocked? You blocked it!" Its tone shifted from surprise to wild joy.
This was its close-range strike. Though not at full power, it was certainly fierce, not something an ordinary demon could withstand.
Shinji did not answer.
He simply moved again.
The materialized Lightning-Muscle Sharp Body was no longer just arcs jumping on the body's surface, lightning had seeped into his marrow, into every bone of the Shura Transformation.
When he stepped, the ground beneath was not crushed, but pierced through by electric arcs.
Speed surged.
Though not reaching Kidōmaru's pure speed transformation, in the instant the lightning surged through his entire skeletal structure, the six-meter bone-lightning body vanished from its spot.
A speed beyond the limit of what the eye could capture.
The next moment, it appeared to Tsuchigumo's right.
Muramasa swung!
Yes, though wrapped in the Shura Transformation, the Shura Transformation also held Muramasa, a colossal blade!
The essence of the Shura Transformation was magnification, an increase and decrease in quality and quantity, but its manifestation was projection.
Projecting its own power. Projecting what it held.
On this foundation, the shadow of Muramasa could also be projected.
Such a maxed-out affinity object would cooperate wholeheartedly.
Like a tool held by a god, acting with perfect intuition.
Between this, the projected colossal blade was no longer wrapped in the simple purple arcs of before.
The materialized lightning seeped from within the blade, merging with the bone blade extended by Bone Soul Transformation, forming a translucent thunder-bone edge around the projected Muramasa.
The blade struck Tsuchigumo's middle right arm.
Thud.
It cut in.
The grey-white skin was torn open by the thunder-bone composite edge. The demonic aura layer churned violently where the blade passed.
The "phenomenon" automatic repair activated but the repair was slower than before.
Because of the lightning.
The materialized lightning now possessed "substance." No longer just pure burning, the demonic aura it carried had gained the ability to interfere with phenomena, though far from spiritual power's restraint or divine power's suppression, it was enough to create brief disruption at the wound.
A moment.
An instant of repair delay.
For Shinji himself, in that brief gap, he might not be able to do much.
But for Kikyō behind him....
Enough.
The string sounded again.
At the same moment Shinji engaged on the right, Kikyō had moved to Tsuchigumo's left rear.
Her position formed a straight line with Shinji, passing through the wound on Tsuchigumo's right arm.
The arrow passed through that gap.
Pale white light passed through the gap, channeling spiritual power directly into the arm's interior.
Then, explosion.
The purification of spiritual power spread from within, stripping away the layers of demonic aura forming the arm.
Simultaneously, lightning eroded from without, blocking the repair channels.
Attack from both sides.
The lower half of Tsuchigumo's middle right arm, from the elbow down, began to collapse.
Not cut off, but the demonic aura, after being purified, lost its ability to maintain form. Like a sandcastle being washed away by water, it flaked off piece by piece.
Though it would quickly recover, it would be difficult to move for a short time.
"Qualified! Qualified!" Tsuchigumo's voice exploded from behind its bone mask. The remaining five of its six arms struck simultaneously.
The upper two clenched into fists and smashed together, creating a shockwave fan above that pressed down.
The lower two plunged into the ground, lifting a ten-yard-wide slab of earth, along with rubble and soil, to hurl at Shinji.
The only intact middle arm on the left opened its palm, shooting dense spider silk, weaving a spinning silk curtain around itself.
The silk curtain prevented Kikyō from shooting from the outside. Her purifying arrows could certainly purify the silk, but passing through the curtain would greatly weaken them.
Clearly.
As an extremely warlike great demon, Tsuchigumo had already found a good way to deal with Kikyō's purifying arrows.
"Adapting quickly," Shinji murmured within the bone-lightning giant.
But he was adapting too.
The materialized Spirit-Seeking Bow Arm Change gave him new means.
He didn't charge again.
The Shura Transformation's left hand raised, fingers spread, from between the fingers, dark green phosphorescence spilled.
Soul-Seeking·Inevitable Hand.
Lock onto the soul. Strike without fail.
He didn't need to penetrate the silk.
He needed to penetrate something more fundamental.
Demonic power condensed at his fingertips, forming a dark green pinpoint, and flicked outward.
The pinpoint did not fly toward Tsuchigumo's body.
It passed through the spinning silk curtain, the silk had no reaction, because this was not a physical attack, but a force aimed directly at the soul.
The pinpoint struck the inside of the elbow joint of Tsuchigumo's left middle arm.
A weak point in the "phenomenon" at its joint surface.
The moment the pinpoint drilled in, Tsuchigumo's left arm stiffened for an instant.
Only an instant.
The soul-seeking power could not harm the great demon's soul—the level gap was too great.
But that instant of stiffness, a single instant, was enough to create a gap in the spinning silk screen.
String sounded.
Kikyō had been waiting for that instant.
She didn't know what Shinji was going to do, but she knew he would create an opportunity.
The arrow threaded through the gap.
White spiritual power flew straight toward the spot marked by the light point.
At the same moment.
The Shura Transformation's colossal Muramasa cut in from the right, the thunder-bone blade biting into the other side.
Attack from both sides, again!
But this time, the target was not the middle arm.
One of the thickest upper arms, the left upper arm.
Kikyō's spiritual power, channeled through the left arm, traveled upward along the veins of demonic aura, invading the left arm's shoulder.
Purification began.
Tsuchigumo felt it.
"—Brat!"
Five of its six arms simultaneously contracted, closing inward, trying to squeeze out the invading spiritual power.
Demonic aura surged.
The ground for hundreds of yards petrified in an instant. Grey-white spread from its feet outward, faster than before and finally completely surpassing Kidōmaru's extreme speed transformation.
This was its full power.
At least, the full power of its current state.
Grey-white "frost" began to appear on the surface of the Shura Transformation's skeleton, petrification spreading.
The ground beneath Shinji's feet also hardened.
But he did not retreat. Instead, he stepped forward.
"Kikyō!"
Only a name.
Kikyō raised her bow.
The spiritual power she had refined during her seven-day seclusion condensed at the arrowhead into a white orb of unprecedented size, a three-foot-diameter sphere of spiritual power, so transparent one could almost see the paths of the spiritual power rotating inside.
Maximum output, without question.
She loosed.
At the same moment, Shinji channeled all the lightning of the Shura Transformation into Muramasa's blade.
Purple light dyed that projected colossal blade into a blinding pillar of lightning.
As he struck down, the spiritual arrow hit the same spot.
Tsuchigumo's left upper arm.
Both powers exploded at the same point simultaneously.
The atmosphere roared and exploded!
Dust surged in all directions.
Blood, dark grey, the blood of a great demon, spattered onto the shattered earth.
The splattered demon blood landed on the petrified ground, making a sizzling sound, like a hot iron on ice.
Amidst the churning dust,
A massive arm fell from midair.
It hit the ground, cratering it to a depth of over ten feet.
The grey-white severed limb twitched twice on the crater floor, its fingers opening and closing convulsively, then demonic aura scattered from the severed surface.
The massive arm began to collapse and weather, turning into grey-white dust flying in all directions, directly returning to the broader natural "phenomenon."
Tsuchigumo's six arms.
One severed.
And unlike the previous collapsing recovery, this was a genuine severe wound, severed nearly at the root, difficult to heal quickly.
And on Shinji's Shura Transformation outer skeleton, "frost" covered most of it. The auxiliary arm structure on the right shattered and fell away. The skeleton of the left leg showed spiderweb cracks.
He retreated.
The Shura Transformation's body withdrew from Tsuchigumo's attack range, its feet dragging on the petrified ground, leaving two scorched tracks burned by lightning.
He stopped before Kikyō.
The Shura Transformation's bone-lightning body, purple electric arcs flickering uncertainly in its cracks, like a lamp about to burn out.
But beneath the demon mask, his crimson eyes still burned.
He looked up.
At that severed-arm giant, still standing in the crater, laughing up at the sky.
Tsuchigumo was truly laughing.
Laughing that in this era, there was someone who could truly wound it.