From the moment Haruta lashed out to the moment Toji killed him in one blow, the entire process took less than two seconds.
Nobara's hand, holding the hammer, was still frozen in mid-air. She looked in shock at the man who had retracted the chain.
That kind of assassination skill, which ignored distance and was precise to a hair-raising degree, overturned her understanding of combat.
"Hey, you two."
Toji shook the blood off the chain and wrapped it back around his arm.
He turned around, looking at Nobara and Nitta Akari with cold eyes.
"The perimeter is cleared. Hurry up and find a safe place to hide. The Shibuya that's coming isn't something you brats playing house can handle."
With that, Toji bent his knees and leaped. He easily jumped onto a rooftop over ten meters high, and within a few bounds, he disappeared into the vast night.
It wasn't until Toji's presence had completely vanished that Nitta Akari's legs gave out. She slumped to the ground, gasping for air, her body drenched in cold sweat.
Nobara slowly lowered her hammer. She looked at Haruta's corpse, then up at the direction Toji had left, biting her lower lip.
"That old guy... who exactly is he? He looks so much like Fushiguro, and that monster-like physical strength..."
Nobara shook her head, forcing herself to calm down. Now was not the time to investigate such matters.
"Nitta-san, can you still walk? We need to hurry and meet up with Itadori and the others. Gojo-sensei has been sealed, and the situation in the subway is definitely a hundred times worse than here."
—
Beneath Shibuya, the dim subway tunnels were like a vast concrete labyrinth.
The alarms had long since ceased, replaced by severed limbs and dried bloodstains scattered everywhere.
Emergency lights flickered overhead, emitting a hissing sound from electrical leaks.
Yuji sprinted through the intricate passages.
The news from Mechamaru that "Gojo Satoru has been sealed" weighed on him like a mountain, but he had no time for fear.
His leg muscles, under the coordination of "Total Concentration: Constant," exploded with incredible kinetic energy as he transformed into a blur, rapidly approaching the Fukutoshin Line platform on the fifth basement floor.
He had to deliver this news to the other Jujutsu Sorcerers, he had to get Gojo-sensei back.
Turning a corner, the gate leading to the connecting passage on the third basement floor appeared before him.
However, Yuji's footsteps came to a jarring halt.
Standing on the only path forward was a man. He wore a turtleneck sweater under a light-colored vest, with two small pigtails pointing upward and a striking black bloodstain across the bridge of his nose.
He stood quietly in the center of the passage, hands at his sides, his eyes filled with a deathly coldness.
The eldest of the Cursed Womb: Death Paintings, Choso.
"So, you are Itadori Yuji."
Choso raised his head, his emotionless eyes locking onto the panting, pink-haired youth.
A thick scent of blood filled the air, the vibration of Cursed Energy emanating from Choso's body.
"Kechizu and Eso... my two younger brothers. You killed them."
Yuji's gaze sharpened as he clenched his fists. He remembered the two Special Grade Cursed Spirit brothers he had encountered during the Yasohachi Bridge mission.
"They killed people. As a Jujutsu Sorcerer, it was my duty to exorcise them." Yuji did not back down, his Cursed Energy quickly coating his fists.
"Duty? Such a thing is irrelevant to me."
Choso's eyes instantly turned frigid. He slammed his hands together in front of his chest, and a large amount of viscous blood overflowed from his palms. Under the compression of Cursed Energy, it instantly transformed into a straight line of blood.
"I only know that you killed my kin. Therefore, you shall join them in death here."
Blood Manipulation: Piercing Blood!
Boom!
A high-pressure jet of blood broke the sound barrier, hurtling toward Yuji's face with a scream that tore through the air.
It was too fast!
The speed of this blood jet even surpassed that of a standard sniper rifle bullet.
Yuji's pupils contracted sharply.
The combat instincts forged through Yamada's hellish training saved his life at this moment.
Instead of blocking, he tilted his body at an extreme angle to the right.
Ssh!
The high-pressure blood jet grazed Yuji's left cheek, trailing a string of blood droplets before striking the concrete load-bearing wall behind him.
The hard wall was pierced as easily as tofu, leaving a bottomless hole.
What terrifying piercing power! I definitely can't take that head-on!
Yuji was horrified, but he didn't retreat. He knew well that against a long-range sniper-type opponent, opening up distance would only lead to death. He had to engage in close-quarters combat.
Bang!
The floor tiles beneath Yuji's feet shattered extensively as he forced himself closer, weathering several successive arrows of blood fired by Choso.
Divergent Fist!
His right fist, saturated with Cursed Energy, slammed toward Choso's chest.
But Choso's reaction was equally swift. He abandoned the long-range Piercing Blood, crossing his arms in front of him. Blood instantly solidified on the surface of his arms into a layer of hard, crimson armor.
Blood Manipulation: Flowing Red Scale!
A dull thud echoed through the passage.
Yuji felt as if his fist had struck a solid steel plate, the recoil made his knuckles ache.
After taking the punch, Choso didn't retreat. Instead, he used the momentum to sweep a kick into Yuji's abdomen, sending him flying back and crashing through a row of vending machines.
"Your taijutsu is good, but before my blood, it is meaningless."
Choso approached with steady steps, the blood on his hands forming two sharp blades.
"Kechizu and Eso must have suffered greatly when they died. I will return that pain to you tenfold, a hundredfold."
A fierce melee erupted within the narrow subway station.
Relying on his superhuman physical attributes and precise Cursed Energy control, Yuji engaged Choso in a life-and-death struggle.
Pipes burst, walls collapsed, and their figures constantly intertwined under the dim lighting.
But Choso's Blood Manipulation was simply too versatile. With Piercing Blood for sniping at a distance, blood blades for cutting up close, and Flowing Red Scale for all-around physical enhancement, Yuji gradually fell into a disadvantage.
Puff!
A blood blade slashed Yuji's shoulder, and blood gushed out.
Yuji gritted his teeth, ignoring the pain to force his way inside Choso's guard, slamming a headbutt into the bridge of the other party's nose.
Choso let out a muffled groan as his vision blurred momentarily, but his combat instincts were terrifying.
The moment he lost his balance, he grabbed Yuji's arms. Blood from his body sprayed out from his pores, piercing Yuji's liver at point-blank range.
Supernova!
"Arghhh!"
The agonizing pain of his liver being pierced made Yuji scream piteously. His vision began to darken, and his strength seemed to drain away as he collapsed heavily onto the water-covered floor. Blood stained the puddle beneath him red.
"It's over."
Choso clutched his bleeding nose and walked over to the dying Yuji. He raised his right hand, high-pressure Piercing Blood condensing in his palm once more, aimed at Yuji's brow.
"Go and apologize to my brothers."
Just as Choso was about to deliver the killing blow—
An extremely eerie ripple exploded deep within Choso's brain without warning.
It was a forbidden memory from the depths of his bloodline, hidden in the bottom of his soul, forcibly awakened.
The scene before Choso's eyes instantly distorted.
The subway station vanished, replaced by a sun-drenched meadow. In a false memory that never existed, he, Kechizu, and Eso sat on a picnic blanket, and the youth sitting between them, smiling as he handed them food...
Was actually Yuji!
"Big brother, hurry up and eat." The Yuji in the memory had a brilliant smile.
"This... what is this?!"
In reality, Choso's pupils trembled violently, and the Piercing Blood in his hand instantly dissipated. He clutched his head tightly, his nails clawing bloody furrows into his scalp, letting out a roar filled with confusion and collapse.
"Memories that don't exist... Why? Why would he call me big brother?! He's clearly the enemy who killed Kechizu and Eso! Why is my soul resisting killing him?!"
This intense conflict between cognition and bloodline instinct caused Choso's mental defenses to completely crumble.
He stumbled back, glanced at the unconscious Yuji lying in a pool of blood, and could no longer suppress the intense pain in his brain. Like a madman, he turned and rushed into the dark subway tunnel, fleeing in panic.
Silence.
In the empty platform, only the dripping of the leaking pipes remained, along with Yuji's increasingly faint breathing.