Although Yuki Tsukumo's combat record in the original work was honestly an embarrassment, that didn't change the fact that Yuki Tsukumo was a powerful sorcerer.
The character of Yuki Tsukumo, despite carrying the title of Special Grade sorcerer, basically didn't get involved in anything and never took missions at all.
She'd spent years travelling overseas — a complete street-drifter whose whereabouts no one could ever pin down.
But Mahiru really hadn't expected this drifter big sister to turn up in a place like this.
This really was a pure-coincidence encounter.
Even though Tsukumo had put Mahiru on her guard, Mahiru wasn't panicking.
Yuki Tsukumo's stats might be considerably higher than hers, but this was a major railway station in some important city, with a massive volume of foot traffic.
Open up Domains and have a Domain battle? Mahiru wasn't about to lose. And let's not forget she had right beside her a Heavenly Tyrant who couldn't be locked down by any Domain.
On top of that, Mahiru's current disguise was such that even Satoru Gojo shouldn't be able to spot the tells — let alone Yuki Tsukumo.
So right now, she really wasn't worried.
"Are you all heading to Kyoto for some sightseeing?" Yuki Tsukumo asked with a smile.
They quickly hit it off in conversation.
Tsukumo was an easy-going chatter, and Mahiru was an easy-going chatter too.
"No, we're getting off partway through," Mahiru answered. "Are you headed to Kyoto, big sister?"
The terminus of this train was Kyoto. From the look of it, Tsukumo was going to Kyoto.
"Yep," Tsukumo said, scratching her cheek. "My… motorcycle's being repaired over there. I've gotta go pick it up."
Tsukumo really was a motorcycle enthusiast.
"Ahem… so…" After about ten-plus minutes of chatting, Tsukumo suddenly pressed her palms together prayer-style and put on a cute act toward Mahiru.
"Um, miss — could I borrow a little money?"
Mahiru's brow twitched. "Money?" she replied in surprise.
You're hitting me up for money??
The sudden topic shift caught Mahiru entirely off guard. She knew Tsukumo was the flighty, off-the-rails type — but to suddenly hit her, a complete stranger, up for money was… kind of weird, wasn't it?
Do I really look like the rich type?
Mahiru glanced over at the two girls in maid outfits beside her.
It felt like her own questionable taste in pranks was producing the exact opposite of the intended effect!
"I've completely run out of cash on me! When I sent the bike in for repairs, basically all of it got used up in one go!" Tsukumo, palms still pressed together, sounded extremely apologetic. "The train fare cost way more than I'd thought. I only bought a half-way ticket — at this rate, I'm gonna have to walk the rest of the way on foot! So could you lend me a little? I'll give you my most private contact info — the minute I get to Kyoto I'll go withdraw money, and I'll pay you back, no question…"
Uhh…
Mahiru was somewhat at a loss for words.
Train fare really was a trivial amount of money.
But for Yuki Tsukumo, a Special Grade sorcerer, to not even be able to scrape together a half-way train fare — wasn't that just embarrassing?
So you Special Grade sorcerers really get zero welfare benefits if you don't work and don't take missions?
"Fine then…"
Mahiru agreed, and lent her the money.
And just like that, Mahiru came into possession of a mysterious phone number.
"Oh my god, I love you to death, babe…"
This phone number was — by Yuki Tsukumo's own description — the 'super-private' number she'd mentioned.
"This phone number — you absolutely cannot pass it around to anyone else, alright?" Tsukumo wagged her finger with a smile. "This is the private number I've been using since my student days right up to now. Not many people know it — none of my industry colleagues even know this number."
Oh-ho.
Mahiru raised an eyebrow and committed the phone number to memory.
Even though Mahiru genuinely didn't know what she'd ever do with Yuki Tsukumo's private number, who knew — it might come in handy later.
Then, roughly a little over an hour passed.
During that hour-plus, Maki and Mai rested with their eyes closed, while Mahiru kept on rambling about this and that with Tsukumo.
When they reached the stop where Mahiru and the others were getting off, Mahiru waved goodbye to Tsukumo and led Mai and Maki off the train.
Once off, they set out in their pre-arranged direction, passing through villages and towns, until they stepped into a stretch of woodland.
Mahiru clapped her hands once.
Clap.
All three of their disguises were lifted at once.
And it was precisely at this moment that, through a communication clone, Mahiru received a message from Jogo's end — intel that Jogo and the others had gathered from inside Jujutsu High.
"Fushiguro's coming too?" Mahiru froze for a moment.
Apparently, Fushiguro had already decided to give up this inheritance. But because Maki, Mai, and Mahiru — all three of them — had reportedly come under attack over the inheritance matter, Fushiguro had decided to reclaim her right of inheritance and come over to see what was really going on.
Predictably, Fushiguro wouldn't be coming alone.
According to Jogo's message, she'd be bringing Itadori and Kugisaki, plus two additional Grade 1 sorcerers, with her to the Zenin estate.
"If it ends up that we have to fight Itadori and the rest… I'm not asking you to beat them to a pulp, but don't go capsizing the boat because your hearts went soft on you, alright?" Mahiru reminded Maki and Mai.
Mai shrugged.
And Maki shook her head. "I know."
The girl, more than anyone, understood that her own position had changed.
From a human… into a Cursed Spirit's subordinate.
Heh… did this count as some kind of fall from grace? A person whose mission had been to kill Cursed Spirits — ending up as a Cursed Spirit's subordinate in the end.
But perhaps the world of sorcerers was the one that was in the wrong.
…
Early morning. The sun was just rising.
The towering main gate of the Zenin estate slowly swung open, letting out a heavy resounding crash.
The Zenin estate's grounds were spread across a large stretch of village land — and taking into account the barriers and the many cursed seals laid down throughout the place, calling it a jujutsu-sense fortress wasn't an exaggeration.
One of the Big Three inherited from antiquity right through to the present day, a vast sorcerer clan with deep historical foundations — the bloodline flowing through Fushiguro Maki's veins came from this very place. And behind the gate, rank upon rank of well-drilled, sword-and-blade-bearing warriors emerged, the grim oppressive aura they exuded pressing down on the scene.
Pressure.
In the early morning, Fushiguro Maki — who had been invited to come, bringing her companions along to the Zenin estate — felt enormous pressure standing at its gate.
"Oh my — bringing this many family in tow, are we? That scared, huh?"
The crowd of warriors split into two halves, and a blond youth strolled out from between them at a leisurely pace, arms folded.
"So you're Megumi Fushiguro?" Naoya Zenin stood before Fushiguro Maki, his smile mocking. "Not even a man anymore, and you're coming to inherit the family estate? A thing that's never even set foot back home once — and you think you're qualified?"
"The will says I'm qualified, so I'm qualified," Fushiguro Maki said coldly. "Are you done with the nonsense?"
Naoya gave a cold snort and lifted his eyes to look at the people behind Fushiguro.
Compared to the teeming throng of people behind Naoya, the ones behind Fushiguro were pitifully few. But at the same time, they carried considerable weight.
Yuji Itadori, Nobara, Nanami Kento, and… one other Grade 1 sorcerer — a mature woman by the name of Mei Mei.
She'd brought two Grade 1 sorcerers along?
She'd come battle-ready, alright.
Naoya turned around and walked back inward. "Come on then. You're not exactly welcome, but the will is the will — what can you do?"
Fushiguro and Itadori exchanged a glance, gave each other a nod, and together stepped into the Zenin estate.
As they entered, Itadori and Fushiguro felt the sensation of a barrier brushing past them. This barrier wasn't on the level of Jujutsu High's barriers, but it managed the most basic effects of concealing presence and providing protection.
To break the barrier outright and invade from outside would require not just considerable strength, but also a certain degree of accomplishment in Barrier Technique.
They walked inside.
Following Naoya's lead the whole way, they walked into a massive, temple-like hall.
Along the way, they saw a great many people. As they entered the hall — the room dim — Fushiguro and the others saw even more.
In name, and in blood, every single one of these people was Fushiguro's blood kin.
But right now, as each of them watched the new arrivals come in, all that lay in their eyes was a deep, buried loathing.
The black-haired girl stood there in a daze.
She suddenly got the feeling that something here wasn't quite as she'd anticipated.
The Zenin estate had always had a poor reputation in Fushiguro's ears.
She'd heard Maki talk about her family before — and every time, the assessment came out the same. Descriptions like, "the Zenin estate are all pedantic, selfish bastards, every last one of them a short-sighted idiot," and so on.
In Fushiguro's imagination — and in Nanami and the others' predictions too — these Zenin estate people should have been at each other's throats over the matter of dividing the inheritance, all of them locked in mutual hatred.
But…
The atmosphere right now… didn't really seem to be like that at all.
Every single person in the hall — including the women and children with no combat ability, including the sword-bearing guards — was staring with dark, hate-filled eyes at the last few participants walking into the assembly, the uninvited outsiders.
There was a kind of…
…feeling of 'unity.'
Yes. Unity.
"..." Nanami furrowed his brow from behind.
And Mei Mei, as though she'd long since seen this coming, let out a quiet little laugh from behind them.
Ah.
Fushiguro Maki understood it perfectly now. She and her party — the outsiders — had become a catalyst instead, binding this otherwise disunited family together into one single rope.
"Come on then, sit down — those are your seats."
Naoya Zenin walked straight to the central position of the hall.
It was a circular interior space.
The space was dim, oppressive, and grim.
At its very centre stood a raised dais shaped like a ring, with a large table set in the middle. Around the table were the seats for every member who, in theory, had the right to participate in the equal division of the family estate.
Behind each seat was standing space for several people — those were the positions prepared for the attendees' retainers.
According to the will, six people in total were qualified to participate in dividing the Zenin estate: Naoya, Jin'ichi, Ogi Zenin, Maki, Mai, and Megumi Fushiguro.
And so there were six seats here.
But three of those would not be able to make it.
So sitting at the table now were only Naoya Zenin, and a sturdy, powerfully-built man whose hair was as wild and dishevelled as a wandering samurai's. That was Zenin Jin'ichi.
Fushiguro and Itadori and the others exchanged glances.
She sat down in her seat.
The atmosphere was already feeling off.
With so many people in the entire hall, there wasn't a single sound — silent as a graveyard.
"You know," Naoya Zenin smiled, leaning back in his chair, lounging with one leg slung carelessly over the other. "I actually know why you've come. Nothing more than… the business with those two useless trash, Maki and Mai."
Fushiguro froze for a moment. She hadn't expected the guy to just lay everything bare like that.
No matter how they'd asked before, the answer the Zenin estate had given Jujutsu High was always 'we don't know.'
"My senpais' disappearance is connected to you, isn't it?" Fushiguro's voice was grave. "Where are they now? What's their condition?"
"How would I know where those two trash are? How could they possibly beat Ogi Zenin? Most likely someone else came by and killed everyone — those two useless trash probably died too." Naoya Zenin spread his hands and put on a mocking smile. "Why even bother looking for them?"
…Beat Ogi Zenin?
All the Jujutsu High people, on hearing those words, found their pupils contracting.
"Which is to say, you've as good as admitted it!" Fushiguro Maki slammed her fist down on the table and rose to her feet. "My senpais' disappearance really is connected to you! Isn't it?!"
"Hahahahaha…" Naoya Zenin burst into loud laughter. "What do you mean, connected to me…"
The next second, the youth's voice turned cold, the smile vanished from his face in an instant, and a frigid murderous intent flashed in his eyes.
"You should say… it's connected to [us]."
Yes — the Zenin estate, although not a family that was united top-to-bottom, was made up of individuals every one of whom was selfish to the core, willing to persecute the family members of their fellow clansmen for the sake of their own interests.
But.
In one particular respect, they were absolutely, completely united.
In the current jujutsu world, a new force was on the rise. The new-thinking sorcerers under Satoru Gojo's leadership were gradually taking control of the entire jujutsu landscape.
And as one of the Big Three of the old-guard faction, the Zenin estate — their infighting was their infighting, but they had one common bottom line: the Zenin estate as a family itself absolutely could not be allowed to fragment.
Divide the estate equally?
You've got to be joking.
Whether this will had truly issued from the old family head's mouth no longer even needed to be judged.
Because not a single member of the Zenin estate would want to see the great tree that was the Zenin estate fall.
Even if the estate really did have to be divided, in the end all the resources would absolutely be reconcentrated into the hands of a single person, in order to maintain the Zenin estate's continued existence.
And at this time, Satoru Gojo's students of the new jujutsu faction — Megumi Fushiguro and Maki Zenin — had become an outside force that 'would split the Zenin estate's power away.' As for Zen'in Mai, because she was Maki Zenin's twin sister, she had likewise been branded a 'traitor.'
So Ogi Zenin's move to kill Mai and Maki wasn't because he himself wanted to seize his two daughters' shares of the estate. It was because every single one of the Zenin estate's inheritors had already collectively agreed to 'clean house' on these two girls.
Back then, by giving up her inheritance, Fushiguro had narrowly escaped disaster.
But now she'd come back again.
So she would once again become a target the entire Zenin estate family had to eliminate… along with everyone she'd brought along with her.
The Zenin estate.
A pedantic family.
A neurotic family.
And at the same time, a radical family. A deranged family.
Most of this family's members, under the leadership of the few at the top, had now wound themselves together into a single rope — top and bottom of one mind.
Today, no matter how important their station, as long as they were an outsider who had sat at this estate-division table, they would die.
And everyone else they had brought along with them would die too.
"You'll all die just like those two useless trash." Naoya Zenin smiled at Megumi Fushiguro. "Useless trash standing behind Satoru Gojo… without Satoru Gojo's protection, what are any of you even worth?"
Cursed Energy surged up.
Cursed Energy erupted.
Zenin Ranta — a member of the Zenin estate's strongest sorcerer group, 'Hei' — possessed a Technique that, using the gaze of his eyes as its medium, could impose 'suppression' on a target.
And at this moment, the youth — wrestling internally between his morals and his family's interests — abandoned the thinking altogether. Hidden among the surrounding crowd, he imposed his Technique's 'suppression' on the entire Jujutsu High contingent, leaving Fushiguro, Itadori, and the others unable to move for three full seconds.
Zenin Choujurou — likewise a member of the Zenin estate's strongest sorcerer group, 'Hei' — a small, withered old man whose Jujutsu Technique was the manipulation of rock.
And now, even as Ranta poured every ounce of his strength into suppressing the Jujutsu High group, Choujurou activated his Technique.
Amid trembling earth and shaking mountains, a pair of enormous palms made of rock erupted up out of the ground.
The pair of giant hands scooped upward, lifting the entire round-table platform at the centre of the hall — table and all, together with the people sitting around it — all together up into the sky, punching clean through the roof.
"Close," Choujurou said.
And so the giant hands began closing inward, crushing the space between their two palms.
Under that immense force, everyone caught between the two stone hands would be crushed to pulp.
As for Naoya Zenin and Zenin Jin'ichi, the very instant the stone hands rose into the air, they had already left the round table — leaping clear.
Pft——
Zenin Ranta spat out a mouthful of fresh blood.
There really were too many people on the Jujutsu High side, and not one of them was anywhere close to weak.
He was no more than a sorcerer slightly above Semi-Grade 1. To try and simultaneously impose 'suppression' on this entire group, leaving them completely immobile for three seconds… was still pushing things a bit too far for him.
So he'd suffered a fairly severe Jujutsu Technique backlash, and could no longer maintain his Technique now.
But it didn't matter.
Even though he'd now stopped his Technique, those people had already been hoisted into the sky.
Once the two giant stone hands slammed shut, even if it ultimately failed to kill those two Grade 1 sorcerers, it would be more than enough to leave all of them seriously wounded.
Once seriously wounded, the rest of the Zenin estate would close in and attack. Every one of them would have a nine-out-of-ten chance of dying.
They would win by overwhelming advantage, and afterward, all that remained to think about was how to frame Megumi Fushiguro and the others, turning the tables in the negotiations between the jujutsu higher-ups and Satoru Gojo.
Yes.
——That was what they had planned.
And that was what they still believed even now.
The great stone hands slammed shut with a thunderous crash.
But in that very instant, a beam of utterly dazzling white light flashed through.
Krak-a-BOOM——
That white light was like lightning made of Cursed Energy, exploding with violent fury. In a single instant, both stone hands' palms were entirely sheared off, the rock shattering, falling fragments filling the sky.
CLANG CLANG CLANG
And it was just then — a beat too late — that the Zenin estate's alarm bells finally began to ring.
"Hm?"
Naoya Zenin — who had been brimming with confidence and certain that victory was already in the bag — froze entirely.
Because the alarm bells ringing meant that the outermost barrier of the Zenin estate had just been breached from outside.
And the white light just now, with its overwhelming Cursed Energy — clearly didn't belong to any of the sorcerers on the Jujutsu High side, and certainly didn't belong to any sorcerer within the Zenin estate either.
The dust dispersed, and the lingering force faded.
Lifted up into the air, standing atop the broken wrist-stumps of the shattered stone hands, Nanami and Mei Mei still held the very postures they had been about to take to meet the attack.
They had been intending to forcibly take that stone-hand-slam attack head-on, in order to protect the three students behind them.
They wouldn't have been defeated by it, of course — but they absolutely would have come away wounded.
But what they hadn't expected was that the white light would flash in, and something else entirely would end up saving them.
Who?
They were left uncertain and on edge.
Sensing the commotion above, the Jujutsu High group looked up as one.
Of the shattered giant hands, one finger remained intact.
And standing atop that one finger were three familiar-looking figures.
The dust and smoke fully cleared.
Now they could see clearly at last.
And so, whether on the Jujutsu High side or on the Zenin estate side, in that moment every single pupil in the hall contracted.
"How is this possible?!" Naoya Zenin's breath came to an utter standstill.
"The blue-haired Cursed Spirit…" Itadori, for his part, wore an expression of complete confusion. "And… senpais?"
"Ohhh dear — not everyone's even here yet, so how come you've started dividing up the estate already?" Mahiru stood at the tip of the finger, flanked by Mai and Maki on either side. Arms folded, she smiled as she looked down upon them all from above. "This estate-division procedure of yours isn't exactly proper, you know."
They might have been about a minute late, but seeing that the fighting had begun, there was no longer any need for them to keep sneaking in covertly.
The three of them — Mahiru, Mai, and Maki — had kicked open the Zenin estate's barrier in one motion, and descended here.
"Relax now, relax — no need to wear those hateful expressions toward us. My two friends here don't want any of your Zenin estate's money, or your land… they don't want any of it." Mahiru gazed down at the Zenin estate members below and gave a cold smile:
"—All they want are each and every one of your lives."
____
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