Jujutsu Kaisen: Megumi — Chapter 27 - Furuhe Yurayura (Patreon)

"Armor merge!"

With Megumi's battle cry, Toji dissolved once more into the shadow tide and fused into Megumi's body.

Megumi exhaled slowly, a scorching breath bleeding out between his teeth. His right hand still gripped the Inverted Spear of Heaven in a reverse hold.

His left hand reached into the shadow tide at his side, casual as slipping a hand into a pocket, and with a spine-chilling scrape of steel leaving its sheath, the Split Soul Katana reappeared.

One long, one short. Two special-grade cursed tools standing at the absolute pinnacle of the jujutsu world, crossed perfectly before him.

Nitou Ichi-ryu!

"Can you keep up, King of Curses!"

Megumi exploded forward. Two streaks of cold light, left and right, instantly sealed off every avenue of escape for Ryomen Sukuna.

Sukuna clicked his tongue, his arms blurring across his chest in an afterimage too fast for the naked eye to follow.

"Tch. Brat!"

He used his fingers as blades and unleashed a flurry of slashing strikes.

CLANG CLANG CLANG!

Rapid-fire metal rang out between their hands. Sukuna bared his teeth in a savage grin and pushed the density of his strikes higher, trying to break Megumi's footing.

"Fall!"

A torrent of slashes poured down, and the scene Sukuna expected, Megumi's balance shattered, never came.

"That's nowhere near enough!"

The Split Soul Katana caught the slashes. The Inverted Spear of Heaven was another matter entirely.

The Inverted Spear of Heaven in Megumi's right hand operated under one absolute, unreasonable law: erasure. It slammed headlong into every layered defensive strike Sukuna had thrown up.

BLOOD FLASHED.

The blade carved a brand-new wound across Sukuna's body, deep enough to expose bone.

The Sorcerer Killer's technique fused with Megumi's cursed energy output made the twin-blade assault even more overwhelming. At comparable speeds, it simply drove Sukuna back.

This round, a complete mechanical victory.

"It seems in close-quarters combat, I hold an overwhelming advantage!"

Megumi didn't let up for a second. His silhouette became a black streak tearing through the void, launching a ferocious chain assault against Sukuna before he could find his footing.

The two figures dissolved into streaks of light, one black, one red, blazing madly through the shattered ruins of Shinjuku.

Every crossing of blade and slash detonated a shockwave in midair.

Afterimages like wind. Pressure waves like blades. All of Shinjuku's ruins became a fragile sand model, ground mercilessly to powder under the residual force of their battle.

The crows circling several thousand meters above could no longer track the specific movements of either combatant. They could only gauge the ferocity of the fight through the constant bursts of light and the buildings exploding below.

Every member of Jujutsu High crowded before their livestream feeds broke into a cold sweat.

"If Sukuna is pushed to a disadvantage in close combat, his next move will very likely be—"

Atsuya Kusakabe had witnessed Megumi produce multiple special-grade cursed tools and then physically dominate Sukuna. Kusakabe's jaw had long since hit the floor. Words had stopped coming.

The one now sitting at the front as commentator was Hajime Kashimo.

Kashimo watched the unbroken string of sparking exchanges. Watched Sukuna take a grazing hit from the Split Soul Katana — deliberately, willingly — just to force open an absolute safe distance from Megumi.

Kashimo read the intent immediately:

"He's going to use his technique!"

As if the words had the power to make it so, the instant that cry left his mouth,

Sukuna pressed his palms together and formed the hand seal that symbolized the apex of the Ten Shadows Technique.

And yet, faced with that casting windup, the kind that should have driven anyone watching straight into despair,

Megumi, who had been pressing relentlessly at his back, made not a single move to interrupt. The fervor in his eyes only burned fiercer.

He clenched his fist at the exact same moment. Like a mirror image, he formed the same hand seal as Sukuna.

The roar of cursed energy and the surge of the shadow tide reached a strange Resonance in that instant.

"Furuhe!"

"Furuhe!"

Two perfectly identical incantations echoed above Shinjuku.

Two Swords of Extermination tore open space together. Megumi and Sukuna completed the final verse in perfect unison.

"Yurayura!"

BOOM!

Two blasts shattered the sky. From the depths of their respective shadow tides, pale colossal silhouettes erupted from the earth, radiating an aura of sanctity and destruction that made the air itself feel wrong.

The two pale giants mirrored each other, standing at their masters' sides in absolute loyalty.

"Oh?" Sukuna looked at Megumi's Mahoraga standing on the battlefield and smiled with contempt. "You chose not to interrupt me with those laughable cursed tools and went for a direct confrontation instead?"

His fingers closed around the wheel of light.

The instant Mahoraga was reabsorbed into the shadow tide, Sukuna grafted the wheel of light, the wheel that meant Adaptation, onto the back of his own head.

"Can you keep up? Little monk."

"You need to adapt to both the Ten Shadows Technique and Shrine at the same time. And on top of that, my Shrine has two distinct offensive forms."

The wheel of light turned slowly behind his head. The sacred radiance it shed cascaded down like a waterfall, coating this blood-soaked King of Curses in a halo that was equal parts holy and wrong.

In the fierce backlighting, Sukuna's face fell into deep shadow.

Only those crimson eyes remained. Only those pale, gleaming fangs.

Standing below, Megumi felt a pressure he had never felt before, like a natural disaster had just arrived and given him its full attention.

"If the sheer number of things to adapt to makes someone choose not to adapt at all..."

Megumi slowly extended his hand and grafted the wheel of light onto the back of his own head.

"That's the thinking of a complete waste!"

"I'm going to cut you to bloody pieces in the middle of every Adaptation!"

Megumi grinned, mirroring Sukuna exactly.

Two wheels of light rested behind two Megumis.

"That uses up two of your shikigami slots."

Sukuna studied the wheel of light on Megumi, watched Tyrant Possession flowing through him, and smiled lightly.

"I still have one slot remaining."

Sukuna formed the hand seal again. A familiar tremor shuddered up through the ground beneath him.

"Now it's two against one."

Sukuna and Agito took positions, one left, one right, and settled into a formation ready to strike.

"Come, Megumi Fushiguro."

"Let yourself captivate me."

➤ Next: Adaptation Begins