Jujutsu Kaisen: Megumi — Chapter 30 - Binding Vow Domain (Patreon)

Ever since Mahoraga descended onto the battlefield.

Between Megumi Fushiguro and Ryomen Sukuna.

Those victory conditions, already as precarious as walking a tightrope, underwent a world-shaking upheaval in a single instant.

The moment the first slash was confirmed nullified, the absolute law that filled Megumi with overwhelming relief formally established itself on the battlefield.

With Dismantle and Cleave both gone as offensive tools, the only move Sukuna had left to deal damage to Megumi was the final variant of Shrine,

Open.

And right now, the distance between them, pulled to breaking point by that desperate close-quarters struggle moments before, had shrunk to less than an arm's length.

A strike of Open, at zero distance like this.

No dust needed to carry it.

As the King of Curses, one who had refined cursed energy to the absolute pinnacle, Sukuna had total confidence: this shot of Furnace: Open would be absolutely devastating.

"Without Adaptation, how will you resist my Furnace: Open!"

Sukuna's face, identical to Megumi's, was twisted with sickly, manic madness.

Four crimson eyes fixed on Megumi with keen interest, staring at the face half-hidden beneath his bangs.

And yet Megumi, actually started laughing.

Loud. Resounding.

Cleaving clean through the air of despair.

"Simple."

"I'll just use my animal friends."

The reflected glow of approaching destruction lit up in the depths of Megumi's eyes.

"Did you forget, the techniques I know best are still the Ten Shadows Technique shikigami!"

Before the words had even finished, Megumi swiftly tossed Playful Cloud aside, letting it fall naturally to the edge of the shadow tide, completing its retrieval.

At the same time, Dad Armor was released.

The tyrant's empowerment instantly receded from the surface of his body like a retreating tide, laying bare Megumi's frail physical form, only at Grade 1 sorcerer level, completely unguarded within Open's lethal range.

Yet this also meant Megumi had freed up a shikigami slot.

He had gained the chance to change tactics one more time.

And what took its place was the silhouette of a fierce beast, the symbol of the lord of the savanna.

"Max Elephant, you're free!"

Megumi roared to the sky. The shadow tide rippled in response to his hand seal.

A Max Elephant's cry rang out, as if from the primordial age, shattering the sky, shaking heaven and earth.

The ancient colossal elephant shikigami, its frame dozens of times larger than both Megumi and Sukuna combined, materialized with a suffocating, physically crushing presence.

And descending alongside that mountain-like body, bearing down on Sukuna,

Was a waterfall that fell from the sky, vast enough to completely submerge the entire ruined city of Shinjuku.

In that exact same instant, the searing white fire arrow in Sukuna's palm completed its final compression, and with a dead-silent shriek, drove straight for Megumi's heart.

On one side: an absolute heat capable of igniting space itself.

On the other: high-pressure water pouring down like the heavens collapsing.

Extreme heat and rushing water, at less than half a meter apart, collided with a thunderous crash.

Mist erupted above Shinjuku like a nuclear detonation.

Vast clouds of boiling white fog surged skyward like a mushroom cloud, swallowing the ruins of every building within several hundred meters, drowning everything in a blinding, scorching haze where you couldn't see a hand in front of your face.

The figures of Megumi and Sukuna vanished completely into this hell, as if the world had returned to chaos.

"That's an elemental reaction — he used an elemental reaction!"

Water overcomes fire.

Anyone with a Jujutsu High education could follow that tactic. Whether it was Kasumi Miwa or Kinji Hakari, who'd dropped out halfway through, both were stunned by Megumi's move, by how far above his weight class he was striking.

"So that's how he resolved it?"

Using Max Elephant's massive water torrent to neutralize the flames of Open was, mechanically, the most flawless optimal solution available.

But.

As this ultimate elemental clash reached its white-hot peak, Megumi's smile suddenly died.

The white mist on the battlefield kept thickening. Megumi's brow locked tighter and tighter.

The temperature... was still rising.

The water curtain... was being forcibly pierced.

The King of Curses' reserves of cursed energy, accumulated over more than a thousand years, were simply too vast. Too terrifying.

What was fired from Sukuna's palm was not some ordinary flame that water could douse.

"Hahahahahaha!"

From deep within the boiling white mist, Sukuna's earth-shaking laughter tore through the haze.

"Surely you didn't naively think that with your output, you could completely stop my Furnace: Open!"

The fire arrow's output, force-fed by that enormous cursed energy like a burst dam, did not gutter out under the torrent. On the contrary, it erupted into a dark-crimson death-light even more blinding than before.

Even as Megumi pushed his own cursed energy to its absolute limit. Even as he drove Max Elephant's water pressure to maximum output.

That overwhelming, mountain-toppling torrent still could not fully neutralize Open's annihilating destruction.

A crisp crack rang out, like shattering glass.

The residual force of the fire arrow, with unstoppable and domineering finality, ripped apart the final line of defense.

The lingering embers struck Megumi's body, stripped of Dad Armor's protection, without holding a single thing back.

BOOM!

The dull, muffled sound of flesh being torn apart echoed through the steam.

......

......

An unknown amount of time passed.

The scalding white mist, thick with the sharp, nauseating smell of blood, was finally scattered by the howling gale sweeping across the Shinjuku battlefield.

Through the perspective of Mei Mei's few surviving crows still circling high above, the scene atop the ruins transmitted clearly back to Jujutsu High's underground command room.

Every onlooker stared at the screen. Every single one of them drew a sharp, cold breath.

At the center of the frame, Megumi was still standing. Both arms thrown up in front of his chest. Not a single step back.

But across both arms, Open's terrifying residual fire had burned a vast, horrifying expanse of charred black.

Even as mere embers, that temperature had instantly stripped away all the surface skin on both arms. At the edges of the heavily charred muscle tissue, through torn gaps, one could clearly glimpse the ghastly white of bone beneath.

"Without your shadows, you're nothing, brat!"

Sukuna dragged the lower half of his body, pierced through by Playful Cloud, not yet fully restored, and slowly closed the distance to Megumi.

Sukuna didn't know why Megumi had stopped submerging into the shadows. But at least, as far as Sukuna was concerned, the result was good enough.

"Damn it. I've been pushed back into that same Okinawa situation in reverse, like when the oxygen tanks all got blown up."

"Never thought there'd be a day when I couldn't even call out: the ground below is shadows too."

Megumi likewise dragged his body, arms pierced through, and forced himself upright before Sukuna.

Both of them bore vicious wounds left by the other. Every scar on each body had a corresponding mark on the one across from it.

Only, for Megumi, who had yet to master Reverse Cursed Technique, Sukuna's body had already entered a slow state of regeneration.

"As you are now, with both hands lost, you can no longer form Round Deer's hand seal!"

"Even if you know how to summon through a Binding Vow—"

"I will kill you in a spray of blood and flesh before you can complete it!"

Sukuna erupted. A hand-blade drove toward Megumi's heart.

"I will establish a Binding Vow, on the premise of not forming hand seals, I will deploy, "

"Round Deer, right?"

"Megumi the Heavenly Emperor, heal up quick!"

"No wait, in a situation like this, shouldn't you call out the Grand Supreme Emperor first (Toji Fushiguro) to intercept?"

"Grand Supreme Emperor, please save Megumi the Heavenly Emperor!"

The livestream viewers were shaken all over again, hearts seizing at the split-second image on screen.

Yet in this absolute desperation.

The Binding Vow condition Megumi spoke from his lips completely surpassed everyone's expectations.

"Deploy—"

"Domain..."

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