Chapter 109 (Patreon)

Tokyo Dome.

All fifty-five thousand seats in the stadium were filled, and people were even standing in the surrounding aisles. The number of visitors had clearly exceeded the venue’s capacity, with an estimated eight or nine thousand extra people packed inside.

Satoru Gojo walked over with two cans of soda, sat down beside Ragnar Kagenou, and said, “There are way more people than I expected. This place is completely packed.”

Ragnar accepted the soda from him and replied, “Anyone who can hold a concert at Tokyo Dome must have a considerable fan base.”

By the time Ragnar glanced over again, Gojo had somehow obtained a full set of concert gear, including glow sticks and other support items.

“Isn’t that a little much…”

Gojo even forced two glow sticks into Ragnar’s hands.

It was far too exaggerated. Anyone who saw him like this would think he had been a devoted fan for the past ten years.

To be fair, almost everyone inside Tokyo Dome was holding two glow sticks. More importantly, their movements were astonishingly coordinated, and waves of cheers surged through the venue one after another.

The giant screen was playing footage of Riko Amanai’s appearance, while every beam of light in the venue converged toward the center stage at once.

Within the dimly lit stadium, neon lights shifted constantly, changing colors and tracing new paths through the darkness. The dazzling display was enough to make people lose all sense of time without realizing it.

However, compared to the excitement inside the arena, the outer corridors and backstage area were already on the verge of collapse.

“Damn jujutsu sorcerers… Humans truly are a calamity. Humanity must be exterminated.”

That was right. This red flower was none other than Hanami.

Or rather, it was a part of Hanami.

The flower on its shoulder had barely managed to escape from Ragnar Kagenou’s hands under the protection of Domain Expansion.

Fortunately, a portion of Hanami’s soul still remained within this flower, allowing it to avoid disappearing from the world completely.

Because of that, Hanami had been hiding underground. Even after Ragnar Kagenou left, it had not dared to come out recklessly.

Its injuries were far too severe. The damage was not limited to its physical body; the wounds inflicted upon its soul were even worse.

Originally, after escaping, Hanami had tried to recall what important matter it had yet to accomplish. However, no matter how hard it searched its mind, it could not remember.

At that moment, a concert happened to be taking place here.

And its instincts were telling it that all these humans were enemies.

Obstacles that had to be purged.

With so many humans gathered in one place, Hanami could turn them into nourishment and replenish its strength.

In its current state, Hanami needed to find a human body to parasitize. Only then would it be able to move more freely.

Ordinary humans would not do. Without cursed energy, even if Hanami took control of one, the body would amount to nothing more than a rotting mass of flesh. There would be no meaning in using it.

However, jujutsu sorcerers were not something one could simply find anywhere. In ordinary human society, encountering one by chance was nearly impossible.

Just as Hanami was about to give up…

It found one.

A human with excellent aptitude for cursed energy.

Even more importantly, this person was not a jujutsu sorcerer.

It was the perfect vessel.

But just as Hanami was about to act, it discovered that two jujutsu sorcerers had arrived.

And those two were far from ordinary.

They were Ragnar Kagenou and Satoru Gojo, the very two who had nearly killed it.

There was no other choice. Hanami could only continue hiding.

But it could not keep hiding forever.

If it missed this opportunity and allowed that perfect body to leave, finding another one of the same quality would be extremely difficult.

Therefore, Hanami decided to gamble.

It would seize that body at the fastest possible speed, then turn everyone here into nourishment and restore itself. After that, it would activate Domain Expansion, isolate those two, and kill them one by one.

Looking at it that way, victory was not impossible.

The advantage still lay with Hanami.

It acted immediately.

After Ragnar Kagenou and Satoru Gojo left, Hanami instantly attacked the person who entered the area.

For now, it would have to make do with this body. As long as it could find her afterward, everything else could still be resolved.

Crack.

The woman, pierced through by plant roots, began to move stiffly.

Green roots replaced the blood vessels inside her body. Her once-bright red heart had already been transformed into a cluster of stems, swelling and spreading without pause.

“Hey, why aren’t you finished in there yet?”

“We’re in a hurry out here. Other people need to use the room too, so hurry it up!”

The person in charge knocked on the door impatiently, urging the person inside to finish cleaning quickly and not delay the next group.

“Did you hear me? I’m telling you, if you keep this up, I’m going to…”

After waiting for a long while without receiving any response, he frowned and forced the door open.

The moment he stepped inside, his vision was swallowed by darkness.

“What’s going on? Are they already done? Why are the lights off…?”

Click.

After flickering twice, the lights finally illuminated the room as normal.

“Why is the floor broken?”

Just as he crouched down to inspect the damage, a figure silently appeared behind him.

Drip.

What was that?

The person in charge touched his neck and found something damp and slippery on his skin. He had no idea what it was.

“What is this…?”

When he saw the unknown purple liquid on his hand, disgust twisted across his face, and he tried to shake it off.

Step.

Step, step.

Clear footsteps echoed through the room.

In that instant, every hair on his body stood on end.

“W-Who’s there?!”

The person in charge was certain that he had not seen anyone after entering. But if no one was inside, where were those footsteps coming from?

The continuous sound of footsteps reverberating through the room pushed him to the edge of panic.

At that moment, the lights above his head began to flicker, as if something unseen was interfering with them.

“No… Don’t. Don’t come any closer…”

Through the flickering light, he vaguely saw a figure floating in midair, slowly approaching him.

He stared fixedly at the shape before him, every nerve pulled taut. At that moment, he could hear nothing except the violent pounding of his own heart.

Run.

Run away now.

His mind screamed at him again and again, but his body felt as heavy as lead. He could not move.

Then, when the light flickered once more, the figure in front of him vanished.

The lights returned to normal.

The air was filled with the scent of pollen, but he had no composure left to notice it.

It seemed to have been a hallucination.

He gasped for breath, overwhelmed by the relief of still being alive.

“I have to leave… I have to get out of here.”

Just then…

Creak.

The door in front of him opened by itself.

There was no one outside.

“Where… where is everyone? Where did they all go?”

His pupils contracted sharply, and his heartbeat slowed so much that it felt as if it might stop at any moment.

In front of him, beyond what his eyes could properly perceive, countless plants had spread out from the doorway.

Except for the place where he stood, everything around him was covered in writhing vegetation.

As he cautiously stepped through the door, his entire body froze.

Before his eyes, hundreds of people were hanging from the ceiling of the corridor like corpses at the end of a noose.

Drip.

Black blood dripped from the heels of the suspended bodies.

“Ah… ah… ah…”

The sight terrified him so completely that he collapsed onto the floor, unable to form even the simplest words.

“Ugh…”

He clutched his neck as roots and branches burst from within his body, spreading outward without end.

Humans were nourishment for these things.

And then, his corpse was slowly hoisted up into the corridor.