The Inumaki Clan Prodigy [Jujutsu Kaisen]

Mahito's mouth gapped as he was struck, blood erupted from his lips as the purple fluid filled his lungs. Mahito ordered two transfigured humans to close in on the sorcerer who currently had his fist planted in his gut, one flew down with its disfigured wings and the other swiped its single, bladed arm towards his legs.

The sorcerer jumped over the blade while maneuvering his body to dodge the bird-like transfigured human by positioning his body sidewise between the two creatures. Before he could fall onto the grounded one's back, he stuck his hand out towards Mahito and blasted a bolt of pure cursed energy towards him.

It pierced his chest a few inches deep while blasting the sorcerer backward and away from the group of master and slaves. Mahito's attacker wasted no time before rushing back in. The grounded creature charged him only to be vaulted over and his neck snapped. The sorcerer used Mahito's creation as leverage to jump into the air, catching the flying transfigured human and ripping its wing off as he fell back towards Mahito.

Mahito smiled as he combined five transfigured humans in another use of body repel. The sorcerer seemed to smile back as he somehow kicked off the air to dodge out of the way. Mahito tsked in annoyance, he'd favored power over speed in that attack, thinking the sorcerer wouldn't be able to dodge it mid-air.

Mahito suddenly lost vision in his left eye as it was pierced by a razor-sharp throwing knife. He pulled it out before the cursed energy imbued in the blade detonated. The sorcerer appeared from his left side, taking advantage of the newly made blind spot to deliver another soul-quaking punch to his chin.

Mahito suffered two more hits to the chin before his left arm was broken. Mahito's right shot out, grabbing hold of one of the sorcerer's fists but was unable to transfigure him due to Domain Amplification. Instead, Mahito drove his knee into the sorcerer's gut, the sorcerer getting his hand in front of it to make the damage inflicted negligible. With both arms occupied, however, he was unable to protect himself against a head butt.

The sorcerer stumbled back as Mahito's technique returned to him. An arm sprouted from his right side, turning itself into a whip while the arm attached to his shoulder transformed into a five-foot-long serrated edge.

The sorcerer ducked the blade as Mahito advanced, the whip barely nicking him as it struck out towards his leg. Mahito suddenly transfigured his left arm into a long cylinder with a small opening at the front. A bang could be heard as he fired transfigured human after transfigured human towards the sorcerer, each of them transformed into tiny, bullet-sized balls with armor plating, as both of his right arms transformed into many, many throned whips.

"Be sliced apart." The cursed speech user commanded as every whip was severed from his body while his left arm was cut up like sushi. Mahito looked down with his single eye, the other having been cut through as well, to find gushing cuts all over his legs and torso.

He smiled as he transformed his body into a ball of spikes, forcing the sorcerer away so he couldn't capitalize with domain amplification before snapping back in place, a fully healed body reappearing.

Would Mahito have liked to land all those hits and cut the sorcerer to ribbons? Undeniably. Was it his plan to? Not really. He just needed to force the sorcerer to use his technique and drain his cursed energy faster.

As Mahito looked around, he saw no sorcerer. Just a desolate and dark street filled with the corpses of transfigured humans and Mahito's severed body parts.

——

Isamu didn't like the term running away. He preferred to call it tactically disengaging. Why? Because he was close. After fighting the curse for more than five minutes after reaching the surface, Isamu was almost there. Just a little more refinement and he would be ready to go all out and crush the curse's skull.

He just needed a bit of time to reflect on their last encounter and- what? What was he doing here? Isamu slid to a stop, his path across the destroyed rooftops forgotten as his head and entire body whipped around. He began running in the opposite direction, back towards the curse, as he sensed a familiar aura in very close proximity to the much larger, much slimmer aura of the patch-faced cursed spirit.

Before long Isamu threw himself off the building, the white sheen covering his entire body obvious in the night sky which slowly became more star-filled as the night went on, less light pollution and all. Unfortunately for the cursed spirit, it wasn't looking for him.

"Heeeyy. Long time no see 7:3. Would you know where your buddy is? It seems he ra-"

The curse was unable to finish his taunt-filled sentence before both of Isamu's feet slammed into the side of his face from above, his head being driven into the ground. Sadly, Isamu hadn't been given the time to refine Domain Amplification to the desired, and necessary, level.

"There you are." The curse said, his surprisingly joyful voice muffled by Isamu's shoes. Each of the curse's fingers became tipped with a sharp knife point as both arms shot up to stab them into his legs.

Isamu casually jumped backward toward Nanami's position. Nanami was more roughed up than he had been last, the dark, circular stain of blood from the devastating blow he'd taken during the fight with the weed still present. Besides that, there were some new cuts and scraps, most minor and insignificant. Overall, he was in fighting condition but Isamu held some doubt.

Yuji was Nanami's equal in physical capabilities. Isamu was able to go toe to toe with Yuji and Megumi with ease after his first black flash. He'd grown a lot since then. To put it bluntly, Nanami had been left in the dust. Isamu knew he would be able to defeat his senior with ease and the curse in front of him was getting closer and closer to Isamu's level as the fight went on.

Isamu simply doubted Nanami would be able to keep up. Even with his binding vow raising his physical capabilities to 120% after five o'clock, it would only address the difference a bit. Should he just tell Nanami to retreat, and find some transfigured humans to dispatch somewhere else? Tell him he was punching far above his weight class, that they were no longer in the same league?

But just before he did, Isamu received a significant nugget of information.

"Isamu…" Nanami paused as he caught his breath, clearly out of breath from no doubt sprinting here as fast as he could. "Yuji and Naobito are on their way, five minutes tops."

Isamu let out a relieved breath. If all he needed to do was buy time and wait for the cavalry to arrive in the form of someone who could actually hurt the damned cursed spirit, it was no problem.

'Focus on the transfigured humans.' Isamu quickly signed before just staring at the curse.

"Alright. I'm afraid I won't be much help against the curse. I'm well aware of how far I am out of my league." Nanami said, he didn't sound sad or fearful though. He was just stating a fact which Isamu honestly respected.

'I know. If you get in over your head, I'll lend you a hand.' Isamu gestured as he continued to stand stockstill. If he was playing for time instead of damage, why rush in? He would wait for the curse to come to him. He wasn't kept waiting for very long.

Isamu drew both of his swords. Maya in his left and the mythical blade of the Inumaki in his right. He scored the ground, impaling the strange transfigured human repelling technique of the curse in a river of stone knives which suddenly appeared below it.

Nanami and Isamu stuck close together, Nanami ready to cut down any transfigured human in a single blow while Isamu stood ready to defend himself and his elder from the newly born cursed spirit. He had to do so a bit quicker than he'd thought.

Saraswati flicked to Isamu's right, cutting a miniature transfigured human in half before it could plunge into Nanami's heart. At the same time, he blocked a drill-tipped arm with the flat of the blade in his left hand, reinforcing that specific spot on the blade with more cursed energy than usual to prevent it from breaking apart.

Isamu forced the arm up as he brought Saraswati back around to attack the offending limb. The curse's left arm met it, transformed into a large tower shield as a third arm sprung from its left tricep, two transfigured humans clutched in its grip.

The curse pushed Isamu back with its shield arm as it threw the transfigured victims toward Nanami, not wanting much interruption. The two grade one sorcerers were separated, the curse pressuring Isamu as the two transfigured humans pushed Nanami back. It seemed those two in particular were a tier above average.

Every appendage of both high-tier combatants was a blur to Nanami's eyes, not that he was allowed to watch much of it. The two transfigured humans he now faced were odd in a few ways.

To start, they were both identical, two entirely pitch-black humanoids with regular human proportions and glowing white eyes. On top of this, they each wielded a katana, each one as dark as the night sky currently hanging over Nanami's head.

Nanami blocked a sudden chop from the transfigured human on his right, using his body's structure to stop the sword head-on with his wrapped cleaver. He stepped to the right while angling his cleaver to allow the blade to slide down its length, the movement necessary to dodge a thrust from the other transfigured human.

Nanami struck out at the sword wielder to his right, striking it near its left eye before it could get its sword back up. Sadly, Nanami was unable to fulfill the requirements for his cursed technique. Steam was visible from the heat of friction on the transfigured human's armor-like skin as Nanami backed away.

He was pressured by the second transfigured human, blocking a strike as he backpedaled. The first attacker, Nanami's former strike doing next to nothing, followed up and scored first blood.

Nanami kicked out at the now bloodied blade as his cursed energy surged, striking out at both in a furry of strikes, nearly all of them landing on whichever transfigured human he was targeting at the time.

Nanami's cursed energy calmed as he backed away, examining his opponents as he did so. Despite both of them taking upwards of 5 strikes, neither had taken any significant damage. Nanami looked down at the long gash running across the side of his forearm. It was a shallow cut.

Nanami tsked as he realized the use of these transfigured humans. They'd given away most of their offensive prowess in exchange for extremely high durability. All in an attempt to keep Nanami occupied and away from the main battle. To stop him forming being any use to Isamu.

——

Isamu cleaved through a transfigured human as he tossed Maya into a transfigured human to his left. The short blade went through it and into its master which stood behind it. These new black transfigured humans were annoying but clearly not on Isamu's level.

Isamu jumped towards the curse as it pulled the blade from its right eye. Its left hand transformed into a blade as it prepared to parry Isamu's sword slash. On approach, Isamu let go of Saraswati as he threw it behind his back. At the same time, he surged the cursed energy in his left hand as he prepared to catch the blade.

That's what the curse thought at least, transforming its right arm into a blade as well. Instead, Isamu's right hand reached over his body and grabbed the handle of the blade from under his arm, causing the curse to miscalculate the exact position of the blade.

As a result, the blade cut through its wrist instead of meeting his newly transformed right hand. At the same time, Isamu's left hand came around and struck the curse's chin, sending surprisingly effective tremors through its skull. Isamu stabbed Saraswati into the curse's gut before he brought his right hand forward to crush its skull.

The curse opened its mouth in the next moment, three tiny, rapidly expanding transfigured humans crawling out of its mouth. Each of them swung towards Isamu, taking a step back Isamu gave them a chance to merge into a single, pitch-black transfigured human.

The transfigured human adopted a rough boxing stance as it started barring down on Isamu with a whirlwind of punches. Isamu ducked one, catching its wrist and breaking it before nailing its other hand to its left pec with a throwing knife. Bringing both hands up, Isamu casually snapped its neck before ripping the head off entirely.

They were durable, sure. More durable than the average transfigured human. But that was like calling a turtle faster than a sloth. You weren't really saying much, at least in Ismau's opinion. Isamu let out a long suffering sigh as he jumped, dodging another large transfigured human as it shot towards him.

As Isamu closed in on the curse, he saw quite an unexpected sight. Standing there, a shit-eating smile splitting its ugly mug, was the curse. That wasn't unusual, no, it was the blade it gripped. Standing before Isamu was a powerful special-grade cursed spirit, wielding the legendary blade of the Inumaki clan. But all Isamu saw was an idiot.

As the curse swung the blade it ripped from its own gut towards its rightful master, a ghostly form appeared behind the fool. A golden, four-armed woman towered over it, her eyes blazing with godly fire. The bottom left arm of the shikigami manifested by the mythical blade plunged through the curse's back, ripping out its heart.

Its bottom right arm grabbed the sword-wielding arm, its hand large enough to easily wrap around the curse's bicep, and ripped it off entirely. Finally, the spirit of the Hindu goddess whose name the blade bore raised both of her top arms before bringing them down on either side of the curse's head, crushing it with no more difficulty than a bodybuilder crushing a grape.

Isamu slid towards the curse as the goddess disappeared, his fist glowing with the power of Domain Amplification in its most refined form yet. Was it the best it could possibly be? No. But had it been stewing in the young prodigies' head for long enough? Yes. While he wouldn't call himself the best, calling himself a master wouldn't be too far off.

Isamu struck out at the curse's stomach, knowing nullifying the curse's technique now would surely spell the end of it. The curse raised its left arm in a desperate attempt to save itself, its fist flying forward with amateur-like skill.

Its technique worked to extend its arm, causing its fist to make contact a fraction of a second before Isamu's. Space distorted as a black and red bolt of lightning descended upon the wasteland of Shibuya. Isamu cursed his luck, or perhaps the curse's. For the sparks of black do not choose who to bless.