Frieren: — Chapter 104 - Fight! Fight! Fight!!!
[Sendai]
BOOM!
The instant the battle began, Okkotsu and Sukuna stepped forward as one. The massive recoil threw two opposing cones of dust in their wake.
In a blink, the gap between them collapsed to a single meter.
[Dismantle (Kai)]
Sukuna swung his arm. Invisible blades sliced straight toward Okkotsu's face.
Step.
Killing intent closed in. Okkotsu planted his foot on the concrete, his shoe scraping sideways with a rasp as he twisted. Only a few strands of hair were sheared off.
He dodged it?
Without even seeing the attack, he evaded?
Sukuna felt a flicker of surprise.
Okkotsu used that hair-thin evasion to cut inside Sukuna's reach. He tensed his forearm and thrust forward, his Cursed Tool shearing through the haze of dust, bearing down from above on Sukuna's face.
"You're interesting."
Sukuna laughed, wilder and more gleeful, and looked straight up at the edge of the blade.
(He's not dodging?)
Okkotsu was puzzled, but he had no intention of pulling back.
The slash came down. Wind pressure hammered the ground as if tons of water had been dumped from above. The earth caved into a smooth concave arc, pressing Sukuna down.
But,
"~"
Crack. Crack. Crack. Crack.
The blade stopped less than 2 centimeters from Sukuna's forehead. It couldn't go deeper. It only trembled.
(This is...)
Okkotsu's breath caught. Sukuna seized the opening, raising his free arm.
HUM!
Invisible slashes hammered in at point-blank range, chaotic crossing lines wrapping around every inch of Okkotsu's body.
Shk!
He yanked the blade back and cut at an angle. White light scattered across his vision as the slashes tore through like a pack of animals, gouging cuts across his face and flank. Blood sprayed across the ground.
But...
"As I thought. You can't see the slashes, but even blind, instinct pulls you away from the killing blow. Not bad! You've got a teacher who really knows how to fight!"
Freshly woken from his long sleep, Sukuna was in a mood to talk. He was even willing to stop and praise Okkotsu.
"And—"
Hssss...
The slashes sent Okkotsu skidding back over 10 meters. But as the distance opened, his wounds began closing.
Reverse Cursed Technique.
(Even in my era, sorcerers who could master this were an absolute minority. This age. This level of strength and potential.)
The interest on Sukuna's face deepened.
"No matter the era. I am never bored! You sorcerers!"
This time, he pulled all five fingers taut, raking them forward like claws.
"Dodge properly now."
He said it cheerfully. He even announced the move in advance.
The Cursed Energy storm was right on top of him. Okkotsu read the force, his blade flashing like obsidian: wrist angling, arm pressing down, thrust, chop, horizontal slash, blocking the bulk of the attack.
But under the relentless barrage, his Reverse Cursed Technique finally stalled.
Okkotsu Yuta was not yet skilled enough to fight and heal at the same time.
"Heh!"
Sukuna's grin sharpened as he stepped in.
The figure flickered once, then vanished.
Okkotsu's expression hardened. Every nerve went taut.
But,
"Slow."
Sukuna had slipped directly into the gap between Rika and Okkotsu.
Okkotsu's stance hinted at a rapid turn, but Sukuna was already faster. One hand shot back and seized the hem of Okkotsu's jacket.
(Shi, )
Bam!
Sukuna didn't take the obvious kill. He flung Okkotsu away like a toy. Then Rika came for him. A casual backhand swatted her into the ground.
Scraaape.
Okkotsu's body tumbled through the air. The Veil spread above. The shattered earth stretched below. And there, flickering back into his path before he could orient, was the King of Curses, grinning.
"——!"
Sukuna hit the ruined earth at a run, launched himself airborne, and drove a kick into Okkotsu.
Desperate, Okkotsu angled his blade diagonally to guard.
CRACK!
Shockwaves rippled outward in layers. A tiered wall of wind slammed Okkotsu backward like a shell leaving a barrel.
BOOM!,!
He hit something distant and hard. The blast kicked up a towering pillar of dust. It was hard to imagine how any ordinary sorcerer could survive that kind of force.
Tap.
Sukuna touched down lightly, one hand on his hip, head cocked.
This was the power of the King of Curses.
Speed. Cursed Energy output. Technique application. Every facet of his "rotation" moved countless times faster than any ordinary sorcerer's.
Facing an enemy like this...
"Keep it up~" Sukuna swayed closer. "Land one clean hit on me, and I'll, "
Half of Sukuna's body suddenly caved inward.
,!,,!.!.!
A concussive force even more terrifying than anything before slammed into him from the side.
In an instant, the dust particles scattering from the crushed ruins were simply gone. In manga terms, it looked like someone taking an eraser to a neat row of inked lines, sweeping from right to left, stroke by stroke, until nothing remained. Eraser dust clung to the page, but underneath was pure, hollowed-out white.
A transparent air barrier swept through, blasting Sukuna and the chunk of ground beneath his feet hundreds of meters away.
His body skimmed across the earth. A jutting ridge caught him and flipped him into a rolling, grinding tumble.
Boom-crack-crack-crack-crack!.
A split second before he flew out through the Veil, Sukuna drove his arm into the soil and braked hard. He came to rest with his back against the Veil's inner wall, faint ripples spreading from the point of impact.
"Haha!"
Completely unharmed, Sukuna snapped his head up, eyes bright.
"Hey, hey, hey! Now that's a surprise!"
Before him stood the Queen of Curses, Orimoto Rika, just finishing the follow-through of her swing.
[DON'T!. GET COCKY!]
Orimoto Rika bared her fangs. White vapor poured off her as she screamed at Ryomen Sukuna.
His attacks against her were virtually useless.
Okkotsu had already healed with Reverse Cursed Technique. He stood beside Rika, body angled slightly.
"Rika, be careful. Don't let Itadori-kun's body take any more irreversible damage..."
That timid face was now wrapped in ferocity, and beneath it, a strange, cold calm. Okkotsu turned it over in his mind.
(We landed a hit. But the feel of that exchange, his ability is almost certainly a [Slashing Technique]. Invisible. No hand-direction needed to release it. Maximum simultaneous count unknown, but at least in the hundreds...)
At his best right now, Okkotsu was trying to think the way the most combat-capable person he had ever known would think.
The way Himmel would think.
(The reason that slash couldn't cut through earlier, he must have been coating his body in countless tiny slashes. Each one could bisect a building. My attack can do the same, but it couldn't punch through that layered armor of blades.)
Rika had sent Sukuna flying because her raw strength was simply that massive, enough to launch him along with the ground beneath his feet.
But it had done almost no real damage.
(Sukuna... he is so far above me it isn't funny. Combat experience, technique, Cursed Energy output, how he applies his Technique. Everything. I could counter him just now only because he wasn't trying. The moment he closed in, he could have dealt a fatal blow.)
(Can't give him another opening. And...)
In the distance, Sukuna brushed rubble and grit from himself, completely at ease.
(He can almost certainly use Reverse Cursed Technique as well... to actually beat him, I might need to land that kind of concentrated Cursed Energy from before, directly on his vitals.)
(In that case, )
"Finished your battle plan?"
The King of Curses stayed where he was, tapping the ground lightly with one toe. The picture of a man with all the time in the world.
"Come on, kid. Entertain me some more."
Okkotsu: "........."
His figure blurred. Then he was in front of Sukuna.
"Hee!"
Sukuna didn't bother to dodge. He raised a hand and came right back.
Both of them moved too fast to track. Clash after clash, absorbing force, attacking, defending, countering!
Transparent blade-ripples carved through the air around Okkotsu's body.
CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG!
Dark violet and deep black detonated in waves. Cursed Energy crackled outward in concentric rings, biting and relentless. The two of them clashed at zero distance.
The young prodigy against the strongest in history!
Fight! Fight! Fight!
Fight to your goddamn heart's content!
➤ Next: Gojo Satoru: Kita Kita~