Chapter 154 - Jogo: I Only Play High-Stakes Matches

Shibuya surface. The ruins of Dogenzaka.

"Kill every sorcerer here?"

Ryomen Sukuna sat on a broken slab of concrete and rebar. One leg bent, elbow propped on his knee. His tone carried undisguised mockery. Jogo stood some ten-odd meters below. The crater atop his head vented heavy white smoke. That terrifying Cursed Energy, the King of Curses, unmistakable, pressed down until the joints of his bones ached.

"That's right."

Jogo steeled himself and spoke, his single eye fixed hard on that face. Yuji Itadori's face. Radiating pure malice.

"If you're willing to act, every sorcerer of this era gets wiped out today. The age of Cursed Spirits will arrive."

"Doesn't sound bad."

Sukuna's fingertip tapped lightly on his knee. Tap. Tap. Tap.

"But you've got one thing wrong."

Sukuna stood. His enormous Cursed Energy crashed down like a tsunami. The chunks of rubble drifting nearby were ground to powder under that crushing weight.

"I don't need a reason for what I do. And I couldn't care less about some bullshit age of Cursed Spirits."

Sukuna looked down at Jogo from above, his mouth splitting into a grin that reached his ears.

"I only go by my mood."

Jogo's single eye narrowed. Trying to reason with this monster from a thousand years ago was utterly pointless.

"However."

Sukuna's tone shifted. He leapt down from the rubble and landed lightly ten meters in front of Jogo.

"In recognition of the effort you all went through to wake me — I'll give you a chance."

Sukuna spread his arms wide, baring his chest covered in black tattoos.

"Just land one hit on me. One hit."

"Not only will I help you kill every sorcerer — everything that comes after, I'll follow your lead."

Land one hit? Jogo's single eye lit up. His mind flashed back to that conversation with Kenjaku from a few days ago.

"Where I stand right now, converted to Sukuna's fingers, roughly how many would that equal?"

"Estimating generously, eight or nine. Ten wouldn't even be an exaggeration." Kenjaku had smiled and held up a gesture.

Yuji Itadori had swallowed fifteen fingers by now. Fifteen against ten. The gap existed. But it was not an uncrossable gulf. Jogo knew exactly what his overwhelming firepower could do. As long as the requirement wasn't to defeat Sukuna, just land one hit, this deal was absolutely worth taking. And this was the best opportunity to prove the strength of Cursed Spirits before this arrogant King of Curses.

"Deal! It's settled!" Jogo roared.

"Then why haven't you started?" Sukuna smiled and tilted his head.

BOOM!

Before the words had even faded, the ground beneath Jogo's feet melted. Several thick pillars of lava erupted from beneath Sukuna's feet and shot skyward. The heat scorched the surrounding air until it twisted and blackened. Strike first. Jogo had no expectation this sneak attack would land cleanly. In the same instant the lava erupted, his hands moved rapidly before his chest, forming seals.

"Ember Insects!"

Hundreds of insects wreathed in green fire swarmed out from his palms. Wings beating, they converged on the lava-engulfed area from every direction at speeds that shattered the sound barrier. The entire space screamed with sonic booms.

BANG!

The lava pillar was torn open from within by a savage force. Sukuna burst through. Faced with the swarm filling the sky, he made no move to dodge. He simply waved a hand.

"Dismantle."

Invisible slashes wove through the air into a dense net of death. The hundred-odd insects at the front were cut into countless fragments in an instant. They detonated in succession mid-air, blasting out a stretch of blinding fire. Fast! Jogo's single eye snapped wide. Sukuna's slashing speed had blown past every prediction he'd made.

"Is that all you've got?"

Sukuna's voice sounded from directly behind him. When had he circled around?! Jogo's scalp prickled. No time to turn. He vented the full accumulation from the crater atop his head, straight backward.

BOOM!

A pillar of intensely concentrated incandescent flame blasted at close range toward what was behind him. Sukuna let out a light sound of surprise. As if he hadn't expected this Cursed Spirit's reaction speed to be decent. He didn't take the flames head-on. His body twisted in an uncanny motion, sliding past the edge of the pillar. A brutal roundhouse kick slammed hard into Jogo's flank.

CRACK!

A sharp sound of bone fracturing. Jogo didn't even manage a scream. His body was sent flying by that immense force, smashing through three storefronts lining both sides of the street in succession, finally crashing into the underground parking lot of an abandoned office building. A load-bearing wall collapsed with a roar and pinned him under the rubble. Agonizing pain swept through his entire body.

Jogo coughed up a large mouthful of violet blood. So this was the King of Curses from a thousand years ago? A single basic roundhouse kick, and the force was more terrifying than that monster with the Heavenly Restriction. If that kick had landed on his head, he'd already be back inside the Cursed Womb regenerating.

"Stop playing dead. Get out here."

Sukuna's impatient voice came from outside the rubble. Jogo clenched his teeth and slammed both palms against the ground.

"Disaster Flames!"

RUMBLE!

The entire underground parking lot transformed into a roiling sea of lava. The collapsed concrete melted under the heat into a crimson liquid. Using the lava as cover, Jogo silently dove underground. If he couldn't match Sukuna's speed or strength, he'd use a wide-area domain to seal off every avenue of escape. Even grazing the hem of his clothing would count as a win.

On the surface above. Sukuna watched the ground beneath his feet rapidly collapse into a vast lava lake. He raised an eyebrow with evident interest.

"Interesting. You're starting to use your head."

The lake's surface kept erupting with enormous bubbles. The acrid stench of sulfur bored straight into the nostrils. Suddenly, the lava beneath Sukuna's feet churned violently. Three enormous hands, condensed from pure molten rock, broke through the surface. Carrying temperatures of several thousand degrees, they grabbed from three different directions toward Sukuna in the air above.

"Too slow."

Sukuna casually stepped on the air. Invisible Cursed Energy formed a momentary foothold beneath his feet. He pushed off and rose another ten-odd meters, easily clearing the encirclement of the lava hands.

"Up here!"

Jogo's furious shout came from directly above him. He had somehow concealed himself in mid-air. Both hands clasped together, his palms condensing a high-density fireball with a diameter exceeding ten meters. The surface of the fireball shone a bright white, and the surrounding space was scorched into ripples visible to the naked eye.

"Hit, damn you!"

Jogo spent every last bit of his strength and hurled that concentrated fireball straight down at Sukuna, who had just exhausted his upward momentum. The distance was too close. There was no dodging it. Jogo's heart pounded like a war drum. He could almost see the edge of the fireball grazing Sukuna's shoulder. Just touch him. That was all it had to do.

Sukuna looked up at the fireball right in front of his face. Not the slightest panic. He even broke into a grin.

"Cleave."

SLASH!

An impossibly enormous slash erupted skyward. The bright white fireball, along with the thick cloud layer behind Jogo, was split cleanly in two by that invisible slash. Like cutting tofu. The unstable energy inside the fireball was disrupted in an instant. Both halves sputtered out mid-air and collapsed into a sky full of fire rain, falling powerlessly. Jogo froze.

He held his downward-striking pose, his single eye staring blankly at the two halves of dying flame sliding past him. It was cut apart? A pure energy attack, severed?!

"What are you spacing out for?"

Sukuna passed through the remnants of the fireball and appeared before him.

THUD!

Right hand like a blade, he pierced through Jogo's chest with casual ease and closed his grip around his spine.

"AAAAAAH—!"

Jogo let out a shrill scream. The lava Cursed Energy inside his chest cavity thrashed wildly, trying to burn through Sukuna's arm. But Sukuna's arm was coated in a layer of extremely high-density Cursed Energy, and the lava couldn't harm him in the slightest.

"Ten fingers? Who gave you that idea?"

Sukuna held Jogo aloft on one hand, his gaze as cold as a man looking at a pile of garbage.

"You don't even qualify to make me break a sweat."

Can't lose. Jogo's single eye filled with veins of blood. If it's for the future of Cursed Spirits, I'll throw away my life if I have to.

"Stop looking down on me!"

Jogo ignored his shattered spine and forcibly burned every last bit of Cursed Energy left in his body. The crater atop his head spewed out thick plumes of smoke laced with black blood.

"Maximum: Meteor!"

HUM!

The sky above all of Shibuya suddenly darkened. Not from cloud cover. A massive meteor with a diameter exceeding 100 meters, trailing a long tail of fire, forcibly smashed through the barrier high in the sky. It plummeted straight toward the two of them. The terrifying pressure caused the lava churning in the lake below to halt its roiling and begin rapidly cooling and solidifying.

This was the pinnacle of what Jogo could release. Even if it meant mutual destruction, he had to fulfill the condition of landing one hit. Sukuna looked up at the sky-blotting meteor. He casually tossed the half-dead Jogo to the ground like discarding a torn sack.

"Since you want to play with fire, I'll keep you company with fire."

Sukuna's hands didn't form a single seal. He simply spread the five fingers of his right hand and pointed them toward the meteor in the sky.

"Open."

A ball of golden flame abruptly ignited in his palm. Jogo lay on the ground, staring fixedly at that flame. Wasn't Sukuna's technique slashing attacks? Why was he using fire?! The purity and temperature of those flames were even more terrifying than his own.

The golden flame in Sukuna's palm expanded in an instant. It transformed into a golden pillar of fire as thick as a barrel and shot straight up to meet the falling meteor.

BOOM!

Two overwhelmingly powerful flames collided high above Shibuya with a thunderous crash. No stalemate. The golden pillar of fire penetrated the enormous 100-meter meteor without any resistance. Then the golden flame detonated with a roar from inside it, burning that massive chunk of molten rock from the inside out into scattered ash across the sky.

The shockwave swept outward. Every window on the surrounding city blocks shattered at once. The smoke and dust settled. Sukuna stood in place. His breathing was not the slightest bit disordered. His white kimono was spotless. Jogo's remaining right arm hung limply at his side. Spine severed. Cursed Energy depleted. He no longer had the strength even to stand. Defeated. He hadn't even grazed him once.

"Is this your limit?"

Sukuna walked up to Jogo and stepped down on his face. He ground his head hard into the cooled rock.

"How boring."

He raised his right hand. A point of dazzling golden firelight condensed once more at his fingertip.

"Dying under my technique — consider it my final gift to you."

The instant the firelight was about to descend. The shadow beneath Jogo suddenly rippled with an eerie disturbance. A pale hand reached out from within the shadow and seized Jogo's remaining right arm.

"Sorry about that, Lord Sukuna — this guy still has some use to me!"

Mahito's voice echoed through the empty ruins, carrying his usual flippancy and cunning.

"Idle Transfiguration!"

A pale blue light blazed in Mahito's palm. Jogo's massive body twisted and contorted into a limp, shapeless lump of flesh. That pale hand yanked him at tremendous speed, dragging him down into the shadow underground.

BOOM!

Sukuna's golden flame crashed down onto the empty ground. The surface within a radius of ten-odd meters was scorched instantly into smooth glassy crystal. The flames subsided. Sukuna stared at the empty ground and slowly withdrew his right hand. The corner of his mouth curled into a cruel arc.

"Interesting."

He turned his head.

"You actually dare snatch a toy from my hands. I hope the speed you run with keeps me entertained for a little while."

➤ Next: All Hands Assemble