Chapter 166 - Kinji Hakari

"Left jab, duck under, takedown!"

BANG!

Inside the octagon, a curse user built like a side of beef got slammed hard into the chain-link fence. Blood sprayed from his nose and splattered across the rusted wire. Outside the cage, hundreds of wild-eyed gamblers waved fistfuls of cash and screamed themselves hoarse.

"So this is the underground fighting ring?"

Yuji Itadori wedged himself through the crowd, nose wrinkling against the acrid burn of cigarette smoke and cheap alcohol. This place is something else. He complained silently in his head. If Toji-sensei were here, he'd probably tear the whole venue down to rubble in under a minute, then force everyone to frog-jump fifty laps around the base of Mount Fuji while shouting youth slogans.

"A concentration camp for society's trash."

Megumi Fushiguro stood off to one side, face cold, both hands shoved in his pockets, radiating the kind of low-pressure aura that said: don't even try.

"The smell is disgusting."

Panda's massive frame stood out like a landmark in the crowd. Panda sidestepped a flying empty bottle with practiced ease.

"Don't say that, this is Hakari-senpai's life's work, at least. Biggest underground fighting club in Tochigi Prefecture. The daily turnover is astronomical. This is how he keeps all his people fed."

"That's exactly what I still don't get."

Yuji scratched his head, eyes sweeping across the frenzied gamblers.

"Why did Hakari-senpai run away from home in the first place? I heard from Geto-sensei that the old administration at Jujutsu High used to be rotten to the core. But hasn't Toji-sensei already beaten them into a puppet by now?"

You have to find the root of the problem before you can treat it. If it was just a clash of principles, maybe there was still room to talk.

Panda let out a sigh and lowered his voice. "It's not about any grand cause. It's because of gambling."

"Gambling?"

"That idiot dad absolutely despises gambling." Megumi picked up the thread, face still blank.

"He has a famous line: 'Gambling is nothing but squandering time that could be spent sweating in honest effort, wasted on hollow, meaningless probability. That is a betrayal of youth!' Of course, I strongly suspect he's only like that because he once lost everything at the horse track — pants included — and was left with a psychological scar that will never heal."

Yuji swallowed. That reason fit Toji-sensei's character perfectly.

"So what exactly happened?"

"Hakari-senpai was running a gambling session in the dorms and got caught red-handed by the old man."

Megumi recalled the carnage of that day, tone unchanged throughout, like someone recounting a horror story in a documentary voice. "The old man educated him through purely physical means for half an hour. Broke three of his ribs. Then stuffed him into a fluorescent pink bodysuit and hung him upside-down from the thousand-year-old ginkgo tree at the Jujutsu High entrance."

Yuji shuddered. Goosebumps crawled up his entire body.

"Hung there for a full twenty-four hours." Panda covered his face, seemingly unable to bear the memory. "The whole time, he had to scream at the top of his lungs: 'Gambling is the cancer of youth.' Miss a single repetition and another hour got added.

"Hakari-senpai decided he had died socially. He bought a standing-room-only ticket that very next night and fled Tokyo. Refused to go back no matter what."

That's it. This just got serious. A cold weight settled in Yuji's chest. This grudge runs deeper than the sky. How were you even supposed to talk him around? Tell him: as long as you come back, Sensei promises he won't put you in a pink bodysuit again? He'd go berserk and try to kill someone on the spot.

"So what do we do now? Just go straight up and find him?" Yuji asked.

"That won't work. You can't even get up the stairs."

Panda pointed at the octagon. "If you want to see Hakari, you have to prove your worth in the ring first. Win three matches in a row, or put on a performance spectacular enough to get noticed, and Hakari will send someone down to bring you up."

"Leave it to me."

Yuji cracked his knuckles. The joints popped like a string of firecrackers. When it came to a fight, he'd never been afraid of anyone. Five minutes later, Yuji was standing in the center of the octagon. No announcer. No referee. The iron door was locked shut. His opponent was a two-and-a-half-meter wall of muscle with a tiger tattooed across his body.

Muscles stacked high, radiating dense waves of Cursed Energy, clearly a curse user who habitually augmented his body with it.

"You done growing yet, kid?" The big man cracked his neck. Joints popped loudly.

He sneered. "I'll crush you with one punch."

Yuji ignored him, dropped into two squats on the spot, and stretched out his thighs. This guy's footing is unstable. One look at the stance was enough. Yuji made his read fast. Cut through the weak point in that Cursed Energy defense and one strike ends it. No point wasting time. At the same moment. Top-floor VIP suite.

Kinji Hakari was leaning back on a leather sofa, legs crossed and propped up on the coffee table. Floral shirt. Thick gold chain catching the light. Kirara Hoshi nestled in one arm. Hakari was watching the surveillance monitors on the wall with the mild interest of someone who had nowhere better to be.

"Who's that? Looks kind of familiar."

Hakari blew a smoke ring, gaze drifting lazily across the pink-haired boy on screen.

"No idea. New blood on the books, probably. Odds are fifteen to one. Plenty of people betting on the big guy."

Kirara Hoshi said with a smile. Right then, Yuji moved. Faced with the big man's heavy punch slamming down loaded with savage Cursed Energy, Yuji didn't dodge. No Cursed Energy fluctuation. No tell of any technique being activated. Yuji wrenched his hips low, and the blood and qi throughout his entire body surged and erupted all at once, like water hitting a full boil.

"Eight Gates — Gate of Opening, open!"

BANG!

The steel-plate floor beneath Yuji's feet blew out a crater. His whole body blurred and vanished from where he'd been standing, moving at a speed that defied all logic, threading clean through the dead angle of the big man's punch. Up in the suite, Hakari's eyelids snapped up. Hakari shoved Kirara Hoshi aside and leaned the entire upper body forward.

That opening move. Familiar enough to give nightmares. That sensation of pure, violent physical dominance pressing down like a ceiling. Hakari reached up and touched the ribs on the right side, the ones that had once been broken. A phantom pain not felt in years shot straight up the spine and into the skull. The devil's special training came to mind.

Those green-fisted shadows swinging wildly everywhere, and that man's wild, exhilarated grin as he ground Hakari face-first into the mud. On the screen, the big man still hadn't registered what was happening. Yuji was already directly above his head.

"Youth Dropkick!"

His right leg became a battle-axe, carrying a shriek that tore the air apart, and drove down hard onto the big man's shoulder.

BOOM!

A massive shockwave detonated inside the octagon. The big man's enormous body dropped straight to both knees, smashing two deep cracks into the steel-plate floor. Eyes rolled back. No scream made it out before he collapsed unconscious. The surrounding noise cut out completely. Two seconds later, a roar erupted that nearly blew the roof off.

Hakari stared hard at the pink-haired boy on screen, now scratching his head, and clenched both back teeth.

"That's... Yuji Itadori."

Recognized him. Never met in person, but it wasn't as if Hakari hadn't been keeping an eye on news from Jujutsu High. This was the kid they called the Vessel. The monster that man had taken on as a Direct Disciple.

Hakari picked up the walkie-talkie from the table, voice flat and hard. "Bring that pink-haired kid up here. And the panda who came in with him, and the Fushiguro brat."

The VIP suite door swung open. Yuji, Megumi, and Panda walked in. The room was thick with cigar smoke and alcohol. Hakari sat sprawled on the sofa like someone who owned the building, gaze raking across all three of them.

"Hey. Panda. And... the Fushiguro brat."

Hakari let out a cold laugh. "That guy actually let you out?"

"We need your strength, Hakari-senpai."

Yuji didn't beat around the bush. "Something's happened in Shibuya. Kenjaku has activated the Culling Game. Sensei Gojo has been sealed. Tsumiki has been caught up in it. We need your help."

At the words Culling Game and Kenjaku, something flickered across Hakari's face. It got buried fast under a layer of hostility.

"Not my problem."

Hakari stubbed the cigarette out in the ashtray and leaned forward. "Come back? Bow my head to that freak in the green bodysuit? Dream on."

That attitude was harder than stone. A bead of sweat appeared on Yuji's forehead. He needed to find a way to get through to this.

"Does that guy even understand what a technique is?" Hakari jabbed a finger at his own temple, voice carrying suppressed fury.

"He doesn't even have Cursed Energy! All he ever does is make people frog-jump, squat, and hit sandbags! I'm a modern Jujutsu Sorcerer, not a caveman! Why the hell would I listen to his outdated lectures?"

"Sensei isn't wrong."

Yuji met Hakari's eyes directly.

"He just wants you to become stronger. You can't reach the top by relying on luck."

That landed like a needle straight into a powder keg.

"Ha? What do you know about luck!"

Hakari slammed a palm on the table and shot to both feet. Violent Cursed Energy ran riot through the room, rattling the glass cups with a steady hum.

"Luck is part of strength! I was born to gamble big! What does he know? His head is full of nothing but muscle and those nonsensical youth slogans!"

Hakari was panting, eyes red.

"Want me to come back? Fine. Have him come here himself, get on his knees and apologize, and admit that gambling is a man's romance. Then I'll think about it."

Absolutely impossible. Yuji knew it perfectly well. If Toji-sensei came, he'd only hang Hakari-senpai upside-down again, and this time, he'd probably throw in a naked sprint for good measure. Just as the situation hit a complete dead end, Megumi spoke. Cold and level.

"Is that so."

Megumi's gaze moved past Hakari and settled on the corner of the desk.

"If you hate the old man so much, and think his methods are so outdated, then what's that copy of the Outline of Youth Eight Gates Taijutsu doing in the corner of your desk?"

Nobody spoke. The room had nothing left in it but the faint hum of the air conditioning. Yuji and Panda turned their heads at the same time. Following Megumi's gaze, tucked in the most out-of-the-way corner of the rosewood desk, sat a notebook with its corners dog-eared from heavy use. On the cover, unmistakably: a green stick figure giving a thumbs-up.

That was the training manual Toji had drawn by hand. Every person at Jujutsu High had a copy. Hakari's face flushed the color of a pig's liver.

"The calluses on the backs of your hands. The old scars on your knuckles."

Megumi pressed on without mercy, eyes sharp as a blade. "Those only come from punching a bare wall at least ten thousand times a day. All these years, you never actually abandoned what he taught you. You're just too proud to admit it."

This is going to be bad. Yuji screamed in his head. Megumi's aim is dead-on, but this is basically lobbing a live grenade straight into a powder keg! Sure enough.

BOOM!

Hakari kicked the solid wooden coffee table clean over. Shattered glass and expensive liquor splashed across the floor.

"Shut the hell up!"

Hakari tore off the tie, every vein in the neck standing out hard.

"You want my help? Fine!"

Hakari fixed both eyes on Yuji, gaze ferocious enough to eat someone alive. "I'll show you my rules right now. Let's make a bet!"

"Bet on what?" Yuji didn't back down. Feet planted flat on the floor.

"Bet on your life!"

Hakari ripped off the floral shirt, exposing a powerful frame covered in scars. "Didn't that bastard pass his mantle down to you? Let me see how much you actually learned. No Cursed Energy, pure hand-to-hand. Last three minutes against me, and I'll go with you."

Hakari split into a grin. Wild and dangerous.

"Can't last? You leave your life here."

Three minutes of pure hand-to-hand. Yuji stared at the furious senpai in front of him, and Toji's wildly grinning face floated up in his mind. If reasoning wasn't going to work, there was only one option left. Sensei's method. Communicate with your fists. Yuji dropped his center of gravity and grinned.

"Three minutes?"

Yuji bent his knees slightly and settled into the standard ready stance. The dormant blood and qi inside him ignited like a charge and blasted up through the meridians straight to the crown of his skull.

"Sensei always said — true youth..."

"Needs no defense!"

"Eight Gates, Gate of Life...!"

Panda and Megumi exchanged a look and swallowed.

"Yuji, be careful, Hakari is—"

Yuji grinned.

"Relax, Panda-senpai. I can't speak for anything else, but when it comes to taking a beating, I'm the toughest one at all of Jujutsu High."

Hakari let out a cold laugh and clenched a fist.

"Is that so?"

"Eight Gates, Fifth Gate, open!"

Yuji's eyes went wide. "?"

Is there still time to regret this?

➤ Next: Gate of Limit vs. Gate of Limit — Megumi Fushiguro's Pep Talk