Special Grade/Frenzy (2)

Where is the pain threshold that no human could ever pass? Is it breaking a limb? Maybe it's being poisoned. However, for Naoko, the answer to this question has been evident since the moment she awakened her power.

Being burnt alive. The most pain a human being can ever experience. There is a reason why hell is most often depicted as a fiery wasteland, and why humans undergo punishment at the stake. Humanity's morbid fascination for fire goes hand in hand with their innate fear of it. They know that arguably one of their most important discoveries can just as easily bring ruin to everything they hold dear. So, they try to tame it, to control it, but fire does not play by the rules of mere humans. It spreads, infects, brings destruction on a level nothing else really can.

Thus, fire makes no exceptions. Not even for its own children. Not even for Naoko. One can't control it without consequences.

For Naoko, her consequence was the pain she had to endure. It was like being placed on the surface of the sun with nothing but a loin cloth. The pain of wielding fire never really subsided. She trained and trained, for years on end only to be able to handle her fire in its most docile form with minimal pain.

The nerves in her hands and feet, the places she used to channel her cursed energy most, were all but destroyed. The pain dissipated, but so did every other sensation. It was cruel, to take away something like that from a person.

So, to avoid the pain, Naoko did the only logical thing her power allowed her to do. Become a mage. By using her combustion technique, she could essentially become a long range fighter, yet even she knew that it wasn't enough. Therefore, to make up for this lack of firepower, she spent countless hours summoning and shaping her cursed energy outside her body.

The results of this training had become blatantly obvious. It required a lot of concentration, enough to render her immobile while casting, but she could successfully manipulate cursed energy independent of her body. That cursed energy would still have to come from her, but she could manipulate it from a safe distance, allowing her to make the flames as hot as she desired.

Bursts of fire jumped out of the floating spear like solar flares, burning the ends of Naoko's kimono. The temperature started sharply increasing, turning the immediate area into a sauna. Naoko didn't mind the heat, she was used to it, but the same couldn't be said for Hakari and his classmate. They were sweating buckets despite the fact they distanced themselves as much as possible from the source of the flames.

Naoko stared at the curse with a grin on her face as she raised her hand and motioned it forward.

"COMBUST!"

The spear shaped flames heeded their master's command and shot forward with all the speed of a bullet. Naoko wasn't sure if the aerodynamic design of her new attack did anything to reduce drag, seeing as it was magic, but it couldn't help to try.

Piercing through the air with a shrieking noise, the spear was completely unbothered by the curse's attempts at stopping it. Unlike the wisp that stopped on impact with any form of matter, the flaming projectile decimated anything that stood in its way. Dozens of tentacles, bits of concrete and rebar were all blown to bits in its wake.

The tip of the pike firmly lodged itself in the curse's body, but it didn't stop there. It pierced through the curse like a hot knife through butter, causing explosion after explosion as bits of it collided with the spirit's innards, effectively blowing it up from the inside by the time it came out the other end.

The curse didn't even feel like screaming.

Ignoring its instinct of self preservation, the curse decided on a last ditch attack. If it was going to die here, it was going to take everyone with it. Afterall, curses aren't born of compassion, they're born of spite, they won't go down without taking anyone with them.

As the curse was slowly being burnt alive by flames no amount of cursed energy could put out, hundreds of tentacles sprouted from its dying body, turning the sphere looking curse into more of an eldritch abomination. 

The tentacles shot towards the trio at great speeds, overwhelming their senses despite their sizable distance. 

"Haaah? You still got more?"

Naoko was the first to react, imbuing her hands with flames and catching the incoming tentacles before they even reached her. With a tight grip on the tentacles and with the cursed spirit too busy attacking to defend itself, Naoko amplified her cursed energy, increasing not only its output, but its heat.

The grin on Naoko's face turned into a cruel smile.

"WHIP THIS!" She yelled in defiance.

The tentacles ignited in a fraction of a second, the fire having already spread through most of their length. 

Naoko further imbued her feet with cursed energy and bounced around the place, jumping around from tentacle to tentacle like a crazed lunatic playing whack a mole. She didn't care, she only wanted to cause as much destruction as possible.

While this was happening, Naoko's flames gradually increased in temperature. She didn't, no, she couldn't notice. Yet, it didn't seem to bother her. Her rampage had consumed all her senses.

However, it was that very rampage that caused her to exceed her limit on what she could handle.

The pain was there, but her brain simply chose to ignore it, instead focusing on the simple task of burning everything that stood in her way.

"HAHAHA! Never have I felt so alive!" She laughed.

She snapped her fingers and moved her hands like a choir director at a concert. All attacks were aimed solely at the tentacles sprouting out of the ground.

"BURN! BURN BURN BURN BURN!" 

The cursed spirit was shrieking in complete agony. It rolled around on its sphere body, trying to put out the fire burning away at its flesh. Tears started pouring out of its countless eyes, though even those evaporated mere seconds later from the sheer heat.

"P…Ple…ase. S-top" It begged. It begged and it begged and it begged for its life. The curse was in so much agony, it forgot why it was even in that situation to begin with. "I- I'm in… innocent. Ple…ase, sa…ve me" 

Naoko was too far to listen to its cries. Even then, the sound of the roaring flames drowned out any sounds coming from the curse.

She continued snapping away at the tentacles reaching out of the ground, not noticing that they were progressively getting thinner and shorter. The veil of tentacles also started fading away along with the curse's life force.

"A…a…a. I- I… I am… sorry." The curse softly muttered with its dying breath. Its words never to be heard by another living soul. Maybe its penance would be heard, maybe its sins would be forgiven and washed away. But not by Naoko.

As the last tentacle faded away, all that was left was a slowly dwindling spherical cursed spirit resting against the cold concrete of the construction site. Though, eventually, all traces of its existence disappeared.

"Huh? You're not getting away that easily." Naoko coldly said as she summoned another spear of flames behind her.

She raised her hand and was about to move it forward when another hand grabbed hers, stopping her movement.

"That's enough." Gojo said, tightly grabbing her arm. "It's gone." 

Naoko froze up. Her flame spear instantly dissipated. She looked around. Seeing Hakari and the student heavily panting with their knees, she frowned. 

'I messed up.' She thought. 'Again.'

Pain tolerance will only carry a person so far. Once they go past that, they only have two choices. The body will either completely shut down as a defense mechanism, or it will ignore any and all pain signals at all costs and continue going. Naoko was part the latter category. She didn't explicitly make the choice, but she knew that if she were to exceed her limit of pain, her body would shut down key parts of her brain, forcing her to go into a tunnel vision frenzy that she herself cannot break out of. By refusing to go into shock, her body effectively runs on fumes as it tries anything to keep Naoko awake.  

Fortunately, no matter how many times Naoko experimented with this state, there was never any sign of long term brain damage. So she is not a threat to herself as much as she is a threat to those around her.

"You remind me of when I was your age." Gojo said, breaking Naoko out of her trance. 

"Let go of me." Naoko said, pulling her arm away. 

"Hmm, you should join the school. Otherwise, that talent of yours will rot away." 

Naoko didn't respond, instead, she looked at where the cursed spirit used to be.

'Dammit.'