Deadly Altercation

"Long time no see, Satoru."

-

Gojo stood there, frozen.

"Suguru…" he whispered. "We buried you. What happened? How are you alive?"

Kenjaku stood in silence, smiling at Gojo.

"Suguru, is it really you?" Gojo's voice was louder now, with hints of hope and desperation in it.

Kenjaku, instead of answering, turned towards Ryoma.

"You must have realised why I healed and took over this body, am I right, Ryoma Kurogane?" he said, ignoring Gojo. "Hand over Cursed Spirit Manipulation, and instead of dying, you will undertake a binding vow signifying that you will do whatever I say."

"Hey! Who are you?" Gojo demanded, with authority in his voice. "What have you done with Suguru's body?"

Kenjaku turned towards Gojo with a serious expression.

"Can you, like, wait a second? We're busy here, I'll deal with you later, 'kay?"

Gojo, hearing Kenjaku's words, clenched his fists.

"I won't let you defile his memory any longer," he growled. "Whoever you are, you'll pay for this!"

He then made a hand sign with the two of his fingers. Everyone present understood the meaning of that.

"*Sigh*, Did you know that you are very problematic, Gojo Satoru? I guess I'll deal with you first, then. Ryoma Kurogane, wait for me here. Don't think of running, I'll find you." said Kenjaku.

Just as Kenjaku said those words, Ryoma and Kuroshin felt something pull them away towards a nearby tree, making them crash into it, effectively removing them from the battle area.

Kenjaku, in the body of Geto Suguru, also made a complicated hand sign.

Both activated their domains at the same time:

"[Domain Expansion: Unlimited Void]."

"[Domain Expansion: Womb Profusion]."

As the two domains clashed, Ryoma and Kuroshin were left standing before each other.

"You took my lifespan, but you didn't take my strength, cursed spirit! While we both can't use cursed techniques, I will make you mine!" screamed Ryoma, his grey hair fluttering in the air.

As soon as he finished talking, Ryoma picked up Playful Cloud from the ground and dashed towards Kuroshin.

Kuroshin, while confused from everything that transpired before him a few seconds ago, saw Ryoma and quickly focused on him.

Even though Ryoma didn't have the vitality and endurance from the lifespan that he stole, and even though he looked like he was seventy years old, he still had his incredible strength and thus heavily outclassed Kuroshin in terms of physical might.

Thus, when they both reached each other, the one who got pierced by a spear was Kuroshin.

Ryoma made many piercing motions with Playful Cloud in a single second, effectively knocking the cursed spirit down. While fighting Kuroshin before, he had been extremely vigilant and didn't do anything risky because of his technique, but now, because of the burnout from the domain, he could not worry about getting touched by Kuroshin.

"You were so unlucky, cursed spirit! You should have won, but you lost! Haha, truly unlucky!" screamed Ryoma with a mad glint in his eyes, while slashing and stabbing Kuroshin repeatedly with Playful Cloud. Purple blood flew everywhere.

Kuroshin couldn't react at all, and after a half a minute he was a step away from being exorcised.

Ryoma leaned in towards Kuroshin and beheaded him with a swift motion of Playful Cloud.

He threw the head of the cursed spirit nearby, and sat next to it.

"I'll wait a little longer, and you will be mine, Kuroshin!" exclaimed Ryoma, who then stood up.

"You still have cursed energy, don't die yet, I'll use you well!"

Ryoma walked towards the still-clashing domains, and halted only when he arrived right next to the barrier.

After some time had passed, the two clashing domains shattered.

Kenjaku stood before a collapsed Gojo Satoru.

"You're lucky that your death won't change anything, Gojo Satoru. Your domain, which is clearly new, is so refined that it nearly defeated mine in a clash. What a monster you are." thought Kenjaku as the domains shattered.

Ryoma didn't waste a single second. He had already imbued his body with cursed energy to the max before the domains shattered. He dashed towards Kenjaku with Playful Cloud in his hand.

Knowing about the burnout after a domain expansion, Ryoma knew that regardless of the result of the clash, both of them would be in a vulnerable state. This was a chance gifted to him by heaven itself!

Kenjaku saw Ryoma dash towards him and reacted swiftly, but couldn't avoid Ryoma's hand. Ryoma had already activated his innate technique, thus when he touched Kenjaku, a part of his lifespan was chosen randomly to be transferred to Ryoma.

"What do you think you're doing, Ryoma Kurogane?" asked Kenjaku, annoyance appearing on his now aged face. Geto Suguru's body had aged by approximately twenty years, while Ryoma, who looked like an old man before, had the appearance of a fifty year old man.

"What do you think it is, Kenjaku?"

Without saying any more words, they both charged at each other.

Even though currently Ryoma was stronger than Kenjaku with all things considered, it was still very surprising to see Kenjaku, a sorcerer whose age surpassed two thousand years, lose out to Ryoma.

He barely dodged Ryoma's attempts, and frequently received injuries from Playful Cloud.

"I just need to last until the burnout ends, then it will be easy." thought Kenjaku, who received another cut to the face, making him bleed even more. "But it doesn't seem like I will last much longer against him."

Ryoma, who had already calmed down, finally saw an opening and dashed towards Kenjaku. He pierced his torso with Playful Cloud, making him fall down.

Just as Ryoma was about to deal the finishing blow, a hand pierced Ryoma's stomach, leaving a hole in there.

Turning around, Ryoma saw that Kuroshin, who's head had been removed by him, had reattached it. The hand that he had used to pierce Ryoma's body was red, covered with blood.

"Again... couldn't feel... cursed energy.." thought Ryoma, who fell down towards the ground.

Not even glancing at Ryoma, Kuroshin made his way towards Kenjaku, who had managed to retreat and heal himself a little bit.

Kenjaku looked at Kuroshin and smiled.

"You're barely walking, cursed spirit. Why don't we resolve our conflict some other day? I need to heal the the young man you just impaled with your fist before he bleeds out. He is important to me after all. I would have possesed his body, but I saw that he can't steal cursed techniques from cursed spirits, so the one thing that was left was to make him return the cursed technique to the original owner of the technique, which I'm sure he can do." 

Kuroshin stood before the collapsed Kenjaku.

"You! You have lived for too long! Too long! It is unacceptable, you will perish! You must perish!" exclaimed Kuroshin and pointed his arm towards Kenjaku. "You are a criminal, and today is the day you die!"

"*Sigh* life is not that easy, dear cursed spirit. Do you think that I will let you do that?" said Kenjaku, who had already healed himself and stood up, readying himself for battle.

"Die!" screamed Kuroshin, who charged towards Kenjaku.

As the two of them fought, Ryoma was lying on the ground, using RCT to heal himself. He was barely hanging on, and if he hadn't been studying, analyzing and practising RCT for the past 9-10 years, he would have died already.

After some time had passed he finally could think about something that wasn't about maintaining RCT.

"I didn't feel any cursed energy from him again, just like the time when we first encountered each other. Is that an ability? He shouldn't be able to hide his cursed energy from me that well." thought Ryoma as he spectated the battle between Kenjaku and Kuroshin. Kenjaku had control of the flow of the fight, but the incredible durability of Kuroshin let him tank the blows of Kenjaku.

After some time had passed, the situation was still the same.

"I think I can finally use my cursed techniques. But most importantly, I still have a decisive amount of cursed energy left, unlike them. I think I know what to do. Time for the cursed spirit to find out the effects of my domain." said Ryoma, who still analyzed the situation unfolding before him.

Kenjaku was winning, and he had already noticed that Ryoma was healing himself, so he wasn't in a hurry to end the fight and heal Ryoma.

"You'll regret doing that, old man. He probably thinks that I don't have any cursed energy." thought Ryoma, who had healed himself fully. 

Ryoma stood up, tore off the remains of the upper parts of his tattered black robes, revealing his muscular upper body.

He was already close to the ongoing fight, so the only thing that he did was to say the words and a hand-sign.

"[Domain Expansion: Perpetual Larceny]."

Kenjaku saw this and his expression changed instantly. He didn't expect Ryoma to have a significant amount of cursed energy left, let alone an amount that could support a domain expansion.

But before he could do anything, Kuroshin's large fist landed on his face, sending him flying out of the range of the domain before the barrier formed and closed.

This all happened in a second, so by the time the domain fully manifested, Kenjaku was already out of it's range.

"Eh?" 

Kenjaku had a stupified expression on his face. He sat there on the ground for a few seconds, then started laughing.

"Haha, the irony. The one who tried to kill me the most ended up saving my life."

After laughing about the situation, he got up. He had a lot of thoughs in his head.

"Looks like the Kurogane brat is still a rookie, his barrier manifestation speed was very slow."

"But the fact that he had that much cursed energy remaining withing him, which even allowed him to cast a domain expansion a second time during the same battle, how big are his reserves?"

inside the domain

On a snowy mountaintop surrounded by corpses and a sea of blood, two figures were standing before each other.

Ryoma stared at the face of the cursed spirit, Kuroshin, whose face was hidden by a red oni mask.

Kuroshin, who was in a truly dire situation, didn't move and didn't say anything. The glowing yellow eyes of the oni mask shined brightly as always.

Ryoma stared the cursed spirit down with his bright orange-red eyes.

"Prepare to become my eternal puppet, prepare to become a lifeless husk that obeys my every word, cursed spirit."

...

ch14 end.