Chapter 7 - A Malevolent Shrine (Part 1)

"Speech"

'Thoughts'

[Narration]

…

(A/N: Gonna drop a chapter a day till you guys catch up to the main scuffles of this arc.)

(Third POV:)

(Flashback Start:)

In the forest late at night, Sloth stood with a dumbfounded expression on his face. "Akira, why is everyone here?"

"I told them that you found a Sukuna finger and that you were going to try and fight the bearer." Akira had everyone behind him.

"Uhhhh." Sloth grabbed the sides of his face and groaned. "You realize I said to only bring Ghost with you, right?"

Akira shrugged his shoulders. "I thought, 'Why not bring everyone to grade up?' and so I brought everyone."

(End of Flashback.)

Currently, the group was running to the shrine, with Sloth having only five manta ray curses. This left Akira and Omni on the ground due to not wanting to share a seat.

Akira, who was in front of Omni by a good fifteen meters, suddenly stopped. The forest was dark due to the trees blocking the moonlight.

Even through that, Akira saw it clearly. Turning to his left and walking forward a few feet, Akira kneeled down.

A purple curse. A worm-like curse began to crawl toward him. Its eyes seemed to be perpetually closed, while its face had baby-like, chubby cheeks.

The curse had made its way over to Akira, and while only a foot away, it turned its head to look up at him.

"P..a..p..a." The curse spoke in a barely audible voice, but due to Akira's hearing being so good, he heard it.

Omni sped past Akira with a look of confusion before his eyes widened due to seeing the curse. A smile grew over his face as he faced forward again and kept sprinting.

Akira let the curse touch him, and as he did so, the curse began crawling up his arm. Eventually, the curse found itself wrapping around his torso and resting its head on his shoulder.

A smile grew on Akira's face as he held his right hand to the curse's face.

*Bleehh*

The curse began regurgitating something as a hilt was spewed from its mouth. The smile Akira had grew even wider as he pulled the hilt out of the curse's mouth.

The short weapon was a dagger with a jitter-shaped blade. Flicking his hand to the right fast, Akira got rid of the saliva on it.

"To think you would have a weapon as great as this." Akira began petting the head of the curse with his left hand. "What a great gift."

The curse showed a visible reaction with its mouth, which was in an ever-present smile, growing even wider.

Seeing as he was far behind the others, Akira rushed forward at his top speed. The wind resistance was high at this speed, but he had a feeling the curse would be able to adapt to it.

...

In front of Akira were a large number of steps. Seeing as Sloth and the others flew to the top, Akira began quickly jumping up the steps.

Omni was behind him, but by the time Akira got to the top step, he saw Omni smiling at the top step while looking straight at Akira with a victorious face.

"Fucking teleporting cheater," Akira said as he walked past Omni.

Omni began walking behind Akira with a pep in his step. "Don't hate the player; hate the game that gave him that skillset!" Omni's smile grew even wider as he saw how Akira began walking faster.

"Akira, Omni, come here!" Sloth, who was in front of them, waved them over with a shout.

The forest covered the bottom area of the shrine, near the steps. Upon ascending the worn stone steps, you would be greeted with an almost barren area.

No trees were on the hill the shrine was built on. It had two buildings. The first building Sloth waved them over to, while the second bigger building was farther down the path.

"What is it?"

"Did you find something cool?"

Both Akira and Omni stood on either side of Sloth, while the others were looking at the secondary building.

The first building was barely holding together, being more of a dilapidated open library with poorly maintained books left on the floor.

"It's what is in this that you need to hear," Sloth said as he turned the first and only page that didn't have any cover and only had two pieces of old paper held together.

"During the age of the gods, there were twelve kings. Each king holds immense power, with the main kings being the second and first kings.

The second king was given the alias 'The control demon.' While the first king was given the title 'Dragon King Apallon.' These kings had the most power and the biggest countries at the time. However, they served under one being.

This being had single-handedly created the age of the gods and put an end to old humanity's reign.

The God of Curses, Azaogdesz Sukuna.

In his life, they named him a devil, a malevolent angel, and even a God. Upon his death, the negativity that had been built due to his rampage and destruction across the world cascaded.

Birthing a curse never seen before. As a devil, they say he had many eyes, four arms, black hair, and black horns on his head.

As a malevolent angel, they said he had angelic white hair, four eyes, two arms, and twelve wings; however, one of those wings, the one on the top right, had become almost obsidian-pitch black. With that wing being the one he would pull out in combat.

No one has ever seen what he looked like as a God and kept sane, but those who viewed him say he was the most beautiful thing in the world.

In their words, he was a 'darkness that surrounded crawling chaos.' No one has been able to understand what they meant."

Sloth stopped reading as the page was scribbled over with insane drawings and even something black with multiple eyes taking up over half of the page.

"What do you think of this, Akira, Omni?" Sloth turned to both Akira and Omni as he put the pages in his inventory.

"This version of Sukuna may be super strong!" Omni had a devious smile as he spoke and began rubbing his hands together.

"Stop doing that." Akira looked at Omni with a disappointed look. "This version of Sukuna is strong, which is why we can't allow his revival. If the fingers are in there, I suggest none of us even think of eating them."

Sloth nodded his head as he heard Akira. "You guys should let me capture the Finger Bearer so that Sukuna can never be revived." Both Omni and Akira frowned at this prospect.

"Nah, I was thinking we get all the Sukuna fingers, throw them in an ender chest, and then destroy the ender chest, right, Akira?" Omni began stroking his chin at his mastermind-level planning.

"That sounds good. No one will ever get the fingers then, and Sukuna will never revive, right, Sloth?" Akira nodded his head as he spoke and eventually looked at Sloth.

"Well, I guess that's good too," Sloth said as Akira and Omni began walking to the secondary shrine building with a satisfied smile on both their faces.

What they didn't see was Sloth, who squinted his eyes and grew a very distasteful frown. 'I'll be getting those fingers even if I have to make you the enemies of the rest of the group.' Sloth thought as he stared at the backs of both Akira and Omni.

"Are you coming, Sloth?" Omni had turned around and waved Sloth over as he spoke. Sloth, who was scheming, became startled as he then began running toward Omni and Akira.

The shrine's secondary building was an old, abandoned Japanese one. It had a sliding door that was closed and had wooden flooring just outside the front door.

The building looked old and abandoned from the outside, but would change once inside.

Sloth, who ran up to the door, slapped the hands of Mahitoasm as he was about to enter.

"What was that for?"

"Were you trying to die?"

"No, I was just going to enter."

"*Sigh*. Let me explain it to everyone then."

Sloth turned to the rest of the group and pushed Mahitoasm back as he stood in front of the door.

"This is a cursed womb. We can imagine that the Finger Bearer may have already been born, so expect danger. The version of Sukuna we are dealing with isn't the one we know of, and because of that, you should expect an increase in danger level.

When we enter this building, expect the inside to be impossibly different compared to the outside due to the cursed womb having laid a 'domain.'

We don't know what's inside, and the Finger Bearer could be even stronger than it was shown to be originally in Jujutsu Kaisen.

Be cautious. Have I made it clear?" As Sloth finished speaking, he got a nod of the head from everyone. "Good," Sloth said before turning around and opening the door, stepping through the door of the shrine.

Akira was following right behind him and walked in second. Omni was next as he turned around, made a silly face to the others, and then made a peace sign as he disappeared through the door.

"No fair!" Sceptix said as he and Ghost ran through at the same time.

"Hopefully I get to use my new ability!" Cursed said as he walked to the door with Shizu behind him.

"This is definitely going to go badly," Shizu said as she pushed Cursed forward and walked through the door. Cursed tripped through the doorway.

"They're definitely going to die, huh." Smokes said to Souei, who smiled.

"Who are you betting on dying first? I call dibs on Sceptix." Souei turned to Smokes with a smug face.

"Damn, I was going to bet on him. I guess let me go with Ghost, as I haven't seen Shizu fight yet." Smokes said as he walked forward through the door, with Souei following him.

Now inside the shrine, the group looked around. The floor looked as if it were held in the air, seeming to be stopping anyone from falling, with yellow metal railings on either side of the room.

There were copper pipes on the ceiling and sides of the room. With everyone walking forward toward a door, upon opening it, they were greeted with another room.

This room had four doors, all of which were in front of them. The copper pipes in the ceiling and sides of the room made noise and the metal floor looked as if it were brand new.

It was weirdly dark, but due to negligence or just knowing that some of the group had good enough senses to see in the dark, nobody was riled up.

"I call dibs on the right door. Akira, come with me." Sloth said as Akira nodded, and they immediately opened and ran through the door on the right.

"I call the door on the left, Sceptix; you're with me." Ghost said as he opened the door on the left and entered, with Sceptix rushing behind him.

Shizu went invisible and then entered the left middle door.

"Alright, Cursed, let's go kill some bitches and get us some paper," Soeui said as he grabbed the door that Shizu went in before it closed and walked into it. Cursed followed him with a smile on his face.

"Well, I guess it's you and me, Smokes."

"Yeah, they left me alone. I mean, it could be worse; I could be left alone with Sceptix." Smokes said as both he and Omni walked through the middle door on the right.

"Damn..." Mahitoasm stood there, staring at his hands. "They really forgot about me." With his head hung low and without a choice, he went through the door he saw Shizu, Souei, and Cursed walk through.