["The Ten Shadows Technique..."]

[Toji Fushiguro. The man born without a single drop of Cursed Energy, branded by the entire clan as something lower than an animal, who had taken that monstrous body of his and used it to grind the Zenin Clan’s vaunted jujutsu legacy and its sacred hierarchy of power into the dirt through sheer, unreasonable violence.]

[Proud as Ogi was, beneath that face lived a fear he would sooner die than admit.]

[Even now, straining with everything he had to hold himself together, the fingers wrapped around his sword hilt twitched in fine, involuntary spasms.]

[His body remembered. The muscles and bones that Toji had once crushed casually.]

[This is a joke. This is a joke!]

[Ogi screamed inside his own head. His features contorted into something barely human.]

[He could not accept this grotesque reality. That man, who had abandoned the Zenin Clan, had somehow produced a child who perfectly inherited the clan’s supreme bloodline and awakened the Ten Shadows Technique.]

[And what about himself? In Ogi’s rigid, extremist worldview, the Projection Sorcery that clan head Naobito prized so highly was nothing more than a modern mutation, laughably shallow in lineage, hardly worth debating whether it qualified as a true orthodox Cursed Technique at all.]

[The Zenin Clan’s genuine orthodoxy, its absolute pinnacle, was the Ten Shadows Technique and nothing else. Ogi had spent his entire life blaming his failure to become clan head on those two worthless daughters of his, Maki and Mai, with their pathetic, negligible Cursed Energy.]

[And now? Even Toji, that Cursed Energy-less bastard, had produced an heir a thousand times superior to those two wastes of space.]

[His head snapped up. Madness filled his eyes.]

[His decision was made.]

[He would not obey Naobito’s order. He would erase this variable that should never have existed, here, tonight. As far as Ogi Zenin was concerned, he had never heard any such command.]

[In that same second, beneath the black sky.]

[The piercing, mournful cry of a blade leaving its scabbard split the courtyard’s silence.]

[The squad member who had been reporting to him, completely unguarded, didn’t even have time to blink.]

[Squelch.]

[His neck parted beneath a stroke so fast it seemed instantaneou.]

[On the head that hadn’t yet fully separated from the body, the eyes bulged wide, registering nothing of what had happened. The mouth, flooding with warm liquid, managed only a ghastly, bubbling rasp.]

["Lord... Ogi...?"]

[BOOM.]

[The katana in Ogi’s grip ignited. His Innate Technique, Blazing Courage, erupted in an instant, converting Cursed Energy into roaring, white-hot flame along the blade’s edge.]

[In the glow of those flames, Ogi looked like something that had crawled out of hell.]

[He stepped over the headless body as it crumpled, letting the blood pool and spread across the floorboards, and muttered in a voice gone hoarse and unhinged.]

["It’s fine... this time, I’ll handle it myself. I will burn your bloodline, down to the marrow, until nothing remains but ash."]

[Meanwhile, across the sprawling maze of the Zenin compound.]

[Megumi lay flat on Divine Dog: Totality’s back as the massive black hound bounded across rooftops and high walls, a bolt of dark lightning threading through the night, meeting almost no resistance.]

[The entire estate had been locked down at maximum alert. Countless guards carrying lanterns and weapons swarmed the courtyards below, shouting and scrambling. But the number of people who could actually match Totality’s explosive speed was vanishingly small.]

[Ordinary squad members, non-sorcerers without Cursed Techniques, weren’t worth mentioning.]

[Even among the Hei, the clan’s elite combat unit of Jujutsu Sorcerers, only a handful could reinforce their bodies with enough Cursed Energy to keep pace. And Naobito’s strict prohibition against harming a single hair on the boy’s head, had hobbled these killers into timidity. None dared intercept at full strength.]

[Against pursuers fighting with tied hands, what chance did they have of stopping a Shikigami with Special Grade destructive power?]

[A single push-off from Totality’s hind legs mid-leap, or one unadorned sweep of its tail, one swipe of a claw, and the sorcerers who ventured too close were sent tumbling through the air, coughing blood, instantly out of the chase.]

[Jinichi Zenin, coordinating the pursuit, recognized the fatal flaw quickly. Watching his subordinates fall one after another, he made an immediate decision and transmitted new orders via Cursed Energy to every member involved in the blockade: Naobito’s laughable "not a single hair" restriction was downgraded to "no lethal injuries."]

[He understood that against a Shikigami of this caliber, denying his people even the right to counterattack or restrict its movement made the task of keeping the boy here functionally impossible.]

[None of these tactical adjustments mattered to Megumi, clinging to the dog’s back.]

[Because even in this seemingly desperate breakout, it wasn’t a child under ten directing Totality’s movements.]

[All he did was grip fistfuls of black fur and hold on so the wind wouldn’t throw him off.]

[The one in control was Totality itself.]

[The great hound was executing, with surgical precision, the escape plan and optimal route that Touma Hayase had drilled into it over years of simulated training, long before this night ever came.]

[As for handling the Zenin sorcerers’ attempts at interception and combat, that was even less of a concern. A walk in the park.]

[From the beast’s perspective, the so-called elites on its tail exerted less pressure than a fraction of what it faced during daily sparring sessions with its master’s teacher, that man who also wielded the Ten Shadows Technique and whose methods were nothing short of brutal.]

[Megumi was starting to believe they’d punch straight through the outer wall when it happened.]

[Totality loosed a deep, hostile growl and dug all four sets of claws into the roof tiles beneath it, grinding to a halt so hard that shattered ceramic screamed into the night air.]

[Not far ahead, blocking the only way forward, two figures stood atop the curved eaves of the main building. The Cursed Energy pouring off them hit like a physical wall. Two mountains. Impassable.]

[On the left, a man built like a fortress, wearing nothing over his upper body but a thin haori, every visible inch of chest and arm carved with muscle. A massive, vicious scar ran horizontally across his forehead. Jinichi Zenin.]

[Beside him, a man with katana in both hands. The blade blazed with Cursed Energy that looked ready to set the sky itself on fire. Ogi Zenin.]

[Even a child could feel it. The full-power output of two Grade 1 Jujutsu Sorcerers pressing down.]

[Megumi didn’t panic. He pressed himself lower against Totality’s back, reached out with a small hand, and patted the thick neck. His voice came out steady and calm against the wind.]

["It’s them. The ones Hayase told me about."]

["Grrrr..."]

[A low rumble rolled from deep in Totality’s throat. Those bloodthirsty eyes locked onto the two figures ahead as its hind legs coiled tight as springs. It knew exactly what came next.]

[Across the gap, Jinichi was packing Cursed Energy into both fists, preparing to use his Cursed Technique to cut off the beast’s escape routes, while privately marveling.]

[Who’d have thought... Toji’s kid, this young, commanding a Shikigami this powerful.]

[He’d assumed the man standing near him shared the same objective: cripple the Shikigami, recover the boy safely.]

[But when Jinichi caught the Cursed Energy blazing off Ogi in his peripheral vision, the killing intent so dense it was almost visible, something jarred loose in his gut. This wasn’t right.]

[That level of output... is Ogi planning to burn the kid to ash along with it?]

[No time to think. The clash erupted.]

[BOOM BOOM BOOM.]

[Jinichi drove both fists forward. His Innate Technique activated, and dozens of massive spectral fists condensed from Cursed Energy materialized across the sky, raining down onto every possible landing point ahead of Totality.]

[And in that lethal instant, the split second Totality committed to a lateral leap...]

["DIE!"]

[Ogi’s shriek tore from his throat, raw and unhinged. The katana in his hand, barely over a meter long, erupted under the full extremity of Blazing Courage. Cursed flames surged and stretched, reshaping the blade into a colossal scythe of fire over forty meters long.]

[The temperature and killing intent behind it left no room for interpretation. Ogi meant to bisect the Shikigami and the child clinging to its back together in a single stroke, reducing both to ashes.]

[Jinichi’s eyes blew wide, pupils shrinking to pinpoints.]

["Ogi! Have you lost your mind?!"]

[He hadn’t believed a fellow clan elder would openly defy Naobito’s direct order and attempt to murder Megumi Fushiguro right in front of him.]

[In that instant, a complicated wave of hesitation flashed through Jinichi’s muscle-packed frame.]

[He wasn’t sure what to do.]

[On principle, Naobito had never issued a kill order. By blood, this was the only living child of his own brother Toji. From the coldest, most pragmatic angle, a boy who’d awakened the Ten Shadows Technique carried an overwhelming probability of restoring the Zenin Clan to the summit of the Big Three Sorcerer Families. From every conceivable direction, this child should not die here. Was he supposed to block Ogi’s attack himself?]

[He didn’t have to choose.]

[Facing that sweeping inferno, Totality didn’t hesitate a bit.]

[Just before the blade could touch fur, it contracted its massive frame in midair.]

[Beneath Megumi’s feet, the black shadow clinging to the roof tiles dilated into a swamp.]

[Whoosh.]

[One large shape and one small, defying every law of physics, melted seamlessly into that bottomless darkness and vanished.]

[FWOOSH.]

[The forty-meter blade of flame cut through empty air. Its heat warped the atmosphere in its wake and cleaved a watchtower clean in half.]

[Jinichi exhaled long and hard, the tension draining from his shoulders. His back was drenched in cold sweat.]

[The instant after the strike missed, a dense glob of shadow, erupted from Ogi’s blind spot on the right, hurtling straight at his face.]

["Parlor tricks!"]

[Ogi snarled and flipped his wrist. The flame-blade whipped around in a vicious backhand slash, shearing the incoming mass of shadow clean in two.]

[But the bisected shadow didn’t scream. It dissolved into a viscous black liquid of Cursed Energy and splattered back down into the shadow swamp below.]

[A decoy.]

[And in the lethal instant that the slash left Ogi’s chest wide open...]

[AWOOOOO!]

[A shape far larger, far more savage than the one before, ripped free from the shadow directly in front of Ogi like a demon unchained, moving at a speed the naked eye couldn’t track.]

[Ogi’s eyes went wide with horror. Through the drifting sparks and haze of Residual Cursed Energy, he stared at the beast now inches from his face. In Totality’s gaping maw, clamped between rows of fangs, gleamed a broad-bladed weapon radiating an ancient, otherworldly aura. The Special Grade cursed tool, the Split Soul Katana.]

[A weapon that bypassed all physical defense to cut the soul directly.]

[CLANG-CRACK!]

[A sound like shattering metal rang across the night sky. Totality, still carrying the momentum of its emergence from the shadows, wrenched its head in a savage arc.]

[The Split Soul Katana’s edge met Ogi’s flame blade and sheared it in two. The severed half spun away into the darkness.] 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

[In the same motion, Totality’s massive body bore down.]

[Squelch.]

[Cold steel flashed. A wet, heavy sound of blade parting flesh.]

[A terrible wound split open across Ogi’s chest, running from left shoulder to right hip, deep enough to show bone.]

[Blood sprayed in torrents, soaking through the haori that marked his rank as a clan elder.]

[Ogi reeled as though struck by lightning, his tall frame staggering backward. But in that instant, in the split second as beast and man crossed paths...]

[Through Totality’s streaming black mane, Ogi’s bloodshot eyes caught a clear, unobstructed look at the small figure sheltered on the Shikigami’s back.]

[Megumi Fushiguro, the architect of every last piece of chaos this night had produced, was curled tight against Totality’s neck, face buried deep in the fur to shield himself from the aftershocks and the debris.]

[He hadn’t raised his head once.]

[He hadn’t spared this elder, this Special Grade 1 Jujutsu Sorcerer Ogi Zenin, so much as a single glance from start to finish.]

[That image drove into Ogi’s chest like a blade ten thousand times sharper than the Split Soul Katana, punching straight through his pride. Capillaries in the corners of his eyes burst from the pressure of his rage.]

[He had spent his entire life suffocating under Toji’s shadow, a man with no Cursed Energy who had still defeated him as easily as crushing a worm. That humiliation had been unbearable enough to make him wish for death.]

[And now he’d been disarmed and carved open in a head-on clash by a child still losing baby teeth. But what shattered him completely wasn’t the wound.]

[It was that the boy hadn’t bothered to look at him.]

["AAAAAAAHHHHH!"]

[Fury and jealousy, twisted together, clawed Ogi’s sanity to ribbons. The agony of the wound gaping across his chest ceased to register entirely.]

["You filthy-blooded waste! How long... how long are you going to keep humiliating me?!"]

[The only response was the violent wind left behind as they moved.]

[At that same moment, Totality released another burst of Cursed Energy. Its huge body grew even bigger.]

[Then, with a tearing sound, two massive wings burst from its back. They crackled with lightning. The wings were made from the power of another Shikigami, Nue, and spread open wide.]

[The wind screamed. Thunder flashed.]

[With one powerful flap, the monstrous beast shot into the sky.]

[Jinichi Zenin could only stare in shock. Around him, countless Zenin guards looked up in despair as Megumi Fushiguro rode the winged black hound into the night sky, leaving the decaying Zenin estate and everything it represented behind forever.]