The beast's body crumpled with a sickening, visceral crunch—its mass folding in on itself like paper in a sandstorm, contorted against the strange blend of sand and painted meadow.
Subaru blinked.
No scream.
No tension.
Not even a flinch.
There was no pain to register. No impact to brace for. It had just—
happened.
He'd died. Again.
Not with fanfare.
Not with meaning.
As if the world had simply pressed reset before he could process the loss.
And yet—
He stood.
Breathing.
Present.
Returned.
Not to the beginning, thankfully. Closer. A mercy, maybe. Or a joke to whatever divine being is having a kick out of his torment.
"…Huh."
His voice came out thin. Fragile. Lost beneath the air.
Then—
CRACK.
The ground trembled.
Fractures webbed outward beneath his feet like splintering glass. And from the ruptures, they came.
First, one.
Then three.
Then an eruption.
Mabeasts—bear-shaped, grotesque—exploded from beneath the soil. Petals of every color imaginable and gritty sand launched skyward as the horde burst forth in a flood of snarls and red-eyed hunger.
Ten.
Twenty.
Hundreds.
Their growls tore through the still air like thunder chasing lightning.
Subaru flinched back a half-step.
His breath caught.
"…Right," he muttered. "Those things…"
He'd been so wrapped in the haze of return—of not dying again—that he'd forgotten.
Forgotten the onslaught. The horde that had torn him to shreds moments ago.
His legs moved before his mind caught up.
He turned—low—sprinting across the mixed terrain with everything he had.
Don't think.
Don't stop.
The pounding of paws behind him was deafening—wild, uncoordinated, desperate.
But this time…
He was different.
Faster.
His legs surged with cursed energy, each step sharper, more responsive. The terrain no longer tripped him. His footfalls felt sure. Deliberate. Deadly.
He had a head start.
Or at least he thought he did...
"Um—?"
The air darkened.
Moonlight dimmed.
He glanced up.
A beast was airborne—massive, mid-leap—plummeting toward him like a meteor made of teeth and rage.
Instinct screamed.
Subaru dropped low, legs compressing, cursed energy snapping through his thighs.
Then—
BOOM—!!
The mabeast slammed down behind him, sand erupting into a shockwave. It crashed into two others, flipping wildly. A chaotic tangle of fur and limbs through the sand.
Subaru didn't look back.
"Yeah, okay, these things… definitely suicidal."
He was learning. Fast.
This wasn't like the sandworm that had swallowed him whole in an instant. No warning. No resistance. Just death.
But this time—
He had cursed energy.
He had options.
He veered right—toward the dunes, away from the Watchtower's cold, distant silhouette. Not ideal, but better than being dogpiled in open space.
He needed a route.
An exit.
A plan.
His eyes scanned the horizon—until—
"Ghh—!"
One lunged from the side.
He pivoted, dipped, and used its skull as a springboard—planting a foot on its head and launching himself upward.
Wind screamed past his ears.
His landing was rough—a rolling crouch across the sand—but his forward momentum never stopped.
They were everywhere.
Flanking.
Corralling.
Herding him from every direction imaginable.
"Shit—!"
A claw swiped.
Too fast.
Sliced against his reinforcement, not enough to draw blood, but simply jarring. Enough to spin him, stagger his footing as he was launched back.
He gritted his teeth, straightening mid-slide, and tore back into a sprint.
Too many.
Too fast.
Even with cursed reinforcement, he couldn't take all of them—not at once.
Focus.
If he could get above them—just high enough—he might spot a path. A gap. Something. Anything that didn't involve him getting eaten alive by mabeasts.
He crouched, cursed energy flooding into his legs.
Muscles tensed.
Timing—everything.
He bent.
Prepared to leap—
But then—
A flicker made him hesitate.
White.
His eyes caught it at the edge of vision. A glint—sharp and wrong.
His heart clenched.
A memory surfaced.
The flash that occurred just a second before his death.
He dropped the jump instinctively—instead twisting his body backward in a violent, unnatural arch.
SWOOOSH—!!
Air split open.
A white projectile screamed overhead—missing by inches. It kissed his cheek with its power, leaving a gash that oozed crimson down one side of his face.
Then—
impact.
FWWOOOOOM—!!!
The ground behind him detonated.
A column of sand, blood, and pulverized meat blasted skyward.
The nearest mabeasts? Gone. Eviscerated. Their bodies didn't fall. They had no time to.
They were simply removed.
Like they had no right to exist.
Subaru didn't stop to process.
Didn't breathe.
He ran.
Straight into the fresh crater, weaving through the carnage—through the haze of gore and steam. Chunks of meat splattered against his legs. His chest burned, ribs flaring with each ragged breath.
"Fuck, man… You've gotta be—"
White.
A flash—so blinding it didn't even feel real.
Subaru's jaw clenched tight as he threw himself to the side, launching into the air just before the blast reached him. A split-second later, the ground beneath him ceased to exist.
The white projectile struck.
A concussive boom swallowed the desert in raw violence. The sand where he'd stood was gone, vaporized. The shockwave caught Subaru mid-air and flung him further like a ragdoll.
Cursed energy surged through his limbs. He twisted mid-flight, chest toward the distant Watchtower—miles away now, yet still the center of this chaos.
White.
He didn't think. He merely braced, a natural response at this point after everything that's happened.
"—!!"
Subaru threw up his arms in a crossed guard, cursed energy hardening around them like armor.
Impact.
The blast struck.
And the sound—it wasn't just sound anymore. It was pressure. Raw force. It roared louder than his heartbeat in his ears, louder than his thoughts.
And yet—
He was still alive.
For a moment, Subaru believed he'd managed to block it. That somehow, he'd intercepted the overwhelming blast in time.
But then—
"Ah… hkh—!"
Warmth. Then cold. Then a wet gurgle filled his throat.
He stumbled as he landed, feet dragging, sliding through sand.
His vision swam.
Slowly, he looked down.
There was nothing.
His forearms—gone, completely blown off at the elbow. And beneath his chest—
A perfect hole. The size of a basketball. Boring straight through his torso.
"Gurhkk… guhr…"
He fell.
Knees hit first, then his body tipped forward like a falling statue. His cheek hit the sand with a dull thud, eyes dimming, lips still twitching with words he couldn't finish.
I'll get through this…
By myself…
I'll prove to the world that I…
That Natsuki Subaru…
Ain't pathetic…
Then—darkness.
——————————————————————
GASP—!
His body moved before thought caught up. He pivoted hard and burst into a sprint—faster this time, already accelerating before the mabeasts could breach the surface.
And just like before—
They did.
Dozens erupted from the earth, snarling, frothing, claws gleaming in the pale light. But Subaru was already gone. The distance widened.
"God, I get it—I reek of miasma, but it's literally everywhere! This is rigged!"
He clenched his jaw and kept running.
His thoughts churned, desperate to stitch together anything resembling a plan.
"Okay, okay—someone's sniping me with white-hot death beams from the Watchtower, miles off. And the only reason I'm not paste already is dumb-uck. So…"
He flinched—remembering his shredded arms, the gaping hole in his chest.
"…Yeah. Not even gonna try blocking that again."
A stone ridge jutted out in the distance—jagged, uneven, tall enough for cover. Subaru veered toward it, sliding behind with a grunt. Sand scraped his back as he hit the ground, letting out a breath.
Maybe a minute. That's all he had. Maybe.
He pressed his fingers to his temples, forcing focus.
"What else can I even do...? Up close, whatever that white projectile is, is literally unavoidable, even at range I have to get lucky. This is goddamn impossible…"
A groan slipped out as he clutched his head.
Then—his eyes sharpened.
"Well then—experiment time."
He vaulted to his feet, cursed energy crackling like electricity down his spine. He turned and took off—sprinting wide, away from the cover and straight toward the pack.
"I can return by—!"
Miasma swirled.
The air answered.
It fed him.
He felt it—an unstable surge. Brief. Volatile. Addictive.
His body could hold together maybe four times. Any more, and it'd rip him apart from the inside.
"I can return by—!"
He said it again. Every time was a dice roll. Every time, a hair-trigger from oblivion.
Cursed energy exploded around him—a storm of seething violet. The ground cracked beneath his heels.
Every mabeast turned toward him in unison. Dozens of eyes. Bloodshot. Starving.
"I can return by—!"
The words stuck.
Perfect.
That meant someone was listening.
This at least told him that whatever's been shooting at him is at least sentient enough to comprehend words, and has absurd senses.
White.
Again, it came.
Subaru threw his hand forward to intercept—
FWOOSH—!!
"URGHH—!"
The force struck him like a battering ram. His cursed armor absorbed most of it—but the rest wrecked his insides. Bones splintered. Muscle tore. But he stayed upright.
He looked to his hand—smoking, blackened, fingers burned nearly to the bone.
But he'd blocked it.
Staggering back, he blinked as the energy faded—and something glinted in the dust.
A single, silver-thin needle.
He stared.
"…A needle? That's what carved a hole clean through me?"
Absurd. But not all that surprising.
He'd seen Gojo crush stone with a finger flick.
This was just the same brand of god-tier precision.
And whoever was pulling the trigger—
They still had him locked.
The mabeasts surged again. Dozens. Rabid. Relentless.
But as they closed—
FWOOM—!!
Another white shot carved through the horde, vaporizing everything in a curtain of red mist.
Subaru dropped low, diving through the bloody cloud and crawling back to cover.
His breath came in sharp bursts. Cursed energy spat and flared across his battered arms.
His hand—charred nearly through.
But he grit his teeth.
"Whew… fuck… okay. Now what?"
His gaze swept across the desert.
Nothing—nothing—then—
A shimmer.
A subtle ripple in space—like heat against stone. Wavering. Faint. But real.
"…Could that be where I came from?"
He rose, cautious.
"It's gotta be something. Maybe it'll pull me out. Even if it just resets me way back to the start… beats taking another shot to the gut or having my head popped like a melon!"
Then—
THUD-!
THUD-!
THUD-!
The beasts finally arrived to where he was hiding.
No more time.
Cursed energy flared—wild and unstable. Purple lightning spiderwebbed around his body. Subaru bent low, his legs coiled tight underneath him.
Then—
BOOM—!
He launched.
The rock formation behind him exploded from the recoil.
In a flash, he cleared a hundred meters, hurling toward the ripple.
Even Subaru blinked at the speed.
"Urghk—?!"
The ripple infront of him warped wide.
Space twisted, bent—
Then fractured.
Subaru didn't pass through.
He fell.
Reality shattered like brittle glass.
The stars spiraled.
The sky folded inward.
Then—
Nothing.
No light.
No sound.
No sensation.
Only a voice.
Distant. Familiar.
A whisper—
Before the darkness swallowed him whole.
——————————————————————
"...et… up…"
A voice. Faint—muffled, as though submerged beneath water and wind.
"Hey, get up—wanna forehead flick?"
Subaru jolted upright like a spring-loaded trap, breath catching in his throat, eyes wide and glassy with panic.
His forehead stopped inches from colliding with a poised, bandaged face—held in place by a shimmering film of empty space.
Infinity.
Had it not been active, he would've slammed straight into Gojo's head.
"...Gojo?"
Subaru rasped, blinking through the fog clouding his vision.
He staggered upright, joints stiff, and finally took stock of his surroundings—or rather, the lack thereof.
Darkness.
Endless, formless, smothering black in every direction. No horizon. No texture. Not even stars.
A void that swallowed the concept of place.
Subaru's shoulders rose and fell with each unsteady breath as he tried to ground himself in the only familiar presence nearby.
Gojo Satoru. White hair glowing faintly against the black. Bandages remained, draped over his eyes. Still tall. Still cocky. Still him.
"The one and only."
Gojo replied casually, as if they were chatting over lunch and not in an interdimensional abyss. He scratched the back of his head and glanced around, squinting like the dark offended him.
"Though… not gonna lie, I'm a little confused how I ended up here with you considering I was just in a sandstorm. But hey, weird days happen."
He straightened up with a relaxed stretch, peering into the shadows like they might part if he stared hard enough.
"Spooky place though. So, what exactly are you doing here, Subaru?"
Subaru didn't respond. Not immediately.
Instead, he rose with deliberate slowness, brushing sand from his shirt—His breath was shallow. His eyes distant. The kind of silence that wasn't just exhaustion—but calculation.
"Doesn't matter.." he murmured.
Gojo arched a brow. His smile slipped, just a bit.
"So Emilia was telling the truth, eh?" he said, voice dipping lower. "You've been off lately. More than usual."
There was no accusation in his tone. Just a quiet observation layered with something uncharacteristically soft.
Concern.
"Y'know… even if I'm your teacher, I'm still your friend, idiot." Gojo added, grin returning—though tempered. "So, I'm gonna help get us out of… wherever the hell this emo liminal nightmare is."
Subaru looked at him with a strange expression. For the briefest second, something flickered behind his eyes before he shook it off and asked what was one of the first things on Subaru's mind.
"Can't you just teleport us?" he asked flatly.
Gojo snorted. "Teleportation?" He crossed his arms, the gesture exaggerated. "It's more like manipulating the space-time continuum at the molecular level through the Limitless, but yeah, same ballpark I guess."
He waved the thought away like it bored him.
"Anyway, two problems. One—I need a spatial anchor. A location to aim for. And that's usually not an issue considering my brain power, but…" He turned in a slow circle. "I got nothing. No landmarks, no coordinates, nada."
"And two?"
Gojo tilted his head, the bandages shifting slightly over his face.
"I need a mental lock on where I'm going. A concept. A thread to pull me through the spacial mess."
His words echoed oddly in the void—like sound traveled slower here.
"But right now?" Gojo shrugged. "Feels like someone took that thread, then took some scissors and snipped it halfway."
Subaru's lips thinned. He looked down at his hands—shaking faintly. Fingers twitching with energy that still hadn't quite settled since the last return.
"So in a less fancy, sciency way... we're stuck." He said, deadpanning.
They walked, in total silence.
And walked...
"Soooo.." Gojo said after a long stretch of silence, voice light. "How's my favorite student been since that mess at the mansion?"
The question lingered like smoke. Subaru didn't answer at first.
Instead, he just walked. Mechanical. Measured. Tension anchored in his shoulders like he carried weight no one else could see.
What do you think...? I've lost everything. My power. My reason. My pride.
"...Fine."
The lie was smooth. Practiced. Automatic.
Gojo didn't buy it.
"Ah. Well—hm?"
He stopped mid-sentence, head snapping forward. His body tensed. One hand lifted to halt Subaru beside him.
He sniffed the air, nostrils twitching faintly.
Then his voice dropped.
"...Either someone's having one hell of a barbecue… or that's the smell of burning flesh."
"Burning…?" Subaru muttered, brow furrowed.
Gojo crouched slightly and squinted at the space ahead. There, the path split—a fork in the road.
To the left, the smoke grew stronger. Acrid. Charred.
To the right, an invisible pressure crushed against their lungs—malice, almost physical in its presence.
Neither path promised salvation.
Gojo's grin returned like a reflex.
"Welp. Left it is!"
He declared, already stepping toward the stench.
Subaru's hand snapped out and caught his sleeve.
"Hell no.."
Gojo turned, puzzled.
"If we're trying to get out of here.." Subaru growled, "why would we walk toward the burning corpse pile?"
Gojo frowned. Then sighed with melodramatic resignation.
"Mmm… you do have a point… urghhh, fine.."
He spun on a heel like a sulking child, circling around and beginning down the right path instead.
——————————————————————
They walked.
And walked.
With every step forward, the pressure in the air thickened, turning viscous and foul. The wrongness didn't just exist around them; it grew teeth, gnawing at the edges of their sanity.
Even Gojo felt it now. His grin had dulled hours ago, replaced by a brow furrowed with creeping, unnatural fatigue.
"This… sensation…" Gojo muttered, rubbing his chest. "It's like wading through tar. It's dragging me back. Weighing me down…"
He exhaled through his nose, the sound sharp and irritated. The air tasted like copper and old blood.
"It's sapping my energy for no reason," he whispered, his voice tight. "Bypassing the Infinity. Getting right into my head."
Subaru didn't respond.
He clicked his tongue once, keeping his eyes locked forward. The tension in his jaw was so tight his molars throbbed in rhythm with his heartbeat. To him, Gojo's voice didn't sound like a complaint; it sounded like a taunt. A buzzing insect he couldn't swat away.
"Maybe we should pick up the pace… 'cause this is just annoying," Gojo mused aloud, half to himself.
The words grated against Subaru's nerves like sandpaper. The shadows in the corners of his vision seemed to warp, whispering that Gojo was mocking him. Laughing at him.
"Hey. Gojo."
"Hm?"
"Can you just… shut up? I need to think."
That stopped Gojo mid-step. He turned slightly, one white brow raised in confusion that quickly curdled into hostility. The miasma flared around them, unseen but heavy, urging him to take offense.
"…What?"
Subaru didn't blink. His voice dropped to a low growl, vibrating with a hatred that felt foreign, yet terrifyingly easy to embrace.
"I said shut up. You're the reason I'm in this hell in the first place. You showed up and made everything worse."
Gojo's expression went flat. The playful veneer cracked.
"Really?" he snapped, the sound echoing too loudly in the dead air. "I showed up because you bolted without a damn word before I'd even woken up. Forgive me for trying to stop my student from running off like an idiot."
Subaru didn't look at him. His fists clenched tighter at his sides, nails digging into palms until skin broke.
"Maybe I didn't want your help."
"Yeah. No kidding," Gojo scoffed, a cruel sound. "Because going solo alwaaaaays ends great for you, doesn't it?"
That one cut deep. It was a precise strike at Subaru's deepest insecurity, amplified by the toxic air filling his lungs.
Subaru's hands shook.
"I didn't explain because I wanted to succeed by myself!"
Gojo rolled his shoulders and resumed walking, but his movements were jerky, agitated. The miasma was stripping away his patience, layer by layer.
"And you're doing amazing, really! I mean, I KNEW we should've gone left. Usually, you've got instincts, but today? Today you're just dead weight, and it pisses me off."
That did it.
Subaru's pace slowed. His face flushed, the capillaries in his eyes bursting. Something inside him twisted—hot, sharp, and rising like bile.
His eyes locked on Gojo's back like crosshairs.
"What...?"
"I'm just saying," Gojo shrugged, his tone mocking now, distorted by the haze into something demonic. "If we'd gone my way, I'd have vaporized whatever freak was deep-frying people, and we'd be sipping tea and eating sweets by now. But no, you insisted on taking this scenic death route—"
Subaru's fists trembled. The black fog seemed to whisper in his ear: He thinks you're useless. He thinks you're a joke.
"I'm out here because I DON'T want to rely on you!" he shouted, his voice breaking with heat.
The air shifted. Even the haze seemed to recoil in anticipation.
Gojo halted, back still turned.
"Awww," he drawled slowly, voice dripping venom. "So that's what this is. Finally understood that you're weak? Finally figured out that without everyone carrying your sorry ass, you'd have died twenty times over by now?"
He glanced over his shoulder—bandages hiding his eyes, but the scorn in his voice sliced through the gloom.
"Face it. You'd be dead meat down here without me. You know it. I know it. Everyone knows it. But we all just pity you becau—"
Gojo stumbled forward, staggered by the fist that slammed into the back of his skull.
No Infinity.
No restraint.
He caught himself mid-step, slowly turning back, rubbing his neck where the impact landed. The pain was dull, but the insult was blinding.
Subaru stood there, knuckles raised. Breathing hard. Eyes burning with a madness that wasn't entirely his own.
Gojo's smile returned—but it was colder this time. Crooked. Unamused.
Predatory.
"Seriously?" he said quietly. "You punched me... knowing full well I could rip you in half before you blink?"
He stepped forward once. The miasma swirled around his ankles, eager for blood.
Subaru didn't move. Didn't flinch. Didn't back down.
The haze around them thickened, churning like smog, tinged with the scent of rotting flowers. It crept into their lungs, their bones, their minds. It turned irritation into rage, and rage into bloodlust.
"You don't get it, do you?" Gojo muttered, his voice low now, gravelled. "You never get it. Always whining. Always breaking down. You think anyone's impressed by how you act? By how you want to go do things on your own?"
Subaru's glare sharpened like glass.
"At least I actually FEEL something!" he snarled. "You walk around acting like pain's beneath you—like you're above it all. You're not a god, you prick! You're just a lonely asshole with a power complex."
Gojo's head tilted slightly.
"…Lonely?" he echoed, the word tightening around his throat. "You've got balls saying that to me, of all people! I'm not the one trying to push away the only person who can actually help you right now!"
The ground trembled faintly beneath them. The miasma pulsed in time with Gojo's rising cursed energy—unstable, reactive, leaking outward in short, violent waves.
Subaru spat at his feet.
"You think I want to be alone? You think I like it?! I have to be, because the second I let anyone close—they always die! Because of me!"
"Boo-fucking-hoo," Gojo hissed, stepping closer. The toxicity in the air made his empathy wither and die. "Guess what? That's life. People die. You aren't special."
The mist thickened again. Every breath came harder, tasting of ash. Every heartbeat thudded like a war drum.
Subaru's voice dropped. Dead calm. The calm of a man listening to the whispers of the Witch.
"You know what I hate most about you?"
Gojo chuckled, though it sounded more like a growl. "Enlighten me."
"You never really care. Not about people. Not about anyone. You act like you do, you say the right things—but the second it gets messy? You just vanish, right?"
Gojo's smile was gone. His expression was stone.
"You're treading on thin ice, Subaru. And you don't know shit about me."
Gojo's voice was low. Cold. Unfamiliar. It was the voice of the Honored One, stripped of humanity by the foul air.
But Subaru didn't flinch. He took another step forward—eyes wild, breath ragged, hand swiping through the thick, cursed air like it offended him just by existing.
"What was that guy's name?" he spat, the miasma digging up a memory he shouldn't have weaponized. "Suguru, right? The only person who actually gave a damn about you. And what did you do?"
He sneered, eyes burning with malice.
"You vanished. Like a coward. I haven't even seen you try—hell, or even show interest—in returning to Japan to fix your mess!"
The world jolted.
Subaru didn't even finish the sentence before Gojo moved.
His fist carved a line through the fog—barely visible before it connected.
The hit landed square against Subaru's guard. The impact was overwhelming. Subaru's body sailed backward—arms bent in front of him, reinforcement already shattered—before he slammed into the ground and skidded, carving a trench in the earth before coming to a violent stop.
Dust exploded outward.
Gojo stood still, fist lowering slowly, his breath sharp. The miasma swirled around him, applauding.
"Blocked it, huh?" he muttered.
Subaru groaned, dragging himself upright. His forearms were steaming—reinforcement shattered in patches, skin blistered underneath. He coughed blood.
But his eyes were still full of fire.
"Attacked me 'cause you know I'm right, huh?"
Gojo scoffed.
"Try me again," he said darkly, "and I'll erase you."
"Yeah..? Try me, you stupid bastard!"
Subaru was barely standing—knees trembling, breath heaving—but his voice hit like poison, all defiance and venom and zero sense.
Gojo tilted his head. But no smile came. Not this time.
Even when facing monsters like Regulus, he'd cracked a joke or two. Even when standing against a calamity, he'd smirked and stayed light on his feet.
But now?
This was different. The miasma had eroded the barrier between his thoughts and his actions.
Although unreasonable, Gojo felt the intense, overwhelming urge to rip Subaru apart. The man standing across from Subaru wasn't Gojo Satoru the teacher. It was something stripped down—something wrathful, ice-cold, and intoxicated by the atmosphere.
And it stepped forward.
No sound. No warning. The distance between them vanished.
Gojo's fist collided with Subaru's jaw like a sledgehammer, snapping his head sideways with a vicious crack. Blood sprayed from his mouth as his body reeled backward, barely able to keep upright.
Subaru didn't think. He couldn't. The Witch's scent drowned out reason.
He threw a hook—a desperate swing in an attempt to even touch Gojo—
Caught.
Gojo's palm clamped around his wrist like a steel trap. No effort. No delay.
And then—
A palm strike to the gut detonated against Subaru's core. The air left his lungs in a gagging wheeze as his body launched backward—skipping like a stone across cracked earth.
A blow to the spine followed before he hit the ground, the impact throwing him forward again—and straight into Gojo's waiting hand.
Fingers curled around his throat.
Gojo lifted him like dead weight, Subaru's legs kicking helplessly above the ground in an attempt to pry himself free.
"You think... you know me?"
A punch drove into Subaru's abdomen—deep, cruel. Multiple ribs shattered at once, the sick crunch of bone echoing louder than Subaru's scream. Pain ripped through his nervous system like fire—paralyzing.
"G-Gurghkk—!!"
Gojo's grip didn't loosen; it only intensified. His voice was ice, devoid of mercy.
"You don't."
Another strike. Precise. Deliberate. Devastating.
Subaru's ribs folded inward—snapping like twigs, bone tearing into flesh, muscle rupturing. His breath hitched. His eyes rolled back.
His mind flickered.
Then Gojo let go of his throat… only to seize him again by the back of the skull.
And this time—
He slammed Subaru face-first into the earth.
The ground howled. The crater exploded outward like a meteor strike, dust and haze vaporizing from the force, stones flattened into glass under the heat and pressure of Gojo's wrath.
Subaru twitched once in the center.
Then stopped.
But Gojo didn't.
Something inside him still burned—still refused to settle. The miasma whispered that it wasn't enough. He disrespected you. He knows your weakness. Break him.
He grit his teeth, rage trembling in his jaw as he yanked Subaru up by a fistful of his dark, matted fringe. The boy's body dragged limply behind him, scraping against the stone like a corpse too stubborn to die.
"You get it yet… Subaru?" Gojo's voice was hoarse. Quiet. Deadly.
"You're not on my level. And you never will be."
He stopped walking—threw Subaru's body forward like garbage.
"You could have all the potential in the world. Hell, take Reinhard's potential, rewrite your fate a thousand times…"
Gojo stepped over him, his blue eyes glowing eerily through the dark fog.
"And it wouldn't change anything."
He crouched, face inches from Subaru's bloodied, unconscious expression.
"Because you… are still Natsuki Subaru."
The words landed.
Subaru's mind tried to retreat from the pain—but it couldn't.
Why him? Why was it always him? Gojo wasn't even trying. Would it change if he had Pride back?
His fingers twitched. His thoughts clawed toward something buried—something deeper.
THUNK—SHNK—SHLK!
Gojo's body jerked. He blinked.
"—?!"
His arm ruptured—black spikes driving outward through his forearm like a pincushion. Dark energy surged into his veins, warping flesh and tendon before the spikes dissolved back into mist.
He recoiled, hissing in pain.
Even with RCT mending the damage swiftly, he stared at the wound with something rare.
Surprise.
But Subaru was already moving.
Blood ran from his eyes. Tears mixed with red.
He was shaking.
But he stood.
He rose.
The shadows bled from his skin. Veins lit with agony. Darkness swelled behind him like a cloak of living malice.
The Authority of Pride had never left.
It was just buried.
Harder to reach.
And now—Subaru reached.
He roared, flinging his arm skyward—
Spikes of abyssal black surged out like spears toward Gojo.
But—
It didn't matter.
Because he was fighting Satoru Gojo.
"Red."
Gojo lifted his now-healed arm casually, index finger aimed like a gun. A crimson core formed at his fingertip—then unleashed. The vermillion blast expanded like a collapsing sun, obliterating everything in its path.
It struck Subaru head-on.
BOOM—!!
He was hurled backward like a ragdoll—bones crunching, lungs screaming, mouth open in a silent gasp of pain—as he was blasted through the air and smashed into a distant wall.
The stone cracked behind him.
Blood dripped from his hairline.
His vision blurred.
And then—
Gojo flickered. Appeared in front of him.
CRACK—!!
A shin smashed into Subaru's face. The wall shattered behind his skull as his neck buckled from the impact.
His brain rattled. Something behind his eyes broke.
Gojo crouched—expression blank. No joy. No rage.
Just emptiness.
His hands wrapped around Subaru's throat again—this time slower. More methodical.
Tighter.
"Fucking... die."
The words came in a whisper. Almost a prayer.
"DIE. DIE—DIE!!"
The grip intensified.
Reinforcement cracked like glass under pressure.
Subaru's throat caved in.
Blood spilled past his lips, his hands twitching weakly at Gojo's wrists—but there was nothing left.
No strength.
No light.
Just the creeping cold.
And then—
Darkness.