Since An Xiu and Seele ostensibly had not known Makima at all before today, although An Xiu had long planned for the current situation, he still pretended to ask Seele.
"If An Xiu-ge wants Seele to go, then Seele will go. If An Xiu-ge does not want that, Seele will stay and protect An Xiu-ge."
"Is that so? Then go. I'll wait for Seele outside the barrier."
With that, An Xiu rubbed Seele's head, then stepped aside like Gojo Satoru.
"Thank you both for your help. Then without further delay, let's enter the barrier now."
Makima, Seele, and Utahime Iori slowly entered the barrier. For a moment, only An Xiu and Gojo Satoru remained outside.
"Thanks for your help with this, An Xiu. I'll prepare a gift to send over afterward as well."
Leaning against a pillar nearby, Gojo Satoru spoke to An Xiu with rare seriousness.
"Forget it. I have no interest in having a man visit the new home Seele and I share."
An Xiu shook his head and refused.
Why would he invite Gojo Satoru over when he had nothing better to do? What if the man showed up at the wrong time and ruined his mood?
Ruining his mood would be one thing. An Xiu considered himself quite easygoing. What he feared was upsetting Seele and Makima—someone might end up dead then.
"So Makima is fine? Wouldn't Miss Seele get angry if you act like this?"
Gojo Satoru did not mind being rejected to his face in the slightest. Instead, he focused on another issue.
An Xiu merely smiled indifferently.
"First, Seele would never get angry with me. Second, even if Seele knew what I was thinking, she would support me rather than stop me."
"But An Xiu, you should be able to tell that Seele likes you. Even so, it's fine?"
"Not only is it fine, Seele would even be happy about it. Though I doubt you'd understand."
Meanwhile, inside the barrier.
Makima, Seele, and Utahime Iori appeared in the forest.
The moment they arrived, they could clearly sense several distinct and powerful currents of cursed energy mingling in the air and coming from different directions.
"The unfamiliar cursed energy is mainly concentrated in two locations. One has two presences, while the other has three."
"Additionally, there are a few weaker cursed energy signatures scattered throughout the forest."
Sensing the cursed energy within the barrier, Makima spoke slowly.
"Next, Miss Seele and I will each head to one location where powerful cursed energy has gathered. The scattered enemies in the forest will be left to Miss Utahime Iori."
Seele Arrives, Hanami Is Cut in Half
Inside the forest, beside a stream.
Rumble!
The ground shook as countless thick tree branches burst from the earth, sweeping toward a certain direction like a tidal wave.
Several figures darted and leaped amid the onslaught of branches, barely holding on.
But before they could catch their breath, scorching flames came blasting toward them.
"Watch out!"
Todo Aoi shouted a warning to the others.
The extreme heat instantly ignited the surrounding trees, leaving behind a charred scar across the ground. Fortunately, the attacker had been rather casual, and everyone had dodged in time after the warning, so no one was injured.
Unlike the original story, the plot had already become utterly unrecognizable due to An Xiu and Seele's earlier interventions.
In the original story, only one Special Grade cursed spirit, Hanami, should have attacked the Jujutsu High School students. Yet now, Hanami, Leaking Pot, Choso, Eso, and Kechizu—a total of five Special Grade cursed spirits—had come to attack.
During the initial assault, the students who had gathered together to confront the attack were forced apart. Miwa Kasumi and Nishimiya Momo fell into the encirclement of the three Special Grade cursed spirits Choso, Eso, and Kechizu, while the remaining students were deliberately driven by Hanami and Leaking Pot toward this forest stream, splitting the battlefield into two.
They had done this because the Disaster Cursed Spirits had discussed it beforehand. Their mission this time was to stall for time, so they used the two Jujutsu High School students as hostages and split the battlefield in two to buy themselves more time.
"Hanami, be careful. Don't let these humans escape."
Leaking Pot continued launching flames while reminding Hanami beside it.
Hanami nodded.
With its abilities, as long as it wished to, not a single human present would be able to escape.
In fact, neither Leaking Pot nor Hanami was taking this seriously. They were only casually attacking the people before them.
After all, their purpose here was merely to buy time. To some extent, these humans were bargaining chips used to draw the attention of the humans outside the barrier. Moreover, Sukuna's vessel was among them, so they naturally could not go all out.
The same was true for the three Cursed Womb Death Paintings brothers.
However, not going all out did not mean they could not make these humans suffer.
A stream of scorching magma erupted through the Jujutsu High School students. Before the people who had dodged could breathe a sigh of relief, the magma before them underwent a secondary explosion in an instant.
Todo Aoi, Zenin Maki, and Inumaki, who had been closest, were immediately covered in severe burns.
"Senpai!"
Seeing this, Fushiguro Megumi formed a hand sign, intending to summon a shikigami. At the same time, Noritoshi Kamo activated his family's inherited technique, Blood Manipulation: Piercing Blood.
Unfortunately, before either of them could attack, massive trees surged up from beneath their feet, interrupting their assault and binding them tightly.
"Hold on!"
Seeing this, Itadori Yuji and Panda, who were some distance away, wanted to rush forward and help. But Leaking Pot, which had somehow appeared before them, sent them flying with a punch each.
In just a few moments, not a single person remained standing on the battlefield.
"So this is all you amount to. Humans are weak creatures in the end. It is only natural that you cannot rival, or even lose to, true new humans like us."
Leaking Pot spoke disdainfully.
Unlike in the original story, it had not attacked Gojo Satoru and naturally had not been beaten senseless yet. At this point, Leaking Pot simply did not regard humans as worthy of notice.
After all, in its eyes, how could feeble humans possibly compare to Cursed Spirits like them, beings born from fears as catastrophic as natural disasters and gifted with incomparably powerful strength from birth?
Suddenly, Hanami looked in a certain direction. Leaking Pot, whose senses were slightly inferior to Hanami's within the forest, followed suit and looked over as well.
An exceptionally powerful cursed energy presence was rapidly approaching them from that direction.
"So they've come?"
Faced with this situation, Leaking Pot and Hanami knew that the powerful human they had previously discussed had arrived.
Surging cursed energy gathered in its hand. Acting on the principle of striking first, Leaking Pot immediately launched an attack in the direction the presence was coming from.
"Let this old man see whether the one who came is truly someone overrated by the weak."
A thick pillar of fire tore through swathes of trees and triggered a massive explosion in the distance. Blazing flames shot into the sky.
Yet before the explosion had even subsided, a figure holding a scythe abruptly appeared behind Leaking Pot.
Slash!
The scythe swept through Leaking Pot's body. Fortunately, it turned around in time and raised both arms to block, barely stopping the attack at the cost of losing both arms instead of being cut in half at the waist.
"So fast... No, she appeared instantly!"
Was this the newly promoted Special Grade sorcerer Geto had mentioned, the one suspected of possessing a spatial cursed technique?
As it circulated cursed energy to restore its arms, Leaking Pot rapidly retreated.
Seeing this, Hanami immediately used its abilities to cover Leaking Pot.
Rumble!
As the ground shook, countless thick trees burst from the earth and surged toward the girl like a tidal wave.
However, Seele, holding her scythe, did not even glance at those attacks. Her figure instantly vanished from where she stood, and all the trees around her were severed in an instant.
"Quick, take the others and get out of here as fast as possible!"
Taking advantage of Seele's attack to escape Hanami's restraints, Fushiguro Megumi, who had experience with this before, immediately called to Noritoshi Kamo beside him. They hoisted up the people lying on the ground and swiftly retreated from the battlefield.
"Damned human, why do you carry the aura of our kin?"
Having restored its arms, Leaking Pot did not bother with the Jujutsu High School students fleeing the scene. To it, they were irrelevant.
The most important question was why it could sense an aura similar to that of a Cursed Spirit kin from the human girl before it.
Could she also be a vessel possessed by some powerful curse?
Thinking this, Leaking Pot gathered cursed energy once more. Its body instantly rushed before Seele, and violent flames erupted.
Yet the moment all the blazing flames touched Seele's body, they passed through her as though they had struck an illusion.
It could not touch her at all. This was the second ability Geto had mentioned, the one said to evade even Domain effects...
Bang!
Kicked in the abdomen by the girl before it, Leaking Pot spat out a mouthful of purple blood and was sent flying backward.
Seeing this, Hanami was about to use its abilities again to stop the girl from pursuing Leaking Pot, only to find that she had vanished from her original position once again and appeared behind it.
Slash!
The sharp scythe swept across Hanami's hardened body. Its sturdy form, which ordinary sorcerers could barely damage, was effortlessly split in two at that moment.
"Hanami!"
In the distance, Leaking Pot, which had just stabilized itself, cried out in shock.
In just one exchange, Hanami, one of the Disaster Cursed Spirits... had been cut in half at the waist on the spot!
Miwa Kasumi and Nishimiya Momo, Makima Arrives
Fortunately, although its body had been split into two, Hanami did not die on the spot thanks to a Cursed Spirit's tenacious vitality. Given enough time, such injuries could still be healed.
Therefore, Hanami, lying on the ground, immediately circulated cursed energy and summoned countless thick, sturdy branches to completely wrap around its body, intending to use this method to withstand further damage.
Meanwhile, Leaking Pot immediately rushed over from not far away. Boiling cursed energy gathered in its hand as it threw a punch toward Seele.
"You little brat, look at this old man!"
Boom!!!
Scorching flames erupted violently, instantly turning the surroundings into a sea of fire. Yet as the smoke and dust from the explosion dispersed, Seele was already nowhere to be seen.
In the distance, Seele appeared on the branch of a tree and turned to look at the raging sea of flames.
It was not that Seele could not have broken through Hanami's wooden defenses or simply ignored Leaking Pot's attack and killed Hanami on the spot. Rather, considering Makima's ability to control others, Seele had no intention of killing Hanami and Leaking Pot.
After all, both controlling trees and creating high-temperature flames were highly practical abilities. Even if they did not greatly improve one's strength, they could still enrich the abilities one possessed.
Therefore, defeating the two Disaster Cursed Spirits before her, stripping them of their ability to resist, and then handing them over to Makima for control was undoubtedly the most cost-effective choice.
"I wonder how things are going on Makima's side."
Meanwhile, at the other battlefield.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
Blood with extremely potent corrosive properties crashed down from the sky with tremendous force, blasting the ground into a pitted mess.
Miwa Kasumi, gripping a katana, desperately dodged and occasionally turned to slash away blood she could not evade.
In midair, Nishimiya Momo tried to help her companion, only for a high-speed arrow of blood to pierce through her shoulder the next second.
"Brothers, be careful. Do not kill these two humans outright. We still need them as hostages to draw the attention of the other enemies. It would be troublesome if they died."
On the ground, Choso pressed his palms together and spoke expressionlessly to Eso and Kechizu beside him.
"Got it, Big Brother. I'll watch the power of my cursed technique."
As he spoke, Eso stretched out his body. A large amount of blood erupted from his back and, under his control, wove itself into a pair of blood wings as he launched an even fiercer attack toward Miwa Kasumi in the distance.
For a time, Miwa Kasumi became even more bedraggled. The katana in her hand swung repeatedly, but under the opponent's blood, which could corrode even stone, it quickly became damaged beyond recognition.
"Why did such powerful enemies show up when we only came to take part in an exchange event?"
Unable to spare a thought for the katana she had bought on loan, the blue-haired girl focused completely on the attacks raining down from above, not daring to relax even slightly in this dangerous situation where she could be severely injured or even killed at any moment.
Before you continue