Foraging

Kurourushi should have remained dormant.

After Kenjaku released Kurourushi into the Sendai Colony, the cursed spirit had sensed the presence of Dhruv Lakdawalla, a sorcerer whose abilities were a particularly effective counter to its own, and gone dormant, suppressing its presence.

But today, it awoke early.

A soul that did not belong to this world crashed into the depths of its sleeping consciousness, carrying all the memories and power accumulated over several previous lives. In that instant, the cursed spirit's original consciousness was compressed, crushed, overwritten, and then erased completely.

Kurourushi opened its eyes. No, Gu Yanzhi opened his eyes.

The moment his consciousness took control of this body, a fierce hunger burned up from deep within his abdomen like fire.

It was chaos-more chaotic than any of his previous transmigrations.

He had experienced the swelling pain of the system pouring the original owner's memories into him, as well as the simultaneous tearing of soul and flesh when Mahito transformed him. But this time was different.

This corruption did not come from outside. It surged from every cell inside his body at once.

His compound eyes quivered uncontrollably, his six legs twitched spasmodically in the darkness, and his mouthparts opened and closed with a piercing sound like scraping metal.

This was not the sensation of an outside force forcibly twisting him, as Mahito's Idle Transfiguration had done. This was his body's instinct.

Cursed spirits were born from humanity's negative emotions, and the fear, disgust, and rejection embodied by a cockroach cursed spirit needed no reason to drive them. They were etched directly into every inch of carapace, every antenna, every heartbeat.

Slaughter and consumption were not choices. They were instincts.

He was now a vessel for those instincts.

Gu Yanzhi fought desperately to suppress the craving.

He clenched his mandibles-crack. The sharp sound as they clamped together was especially clear in the darkness. He planted all six legs firmly against the ground, the muscles beneath his carapace taut as a bowstring drawn to its limit.

But just as he suppressed the first wave of impulses, his compound eyes caught two figures.

Two people stood beside the pipe wall a short distance away, giving off the scent of cursed energy.

They were not ordinary people-they were players in the Culling Game.

Their cursed energy shone like two flames in the darkness.

The man was torturing a child, driving needles formed from cursed energy into the child's legs with a delighted smile on his face.

The woman leaned against the pipe wall, watching idly, the corners of her mouth slightly raised.

Cursed energy flowed through their bodies, carrying the smell of blood and the resentment of the countless ordinary people they had killed during this time.

In Gu Yanzhi's eyes, those were not two people. They were two enormous blood bags giving off a rich, fragrant aroma of cursed energy.

I can't resist at all.

I really can't resist at all.

Kurourushi's body moved before his consciousness did.

All six legs pushed off the ground at once, launching his entire body out of the darkness like an arrow loosed from a bow.

The man was holding the boy by his hair, gathering cursed energy in his hand and still muttering something.

Gu Yanzhi planted one hand on top of his head.

The cursed energy defense the man raised burst like a soap bubble beneath that hand's grip. It did not last even a second.

The man froze. He opened his mouth, trying to make one last desperate struggle-crack.

The sound was crisp, like a walnut crushed underfoot.

The man's head burst in the enormous palm. Bone fragments and brain matter squeezed out between the fingers and splattered against the pipe wall.

The headless corpse remained standing, traces of cursed energy still glowing on its fingers. Then its knees buckled, and the entire body collapsed into the water.

Gu Yanzhi stared at the remains still dripping from his forelimb. Hundreds of tiny images in his compound eyes focused on that indistinct mass of flesh and blood at once.

A fragrance-an indescribable fragrance-traveled through the sensory nerves in his carapace to his brain, stimulating every ravenous cell.

He had been human before, and he was still human now-at least his consciousness was.

But this body was not.

This body was a cursed spirit, a monster born from humanity's fear of cockroaches.

It needed to feed. He brought the remains to his mouth and began chewing. The sound of his mouthparts grinding through bone echoed through the quiet sewer, every mouthful accompanied by the sharp crack of shattering bones.

The woman was still alive.

She had reacted the instant Gu Yanzhi crushed the man's head-leaping backward to put distance between them, striking the pipe wall with her back, then immediately turning to flee.

Special grade. The thought exploded in her mind, like a bucket of ice water poured over her head.

It's definitely on the level of a special grade cursed spirit. Just my luck. How did I end up in this mess?

Gu Yanzhi did not look at her. He continued enjoying his meal, merely raising his other hand slowly and pointing toward the exit ahead of her.

Countless cockroaches poured out of the darkness, large and small, crawling over the walls, floor, and ceiling in dense swarms.

They piled on top of one another, forming a wall of countless carapaces and antennae that sealed the exit completely.

The woman slammed her left foot down to brake, sending water spraying beneath her. Staring at the writhing black wall before her, she gathered power in her right hand and threw a punch.

A powerful shock wave exploded from her fist, blasting a gap through the wall of cockroaches. Shattered shells and bodily fluids sprayed in every direction.

But before she could feel relieved, more cockroaches filled the gap, layer upon layer, faster than her shock wave could tear through them.

She stopped, panting heavily.

With them replenishing themselves this quickly, forcing her way out would be difficult.

But it also confirmed one thing for her-summoning this many cockroaches at once meant this was a shikigami-based cursed technique.

Sorcerers and cursed spirits that used shikigami all shared one weakness: mediocre close-combat ability.

Because they relied on shikigami to fight, most lacked personal combat experience. They also had to devote part of their cursed energy to maintaining their shikigami, weakening their ability to reinforce themselves.

She had encountered plenty of sorcerers like that, and killed plenty too.

She had even seen grade 2 sorcerers lose to grade 2 cursed spirits because they relied too heavily on their shikigami.

This cockroach cursed spirit had certainly shown great strength just now. But as long as she could break through its shikigami's defenses and attack its main body directly, its physical defenses and close-combat reactions would surely offer an opening.

She stopped running and turned around, letting her hands hang at her sides as she took a stance for close combat.

"My cursed technique is Shock Wave-I can convert cursed energy into higher-output shock waves and release them from my body."

Revealing her cursed technique.

Her cursed energy fluctuations surged abruptly, forming a visible ring of rippling air around her.

Gu Yanzhi struck first.

A wave of cockroaches surged toward her, their scraping carapaces producing a piercing rustle. Like a moving black carpet, they peeled away from the pipe walls and flooded toward her position.

She smiled faintly. Just as she had expected.

If this cursed spirit wanted to overwhelm her with its swarm, it would concentrate more cursed energy on summoning, leaving an even greater opening in its main body's defenses.

A powerful shock wave exploded behind the woman, not to attack-but to propel her forward.

Her Shock Wave technique was not limited to direct attacks. She could also use it this way to move rapidly.

Driven by the shock wave, her body became a blur. At the same time, she wrapped herself in cursed energy as an extra protective layer and forced her way straight through the cockroach tide.

She appeared in front of Gu Yanzhi.

A shock wave gathered in her right hand at the same time. The cursed energy around her fist had become blindingly bright, enveloping her entire arm in a mass of light.

She cheered inwardly as memories of her past battles against shikigami-using jujutsu sorcerers flashed through her mind-the panic on their faces when she closed in, the cursed spirits blasted to pieces by point-blank bursts of her shock waves.

Once I'm in close, it's my turn.

Although this cursed spirit had just killed her companion, that man had been a support-type sorcerer to begin with. He had never been strong in a direct fight.

Now, with this speed and a punch like this at point-blank range-even if you're a special grade cursed spirit, I can still kill you.

She looked at Gu Yanzhi, and Gu Yanzhi looked back at her.

Hundreds of tiny images in his compound eyes focused at once on her face, which was beginning to show a triumphant smile.

The woman's smile grew brighter. Can this thing not even react?

At this distance, it's already too late.

Die, you beast! I've won!