The man in the tree was fair as jade.
The young gentleman was getting anxious.
Jiahao gazed into the distance, his brows knitting tighter by the second.
Where were they?
Where were the cursed spirits?
Had he actually been played by a bunch of brainless cursed spirits?
How was he supposed to act out his script and earn valor points at this rate?
Looking down at the chaotic battlefield below, Jiahao raised an eyebrow. "Too many people gathered together, so you're afraid to show yourselves?"
"You're special grade cursed spirits, for crying out loud. Talk about spineless."
Jiahao pushed off with his toes, and his figure dissolved into the wind.
At the same time, Maki, who had held an overwhelming advantage in her fight, seemed to sense something. She abruptly stopped attacking and stepped back.
Kasumi Miwa was wondering why as she maintained her Simple Domain when a spatial vortex split open out of nowhere and swallowed Maki.
"Huh?!"
Kasumi Miwa's eyes widened. A second later, a bandaged hand reached out of the void and dragged her inside.
Was she going to be eaten?!
Had a mummy turned into a cursed spirit?!
She was still so young. She hadn't even become a Grade 1 Sorcerer yet, and she had two younger brothers to support.
Standing on an endless pitch-black platform inside the Kamui Dimension, Kasumi Miwa was on the verge of tears. "Is anyone there? Help!"
"Don't cry. Calm down!"
Maki walked over from the black stone slab opposite her and spat on the ground in irritation. "Damn it, what's gotten into that bastard now?!"
Kasumi Miwa's tearful eyes lit up. Just as she was about to ask a question, the void overhead suddenly brightened.
"Who's there?!"
Kamo's shout came through the opening connecting them to the outside world.
The image flashed, and Kamo, his eyes blood-red, crashed onto the platform alongside Fushiguro, who was holding a Divine Dog in his arms. The light vanished.
Seeing her captain, Kamo, arrive, Kasumi Miwa felt a little more at ease.
Kamo looked around. Everything was dark and desolate.
Turning to Fushiguro and Maki, who wore identical expressions of annoyance, Kamo frowned. "What is this place?"
"Hi-yah!!"
Kamo had barely finished speaking when light flashed and vanished. The Kung Fu Panda duo dropped from above, with Panda riding on Mechamaru.
Panda's big eyes darted around. Then he rolled off Mechamaru and lay flat where he landed.
Looking at Kamo in his Spinosaurus form, Panda waved a hand from the floor. "Relax. Just think of this as halftime."
Kamo frowned. "What do you mean?"
Panda said, "Let's wait until everyone's here. I don't know what Jiahao's trying to do either."
No one could fathom the outrageous ideas inside Jiahao's head, but they were frequent visitors to this Kamui Dimension.
In fact, during the days leading up to the Goodwill Event, Panda and the others had done their close-combat training inside the Kamui Dimension.
As they spoke, two more figures fell through the light.
"You crazy bitch! I'll rip all your hair out!"
Kugisaki and Mai landed on the platform, clutching each other's hair. Completely ignoring the change in surroundings, they kept pulling and hurling insults.
"What kind of Goodwill Event is this? Those two are just settling a personal grudge!"
"Women really are terrifying."
As Panda muttered, a boy, a girl, and a broom suddenly landed on his soft belly.
"-Ow!"
"Huh, that didn't really hurt!"
Having landed with Panda's belly to cushion her fall, Momo Nishimiya looked around, picked up her broom, and hurried over to join the others on the Kyoto platform.
Only Todo and Itadori were missing now.
Unwilling to sit around waiting, Mechamaru stood up and gathered a laser in his palm, aiming it into the boundless void.
Boom!!
A blinding crimson beam streaked through the darkness like a meteor, then nothing else happened.
"Save it. Don't waste your cursed energy."
Panda rubbed his belly and yawned. "You've watched Naruto, right? Doesn't this place look a lot like Obito's Kamui Dimension?"
"The space here only connects to the outside world at the instant the cursed technique activates."
"We probably can't find our own way out. We'll just have to wait until Jiahao's done with his episode and lets us out."
With that, Panda lay back on the floor and scratched his butt. "Well, since it's come to this... might as well get some sleep."
Splash!
Panda had barely lain down when a cold blue waterfall crashed onto his broad face.
Panda jolted, rolled to his feet, then spun and jumped.
The water droplets he flung off splashed Fushiguro and the others in the face.
The passage through the void overhead now gave off a faint glow. Looking up, they saw the rippling blue surface of a lake.
"Halftime is over!"
Jiahao's flat voice came from beyond the void. "Round two: Maki versus Kasumi Miwa."
Miwa blinked her big, bewildered eyes. "What's going on? This year's Goodwill Event has a referee?"
"Tch!"
Annoyed but powerless to do anything about it, Maki grabbed her weapon and leaped through the passage. "Keep up."
Miwa glanced at her teammates before cautiously following Maki.
Stepping out of the darkness into the light, Miwa stood on the lake's surface and sensed the presence of Jujutsu High's barrier.
Instinctively raising a hand to shield her eyes from the glaring sunlight, Miwa turned and saw Jiahao dressed in a full ninja outfit. "Sasuke?!"
Maki shot Jiahao a fierce glare. "Since when did Uchiha Sasuke moonlight as a referee for the Chunin Exams? What episode of Naruto was this?"
"If you're going to act, at least be professional! Don't go randomly rewriting the script without any explanation, you bastard!"
After all Jiahao's messing around, Maki had lost the urge to keep picking on Miwa.
Yet despite Maki's barrage of complaints, Jiahao maintained Sasuke's aloof demeanor and gave no reply.
Gazing coldly into the empty void, Jiahao murmured, "The storm is coming. There isn't much time left."
Leaving behind that baffling prophecy, Jiahao's figure dissolved into the breeze.
The corner of Maki's mouth twitched, and her fists clenched!
Crack! Crash!
With a light clatter of shattering roof tiles, the bulky Panda and Mechamaru were tossed onto a rooftop several hundred meters from the lake.
"The storm is coming. There isn't much time left..."
Jiahao delivered his prophecy again, then vanished before the panda and the machine.
Boom!
At a loft in the Mansion, its door smashed apart, Fushiguro and Kamo were pulled out of the void.
Jiahao left his prophecy and disappeared again.
Kugisaki and Mai...
Jiahao wasn't sure whether those two lunatics, still beating each other up, had heard his prophecy.
After separating everyone in order and spacing them apart, Jiahao returned to the highest point at the center of the forest.
"Oh, right. Almost forgot!"
Jiahao swept his hand downward, and two more figures plummeted toward the ground from high above.
"Bonito flakes!!!"
Falling from the highest point, Inumaki shouted, his whole body instantly drenched in cold sweat.
Boom!
If the Loli Witch on her jet-powered broom hadn't come to the rescue at the last moment, Inumaki would have been forced to experience a thrilling skydive... without a parachute.
"Huh? Utahime, why are you glaring at me like that?"
In the observation room, Satoru Gojo turned to meet Utahime's resentful glare and spread his hands innocently. "I'm not the one bullying your students. If you're going to glare at someone, go glare at Uchiha Zuohao."
Utahime gritted her teeth and glared. "I strongly suspect that brat is acting on your orders, you bastard!"
"Huh?"
Wrongly accused, Satoru Gojo looked utterly baffled.
How much did Utahime hate me? Why did she blame me for everything?
"Heh."
In the back row, the mature beauty Mei Mei, whose long hair covered her eyes, chuckled.
Brushing aside the white ponytail in front of her eyes, Mei Mei narrowed her eyes at Jiahao, standing at the highest point on the screen, and smiled. "Strength beyond the norm, a personality that does whatever it pleases, and a habit of ignoring everyone else while completely absorbed in his own world..."
"No wonder Utahime said that. He really does resemble the Satoru Gojo who used to run wild back then."
"No way!"
Satoru Gojo pointed at the center of the screen. "Was I ever that full of myself?!"
"Yes!"
Utahime and Mei Mei answered in unison.
"You were even worse."
Yaga, his arms folded, and Gakuganji, leaning on his cane, nodded together.
"He certainly is an interesting boy, this Uchiha Zuohao."
Resting her chin on one hand, Mei Mei parted her red lips. "But is there any point in continuing the Goodwill Event?"
Although Todo had accidentally rammed a few grade 3 cursed spirits to death while taking a shortcut at the start, putting Kyoto ahead on points.
The immense strength Jiahao had displayed on-screen made it clear that he could easily wipe out the entire Kyoto team.
If Jiahao had spent the time he'd used capturing people on exorcising cursed spirits instead, the Goodwill Event would already be over.
Watching the students on-screen, none of whom could muster any enthusiasm, Principal Gakuganji sighed softly.
Winning or losing the team match wasn't really important. What mattered most was eliminating the threat posed by Sukuna's vessel.
But the glimpse of strength Jiahao had revealed forced Gakuganji to temporarily abandon his plan to assassinate Itadori.
Gakuganji shook his head and rose from his seat. "Let's announce the results early."
"Heh, I thought an old fossil like you would keep struggling a little longer!"
Satoru Gojo's sweet words sent Gakuganji's blood pressure soaring again.
Just then, the exorcism talismans posted on the wall, each representing a cursed spirit in the area, all burned to ashes at once.
Every feed on the surveillance screens, which had covered every angle, vanished.
Boom!!
The combat area, far from the observation room, was enveloped in a pitch-black barrier.
A twisted tree as tall as a mountain burst from the ground inside the barrier.
High in the sky, the corners of Jiahao's mouth curved into a faint smile.
"The storm has arrived!"
Before you continue