Choso looked at Itadori, who lay completely unconscious before him, his chest still rising and falling, and frowned slightly.
"Still breathing, huh."
He stepped forward, and the blood on his right fist hardened again, its dark red shell gleaming coldly under the lights. He clenched his fist, raised it high, and swung it down.
"Geto, why hasn't Dagon met up with us yet?" Jogo looked at Kenjaku, who was studying the Prison Realm, impatience creeping into his voice. The thing couldn't be lifted or moved, as though it had grown into the floor. Kenjaku crouched beside it, poking it with a finger as though teasing a disobedient cat.
"Could something have happened?" Hanami spoke from beside him, voice low and tinged with unease.
"It's fine." Kenjaku didn't even look up. He poked the Prison Realm again, a faint smile on his lips. "Dagon is close enough to Kashimo that they can watch out for each other. They should be here soon."
Mahito yawned beside them, bored out of his mind. He glanced at the Transfigured Humans standing motionless around him, then at Kenjaku's back, and said nothing.
Suddenly, a sound came from the passage nearby.
Footsteps. Unhurried, one after another, landing in puddles with sticky splats.
Then half a Cursed Spirit's body was thrown out of the passage. It rolled several times across the floor, trailing a long, horrifying smear of purple blood.
It was Dagon. Only one arm remained, and everything below the abdomen was gone. The flesh at the severed edge still twitched faintly, purple blood pouring from it like water from an open faucet.
Dagon braced that lone arm against the floor and crawled forward, inch by inch, toward Jogo. Every movement left another smear of blood.
"Jogo... Hanami..." Dagon's voice faltered like a candle flickering