Wild man, wild fury, wild ride

They were three guys who normally never drank, yet a brief meeting of kindred spirits had led them to drink their hearts out.

People who drank too much had no sense left.

In the small hours, Xia Xia suddenly sat bolt upright in bed.

He was going on a drunken rampage.

"It's getting late. I'm going out to have some fun."

"Brothers, I'll be right back."

With that, Xia Xia laughed toward the still-sleeping Yuji and Choso, then ran outside and hauled an almost brand-new heavy-duty semi out from behind the hotel.

Let's go tear up the streets.

Heaven knew where it had come from, but nobody was around, and the keys were at the hotel reception desk. That made what came next very simple.

Xia Xia had always disliked biker gangs roaring through the streets on their motorcycles. To him, there was nothing remotely romantic about those hunks of metal embraced by flesh and blood. He preferred something wilder, something more interesting.

The mighty semi that had sent him to this world remained vivid in his memory.

Yes, this was how a real man ought to be.

This was what a man should aspire to.

It's decided. From today onward, this heavy truck is called Red Hare. You'll ride into battle with me from now on, old buddy.

Xia Xia had no driver's license and had never taken a driving test, but that did nothing to stop him from operating this steel monster with knowledge stolen from other people's minds.

"Where are you going?"

Yuji Itadori and Choso had drunk a lot, but when they saw Xia Xia running out, they still groggily asked him.

"Sendai."

There was still plenty of time, anyway, and everyone had their own business to handle. Rather than sit here thinking about what to do next, he might as well get moving.

As far as their objectives went, Itadori and the others wanted to free the "Gojo box," Megumi Fushiguro wanted to save his sister, and Yuta Okkotsu was traveling alone to kill the ancient jujutsu sorcerers and Kenjaku.

Their teams had Yuji Itadori and Megumi Fushiguro hunting down Hiromi Higuruma in Tokyo to get a hundred points and change the rules, Kinji Hakari and Panda going to Tokyo No. 2 Colony to find Angel and unseal the Gojo box, and Yuta Okkotsu heading to Sendai to hold the line against the resurrected ancient jujutsu sorcerers...

Why bother thinking so much?

After all that dithering, aren't we here to fight?

Drink today while there's wine today. Don't worry about this little farewell. The new save point's already set. Let my big brother and little brother rest up somewhere safe while I go see if there's any fun to be had. I just can't sit still.

It's the middle of the night. Who needs sleep?

If I die, I die. I can reload afterward.

Yuta Okkotsu was taking on four opponents in Sendai. He couldn't let that champion of pure love steal the spotlight in such a spectacular showdown.

Let's go watch the show.

Start the engine. Set sail!!!

Xia Xia had once been a nationally ranked Sun Ce master. If he could pilot a speedboat, he could drive a heavy truck. The city inside the barrier was dilapidated, with an apocalyptic atmosphere, but at this moment, the speeding truck made even the wind sound faint in his ears.

This was a Hundred-Ton King traveling at 145 kilometers per hour.

The speeding truck was loaded with construction materials and heavy machinery. Even the front drum of a road roller seemed to be sitting in its trailer. Its tremendous kinetic and gravitational potential energy could reduce anyone blocking its path to scraps and meat patties.

Xia Xia sat in the cab with half a bottle of high-proof Kumquat Lemon Whiskey still in his hand.

He turned the wheel while pouring liquor into his mouth.

What a coincidence. Some cursed spirit or jujutsu sorcerer really had the nerve to block his way. He was too drunk to see clearly, but whatever it was, it didn't look human. It was all crooked and misshapen.

Xia Xia slapped the wheel and got fired up. Cursed energy from Demon-Repelling Edge wrapped around the truck, plating this physically unstoppable siege engine in mystical armor. Gods or ghosts, it could kill them all. Nothing could withstand it.

Charge!

His face flushed and his neck bulging, Xia Xia felt filled with boundless bravado. The hideous cursed spirit blocking his way looked more ridiculous by the moment, like a target waiting to be hit.

"You dare show off those petty tricks before a master? I could tell at a glance you weren't human!"

"Mighty Heavenly Dragon!"

The impact came soon enough.

Blood burst everywhere, like a punctured water balloon. Red, mottled, white, and green splattered across the windshield.

All that remained of the enormous cursed spirit was a black-and-red smear dragged across the ground. Red Hare's cursed-energy-coated body remained completely intact, and the blood and minced flesh only made it look more imposing.

Had he run over a cursed spirit?

Perhaps.

It might also have been people worse than cursed spirits, people who deserved to die-a few rogue jujutsu sorcerers.

In fact, they were a bunch of roadside robbers, rogue jujutsu sorcerers who had banded together and killed plenty of people inside the barrier with their fairly powerful cursed techniques. The moment they spotted the truck in the distance, they prepared to kill the driver and steal its cargo. This was how they had spent all these days.

They had taken some time to pile debris into a checkpoint, then started blocking the road and killing people. Their road, their trees, their toll.

Anyone who still held on to a little conscience after order had collapsed was a decent person. As for the rest, ordinary people weren't so bad. The truly dangerous ones were those who had gained a little power and thought themselves extraordinary.

There were actually enough supplies to go around. As long as people avoided the cursed spirits, they could survive. There was no need to fight and kill over this.

But these people considered themselves superior, blessed by heaven with supernatural powers, and freely exercised their authority over life and death. Thanks to these lunatics, what should have been a mere Culling Game colony had turned into a zombie-apocalypse survival scenario.

That Izumino fellow from before had been the same sort.

There was no law or order here, anyway. Morality meant nothing. Even the rules of the Culling Game barriers endorsed their behavior. Killing was necessary to survive.

Did killing even need a reason?

Life was so very fragile.

But those who killed would themselves be killed. These thugs with their little scraps of power had finally met their karmic punishment-a punishment that answered violence with violence...

See, humanity's anthem was an anthem of courage. Some people even ran onto highways to try to intimidate heavy trucks.

Who knew how many people the cables and tire spikes they had laid in advance had harmed on this road? But to Xia Xia's cursed-energy-powered truck, all that clutter only made him mistake the fortified checkpoint across the road for a cursed spirit blocking his way. He was drunk, and his eyesight wasn't great.

He had stumbled into delivering heaven's justice. Nothing to regret there. What decent person blocked roads to murder and rob people?

Sunk!

Xia Xia felt fantastic and took another swig of liquor.

The cold liquor burned hot as it flowed down his throat, making it ache. But his stomach didn't churn at all, and the bloody smell spreading around him felt pleasant.

He might have been sober at that moment, but sobriety was hardly likely right then. Laughing wildly, he pressed his foot all the way down.

Floor it.

I said, floor it!

The red-painted heavy truck tore down the road, letting out a wild roar like a fierce stallion.

What bunkers? What checkpoints? Those flattened "two-dimensional" folks on the ground aren't complaining, are they? Isn't the sidewalk beside them nice and wide? Everyone awakened a cursed technique inside a Culling Game barrier. You all started from the same place. Figure out why you fell behind yourselves.

Run. Just keep running.

Don't talk to me about dangerous driving or points on my license. I'd need a license before you could deduct any points.

At a pitch-black intersection, Red Hare whipped its tail around in a death-defying drift. Several enormous wild cursed spirits were turned into "two-dimensional creatures" by Xia Xia's civilian-use dual-vector foil, spread flat on the ground like pancakes.

The jujutsu sorcerers of this world had probably never imagined anyone would exorcise cursed spirits in such a wild fashion.

Go. Go even faster.

No road ahead? An overpass?

What the hell? If I stop just because you say there's no road, won't I look pathetic? Just keep going. Cursed energy lifted the Hundred-Ton King straight into the air, letting it travel through the void and ride the wind.

There's a road. It'll load once you get there. The connection's bad. Give it a few seconds.

Fiddling with the truck's stereo, Xia Xia practically mashed the volume button into a DJ turntable, producing a thumping Emperor electronic track. He cranked the volume to maximum and pushed the speedometer to its limit. The Emperor himself had loved this background music back in the day.

An unknown road lay ahead. He had said he was going to Sendai, but after a few full turns of the wheel, he no longer had any idea where he had veered off to. He was miles and miles off course.

Something almost human lurking in the shadows tried to leap down from a building, roaring as it lunged to tear open the truck window.

Xia Xia raised a hand and summoned a long blade. Keeping one hand firmly on the wheel, he thrust the other out the window and actually made the truck leap off the flat ground. Poised atop his charging steed, he slashed down, and within a few moments, the blade's light destroyed both the cursed spirit and the abandoned little building behind it.

He turned his hand over and closed it.

A metal ingot landed in his palm.

What a thrill. What a thrill! So satisfying, so damn satisfying.

Xia Xia had no idea what he had done along the way. All he remembered was that the bottle in his hand kept getting emptier as he drank. What the hell kind of booze is this? Such lousy quality. The more I drink, the less there is!

"Why doesn't this plain water have any flavor?"

Only at daybreak did Xia Xia, after a whole night of wild driving, regain his senses and look around in bewilderment.

The first thing he saw was the leaderboard provided by Kogane.

"Three hundred and twenty-five?"

Cool. That's plenty satisfying.

He had no idea what he had done last night, but those three hundred and twenty-five points couldn't have appeared out of thin air.

Some unlucky bastards had probably walked straight into his line of fire again.

Come to think of it, if I can see points and rankings now, did Hajime Kashimo rack up another satisfying kill streak and add that rule?

Fine. If he can add one, so can I.

"Bug, I want to add a rule."

"Everyone in the Culling Game can freely transfer their points, without restrictions."

He spent a hundred points and accomplished what Yuji Itadori had originally done. From this moment on, killing was no longer necessary. People could exchange points to avoid that damned rule that killed them if their scores stayed unchanged.

"Second rule: ordinary people who were innocently dragged into this can leave the barriers unilaterally."

"Sorry, a similar rule already exists. Please think of another one."

"?"

Similar? That meant someone had already proposed it. In the original story, Megumi Fushiguro had spent a hundred points to save his sister by allowing a player to recruit someone from outside the barrier into the Culling Game as a replacement, letting the original player leave.

"That one?"

"That one."

That was all right, he supposed. Release was conditional, but it was still useful. They could bring people in from outside the barrier as reinforcements.

Xia Xia flicked the little golden bug away with a finger, then looked around. No signs. No directions.

Where the hell have I ended up? Is this still Sendai?

Of course it wasn't.