[Cursed Tools]
As implements that assisted Jujutsu Sorcerers in battle, they sometimes provided support even more dependable than a companion. They came into being in different ways, but those fell into four broad categories.
First: sorcerers specializing in creation, primarily through the Construction Technique, slowly condensed them from cursed energy through years of accumulation and exceptional skill.
Second: they began as ordinary objects, but as a Jujutsu Sorcerer used them, cursed energy gradually wrapped around the weapons, immersing them like an ocean. Not only could they become Cursed Tools, but their wielder's Cursed Technique might even be engraved within them.
Third: certain regions and communities with long histories of Jujutsu possessed crafting methods that allowed them to precisely manipulate and weave cursed energy. Though Cursed Tools of this kind often required considerable time to take shape, they also tended to be quite powerful.
Fourth: a Jujutsu Sorcerer established a Binding Vow at tremendous cost. The creation of these Cursed Tools defied the natural order, yet they were powerful enough to bypass the need for years of accumulation and come into being in an instant.
The ring Rika Orimoto wore at that moment was just such a Cursed Tool. First saturated with Okkotsu's immense cursed energy, then reinforced and condensed through a Binding Vow, it was a ring of protection created to keep Rika safe.
With this ring on, Rika was not only constantly protected by the immense cursed energy Okkotsu had stored inside it, but could also briefly use the Cursed Technique engraved within.
Feeling that familiar cursed energy wrapped around her, Rika found the unease in her heart completely washed away by its soothing presence. In its place came twitching lips and a face that gradually flushed, taking on an obsessively lovesick look.
"Yuta... Yuta... Yuta..."
With that same