Dagon's domain shattered.
Dagon knelt on the ground.
His tentacles drooped like waterweed battered by a storm, and he no longer even had the strength to lift his head.
His lips moved several times before he finally squeezed out a sentence.
"Huojin..."
"This man... this man..."
"He's even harder to deal with than Satoru Gojo."
Huojin stood atop the rubble, his gaze fixed on Wangchuan.
His breathing grew heavy as well, as though he were reassessing something.
"I know."
His voice was so soft that only Dagon could hear him.
"This man hasn't even seriously mobilized his Cursed Energy yet."
"He's been fighting us with physical techniques and that layer of protection the whole time."
He fell silent for two seconds, the dark red light in his chest pulsed again, and then he made his decision.
"Let's go."
Dagon lifted his head, a tremor of relief flickering in his black, beanlike eyes.
"Go... we're leaving?"
"Yes."
Huojin's heels had already pressed back slightly, his center of gravity beginning to shift.
"We're leaving now."
He abruptly grabbed one of Dagon's tentacles and hauled him off the ground.
Dagon weighed almost nothing, dangling lightly from Huojin's hand like a wad of waterlogged cotton.
Then Huojin moved.
In that instant, his Nuclear Core abruptly compressed, then erupted with a dazzling dark red shock wave that propelled him and Dagon backward.
He was incredibly fast.
He covered three streets in almost the blink of an eye.
Dragged along, Dagon's voice was torn into broken syllables by the wind.
"He, he'll chase..."
"I know."
Huojin did not look back.
His gaze remained fixed ahead, on the edge of the ruins, on the outlines of the still-intact blocks in the distance.
His mind raced, calculating distances, angles, and escape routes, planning every step in advance.
He