For the first time, Hayakawa showed an expression other than indifference. His voice was panicked.
No... he couldn't.
She was still waiting for him.
He still had to take her to see the sea.
Okkotsu looked at him and said with a faint smile, "You're just afraid."
Then came an unquestionable verdict:
"You broke into the barrier and slaughtered people indiscriminately. You didn't even spare ordinary people.
With a cursed technique like that in your hands, more people will only die."
That was his verdict, and it was also his responsibility as the one standing guard here.
Okkotsu gripped his sword in both hands, its tip pointed downward. Cursed energy compressed furiously along the blade as he layered cursed speech over it:
"I say, this blade shall slay the person before me."
Empowered by cursed speech and cursed energy, pure white light burst along the blade. There was no towering pillar of light filling the sky, only a single, supremely concentrated slash.
The replicated moves shattered upon meeting the blade's light. This was an overwhelming disparity in raw power.
Okkotsu no longer concealed his immense cursed energy. It nearly blotted out the entire sky.
The sketchbook's frantically flipping pages abruptly stopped. Then, starting from the bottom corners, they burned to ash inch by inch.
Hayakawa still held his brush raised in midair, attempting one final block.
Then, starting from the point against which the sword tip pressed-
Crack-
Everything shattered along that fracture.
The Wolf-Hair Brush in Hayakawa's hand broke in two first. Immediately afterward, the blade containing all that cursed energy pierced his chest.
He staggered half a step backward, his gaze passing through the dispersing mist of cursed energy to settle on the two opposite him.
Okkotsu turned sideways and sheathed his sword with a clink, then raised