Completing the domain

On the third day of his vacation, it was nearly noon when Madara woke.

Sunlight spilled through the curtains and filled the room, and the air held the warmth and languor peculiar to spring.

He lay in bed, staring at the ceiling for a long time, his mind empty, thinking of nothing.

Then he realized a problem: he had no idea what to do today.

He had gone out with Okkotsu and the others on the first day, then happened to run into Nanami and watched a movie on the second. Both days had more or less had a plan.

But now, with two full days of vacation left, Madara suddenly discovered that he had no idea how to "do nothing."

Madara sat up and scratched his head, feeling for the first time that a four-day vacation really might be a little too long.

He walked to the window and pushed it open.

The spring breeze blew in, carrying the scent of grass and flowers. The distant training ground was deserted, and Jujutsu High was as quiet as an empty city.

Then he remembered something.

The incomplete domain he had grasped during his battle with Satoru Gojo-"Heavenly Imperial Pillars."

The white space, the rotating stone pillars, that feeling of having everything under his control.

Although it had only been a rudimentary form, although it had lasted mere seconds, Madara had indeed touched the threshold of Domain Expansion.

Ever since then, he had wanted an opportunity to try again, to see whether he could manifest a more complete domain.

But training and missions had come one after another, leaving him without a suitable time or place-Domain Expansion caused too much of a disturbance. Practicing at Jujutsu High would definitely cause a commotion.

And now...

Vacation.

Madara's eyes lit up.

He quickly washed up, changed into casual clothes, stuffed his jujutsu sorcerer identification and phone into his pockets, packed a few bottles of water and some emergency supplies into his backpack, then left his room.

He told no one where he was going.

He simply followed his instincts and headed toward the outskirts of Tokyo.

Tokyo Metropolitan Seventh Junior High School had been abandoned three years earlier because of financial problems and declining student numbers.

The school building had stood empty for years, its windows broken and its walls peeling, while weeds covered the athletic field.

There were no residential areas nearby, only undeveloped wasteland. People rarely came here.

Madara stood before the school's rust-covered iron gate, looking up at the old three-story building.

He could feel it.

From the moment he entered the area, a malicious presence had permeated the air.

Places like schools-youth, pressure, competition, bullying, loneliness, despair-were inherently fertile breeding grounds for curses.

With no one maintaining it after its abandonment, resentment had accumulated day after day. The cursed spirits it spawned would naturally be far from weak.

Madara gently pushed open the iron gate.

Creeeak-

The rusty hinges made a grating noise, especially distinct in the afternoon silence.

He entered the school grounds.

The synthetic running track had cracked, the rusted basketball hoops looked ready to collapse, and vines covered the school building's exterior walls.

A musty smell hung in the air, mingled with an indescribable bloody odor.

Rather than enter the school building immediately, Madara first made a circuit of the grounds.

He activated his Sharingan, his blood-red eyes slowly rotating as they tracked the flow of cursed energy.

Cursed residue covered the entire campus like a spiderweb, but it was thickest... in a classroom on the east side of the second floor.

He headed toward the school building.

The main entrance had been boarded shut, with a warning sign reading "Danger: no entry."

Madara went around the side, found a broken window, and vaulted through it.

The hallway was dim.

Sunlight shone through the broken windows, casting dappled patches of light and shadow across the dust-covered floor.

Madara's footsteps were light, almost silent.

He walked down the hallway, passing one empty classroom after another.

The chalk writing on the blackboards had blurred, desks and chairs lay askew, and the certificates and posters on the walls had faded and peeled.

Then he stopped outside a classroom.

The sign read "Class 2-C." The door stood ajar, and faint sounds came from inside.

Madara pushed the door open.

Creeeak-

The sight inside made him pause. It was not the dilapidated classroom he had imagined.

The space had been replaced.

What should have been a classroom of only a few dozen square meters had become a complex, interwoven space.

The walls extended endlessly, the ceiling was too high to see, and the floor consisted of countless intersecting platforms and staircases, like some abstract-art labyrinth.

At the center of the space floated an enormous lump of flesh.

Eyes and mouths covered its surface, and countless tentacles extended from its body, coiling around the platforms.

Every eye swiveled, and every mouth opened and closed, producing those chaotic whispers.

An open domain.

No, it was not yet a complete open domain-but achieving this much already proved that this cursed spirit's grade was at least...

Special grade.

The corners of Madara's mouth lifted slightly.

He felt no panic. Instead, he felt an eager excitement.

After his battle with Satoru Gojo, he had gained a clearer understanding of his own strength.

Although he had yet to fully master Reverse Cursed Technique or a perfect domain, he did not believe he would lose to anyone when using his full strength-including Satoru Gojo.

Of course, that was on the condition that he used his "full strength."

"Heeheehee!"

A strange laugh came from above.

Madara raised his head and saw a cursed spirit separate from the lump of flesh and shoot toward him like a cannonball.

It was a bizarre-looking cursed spirit.

Its main body resembled an enormous flying insect, its wings as thin as a cicada's beating rapidly with a piercing buzz.

But at the bases of those wings grew two pairs of human arms-pale and slender, their fingers twisted into claws.

Its head had no facial features, only a mouth full of sharp teeth, stretched into an impossibly wide grin.

Madara looked at the cursed spirit and asked, "Hmm... can you talk?"

"Keh keh... aaah!!!"

It did not answer Madara's question. It merely let out a chaotic shriek, then accelerated toward him.

It moved so fast that it left afterimages in the air, all four arms spreading at once, an ominous black light gleaming at the tips of its claws.

The instant those claws were about to touch his face-his Mangekyō Sharingan activated.

Three tomoe spun and transformed into an eerie pattern.

Susanoo's skeletal frame appeared instantly, blue ribs shielding him within.

The cursed spirit's claws struck the bones with a piercing scrape, sending sparks flying.

But Susanoo did not budge.

Madara looked at the cursed spirit through the gaps between the bones, his voice calm. "So you can't talk... fine. I'll use you to test things out."

He pressed his palms together and interlaced his fingers, forming that complex hand seal.

Cursed energy surged through his body like floodwaters bursting through a dam.

Purple light spilled from his eyes. Then he uttered those words.

"Domain Expansion-"

"Heavenly Imperial Pillars."

The world stood still.

The abandoned school's classroom, the distorted space, the writhing lump of flesh, the flying cursed spirit-everything vanished in an instant.

In its place was pure white.

The sky was white, the ground was white, everything was white.

There was no sun, no clouds, no shadows. Only soft white light shone from every direction, as though this were the end of the world, the void at the beginning of chaos.

Then the ground began to shake.

The white ground bulged and split, and pristine white stone pillars rose from below.

The pillars arranged themselves in a circle around Madara, rotating slowly to form a perfect circular array.

Madara stood at its very center, on a circular platform that was likewise white.

His eyes had already become the Rinnegan-deep purple irises with concentric rings rotating slowly, reflecting this pure-white world.

The cursed spirit froze.

It hovered in the white space, all four arms stiff in midair, its tooth-filled mouth slightly open as it made a bewildered sound.

"Urrgh?!"

It did not understand what had happened.

One moment, it had been inside its own domain. The next, it had been dragged into this unfamiliar space.

It could feel that everything here-the stone pillars, the white light, even the air itself-was filled with that black-haired boy's cursed energy.

This was his world.

His rules.

Madara raised his hand, spreading his fingers with his palm facing upward.

"I understand the essence of my cursed technique now," he said softly, his voice echoing through the white space, as clear as a whisper beside the ear.

"Or rather, I should have understood long ago."

He watched the rotating pillars, watched this world he had created, and a trace of understanding flashed through his eyes.

"It's something very obvious."

He lowered his hand, the purple light in his Rinnegan growing brighter.

"My cursed technique is-"

He did not finish.

But the answer was already self-evident.

Madara Uchiha.

Not a particular ninjutsu, not a specific ability, but the very existence known as "Madara Uchiha."

The Sharingan, the Mangekyō Sharingan, Susanoo, the Rinnegan, even the abilities he had yet to unlock-everything was a manifestation of the concept of "Madara Uchiha."

And now-

He looked at the cursed spirit.

The cursed spirit seemed to realize the danger and began struggling frantically.

It beat its wings, trying to escape the space, but the surrounding whiteness seemed to form solid walls, trapping it in place.

It opened its mouth and spat a black beam of cursed energy at the nearest stone pillar.

The pillar did not budge.

The beam was absorbed the moment it touched the pillar, leaving not even a trace.

Madara shook his head.

"It's no use. It'll be over soon."

"AAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!"

The cursed spirit let out a fierce scream of agony.

Outside the abandoned school.

A black official car was parked by the roadside. Kiyotaka Ijichi sat in the driver's seat, nervously watching the dilapidated school gates ahead.

In the passenger seat, Satoru Gojo sat with his legs crossed and his chin propped on one hand.

They had rushed over after receiving an urgent report from Window-fluctuations of special grade cursed energy had suddenly been detected at a cursed spirit gathering site originally rated Grade 2, suggesting that an unregistered special grade cursed spirit might have emerged.

Satoru Gojo had been dispatched to handle it.

"We're still a little way from the school," Satoru Gojo suddenly said. "Ijichi, stop the car."

Ijichi froze, but still stepped on the brake. "Ah, yes."

They were still roughly two hundred meters from the school.

Satoru Gojo had told him to stop because the opponent's strength was unknown-if it was a special grade capable of expanding a domain, the battle might affect the surrounding area.

As an assistant supervisor, Ijichi had no combat ability. Getting too close would put him in danger.

"Just stay here," Satoru Gojo said, pushing open the car door. "I'll be right back~"

Ijichi hurriedly said, "All right, then I'll lower a Curtain-"

"Wait."

Satoru Gojo suddenly stopped moving.

Standing outside the car, he looked up toward the school. Then a smile slowly curved his lips.

Ijichi was puzzled. "Is something wrong?"

"Nothing." Satoru Gojo looked away and sat back down in the car. "No need to go."

"Huh?" Ijichi was even more confused.

Satoru Gojo leaned against the seat back, his tone relaxed. "Because someone's already taken care of it for us."

"Wh-what!?" Ijichi's eyes widened. "An unknown jujutsu sorcerer? Or another special grade-"

"No," Satoru Gojo interrupted him, his smile deepening. "It's someone we know. Drive up and pick him up."

Though Ijichi's head was full of questions, he still started the car and drove toward the school gates.

Just as they reached the gates, they saw someone walk out through the gap in the perimeter wall.

It was Madara Uchiha.

He looked no different than usual-his clothes were a little dusty and his hair a little disheveled, but neither was much of an issue.

Madara paused when he saw the approaching car.

The car window rolled down, and Satoru Gojo stuck his head out and waved. "Yo~! Madara!"

"Gojo-sensei?" Madara walked over, looked at the car, then at Satoru Gojo. "What are you doing here?"

"That's what I should be asking," Satoru Gojo said, waving a hand. "We only just got word about a special grade cursed spirit, and here you are. Don't tell me..."

Madara admitted it openly. "I wanted to test my domain, so I found this place. I didn't expect to run into a special grade cursed spirit."

"So," Satoru Gojo said, his smile taking on a little more interest, "how did it go?"

Madara smiled too, a smile filled with absolute confidence.

"Too easy."

Two words, delivered casually.

Satoru Gojo burst out laughing, his laughter echoing through the empty street. "Was it, was it! That's really good news."

He looked at Madara, complex emotions in his eyes-gratification, pride, anticipation, and... worry.

It was a good thing to see a dependable junior grow, but sometimes, growing too quickly could be unsettling too.

But Satoru Gojo suppressed those emotions and patted the car door. "Come on, I'll treat you to a meal. To celebrate your first time exorcising a special grade cursed spirit on your own~"

Madara's eyes lit up. "Really!? Thank you, Gojo-sensei~"

He opened the car door and sat in the back seat. Ijichi glanced at him in the rearview mirror, cold sweat beading on his forehead.

A few months ago, this boy had been nothing more than a newcomer who had just awakened his cursed energy.

A few months later, he could already exorcise a special grade cursed spirit on his own, and had even deployed a domain.

That rate of growth... was simply terrifying.

Ijichi started the car and drove away from the abandoned school.

Satoru Gojo hummed an off-key tune in the front passenger seat, while Madara sat in the back, watching the scenery rush past the window.

Sunlight streamed through the car windows, warm and pleasant.