T0 Intel: Satoru Gojo

Looking at the man who had provoked him again and again, Sukuna smiled disdainfully.

He activated Reverse Cursed Technique, and his arms regenerated in the blink of an eye.

"A challenger?"

He sneered. "You just landed a sneak attack, yet you're really enjoying yourself, aren't you?"

"Satoru Gojo, you're nothing more than a fish on the chopping block to me. Even if you can flop around more than the others, you're still just a nameless little fish."

Sukuna took his stance, the corners of his mouth rising as scarlet Cursed Energy gathered between his palms.

"Now... I'll start by stripping off your scales!"

Everyone had gathered in the monitoring room.

Watching Sukuna deliver the same lines and make the same moves as in the original, Shiratori Gotsu couldn't resist a jab.

"Sukuna's still too cultured. His insults don't pack any punch at all."

"You can still say something that ridiculous at a tense moment like this? You're hopeless."

Ryu Ishigori and Kusakabe spoke in unison.

As for the others, they remained focused on the images on the monitor.

Meanwhile, Satoru Gojo took off his jacket, tossed it aside, and began loosening up.

"Come to think of it, why are you still wearing that face? Are you trying to make me go easy on you?"

"I'm afraid you'll be disappointed. I'm professionally trained."

Finished warming up, he took his stance, looking ready to strike.

"Even if it's Megumi, I can still go all out without holding back."

"Considering Yuji already died once at your hands, I think I can kill you first and worry about Megumi afterward!"

"If you can manage it." Sukuna smiled mockingly.

The next instant, the two closed in, trading punches and kicks.

Everything that followed played out exactly as it had in the original, until...

"Hey, hey, hey, here it comes!"

Shiratori Gotsu raised his voice, interrupting the endless discussion in the monitoring room about "why Satoru Gojo and Sukuna didn't clash domains right from the start."

He drew their attention back to the screen.

Satoru Gojo and Sukuna began forming hand signs almost simultaneously, as though they had planned it.

A surge of Cursed Energy instantly enveloped the battlefield.

"Domain Expansion!"

"Domain Expansion!"

Unlike Shiratori Gotsu's unpracticed domain barrier, which expanded slowly before closing,

Unlimited Void's domain sphere formed almost instantly, enclosing them both in the blink of an eye.

At the same time, Malevolent Shrine's shrine appeared beneath Sukuna's feet, surrounded by a carpet of bones.

Within Satoru Gojo's domain barrier, their sure-hit effects canceled each other out.

That meant whichever one of them suffered a devastating blow first, causing his domain to begin collapsing, would be struck by the other's sure-hit Cursed Technique the next instant.

But Malevolent Shrine was an Open Domain with a greater range, allowing it to attack Unlimited Void from outside its barrier.

And a domain's barrier was very vulnerable to attacks from the outside.

Crack.

Under the onslaught of slashes that blanketed the area, a crack appeared in Unlimited Void's outer barrier.

A smile appeared on Sukuna's face, as though declaring victory.

But the next instant, Gojo's expression seemed to say, Just as I thought.

"Hmph... Sure enough, Shiratori's information was right on the mark."

As he spoke, Satoru Gojo raised his hands and formed another sign.

At the name "Shiratori," the smile vanished from Sukuna's face.

Realizing something was wrong, he immediately increased Malevolent Shrine's output, but Satoru Gojo had already acted.

The domain sphere, originally over ten meters in radius, shrank inward at tremendous speed, becoming the size of a basketball in the blink of an eye.

Seeing this on the monitoring room screen, everyone cheered.

Shiratori Gotsu picked up the juice he had bought earlier and took a sip. "Sure enough, everything's going as expected."

"Shiratori, you're reliable as always," Okkotsu said with a smile.

"Your foresight is incredible, Senpai!" Itadori also made no effort to hold back his praise.

After learning from Shiratori Gotsu that Malevolent Shrine was an Open Domain, Satoru Gojo had specifically trained to counter it during his pre-battle preparations.

Compressing the domain's outer shell and changing the hardness of the barrier's interior and exterior-although Satoru Gojo had used each of these later in the original, they had been countermeasures devised on the spot.

His proficiency with them couldn't possibly compare to what he had achieved through dedicated training.

Yet even so, he had managed to put Sukuna at a disadvantage in their domain clash.

Let alone now...

The basketball-sized Unlimited Void stood firm against Malevolent Shrine's storm of slashes.

Inside the domain, Satoru Gojo and Sukuna continued to fight.

"So that Shiratori Gotsu was on your side!" Sukuna threw an angry punch at Satoru Gojo's stomach. "I never should have let him get away!"

Satoru Gojo blocked the blow with one hand and returned it with a knee strike. He didn't forget to mock Sukuna, either.

"You clearly didn't even react in time!"

"The mighty King of Curses, repeatedly getting the worst of it because of a Grade 2 Jujutsu Sorcerer. How hilarious!"

As he taunted him, Satoru Gojo drove a heavy punch into Sukuna's ribs.

But unexpectedly, Sukuna didn't retreat after taking the blow. Instead, he used the momentum to press against Satoru Gojo, slip behind him, and lock him in a hold.

"Don't tell me you thought you were the only one who could change the conditions of your domain?"

Sukuna formed a sign with one hand, and Malevolent Shrine's range instantly shrank until it just covered Unlimited Void's basketball-sized barrier.

At the same time, he made a Binding Vow by canceling Malevolent Shrine's sure-hit effect inside the domain, further increasing the power of the slashes outside it in exchange.

As for how to counter Unlimited Void after canceling the sure-hit effect...

The reason Sukuna pressed himself against Satoru Gojo's back was that, inside the domain, anyone in physical contact with Satoru Gojo could, like Satoru Gojo himself,

Be immune to Unlimited Void's effects.

Sukuna had learned this while inside Itadori's body, back when Satoru Gojo fought Jogo in a domain battle.

An attack range compressed to its limit, combined with a Binding Vow to increase its power... Unlimited Void's domain barrier once again gave an overstrained crack.