Chapter 113 : Crappy Luck
Satomi’s laughter faded, replaced by a rare look of genuine surprise.
The air warped, and she appeared right next to Mark on the surface of the pond.
She slid her sunglasses back up, eyes locking onto the empty stretch of mud where the two curses had just vanished.
"Well, damn," she murmured, all the playfulness gone.
"Compared to that arrogant volcano, this one’s actually dangerous. Blended its cursed energy perfectly with the plant life. Even my Six Eyes didn’t catch it until the last second."
Mark didn’t say anything. He just stood there, watching the sawdust settle on the water.
Inside his head, he was screaming.
Motherfucker! Son of a bitch! God fucking damn it!
Every American swear word he knew, on loop, furious.
This was supposed to be a setup. He’d held back the Hollow Purple on purpose.
Left Jogo’s head intact on purpose, because he knew the plot — knew Hanami would show up to play savior the second the volcano got cornered.
He’d even used future vision, skimmed the timeline, watched his fist bury itself in a solid torso.
But he’d gotten careless. Saw the hit land and stopped looking — didn’t bother checking what it actually landed on.
The plan was clean: bait the rescue, let the tree bastard jump in, wipe them both out in one shot.
A decoy. A fucking log with a face.
Fucking decoy, Mark thought, jaw locked so tight his teeth ground together.
If he’d caught them both here, he could’ve derailed Kenjaku’s entire timeline.
Skipped Shibuya. Stopped a mountain of bullshit before it even started, right here on this stupid mountain.
Fuck Hanami. Fucking bitch
He closed his eyes, exhaled long and slow, forcing the rage back down before it gave him an aneurysm. Hands back in his pockets, the sleepy, lazy look sliding back over his face like nothing had happened.
"Whatever," he grumbled, turning away from the mudbank. "Let’s just grab the merch and go. I need a fucking nap."
Satomi fell in beside him, scanning the wrecked forest, brow furrowing.
"Isn’t it strange, though? Two unregistered Special Grades." Her tone sharpened. "Curses like that don’t just show up. And they definitely don’t work together to save each other. That was organized. Intelligent."
Mark stopped at the edge of the melted asphalt and picked up his Akihabara bags — completely untouched. "Yeah. Means someone with an actual brain is pulling their strings."
Satomi smirked, arms crossed, a dangerous spark lighting up her eyes. "A cursed spirit alliance. How fun. Wonder who’s running it."
A brain in a jar wearing a dead monk’s body, Mark thought bitterly, swallowing another sigh. And thanks to that tree, Kenjaku knows about me now too.
"Don’t know, don’t care," he lied, stifling a yawn as he slung the bags over his shoulder. "Sounds like tomorrow’s problem."
***
The sound of gentle waves lapped against the shore inside Dagon’s innate domain.
Kenjaku sat sprawled on a woven lounge chair, dressed in Suguru Geto’s stolen robes, chin resting on his hand.
A serene, faintly amused smile played across his face as he looked down at the severed, smoking head lying in the white sand.
"Let me make sure I understand the sequence of events," Kenjaku said, smooth and conversational, entirely unbothered that half his strike force had just gotten humiliated.
Jogo’s jaw clenched, eye averted, shame written all over what was left of his face. Hanami stood silently beside him, offering nothing.
Kenjaku tilted his head, dark eyes gleaming with sudden interest.
He’d sent Jogo on a suicide run specifically to test Satomi’s limits — fully expected the arrogant volcano to come back in pieces.
What he hadn’t expected was for the pieces to bring back news this far outside a thousand years of calculation.
"You’re telling me there was a second sorcerer," he murmured, tapping a finger against his cheek.
"A blonde man with untrackable cursed energy, who had the Limitless, buried your domain under Unlimited Void, and erased your body with Hollow Purple?"
"His cursed energy felt infinite," Jogo rasped, spitting a glob of dark blood onto the sand.
"Like staring into a crushing ocean. He wasn’t even taking us seriously. If Hanami hadn’t used a decoy, we’d both be gone."
Kenjaku didn’t panic. Didn’t so much as blink. The smile on his face just widened into something closer to real, morbid fascination.
A second Six Eyes user? A walking anomaly with boundless energy, mirroring the strongest sorcerer alive? By every rule of Jujutsu, two Six Eyes users couldn’t exist at once.
The world was breaking its own laws right in front of him.
How utterly fascinating. A thrill cracked through his usual cold calculation.
A thousand years of planning, and the world had still managed to hand him a variable he’d never seen coming.
This didn’t ruin the game. It made the board a hell of a lot more interesting.
Kenjaku chuckled, rising from the chair, brushing off his robes.
"Well," he said, eyes narrowing with something dangerously close to delight. "Seems this world is far more chaotic than I gave it credit for. We’ll have to adjust the plan for Shibuya."
And, he suspected, he wasn’t going to like this new Six Eyes user much either — if the trait held true, they were bound to be just as insufferable as the last one.