"Okay."
Yuji responded and snapped the wooden stake in his hand. Immediately, the curtain that had been set at Meiji-Jingumae Station to prevent sorcerers from entering disappeared.
"Rest in peace…"
After throwing the broken stake aside, the boy bowed toward the corpse that had been eaten beyond recognition by the locust curse, then followed after his teacher.
'Itadori really is kind…'
Compared to Nanami, Haibara tended to show his emotions openly on his face.
"There should be another one… probably at the lowest platform…"
Ignoring the brief interruption, the two of them jogged deeper underground while Haibara muttered to himself. The strength of the outer curtain was completely different from the one they had just destroyed, which meant another base of the curtain still existed inside.
It was likely located somewhere near the center.
About a dozen seconds later, they arrived at the fifth underground level. On the way down, they had not encountered a single curse or curse user.
But the path had been too smooth.
There was not even a single living person in sight.
According to the intelligence provided by the Window, there should have been at least several hundred civilians trapped here. Based on Ko-Guy's size and the speed they saw him eating, even if he ate all day he would not be able to consume that many people.
Unless there were other curses here.
Or a curse user with some special ability.
When they reached the fifth underground level, the scene in front of them changed again.
Signs of violent destruction were everywhere. More than a dozen human corpses lay in pools of blood.
Yuji's lips trembled.
The thing he feared most was seeing people who should have been saved dying right before his eyes. Human lives had been trampled, and the scattered bodies struck his kind heart again and again.
"Looking at the wounds… this was done by a curse user."
In contrast, Haibara remained calm. He crouched down and carefully examined the wounds before quickly reaching a conclusion.
There was a trace of cursed energy left in the wounds. If a curse had done this, the residual cursed energy would be much stronger and more obvious.
"Damn it… what are they trying to do? Even curse users are still human, right? Why would they treat their own kind like this…"
Yuji could not understand it. To him, humans should not harm each other.
But in reality, humans had killed far more humans than curses ever had.
"They can't really be called humans anymore. Itadori, don't let what you see shake your mind. As sorcerers, we just do what we can."
Haibara was beginning to understand why Nanami had asked him to guide Yuji.
Yuji was very kind.
But too much kindness could easily break someone, especially when Sukuna was still inside him like a ticking bomb.
Yuji had already devoted his entire heart to the duty of a sorcerer, to the point where he valued other people's lives more than his own.
Because he himself was a "vessel" that could be sacrificed at any moment.
"But… if I had been faster, maybe they could have…"
Yuji turned his head, clearly struggling to accept what he saw. Since entering the jujutsu world, he had never witnessed so many deaths at once.
"Then keep moving forward. We'll stay with you until you can run faster and save more people. That's what we sorcerers do."
Haibara's personality was similar to Yuji's.
The difference was that he always remained positive and optimistic.
When facing things like this, he acted like a mirror with a special ability. He accepted the other's emotions, then reflected sunlight back to drive away the darkness in their heart.
"Haibara-sensei…" Yuji's voice shook, but he nodded firmly.
The two stepped over the corpses on the ground and headed toward the platform ahead.
There was no time to mourn the dead. What they needed to do now was save the living.
"The stake… it's here?!"
Once they reached the platform, a wooden stake wrapped in talismans appeared before them. But before they arrived, it had already been snapped into two pieces.
Unlike the second underground floor, there were no curses or curse users guarding it.
Thinking about the locust curse above, this was not difficult to understand.
Whether people could see curses or not, fear of the unknown would push them toward what they believed to be a safer place.
That meant going downward.
But then another question appeared. Why carefully set up a curtain only to break it yourself afterward?
And the timing.
Was it coincidence? Or had someone intentionally waited for others to arrive before destroying the curtain?
"If it's broken like this… can it still work?"
Yuji picked up the two broken pieces and looked at Haibara.
"Normally it shouldn't. The talismans are broken in the middle, so the barrier carved into them is incomplete," Haibara answered instantly.
Then he jumped down onto the train tracks and looked toward the dark tunnel ahead.
The ground still held some warmth.
He had a bad feeling.
"There's someone over there!"
Just then, Yuji noticed a figure curled up in the corner. The sudden discovery filled him with hope as he quickly ran over.
"Miss, please don't be afraid. We're here to rescue you. What happened here? Where did everyone else go…"
Yuji crouched down and spoke as gently as possible to the woman, who looked completely terrified.
"They were taken away…"
Her voice was broken, but her meaning was clear.
Just a few minutes ago, the area had been filled with civilians trapped here just like her. Then suddenly a very strong man carrying a knife appeared above and began killing people, forcing everyone down here.
At that moment, a train arrived.
Everyone desperately rushed to get on board. She had tried as well.
But when the doors closed, she had failed to squeeze inside.
Yet something strange happened. The killer did not attack her. Instead, he took out a wooden stake, snapped it in half, then jumped onto the roof of the train and left with it.
She had stayed behind, hiding here in fear that more people like that might still be above.
"Are they planning to use them as hostages?"
Yuji frowned while thinking.
"I don't know. Shibuya Station is nearby. This might also be part of their plan. But with Gojo-senpai over there—"
Haibara was about to say that Satoru would handle everything when the phone in his pocket suddenly vibrated.
(Because they arrived here after Gojo entered the curtain, they still did not know he had been sealed.)
"Let's go. We'll return to Shibuya from the surface."
Haibara's expression suddenly turned serious.
"Did something happen?"
"A new curtain suddenly appeared in Shibuya. It prevents sorcerers from entering. If we keep going through the tunnel, we'll be blocked. And… they need us over there."
The call had delivered the news. Both of the strongest had already encountered disaster.
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