While things were heating up on the other side, it was just as lively on Suguru's side.
Yuji, the brave hero who dared to challenge the Demon King alone, had already collapsed on the ground, his eyes spinning like mosquito coils, his butt sticking up.
Beside him, a soft, pink Cursed Spirit was holding a sign, poking here and there, but unfortunately, the sign would not stand up.
Looking closely, a few crooked words were written on the sign: "I've behaved, please let me go."
Finally, with the Cursed Spirit's persistent effort, it found a place where the sign could stand, and it was very conspicuous.
His butt.
Yuji, who had been knocked unconscious by the pummeling, shivered all over, a pained expression on his face, as if he were having a nightmare.
"To... Todo... hurry up... use your full strength..."
Not far from where Yuji had fallen, Maki and Suguru were fighting with increasing fervor.
Maki, wielding the Thousand Machine Umbrella, and Suguru, wielding Playful Cloud, were truly enjoying their fight.
Maki had been diligently training her body in order to gain the strength that would allow her and her sister to live freely without being bullied by others.
Although Suguru was the Jujutsu World's number one master of Cursed Spirits, he was also an avid enthusiast of body training.
He was the kind of person unreasonable enough to challenge someone else's profession with his hobby.
So, the two of them were indeed having a very satisfying fight.
"Your name is Maki, isn't it?"
Clang.
Playful Cloud and the Thousand Machine Umbrella collided, emitting a crisp sound.
"What, do you want to know who defeated you in advance?"
Maki looked provocatively at Suguru.
Unfortunately, Suguru was not provoked by Maki.
"You're in your second year of high school, so you'll graduate in two years, right? Would you like to become part of my family then?"
Suguru smiled as he swung Playful Cloud, using its chain to entangle the Thousand Machine Umbrella, and then both sides began a tug-of-war.
"Too bad, I already have irreplaceable family."
Maki said this, increasing the force in her hands again.
"Is it that child behind you?"
Suguru looked past Maki toward Mai, who stood in the distance with her arms crossed in an elegant posture.
He saw in Maki's eyes a will he was familiar with and loved.
It was love, pride, and strong possessiveness toward family.
In this life, Suguru, whose ideology had been corrected in time by proper moral education, no longer used Jujutsu Sorcerers with Cursed Energy and monkeys without Cursed Energy as the standard for distinguishing people.
So, he was far less extreme than in the original story.
"If she's willing, she can join my big family too."
Suguru withdrew his gaze and smiled at Maki.
However, in the current situation, those words...
Especially when Suguru was not wearing his iconic five-striped monk robes, but rather a pair of floral shorts similar in style to Satoru's, it sounded a bit off.
"If you keep talking like that, I'll accuse you of harassment!"
Maki twisted the Thousand Machine Umbrella's disk.
Amid a series of creaking transformation sounds, the Thousand Machine Umbrella broke free from Playful Cloud's chain restraint.
"You know I didn't mean it that way."
Suguru held both ends of Playful Cloud, constantly deflecting Maki's attacks.
"Thanks for the offer, but I don't want to join a weird religious group with my sister."
Unable to break through, Maki drew a katana from the bottom of the Thousand Machine Umbrella, beginning a dual-wielding fighting style with a katana in her left hand and a war spear in her right.
Because Suguru's speed and skill were both very strong, Maki could not use her favorite greatsword form with two blades.
That form was too cumbersome against Suguru, who dual-wielded Playful Cloud. She had accidentally been stabbed a few times before.
Just then, a large amount of purple lightning followed the water flow beneath their feet to where they were fighting.
This was immediately followed by the shockwave from an explosion.
Both sides leaped at the same time to dodge.
After another powerful collision between the Thousand Machine Umbrella and Playful Cloud, both flew backward.
"Warm-up's over. Now for the real fight."
After Suguru finished speaking, a dark space appeared behind him.
However, only a small number of Cursed Spirits appeared in the space. Most of them were Heavy Armored Crabs, Bubble Seahorses, Angel Sea Hares, and other creatures from the first island.
"Your Cursed Spirit Manipulation can even capture these things?"
Maki looked surprised. These cute and beautiful creatures did not look like Cursed Spirits at all.
"Indeed, it can capture them."
Suguru spread his hands.
Eichi, outside the arena, slapped himself hard across the face.
Slap.
A crisp sound rang out.
To save trouble, he had used the method of generating imaginary Cursed Spirits to create these creatures in the imaginary world, and he had not expected it to benefit Suguru so much.
At this moment, Eichi recalled Medea's previous report that the creatures in the imaginary world had started a civil war.
At the time, he had been so engrossed in watching the exhilarating pummeling battle between Yuji, Todo, and the Shadow Servant Heracles that he had not paid attention to it.
Now, he felt a sense of shame and guilt for having cut corners and been discovered.
'No, this isn't my problem. Ultimately, Satoru and Suguru weren't even invited to this event!
And Suguru must have been instigated by Satoru to do this.
So everything is Satoru's fault.'
Rather than blame himself, it was better to blame Satoru.
Thinking this, Eichi felt much better.
"What step are we on?"
Eichi immediately looked at Medea, who was adding new functions for the students.
"Almost there. It needs another ten minutes."
The eleven magic circles around Medea grew brighter and brighter.
"Ten minutes."
Eichi looked at the barrier screen.
'Come on, if even Miguel can last ten minutes without being killed by Satoru, I believe you all can too.'
After silently praying for everyone in his heart, Eichi also lowered his head and continued with this official emergency strengthening.
Just as the people outside were busy, new changes were also occurring in the competition venue.
"Huff, huff, I'm back."
Nobara ran back to the platform, panting.
Initially, in order to make better use of her Straw Doll Technique, Nobara had exchanged her earned points for Todo's Boogie Woogie.
Relying on the combination of Boogie Woogie and Straw Doll Technique, Nobara had almost achieved a sure-hit effect similar to a Domain.
She had originally intended to use this move to easily deal with everyone except that gorilla from the Kyoto School, but she had not expected the two schools to team up, and now she had to fight Satoru?
Me, fighting Satoru?
With what?
Hoping he would be gentle with the fairer sex?
Nobara silently cursed the school administration in her heart, then ran off the platform to farm points from Shadow Servants.
Fortunately, the Shadow Servants gave a lot of points, and Nobara did not take long to accumulate enough points to exchange for the Ten Shadows Technique and Shinkage-ryu: Simple Domain.
The former was the currently known Cursed Technique that posed the greatest threat to Satoru, and the latter was to counter Satoru's Domain Expansion.
After all, Nobara could not perform Domain Expansion, nor did she have Maki's characteristic of being unable to be automatically recognized by a Domain.
Just then, a system panel notification rang out.
[Ding, congratulations to everyone for receiving the Holy Grail's blessing. Please click to view.]
(To be continued.)
◇◇◇
◇ One bonus chapter will be released for every 200 Power Stones.
◇ You can read the ahead chapter on Pat if you're interested: p-atreon.c-om/Blownleaves (Just remove the hyphen to access normally.)