Crimson Blood Manipulation, [Hundred Refinement].
True to its name, which means “to gather in a hundred drops of blood,” it is a technique that draws blood together to the extreme and compresses it.
How perfectly and how quickly one can perform [Hundred Refinement] is enough to judge the skill of a user of Crimson Blood Manipulation, which is why it is called the alpha and omega of the art.
The usual method is to combine it with a secret art.
Release the blood compressed by [Hundred Refinement] from a single point and fire it.
This secret art, in which blood reinforced by cursed energy flies at a speed that surpasses even the speed of sound, is one of Crimson Blood Manipulation’s ultimate moves.
Its name—
“Thousand Blood.”
Pshuuuu—!
The beam of blood released from Choso’s fingertips shot forward at a speed that broke the sound barrier.
The blood that pierced through the elephant shikigami summoned in front of Megumi aimed straight for him, and he reflexively drew the sword in his hand.
The supersonic blood gouged into the side of the steel blade, driving Megumi backward.
Ssssss!
“Fast. And sharp!”
Under the pressure and piercing force of Thousand Blood, the Grade 1 cursed tool sword was being shaved away.
Megumi’s arms, braced around the sword, began to tremble as well, slowly slipping beyond his control.
Shhrrrk!
“!”
Before Thousand Blood could fully punch through the sword, he barely managed to let it slide along the blade and throw himself aside.
Choso clicked his tongue, looking disappointed. Once again, compressed blood beads floated up around him, ready to attack.
He had failed to land a clean hit because the elephant’s bulk had interfered and weakened the attack, but he wouldn’t be able to keep dodging or blocking forever.
Once more—Thousand Blood.
Pshuuuu!
Because he had already compressed the blood in advance with [Hundred Refinement], the windup was greatly reduced, and just as Choso expected, this time Megumi couldn’t evade it.
The red laser pierced Megumi’s thigh.
“Gah!”
A scream burst from Megumi’s mouth.
Just as Choso swung his arm to cut the whole leg off, the tongue of a toad shikigami stuck to his hand.
“Sneaky little tricks.”
The sticky viscosity of the tongue forced Choso’s hands apart, the momentum of Thousand Blood fading. In that opening, Megumi yanked his leg free and formed hand signs with a pained expression.
“Round Deer.”
A deer shikigami appeared behind him.
When the limping Megumi pressed his leg against it, the flesh knitted together in an instant and the wound healed.
There was still some aftereffect, and it throbbed painfully, but it was no longer bad enough to interfere with his movement like before.
“Hup!”
Shrrk!
While Megumi was healing, Choso created blood daggers in both hands and twisted his wrists to cut away the toad’s tongue that had latched onto him.
He merged the two high-speed blood blades into one, forming a huge blood disk with a blade edge in one hand and hurling it at Megumi.
Wheeeeeee—!
An attack that gave up speed in exchange for pushing its range and power to the extreme.
If that hit, any shikigami would be destroyed in a single blow.
“I can’t lose it before I’ve even figured out the inheritance conditions!”
Megumi tried to hide behind Round Deer, but realized it was useless. He dismissed all the shikigami and lowered his stance to the extreme.
The blood disk skimmed past just a finger’s width above Megumi’s neck.
Red death was about to be fired again at Megumi, who had felt a chill at how close the reaper had come.
“Thousand Blood...”
“Like hell I’m letting you do that again!”
But this time, Megumi wasn’t going to sit still either.
Since Junpei had beaten Kamo Noritoshi senseless during the exchange event, this was Choso’s first fight against a user of Crimson Blood Manipulation.
Even so, Megumi, who knew the techniques of the Three Great Families inside and out, understood the principle after seeing it just a few times.
“He suppresses the blood’s coagulation to raise the internal pressure. Then what I need to do is obvious.”
“Rabbit Escape!”
Countless rabbits swept across the ground beneath them and gathered in a circle, building a wall.
Choso ignored the rabbits swarming annoyingly around him with a few casual swats, but when his field of vision was obstructed, he temporarily canceled the Thousand Blood he had been about to fire.
He was confident in close combat, but he judged the risk of missing Thousand Blood to be greater.
What Choso, master of Crimson Blood Manipulation, lacked was combat experience. He couldn’t understand what Megumi was trying to do, so he chose to watch for now.
Tap, tap, tap
And then, as the Rabbits piled up and the view finally opened again, he realized he was inside a colosseum made of rabbit walls.
In a wide open space, the effectiveness of the elephant shikigami drops.
The reason he had used Rabbit Escape to narrow the space was...
“Elephant!”
Shaaahhhh—
Diluting the blood with the elephant’s water!
Water sprayed down from above like sprinklers, and the blood beads circling Choso dissolved and flowed to the floor.
The blood cells in the diluted blood burst apart in the large amount of water, making control impossible.
Until the elephant was dismissed, Choso’s manipulation of blood outside his body was effectively bound.
Grrrrr!
As soon as Rabbit Escape was released, the Divine Dogs: Totality that had been summoned charged at Choso.
With his external blood manipulation, which had been handling mid- to long-range firepower, blocked, he was being forced into close combat now.
But Choso quickly judged that he had no other choice and moved.
Crimson Scale Dance.
The line crossing Choso’s cheek changed shape, enhancing his physical abilities.
A kind of doping that manipulated the blood components inside his body. With that alone, Choso’s physical ability rose to a level comparable to Itadori Yuji’s.
Thud! Thud!
His fist, swung in the blink of an eye, slammed into the Divine Dog’s belly and Megumi’s cheek.
For a moment they staggered, but neither the dog nor Megumi was weak enough to go down from that alone.
The two quickly widened the distance and launched a pincer attack from both sides.
“Is this a technique that summons shikigami through shadows? From what I’ve seen so far, he can only use two types at once...”
Even while exchanging blows, Choso calmly analyzed Megumi’s combat power.
That elephant shikigami was probably going to stay summoned, so the only shikigami he could actually use was one type.
It was still a 2-on-1, but Choso thought it was manageable.
Tap
“!!”
When Choso made the preparatory motion of bringing his hands together, Megumi’s face hardened and he took an evasive stance.
It was a trauma response, an instinctive reaction from having experienced the terror of Thousand Blood firsthand.
But that was just a feint from Choso, who had already given up on manipulating blood outside his body. The next instant, his kick sent the Divine Dog protecting him flying along with Megumi.
Thump!
As the two rolled together across the floor, the elephant shikigami wrapped around them with its trunk and hurled them back at Choso once more.
The sword strike and claw strike, now with added momentum, both aimed for Choso’s torso.
A rapid shift from offense to defense.
He blocked Megumi’s sword strike with [Coffin] hardened over his torso and dodged the Divine Dog’s claws, then spun around and smashed his heel into Megumi’s lower body.
Pak!
Megumi lost his balance and fell.
Choso tried to follow through by snapping his chin upward and knocking him unconscious, but the Divine Dog, which had hidden in the shadow beneath him, sprang out and slashed Choso’s torso with its claws.
Shrrrk!
“...!”
When the highest-grade [Coffin] was shaved away by a single claw strike, Choso felt tension creep in and stepped back.
“I need to be careful of that wolf shikigami’s attacks.”
If he allowed a solid hit, he’d be at a disadvantage.
And with the elephant shikigami around, he had no idea when [Coffin] would melt away anyway. If he got hit wrong, a handful of flesh from his side would be torn off.
Even if the usual way to fight a shikigami user was to target the sorcerer first, that depended on the situation.
Choso decided to destroy the most threatening one first: the Divine Dog.
“He’s been obsessively avoiding the destruction of his shikigami since earlier... probably because if it’s destroyed, that’s it.”
Good.
Once it came close, he’d blow it up.
Choso secretly held a blood bead compressed to the limit in his hand, making sure Megumi wouldn’t notice, then took a stance and waited for his opponent to approach.
But to his surprise, Megumi dismissed the Divine Dog and formed a new hand sign.
“That should be enough.”
“...?”
Choso tilted his head at Megumi’s incomprehensible behavior.
He’d been forcing close combat just a moment ago, so why now? Did he have another shikigami?
Up to now, he had shown five shikigami total. It wasn’t easy to imagine there was another type, but there was no harm in being prepared.
To guard against a mid-range attack, Choso quickly tried to close the distance, but a hole in the shadow beneath his feet grabbed at his ankle.
“This is...!”
“Nue!”
The masked bird Megumi had summoned flew toward Choso.
Blue lightning crackled from Nue’s wings, and Choso soon noticed that the water surrounding him had turned red.
Pure water doesn’t conduct electricity, but the water that had been laced with the [Coffin] Choso had shaved off earlier—
had taken on the properties of an electrolyte, multiplying the effect of the lightning several times over.
Crackle-crackle-crackle!!
“Grrghhh!!!”
Blue electricity ran through Choso’s entire body, electrocuting him.
Even as his body was seared stiff with static, Choso did not let go of the blood bead hidden in his right fist.
Rather, the recoil from his limbs curling inward compressed the blood bead even further, until it was on the verge of exploding.
“Just a little closer...!”
With eyes wide open, Choso glared at him, and Megumi prepared his final strike as well.
He had successfully bound Choso’s feet with shadows and immobilized him with Nue’s lightning.
All that was left was to smash him.
Whatever he was hiding, he could just overwhelm it with greater force.
That was the new shikigami he had tamed for this purpose.
“Piercing Ox!”
A shikigami in the form of a black bull was summoned behind Megumi, snorting.
Prrrff.
The distance between Piercing Ox, which had scraped the ground once with its hind legs, and Choso was about 10 meters.
Megumi judged that short distance to be enough and immediately sent Piercing Ox charging.
Goooooo—
The binding placed on Piercing Ox was the prohibition against changing direction.
But in exchange for only being able to go straight, its power and speed increased exponentially in proportion to the distance it ran.
At first it had been running at bicycle speed, but in an instant Piercing Ox was right in front of Choso.
KWA-KA-KA-KA-KA-BOOOOM!!!
“Now!”
At the same time, Choso released the blood bead he had been holding.
“Supernova!”
The charging Piercing Ox and the blood bomb exploding in all directions collided.
----------------------------------
After the aftermath of the tremendous shockwave passed, Megumi, who had been thrown backward, slowly opened his eyes.
Piercing Ox, bleeding from all over its body, collapsed and melted into shadow...
and at the spot where Choso had been standing, only human-sized holes blasted through the wall remained.
“So not fully summoning it was the right call.”
He had given up on piercing power and focused solely on brute force.
Normally, he would have been blown apart in place instead of sent flying, but Megumi, wary of Choso’s last move, gave up on confirming the kill and chose to preserve Piercing Ox.
Fortunately, the attack seemed to have been strong enough that he couldn’t sense Choso’s presence anywhere nearby.
“...I should rest for a bit.”
22:16.
Basement Level 1 of Tokyo Metro Shibuya Station.
Choso versus Fushiguro Megumi.
Fushiguro Megumi wins by decision.
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