[Geto and Haibara, standing off to the side, looked like someone had physically removed the floor beneath them.]

[Those composed eyes of Geto’s had gone perfectly round, the corners twitching involuntarily, while Haibara’s jaw hung open, disbelief scrawled across every inch of his face.]

[Neither of them, in their wildest imagination, had expected that Touma Hayase, the perpetually calm, razor-sharp, borderline enigmatic figure they thought they knew, would respond to a Special Grade Jujutsu Sorcerer’s come-on with that level of brazen conviction and what could only be described as a hardcore otaku manifesto.]

[Your choice of that seemingly absurd answer was, of course, anything but random.]

[On one hand, it provided an explanation for why the arrival of someone as magnetically attractive as Tsukumo hadn’t produced so much as a blip in your pulse.

On the other, the words themselves weren’t sincere, but under the absolute reinforcement of Life is Like a Play, the lie had been forged into truth.]

[But a woman who stood at the apex of the Jujutsu world was never going to be deflected by a few absurd sentences.]

[She had no intention of letting it go. Despite the flawless performance you’d delivered, the casual amusement on her face was already receding, replaced by something edged and clinical.]

[Every predatory instinct she possessed was screaming the same thing: that answer was garbage.]

[Her eyes narrowed, red lips parting, and the words came out laced with iron certainty.]

["That’s a lie, isn’t it, Hayase?"]

[Before you could even begin assembling your next deflection, Geto moved first.]

[He’d been wary of this woman from the moment she’d breached Jujutsu High’s grounds and zeroed in on you. Her aggressive, probing manner had curdled that wariness into open hostility.]

["What exactly are you here for? If you’re looking for trouble, Special Grade or not, Jujutsu High isn’t a playground."]

[Tsukumo didn’t spare his warning so much as a glance. Didn’t bother to rebut.]

[From the beginning, her attention had been locked onto you like iron to a magnet, and nothing short of physical force was going to pry it loose.]

[She stared at your face as though trying to read something etched on the back of your skull, and spoke with absolute seriousness.]

["My gut tells me you are categorically not the kind of person who’d have such a boring preference..."]

[The certainty in her voice tripped something. Inside your racing mind, several key puzzle pieces snapped together at once.]

[You had a rough idea now. She’d sensed it, somehow. Figured out that you were the anonymous caller who’d contacted her over a year ago.]

[What you couldn’t yet determine was through what intelligence network or method she’d traced that voice back to your real identity.]

[None of this showed on your face. You met her gaze with eyes as still as glass and answered in a tone better suited to discussing the weather.]

["Then maybe your gut needs recalibrating. I don’t recall Ms. Tsukumo and I being close enough to have opinions on each other’s taste."]

[Tsukumo seemed to tire of the verbal fencing. She decided to flip her cards face-up.] 𝕗𝚛𝚎𝚎𝐰𝗲𝗯𝗻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝕞

[No more circling. Straight for the throat.]

["Starting roughly a year ago, the person looking after Toji Fushiguro’s child... that’s you, isn’t it?"]

[So a year was enough to trace it back this far...]

["It is. And?"]

[Four syllables, tossed off like pocket change, and they sent tidal waves crashing through the heads of the two people beside you.]

[Geto and Haibara wore matching expressions of pure, fog-thick bewilderment. They felt like bystanders who’d accidentally wandered into someone else’s classified briefing.]

Who’s Fushiguro? What child? Why would a Special Grade who’s been abroad for years come to Jujutsu High specifically to confront Touma over some kid she’d never met? What kind of secret arrangement existed between these two?

[Your unhesitating admission drew a look of vindication across Tsukumo’s face, a flash of "exactly as I suspected."]

[She stepped closer, pressure rolling off her, and pressed harder.]

["Then why? Why would you go out of your way to do something so thankless?"]

[Your expression didn’t waver. With practiced ease, you deployed the explanation you’d rehearsed to perfection across countless mental simulations.]

["Fushiguro was an acquaintance of my father’s from his work with the Zenin Clan. One day out of the blue, he mentioned he’d taken on a big job and would be gone a long time. Paid me to watch the kid while he was away. Is there a problem with that?"]

["Of course there’s a problem!"]

[Tsukumo’s voice surged, her body snapping forward, eyes blazing as she fired back.]

["You should know better than anyone what kind of scum Toji Fushiguro was! During the Star Plasma Vessel escort mission, you didn’t hesitate to kill Curse Users hired by the Star Religious Group to protect her. Someone with that much hatred for evil, willingly helping the ’Sorcerer Killer,’ a man who hunted Jujutsu Sorcerers for a living, raise his child? The logic doesn’t hold. I can’t make sense of it..."]

["There’s nothing hard to make sense of. One thing’s got nothing to do with the other. The blood on his hands and the sins he committed are his business. That child, who knows nothing about any of it, has nothing to do with them."]

[Tsukumo didn’t accept the noble framing. She stopped arguing. Instead, her gaze locked onto your eyes, each word falling with the weight of a verdict.]

["Unless... he didn’t just leave for a while, like you said. He left this world. Permanently."]

[Even with Tsukumo’s terrifying intuition and intelligence analysis having driven her deduction to this bone-deep conclusion, not a trace of distress crossed your face.]

[You blinked, almost innocently, and answered with the mildest possible confusion.]

["Left permanently? I’m not sure I follow what you’re getting at, Ms. Tsukumo."]

["Is that so..."]

[The murmur barely left her lips before something detonated behind her eyes. In the same heartbeat, without a shred of hesitation, she ignited the monstrous Cursed Energy coiled inside her.]

[The air solidified. Geto’s Special Grade perception screamed before his conscious mind caught up, and his face drained of color. Instinct seized him first, pure shock and terror ripping a shout from his throat.]

["Touma! Move!"]

[Too slow. Tsukumo’s fist, loaded with the catastrophic virtual mass of Star Rage, had already torn through the sound barrier and was hurtling straight at your face.]

[She was done listening to explanations. She trusted her fists more. This single strike, powerful enough to split a mountainside, would answer the only question that mattered: whether the unassuming student standing before her truly concealed the kind of power capable of killing a monster like Toji Fushiguro.]

[BOOM.]

[No gore painted the corridor walls. What erupted instead was a deafening shockwave, the roar of immense kinetic force compressing air to its absolute limit, loud enough to rupture eardrums.]

[Wind shrieked through the hallway, whipping the hair across your forehead into a frenzy.]

[But Tsukumo’s fist, carrying enough force to pulverize a Special Grade Cursed Spirit, hung frozen. One centimeter from your skull. No closer.]

[Against the impassable wall of Limitless, against that infinite barrier of folded space, the mountain-shattering power locked in place and could not advance a single hair’s breadth further.]

[Geto’s pupils contracted to pinpoints. Then fury erupted from somewhere deep in his chest.]

[No hesitation. His hands flew through seals, and multiple Grade 1 Cursed Spirits tore howling out of warped space, surrounding Tsukumo on every side.]

[Killing intent glittered in his eyes, and his voice cracked through the corridor like a whip.]

["Have you lost your mind?!"]

[Beside him, the sunshine that usually lived on Haibara’s face had gone dark. Gone completely.]

[Without a moment’s pause, his hand locked around the hilt of the cursed tool at his waist.]

[A blade-sharp wave of sword pressure laced with Cursed Energy exploded outward from him in a perfect sphere: New Shadow Style, Simple Domain.]

[Because both of them understood, with sickening clarity, that even if Tsukumo’s intent had been nothing more than a test, the blow she’d thrown would have reduced either of their skulls to red mist on contact. If it had landed on anyone other than you and your absolute defense, they’d be dead where they stood.]

[At the dead center of the storm, surrounded by killing intent thick enough to choke on, you didn’t so much as blink.]

[You lifted your gaze to meet Tsukumo’s, close enough to count her eyelashes, her own expression flickering with a shard of genuine shock at encountering Limitless.]

[Nothing stirred in the depths of your eyes. Your voice came out level, quiet, and threaded with a pressure that made the air feel heavier.]

["Ms. Tsukumo. If that was meant to be a test... as jokes go, it was in rather poor taste. And it wasn’t funny in the slightest."]

---

Join my Patreon for early access to Chapters: patreon.com/rivyura

Next Target 600PS :)