The manor had been silent all morning.

Not the comfortable silence Yuji dragged in with him whenever he returned, full of noise and warmth and pointless chatter, but the older kind—the kind the estate had known for centuries, when its halls belonged only to Ryomen Sukuna and the things that served him. The air still carried the metallic thickness of blood, heavy enough to taste, drifting slowly through the open corridor where the doors to the outer hall had been left half-drawn.

The bodies were no longer whole.

A dozen had entered the grounds without permission, cloaked in the arrogance of devotion, whispering prayers they thought might spare them. Worshippers were always the most disappointing. They came trembling, kneeling, offering themselves as if reverence meant anything to him. Sukuna had killed them without hurry, without irritation, without pleasure. Blood spread across the polished floorboards in dark, uneven pools, creeping toward the grooves in the wood like ink seeking somewhere to settle.

He stood at the center of it, untouched.

Not a single drop clung to him. The cursed energy around his massive body bent the mess away as if the filth itself understood it was not permitted to stain him. In his true form, he towered over the ruined hall, well over two meters tall, broad and built for war, four powerful arms resting at ease as though the slaughter had required no effort at all. Each hand flexed once in turn, slow and deliberate, more from habit than necessity, before going still again. The air trembled faintly with the last remnants of his power, the residue of violence hanging in the hall like heat after lightning.

Behind him, Uraume waited in perfect stillness, head slightly bowed, already prepared to have the floor cleaned, the bodies removed, the hall restored before the sun shifted past the eaves.

What was unusual was the quiet.

Yuji had been gone since morning.

The boy drifted in and out of the estate as if the place were both home and not, vanishing for hours to chase whatever caught his interest—friends, food, cheap films, pointless errands that had no weight to them at all. He returned smelling like the outside world, like sugar and street smoke and the faint warmth of other people, and then filled the halls with noise until even the servants moved differently, as if the air itself had softened.

Sukuna found it irritating.

He turned from the bodies, already finished with them, already bored, and stepped toward the corridor that led deeper into the manor. The soles of his feet made no sound against the blood-slick wood despite his size, his massive frame moving with unnatural ease, four arms shifting slightly with the motion, balanced and perfectly controlled. He had no reason to remain here any longer. Uraume would handle the rest. They always did.

The sliding doors at the far end of the hall opened before he reached them.

The movement was sudden enough to cut through the lingering stillness, the paper panels drawn back with the careless force of someone who belonged here too much to think about what might be on the other side.

Yuji stood in the entrance.

He froze the moment the smell reached him.

His hair had been tied into two uneven buns high on his head, the attempt sloppy enough that loose strands stuck out in every direction, an obvious imitation of Choso that looked like it had been done in a mirror with no patience. His clothes were different from what he had worn that morning, sleeves rolled, collar crooked, the faint scent of outside air clinging to him even from across the hall. He looked like he had just gotten home.

His expression stopped the instant his eyes landed on the floor. On the bodies. On the blood.

On Sukuna standing in the center of it as if the carnage were nothing more than misplaced furniture, his towering form filling the hall, four arms hanging at ease at his sides, each hand relaxed, each movement controlled, his presence alone enough to make the air feel too heavy to breathe.

Sukuna’s gaze shifted to him slowly.