The lost words

I don’t think anyone would think it makes sense that Yuta - second only to Gojo, the strongest modern sorcerer  - could be the one to eat the King of Curse’s finger. While he IS powerful, it is still so risky to think he could ingest a piece of Sukuna’s soul and keep it inside himself for God knows how long.

Also, if a human had eaten one of his fingers, it seems a bit unlikely Sukuna wouldn’t have noticed somehow, as the cursed object holds a part of his very soul.

On the other hand, Rika hasn’t fully manifested. It seems an odd thing since this battle is even more dangerous and important than all previous battles Yuta had since his 2vs1 with Geto. Which may be just a wild speculation, but that has me thinking that maybe - just maybe - he hasn’t allowed her to fully manifest because she ate the finger. Like with the finger bearers at the beginning of the manga, Sukuna would know it is there, and he could target Rika more fiercely. Perhaps get to even retrieve it.

But this is speculation only - and I hope we will be sure of it in the next chapters.

It’s good to remember tho that it was Rika who ate Uro’s arm, not Yuta. And I doubt Yuta himself could have also eaten Hana’s and Inumaki’s arms…

Yuta was right in thinking that Sukuna would be surprised at being hit by his own technique.

However, something pretty nice happening here is that Sukuna looks pleased at tasting his own technique.

You know, we are well aware by now that Sukuna is a hedonist to the fullest. So I’m actually pleased that, rather than being really pissed off for getting a taste of his own medicine, he really experienced this little moment in a way that couldn’t show better how a being can be more self centered lol

I mean, his smile as he says ‘I see. Quite the meal.’ or "Oh, I get it. You ate it." feels like he is amused at tasting some of the power his own technique holds. I can hear Suwabe-san making it sound like he is having a foodgasm. And Yuta’s face turning worried is a sign that he oughta move to his next attack against the King of Hedonism ASAP.

Yuji and Yuta’s hand-to-hand-fight with Sukuna is beautiful, my god.

Sukuna is a good +4m tall muscle-built four-armed TITAN GIANT. Yuta and mostly Yuji are making him bend, making him bleed, making him blind by spitting blood on his cursed eyes, and FUCK - THIS FIGHT IS GOLD!!

Details I gotta highlight:

This is the second time Yuji survives Cleave at point blank, showing how much his endurance is up in such a crucial moment.

It was so smart of him to spit blood on Sukuna’s face. Reminds a little how his lil brother Kechizu spat his cursed blood on him back in s01 times.

Yuji’s determination to save defeat Sukuna and save Megumi with ‘heal up, heal up, HEAL UP’ makes me wanna chomp on wood T_T (C’mon baby, you can do it!)

Count on Sukuna to keep looking amused as he is being wrecked to the bones lmao. But also, this means he is thinking, analyzing, plotting, and soon preparing to counterattack.

The way Rika grabs him by the leg and throws him at Yuji’s soul shaking kick IS PERFECT.

The beating is so well delivered that, in fact, Sukuna is pushed to a deadly gamble.

I love when Sukuna gambles. He does it so many times throughout the story that I don’t think anyone can actually be surprised to see him doing this again in this chapter.

And I really mean it, cause not even our MCs are surprised. They had a solid plan of what to do once they had pushed Sukuna to the point they wanted: aka, releasing the HWC to try using Space Dismantle while tanking Jacob’s Ladder.

In less than a blink, Sukuna is 3/4 immobilized.

Rika, half manifested, gets his upper arms while Yuji goes for the lower right.

Yuta, though, goes straight to his guts, and bravely shoves his hand inside his belly mouth while Sukuna's only free arm goes straight to his head.

The cost for such a risky attack? A Cleave delivered directly on his bloody head.

But Yuta’s RCT doesn’t fail him. And he also still gets to rip out the Cursed Tongue - leaving Sukuna to have only one way to chant curses now. Confirming their suspicions that the King needs to use hand signs and chants or both to use “Space Dismantle”, which is an opening they can take an important advantage of to both use the domain's sure hit and reach Megumi.

This page made me scream!

The sight of Sukuna’s cheek exploding is bloody horrible.

Yuta tanking another slash attack shook me.

But Yuta coming up at the fucking King of Curses absolutely confident he can face him off FEARLESSLY is even more gobsmacking. I love my son!

ALSO: DID YUTA REALLY USE DISMANTLE ON SUKUNA’S ARM RIGHT HERE????

Also, the fact that Sukuna’s output is low to that point is both a sign that 1) his deadly efficiency is truly getting compromised by the biggest jjk team jump this manga had to this day,  2) Yuta and Yuji really leveled up to an impressive stage!

I don’t think we have ever seen Sukuna getting so overwhelmed and shocked.

Yuta’s next sword attack happens simultaneously with Yuji’s blood manipulation attack, and Sukuna loses his free hand while he realizes Yuji in fact just used his spitted blood to blow half his face off, rendering unable to speak.

A little thought I want to share though is that, while it has been long hinted that Yuji is able to use Blood Manipulation in any form after eating his brothers and training with both Choso and Noritoshi, I still have a little doubt whether the piercing blood attack in chapter 247 really comes from Yuji or not.

From the pov in 247, PB comes from somewhere really high and far from where Sukuna is. And in chapter 244, we see Mei Mei and Momo observing the battle from a tall building not too far away. I could see Choso being taken somewhere safe up to and despite being heavily wounded, still trying to help his lil brother. But also, I can picture Yuji rushing up some of the destroyed buildings to locate Sukuna and Higuruma, and desperately PB Sukuna to buy some time until he gets there. 

I mean, if it had been really Yuji, I half expected Sukuna to have a lil flashback not only of the moment Yuji spat on him, but also from when he was attacked back in 247. That would solidify the fact he shockingly realized Yuji is using BM. So I will wait for a clear confirmation...

This talk is pretty interesting and important.

We discovered through Yuki’s search that: 

Even when souls mix to some degree, they don’t become one single soul.

Choso can’t feel the OG soul of the human whose (his) body belongs to, and that’s why he asks if Yuji and Sukuna aren’t a special case. A fair question that made me think Choso could actually give back his body to the guy if he knew the poor man was trapped inside.

Yuji explains that CE plays an important role in the case of cursed objects and non-sorcerers then. Yet, no matter how deep a living soul may sink, it won’t merge or disappear in such cases.

Choso proposes another special case: since Yuji said, “in general level things are unmergeable”,  what if Megumi and Sukuna are different tho? What if that could happen to them?

Yuji proceeds to say he added the “general” thing cause he had dealt with Mahito. Also, uniting souls transform them into other separate being. So as long as a soul CT like Mahito’s is NOT a play, then the merging of souls can’t happen.

And trusting fully in Yuki’s search, Yuji promises he will shake Megumi’s soul awake.

And after learning all of this, I wished for real that Yuki had not died so prematurely. The fact she was a former Star Plasma Vessel, that she could hear the voices of the souls Tengen had absorbed throughout the millennium, and that she had now Maki, Yuji/Sukuna, Choso and Mahito to deepen her research on souls and find a “scientific way” for how to break free from CE, BUT she never could do it… is a PAIN. We can’t undo what GG did, tho, so let's move on to the next topic.

Angel’s technique is special.

But it has a well defined role in the story: one that is NOT what some ppl think.

In an incarnated body, there is the mix of one’s technique + the personality + cursed object. So, since Angel’s CT can eradicate CTs, they can erase Sukuna. As they all want to save Megumi, tho, they will need to do the same thing Hana tried back in chapter 213: using the attack to FIRST weaken the connection between Sukuna and Megumi so Megumi’s chances of surviving the brain damage are better, and THEN move on to finish off the King of Curses.

And here I want to point out how absurd it is for anyone to expect a MINOR side character to end the history of the final MAIN antagonist of this series. Because, truly, unless you are being really disingenuous or purposefully kidding yourself just to hate and badmouth JJK, one cannot be serious over Hana EVER standing a chance against Sukuna. Even more with one of her arms torn off by the King himself.

And that’s why Yuta - the one second only to Gojo - is the one side-handling this freaking final battle. 

Sukuna is damn right roughen and wrecked.

Yuji has one of his arms, Rika has two arms + a bite on his shoulder, his free arm is handless, his main mouth is half blown, and his belly mouth is tongueless and dripping blood.

There is a seriousness to his features that is different though. I mean he is the king of smiles, but he is deadly serious right here...

He KNOWS what is coming. He has chosen to gamble his endurance power against Yutangel’s Max Jacob’s ladder. So he is definitely mentally preparing to receive one of the hardest blows on his unstable (connected to Megumi) form.

And then Sukuna takes it.

His reaction is highly different from last time though, and it’s kinda obvious why. In chapter 213,  he had just barely taken over Megumi’s body as well as he was at 15 fingers. Here he is in his incarnated true form, 19 fingers + his very mummified head in.

That said, the way he only growls/grunts/gasps tanking a DE’s sure hit from someone with a CE around the same as his own is impressive. Not only that, but also another crystal clear hint that he is the fucking King of JJK for a reason. You can’t break him easily. You can’t beat him conventionally. You can’t kill him until his last drop of CE is gone, until his brain is incapacitated, until his self-serving wish to keep existing - even if meaninglessly - is obliterated together with his cursed soul. As long as he holds the overwhelming power to exist, he will keep existing.

Knowing the enemy is NOT down yet, Rika chomps her mouth on Sukuna’s shoulder again as she holds his arms again while Yuta butchers his lower right arm in half, buying the time Yuji needs to fuel the special punch that he hopes will shake Megumi’s soul awake from the depths of this nearly unkillable monster. And if my eyes are not deceiving me, I think that -  by the shape of Sukuna’s tattoo - Yuji hits him in the middle of his chest. Right over his heart.

Megumi’s breakdown deserves an analysis of its own.

But, yeah, IT HURTS.

As Yuji is shaken by Megumi’s state, though, the inevitable happens.

Sukuna, following his gamble of tanking and surviving JL to throw the WCD, does exactly that. The chants come on the page on a background a little similar to how his DE first appeared in animation. It’s eerie, cursed, and we know shit will happen on the next page…

Using what seems to be the arm Yuta had slashed in half (or is it the hand Rika was holding before), Sukuna strikes ALL his enemies with a seemingly WCD. 

Way too close to him, Yuta takes the bruntest of it - the slash rips/slants his abdomen (letting we peek what is probably his liver), his back and his ring fingered hand (strongest way of connection with Rika) is severed from his wrist. Rika is slashed all over her face, the lower jaw which had bitten onto Sukuna’s shoulder is cut off and falling, her monstrous hands all cut and bloodied when they release Sukuna. Yuta is slashed on his forehead, across his face, and by the blood trajectory, from his collarbone down to abdomen. 

There is NO WAY THO that Yuji is dying like that, though.

So before we find out how Yuji - and prolly Yuta too - will survive this attack, it is important to notice here that Sukuna does not say “Dismantle” when he unleashes this attack on them. And, YES, chants ARE important in JJK. (I know a lot of ppl will complain about this, especially since “Gojo died with this attack!”, but I’m just saying what is drawn in the manga.)

Sukuna is back to his menacingly smiling aura as Yuta’s domain starts crumbling on top of him.

But while he RCTing his injuries and tasting what seems to finally be the end of this cursed battle day, he is struck by the sneakiest signature attack of the modern era.

Maki Zenin, the demon with zero cursed energy, pierces his heart - and soul - with her Split Soul katana.

If I said I haven't screamed at this whole sequence, I would be a liar. This was absolutely INCREDIBLE!

Now I hope GG won't switch the pov back to Hakari x Uraume, but I feel like he might as well do again T_T