Chapter 226

Endless slashing from Malevolent Shrine caves in the shell that houses Unlimited Void. Gojo can stay alive by leaning on reverse cursed technique, yet the comrades following the feed grasp that even the strongest faces real peril here.

Now that his domain has been broken open from the outside, Gojo eats the certain-hit slash of the Shrine across his throat, and a panicked Yuji shoots up from where he sits in the viewing room. Gojo seals the wound at once with reverse cursed technique, but Higuruma points out that the cutting will not stop for as long as he stays inside the effect's reach. Choso asks why he does not just leave the opened barrier, and Hakari agrees his speed ought to carry him clear, yet Kusakabe corrects them: teleportation depends on Limitless, so Gojo is trapped while that technique stays burnt out. Sukuna dumps a flood of blades onto him, and Gojo runs reverse cursed technique at maximum to survive even as he is torn apart and drenched in his own blood. Inwardly he is relieved that, weighed against this guaranteed-hit barrage, his Limitless still surpasses Sukuna's method. He bolts, but Sukuna cuts off the escape route, and in the resulting brawl Gojo nearly connects with a clean blow, earning grudging admiration from a foe amazed he can still move while wounded and mending.

Yuji wonders what would become of Sukuna's domain if someone wrecked the shrine itself, but Kusakabe answers that objects conjured within a domain seldom carry any real weight, and Mei Mei adds that the Six Eyes would already have shown Gojo if smashing it would help. As Kirara despairs that Gojo has no reply, he raises a simple domain to protect himself, startling his student; Kusakabe clarifies that his natural genius is precisely why nobody could teach him the skill. Gojo defends and heals at the same time, though Choso cautions it only stalls. After another short trade, the simple domain breaks and the slashes return, so Gojo throws it up again and annoys Sukuna, yet this round the watchers notice he has quit healing. Ino suspects a cursed-energy shortage, which Yuta brushes aside, and as the simple domain falls once more and the cuts stack up, the dreaded question forms: is Satoru Gojo on the verge of defeat? Instead, Gojo rushes in at Blue's velocity, clamps his legs around Sukuna, and fires Cursed Technique Reversal: Red at the closest possible range, launching him into the shrine. Yuta works out that Gojo just used reverse cursed technique to bring his burnt-out innate technique back, and with the tide turned, Gojo heals himself and confesses that was a difficult corner to crawl out of.

Spanning nineteen pages, this chapter went on sale June 19, 2023 in issue 28, belongs to the Shinjuku Showdown Arc, and was gathered into Volume 25 with Sukuna and Gojo together on the cover. It confirms that a depleted innate technique can be revived through reverse cursed technique and shows a simple domain warding a sorcerer off from a rival's certain-hit effect.