That could've gone worse, Satoru would be the first to admit; it could've gone a lot worse. Because, as it turned out, the corrosive nature of True Negative Cursed Energy was a lot stronger than he'd first expected, which was a good way of saying he'd underestimated it quite severely, resulting in him damaging his own soul like a total jackass. It wasn't too bad, Satoru mused; the damage wasn't anything that would heal on its own within a full day or so, but, still, this meant he couldn't make use of True Negative Cursed Energy for more than two hours at a time. For greater efficiency, he'd have to cut that time down to just a single hour and, more importantly, he needed to figure out how to convert Neutral Cursed Energy into True Negative Cursed Energy without converting all the Cursed Energy in his body, similar to how he only needed a handful of Neutral Cursed Energy to create Reverse Cursed Energy.

That would have to come later. The cracks in his soul were looking a little too dangerous to poke and prod for now. So, no more experimenting with True Negative Cursed Energy until his soul was fully healed. Until then, maybe he could figure out how Shoko was able to use her own Reverse Cursed Energy to heal others. That had always been a big puzzle to him, simply because he could never figure out how that woman did it. Her skill in generating Reverse Cursed Energy was a lot weaker than his own, but – somehow – her control over it must've been of a divine level as not even he, Gojo Satoru, could use his Reverse Cursed Energy to heal others.

Not even Shoko could properly explain how she did it. And his Six-Eyes apparently wasn't worth jack shit, because even it couldn't figure out how she did it, no matter how much time he spent studying her while she healed the wounded and the sick. It was also entirely possible that her seemingly unique ability was just that, unique. He'd thought so before, of course, but it wasn't like he could just ask Shoko, who didn't know and didn't care enough to find out. Was it a Cursed Technique? No one knew.

Eh, he had all the time in the world to figure it out for himself. Though, the problem was that he was a bit lacking in the test subject department and Satoru was pretty sure that Reverse Cursed Energy would have an ugly reaction to True Negative Cursed Energy, a reaction that he wasn't quite willing to test inside a ship that was floating in the vacuum of space. Yeah, nah.

Still, he was a bit tired now. Not physically or even spiritually; his reserves were almost full now and, by the time they reached the Eldar Craftworld, it'd be full. His body didn't hurt and neither was he injured; and, even if he was, a quick burst of Reverse Cursed Energy usually solved things. No, he was... just... mentally drained... exhausted. It was the sort of exhaustion that weighed heavily at the back of his head and could only be solved by a good night's sleep.

Yeah, he was going to take a fucking dirt nap for the first time in... three... four days? He wasn't even sure how long it'd been since he woke up in this fucked up new reality. Well, certainly, he was still kind of glad that it happened at all, since this sci-fi galaxy of horror and wonder was definitely about a thousand times more exciting than plain old earth with its plain old food and plain old Cursed Spirits. Still, the cushions by the viewing panel were looking quite spicy, especially with Larkin and Tanya distancing themselves from him, something that, ultimately, didn't matter much; though, if he had to guess, it was probably because of his experimentation with True Negative Cursed Energy, which had driven the both of them away with how disturbing it must've been.

Whatever the case, he still had a dozen or so hours before they actually reached the Eldar Craftworld and right now was as good a time as any to fall the fuck as asleep. Stretching his limbs, Satoru hopped forward and promptly crashed face-first into the soft cushions of the long bench, his face almost sinking into the material. Ah, that definitely hit the fucking spot. It was like floating on a damn cloud – so soft. The air was nice and cool, probably not a very good thing, he mused, but – right then and there – it hardly mattered. Satoru drooled and promptly fell blissfully asleep.

And there, he dreamed of four great mountains – one covered in skulls and bones and blood, another was covered in slime and rot and decay, another was comprised entirely of writhing and moaning bodies, and the last shifted and changed constantly. The four mountains loomed over him, but Satoru found a narrow, nearly inaccessible path between them, a path that lay beyond the mountains, a path that would take him far above the four. He had to become an even greater mountain. Or, perhaps, he could simply consume them. And then he heard laughter, booming and mocking, amused, but also challenging and daring; the four mountains wanted him to try. They wanted to see just how far he'd go, how much he'd achieve, how many he'd lose before he crashed and burned, before he gave up and lost.

Heh.

They'll come to regret that. He was Gojo Satoru and there were two things about him that would never change: he was hot and handsome and could take any girl out to the night of her life, and he never gave up on anything once he set his mind to it. And his mind was set. Now matter how large and daunting the four mountains might've been. Satoru's path was clear. He was going become even larger and greater than any of them could ever hope to be.

He had plenty of time and an unlimited supply of motivation. Nothing was going to stop him. Nothing. Not even gods.

Satoru's eyes shot open to tears. He pushed himself up and off the cushioned bench, before reaching up to touch his face. Blood, he found. He was crying tears of blood. Son of a bitch. Was it them again? It had to be them. Tsk, even his dreams weren't inviolable, huh? Well, screw them. Someday, he was going to haunt their dreams and there was nothing they could do about it. Admittedly, that was going to be a long time away.

Whatever damage he'd sustained, Satoru noted, was mostly to the brain, which he figured was due to some form of unmitigated exposure to that realm of pure Cursed Energy, the Immaterium. But it wasn't anything a quick burst of Reverse Cursed Energy couldn't fix. He shook his head and breathed in. Bleeding aside, that was a pretty good sleep. With a casual swagger to his steps, Satoru walked towards the viewing port and... his eyes and mouth widened.

It couldn't have been that far now, merely hours away. But it seemed as though even Six-Eyes had failed to reveal just how... utterly alien the Craftworld actually was. There was... no way to properly describe it, honestly. The closest thing he could think of was that the "Craftworld" looked a lot like a shellfish of some sort, made entirely of ridged plates that overlapped each other. Size-wise, it was nowhere near as large as Earth and was closer to the size of the moon – probably a bit bigger. The surface of it was filled with... all sorts of biomes and what looked like weirdly-shaped cities made of interconnected spires and brides of light. The other plates seemed to host mountains and deserts and forests and oceans, but strange spiraling structures that made no sense and freakishly tall towers.

What truly caught Satoru's attention, however, was the immensely powerful Positive Cursed Energy that saturated the entire planetoid. There was so much of it, in fact, that no Cursed Spirit could possibly reside in such a place; they'd just get exorcised immediately. It also meant, unfortunately, that neither Larkin nor Tanya would be able to hide there; the both of them would stick out like a bunch of sore thumbs, like blotches of black on an otherwise pristine white canvass. Satoru himself could easily convert all his Neutral Cursed Energy into Positive Energy, which meant that infiltrating the giant ship thing was within the realm of possibility.

This might just get difficult.

He turned over his shoulder as soon as he felt the presence of Larkin and Tanya, the duo entering the bridge. Larkin walked towards him, now bearing a similar rifle to the one Satoru had over his back. Nice. "Is that the xeno planet? Seems smaller from up close."

"Well, we have a problem." Satoru said. "That place is saturated in Positive Energy and the two of you are saturated in True Negative Energy. Do you think your little imperceptibility trick can work here?"

At the very least, if it could get past his Six-Eyes, then there was a very high chance that these Eldar aliens might not be able to see them. It was damn-near impossible, of course, but Satoru couldn't leave anything to chance now; he did that once and died for it. He couldn't perceive Sukuna's slashes, for instance, not even with Six-Eyes, but Mahoraga could and that meant his Six-Eyes weren't infallible in their ability to perceive the presence and absence of Cursed Energy. That said, they had to take a risk anyway, because there was no way in hell the Eldar were just going to let them walk around their home ship thing. They had to stay hidden. And the best way to achieve that was to be imperceptible; in Satoru's case, he could simply isolate his Cursed Energy to make seem as though he didn't have any, making himself invisible to anything that could detect Cursed Energy, but not make him invisible to physical perception.

Though, he could use Infinity to block photons, which would kind of make him invisible, but he tried that before and it just made him blind as shit. Sure, Six-Eyes still kind of worked and allowed him to kind of perceive the movement of all Cursed Energy around him, but he also walked right into a wall and his Infinity, apparently, did not function well under such circumstances. So, no going invisible for him, unfortunately.

"I don't know." Larkin answered. "Is there a way to test it?"

Satoru shrugged and pointed at his eyes. "I can see just about anything with these bad boys; so, try it and we'll see. If I cant see you, then that means the Eldar probably can't, but don't take my word for it, since we're literally jumping into the unknown."

Larkin nodded, before turning to Tanya. "It's time to disappear, okay sweetheart? Just like we practiced. Deep breaths now. Keep your eyes on me, okay? Don't wander."

Satoru raised a brow, his eyes narrowing in concentration. Now that he'd gotten a firsthand taste of it, it was now far easier to perceive the flow and presence of the True Negative Cursed Energies within the two, how they subconsciously shaped it according to their desires and feelings, and how it responded to their will. Unfortunately, it seemed like Larkin and Tanya's connection to their True Negative Cursed Energies ran much deeper than Satoru's ever could; they were born with it, after all, molded by it. Their bodies were so freakishly attuned to the stuff that Satoru doubted they'd ever be affected by direct attacks. Hell, he was willing to bet that not even Sukuna's Cleave and Dismantle could touch them. This also made them immune to Domain Expansions. If these two learned to properly wield their powers, they'd be freaking terrors to just about every Sorcerer he could think of.

And then, as though they'd never been there to begin with, Larkin and Tanya just... disappeared. They were there a moment ago and... wait... were they there? Huh... who was he thinking about? Right, a father and his daughter... what? Who? Where-

Oh, hell no!

Satoru flared his Cursed Energies, which he then funneled right into his brain. "Oh, what the fuck?"

Larkin and Tanya. Yep, those were their names and they were now doing their invisibility trick.

What in the goddamn hell just happened with his head?

And then, the both of them reappeared right where they were. Larkin consoled his daughter, who seemed upset and disturbed. Whatever they just did wasn't exactly easy or comfortable for them, it seemed. Larkin then turned to him. "Did it work?"

Satoru raised a brow. "Yep. It worked way better than I thought."

He then shrugged off his confusion and turned to the viewing port. "Well, I guess we have something of a plan now. Because I think the Eldar just sent a bunch of ships towards us."


AN: (Pat)reon's up to Chapter 19!