Hey everyone, long time no see, hope you all have been well. Here's some thoughts I had the other day while at the gym. Sorry if it's a little all over the place I haven't written in some time.
Personal Trainer! Sukuna is undeniably very hot, hell there's heeps of girls and guys who attend the gym just to catch a glimpse of him.
The catch is that he's very mean and demands the best performance from his clients.
"You can do better than that" the tone is oh-so condescending and degrading but the only thing you can do is glare at him while your fatigued muscles try to lift the extra weight he added after he said that you can handle it.
"you're lifting that way too easily, add more weight" hands find his pockets as he's making his way to you "yeah I'm doing more reps that way" Did he just scoff? "resistance training isn't about reps, if you're trying to build muscle add a bit more weight to make your sets more tiring"
You can never slack with him around, you're taking too long of a break between sets, you'll never hear the end of it. "You've only done two of your six sets don't tell me you're already giving up"
You'd think that with his physique he'd be up everyone's ass telling them to gulp protein powder but he believes in a well balanced diet.
HATES DIRTY BULKING WITH BURNING PASSION
Doesn't understand the dudes who go on frenzies about how everyone with an impressive body is definitely taking steroids.
Makes fun of them too.
Even though he's a dick he's very attentive and good at his job. Your posture is wrong during an exercise? He points it out so you can correct it. You need your fitness program to fit you better? He'll make the best adjustments for you.
"Keep your back straight brat, not the best time to arch it unless you want a lower back injury"
I never said he was nice about his corrections.
Hates cardio but still bites the bullet and gets it over with, always suggests it to beginners cause the less sore they are the next day the most likely they won't waste their membership.
Never comments on looks cause honestly he doesn't give a shit, he just wants to see people be active and blow some steam in a healthier way.
Hates stupid questions and he gets a lot of them. Probably why he's extra snappy some days.
"if my arm is broken can I still do my deadlifts?" "Can I get a six pack if I don't work out but eat lots of protein?" "Can you make me a program that will make me look like you in a week?"
Most of the time he just turns around and walks away, he gets something like that at least once a day he can't be bothered explaining things anymore.
CAN WE TALK ABOUT HIS BACK
GODDAMN THE MUSCLE DEFINITION
Also titties
And ass
He's got it all
The best compliment you can get from him is "I see you've improved" .
"And here I thought your technique would always suck" a prideful feeling took over your chest, your very bitchy trainer recognised your effort.
Even though you like to think his approval doesn't mean shit, you still crave it, stealing glances every now and then to hopefully get a positive comment.
Sukuna knows that, heck sometimes he can't hide the shit eating grin from his face when he catches you in the act.
It's not that he's not gonna give you what you want but he's definitely not gonna be sweet about it.
if u dont acknowledge the fanfics u read, the writer won’t think anyone is actually taking the time to read their stuff, which makes our effort feel wasted and our passions feel worthless
Okay, so let's talk about the Mahoraga fight and what it tells about Sukuna in regards to both his personality and about how he got to his place as the King of Curses.
Spoilers for Chapters 117 - 119!
The first thing that we learn is actually given to us before the fight even starts and it's that once Sukuna invests his interest and time into something, he'll do whatever he needs to to make sure that that time and energy isn't wasted. We'd already been told that Sukuna only cares about his own desires, but up until this point, we didn't know if that extended to stepping in himself if he ever needed to.
No Megumi means no Ten Shadows, and while we don't know if Ten Shadows is really what he's after, I do want to point out that Sukuna was fully ready to kill Megumi up until Megumi gave him a glimmer of just how powerful Ten Shadows could be by beginning to use that same Summoning Ritual in their first fight.
The second thing that these panels tell us is that Sukuna is cautious when he approaches fights against things that he doesn't fully understand. He makes sure that nothing about the Ritual changes before he takes part in it because he doesn't want to risk it ending and killing Megumi before he can end it himself and keep him alive.
We see this same caution in a different form back in chapter 9 when he urged Megumi to go all out against him. He wanted to see what Megumi could do before he fully engaged him, because he isn't about to put himself in a position where he doesn't already have an idea of how to overcome whatever is being thrown at him. So he pushes Megumi to the point of using the same attack that he was going to use against Yuuji all the way back in chapter 1: Mahoraga.
In contrast, we don't get this from him during his fight with Jogo, because he already knows everything that Jogo can do. The Nature Curses have been around for a while and they get reborn, he doesn't have to worry about what tricks they have up their sleeves. He's more than likely seen all of it before.
I have a theory about the fire technique, but that's for another time.
But he doesn't know anything about Mahoraga. Megumi has never actually used it against him, despite threatening him with it twice. (Three times if you count him almost using it against the Finger Bearer before he decides to use Chimera Shadow Garden instead.)
So what do you do when you're up against an opponent and you have no idea of what they're capable of?
You let them attack first.
People will typically use their first attack to end a fight quickly; they don't want to give you the chance to retaliate. Mahoraga does this exact thing with the Sword of Extermination.
If Sukuna wasn't inside of a Vessel, he would have died here. He fully acknowledges that, but it's also not the full picture. He needs everything before he's willing to go all out.
Which is why this fight happens in clearly defined stages. Mahoraga attacks and Sukuna retaliates. Mahoraga adapts and Sukuna learns. He's never wasteful with the effort that he puts in and he's always looking for the answer to a question with each move that he makes. We see that with how he opens his turn in the fight.
In the panel right before this, Sukuna's first actual attacks against Mahoraga are all physical. They're rapid, in a vulnerable spot (Mahoraga's head) and devoid of Cursed Energy. Then he follows up with Dismantle and while it's not a weak attack by any means, it's a simple one in the same way that the punches were.
So he uses two straightforward attacks, one that's purely physical and one that has a Technique behind it.
His question here: Which of these attacks is going to do the most damage against Mahoraga? What's going to stick and be useful to me going forward?
The answer that he gets is neither.
Mahoraga's wheel turns and it heals itself. Sukuna takes note of this and attacks with Dismantle again to see if anything else has changed beyond the physical damage that he inflicted.
And he learns that Mahoraga didn't just heal it's injuries, it adapted to his Technique as well. So physical damage won't stay after the wheel turn and the Technique he just used isn't going to work from now on. But he needs a bit more information.
Question: Does Mahoraga have any other abilities? If not, what attack is it going to use now that the Sword of Extermination didn't work?
Answer: There aren't any other abilities. It's next attack is a physical one with a ton of cursed energy behind it instead.
Mahoraga sends Sukuna through a few buildings here and follows up with another strike that Sukuna has to dodge when it gets into his space faster than he expected. He now knows that Mahoraga is incredibly fast, incredibly strong, and has a lot of Cursed Energy at it's disposal.
Now its Sukuna's turn and he uses Distmantle again (this time from a distance that Mahoraga can't deflect from) and follows it us with another purely physical hit. Same as before, but for a completely different reason.
He's still being cautious and using his turns to gather information on how Mahoraga works. Something is missing from the first time that they traded blows (the wheel turn) and he's trying to force that condition to see if it's the reason behind Mahoraga adapting.
Question: What does the wheel turn do?
Answer: The wheel turn allows Mahoraga to adapt to the information that it's given while healing physical damage.
Now he has everthing he needs. Now he can use his stronger attacks without fear of wasting them, because he knows how to make them effective.
So we get Malevolent Shrine and on top of it dishing out a ton of damage with his technique, he also uses it's massive radius to ensure that Mahoraga can't escape that damage with it's speed before the Domain has done it's job.
And that should be it, right?
Well no, because Mahoraga adapted to Dismantle, but Sukuna doesn't know if that counts toward just that one ability or the entire Technique. So he prepares himself to use another Technique in case he needs to.
As soon as the smoke clears and he sees that he does --that Mahoraga is healing itself from the damage dealt by the Domain before the wheel goes through a rotation-- he immediately hits it with the other Technique before that rotation can start and make it immune to his Domain Expansion as well.
So what does all of this tell us beyond the fact that he's cautious?
Well, three things actually: that he's incredibly intelligent, that he doesn't overestimate his own strength, and that Dismantle & Cleave is his Innate Technique.
We know this because it's the Technique that's imbued into his Innate Domain when he creates his Domain Expansion.
As far as Techniques go, it's not complicated or flashy by any means: it's a slashing attack that targets Cursed Energy in one form and everything else in the other. But despite having a relatively simple Technique in comparison to the others that we've seen --Ten Shadows, Limitless, even Straw Doll-- Sukuna still gained enough power during the height of Jujutsu to be referred to as the King of Curses and that's because he doesn't take unnecessary risks.
He approaches his fights as an opportunity to learn without putting himself in unneeded danger. He lets his opponents attack first. He pushes them to reveal what they can do. He analyzes what he learns and then he tests that knowledge as many times as it'll take for him to understand exactly how all of it works.
But most importantly, once he has all this information tucked away and has mapped out a true plan of how to end a fight in his favor, he keeps himself on guard and prepares a follow up attack before the first is even done. Just in case he's wrong. Just in case there's more for him to learn.
That's why he's strong.
Not because of his Technique, not because of his Cursed Energy, but because he approaches his battles with his mind well before he ever brings Jujutsu into it.
yo theyre really dragging me and my bank account through the mud face down, rocks in our eyes, worms in our mouths begging for mercy 😭😭 if you catch me breathing slap me, im on a budget!!!!
