And then it's back to business.

"How did you punch through a tree?" she wonders, as the last curse present begins to dissipate.

"—hm? Oh. Mysterious superstrength of unspecified origin," he says, shrugging. "Always had it."

“That makes no sense, but. Okay. Do you have another inexplicable innate ability that let you come find me? That we can use to find Fushiguro-san, maybe?”

"I was following them," he says, hiking a thumb in the direction of the dissipating curses. "There were, like, six? I killed some, they started running away, then they disappeared but... I don't know, I just knew where to go. It was like following breadcrumbs. Mysterious invisible breadcrumbs you feel rather than see."

“I… see.” She doesn’t, she really, really doesn’t. “So I guess we’re back to my plan of all meeting up at the big curse, since it’s our only real landmark in here. Unless there are any more mysterious invisible breadcrumbs?”

"I don't think so!" he replies, brightly. "I also have no idea where the big curse is, so, lead the way, Senpai!"

“That way,” she says, pointing. “Oh, and. Good job. You’re handling this very well.”

!!!!!! Senpai noticed him!!!!!!!!!

"Thank you," he preens.

Cute? Cute.

Onwards!

They run into a couple more tangela vine curses, who seem to have heard from the grapevine (hah) that these two are trouble and immediately try to flee them on sight. It doesn't work very well for them, between superstrength Naruto-stand-in who can literally leap from a standstill and end up fifty feet away and the plucky heroine who likes stabbing things perhaps a bit too much.

And then they run into a snake curse. With three heads. And it definitely has more than one tail, although where it branches off from its body or how exactly it moves like that is super unclear given how humongously huge it seems to be and how most of its body seems to be hidden underwater at all times.

For this curse, she'd actually like to play keep away. Be a ranged specialist that stays away from the big scary curse snake, and all of its heads, and all of its tails.

"Not the curse this domain belongs to," reports Hayashi, as she begins throwing her sharps. "If you could dismember it or cut off a head or something that would make this go a lot faster. But focus on safety first."

"Got it. Here cursey cursey here!" he singsongs, sprinting over to its heads to serve as bait. Various tails try to stop and grab him, but he almost-effortlessly weaves between them, sometimes even using them as pivots to launch himself closer to his target.

Until, that is, he's hit once by one of the tails and thrown right at one of the surrounding trees with enough force to make it crack and dent. He growls and immediately dodges out of the way of another tail that was trying to impale him against the tree, and near-misses chopping the tip of said tail off with his cleaver.

Which is not to say the snake is leaving Hayashi alone; it's definitely focusing more on the close-up, immediate threat that is Itadori, but it has enough tails to try to swipe and stab at the other sorcerer.

Huh. Having a close combat specialist to distract the curse makes this a whole lot easier, actually. That's nice.

Anyway, yes! Keep away. Dodging, weaving, running and (curse enhanced) leaping and whatnot. The usual. She saves throwing needles for when she's got an opening for one of the many eyes. Turning a thing this large into a pincushion would just annoy it, not do anything that actually matters. This makes it easier to focus on not being grabbed, swiped, or stabbed.

Itadori manages to land on one of the snake's heads, riding it like a pony, and goes "Yeeehaw!" as he starts hacking at its neck. It makes an inhuman screechy gargly noise and one of the other heads tries to attack him but he dodges well enough that it has to pull back lest it bite its own head off.

So it decides to change tacks, and all of its tails decide to go for Hayashi in hopes of pinning her down and holding her hostage.

She lets out a little snort at her new cowboy companion, who definitely seems to be having the appropriate amount of fun.

Well, all of the tails going for Hayashi at the same time just makes her feel like she's back on her own. Which is to say: about normal, really. No, Hayashi will not be your hostage for today, and for shame for thinking that! In fact, somebody needs a reminder that she is a sorcerer, not a bystander. And she's been given such an excellent opening, with that head pulling back before it bites itself. She throws several needles, leaps, spins mid-air to get the angle just right, and then sends her projectiles swerving to see about causing some blindness. Then she lands neatly, and gets back to playing keep away.

It's blinded, or at least many of its eyes are, and it starts thrashing wildly this way and that, ironically all the more dangerous for being less targetted and less concerned about its own safety. It manages to shake Itadori off—

—and great timing, too, because a crocodile the size of a truck with far too many eyes and legs emerges from the water (where it definitely had not been prior to this) and takes all of the snake's heads into its unreasonably large maw. It makes gargly ear-piercing noises as it chows down on the snake and tries to eat as much of it as it can before it disintegrates.

Itadori himself has managed to grab hold of a tree branch and used his momentum to swing back to Hayashi's side, and now he's just watching gobsmacked as one curse eats the other.

"That is the curse the domain belongs to," she reports, wrinkling her nose. "Aaaaaand it's now getting a power up from eating its fellow. Great."

Needles in the eyes, crocodile with no setup edition! Can she pull it off? She doesn't have high hopes but blinding it early would be really helpful!

It... it has too many eyes. She definitely cannot blind them all. It seems less protective of them for having so many, too, and when it lands on the muck (with an accompanying enormous wave of swamp water and dirt in all directions) it turns towards them and screams at them (it has a second mouth inside its mouth, and eyes inside that one).

"So I still try to dismember it?"

Oh, ew, it's gross. She's so glad she's a sorcerer and gets to kill it for being gross.

"Yes, please. Let's kill it if we can, but we're stalling until our third gets here. Don't let it tire you out."

"—Senpai you can't give me an opening like that and then ask me not to make any innuendos!" 

That startles a laugh out of her.

"I don't remember asking that. Now I'm curious!"

She says this as she relocates somewhere she'll have a lot of room to move. Because this is still a combat situation.

"I lost the timing! But, you know, we can't have all the fun by ourselves and let our third dry in the field, or something, I dunno." Right, combat. Here's another leap at the thing's head, cleaver first, and—

—it's fast. It dodges out of the way far too quickly for something that size, and then immediately turns its whole body 180 degrees to throw its whole weight into swinging at Hayashi and Itadori with its body and tail (tails???? did it grow a second tail after eating the snake??????).

Fortuantely, she was expecting this. Hayashi dodges the very large swipe, leaping onto and then kicking off of a nearby tree to go over the tail(s?) and landing on the other side of the swipe.

"That's terrible!" she says, laughing.

Hmmm. Let's do setup for later, while they're waiting for Fushiguro. She starts sending out needles into the environment, eye side embedded into the scenery, pointy side out. In places Itadori is unlikely to be thrown into or land on accidentally. Accidentally stabbing her partner (heh) would not help anything. This will maybe become relevant at some point! Or not, she'll find out.

Yeah nah, it was expecting her too and as soon as she and Itadori dodge its swipe it immediately swipes in the opposite direction to try to get them where they stand.

It definitely gets Itadori, who for the second time today gets launched against a tree.