Jujutsu Kaisen has always explained Mahito's Cursed Technique, but not enough

Modified Dec 30, 2024 16:16 GMT

Mahito as seen in the anime (image via MAPPA)

Gege Akutami's Jujutsu Kaisen manga officially concluded on September 30, 2024. To this day, fans continue to revisit the series, re-reading their favorite moments and character arcs. However, as many have pointed out, the series is riddled with plotholes, especially in its ending.

This led to multiple debates and discussions on social media, with fans attempting to resolve the plotholes themselves. A Jujutsu Kaisen fan pointed out one such inconsistency regarding the Cursed Spirit Mahito's Idle Transfiguration technique. However, the manga may have already explained this inconsistency.

Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers for the Jujutsu Kaisen manga.

Exploring a possible plothole behind Mahito's Idle Transfiguration in Jujutsu Kaisen

Expand Tweet

In Jujutsu Kaisen, Mahito possesses a deadly cursed technique that allows him to completely distort the shape of a person's soul and transfigure their body as a result—the Idle Transfiguration. This ability to manipulate the essence of existence, the soul itself, makes Mahito the worst enemy for almost every person.

To activate his cursed technique, Mahito needs to physically touch someone. Since the shape of the body is dependent on the shape of the soul, the distortion of a person's soul also results in the distortion of their body. At one point in the series, the Disaster Cursed Spirit Jogo once remarked that the wounds inflicted by Idle Transfiguration are irreversible and cannot be healed.

However, one fan pointed out a glaring contradiction in the working of Idle Transfiguration. If Jogo's claim about Mahito's technique is true, how did Kento Nanami and Nobara Kugisaki recover from the Cursed Spirit's attacks in their first encounters?

During Mahito's first encounter with Nanami in the Vs. Mahito arc of Jujutsu Kaisen, the Cursed Spirit used his technique on the former salaryman by touching the lower part of his torso. This should have left a grave injury on Nanami. However, Nanami's injury was not as severe as it should have been, especially since Idle Transfiguration was supposed to completely alter the shape of his soul.

Another instance of Idle Transfiguration's inconsistency, as the fan pointed out, was its effect on Nobara Kugisaki. In the Shibuya Incident arc, Mahito used his technique on Nobara by directly touching a part of her face. As a result of the attack, the left side of her face was distorted.

While she didn't make it out of the encounter completely unscathed and was on the brink of death, she managed to recover from the injury and returned to fight Sukuna in the Shinjuku Showdown arc. According to the fan, since Mahito had completely distorted a major portion of Nobara's face, she should be perpetually bleeding from her eye socket, especially if Mahito had distorted the shape of her soul to have an open eye socket.

Although these observations suggest some glaring inconsistencies in the functioning of Mahito's abilities at first glance, a few explanations may provide better context and resolve them.

Firstly, Idle Transfiguration isn't exactly a one-shot one-kill technique. In other words, it is possible for sorcerers to protect their souls under certain circumstances. However, normal people can't survive the effects of Idle Transfiguration.

Expand Tweet

In Nanami's case, as soon as he was hit with Mahito's technique, he instinctively protected his soul with cursed energy. This means that Nanami's soul never really got transfigured in the first place. As for Nobara, Mahito likely distorted her soul just to make part of her head explode instead of making it bleed forever. That said, she did end up getting seriously injured by Mahito's attack and could have died if Arata Nitta hadn't arrived on time.

In Nobara's case, there were no inconsistencies in the working of Idle Transfiguration since Mahito's attack permanently damaged her left eye socket and left a hole, which cannot be healed even through the Reverse Cursed Technique. This is due to Mahito altering the shape of her soul.

The confusion regarding the functioning of Mahito's technique might result from the mangaka Gege Akutami's habit of not providing detailed or complete explanations for certain things, often leading people to misinterpret them as inconsistencies.

Final thoughts

To this day, fans of Jujutsu Kaisen are still confused about several aspects of the series. Many argue that this is due to the series' rushed ending, which failed to properly shed light on multiple plot points.

Nonetheless, Jujutsu Kaisen remains the most popular shonen manga of the modern generation, a feat that few can achieve in the animanga industry of today.

Related Links:

Edited by Shreya Das