Highlights

Maki Zenin's heavenly restriction, which limits her cursed energy but grants her immense physical capabilities, plays a significant role in shaping her character and abilities in combat.
Maki's partial heavenly restriction holds her back from reaching her full potential, but after her sister's sacrifice, she becomes fully realized and reaches the same level of power as Toji Fushiguro.
Maki's heavenly restriction makes her a formidable fighter, as she possesses a body without cursed energy, heightened senses, and immunity to domain expansions and barriers. She has the potential to become even stronger in the future.

Maki Zenin is one of the most intriguing characters in the world of JJK. Fans have come to love this character, given that she's a part of the side cast and has made a tremendous impression over the years. Maki is also one of the only competent female characters introduced in Jujutsu Kaisen, potentially the only one as of now.

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A big part of her character revolves around the concept of Heavenly Restrictions and fans have seen this cursed restriction being placed on many characters in the story from the beginning. In the case of Maki, there is a special heavenly restriction that has shaped her character the way she is today.

What Is A Heavenly Restriction?

To understand Maki's Heavenly Restriction, one needs to understand what the heavenly restriction truly is. Simply put, heavenly restrictions are cursed restrictions that are placed on an individual the moment they are born. These restrictions cannot be placed on someone after their birth or, at the very least, no such an instance has occurred in the story so far. Heavenly restrictions are a balanced trade-off. In exchange for losing something pertaining to cursed energy, a person gains something in addition. For instance, if someone is blessed with immense cursed energy at birth and they have a heavenly restriction active, then, they will likely lose something, such as having a weaker body, for instance. Conversely, if someone is born with very little cursed energy, they will then have tremendous physical capabilities. Of course, these aren't the only trade-offs in heavenly restrictions and they are likely others that the series hasn't dived into just yet, however, these examples help one understand what heavenly restrictions truly are.

Fans have seen quite a few users of heavenly restrictions in the story and, a very good example would be Kokichi Muta. Fans know Muta was born with quite a lot of cursed energy, however, his body, as was seen in the story, was incredibly fragile. Despite having immense reserves of the cursed energy, he was not strong enough to make use of them properly and that is why he developed Mechamaru, among other things. On the flip side, Toji Fushiguro is another great example of a user of heavenly restrictions. He was born with absolutely no cursed energy and, as a result, he was gifted a body with tremendous might. His physical attributes were far beyond that of anyone in the JJK world and he was granted a body of steel with ability to overwhelm anyone standing in his way. Toji was unique in that nobody could even detect him and that truly is the essence of the sorcerer killer.

Maki's Partial Heavenly Restriction

Maki Zenin was born with a heavenly restriction as well. In her case, she was born with very little cursed energy and because of that, she was very limited in what she could and couldn't do in combat. Maki wanted to be a strong sorcerer, however, due to not having the ability to utilize cursed energy properly, she was always lagging behind. Her twin sister, Mai, was born with cursed energy, however, she was just a regular human with no special talent for anything, unlike Mai. Maki's heavenly restriction was similar to the one that Yuki described to be the case in many instances – a body being born with low cursed energy and supremely gifted physical attributes.

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As fans saw in the story from the beginning, Maki was always great when it came to hand-to-hand combat. She could overwhelm even extraordinary sorcerers and, even against a special grade curse, such as Hanami, Maki was able to put up a fight with Playful Cloud, which is nothing short of extraordinary. However, this was not Maki at the peak of her abilities. Maki did have little cursed energy in her body and this is what held her back greatly. This is why Maki's heavenly restriction was only partial at this point in the story.

Maki's Full Heavenly Restriction

Maki Zenin vs. The Zenin Clan jujutsu kaisen

Even though Maki was born with low cursed energy reserves, her heavenly restriction was always similar to that of Toji. Yet, because she was born with little cursed energy, she could not fully realize her powers. That is, until much later in the story, when Mai made her sacrifice for her sister. Twins in the world of JJK, are often seen as a sign of bad luck and, in the case of this particular duo, Maki was born with low cursed energy and a lot of talent for physical combat, while Mai was born with a decent amount of cursed energy and no talent for combat at all. When Mai sacrificed herself, she took along with her all the cursed energy that was present within Maki.

With that, Maki was finally rid of cursed energy and, as a result, she was fully realized. The same heavenly restriction that was applied to Toji now worked on Maki as well and, as a result, her true powers bloomed. At this point in the story, Maki was on the same level as Toji Fushiguro and that is nothing short of staggering for her character. Mai herself mentioned that she would always be a part of her sister and, Maki does wield her as the split soul katana, which is always by her side. Maki’s heavenly restriction makes her one of the strongest characters in JJK and, at the same time, it also makes a talent so unique that she has the potential to be one of the strongest in the future of the story, just like Yuta, Hakari, Yuji, and Megumi.

Maki's Strength

Maki, when fully realized, is one of the most dangerous fighters in the story. For one, she has a body without any cursed energy and that means she cannot be detected at all. She has a body of steel and physical capabilities that cannot be matched by anyone in the story. She reigns supreme at the very top when it comes to this aspect of power. Maki's body is such that she has trained it to recognize even the slightest of changes in her surroundings. She can read things like changes in air pressure and density and notice even the slightest of movements in the air around her. She can detect all inorganic matter and even notice the smallest rise and drop in temperature around her. Maki has become incredibly perceptive and all that is thanks to her heavenly restriction. If that wasn't all, one of the biggest advantages that Maki has is that domains simply do not work on her. Since she does not have any cursed energy, she cannot be attacked by domain expansions or the sure-hit attacks that they offer. In fact, barriers erected around her simply have no effect on her.

The greatest thing that Maki has going for herself is that she's already on the same level as Toji Zenin. However, she is still very young and the fact is that she can actually get stronger. Maki can surpass Toji and reach unprecedented levels of power that fans have not seen in the story before and that is what makes her character truly special and one worth watching the journey of.

Jujutsu Kaisen

Creator: Gege Akutami
Studio: MAPPA
Number of Episodes: 47
Streaming Service(s): Crunchyroll

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Jujutsu Kaisen is available to read via Viz Media. The series can be read by the fans officially and for free on the Shonen Jump and the Manga Plus app. The release date for the next chapter of JJK, Jujutsu Kaisen chapter 248, is set to be January 21, 2024.