Highlights
- Kashimo, the strongest participant in the Culling Game, had the highest kill count without using most of his strength and abilities.
- Kashimo lost both of his fights, making some consider him a fraud, but his purpose was to understand the nature of being the strongest.
- Kashimo's fight against Hakari showcased Jujutsu Kaisen at its best, with two powerful sorcerers going head-to-head. Despite his defeat, he gained wisdom about love and recognition.
Kashimo was a character introduced in the Culling Game arc of Jujutsu Kaisen and was stated to be the strongest participant in the entire tournament. Though the glimpses that fans got of him during the arc were very brief, they showed him to have the highest kill count out of anyone else in the entire Culling Game and this was done without him even using most of his strength and abilities.
However, despite the implication of his overwhelming power, many in the Jujutsu Kaisen fan base consider him to be a fraud. Though the main reason for this view is that Kashimo failed to back up all of his claims, it is also because he was hyped to be the strongest sorcerer of the Edo period, but did little to show it.
Where He Failed
The main point of contention against Kashimo is the fact that he lost both of the shown fights that he took part in. While it is very impressive that Kashimo was able to rack up the highest kill count in the Culling Game, the strength of his opponents was never specified. Since the Culling Game had brought over 1000 sorcerers from many different periods, most of them were naturally considered fodder.
Kashimo has historically failed against Special Grade opponents, which is the space that the strongest characters in all of Jujutsu Kaisen occupy. His first fight was with Kinji Hakari, a suspended third-year student at Jujutsu High who holds one of the most complex and incredible Cursed Techniques in the entire series.
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On his way to finding Sukuna, Kashimo eventually comes across Panda, whom he makes very short work of without any real effort. Although Panda is ranked as a Semi-Grade 2 Sorcerer, it is still quite impressive how Kashimo is able to beat him rather easily without using his Cursed Technique. Just as he is about to finish him off, Hakari makes his entrance into the fight, still in his amped-up state after his battle with Charles Bernard. Here, the best fight in all of Jujutsu Kaisen begins!
Kashimo's fight with Hakari is Jujutsu Kaisen at its best, as it shows two extremely powerful sorcerers going head-to-head in a battle that's very fun to read. Hakari's masterful use of his Cursed Technique and Domain Expansion gives him the chance to get an infinite amount of Cursed Energy and automatic Reverse Cursed Technique for a limited amount of time, bringing him to the same level as the strongest in the series.
Although Kashimo refuses to use his Cursed Technique and opts to battle only with his physical prowess and Cursed Energy, the fight is still amazing, with the scale tipping towards either sorcerer at different points. In the end, though, Hakari out-maneuvers Kashimo and uses his quick thinking to beat the ancient sorcerer. However, he is then recruited by Hakari to eventually fight Sukuna.
After Gojo's death, Kashimo didn't even hesitate for a second before jumping into a battle against the King of Curses. Here, he puts up a valiant effort, as he was able to land multiple damaging blows against Sukuna and was even shown to be resistant to the Cursed Technique of Kamutoke, which shoots a large barrage of lightning at the opponent.
Kashimo finally activates his Cursed Technique in this battle; Mythical Beast Amber. This is an incredible offensive technique that covers his body with Cursed Energy and greatly improves the already incredible physical abilities of the user, who can now also use powerful ranged attacks. With this technique, Kashimo does a great amount of damage to Sukuna, forcing him to release his original form.
Once Sukuna does this, however, the rest of the fight is fairly one-sided. Sukuna eventually regains the ability to unleash the Reality Cutting Dismantle that he used to defeat Gojo, and he uses it on Kashimo, ending the ancient sorcerer with the massive attack. In yet another fight against a Special Grade Sorcerer, Kashimo is defeated.
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Where He Succeeded
To call Kashimo a fraud genuinely depends on how the character and his goals are viewed. In the flashback that saw him talking to Kenjaku, it was revealed that Kashimo had always wanted one thing in his life; to know the nature of being the strongest. To understand this, he wanted to ask and fight someone else who had been in his position, which is why he made the deal to be reincarnated to fight Sukuna.
Although his fight against Hakari ended in a loss for him, it should be noted that Kashimo did not use his Cursed Technique, which may have spelled the end for the student. The reason for this is that even though Mythical Beast Amber is extremely powerful, it covers the flesh in Cursed Energy, which means that after the technique has been used, the users body collapses either forever or at least until they heal themselves.
He was always saving his technique to use against Sukuna so he could get an answer to the question that had bothered him for ages. Kashimo was the strongest of his era and because of this, he could never relate to anyone below him in terms of strength. To him, everyone else was so weak that he essentially viewed them as dirt, confining himself to a life of isolation where he simply could never understand love or kindness.
Sukuna was the opposite of this. Despite also being the strongest of his time, Sukuna never viewed himself as being lonely, as he always claimed that the best way to unlock one's true strength and potential is to live unapologetically for yourself. He also claimed that he was no stranger to the love that Kashimo and Gojo claimed to have missed by being the strongest.
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This is because Sukuna said that he was put in a place of reverence and love by far weaker warriors who challenged him. He answered this love by recognizing them and validating their strength, claiming that this is what those who are given the title of the strongest must know as love and if others who aren't in their position don't understand this, it's their problem.
As Kashimo is just about to die, Sukuna imparts this wisdom to him. With this, Kashimo gets an answer to the true nature of being the strongest, and that it is greedy to know the love and recognition of those weaker than them but still tackling life from a place of self-isolation.
So, the answer to whether Kashimo is a fraud is both yes and no. Yes, he is a fraud because he lost both of the battles that he took part in against stronger opponents. But, on the other hand, he is also not a fraud because he never used his full power against Hakari and his purpose for fighting Sukuna was to find out what it means to be the strongest, something to which he eventually got the answer.
Jujutsu Kaisen can be streamed on Amazon Prime and Netflix.
