Would gojo win against sukuna if sukuna didnt have 10 shadows or world slashing cleave

Checked on February 4, 2026
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Executive summary

If Sukuna lacked the Ten Shadows Technique (and therefore the Mahoraga-enabled path to “world-cutting” Dismantle/Cleave), the balance of tools that allowed him to bypass Gojo’s Infinity would be removed, and most available analyses conclude Gojo would very likely win that duel thanks to Infinity, domain mechanics, speed, and reading of cursed energy [1] [2] [3]. Counterarguments from fan threads stress Sukuna’s raw destructive power and alternate Shrine uses, but the reporting and community breakdowns available tie Sukuna’s decisive win specifically to Ten Shadows–enabled tactics and Mahoraga’s adaptations that bypass Infinity [4] [1] [5].

1. What actually let Sukuna beat Gojo in canon — and why that matters

The narrative and technical explanations collected by fans and wikis attribute Sukuna’s ability to bypass Gojo’s otherwise impenetrable Infinity to adaptations learned from Mahoraga and to his Malevolent Shrine upgrade that broadened Dismantle into slashes that “cut the world” — an explicit mechanic described as transforming Dismantle into attacks that circumvent Infinity and finally kill Gojo [1] [4]. That chain of events relies on Sukuna controlling Ten Shadows shikigami like Mahoraga and on the specific mechanics of Shrine and Dismantle as presented in those summaries, so removing Ten Shadows removes the canonical route used to nullify Gojo’s core defensive advantage [1] [4].

2. Removing Ten Shadows: what goes with it and what remains

Without Ten Shadows, Sukuna loses access to the army of shikigami and the Mahoraga interactions that provided both a physical lever and the learning/adaptation vector for world-slashing techniques; sources emphasize how Ten Shadows’ shikigami provided the pressure and adaptations that made Infinity penetrable [4] [3]. Sukuna still retains Shrine, Dismantle/Cleave in principle, and immense cursed energy, but the specific evolution that created “slashes that cut the world” is tied in the available summaries to Mahoraga’s adaptation model and Sukuna’s opportunistic use of Ten Shadows—so the decisive bypass mechanism is absent in this hypothetical [1] [4].

3. Why most analysts and fans favor Gojo in that scenario

Community and analytical threads argue that without the Ten Shadows toolkit, Sukuna lacks a reliable, repeatable method to break Gojo’s domain or Infinity and that Gojo’s speed, domain tactics (Unlimited Void), and read on cursed techniques give him practical advantages in a straight fight [2] [5] [3]. Multiple forum posters note that Gojo’s knowledge of Dismantle/Cleave and experience against slashing-type techniques makes him far less likely to be surprised or instant-killed if the world-cutting variant is out of play, and that within-domain interactions favor Gojo’s overwhelming sensory/technique superiority [2] [5].

4. The counterarguments and remaining uncertainties

Opposing takes—largely from fan forums and opinion pieces—stress Sukuna’s raw offensive ceiling and suggest alternate Shrine uses or in-character trickery could still create openings even without Ten Shadows, and some defenders point out canonical ambiguity about whether Shrine alone could be adapted differently [5] [6]. These sources, however, are speculative and often presuppose rule changes or feats not explicitly laid out in the wiki summaries; the material available does not provide a canonical, well-documented alternate route for Sukuna to reliably bypass Infinity absent Ten Shadows [5] [6].

5. Source reliability, implicit agendas, and the honest limits of this verdict

The conclusion rests largely on wiki summaries and fan/community analysis (Fandom, GameRant, SpaceBattles threads), which synthesize manga events but also insert interpretation and fan debate—forums naturally amplify speculative or favored narratives while recap pages condense complex mechanics into plain language [4] [3] [5]. Because the provided sources do not include primary manga chapter text here, this assessment is constrained to how those secondary sources interpret the mechanics: they consistently link Sukuna’s decisive victory to Ten Shadows and Mahoraga-enabled world-slashing, so removing those tools strongly tilts the matchup toward Gojo, but absolute certainty would require the original chapter texts or an authoritative in-universe ruleset beyond these summaries [4] [1] [2].

Want to dive deeper?
How does Malevolent Shrine function independently of Ten Shadows in the manga sources?
What specific panels/chapters depict Mahoraga’s adaptation and Sukuna learning world-cutting slashes?
How do Gojo’s domain interaction rules change across different fights in canon?